22 Water St | North Point Area | Cambridge

Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

FK4 said:
Is water street eventually going to be connected to the north point street grid?
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Yes.

FK4 said:
What they really should do is run third street over the tracks to connect with innerbelt...
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Somerville wants it, and reportedly Cambridge does not. GLX (with the new path viaduct) will not preclude construction of such a road connection. However, Cambridge is wary of having this serve as a shortcut from Sullivan Square to Leverett Circle.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

kjdonovan said:
Yes.


Somerville wants it, and reportedly Cambridge does not. GLX (with the new path viaduct) will not preclude construction of such a road connection. However, Cambridge is wary of having this serve as a shortcut from Sullivan Square to Leverett Circle.
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Can't say I blame them. UPS would totally use/abuse that as their driveway all day long to no useful benefit of anyone or any road's traffic. Their current access point to 28, 38, 93, 99 via Washington is perfectly adequate; they don't need to be gift-wrapped any lazy shortcuts. And there's not going to be as much other traffic-generating biz left on the 3rd/Innerbelt block when the GLX yard razes the MS Walker and DPS plants.


Community Path ped connection primarily serves the Cambridge side. Any of the office workers there in the landlocked south Innerbelt are going to be spending their money in Cambridge or Boston for lunch when that opens. This is still your "pedestrian access" to East Somerville and Sullivan, and that's not going to change too fundamentally with the Community Path angled away from East Somerville and the Sullivan environs. So of course Somerville is going to prefer a thru road it can justify lobbying for a bus route on. It's the only way those remaining 30 acres landlocked on all 4 sides by tracks have possibility of becoming fungible redevelopment to them. All their Innerbelt redev action is north of the Lowell Line embankment where it's well-connected to (their) civilization.

There really isn't a high- value proposition thing they can do with those remaining 9 non-MBTA buildings on the 3rd Ave. block except the same light trucking it currently serves. This is like the Widett Circle no man's land of the northside. Planners may try to brainstorm because--land!...big rectangular parcels!...my instincts compel me to force-fit mixed-use somethingorother because reasons! But at the end of the day it is what it is: an inaccessible bowl surrounded by a moat of noisy train tracks and a really shitty draw for mixed-use developers' money. For the same reason Menino's overtures to devs to build on the Readville moonscape fetched zero interest from any of the usual big money suspects.

You can't not have some modicum of trucking business in town like a local UPS warehouse any less than you can't forgo train yards and successfully supply your spiffy new billion-dollar rapid transit line. It's kind of necessary economic activity and land use. This is the place those things can do their necessary thing for a functioning society with the fewest people noticing it's there. Nothing wrong with that. North half of the Innerbelt's still got plenty of redev juice to tap.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

F-Line to Dudley said:
Can't say I blame them. UPS would totally use/abuse that as their driveway all day long to no useful benefit of anyone or any road's traffic. Their current access point to 28, 38, 93, 99 via Washington is perfectly adequate; they don't need to be gift-wrapped any lazy shortcuts. And there's not going to be as much other traffic-generating biz left on the 3rd/Innerbelt block when the GLX yard razes the MS Walker and DPS plants.


Community Path ped connection primarily serves the Cambridge side. Any of the office workers there in the landlocked south Innerbelt are going to be spending their money in Cambridge or Boston for lunch when that opens. This is still your "pedestrian access" to East Somerville and Sullivan, and that's not going to change too fundamentally with the Community Path angled away from East Somerville and the Sullivan environs. So of course Somerville is going to prefer a thru road it can justify lobbying for a bus route on. It's the only way those remaining 30 acres landlocked on all 4 sides by tracks have possibility of becoming fungible redevelopment to them. All their Innerbelt redev action is north of the Lowell Line embankment where it's well-connected to (their) civilization.

There really isn't a high- value proposition thing they can do with those remaining 9 non-MBTA buildings on the 3rd Ave. block except the same light trucking it currently serves. This is like the Widett Circle no man's land of the northside. Planners may try to brainstorm because--land!...big rectangular parcels!...my instincts compel me to force-fit mixed-use somethingorother because reasons! But at the end of the day it is what it is: an inaccessible bowl surrounded by a moat of noisy train tracks and a really shitty draw for mixed-use developers' money. For the same reason Menino's overtures to devs to build on the Readville moonscape fetched zero interest from any of the usual big money suspects.

You can't not have some modicum of trucking business in town like a local UPS warehouse any less than you can't forgo train yards and successfully supply your spiffy new billion-dollar rapid transit line. It's kind of necessary economic activity and land use. This is the place those things can do their necessary thing for a functioning society with the fewest people noticing it's there. Nothing wrong with that. North half of the Innerbelt's still got plenty of redev juice to tap.
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F-Line is back!?! Hurrah!
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Welcome back F-Line! I for one will be quite happy if you're back on this message board more often. I've missed your knowledgeable insights, particularly regarding the transit stuff related to the Olympics idea. Hope to see you on those threads as well!
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

I never left. But Internetsing happy-fun time is significantly chopped back by real put-a-roof-over-my-head freelance work nowadays.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Once MS Walker and DPS are gone, you have UPS and a bunch of data centers in that landlocked area. It might be better for Somerville to encourage the rest of the lots to become data centers, since that would reduce the necessity for replacing the twin tubes.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

F-Line to Dudley said:
Can't say I blame them. UPS would totally use/abuse that as their driveway all day long to no useful benefit of anyone or any road's traffic. Their current access point to 28, 38, 93, 99 via Washington is perfectly adequate; they don't need to be gift-wrapped any lazy shortcuts. And there's not going to be as much other traffic-generating biz left on the 3rd/Innerbelt block when the GLX yard razes the MS Walker and DPS plants.


Community Path ped connection primarily serves the Cambridge side. Any of the office workers there in the landlocked south Innerbelt are going to be spending their money in Cambridge or Boston for lunch when that opens. This is still your "pedestrian access" to East Somerville and Sullivan, and that's not going to change too fundamentally with the Community Path angled away from East Somerville and the Sullivan environs. So of course Somerville is going to prefer a thru road it can justify lobbying for a bus route on. It's the only way those remaining 30 acres landlocked on all 4 sides by tracks have possibility of becoming fungible redevelopment to them. All their Innerbelt redev action is north of the Lowell Line embankment where it's well-connected to (their) civilization.

There really isn't a high- value proposition thing they can do with those remaining 9 non-MBTA buildings on the 3rd Ave. block except the same light trucking it currently serves. This is like the Widett Circle no man's land of the northside. Planners may try to brainstorm because--land!...big rectangular parcels!...my instincts compel me to force-fit mixed-use somethingorother because reasons! But at the end of the day it is what it is: an inaccessible bowl surrounded by a moat of noisy train tracks and a really shitty draw for mixed-use developers' money. For the same reason Menino's overtures to devs to build on the Readville moonscape fetched zero interest from any of the usual big money suspects.

You can't not have some modicum of trucking business in town like a local UPS warehouse any less than you can't forgo train yards and successfully supply your spiffy new billion-dollar rapid transit line. It's kind of necessary economic activity and land use. This is the place those things can do their necessary thing for a functioning society with the fewest people noticing it's there. Nothing wrong with that. North half of the Innerbelt's still got plenty of redev juice to tap.
Click to expand...

I totally agree that cities need industrial or light industrial/commercial loading districts... it's sad to see the demise of many of them and Im not suggesting replacing all of the inner belt with quaint TOD, smart streets etc. But connectivity is psychologically important, and there's very few ways to get across the barrier of those tracks.. If a bridge got built (which it probably wont), it could prohibit commercial vehicles or something like that. I do think that one way or another the inner belt will get overbuilt, sooner or later.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Is it just me or does the massing of this building seem awkward to anybody else? I guess we'll see how it looks when the cladding goes up.

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Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Well judging from Beeline's pics.... I like it
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

With all of this new construction going on further down Monsignor O'Brien Highway I wonder how long before the Superior Nut warehouse, car wash and liquor store have been bought up and redeveloped? Even the Star Market got a rehab.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

its definitely making its own skyline along that route
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

22 Water has to be the only building I've seen that actually looks better from the landscraper angle. The direct south angle I posted just looks kinda silly and squat. Angles showing how long the building is make it look massive as it does have a decent amount of height. Really wondering how this is going to work set back from 28. It's kind of too bad, that road is getting an impressive streetwall but it's still kind of a dismal pedestrian experience to walk down - no retail, small sidewalks, no parking lane buffer from high speed traffic. Seems like a lot of wasted potential right now, this road should be a great urban boulevard.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Agree with Tango & Pixel ... the area north past 22 Water is absolutely horrid. And a biker's nightmare, to boot. Ionce saw nearly the entire Shell station get soaked when a bus ran through what could only be described as a small lake.

"Oh the humanity (is our infrastructure)..."
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

ivyhedge said:
Agree with Tango & Pixel ... the area north past 22 Water is absolutely horrid. And a biker's nightmare, to boot. Ionce saw nearly the entire Shell station get soaked when a bus ran through what could only be described as a small lake.

"Oh the humanity (is our infrastructure)..."
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I have been soaked walking past the Shell station by a bus running through that same small lake. More than thrice. That was my walk home from work for the 2 years I lived in East Somerville.

That drag of O'Brien/McGrath is despair.

Despair.


EDIT: ...and I'm pretty sure this storm drain is either just for decoration or hasn't been unclogged by DCR since 1971, because that's ground zero for the brackish swimming pool that forms in the right travel lane every time it drizzles.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

Good news is the overpass is going to be grounded. Eventually...
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

underground said:
Good news is the overpass is going to be grounded. Eventually...
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O'Brien from Lechmere Sq. to the Fitchburg Line overpass only needs a lane-drop, bike/bus stop lane, and less narrow sidewalks to become tolerably multi-user. It's the screaming high-speed traffic inches away on that sidewalk barely wide enough for 2 people to pass each other that makes it DESPAIR. The volumes are so low on that stretch now all that capacity serves no purpose except making it a drag strip. They could fix that today if they wanted to...well ahead of blowing up the McCarthy overpass.


I think it's safe assumption that the blighted properties are going to overturn instantly when Water St. and the Lechmere station relocation anchors Lechmere Sq. Property values at Superior Nut, the car wash, and Sav-Mor are just going to be too high for those tenants to stay. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if somebody scooped up those buildings long ago and is just sitting on them waiting for Lechmere Sq. to advance enough to evict the tenants and raze the buildings. Doubt the other side of the street is going to have used car mini-lots and mini-garages too much longer either.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

That Lechmere T Station is an eyesore. I suppose that people who stay at the Hampton Inn, Holiday Inn or the new Marriott under construction will see a map of the area and think that it is great to be so close to a T stop. I wonder what they think when they see a "shack" with broken windows? I do not think that the station even has a bathroom for T employees. Maybe the T could put up a few posters of the proposed Lechmere T Station so that visitors could get the impression that this is not permanent. As residents we are used to this station but it is an embarrassment when visitors see this as part of our transportation system. It did not have to get this bad.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

underground said:
Good news is the overpass is going to be grounded. Eventually...
Click to expand...

The overpass by Twin City plaza is not being grounded ever. That's the Fitchburg Line overpass and technically not part of the McCarthy Highway. F-Line covered what can be done to improve that overpass for pedestrians/cyclists.
 
Re: 22 Water Str. (North Point Area), Cambridge, MA

BussesAin'tTrains said:
The overpass by Twin City plaza is not being grounded ever. That's the Fitchburg Line overpass and technically not part of the McCarthy Highway. F-Line covered what can be done to improve that overpass for pedestrians/cyclists.
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http://goo.gl/maps/LPbSb

-1 lane, 2x width this sidewalk on both sides of the bridge, and bike-stripe. That's all that needs to be done from Water St. to the Linwood St. stairs on the Somerville side of the bridge. The aesthetic improvements will come when more pedestrians and bicyclists can safely get between Lechmere and Washington, and when skyrocketing property values tear down all those hideous industrial buildings.

This part of the road 'works' with a re-striping and couple weeks worth of sidewalk reconstruction. All the real big-deal controversial reimagining is on the Somerville side of the bridge incline in our great McCarthy Overpass-less future. But McCarthy or no McCarthy you'd at least be able to walk to East Somerville from Lechmere without getting caked in road salt and bike...at all...if this road shed a stripe's worth of excess capacity.
 
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