Canopy by Hilton (née Haymarket Hotel) | Blackstone St | Parcel 9 | Greenway

[datadyne007]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I don't see why such a post was even necessary. Why not use the original name if you lived there? Someone from Wien wouldn't suddenly start talking about how they lived in "Vienna."

 

[underground]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I don't see why such a post was even necessary. Why not use the original name if you lived there? Someone from Wien wouldn't suddenly start talking about how they lived in "Vienna."

Sorry it offends you. Seems like a pretty minor detail to me...

 

[Hutchison]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

datadyne007's comment was probably to Itchy...

I also lived in kobenhavn for a year...too bad I can't figure out how to get the "o" right

 

[datadyne007]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

^ I think he was defending your post.

Thanks. I was indeed defending your usage of "Kobenhavn," underground.

 

[underground]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Ah, got it. Thanks for the clarification. Sometimes message boards are hard to read.

 

[whighlander]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I don't understand the residence/market incompatibility argument. I lived in a great apartment above a 24 hour strip club in Kobenhaven. The people watching out the window was amazing. Most new construction, high end stuff will be double paned with windows closed and AC running all summer anyway. The noise at the Haymarket isn't even really that loud. No more or less noisy than you'd get living further up Hanover in the North End. I think it'd be the smell that would be worse, but windows do an even better job of blocking smells than they do sound.

Underg -- Since you live in the North End -- take a walk on a warm to hot Friday / Saturday late afternoon

The Haymarket is not a strip-club, not is it an orderly, well manicured European-style public market (e.g. Budapest)

What you will find is a 3rd World street market in the midst of downtown Boston

This market is functional -- you can get good deals; and the tourists think its quaint -- But it is not compatible with people living in MultiMilion $ condos or even MultiThousand $/month apartments

 

[underground]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Underg -- Since you live in the North End -- take a walk on a warm to hot Friday / Saturday late afternoon

Thanks for the suggestion. I already have. Numerous times. That's what I based my comment on.

 

[whighlander]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Thanks for the suggestion. I already have. Numerous times. That's what I based my comment on.

Undrg -- I meant that fairly rhetorically

I just find it hard to reconcile the actual Hay Market with upscale residences in a place such as Boston

Yes, of course a fancy residence could be next door to an open dump in Hyderabad or Bengeluru in India -- but I'd bet no person originally from India who now lives in Boston would want to live next to Hay Market

Note that the same upper middle class person when in Hyderabad would expect daily power outages, and the complete lack of potable water from the tap even in a fancy hotel -- none of those would be tolerable here

Of course, the plans of some of the proposals for Parcel #9 which include residences incorporate some sort of process of "westernizing" Hay Market with semi-permanent roofs and such -- I'm just not sure how you can without it just turning into a mini Whole Foods

 

[datadyne007]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I just find it hard to reconcile the actual Hay Market with upscale residences in a place such as Boston

^^ Ok, then why don't you just lose the notion of upscale residents and imagine some competitively-priced housing for people who actually want to live in an urban environment? College students would live here in a flash, even college students with extra money from mommy and daddy if the prices are still higher.

 

[whighlander]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

^^ Ok, then why don't you just lose the notion of upscale residents and imagine some competitively-priced housing for people who actually want to live in an urban environment? College students would live here in a flash, even college students with extra money from mommy and daddy if the prices are still higher.

Data -- I'd don't believe that you want to build down-scale -- this area will become some of the priciest in Boston

Diagonally across the Greenway you have the Intercontinental; the Boston Harbor Hotel; Rowes Wharf with John Henry's yacht; Atlantic Wharf; the Fed; on the same side you have International Place; One Financial Center; the Millennium Bostonian Hotel

with potentially the Aquarium Garage tower(s) to come

As RR said, "America is too big for small dreams"

 

[bbfen]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Data -- I'd don't believe that you want to build down-scale -- this area will become some of the priciest in Boston

Your contradictions hurt my head. Haymarket is a shitpit and no one Of Culture wants to live there. But you don't want to build regular apartment buildings because it will become the priciest in Boston!? OY

 

[Shepard]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I think what Westie is saying is that Haymarket is a fragile niche in an ecosystem bent on sanitizing everything around the area. Apartments or condos would based on location be upscale. Fragile niche is thrown off. Therefore this spot should avoid apartments or condos.

I really don't see what's controversial about what Westie's saying. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble but realistically there won't be downmarket housing built along the Greenway.

 

[datadyne007]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

As RR said, "America is too big for small dreams"

So we should design our cities based off pandering to only the rich? Not sure RR is the best person to quote for anything, tbh.

 

[Shepard]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

You make it sound like "pandering to the rich" is a policy... For heavens' sake, the new buildings in Allston are all luxury, don't tell me anything other than that could or would be developed 50 yards from Quincy Market.

 

[HenryAlan]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Undrg -- I meant that fairly rhetorically

I just find it hard to reconcile the actual Hay Market with upscale residences in a place such as Boston

I reject the notion that Haymarket resembles a third world market. True, it's more raucous and dirty than something like Pike's Place Market, but it's definitely not third world. I might be able to afford an upscale unit in a building overlooking Haymarket. I'd be in to that proposition. I suspect there are quite a few who would. At a minimum, there would be enough to fill the building. It may not be for every 5 per center out there, but plenty would like it, especially if it gets cleaned up just a tad, which is in fact part of the proposal.

 

[whighlander]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

So we should design our cities based off pandering to only the rich? Not sure RR is the best person to quote for anything, tbh.

Data -- perhaps you'd prefer Abe Lincoln who said No one ever got a job from a poor man

If you are developing a piece of property anywhere - you build as constrained by the authorities (we call it zoning) and by the opportunities to sell, rent, or use it yourself (we call it the market)

So, on desirable property you will pay more for the privilege of ownership and hence you will build bigger and more extensively than you would on a similar size property in a less desirable location

More concretely, you buy an acre in Readville near the tracks for X -- its fairly cheap -- you would not put luxury-quality housing there without some tremendous sense of guilt or ignorance of reality

Alternatively, you pay 10X for an acre of land in the Back Bay - you will try to maximize your height to maximize the square footage of your building and you will also build in a more expensive style to attract the customers who will pay more

Right-now the Greenway parcels are between the two examples though closer to the Back Bay in cost and potential return on your investment

Sure, build a dorm or a rooming house on Parcel #9 -- you probably wont have too many complaints about the Hay Market -- but you had better be a "Not-expecting any kind of profit" developer. Alternatively, build what the Greenway market will support, and you will instantly have an on-the-scene constituency trying to "improve the retail environment" for the Hay Market --perhaps couched in terms of preserving the near-by Historic Blackstone Block and Creek Square -- essentially its a cease and desist order for Hay Market's traditional business.

 

[whighlander]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

I reject the notion that Haymarket resembles a third world market. True, it's more raucous and dirty than something like Pike's Place Market, but it's definitely not third world. I might be able to afford an upscale unit in a building overlooking Haymarket. I'd be in to that proposition. I suspect there are quite a few who would. At a minimum, there would be enough to fill the building. It may not be for every 5 per center out there, but plenty would like it, especially if it gets cleaned up just a tad, which is in fact part of the proposal.

Henry -- perhaps not the worst of 3rd World-style -- but certainly not Euro-style either.

As a typical hot summer day progresses toward the shut-down -- the Hay Market loses what order it possessed and the combination of unrefrigerated fruits and vegetables sitting in the sun, the shouts of the vendors, and the pushing and shoving of the bargain-seekers -- makes Hay Market resemble a 3rd World Market Place (perhaps on a better day).

On several occasions, I've carried off big boxes of strawberries for a very good price -- because they'e been sitting in the hot sun all day. When you get home with them 1/3 to 1/2 of the strawberries are only good for sauce, and the rest will follow by the next morning. After I left -- there were still some of those boxes of strawberries sitting there on the tables as well as some full boxes already consigned to the pavement.

Of course, as a nod to your upscale neighbors across the street -- you as a Hay Market vendor can put a roof on with a sun shade and perhaps some air conditioning and refrigeration and then running water and drains -- you will have a much more expensive if slightly more sanitary product to sell -- and immediately advocates for the poor will be suing to return the old affordable Hay Market.

 

[blade_bltz]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Data -- perhaps you'd prefer Abe Lincoln who said No one ever got a job from a poor man

Talk about an utterly content-less statement.

And can we get a proper citation on that?

 

[Pierce]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

Talk about an utterly content-less statement.

And can we get a proper citation on that?

I second, the last few years there has been a lot of simplistic free market gibberish (dumbed down enough to even make Ayn Rand blush) floating around with Lincoln's name ascribed to it. Snopes eviscerates most of it, but this quote brings up nothing on Google.

No surprise, no one actually quotes directly anymore-- they quote a friend quoting a guy on tv quoting a web source quoting an author quoting a journalist quoting Bartlett's quoting someone from antiquity.

 

[choo]

Re: Parcel 9 - The Greenway

“You Can’t Believe Most of the Quotes You Read On the Internet” -Abraham Lincoln