355 Bennington Street | East Boston

Equilibria

Equilibria

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2020-12-28_Project Notification Form (PNF)_355 Bennington Street.pdf | Powered by Box

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We've seen the dark silver wall with square windows thing before. It looks okay here but I remember it sucking in practice, and it will face the highway dead on.

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The dark silver side reminds me of the AC Hotel in the Ink Block, where the wall also directly faces a raised highway.

Is that a new architecture school tenet, walls facing raised highways must be dark silver with outlined windows?
 
What's impressive about this development is how it fits anything in the very tight height limit being directly on the final approach for runway 15R. The Greenway connection into Day Square is also nice and could play well for linking day square to wood island and future silver line developments
 
When I lived in the area, that block was always out of place considering the street level activity 2 blocks away in Day Square. As a bonus, the people facing 1A will get free entertainment from the semis that ignore the signs in the U-Turn under the overpass and get wedged.
 
Just what Eastie needs—another plywood palace!
 
The good thing about average looking wood structures like this is that very very few buildings these days are built new as affordable housing. Instead market rate buildings are built and then over the years they get older and older and become more affordable over time. The vast majority of “affordable housing” is just older market rate housing with an out dated kitchen or style of structure or whatever.

Thats why its important to build as much as we can now so that theres a solid stock of these buildings later that people can move into when more new market rate housing gets built. Some of these new very average looking apartments in say everett may command higher rent now but in a decade theyll be cheaper than whats going up then. New build affordable housing has its place, but the majority of people will move into apartments like these when theyre a few decades old.
 
stick n move said:
The good thing about average looking wood structures like this is that very very few buildings these days are built new as affordable housing. Instead market rate buildings are built and then over the years they get older and older and become more affordable over time. The vast majority of “affordable housing” is just older market rate housing with an out dated kitchen or style of structure or whatever.

Thats why its important to build as much as we can now so that theres a solid stock of these buildings later that people can move into when more new market rate housing gets built. Some of these new very average looking apartments in say everett may command higher rent now but in a decade theyll be cheaper than whats going up then. New build affordable housing has its place, but the majority of people will move into apartments like these when theyre a few decades old.
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No, these suck. Period. The developments on the water in East Boston are a complete disgrace.
 
FK4 said:
No, these suck. Period. The developments on the water in East Boston are a complete disgrace.
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355 Bennington is nowhere near the East Boston Waterfront. I agree, 355 Bennington really looks awful.

However, I did a walk around the East Boston Waterfront a few weeks back and went through Piers Park and was amazed at how nice it is and how nice it will be when the other two Piers Park iterations are completed. There is still a lot of work to do and to fill in, but wow, that area is nice, has a Maverick Square headhouse right among some of the apartments, etc. I'd love to live there someday.

I'd be interested to hear what you are so upset about with the East Boston Waterfront developments.
 
I personally think clippership wharf is one of the better developments in the city. Id absolutely love to live there. Waterfront views, blue line stop right there, harborwalk, rail trail, waterfront parks close by, waterfront basketball courts. Its damn near perfect. It looks great too, its human scale and high quality.
 
stick n move said:
I personally think clippership wharf is one of the better developments in the city. Id absolutely love to live there. Waterfront views, blue line stop right there, harborwalk, rail trail, waterfront parks close by, waterfront basketball courts. Its damn near perfect. It looks great too, its human scale and high quality.
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It certainly is. The events hosted here are free and largely open to the public as well. Live music, outdoor movie screenings, food trucks, etc. I believe they post all of this info on their Instagram page.

Related, the last little sliver of the under construction harborwalk (in front of The Mark) is now open. It's a pretty nice, unbroken stroll from The Eddy to Tall Ship.
 
shmessy said:
355 Bennington is nowhere near the East Boston Waterfront. I agree, 355 Bennington really looks awful.

However, I did a walk around the East Boston Waterfront a few weeks back and went through Piers Park and was amazed at how nice it is and how nice it will be when the other two Piers Park iterations are completed. There is still a lot of work to do and to fill in, but wow, that area is nice, has a Maverick Square headhouse right among some of the apartments, etc. I'd love to live there someday.

I'd be interested to hear what you are so upset about with the East Boston Waterfront developments.
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Yes I know but it’s still just another contribution of vapid garbage being built in East Boston. The parks are nice, I’ll give you that. But I would say the green space doesn’t come close to justifying the existence of the buildings next door. The land was literally completely vacant and abandoned, if the city couldn’t get its act together to get some decent parks built over there, then things are even worse than I think they are. So yeah, we got the parks. If you ask me, that was a prerequisite for even considering anything else being built there.

The buildings are unimaginative and ugly, and they occupy absolutely keynote spots on the water, facing downtown. They are big, galumphing low rises with absolutely no thought or care other than “we gotta fill this space”, and that would look appropriate for Rt. 9 in Framingham, not here. They are unjustifiable, and no amount of rationalizing away how much affordable housing may or may not have been built into them provides an excuse for such insipid structures. This isn’t about letting perfect be the enemy of the good. This could have been much better and it’s sad that it wasn’t.
 
FK4 said:
The buildings are unimaginative and ugly, and they occupy absolutely keynote spots on the water, facing downtown. They are big, galumphing low rises with absolutely no thought or care other than “we gotta fill this space”, and that would look appropriate for Rt. 9 in Framingham, not here. They are unjustifiable, and no amount of rationalizing away how much affordable housing may or may not have been built into them provides an excuse for such insipid structures. This isn’t about letting perfect be the enemy of the good. This could have been much better and it’s sad that it wasn’t.
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What would you have done differently?

I wouldn't describe either as groundbreaking from an architectural standpoint, but I do think that Clippership is nice (worthy of the location) and Portside is functional and inoffensive. I have no issue with the heights - they're contextual with the neighborhood. The Eddy is taller and sticks out like a sore thumb. We also don't need to duplicate the Seaport boxes across the harbor. I think you could make the case that another street parallel to Marginal and East Pier Drive could have been drawn between the two in order to create smaller blocks at Portside, but I don't think it's either offensive or anti-urban. Certainly not Rt. 9 in Framingham. Both developments have done wonders for creating connections to the waterfront from the neighborhood, and both have created a number of new public spaces that are heavily utilized by people from all over. While the architecture could be better, it's not bad, and it's hard to view these developments as anything other than a net win for the area. 355 Bennington is a different story - absolute garbage.
 
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As some might recall, I’ve had a lot to say about the shortcomings of the development of the East Boston waterfront; if the search feature is ever repaired, I encourage any curious reader to find those posts, as my feelings on the issue have only been amplified during my time away from aB.

Quick ‘n dirty: Massport landbanked most of those sites and cashed in at the tail end of the Menino junta’s reign of incompetence. The buildout was only delayed by the financial meltdown of 2008-09.

If an urban form can be read as language directed at the established communities in Jeffrey’s Point and Maverick Square, those words would range from “KEEP OUT” to “THIS ISN’T FOR YOU” to “FUCK OFF.”
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Lrfox said:
What would you have done differently?

I wouldn't describe either as groundbreaking from an architectural standpoint, but I do think that Clippership is nice (worthy of the location) and Portside is functional and inoffensive. I have no issue with the heights - they're contextual with the neighborhood. The Eddy is taller and sticks out like a sore thumb. We also don't need to duplicate the Seaport boxes across the harbor. I think you could make the case that another street parallel to Marginal and East Pier Drive could have been drawn between the two in order to create smaller blocks at Portside, but I don't think it's either offensive or anti-urban. Certainly not Rt. 9 in Framingham. Both developments have done wonders for creating connections to the waterfront from the neighborhood, and both have created a number of new public spaces that are heavily utilized by people from all over. While the architecture could be better, it's not bad, and it's hard to view these developments as anything other than a net win for the area. 355 Bennington is a different story - absolute garbage.
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+1. I really find the HEIGHT discussion about the East Boston developments hilarious when they are LITERALLY next to an international airport.
 
Beton Brut said:
As some might recall, I’ve had a lot to say about the shortcomings of the development of the East Boston waterfront; if the search feature is ever repaired, I encourage any curious reader to find those posts, as my feelings on the issue have only been amplified during my time away from aB.

Quick ‘n dirty: Massport landbanked most of those sites and cashed in at the tail end of the Menino junta’s reign of incompetence. The buildout was only delayed my the financial meltdown of 2008-09.

If an urban form can be read as language directed at the established community in Jeffrey’s Point and Maverick Square, those words would range from “KEEP OUT” to “THIS ISN’T FOR YOU” to “FUCK OFF.”View attachment 17547
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……and yet there is a Blue Line T headhouse right between two of those buildings and they end in one of the most beautiful and inclusive waterfront parks on the east coast (Piers Park I) which is about to be added onto (quadrupled in size) by Piers Parks II and III). Let’s judge it all when done. That whole area stretching is about 25% at the moment. Much will be coming in the form of more buildings, restaurants, waterfront activities. I walked down there after Santarpios a few weeks ago for the first time and was blown away by it and the future plans and layout. Then I hopped on the Blue Line right in between two of those “Get Fuck out”??? Buildings. I’m gonna give it some time to breathe and grow first, but the future looks great there. And by the way this isn’t Kenmore Square getting ruined or anything …… it’s the former freaking East Boston waterfront, (next to an airport - miles ahead of the surroundings of every single us airport I’ve ever seen ——/ not even close).
 
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