401 Park Drive (née Landmark Center) | Fenway

Czervik.Construction said:
Not an ideal location for lab space unless it is hospital-associated lab space. You'd be surprised how oddly zip code specific biotechs can be when looking for space, even in a super tight market like Kendall. A local real estate guy I know told me how even though some of these guys could build / occupy on the Boston side of the pike, they all feel they need to be in Cambridge unless they have made the decision to be on 128 or 495.
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This building's proximity to Longwood will be 100% of its marketing appeal. It shares a zip code with BIDMC and DFCI and is right down the street from BWH, BCH, and the whole HMS/HSPH complex (among others). Merck chose to put their research labs here, not in Cambridge. Also, the main tenants of the existing office complex it is being added to include BCH (257k sf!), HMS, Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare Institute, and HSPH. BI also has a research building three doors up Brookline Ave from here, and BCH has a whole 'nother building around the corner on Boylston.

Even putting aside the Longwood center-of-gravity, biotech lab developers and tenants have been showing a willingness to reach beyond Kendall in recent months. See the whole Foundation Medicine move to the Seaport (580k sf, the biggest lease of any type in the city since Vertex's move in 2011), plus Alexandria's GE purchase and Related Beal's Gillette purchase paving the way for a new multi-developer lab neighborhood along Fort Point Channel. Then there's the whole boom in "Cambridge Crossing," which is still mostly in Cambridge but outside of Kendall's traditional center.

Unless we hit a recession (in which location won't really matter) I suspect Samuels will have as much difficulty filling this as he had filling his commercial spaces in Landmark or above Target.
 
The seaport is an option that is being explored with Vertex and Foundation and soon to be others as an area beyond Kendall, but Boston-Longwood has not been a destination. The Merck facility is one example, but have you noticed no one else has moved there?

Merck is expanding into Cambridge, not expanding their footprint in Longwood and no other biotechs or pharmas have set up shop there, either.

The work in most biotech/pharma labs does not immediately mesh with academic/clinical labs in a hospital. Academia labs -> startup/emerging biotech -> scaled biotech/pharma
 
Czervik.Construction said:
Not an ideal location for lab space unless it is hospital-associated lab space. You'd be surprised how oddly zip code specific biotechs can be when looking for space, even in a super tight market like Kendall. A local real estate guy I know told me how even though some of these guys could build / occupy on the Boston side of the pike, they all feel they need to be in Cambridge unless they have made the decision to be on 128 or 495.
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Czerrvik -- this place is a stone's throw from Brigham, Beth Israel, New England Deaconess, Dana Farber, Joselin Diabetes, Children's Hospital to name a few --- not only are those hospitals, but they are major biomedical research operations -- Oh yea also just around the bend --- Harvard Medical School

from a year ago an article by the Boston Urban Land Institute

In the Longwood Medical Area, much-needed workspace has been hard to come by for the researchers and entrepreneurs at its medical centers and universities. Office vacancy rates have averaged about 1 percent annually since 2010. More than 110,000 people work or visit the institutions in 213-acre (86 ha) Longwood each day. Hospitals such as Beth Israel Deaconess, Brigham and Women’s, and Boston Children’s Hospital are among the city’s largest employers.

In the Longwood Medical Area, research space has been 100 percent occupied and rents for $100 per square foot ($1,076 per sq m), “which is indicative of the tightness of that marketplace,” says Brian Kavoogian, president of Charles River Realty.
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Perhaps you want to revise and extend your remarks as they say in Congress when they've been caught not doing their homework
 
There are already several biotechs in Fenway. Notably in the Optum building. The VCs are almost all on Newbury St.
 
I have to think Samuels did his due diligence, so it's hardly going out on a limb to suggest that his strategic decision making might be more data based than our speculation. There is almost certainly a market for this building at that location.
 
With such easy connection to the LMA I'd be amazed if this spot didn't get a tenant quick.
 
Have there been any announcements about an official groundbreaking?
So, the impetus to dump the residential turned out was only $$$, or
also getting not to irritate the neighborhood with hundreds of added units? .
 
Equilibria said:
Umm... what's with the dumb porches? This building was really nice looking before...
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I think they were always there, just less of them and less noticeable. I agree; the previous iteration looked cleaner.
 
stick n move said:
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All that space for a lawn and they couldn't figure out a way to fit a bike path, or even a lane on the street. The gall to show a cyclist in this image when that's a completely unsafe location to ride. It's directly across the street from where a cyclist was killed earlier this year.
 
Definitely bad optics on the render. If the devs aren't working with city (state?) officials to improve multi-modal in this corridor it's a gross missed-opportunity.
 
HenryAlan said:
All that space for a lawn and they couldn't figure out a way to fit a bike path, or even a lane on the street. The gall to show a cyclist in this image when that's a completely unsafe location to ride. It's directly across the street from where a cyclist was killed earlier this year.
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The just repaved and striped this part of Brookline Ave a couple weeks ago, and there's a buffered bike lane there now.
 
JumboBuc said:
The just repaved and striped this part of Brookline Ave a couple weeks ago, and there's a buffered bike lane there now.
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I've been through when they were recently grading, repaving, and even outlining lane markings, but I've yet to see the finished product! From what I last saw, there's still a door-zone lane going towards Kenmore.
 
That's encouraging to read about the buffered lane. I almost never rid on that side of the circle, but I have appreciated the buffered lane on the Park Drive side, heading inbound. Should have shown it in the render!
 
I have a question outside my realm of knowledge.... this is wedged against the Landmark Center and looks completely at odds with the Landmark design. I like the new building, just looks like a bit of an odd duck alongside the existing building.

Am I out of my mind on this one?
 
HenryAlan said:
That's encouraging to read about the buffered lane. I almost never rid on that side of the circle, but I have appreciated the buffered lane on the Park Drive side, heading inbound. Should have shown it in the render!
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Here's a video I shot of the lane 2 weeks ago. Much better than the prior streetscape, but it still empties out into those hellish DCR roads. Ugh.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1180467832615772160
 
@#bancars I did know about that lane, I thought you meant on the DCR road there was now a lane. They did put a buffered lane on Park Drive running from Brookline Ave. to somewhere around Ave. Louis Pasteur. That needs to happen on the Fenway side, so that you don't get dumped in to traffic the way you are in that video.
 
Czervik.Construction said:
I have a question outside my realm of knowledge.... this is wedged against the Landmark Center and looks completely at odds with the Landmark design. I like the new building, just looks like a bit of an odd duck alongside the existing building.

Am I out of my mind on this one?
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i actually opened this thread to ask,
'btw, with the termination of the original very cool (residential/retail) planning
does anyone really care if this ever gets built?.
i realize by putting offices here creates a possibility for a few commuters riding less congested trains out of Back Bay, but, not sure it will be enough to help.
 
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