Assembly Square Infill and Small Developments | Somerville

[stick n move]

I wonder if they have thought of putting a line of some 2,3,4 story small buildings on the edge of grand union blvd to keep the mall parking lot but also keep a coherent street wall throughout the area. Basically the types of buildings you'd find in any downtown area of any town in Massachusetts that line the streets.

Heres downtown Framingham as an example:

 

[tysmith95]

Parcel 7, 8, 9, and 5b have yet to break ground. Also there are large plans for a new complex at the parking lot that surrounds parcel 9. Hopefully there are also plans to redevelop the former Circuit City (and maybe even the Home Depot). http://www.archboston.org/community/showthread.php?t=5365.

Also glancing at the master plan i'm happy that they aren't including any new parking garages for the remaining developments (except for the small one at parcel 5b).

 

[JumboBuc]

as someone who lives very close to assembly, my observation is that it's great that it's added vibrancy to the area and no doubt pumped $$$ into the local economy, BUT it's essentially a disney-world version of urban life. lots of ugly, prefab, nondescript buildings that dont integrate particularly successfully with the area(s) around them and certainly don't represent any high (or even low/mid) levels of architectural or design achievement. it's like someone took a satellite portion of the northshore mall and plopped it in somerville. i'd love to be proven wrong, but i suspect that once whatever "wow, this is new!" sheen wears off -- say 10 or more years from now -- this area will be a ghost-town, particularly if the economy tanks to any degree, whatsoever.

We've had this exact discussion probably 100 times on this forum, but Assembly is new. You can't hold that against it. Just about everything that is new is described as "ugly" (to some) and "prefab". And I take "nondescript" to be a good thing; Assembly should not be an avant-garde architectural masterpiece. It is designed to be a practical, appealing, active, walkable, mixed-use new neighborhood, with shops and apartments and condos and offices and restaurants and entertainment attractions and hotel rooms (under construction). It succeeds at this fantastically. I can think of no other new, built-from-the-ground-up developments that do a better job than Assembly at creating an urban neighborhood. Is it perfect? No, but it does a far better job at being what it's supposed to be than any of its peers.

As far as it being "a satellite portion of the northshore mall and plopped [...] in somerville", this point has been made and debunked on this forum too many times to count... This might have some truth if all of the new buildings were like the previously existing Assembly Square Mall, or if all of the new buildings were only their ground floors. But that is clearly not the case.

In ten years Assembly will not only still be popular, it will still be growing.

 

[davem]

Assembly needs to stop being looked at as a mall, and more like the Back Bay of the 21st century. Because that's exactly.what.it.is. A new downtown for Somerville is literally being built on marshlands. The condos at Alloy are listing at what, 800k? This isn't some fluke, it's literally a new neighborhood and can't be compared to most similar developments.

 

[JeffDowntown]

I dont think it will ever become a ghost town but I agree that it looks like a Disney land model of an urban core. It looks like sets for a movie and its blatantly obvious when your there that it was all planned and recently built. That being said its successful, its a nice place to be, and I don't know anybody that isn't on this forum that has ever said its a failure. We just notice the flaws more because were looking but the majority of people like it just fine.

These "Disney" faux urban core designs are ubiquitous throughout the sun belt.

 

[Arlington]

I dont think it will ever become a ghost town but I agree that it looks like a Disney land model of an urban core. It looks like sets for a movie and its blatantly obvious when your there that it was all planned and recently built. That being said its successful, its a nice place to be, and I don't know anybody that isn't on this forum that has ever said its a failure. We just notice the flaws more because were looking but the majority of people like it just fine.

It simply cannot be that being new and looking all the same is the standard for failure. By that measure, Rockefeller Center was an urban disaster (which is absurd).

[And to pick a transit-accessible built-all-together sunbelt project at random, MarketCommon (near Clarendon Metro station since late 2001) in Arlington VA is still going strong in its 15th year, AFAIK). Rockefeller Center opened in 1939. Fifteen years on would be 1944. Also as far as I know, there was never an age at which Rockefeller Center was considered obsolete or unattractive.]

 

[stick n move]

If you read the part where I said its successful-you quoted it, you would see that Im not saying its the standard for failure...

My point was yes it is those things mentioned, but regardless it still works and is a nice place to 99% of people who don't care as much as people on here do about the small architectural details.

 

[Arlington]

If you read the part where I said its successful-you quoted it, you would see that Im not saying its the standard for failure...

My point was yes it is those things mentioned, but regardless it still works and is a nice place to 99% of people who don't care as much as people on here do about the small architectural details.

I was mostly agreeing with you. Sorry for the confusion. If I'd needed someone to be in direct contrast to, it'd have been fairer to quote chrisbrat:

BUT it's essentially a disney-world version of urban life. lots of ugly, prefab, nondescript buildings that dont integrate particularly successfully with the area(s) around them and certainly don't represent any high (or even low/mid) levels of architectural or design achievement. it's like someone took a satellite portion of the northshore mall and plopped it in somerville. i'd love to be proven wrong, but i suspect that once whatever "wow, this is new!" sheen wears off -- say 10 or more years from now -- this area will be a ghost-town, particularly if the economy tanks to any degree, whatsoever.

chrisbrat is mistaking cause for effect here. The must-drive eat-shop-only malls (eg. Meadow Glen & Assembly Row) failed to renew themselves because their model had failed and been overbuilt, not that their model failed because they were no longer new.

The Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill (1989-2012) was always new, but failed even when brand new and even after several cosmetic redos.

The problem was urban traffic is awful (we've doubled car ownership since 1970 but added basically no lane-miles) and that online shopping killed most small-box stores and every department store department except fashion & cosmetics.

Assembly is new the way that Rockefeller Center was a World's Fair sort of new in 1939. There's nothing inherent in its design (that I can see) that makes it unsustainable.

In fact, Assembly, by building lots of structured parking, has left itself semi-blocks that make sense now, but which it can easily tear out and replace with mixed use in the future as households go ever-more car-lite.

 

[stick n move]

no prob

 

[chrisbrat]

I was mostly agreeing with you. Sorry for the confusion. If I'd needed someone to be in direct contrast to, it'd have been fairer to quote chrisbrat:



chrisbrat is mistaking cause for effect here. The must-drive eat-shop-only malls (eg. Meadow Glen & Assembly Row) failed to renew themselves because their model had failed and been overbuilt, not that their model failed because they were no longer new.

The Atrium Mall in Chestnut Hill (1989-2012) was always new, but failed even when brand new and even after several cosmetic redos.

The problem was urban traffic is awful (we've doubled car ownership since 1970 but added basically no lane-miles) and that online shopping killed most small-box stores and every department store department except fashion & cosmetics.

Assembly is new the way that Rockefeller Center was a World's Fair sort of new in 1939. There's nothing inherent in its design (that I can see) that makes it unsustainable.

In fact, Assembly, by building lots of structured parking, has left itself semi-blocks that make sense now, but which it can easily tear out and replace with mixed use in the future as households go ever-more car-lite.

repeating myself, but i'd absolutely love to be proven wrong. to me -- and others i've talked to (obviously this is anecdotal and in no way a "scientific" metric) -- the whole development just looks like some mars colony, plopped on an arbitrary plot of land. it doesn't "play nice" or even really interact at all with the areas around it. that could very well change and i hope it does.

 

[tysmith95]

At present it is an island and will be until the big box parcels are redeveloped and Sullivan is redesigned. However it is close to becoming a self sustaining island, hell you may soon be able to walk to a casino.

 

[Arlington]

me -- and others i've talked to (obviously this is anecdotal and in no way a "scientific" metric) -- the whole development just looks like some mars colony, plopped on an arbitrary plot of land. it doesn't "play nice" or even really interact at all with the areas around it. that could very well change and i hope it does.

This has the same ring to it as a cineast noting that neither he nor any of his friends would ever nominate Walt Disney for a Best Picture (in his life, he was nominated only once, for Mary Poppins, and lost to the "meh" My Fair Lady). Commercial success seems a better predictor of staying power.

As for plopped, Midtown was a dump in the 1930s, Anaheim and Orlando were orange groves in the 50s and 70s, and (to cite another) Reston Town Center was a place-less nothing in the middle of a centerless suburb in 1995.

 

[Lrfox]

These "Disney" faux urban core designs are ubiquitous throughout the sun belt.

Agreed, There are plenty. I've spend a good amount of time in National Harbor and Virginia Beach Towne Center which are essentially similar versions of Assembly Row.

The difference is that those places are more or less doomed to function as islands in a sea of suburbia. Assembly Row is much closer and better connected to central Boston. It doesn't need to be nearly as autocentric as those other places. And unlike National Harbor, Virginia Beach Towne Center, or even Station Landing across the Mystic, Assembly Row has room to grow in an organically urban way (see the proposals for the parking lots near Partners) and connect with walkable urban residential neighborhoods nearby in a meaningful way. Almost everywhere else that faux/disney urban developments like this has them plopped in the middle of a highway interchange/suburban hell. This is in old industrial land in the middle of a very urban area. Unlike the others, it doesn't have to function forever as a pretend urban island in the middle of a suburban wasteland.

 

[JeffDowntown]

Agreed, There are plenty. I've spend a good amount of time in National Harbor and Virginia Beach Towne Center which are essentially similar versions of Assembly Row.

The difference is that those places are more or less doomed to function as islands in a sea of suburbia. Assembly Row is much closer and better connected to central Boston. It doesn't need to be nearly as autocentric as those other places. And unlike National Harbor, Virginia Beach Towne Center, or even Station Landing across the Mystic, Assembly Row has room to grow in an organically urban way (see the proposals for the parking lots near Partners) and connect with walkable urban residential neighborhoods nearby in a meaningful way. Almost everywhere else that faux/disney urban developments like this has them plopped in the middle of a highway interchange/suburban hell. This is in old industrial land in the middle of a very urban area. Unlike the others, it doesn't have to function forever as a pretend urban island in the middle of a suburban wasteland.

I think part of the challenge is that these constructed "town centers" always feel fake, because they are too controlled. The developers want them to be perceived as perfect (Stepford-esk). So none of the typical urban riff raff are allowed in.

For suburbanites, they feel "safe". For real urban dwellers, they feel plastic.

Not that I want depressing, run down urbanism. But you need a local dive bar every so often to break up the plastic chain store monotony.

 

[chrisbrat]

I think part of the challenge is that these constructed "town centers" always feel fake, because they are too controlled. The developers want them to be perceived as perfect (Stepford-esk). So none of the typical urban riff raff are allowed in.

For suburbanites, they feel "safe". For real urban dwellers, they feel plastic.

Not that I want depressing, run down urbanism. But you need a local dive bar every so often to break up the plastic chain store monotony.

this ^^^

i think your observations sum up my (and others) feelings about this area far better than my own attempts.

 

[fattony]

I think part of the challenge is that these constructed "town centers" always feel fake, because they are too controlled. The developers want them to be perceived as perfect (Stepford-esk). So none of the typical urban riff raff are allowed in.

For suburbanites, they feel "safe". For real urban dwellers, they feel plastic.

Not that I want depressing, run down urbanism. But you need a local dive bar every so often to break up the plastic chain store monotony.

Right, but given enough time, Assembly is definitely going to acquire some "place." The key elements of good urbanism are all there, but obviously they are all shiny when new. You can't start an isolated urban space with grit from day 1. The grit has to be applied by us. You also can't round up 25+ retailers without a unifying plan/theme like Assembly's outlet theme. The outlets aren't going to last forever, they are really just there to prime the pump.

As others have said, Assembly is A) hopefully going to grow into the fabric of East Somerville and Sullivan Square or B) failing that, will still be large enough to stand alone as an urban village. Unless the city of Somerville makes a major change in planning priorities, the future of Assembly square is bright.

Reston is a good comparison because it is getting some age on it and still thriving. IMO Assembly stands to be way better than Reston in the long term.

 

[Arlington]

Not that I want depressing, run down urbanism. But you need a local dive bar every so often to break up the plastic chain store monotony.

The moment at which you switch from an "I" in the first sentence to a "you" in the second is where you lost me. I don't see the basis for an I-to-you extrapolation.

Starting from at least when the fancy people moved from the North End to the newly-plopped cookie cutter homes of Beacon Hill (c. 1800), and again when they decamped for Bullfinch's South End squares and later the new Back Bay, there's always been a big market in cookie-cutter, shiny-new developments which eventually become a normal part of the city.

 

[Justin7]

i think your observations sum up my (and others) feelings about this area far better than my own attempts.

But you said it would be a ghost town. Just because you do not personally like something does not mean it won't be successful.

Personally, I think this is a great development. Measuring it against the heart of Boston seems absurd to me. It's dense-for-suburbia-TOD and probably a decent place to see a movie and grab a bite for anyone in the area. How is that not a win?

 

[tysmith95]

^Somerville and this development isin't part of suburbia though, it's part of the urban core.

And what makes a new neighborhood appealing to you all? Does it have to be full of supertalls or run down in order to be a place that you want to live? I'm sure people complained that the Back Bay had no character in the 1800s so don't use that argument.

Yes it's not perfect and is full of too many chain places. However I actually believe that this is the best development in the Boston area, it's transforming a wasteland into a new downtown for Somerville.

 

[Lrfox]

.

Not that I want depressing, run down urbanism. But you need a local dive bar every so often to break up the plastic chain store monotony.

I think time is the only thing that can make that happen. The place needs to be have time to weather (via actual weather and also economic cycles, booms/busts, and other development trends) a bit before it can get that kind of grit. Even if a local person wanted to open up a dive bar in Assembly Row right now, it would either not be a dive (too shiny and new), or it would have to be Disney/Faux too to get that look/feel. As the area grows and becomes better connected to East Somerville, you'll probably get more integration and local infusion. And not for nothing, River Bar, and American Fresh are not chains. They're certainly not dives, but they're not generic. So given some time, I don't see any reason the place won't develop a bit more character.