[ARCHIVED] Harbor Garage Redevelopment | 70 East India Row | Waterfront | Downtown

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Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

John Chesto, reporter of the Globe story, was previously as the Boston Business Journal. He moved over maybe two months ago? He knows his beat.

Related, I had read somewhere that Casey Ross at the Globe had left but I still see his byline on occasion. That would be a loss.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

SeamusMcFly said:
And as usual. The comments are so so fun to read....
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They never disappoint. I love how if you support the development, then people will automatically label you as someone who's on the payroll of the developer, as if the Boston Globe comment section is some influential area which sways public sentiment.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

City Hall opens door for tower on Harbor Garage site
By Jon Chesto GLOBE STAFF JUNE 10, 2015

After eight years of trying, developer Don Chiofaro is about to receive preliminary approval from Boston officials to build one of the city’s tallest towers, a megaproject that would redefine one of the most prominent stretches of the waterfront.

Boston Redevelopment Authority officials said they plan to recommend Wednesday that a skyscraper on the site of the Boston Harbor Garage be allowed to reach up to 600 feet. That would essentially match the taller of the two buildings Chiofaro has proposed for the property and would be far taller than any other neighboring building overlooking the harbor.

But Chiofaro would not get everything he wants: City officials will propose to limit development at the garage site to 900,000 square feet. The two-building complex proposed by Chiofaro last year would total 1.3 million square feet, with a mix of offices, residential units, and other uses.

Chiofaro declined to comment, so it’s unclear whether the smaller building area would limit the developer to one tower instead of two.

City officials said that decision would be up to Chiofaro.

“We don’t want to be too proscriptive,” said Richard McGuinness, deputy director for waterfront planning at the redevelopment authority. “What we’re going to recommend . . . is a variety of scenarios that could be built out. You could do two towers. You could do one single, slender tower.”
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continued ...
http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...garage-site/zbsHeW1yywBxmmAbJeT6EN/story.html
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

The land parcel is about 57,500 sq ft. Assuming half of that becomes open space, that allows a floor plate of 29,000 gsf. 900,000 / 29,000 = 31 floors.

The only PNF ever filed, for the 'Arch' proposal, was for 1.5 million gsf, and a garage for 1,400 spaces, 75 fewer spaces than existing.

At 18,000 gsf per floor, and 12 feet vertical between floors, and assuming no podium base with a larger footprint, you could get 50 floors and 600 feet. (Because of the garage, an 18,000 gsf base is probably ridiculous, so there might be three floors of 29,000 gsf, which would cut the number of tower floors by two or three.)

Whether the numbers work for Chiofaro at 900,000 gsf, its hard to say. He has said he can't afford to build less than 1.3 million gsf or so, because of how much he paid for the garage, and the cost of building a new underground garage.

Another option might be to retain the garage, which has 420,000 gsf, and build a 500,000 gsf building on top of that. If he retained the existing garage, I think that is grandfathered from Chapter 91, and the open space requirement wouldn't apply. But I am also not a Boston lawyer. If he retains the garage, and builds a building with 35,000 gsf area per floor, he gets about 15 floors above the garage.

The article doesn't mention the FAA limit, and don't know whether the Greenway development plan will reference it either.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

“We appreciate the hard work the BRA and Walsh administration have put into this, and we are gratified that they agree the proposed 1.3 million square feet was excessive for this sensitive block on the Harbor and Greenway,” Kozol said in a statement. But, he added, “serious questions remain about whether this scale of development belongs on Boston’s waterfront, understanding that it would be only the first of many like it.”
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You see, it's ironic, because he lives in the Harbor Towers.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

stellarfun said:
Another option might be to retain the garage, which has 420,000 gsf, and build a 500,000 gsf building on top of that. If he retained the existing garage, I think that is grandfathered from Chapter 91, and the open space requirement wouldn't apply. But I am also not a Boston lawyer. If he retains the garage, and builds a building with 35,000 gsf area per floor, he gets about 15 floors above the garage.

The article doesn't mention the FAA limit, and don't know whether the Greenway development plan will reference it either.
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That option would be awful for the city & Greenway---But economically it would work for the developer and investors.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

There is no reason for Chiofaro to Build if he doesn't get what he wants.
The garage is a GOLDMINE. And if he built on top of it would be a bigger GOLDMINE--

If height is not the issue at this point maybe the BRA should reach out to the FAA for this location and recommend 700ft or 725ft to offset the extra square footage.

This would assure this project will be built.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Is the garage structurally capable of being built over?
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

I enjoy reading some of the comments. While the T is hardly a model for efficiency, some people really make it seem like the system is an absolute joke and cannot function at all.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

TheRifleman said:
If height is not the issue at this point maybe the BRA should reach out to the FAA for this location and recommend 700ft or 725ft to offset the extra square footage.

This would assure this project will be built.
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Not true. The added height does not increase the square footage and at the same time would increase the cost.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

However this turns out the positive is that Walsh has a more proactive get 'er done approach than the autocratic, kiss my ring Menino. The arcane, pretzel logic approval process unfortunately remains.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Chiofaro paid $153 million for a 400,000 sq ft garage, and 1.32 acres of land. Estimates of the cost of burying the garage range from $180 million to $200+ million.

So you think you'd be seeing a Four Seasons tower at One Dalton if Carpenter et al's sunk costs before they even started building were $330-350 million?
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

stellarfun said:
Chiofaro paid $153 million for a 400,000 sq ft garage, and 1.32 acres of land. Estimates of the cost of burying the garage range from $180 million to $200+ million.

So you think you'd be seeing a Four Seasons tower at One Dalton if Carpenter et al's sunk costs before they even started building were $330-350 million?
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Stel -- au contraire

The higher sunk costs mandates something 4Seasons-like or Mandarin Oriental-like

He needs a couple hundred million in condo sales to offset his sunk costs

I think that he will in the end:

  • bury the garage
  • bury his ego
  • build a nice public space -- for his ego's rehab
  • build one -- that towers until the FAA squeals -- 655' to the mechanicals
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

dirtywater said:
Not true. The added height does not increase the square footage and at the same time would increase the cost.
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Confused? Extra floors mean more space. Of course the costs will go up but there will be rentable space?

Height could offset the weight for more Square Footage or extra units to sell.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Because they set a maximum square footage. If the building got taller, it would need to get thinner. More cost per sf.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

SeamusMcFly said:
Because they set a maximum square footage. If the building got taller, it would need to get thinner. More cost per sf.
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That's not what I initially said. I said give him more height to add extra space so the building would get built. I Never said give more height to thin out the building at the same amount of Sq footage.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

But we were discussing that the City is capping (a) the floor area at 900,000 square feet and (b) the height at 600 feet. Your post (quote below) suggested that added height alone would ensure that the project gets built.

If height is not the issue at this point maybe the BRA should reach out to the FAA for this location and recommend 700ft or 725ft to offset the extra square footage.

This would assure this project will be built.
Click to expand...
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

The higher he goes, the thinner it gets, and thinness increases the percentage of the gross floor area devoted to the core (elevator shafts, stairwells, mechanicals) relative to the square footage available for lease/sale.

Because of Chapter 91, do not overlook the state's role in this. They've already made noise about no shadows on Long Wharf, and no counting a glassed-in pavilion as 'open space'. (And BTW, no filling in the harbor to create 'steps to the sea', which the Feds would also have something to say about.)

It seems to me that Chiofaro has almost no argument to use against the FAA height cap, because the FAA can point to his being able to construct a shorter building. (Its also possible if the tower is slender enoiugh, the FAA might give it a pass,) The state may use a similar argument with regard to his seeking a waiver for the 50 percent open space requirement.

If he doesn't want a shadow fight, and wants to meet Chapter 91 requirements, and not tussle with the FAA, he builds to about 400 feet, single building. His 'problem' is that up to / at 400 feet, Harbor Towers will have the same / better view, so he can't get a price point much above Harbor Towers.

So, IMO, the economics will drive him to keeping the garage, and building something that's maybe 15 floors above the garage, to a total building height of around 300'. But hey, it/s not my money, nor my project.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

I still can't help but think he should try and do a land swap with the city. Move City Hall to this site eventually and let him have the development rights for City Hall. It's win-win-win. Boston gets a new city hall. We get rid of the disgusting mess that is the current city hall. Chiofaro get's to build whatever he wants and everyone gets to stick it to the Harbor Tower residents who probably don't want anybody near their precious concrete towers...
 
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