Copley Square Revamp | Back Bay

cburns said:
This is pretty terrible. Even the street furniture choices; those light poles are terrible a clash directly with notable pieces like the gorgeous ones on the east face of the BPL and the general light pole scheme that surrounds the park.

Perhaps a small, silly detail to many, but it's an example of how poorly thought out and executed this was: no context, no cohesion, just mess at a high cost.
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With the dramatic expansion of the overflow of the Mass & Cass crowd into the square, it was guaranteed that benches would be chosen to frustrate sleeping on them.
 
Charlie_mta said:
A "mini me" of City Hall Plaza. Another sterile slab of concrete detached from the life of the city. I hope some food vendors and sidewalk cafes can be set up around the periphery.
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There are a lot of little things I'd criticize about the new design. Food vendors would help for sure. I can think of some other changes I'd make.

But FWIW, every time I go by, it's been busy and pretty well used. The new space seems especially good for the farmers market and whatever other events are going on there. That picture looks like maybe it had just rained, and maybe the wrong time of day. Admittedly I don't go by too often, but that photo doesn't reflect my experiences there the past several months, since it's been reopening.
 
Seaport critics: "That new "neighborhood" sucks and has no spirit or life. Why can't it look more like Copley Square?"
And meanwhile, Copley Square "revamp" ends up looking less alive than comparable areas of the Seaport.
 
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PercyL said:
With the dramatic expansion of the overflow of the Mass & Cass crowd into the square, it was guaranteed that benches would be chosen to frustrate sleeping on them.
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A fantastic example about how a governance model built around avoiding touching solvable problems makes life worse for all of us. Neither South Station nor Copley Plaza should be expected to be a 24/7 homeless shelter, and expecting them to function as one ruins their actual purposes.
 
Yea thats a good point, instead of making our public spaces less welcoming for everyone in order to make it so less homeless ppl congregate/sleep there we should be making our public spaces welcoming to everyone and addressing the underlying issues causing the homeless problem in the first place.
 
RandomWalk said:
The bridge needs to be rebuilt, or another solution implemented to reopen the shelter on Long Island.
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Pointing that bridges are a fix to homelessness is like saying another slice of cake will fix homelessness.
 
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as02155 said:
Pointing that bridges are a fix to homelessness is like saying another slice of cake will fix homelessness.
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Far beyond the scope of this thread so I'll stop with this comment, but I agree. A safe, supportive, accessible facility is only one component. You also need policies willing to consider involuntary placement for a subset of the homeless, as Suffolk County Sheriff Steve Tompkins suggested in 2021.
 
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Jeremi said:
It's a grey spring day in New England! Everything looks like this.
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I feel like it would've gone a long way to use more brick in the paving. Something about the red brick just looks a lot less bleak, especially since Copley Square is separated from the surrounding buildings by relatively wide roads. Could've used a real big tree in the middle of the plaza to break things up as well.
 
FahrradFahren said:
I feel like it would've gone a long way to use more brick in the paving. Something about the red brick just looks a lot less bleak, especially since Copley Square is separated from the surrounding buildings by relatively wide roads. Could've used a real big tree in the middle of the plaza to break things up as well.
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The. City needs to encourage food vendors, sidewalk cafes, and other communal activities on this plaza.
 
Charlie_mta said:
The. City needs to encourage food vendors, sidewalk cafes, and other communal activities on this plaza.
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I thought that was the entire point of creating more of an event space along the St. James and Dartmouth Street edges (hardscape). Maybe we just need to wait a month or so for more "outdoor season". Most of Boston's outdoor activities are seasonal (although we need to do better about winter -- others do).
 
The FanFest is still at City Hall this year. I've been wondering if they'll move it back.
 
It seems to be simply too flat and monotonous. I was hoping for maybe a little round riser with some semi-circular seating around it for a somewhat haphazard schedule of performers, and then a place for a couple of food trucks and maybe a dynamic ice cream stand. It seems to lack energy, or potential energy. But then that can be fixed. In my part-time home of Portland, Maine they have something called Congress Square Park. A while back a New York based design firm was hired to improve that square with a $7.2 million budget, but nothing really happened. The more artistic minded of residents then brought in some colorful tables and lounge chairs and fixed the little stage and gave it a fun painted backdrop. As it is slightly sunken, the homeless had thought it was a good place to hang and hide back then. But now, today, it's kind of vibin'. First Fridays are popular here. I'm sure with all of the brilliant architects and artists in Boston that they can pool a few together to create some kind of low-cost enhancement. Never under-estimate creative people and their ability to improvise with very little.
 
Looks like the utterly cold grey scale that has been in vogue in cheap condo conversions in the area (and for some reason rendered even more extreme via color filters in most listings). Copley is surrounded by warm tones: brown, terracotta, the Fairnount and the BPL both warmer grey. Why they had to use surgically sterile color tones here is beyond me.
 
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