RandomWalk
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The bunker-like base is depressing.
Back Bay Garage Tower | Dartmouth and Stuart | Back Bay
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Blackbird
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So long as the interior of the station is fantastic, I’d be ok.
I'm telling myself that the ground level is okay, so any blandness 30 feet up is not going to ruin anything.
theSil
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Consider for a moment that in the span of a decade, NYC is bookending GCT with One Vanderbilt and 175 Park Ave.
I'm in no way insinuating that we were going to get anything of this scale built here. More importantly, NYC is choosing to build two of the country's most architecturally noteworthy towers of the 21st century, on the doorstep of the one of the main entrances to the city. Boston is presented with a similar assignment and is choosing to build this. We really shouldn't be so accepting of mediocrity here.
I'm in no way insinuating that we were going to get anything of this scale built here. More importantly, NYC is choosing to build two of the country's most architecturally noteworthy towers of the 21st century, on the doorstep of the one of the main entrances to the city. Boston is presented with a similar assignment and is choosing to build this. We really shouldn't be so accepting of mediocrity here.
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dshoost88
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Okay... a few things.
1) Back Bay Station is an entrance to the city, not one of the main ones.
2) Grand Central Terminal is literally one of the finest passenger rail terminals in the world by most metrics. Back Bay Station--though functional--is not. It's like comparing Orson Welles' Citizen Kane to Tommy Wiseau's The Room.
3) Unless One Vanderbilt and 175 Park Ave are tasked with constructing on 150-year-old landfill, an active interstate highway, and integrating an existing floating above-highway parking garage instead of building on terra firma bedrock, it's an insult to the civil engineering design team in Boston to call this "a similar assignment."
Here's something to consider for a moment: in the span of a decade, Boston is expanding its long established life sciences lab footprint from 32 million sq. ft. at the start of the decade to 62 million sq. ft. by the end of it. Coming out of the worst pandemic in a century and on the verge of another recession, real estate developers like Boston Properties are faced with the only viable option for securing tenants at their prospective developments, and in this case that is a development that can pivot to life-sciences/lab space if it hasn't already. It's not sexy... it's not easy to build... but it's in demand, it appeases the shareholders, and frankly it's the kind of use that has spillover benefits to multiple industries and residents across the region.
This is not a mediocre addition, even for Boston standards. The truth is nearly every other large city in the country would envy the opportunity to land a development like this one, glass facade and all.
kz1000ps
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Boston's version on this site could have resembled something like this (maybe less blue glass but it's mainly an exercise in developing the building envelopes), which includes an office tower and a residential tower.
https://images.skyscrapercenter.com...laza_exterior-overall_(c)rainerviertlbock.jpg
Instead we're getting this and a bunch of people jump on here and pretend it's good. It sure isn't good compared to the above types of tower we *could have* had! Boston has maybe 10 parcels that could possibly support something like the above. Rather than classy, tall, and slender to fit in with the Back Bay bigs, we're getting the clownshow below. Everybody who says "it's good" is why we never get proposals like the above as opposed to this crap.
Boston is meant to be beautiful. These aren't beautiful. Over time, this ongoing complacency with purely utilitarian projects will leave the city not only unrecognizable, but no longer beautiful. Blocking off many views of Boston's best tower by crowding it with one of its ugliest is only going to accelerate the process.
Blackbird
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But this is an opportunity for us to upgrade to something like Hook or Paul Blart Mall Cop!
No reason one of our premier rail stations needs to be stuck at the level of The Room for another 93 years..
This made me laugh, don't get me wrong - but it's not really apt here. The Room is on almost everyone's Worst Film Ever shortlist. Back Bay Station is nowhere near a Worst Major Commuter Rail Station Ever list, US-specific or otherwise. I'd say Back Bay Station has at least a 40% Rotten Tomatoes score. So . . . Meet Joe Black? Hook works too.
I understand the "better than before so I'll take it" sentiment, but at a certain point this is just self-inflicted kneecapping. And while I'd agree that most major cities in America would be happy with this, the only ones which Boston should measure itself against (SF, Chicago, Philly, and yes, NYC) would and continue to do better. Look at what Montreal is doing now. Who cares if the Atlantas and Dallases would love this? Boston is one of a just a few cities in North America than even can be truly great. It has all the prerequisites that Atlanta and Dallas and the rest can never have. That's what makes something like this extra frustrating. Watching from afar, I admit.
Yeah, I think I will take the bootleg 1/2 price version of the Center for Computing & Data Sciences then either of those which I could only describe as glass-inspired PoMo art-deco. That said, I don't particularly like this proposal either and wish they would do something other than a ve'd bootleg rip off of the stack of books concept.
You don't like Liberty Place? You're the first person I have heard say that in 40 years. The point was more to show the general height and shapes possible, as opposed to going exactly with this Pomo design.
An approximate height comparison, although I think the crown on 1 Liberty is drawn about 30' too low, with too much spire.
guitarguynboston
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Boston really needs to get back as much of its transit history as possible and obviously build newer projects too. And with that said Back Bay Station itself needs a major overhaul both aesthetically and functionality and things like those projects need to go hand and hand with the development above them. Whatever is developed above these stations will benefit the owners tons in many ways.
Just my 2¢
Just my 2¢
(Isn't most PoMo Art Deco inspired? I always thought Modernism and its child International Style were "rational" reactions against Art Deco's exuberance, and PoMo was in turn a rejection of International Style's cold, repetitive forms and a return to Art Deco's playful ornamentation. How do you feel about International Place? Seems like this is a sharp line on AB: International Place - fantastic or a hot mess? Anways, I think the Liberty Places rock.)
I don't necessarily take issue with the lack of height here at Back Bay Station. I'm not part of the tall-is-great-a-priori crowd. I'll often prefer height because when proportioned correctly height allows for more of all the good stuff: light and sky, visual balance, housing/office space, taxes. I think Raffles works next to the Hancock because its proportions are complimentary. This is just more of what we already know doesn't work well through numerous examples over the last 10 years: short, fat, and boxy.
This looks like a recycled Seaport design which was initially rejected for being a bit too tall for the FAA. From 2012.
themissinglink
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I wish that we were getting a taller tower as part of this project, although not necessarily for aesthetic reasons. It would be ideal for the main residential tower to be increased in height, we should be striving for much more residential density when it comes to TOD atop the third busiest rail hub in the city.
I also feel that Ruggles is deserving of a large-scale air rights development, and we should similarly be striving for a large amount of residential density if such a project ever occurs.
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urbanmansprawler
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"I also feel that Ruggles is deserving of a large-scale air rights development, and we should similarly be striving for a large amount of residential density if such a project ever occurs."
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You need to find a developer willing to take a mega hit and load up said transit-topping-towers with truly affordable housing (none of the AMI junk that puts upper middle class couples in income-restricted units and takes a victory lap) rather than a massage-ready 'X affordable percentage' that can be relegated to a crap stand-alone structure in the 'hood when neighbor push-back occurs. See this scenario playing out? Neither do it.
Boston doesn't need, aesthetically or demand-wise, a half-dozen transit-towers filled with a skewed mix of affordable and market-rate units. The city needs at least two new Old Colonies or Bromley-Heaths (in addition to the current major renovations occurring in BHA properties). Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling smoke or land.
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You need to find a developer willing to take a mega hit and load up said transit-topping-towers with truly affordable housing (none of the AMI junk that puts upper middle class couples in income-restricted units and takes a victory lap) rather than a massage-ready 'X affordable percentage' that can be relegated to a crap stand-alone structure in the 'hood when neighbor push-back occurs. See this scenario playing out? Neither do it.
Boston doesn't need, aesthetically or demand-wise, a half-dozen transit-towers filled with a skewed mix of affordable and market-rate units. The city needs at least two new Old Colonies or Bromley-Heaths (in addition to the current major renovations occurring in BHA properties). Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling smoke or land.
The reason JHT was allowed was bc Hancock, in no uncertain terms, said it’d leave Boston and move its HQ to Chicago otherwise. What you’re describing are/were Cobb’s noble and admirable goals — which he achieved — but not the reasons why the tower got the green light by the city.
theSil
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It's the city's third busiest commuter rail station. It even serves intercity rail, unlike GC. Maybe I'm a bit too transit-oriented, but I think that earns it being considered a very important entry point.
No one is comparing Grand Central and Back Bay aesthetically. Just their importance as transportation infrastructure.
175 Park is being built over a subway line that has higher daily ridership than the entire MBTA system. One Vanderbilt was built on top of existing Grand Central tracks and had to be future-proofed for LIRR's East Side Access. I'm no civil engineer, but both sound tough. Regardless, they're able to build something next to Back Bay station, so build something that's not a turd.
175 Park, One Vanderbilt, Liberty Place, and this Back Bay Garage are all bad in different ways.
175 Park is oversized to an extreme. It'll be wide as the MetLife Building and twice as tall. It makes the Chrysler Building next door look like a lawn ornament. It looks more like a Sim City 2000 arcology than a human building.
One Vanderbilt's height terminates with a disordered jumble and they attempted to mask it with nonfunctional cross braces that are meant to confuse the eye like WWII dazzle camouflage.
Liberty Place is one of the worst "city's tallest" in the country, (since usurped by Philadelphia's Comcast Technology Center, which taller and even worse). The worst of any of the buildings mentioned in this thread. It's a chubby deco knockoff, like the Chrysler Building got fat on 80s pomo excess. Just haphazard bands of granite and mirror glass, pure cocaine fantasy.
The Back Bay Garage Tower isn't even a tall building. The truly humiliating thing is that the residential buildings, which are the real upside of the project, will likely never be built.
175 Park is oversized to an extreme. It'll be wide as the MetLife Building and twice as tall. It makes the Chrysler Building next door look like a lawn ornament. It looks more like a Sim City 2000 arcology than a human building.
One Vanderbilt's height terminates with a disordered jumble and they attempted to mask it with nonfunctional cross braces that are meant to confuse the eye like WWII dazzle camouflage.
Liberty Place is one of the worst "city's tallest" in the country, (since usurped by Philadelphia's Comcast Technology Center, which taller and even worse). The worst of any of the buildings mentioned in this thread. It's a chubby deco knockoff, like the Chrysler Building got fat on 80s pomo excess. Just haphazard bands of granite and mirror glass, pure cocaine fantasy.
The Back Bay Garage Tower isn't even a tall building. The truly humiliating thing is that the residential buildings, which are the real upside of the project, will likely never be built.
themissinglink
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What makes you believe that Boston doesn't need more residential TOD? I agree that we badly need more public housing developments like Old Colony and Bromley-Heath, but we need both public housing projects and large scale market rate housing, not one or the other.
Nibbles O’Plenty
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More housing projects? Really? They tend to make a neighborhood go downhill.