Yeah, I ended up being able to attend this last night. John's post is a pretty accurate summary of what was discussed.
As I said to Brut afterward, the meeting was a sort of microcosm of Boston's development process and illustrated some of the glaring shortcomings inherent in that process.
The three planners spoke first. Krieger unapologetically advocated the virtues of tall buildings, while Patrose and Dixon were far more conciliatory to the anti-development portion of the crowd. All three did basically agree, though, that tall buildings bring people and vitality to the city; they are a necessary and inevitable part of Boson's future and the community process should be used to make these projects better serve the city. All three spoke compellingly and articulately, supporting their arguments with examples and statistics.
Then Byron Rushing spoke. He rambled on at length, about, among other things, good tall buildings and bad tall buildings, shadows and sunshine, and the north slope of Beacon Hill. I gather he was advocating that tall buildings are bad, but I couldnt follow his logic, if there was any. Maybe it was just me though, because as he meandered, many in the crowd nodded and chuckled approvingly.
There was a large anti-development contingent present, maybe about half the crowd. It seems to me that this NIMBY sentiment is rooted in a fear that their beloved neighborhoods will be changed, possibly for the worse, by new development. This is understandable. But as a women in the crowd poignantly reminded us, the current residents of any neighborhood will not live forever and should not demand that the neighborhood be preserved axactly as it is for all eternity. "We're just passing through," she said. "Let's let other people have their turn."
There was also a lot of debate about transparent zoning versus constant negotiation. I was very surprised to openly hear that negotiation, not zoning, is the method utilized by the BRA to determine what projects are built and what projects are not.
Apparently Boston's current zoning is really just a starting point and really has no real purpose other than to get the negotiation going--if the project lies in a PDA, then zoning is pretty much irrelevant altogether. But once the negotiation gets going, the question simply becomes, if we let you build X, what will you give us? Maybe I'm just naive, but this sort of sounds like extortion.
Legal and ethical qualms aside, this process of negotiation also strikes me as counterproductive and inefficient. Not only does it bog down the process and make cohesive, comprehensive planning impossible, but it also frequently results in inferior projects. There's no such thing as a free lunch, and trade-offs are just that: trade-offs. As Krieger pointed out, the developers can negotiate too, and they do.
It really goes without saying that Boston needs to reform the development process. If this city is to compete and prosper in the future, I strongly believe that we need intelligent, transparent zoning that serves and benefits the city as a whole.
It was a really interesting forum and I'm glad I actually got to make it. I left there with a real respect and admiration for Krieger. As someone who has attended quite a few community meetings, I found him to be a real breathe of fresh air.
Good seeing both Brut and John.
Also John, a word of advice: never argue with crazy people.
