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We're watching a number of trends collide here in real time, from once-cheap capital, to Cambridge exuberance, to pandemic effects. Class A is doing better in Boston, but there's still a ton of softness in the market. Someone is going to love this place at the right price, but there's going to...

Looking at this list there are a few that jump out, notably 112 State Street, or the Richard Building. It's an ornamental cast-iron fronted building near the intersection with Congress and a rare well-maintained cast iron building downtown. I can't find the filing on BPDAs website or elsewhere...

So your position is it’s the governments job to tell developers how many parking spots they need for their projects? Again, this bill is to say that there is no parking requirement above 1 spot per unit. If a $50M project is going to bomb in Marshfield because there’s not enough parking that is...

Yes, yes. Affordable (edited that comment). Synergy is leading the 250 Washington conversion and maybe some more. Haven't been inside any of the conversion but the first ones are just coming online. The Summer/Melcher project has been underway for a few months and the 281 Franklin project...

Cool detail in the filing. That sloped glass top floor is being removed and pushed back to create outdoor terraces on the top floor. They're also adding a pool at ground level. Some really good filings recently. Hoping these can get financed and underway shortly.

Actually surprised no one has challenged this; the text of the amendment is more explicit than I had thought. I had read the law as general allocation to education and transit, but here's the final text from the state constitution: Article CXXI. Article XLIV of the Massachusetts Constitution is...

That's the minimum, not the maximum. If a developer wants to add more parking to make a project more desirable they can do that. It's just that they won't be compelled to add parking spots to (especially urban) projects where they don't deem them useful. Again, to be clear, these are NOT...

Indeed! https://www.bostonplans.org/projects/development-projects/12-post-office-square-office-to-residential

I try to think about this program as a backstop against the urban doom loop (which Boston wasn't really facing, in my opinion). Vacant buildings are bad, downward drag on office prices leading to collapsing assessed values is bad on tax revenue, and since we can't build housing at nearly a fast...

This is really exciting. Some of these grand old buildings that just aren't competitive as offices anymore and would be too expensive to convert to housing at market rates are finally getting a second life. Not that this was slated for demolition, but to have it sit mostly empty and slowly decay...

Double cores, three elevators total. The one closer to the water looks like the main resident use elevator, while the one away from the water was the larger structural core but only has a single elevator and stairs. Looks like service/BOH.

Great comedic timing, thanks. But I totally agree this is real progress and having uniform housing laws across the Commonwealth should smooth reviews and neuter emotional NIMBYs. The question is whether this has a chance of ever being passed into law. I can absolutely see Healey signing this...

Especially when the administration has gone 0 for 4 on these stop work orders. In the meantime we've wasted taxpayer money, private capital, delayed new energy coming onto the grid and ended up right where we would have if they did nothing. Just absolute idiocy.

Vineyard Wind is back on, and hopefully they can complete the project by the end of the quarter before the lease on the service vessel runs out (repeal the Jones Act) https://www.wbur.org/news/2026/01/27/vineyard-wind-judge-murphy-stay-injunction-massachusetts-offshore-wind

Elimination of statewide parking minima is so good it's basically a guarantee that it won't make it into final legislation. If it's too much for Boston then the hysterics will absolutely be worse in other parts of the Commonwealth. Still, love to see this sponsored and make it through committee.

Also not an expert, but we're still exporting out of ISONE back to Canada since they're winter-peaking demand, too. I'd expect to see those exports tick down if load continues increasing as prices also rise. It will absolutely be cold the rest of this week, but the BTM solar will come back...

Not great! The ugly dark wedge on the bottom is oil coming online. Edited: represents 35% of total production and 77%(!) of total emissions. We need to recon with the fact that even if this were natural gas it would be a much better solution. Additional renewable capacity would be ideal but...

I agree it's bad policy, but the Cambridge case on takings isn't about a requirement to put money in a fund (which I guess could be done by direct taxation on new developments a different way) but is focused on the fact that the use requirements are a curtailment of their property rights and...

I mean, there are very valid criticisms of IZ (it's my #1 complaint against Wu and the contradictory claims about wanting to build more housing) but the idea that governments can't regulate private developers in what they are allowed to build means the end of zoning altogether. With SCOTUS...

Thanks, I was confused looking at streetview to figure out where the office building at 250 Washington was. Makes sense to consolidate the Devonshire when commercial rents are falling.