Amazon HQ2 RFP

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One of those ideas that is floating around lately is putting electronic tolling on rt 93, which everybody saw coming from a mile away once they went up on the pike, but using this to pay for infrastructure projects in the city so its not solely relying on the pike for tolling and people way outside the city end up paying for Boston. Funny tolls on the pike were supposed to end once it was paid for but instead were going to get even more than before. But this is an idea thats been floated around recently to pay for transit and infrastructure projects. I can complain about this idea, but then at the same time I don't really have a better idea on how to pay for infrastructure and rail projects so it is what it is, well see if it happens.
 
stick n move said:
One of those ideas that is floating around lately is putting electronic tolling on rt 93, which everybody saw coming from a mile away once they went up on the pike, but using this to pay for infrastructure projects in the city so its not solely relying on the pike for tolling and people way outside the city end up paying for Boston. Funny tolls on the pike were supposed to end once it was paid for but instead were going to get even more than before. But this is an idea thats been floated around recently to pay for transit and infrastructure projects. I can complain about this idea, but then at the same time I don't really have a better idea on how to pay for infrastructure and rail projects so it is what it is, well see if it happens.
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I would be fine with creating a electronic tolling along 93 as long as we AUDIT both the MBTA and local and state senate and convert all state and local pensions to 401K's and find solutions to contain local and state healthcare for our officials.

We need to start controlling the costs of the state before taxing and trying to create tax revenue to better the system.

Get your financial house in order then start thinking outside the box.
 
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Here, by way of reference, is how Microsoft is touting its new 6.7m sqft campus, including the location of light rail on one corner:
watch


I find this relevant here because Amazon and MSFT will both use their HQ as tools in competition for global AI, hardware, & services talent. The quality of life at HQ is important enough that MSFT is making videos about it (as if Apple and Pixar hadn't already driven the point home with all the PR about their Jobs-ian HQs)



I watched the video above thinking that when the time comes for Amazon to make its video about its HQ2 and "why Amazon", Suffolk Downs can deliver "all this and more" in terms of
- Blue Line Heavy Rail vs Seattle Light Rail (T offers frequent service that connects to stuff)
- Being much closer to the urban center, which Boston underscored with its aerial shots of the site showing the downtown skyline at the top of the frame
- Being easier to integrate into regional bike commuting & recreation
- Way closer to "downtown" and "the airport"
- And proximity to "the beach" Revere Beach is crazy-close, of course (vs DC, Austin, Atlanta, & Dallas which have no beach) and even Philly, the Jersey shore is an hour by car...vs Lynn (15mins), Swampscott (25)
 
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I'll post this here rather than in the Suffolk Downs thread.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...view-waiver/lzDiRbtJEZpG9mijIUXdJI/story.html

The owners of Suffolk Downs are asking for a waiver of the state's requirement for an environmental review for the first two office buildings. only. They are seeking the waiver so that construction of two 260,000 square foot office buildings can be started in early 2018, and be completed by the end of 2019.

The full environmental review would still be prepared to cover the entirety of the property and the rest of the buildout.

If they went through the full review before breaking ground, the 500,000 sq ft would not be ready by Amazon's timeline of the end of 2019.
 
stellarfun said:
I'll post this here rather than in the Suffolk Downs thread.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...view-waiver/lzDiRbtJEZpG9mijIUXdJI/story.html

The owners of Suffolk Downs are asking for a waiver of the state's requirement for an environmental review for the first two office buildings. only. They are seeking the waiver so that construction of two 260,000 square foot office buildings can be started in early 2018, and be completed by the end of 2019.

The full environmental review would still be prepared to cover the entirety of the property and the rest of the buildout.

If they went through the full review before breaking ground, the 500,000 sq ft would not be ready by Amazon's timeline of the end of 2019.
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There will be about 10,000 housing units without Amazon, 7,500 if Amazon picks Boston. Count me among those who hope they go elsewhere.
 
GW said:
There will be about 10,000 housing units without Amazon, 7,500 if Amazon picks Boston. Count me among those who hope they go elsewhere.
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With or without Amazon, I'd like to see Suffolk Downs as a mixed-use district with a significant office component. Even if that means 2500 fewer homes.

New jobs added ouside the primary employment center provides some load balancing and relief to our transit system. When people are moving in all directions, infrastructure is utilized twice as much as when everyone moves into the CBD in the morning and everyone move out in the evening.

The most effective place to build new homes is near existing jobs, because those residents are likely to use minimal transportation infrastructure of any kind. The same reasoning goes for building new jobs near existing homes. The people that do travel to reach these jobs are commuting against the rush hour flow or arriving at work without entering the CBD. If we are building a new neighborhood from scratch, just outside the CBD, our best allocation of resources is to make it mixed-use from the outset (again, with or without Amazon). Assembly Square is a perfect example for Suffolk Downs. Assembly is better off, not worse, because of the Partners office building (and other future commercial buildings).
 
Amazon should be paying cities for the inconvenience they want to cause.
 
I really have a tough time to envisioning Amazon #2 headquarters being located in Revere at Suffolk Downs.

I just don't see it.

But you never know.

Question is if they bypass the environmental review waiver and if Amazon does not locate at Revere does that mean the developer gets a free pass on the environmental waiver on the 10,000 Units also?
 
fattony said:
With or without Amazon, I'd like to see Suffolk Downs as a mixed-use district with a significant office component. Even if that means 2500 fewer homes.

New jobs added ouside the primary employment center provides some load balancing and relief to our transit system. When people are moving in all directions, infrastructure is utilized twice as much as when everyone moves into the CBD in the morning and everyone move out in the evening.

The most effective place to build new homes is near existing jobs, because those residents are likely to use minimal transportation infrastructure of any kind. The same reasoning goes for building new jobs near existing homes. The people that do travel to reach these jobs are commuting against the rush hour flow or arriving at work without entering the CBD. If we are building a new neighborhood from scratch, just outside the CBD, our best allocation of resources is to make it mixed-use from the outset (again, with or without Amazon). Assembly Square is a perfect example for Suffolk Downs. Assembly is better off, not worse, because of the Partners office building (and other future commercial buildings).
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Sure, but we never get to build housing or even office space in its ideal location. We have a housing crisis and not a jobs crisis, and I think the priority should be keeping housing costs as low as possible. And respectfully, I think talk like "primary employment center" and "our best allocation of resources" is pretty dry and abstract next to the ugly reality that tens of thousands of people are being priced out of their homes--and, not incidentally, forced to move further and further away from their "primary employment center." There's a tremendous amount of hardship in this city right now and I think we commenters here on this forum sometimes forget that.
 
jass said:
Amazon should be paying cities for the inconvenience they want to cause.
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Don't all companies who pay property taxes?
And the investment into public transit promised as part of the new HQ
and the new jobs for locals who add monies to local tax roles
ancillary jobs to support new growth
ancillary jobs from competitors and related companies that follow the big boys.

All moves like this should be mutually beneficial. And that doesn't mean they cut a check to allow us to deal with the inconvenience. That would be somewhat illegal one would be compelled to think.
 
GW said:
Sure, but we never get to build housing or even office space in its ideal location. We have a housing crisis and not a jobs crisis, and I think the priority should be keeping housing costs as low as possible.
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Good comment.
We have a housing crisis and not a jobs crisis,
 
GW said:
Sure, but we never get to build housing or even office space in its ideal location. We have a housing crisis and not a jobs crisis, and I think the priority should be keeping housing costs as low as possible. And respectfully, I think talk like "primary employment center" and "our best allocation of resources" is pretty dry and abstract next to the ugly reality that tens of thousands of people are being priced out of their homes--and, not incidentally, forced to move further and further away from their "primary employment center." There's a tremendous amount of hardship in this city right now and I think we commenters here on this forum sometimes forget that.
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I didn't mean to minimize the housing crisis, but I think everything I wrote supports the long-term alleviation of the crisis. You say we don't get to build housing or offices in their ideal locations, but I'm saying the blank slate at Suffolk Downs offers exactly that. We shouldn't squander the opportunity. Knowing what the optimal development pattern is, ignoring it, and pursuing a sub-optimal plan instead is not going to bring you the results you seek.

Mixed-use TOD is the path to a more affordable and equitable city. Saying you wish that jobs growth in Boston were slower because it has caused a housing crisis is like saying you wish your kid would stop growing because his clothes don't fit anymore. The cause of the "problem" is something absolutely essential, without which you'd have much more serious problems.
 
Any city that has high income inequality (which Boston definitely does) has a jobs crisis.

It's the difference between people fighting for a slice of the existing pie (e.g., when all of the slices have already been allocated), versus increasing the size of the pie so that there are more slices to be had. More jobs (assuming they are good jobs) = more class mobility opportunities.

Do I think Boston should give Amazon handouts - no. But should we reject them and the jobs they bring? - hell no.
 
bigpicture7 said:
Any city that has high income inequality (which Boston definitely does) has a jobs crisis.

It's the difference between people fighting for a slice of the existing pie (e.g., when all of the slices have already been allocated), versus increasing the size of the pie so that there are more slices to be had. More jobs (assuming they are good jobs) = more class mobility opportunities.

Do I think Boston should give Amazon handouts - no. But should we reject them and the jobs they bring? - hell no.
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There will be more high paying jobs if Amazon comes to Boston, but if we don't build enough housing to compensate, then people with lower paying jobs will be priced out.

One thing I haven't seen addressed on this subject is the multiplier effect of high tech jobs. According to this source every high tech job added creates an additional 5 support jobs around it. So if Amazon brings in 50,000 jobs over 10 years Boston might see an extra 250,000 support jobs. That is an obscene amount of housing that we will need to create if Amazon comes here.
 
FenwayResident said:
There will be more high paying jobs if Amazon comes to Boston, but if we don't build enough housing to compensate, then people with lower paying jobs will be priced out.

One thing I haven't seen addressed on this subject is the multiplier effect of high tech jobs. According to this source every high tech job added creates an additional 5 support jobs around it. So if Amazon brings in 50,000 jobs over 10 years Boston might see an extra 250,000 support jobs. That is an obscene amount of housing that we will need to create if Amazon comes here.
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I did not say we didn't have a housing crisis. I was simply responding to the sentiment above that we don't have a jobs crisis.

We must build housing in parallel or the whole thing doesn't work.
But, remember all of the low income families that are already here...whose kids are in Boston Public Schools. If Amazon is a true community partner, then they should be building programs to enact a pipeline from those communities into their new jobs. Whether via UMass Boston or MIT or everything in between, there is a local route from Rox/Dot/HydePark/Eastie into a $100k job. Or let me say it differently: if there isn't, then this is a sham deal for Boston.

In other words, filling all 50,000 of these jobs should NOT involve importing 50,000 new people.
 
bigpicture7 said:
I did not say we didn't have a housing crisis. I was simply responding to the sentiment above that we don't have a jobs crisis.

We must build housing in parallel or the whole thing doesn't work.
But, remember all of the low income families that are already here...whose kids are in Boston Public Schools. If Amazon is a true community partner, then they should be building programs to enact a pipeline from those communities into their new jobs. Whether via UMass Boston or MIT or everything in between, there is a local route from Rox/Dot/HydePark/Eastie into a $100k job. Or let me say it differently: if there isn't, then this is a sham deal for Boston.

In other words, filling all 50,000 of these jobs should NOT involve importing 50,000 new people.
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All I was pointing out is that the number of units Boston needs to create would be in the hundreds of thousands, not tens of thousands, if Amazon were to come here.
 
FenwayResident said:
All I was pointing out is that the number of units Boston needs to create would be in the hundreds of thousands, not tens of thousands, if Amazon were to come here.
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Amazon or not, the city should commit to building 100,000, not 50,000 new units over the next dozen years or so. I'm not completely sure what the plan is, if there is one, for locating those original 53,000 units, but from the looks of it South Boston, Fenway, and along the Fairmont line are bearing the brunt of it. That's fine, but the city then needs to take a holistic approach to the remaining large parcels (Suffolk Downs & Wonderland, Widett Circle, Beacon Yards) and mandate a minimum amount of units. In these places, it needs to go big on housing to get that extra 50,000 units. Having housing and Amazon co-exist at Suffolk Downs is fine if that's the way things work out, but regardless the city probably needs at least 10,000 units there even if its sharing the land as a 2nd HQ.

If Amazon doesn't come, hey maybe you've eased the pressure on price increases. If it does, then you'll have the housing to accommodate it without waiting for any new transit investments from the state that will happen around the same time Captain Kirk takes command of the Enterprise for the first time.
 
The city has an annual figure of housing units. My understanding from Sheila Dillon's statement before the election is that they will meet the 52k total for housing units years ahead of schedule. Agree - they should revise that total upwards for the 2030 housing goal.

Development is happening across the entire city now. South Boston/Seaport has certainly the most, but I would add East Boston, the South End/NY Streets and even JP-South Huntington have added several hundreds units (if not more) apiece. A lot of proposals in the past year or so have been in places like Roxbury, Dorcester and West Roxbury.
 
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