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

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TheRifleman said:
Great PICS:

The area has so much potential: Too bad the current developments look like they are post communist era. Depressing followed by oppression of society.
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Come on! Its Boston's version of Baltimore's Inner Harbor!
 
tobyjug said:
Come on! Its Boston's version of Baltimore's Inner Harbor!
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The BRA should be ashamed of themselves leaving this area like this.
HAHAHA Thank god for the 7-11 Elven being on the waterfront 21st century development on Boston's Waterfront on the Greenway.

Lets go see the Sea Lions in the Fiberglass Concrete dad. That must be healthy for the Animal
 
Great PICS--A waterfront for the 21st century in which Bostonians can be proud of.

(Like we never left the Flintstone Era)
 
The Harbor Towers community have been the benefactors of a financial windfall of biblical proportions since day 1. When does Chiofaro's parking obligation to the Harbor Tower community expire?

1. Reduce the number of parking spaces by 300~350 units.
2. Wait for the parking deal with the HGT residents to expire.
3. Go for permitting.
4. Offer limited parking to HGT residents at luxury prices.
5. Get a temporary $40,000 tax reduction per unit from the city for limiting the tower to 900,000 sq ft.
5. Build the tower.
6. City charges residents a $40,000 harbor tax to kick in after 3 years for all waterfront units higher than 150 feet. Make this law effective for all waterfront condominiums.
7. After the last unit/s are sold, Chiofaro pays back the tax on the remaining units (under 150 ft).
 
odurandina said:
The Harbor Towers community have been the benefactors of a financial windfall of biblical proportions since day 1. When does Chiofaro's parking obligation to the Harbor Tower community expire?

1. Reduce the number of parking spaces by 300~350 units.
2. Wait for the parking deal with the HGT residents to expire.
3. Go for permitting.
4. Offer limited parking to HGT residents at luxury prices.
5. Get a temporary $40,000 tax reduction per unit from the city for limiting the tower to 900,000 sq ft.
5. Build the tower.
6. City charges residents a $40,000 harbor tax to kick in after 3 years for all waterfront units higher than 150 feet. Make this law effective for all waterfront condominiums.
7. After the last unit/s are sold, Chiofaro pays back the tax on the remaining units (under 150 ft).
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Can they just implode the harbor towers? Boston would be a much better city if that happened. Would love to see those eyesores gone.
 
The HT residents parking easement ends in 2021 IIRC.

Chiofaro, or whomever owns the garage property in the future, may not be able to reduce the number of parking spaces. The garage originally was built on BRA land, and seems to have been sized by the BRA. Chiofaro's plans all call for a similar number of spaces, even if it is economically unfeasible / prohibitively expensive to do so.

Your financing scheme is discriminatory, and not legally defensible. The city has no basis for levying a 'harbor' tax from which the payer derives no benefit. The city's land assessments (real property tax) already factors in the value of waterfront property. Why not charge a "view" tax for all condos above 250 feet with an unobstructed view? Same principle.
 
Yeah,

i figured a 'keepin' it to 900,000 sq ft' tax would run into legal trauma.

Maybe Chiofaro can charge $40,000 as a 'density reduction' fee? Of course, who wouldn't argue that it's just semantics, as all it would do is lower the base price of the units by the same $$$ figure.
 
odurandina said:
Yeah,

i figured a 'keepin' it to 900,000 sq ft' tax would run into legal trauma.

Maybe Chiofaro can charge $40,000 as a 'density reduction' fee? Of course, who wouldn't argue that it's just semantics, as all it would do is lower the base price of the units by the same $$$ figure.
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Because Chiofaro pays for so little work on his project, the BRA actually hired a consulting firm to prepare a financial analysis of whether the numbers work for a 900,000 sq ft building(s). And they do.

Now, they might not work if you're in hock for $175 million or so for the garage, but that is not the city's problem.
 
stellarfun said:
Because Chiofaro pays for so little work on his project, the BRA actually hired a consulting firm to prepare a financial analysis of whether the numbers work for a 900,000 sq ft building(s). And they do.

Now, they might not work if you're in hock for $175 million or so for the garage, but that is not the city's problem.
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Actually it is...you see the prime input to a financial analysis is Purchase price...
 
617 said:
Actually it is...you see the prime input to a financial analysis is Purchase price...
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More importantly the $15 million or so in income from the garage as-is raises the bar for acceptable risk for investors. They lose that revenue every year there is a hole in the ground. Then they risk construction delays. Capital drying up unexpectedly in the case of recession. The safer play is to wait until you break even on the initial $153 million investment, say 15 or 20 years. That is why the project doesn't get built for another ten years or so.

Better off building a tower in front of the Aquarium itself and leaving the garage.
 
Pardon for thinking out loud. But, how do you do that? Doesn't the garage occupy something like +90% of the parcel? What is it, 60-62,000 sq ft? Where's the profitability of this thing? How could it ever become profitable if you're responsible for providing the physical parking infrastructure for the Aquarium, HT's, and then the new tower? How much does it cost to sink 1400 parking spaces and then build a slender ventilation tower that works with the residence tower.

This has got to be one of the most insane, long-shot propositions in the history of Boston. Whole damn thing looks like a non-profit. Build 1.0M sq ft and maybe you get your costs back. That's if the economy doesn't go into recession. And what is the next down cycle going to look like? How many years is realistic to recoup the massive costs of permitting, demo, sinking the garage, building the new tower and selling the units... Hard enough to do if there's low supply... but, when you've had 8, 10, or 12 other luxury towers that beat you to the finish line....

MT takes 5 years and nets a fantastic windfall. With all the opposition, the state, city, Waterfront Planning blah blah, Harbor Towers, Greenway, Aquarium advocates. It's a process i can scarcely imagine. How many years would it be before construction would commence? The market could sour, and crash. Once they start tearing down the garage, with everything having been started so late, God knows how long it could take to see the return on the investment. Could be 7-8 years.... or 14 Years.
 
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It sucks but this thing is going nowhere. Might as well just forget about it because the garage is going to be around for a long time. The city and Chiofaro cant agree on terms and its going to sit idle until one of them gives, which is going to be a while. It already would have been a long time if this thing was approved because of the logistics of the site, but as it sits now I'd say 10 years minimum until we see anything happening here. Thats life and if you look at the bright side it will give us a great waterfront development to watch go up long after all of these recent towers do. Who knows what the "in" architectural style will be at the time.
 
odurandina said:
Pardon for thinking out loud. But, how do you do that? Doesn't the garage occupy something like +90% of the parcel? What is it, 60-62,000 sq ft? Where's the profitability of this thing. How could it ever become profitable if you're responsible for providing the physical parking infrastructure for the Aquarium, HGT, and then a new tower. How much does it cost to sink 1400 parking spaces and then build a slender ventilation tower that works with the residence tower.

This has got to be one of the most insane, long-shot propositions in the history of Boston. Whole damn thing looks like a non-profit. Build 1.0M sq ft and maybe you get your costs back. That's if the economy doesn't go into recession. And what is the next down cycle going to look like? How many years is realistic to recoup the massive costs of permitting, demo, sinking the garage, building the new tower and selling the units... Hard enough to do if there's low supply... but, when you've had 8, 10, or 12 other luxury towers that beat you to the finish line....

MT takes 5 years and nets a fantastic windfall. With all the opposition, the state, city, Waterfront Planning blah blah, Harbor Towers, Greenway, Aquarium advocates. It's a process i can scarcely imagine. How many years would it be before construction would commence? The market could sour, and crash. Once they start tearing down the garage, with everything having been started so late, God knows how long it could take to see the return on the investment. Could be as 7-8 years.... or 14 Years.
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This is a perfect example of not be connected to the political class in Mass.
If this was Fallon or Liberty Mutual they would have gave them 100Million in taxpayers money to knock the garage down like they did in the Fan Pier or Liberty Mutual project.

The garage is fucking disgrace on the Greenway.
 
odurandina said:
Pardon for thinking out loud. But, how do you do that? Doesn't the garage occupy something like +90% of the parcel? What is it, 60-62,000 sq ft? Where's the profitability of this thing? How could it ever become profitable if you're responsible for providing the physical parking infrastructure for the Aquarium, HT's, and then the new tower? How much does it cost to sink 1400 parking spaces and then build a slender ventilation tower that works with the residence tower.
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*i accidentally called Harbor Towers as HGT when it's just HT's.

The Mayor has some type of relationship with the Aquarium people, that also appears not to be such a good thing for Chiofaro. Yet, despite that he overpaid for the garage, i think DC and Prudential should keep talking to the City about how to get this thing done in a way that works for both parties. The garage, really is a blight on the Greenway and H20front. While providing a critical parking need, it still has no place on the waterfront above ground.

People seem very pleased with Rowe's Wharf. i'm in that group. But. how does a single, 600'/1M sq ft/180' wide tower at Harbor Garage compare as being an impediment on the waterfront to say, Rowe's Wharf? Simple answer; It doesn't. If you're riding, biking or driving toward the tunnel arch from High Street, or along the Greenway, the building is 400' long! You can't see over it, unless you're in a high floor in one of the towers downtown. For everyone else, RW may as well be 40 stories.
 
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TheRifleman said:
This is a perfect example of not be connected to the political class in Mass.
If this was Fallon or Liberty Mutual they would have gave them 100Million in taxpayers money to knock the garage down like they did in the Fan Pier or Liberty Mutual project.

The garage is fucking disgrace on the Greenway.
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It's not so bad, at least we are getting a casino!
 
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