Cambridge Crossing (NorthPoint) | East Cambridge/Charlestown | Cambridge/Boston

Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

^Funny, my thought when I read that article was "that sure was a quick fix." It's a democracy, remember, worst form of government 'cept for all the others. Remember Schoolhouse Rock's "I'm just a bill?" These things take time.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Looks like government worked fast this time around.

Thursday, November 15, 2007 - 2:36 PM EST
Law makes properties on filled tidelands exempt from Chapt. 91
Boston Business Journal

Governor Deval Patrick signed a bill into law that will allow property built on landlocked filled tidelands to be exempted from the state's Chapter 91 licensing process for waterfront properties.

In February, the Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the Department of Environmental Protection, which administers Chapter 91, lacked authority to exempt from properties located on filled tidelands that are not on the waterfront * at least 250 feet from the water and separated from it by a public way * which the agency had done since 1990. Some 3,000 acres of Boston alone, and another 1,000 acres across the state would have had to go through Chapter 91 licensing if not for the governor and legislature's compromise bill.

More here...
http://www.bizjournals.com/boston/stories/2007/11/12/daily57.html?jst=b_ln_hl
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

The saga with Pan Am Railways, ex-Guilford. ex-whatever continues.
No deal is ever simple with them (Mr. Mellon and Mr. Fink).

NorthPoint buyer backs off. Archon letter stirs investor fray
By Scott Van Voorhis
Saturday, February 9, 2008

A New York investment firm is playing hardball in talks to buy the troubled NorthPoint project, casting a cloud over plans for the largest single development ever proposed in the Boston area.

In a letter sent Jan. 17, Archon Group said it was terminating a $177 million-plus agreement to buy plans and land for the 40-acre-plus city within a city in industrial East Cambridge.

Just a week before, Archon, the real estate investment arm of Wall Street firm Goldman Sachs, had executed a purchase and sale agreement for NorthPoint, court documents state.

Archon?s move, meanwhile, has triggered a fresh round of battling between the project?s investors.

Citing Archon?s letter, a group of minority investors in the project has filed suit. The group of prominent local development executives, Cambridge North Point LLC, contends the project?s majority investor, Boston and Maine, violated the terms of an earlier agreement by failing to wrap up the Archon deal.

Cambridge North Point wants to transfer ownership back to a development entity it has a significant stake in, while hiring a new marketing firm to sell the property, documents show.

?It?s unfortunate. You have two sellers that can?t get along,? said one executive familiar with the talks.

The suit is just the latest in months of legal wrangling that has threatened to sink a landmark project that not long ago appeared ready to finally move forward after years of planning.

However, David Fink, president of Pan Am Railways, the umbrella company for NorthPoint owner Boston and Maine, called Archon?s move a ?negotiating ploy.?

Archon opted to pull back because it did not want to commit to paying an $8 million deposit yet, Fink contends.

Given the uncertain real estate market, Fink contends the best thing to do is to push ahead with Archon.

?I don?t think property values and real estate values are going up at the present time,? Fink said.
Click to expand...

http://www.bostonherald.com/business/real_estate/view.bg?articleid=1072331
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

I was over by Northpoint this weekend and snapped a couple of quick pictures.
northpointhousing.jpg


Why anyone would want to live in an office park is beyond me. I guess creating real neighborhoods is either a lost art or illegal. What a tragic lost opportunity. It will serve to turn off Bostonians to modern designs for another generation.

norhtpointhousing2.jpg


I was hoping that the recent financial problems would allow time for a redesign, but it looks like much of the landscaping for the ridiculous park has already been done.

Northpointparkland.jpg
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Wasn't the park already built by the Big Dig folks, and opened last fall?
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

That's a different park, Ron. This area is a vast wasteland of immaculate parks tucked under and around on-ramps. I'm so glad our tax money paid for them all, and not private development.

This Northpoint "park" has been paid for by the private developer. I walked by the other day, it's a sad area.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Yea the park land sucks. Its a bunch of small, but steep hills. Absolutely no one will get any use of it. I'm sure they had to include park land b/c of NIMBY's demands. God forbid we create more neighborhoods in this metro area, only isolated living buildings.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

I guess if you don't want to live in the suburbs but miss the charm of soulless office park buildings, Northpoint is the place for you. Man. I don't know whether I should be scared of the people who'd look at that and go "That's where I want to live!" or if I should just feel sorry for them.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

In that case, we need a map, because I did not know there were two different parks, and the one I pass by on the way from Lechmere to Science Park looks mostly flat to me.

(Not that artificial hills are necessarily a bad thing. The ones in Cambridge's Danehy Park work quite well.)
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

I second that, I also want a map, Im confused at where the parks are
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

http://www.lesvants.com/stock/cambr...ges/3-30-08_cambridge stock_4041-167 copy.htm

No map but this aerial shows the park pretty clearly.

At the risk of being unpopular, I think the park has definite potential. Some mature trees along the creek bank and the berms will really add a lushness, and look very beautiful. I'm imagining a Riverway sort of look. If you fill out the rest of the site with the apartment buildings that they concieved of then you'll have a pretty vibrant area. Architecture aside its still good planning Especially if you connect the parks to bike trail, which I believe is planned, and the Charles. Certainly better than an industrial wasteland and train tracks.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Is Boston Sand and Gravel that runs along I-93 a permanent fixture? For years as I've driven or take the train into the city from the North I have prayed that it is only there for convenience-sake during Big Dig construction. Someone please tell me I'm right. Someone please tell me that eye-sore will eventually be removed or relocated. Please?
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

It was there long before the Big Dig. (What would you replace it with?)
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Anything? OK, so that's a sarcastic answer. But right now we have BS&G saying "Welcome to Boston" when traveling into the city from points North....and that's not very welcoming.

The footprint is oddly shaped and is probably not accessible to normal traffic because of the train tracks and elevated highway that surround the area, so and actual development is probably out of the question. But honestly, just clearing out that area would certainly improve the view when traveling from the North. I guess in my imagination I always thought it would be taken down and just replaced with something resembling natural-looking woodlands. Not necessarily parks, like the Common or Esplenade. But just lots and lots of trees that when fully grown would look like they've been there all along.

- clean up the air - clean up the view - make the entrance to the city a little more aesthetically pleasing. Hell...you can even call it parkland, and it can be linked to North Point, and thus the Charles River Basin parks... just to throw the Nimby's a bone.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

The gravel company's got to go somewhere. At least in the middle of a highway it isn't taking up any otherwise useful space.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Meh - I'd just stick em' out on Dear Island or out by the airport somewhere. ;)
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

It is funny how people see things in a different way. I imagine it like a machine churning out the city all around.
You really can't see it well from the expressway and from the Leverett Connector I think it's pretty interesting. At a certain point you have concrete in every direction with ramps crossing overhead and the Sand and Gravel is on the right, with the Zakim beyond. Even better when either the bridge or the BS&G have flags on them.

The city needs industrial areas though someday with the developments in North Point, Rutherford Ave and Inner Belt it will squeeze the area enough where the land will be more valuable for something else, but that is a long way away and there are already enough parks in the area. Unless using some of the land would improve existing parks in the future, I think this area needs housing more than anything else.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Let the sand and gravel stay as long as it likes. We don't need grass-carpeted glades decorating our highways. This is an old Northeastern city, not a glorified office park surrounded by pretty landscaping ala downtown Houston. We should revere our layers of history, even the less quaint ones.

As for North Point, I'm sure it will find buyers. Believe it or not, there are plenty of people whose concern for aesthetics is far outweighed by a desire for a new building with sub-zero refrigerators and a short commute.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

I agree. BS&G isn't hurting anything by being there, and it certainly isn't occupying land that could reasonably be developed for any other purpose. I'd target Bunker Hill Community College's parking lots instead.
 
Re: NorthPoint Cambridge

Ronwell, you can't seriously think this is good planning. Read this thread starting on page 13 for a discussion of how much of a tragic and lost oportunity this whole development is.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top