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

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Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

TheRifleman said:
And $4,500 a year * 99 year lease is $445,500 per spot. And I said offer 150,000 a spot for a 99 year lease.

Its a good investment like I said not included future inflation and lack of supply in parking in the city.
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Do you know the difference between lease and purchase? First, you had Don selling off 1,400 spaces at $150,000 per, so that he can get his money back, and then some. Now you have Don leasing them at $4,500 a year.

How does that work out for Don?

Let's assume Don's loan to buy/own the garage is $155,000,000. At 5 percent interest, that's an annual interest cost of $7,750,000. Leasing 1,400 spaces at $4,500 a year yields $6,300,000 in annual income. And Don still has to pay the taxes, the upkeep, the maintenance, the utilities, the garage staffing, etc.

Keep digging, you may yet reach China.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

This whole situation comes down to a question of how much desire the city has to replace the garage with something else. Chiofaro has most (all?) of the leverage. If the city doesn't approve his project he can just give them the big middle finger and keep the garage... it's not hurting him financially.

That said, I think the proposal sucks.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

meddlepal said:
This whole situation comes down to a question of how much desire the city has to replace the garage with something else. Chiofaro has most (all?) of the leverage. If the city doesn't approve his project he can just give them the big middle finger and keep the garage... it's not hurting him financially.

That said, I think the proposal sucks.
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Here's my prediction.

The existing garage, 70 feet high, will be demolished. Chiofaro will build a replacement garage for 1400 spaces, sell some to Harbor Towers residents. About 30 feet of the new garage will be buried, 50 feet will be above grade. Street level retail along Atlantic Ave, and Milk St.

Gets 200 feet of building atop the garage. Average gross floor area per floor is 52,000 sq ft. Total average height is about 250 feet, might be stepped.

No shadows reach Walk to the Sea. No requirement for open space, argument being he is grandfathered, merely reconstructing a building on its existing footprint.

Photoengrave India Wharf on a ceramic screen for the garage cladding along Milk St. Garage will be accessed off East India Row. Red brick panels for the East India Row garage level facade.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

stellarfun said:
How does that work out for Don?

Let's assume Don's loan to buy/own the garage is $155,000,000. At 5 percent interest, that's an annual interest cost of $7,750,000. Leasing 1,400 spaces at $4,500 a year yields $6,300,000 in annual income. And Don still has to pay the taxes, the upkeep, the maintenance, the utilities, the garage staffing, etc.

Keep digging, you may yet reach China.
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Stellarfun I would rather invest my money with Bernie Madoff than with you. You have no clue. First off its all based on Return on investment (ROI).

For example.
If Chiofaro/Pru paid 155Million:
How much of their own money have they invested in this project. That is the only number that matters is how much money they are making off their personal investment. How fast can they get it back.

Besides myself you also have no clue on the details of this deal and every deal is usually different-- based on the investors situation.

I bet you went to Grad School at Bunker Hill Community College.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Chapter 91 won't stop this project, or force a squat stump to be built, or require the site to be 50% open space.

That's why the State allows for the filing of Municipal Harbor Plans and that's why this MHP is under way.

In the same regard an MHP was drafted that allowed a tower at Atlantic Wharf to move forward on an existing base. There wasn't all this hand-wringing about open space at Atlantic Wharf, why? Because the proposal sufficiently addressed the "publicness" of its public realm (docks, harborwalk, patio), sufficient "publicness" of interior uses (Waterfront Square lobby, gallery, 2nd floor meeting room) and active remaining ground floor uses (retail, no office or inactive uses). Plus a below-market lease for BSA / BSA Space and add about $2M in funds for improving Childrens Museum Park, Congress St Bridge lighting and programming events and floating art via the Fort Point Operations Board.

The issue of the arcade is whether or not it demonstrates sufficient "publicness" to be better than an open air connection between Greenway and Harbor. The renderings do not adequately convey what this thing is, but arcades like the Winter Garden in NY would not likely pass muster as public open space on MA tidelands.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

TheRifleman said:
Stellarfun I would rather invest my money with Bernie Madoff than with you. You have no clue. First off its all based on Return on investment (ROI).

For example.
If Chiofaro/Pru paid 155Million:
How much of their own money have they invested in this project. That is the only number that matters is how much money they are making off their personal investment. How fast can they get it back.

Besides myself you also have no clue on the details of this deal and every deal is usually different-- based on the investors situation.

I bet you went to Grad School at Bunker Hill Community College.
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Did you not once claim to have gone to Bunker Hill CC? Maybe you remember me on campus.

Chiofaro filed for bankruptcy a decade ago. He had mortgaged IP to the hilt, and Tishman Speyer bought the mortgage. Or don't you remember that?

Here's what Don said at the time,

"The New York crowd is a gang of pirates. They take no prisoners; they give no quarter."
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As Don refinanced his balloon note on his Harbor Garage 'mortgage' last year, and the amount on the note was increased, it seems that his cash flow on the garage is sufficient only to pay interest on the note. Prudential REIT does not loan Don money, interest-free.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

stellarfun said:
Did you not once claim to have gone to Bunker Hill CC? Maybe you remember me on campus.

Chiofaro filed for bankruptcy a decade ago. He had mortgaged IP to the hilt, and Tishman Speyer bought the mortgage. Or don't you remember that?

Here's what Don said at the time,



As Don refinanced his balloon note on his Harbor Garage 'mortgage' last year, and the amount on the note was increased, it seems that his cash flow on the garage is sufficient only to pay interest on the note. Prudential REIT does not loan Don money, interest-free.
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Not sure it's relevant to your conversation but...

IIRC, Mr. Chiofaro stated at the MHP meeting in July that he could sell the garage today for $180M, $30M more than the purchase price.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Chiofaro Company issued a press release recently with the programming images for the park (I work in development media/communications, so I see these developer press releases all the time as they're issued).

They show an NHL rink, concert venue set-ups and other goodies for the waterfront park/open space. You can check out all the configurations here

http://www.harborgarageproject.com/images/

Pretty damn cool. I've been working in Toronto since August where they embrace modern architecture and all kinds of cool, fun buildings... so it's pretty funny to me that this project would even be considered somewhat controversial by the old lumps in Boston.

Maybe the developers should stick a gilded, old-timey post-modern weathervane on one of the towers to appease all these cranky old people.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Please build this now!

I think if this doesn't happen I'm moving...missed opportunity worse than Columbus center.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

I think the shorter tower needs something reaching skyward to make it seem less squat & fat

02.jpg


04.jpg


05.jpg
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

re.jpg


Kind of like this, @bobthebuilder?
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

bobthebuilder said:
Blackbird said:
Boston02124 said:
man I hate cell phone pics I need to start carrying my camera again!!!
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It's kind of fat.

Almost the width of both Harbor Towers put together?
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It certainly is, especially the shorter tower.

This is the one thing that really concerns me about the design, we really need some slenderness in our skyline.
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One thing about this fat version, it's guaranteed to annoy the Harbor Towers folks, because it will completely cut off their view of a good chunk of the city. Perhaps this is a gambit to get them to back something more slender in return for more height.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

pel_north said:
re.jpg


Kind of like this, @bobthebuilder?
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That could work, but I think something like that right in the middle would detract from the openness that the separation is supposed to create. I think if the roof line of the shorter tower just had a steeper pitch, it would look a lot better.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Ugh, I really, really, really want to see this built.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

Mike02125 said:
......
They show an NHL rink, concert venue set-ups and other goodies for the waterfront park/open space. You can check out all the configurations here

http://www.harborgarageproject.com/images/
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The rink is not NHL size, wouldn't even serve PeeWee hockey. The basketball court is NBA size, but they don't include space for the end-lines which would add 12 feet to the overall length, nor the sidelines, which might add another 16-24 feet to the court width.

The only venue diagrams that seemed to make sense from an audience standpoint were the fashion runway, and some of the [outdoor] concert ones.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

This thing looks like it looms over IP1... is that perspective? Aren't they both 600ft?

Personally, of all the towers proposed I could care less about this one. The garage sucks, but I don't think this does a ton for the area either.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

How so? This has more street level interaction than anything except the garden towers.
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Good point.... I need more time to reflect on this project.

In an alternate reality where I was mayor I would have offered to land swap this garage with the current City Hall. Build a new mixed use city hall and commercial building here in the 400 ft range and then raze the old City Hall and let Chiofaro go to town with something really bold.

Maybe it's time for a Crazy Development Pitches thread.
 
Re: The Boston Arch (Aquarium parking garage)

meddlepal said:
Good point.... I need more time to reflect on this project.

In an alternate reality where I was mayor I would have offered to land swap this garage with the current City Hall. Build a new mixed use city hall and commercial building here in the 400 ft range and then raze the old City Hall and let Chiofaro go to town with something really bold.

Maybe it's time for a Crazy Development Pitches thread.
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That would work. But I have a sinking feeling city hall is staying where it is for a long time, such a waste of space in the heart of downtown.
 
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