Back Bay Garage Tower | Dartmouth and Stuart | Back Bay

Funny, I dug this thread up yesterday in order to get familiar with the plans again. I'm looking forward to reviewing the updates.
 
Wow! Impressive and hope it get's built as shown. Sad that they included renderings of the Copley Place Tower (I had such high hopes for this project) since it seems to be a no go for the immediate future. Other than shadows, wind, and increased traffic, any other objections that the neighbors might have to this project? Thanks for the update, Equilibria.
 
Some other things I noticed:

- BP sure does love indoor walls made of plants. They did the same thing at 888 Boylston.

- Going for the "Fresh Organic" market. Based on lettering color and font, it's clear who that really would be. Not sure they'd do it with their Ink Block location so close, though. Might have better luck with Roche Bros if Downtown Crossing is going well for them.

- Pretty sure Copley Place Tower is in there for the same reason 40 Trinity is: to make it clear how tall these buildings aren't. I believe 40 Trinity would be the tallest building on-site.

- The giant LCD signboard that would show train maps and times is a great idea. Of course, it would probably be showing ads 90% of the time.

- I'd love the neighborhood or BPDA to insist on some camo for the Turnpike end of the garage. Fins? Mesh? Public Art a la WGBH? Don't care, but it's ugly and this project proposes no solutions.
 
Equilibria said:
Going for the "Fresh Organic" market. Based on lettering color and font, it's clear who that really would be. Not sure they'd do it with their Ink Block location so close, though. Might have better luck with Roche Bros if Downtown Crossing is going well for them.
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I think WF can definitely succeed here without cannibalizing their other nearby stores. The population density here plus commuter traffic is huge. Just compare to the WF spacing at Cambridgeport-Central-Inman. Adding one here would be about the same spacing to serve a much larger community.

That said, Roche Bros would be welcome as well. This city needs more grocery stores just about everywhere. Period.
 
Equilibria said:
PDA Filing:

http://www.bostonplans.org/getattachment/5f200ba8-8c41-4c71-9272-73263b79b363

Plans are in Exhibit F.

Official name = "Back Bay/South End Gateway".

Supplemental (with renders, beginning on p.62).

http://www.bostonplans.org/getattachment/7c49b4f8-897d-4e8a-bc09-8ef9200ecb7d

The tallest building (one of the residential ones) is planned for 400'.
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For the most part I think this is a great proposal. When i saw the site plan I knew an articulated bus (the 39) would not really be able to do a turnaround there. Then i realized that part of the proposal is to actually terminate the 39 bus over at Copley. Even with the close distance between the stations I wonder how that idea will be received....
 
That could be an issue. Realistically you'd be losing 1 stop (Back Bay station) on the route, but it's a significant connection. Would it terminate at Copley in front of the Fairmont Copley hotel?

I've taken the #39 from Copley Square many times out to JP. I'd say that is one of the largest stops in the outbound trip in terms of passengers.
 
Interesting that the signs in those renders all show "Back Bay South End Station". This is step further than the current name of "Back Bay Station" with "South End" sometimes tacked on as something of a subtitle.

I wonder if the naming convention in the renders came from the T or BXP?

"Back Bay South End" is a more appropriate name for that station's location, but god is that a mouthful.
 
JumboBuc said:
Interesting that all the signs in those renders show "Back Bay South End Station". This is step further than the current name of "Back Bay Station" with "South End" sometimes tacked on as a subtitle.

I wonder if the naming convention in the renders came from the T or BXP?

"Back Bay South End" is a more appropriate name for its location, but god is that a mouthful.
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It likely came from the developer - the T maps in the renders aren't the official ones.
 
Reznor said:
That could be an issue. Realistically you'd be losing 1 stop (Back Bay station) on the route, but it's a significant connection. Would it terminate at Copley in front of the Fairmont Copley hotel?

I've taken the #39 from Copley Square many times out to JP. I'd say that is one of the largest stops in the outbound trip in terms of passengers.
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From the looks of the graphic on page 126, the 39 route would terminate at the Copley Green Line entrance and then loop around Copley Square. Essentially its the same route minus the Back Bay stop. Why they wouldn't show it stopping in front of the Copley Fairmont is beyond me. Maybe they are trying to graphically get some brownie points by saying this route terminate at a Subway connection.

I think on a transit level this is a HUGE mistake! They are proposing in the graphic a "Bus Way" at Copley, but lets be honest, that'll be designated as "Designed by Other" in some future phase, and essentially it will be more justification of reducing transit connectivity.
 
^That would be OK, because SoDuSoPa and CtPaTown are already taken.
 
CBCArch61 said:
From the looks of the graphic on page 126, the 39 route would terminate at the Copley Green Line entrance and then loop around Copley Square. Essentially its the same route minus the Back Bay stop. Why they wouldn't show it stopping in front of the Copley Fairmont is beyond me. Maybe they are trying to graphically get some brownie points by saying this route terminate at a Subway connection.

I think on a transit level this is a HUGE mistake! They are proposing in the graphic a "Bus Way" at Copley, but lets be honest, that'll be designated as "Designed by Other" in some future phase, and essentially it will be more justification of reducing transit connectivity.
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I have to assume that the poor busway design will get shot down. Not accommodating articulated buses in the new station busway is horrible future proofing (it actually sets the bus operation there back). Articulated bus use in Boston is likely to increase in the future. Hopefully the T has some input on this.
 
I don't know, man. I'm not a big fan of these square box tower (or stack of box tower). These are some pretty uninspiring architecture. The stacked box literally looks like they stacked 5 ICA buildings on top of each other.
 
^^in the 4 or 5 months before the unveiling 2 years ago, i posted (in the Globe) that the rumors of an iconic, tall tower at BBS were false. That they'd been given squat volume over a 'pedestrian' station to ensure the Copley Square treasures not be put under shadow. The new pnfs go into some detail about it. ....i'm excited about being able to breathe cleaner air in the pedestrian station.

Hubman said:
The article says it's gonna be 365', but I heard 416 or so. Who's right?
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The new renders show about 414' to the top of the 400' residential building, and about 390' to the top of the office building. The third tower (residential) is ~325'.
 
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odurandina said:
^^in the 4 or 5 months before the unveiling 2 years ago, i posted (in the Globe) that the rumors of an iconic, tall tower at BBS were totally false. That the towers were given squat volume over a pedestrian station to ensure the Copley Square treasures not be put under shadow. These new pnfs go into some detail about it.
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It's not the height I'm complaining about. It's the design. I rather they went with a shorter hearst tower-type structure than the offset stacked box design.
 
Here are the renders from Exhibit F of the PDA filing posted above for those who want to save some time:

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Reznor said:
That could be an issue. Realistically you'd be losing 1 stop (Back Bay station) on the route, but it's a significant connection. Would it terminate at Copley in front of the Fairmont Copley hotel?

I've taken the #39 from Copley Square many times out to JP. I'd say that is one of the largest stops in the outbound trip in terms of passengers.
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Being a fairly frequent rider of the 39 bus. It pretty much runs empty both directions between Copley and Back Bay. Typically less than 5 passengers. For tourists I always thought it reflected poorly on Boston's transit system to have articulated buses running nearly empty on such a busy street. Ending at Back Bay felt like the MBTA was trying to say "look at what we've connected" even though it has little use.
 
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