Columbus Center: RIP | Back Bay

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Re: Columbus Center

chumbolly said:
Calling this "California's" Columbus Center is a disingenuous red herring. . . all frothy and unburdened by reason.
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Remember that there are forum members and several elected officials still walking around town referring to ?Winn?s? project, what ?Winn? might do next, whether ?Winn? has any money left, etcetera.

They all would benefit by remembering that on 15 March 2006, Winn sold Columbus Center for about $48 million to the California pension plan (CalPERS), and its off-the-government-books subsidiary (CUIP), and its contract investment consulting firm (MURC). Since then, CalPERS-CUIP-MURC has controlled every major decision, including the mid-March decision to halt construction, and the request for a new project calendar spanning 28 years:

13.08 years - Plan (Sep. 1996 - Sep. 2009)
02.25 years - Build Railway & Roadway Tunnels (Oct. 2009 - Dec. 2011)
10.00 years - Delay Construction (Jan. 2012 - Dec. 2021)
02.50 years - Erect Buildings (Jan. 2022 - Jun. 2024)
27.83 years + unlimited extensions for unforeseen, uncontrollable events

Anyone startled by this total of 28+ years should read the documents released by MTA last February:
■ Lease Amendment Summary, page 4 (MTA, 29 February 2008)
■ Lease Amendment, pages 16-17, (MTA, 29 February 2008).

More than any other entity, the continuance, success, and/or failure of this proposal lies in the hands of CalPERS-CUIP-MURC, or ?California? for short.
 
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Re: Columbus Center

tobyjug said:
. . . I assume (foolishly) that there is a performance bond that covers the remediation and that the surety has been put on notice of a potential default!(?)
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Surety on this project consists of two forms.

In the lease signed and promptly defaulted over two years ago, Article 4.12 (b) (vi) required California (CalPERS-CUIP-MURC) to provide payment, performance, and lien bonds for the tunnels and decks.

The amendment that California agreed to on 29 February 2008 included further guarantees assuring the MTA up to $285 million if for any reason the tunnels and decks were not completed on time and as designed. But California never signed, MTA withdrew the previously finalized amendment, and now both sides are negotiating over a 29-year project calendar, among other things.

So, yes, there was a performance bond in the original lease, and, yes, there were even stronger guarantees in the amendment. But California defaulted on the 2006 lease, and never signed the 2008 amendment. Consequently, MTA expects to announce some new prognosis in early July, including whether the set of guarantees has been left alone, loosened, or tightened.
 
Re: Columbus Center

I'm sure this was posted much earlier in the thread, but this is a really cool interactive feature:

http://www.boston.com/news/specials/columbus_center/flash_graphic/

Now that the debate over this project is decisively over, it's worth taking a step back and checking out the incredible asset and addition to the city of Boston that will be coming once the capital markets sort themselves out and the delicate mosaic of financing for a project this complex gets worked out.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned, Question 75, might you be able to describe the view from your unit in 75 Clarendon and furthermore, how that view and correspondingly your property values will be influenced by a fully developed Columbus Center?
 
Re: Columbus Center

I think we should just get rid of the MassPike and plant parks all over it so that nobody will be exposed to the big bad UFP that can kill us all. While we are at it, let's ban all vehicles and turn Boston into one of those small town suburbs so we don't need to worry about the UFP.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Think about it, if UFP's are as bad as Neddy purports, do you really think even he would be stupid enough to live right next to a major source. I check ziprealty everyday salivating over seeing unit 508 on the market so I can move in and be exposed to those wonderful toxins.
 
Re: Columbus Center

this would be a great place to live in with the skyline view of boston
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned Flaherty said:
Surety on this project consists of two forms.

In the lease signed and promptly defaulted over two years ago, Article 4.12 (b) (vi) required California (CalPERS-CUIP-MURC) to provide payment, performance, and lien bonds for the tunnels and decks.

The amendment that California agreed to on 29 February 2008 included further guarantees assuring the MTA up to $285 million if for any reason the tunnels and decks were not completed on time and as designed. But California never signed, MTA withdrew the previously finalized amendment, and now both sides are negotiating over a 29-year project calendar, among other things.

So, yes, there was a performance bond in the original lease, and, yes, there were even stronger guarantees in the amendment. But California defaulted on the 2006 lease, and never signed the 2008 amendment. Consequently, MTA expects to announce some new prognosis in early July, including whether the set of guarantees has been left alone, loosened, or tightened.
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Interesting. The payment bond would not be in play at this point, but the performance bond is intriguing. (Note for non-construction types: a performance bond is required in a public construction project, usually in an amount equal to 100% of the project cost. As the name implies, it pays for performance by substitute contactors hired to complete work that the original contractor would not or could not complete.)

The issue here would be the scope of work which the performance bond secures. Not having reviewed the contract documents, I guess that it covers only the "public infrastructure" part of the development: decking, street and sidewalk improvements, publically owned amenities. It ought to cover remediation too.

A failure to sign a 2008 amendment should not excuse a default of the 2006 contract.

In this type of situation, it is usually adviseable to immediately initiate a bond claim by putting the surety (usually a large insurer) on formal notice of a claim. This has the useful effect of making it difficult, or even impossible for the developer to obtain a bond on any other project it might be contemplating. As you can imagine, this usually brings matters to a head pretty quickly, as very little major construction occurs without some type of bond. A developer/contractor which cannot put up either a bond or cash as security is out of business.

I am again guessing that the surety (if any was secured) laid alot of its potential exposure off on to reinsurers. A claim would create a panic among them. The fur would fly!

If part of the 2006 default was a failure to provide any bond, I question the ability of the developer to complete the project. Such a failure means either the developer could not afford the bond premium charged by the surety, or the surety companies deemed the developer so lacking in creditworthiness that none would issue a bond on the project. Neither of these scenarios is good, and such an unworthy developer should be jettisoned as soon as possible. He, she or it is always a deadbeat timewaster.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned Flaherty said:
Such scrubbing systems aren?t pre-built, stored in warehouses, or sitting in the aisles at Home Depot; each has to be custom designed and fabricated for a specific application. Experts who work in this tell me that the technology does exist, and can be adapted to clean the I-90 and I-93 corridors as soon as agreed to by some mix of the owners: State of Massachusetts, Turnpike Authority, City of Boston, California pension plan, etcetera.

But, rather than argue the fine technical points further myself, I will identify and then post here some information, firms, and people, so anyone who cares can study further on their own.
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Ned, I never said the technology to scrub doesn't exist; I am saying that the volume of air that you have to scrub makes the application of the technology impracticable. I'd be interested if the "experts" you talk to can identify a single example where the ambient air from an urban highway or a long tunnel is being scrubbed.

As for the NRDC suit in California, there are some differences between there and Boston.

a.) Southern California is a non-attainment area for particulates. Boston is not.

b.) the suit wants particulate monitoring stations to be closer to major freeways. In Boston, the monitoring stations, e.g., Kenmore Sq. are very close to these highways.

c.) traffic volume, particularly diesel truck volume, is much higher on these major Southern California freeways than it is in Boston.

d.) the suit targets limits on motor vehicle emissions, thus trying to control pollution from the source. At Columbus Center, you are trying to treat the polluted air.
 
Re: Columbus Center

kmp1284 said:
Ned . . . might you be able to describe the view from your unit in 75 Clarendon and furthermore, how that view and correspondingly your property values will be influenced by a fully developed Columbus Center?
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As I?ve said for 13 years, all the views from my home ? and the property values affected by those views ? would remain totally unchanged. My thread post #544 (2 April 2008) is repeated here for your convenience: ?None of my written or verbal testimony was ever about views, because those would change little if the proposed Columbus Center were built. Even if the views changed a lot, that?s relatively unimportant.?

Columbus Center would reduce property values, not because of views ? mine or anyone else?s ? but because of public health risks. The project?s 5 air pollution vents ? exhausting air from the tunnels running 6 blocks west and 6 blocks east ? will increase health care costs, lost work days, illness, and fatalities for people working or living near the project.
 
Re: Columbus Center

tobyjug said:
. . . The issue here would be the scope of work which the performance bond secures. Not having reviewed the contract documents, I guess that it covers only the "public infrastructure" part of the development: decking, street and sidewalk improvements, publically owned amenities
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Streets and sidewalks must be repaired after construction finishes, but that?s merely a regulatory requirement. Most importantly, this project contains no public infrastructure at all. The lease and other legal agreements defined everything being built ? tunnels, decks, buildings, parks ? as 100% privately owned.

tobyjug said:
. . . A failure to sign a 2008 amendment should not excuse a default of the 2006 contract. . .
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It?s true that failing to sign the 2008 amendment now doesn?t excuse defaulting on the 2006 lease two years ago.

But note this key distinction between these two documents: it was the 2006 lease that required tunnel/deck replacement insurance, and payment-performance-completion bonds, but it was the 2008 amendment that required the $285 million in ?absolute, unconditional? tunnel completion guarantees.

The lease was signed; the amendment wasn?t. So, MTA can evict its tenant for defaulting on the 2006 lease, but it can?t cash in the guarantees (because although California negotiated them into the 2008 amendment, they never signed it).

tobyjug said:
. . . I am again guessing that the surety (if any was secured) laid a lot of its potential exposure off on to reinsurers. A claim would create a panic among them. The fur would fly!. . .
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The liability you?re thinking of would have been borne by reinsurers ? if there were any. But there weren?t. California insured itself when it negotiated the $285 million in guarantees. Yes, any claim will cause panic, but the fur that flies will be only from the pelts of the original owners (Winn), current owners (CalPERS-CUIP-MURC), and city, state, and federal agencies.

tobyjug said:
. . . A developer/contractor which cannot put up either a bond or cash as security is out of business. . . If part of the 2006 default was a failure to provide any bond, I question the ability of the developer to complete the project. Such a failure means either the developer could not afford the bond premium charged by the surety, or the surety companies deemed the developer so lacking in creditworthiness that none would issue a bond on the project. Neither of these scenarios is good, and such an unworthy developer should be jettisoned as soon as possible. He, she or it is always a deadbeat timewaster.
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Yes. That?s precisely why the current proposal can?t succeed, no matter how nicely market conditions are believed to improve in future years.
 
Re: Columbus Center

stellarfun said:
Ned, I never said the technology to scrub doesn't exist; I am saying that the volume of air that you have to scrub makes the application of the technology impracticable. I'd be interested if the "experts" you talk to can identify a single example where the ambient air from an urban highway or a long tunnel is being scrubbed.
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The studies of logistics, practicality, and affordability are still in progress, but I?ll post results after they?re released. It might turn out that I-90 is the first such tunnel to accomplish this. But the fact that an operational example isn?t in use today doesn?t mean the technology doesn?t exist, or that it can?t be implemented.

stellarfun said:
. . . As for the NRDC suit in California, there are some differences between there and Boston.
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Yes, there are climate and traffic differences between many areas, including California and Massachusetts. However, those differences don?t matter, because the suit isn?t about specific remedies for California, or Boston, or any particular location. Rather, the suit seeks to force EPA to adopt appropriate policy nationwide: taking the right measurements, at the right locations, at the right times, and reporting in ways that don?t hide the public health risks. The suit uses California only as an example to illustrate the problem; but the NRDC plaintiffs, the EPA defendants, and the court will agree that any solution should be workable nationwide.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned Flaherty said:
The studies of logistics, practicality, and affordability are still in progress, but I?ll post results after they?re released. It might turn out that I-90 is the first such tunnel to accomplish this. But the fact that an operational example isn?t in use today doesn?t mean the technology doesn?t exist, or that it can?t be implemented.

Yes, there are climate and traffic differences between many areas, including California and Massachusetts. However, those differences don?t matter, because the suit isn?t about specific remedies for California, or Boston, or any particular location. Rather, the suit seeks to force EPA to adopt appropriate policy nationwide: taking the right measurements, at the right locations, at the right times, and reporting in ways that don?t hide the public health risks. The suit uses California only as an example to illustrate the problem; but the NRDC plaintiffs, the EPA defendants, and the court will agree that any solution should be workable nationwide.
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Ned, so in the end this seems to be where we stand:

For ultrafine particulates (particles) (UFPs):

a.) no national, regional, or local air quality standard specifying permissible ambient concentrations of UFPs currently exists, nor is one being developed;

b.) no monitoring of current ambient concentrations of UFPs is being done anywhere in Massachusetts;

c.) Massachusetts currently attains national air quality standards for fine particulates, which are larger than UFPs;

D.) Massachusetts continuously monitors ambient concentrations of fine particulates at monitoring stations located proximate to major urban highways;

E.) No technology has been identified that can scrub UFPs from the open atmosphere, although there exist technologies that can scrub UFPs from closed systems;

F.) Nobody in the world has sought to capture and scrub pollutants from the open atmosphere;

G.) In your view, Columbus Center should be responsible for developing, installing, and operating the world's first pollution control technology that scrubs the UFPs that are an emission byproduct of of vehicles traveling on the Mass Pike and MBTA trains at Back Bay station. The technology should be designed to achieve a standard that does not yet exist. The technology should be designed to achieve maximum feasible control, even if such control exceeds what might in the future be necessary to achieve a standard if a standard is ever proposed. (If you don't have a standard, and you don't know (or care about) current ambient concentrations of UFPs, you basically build best available technology.)

H.) In your view, Columbus Center should not proceed with construction until it has agreed to develop, install, and operate a scrubbing system for UFPs.

To help your 'experts', here is a summary of cloud chamber technology that is being used to scrub the diesel exhaust of railway engines in railyards.

http://www.tri-mer.com/ccs-case-study-6-diesel-exhaust-emissions.html#diesel

I suggest your 'experts' read it carefully and note that the technology used converts a diesel engine into a closed system, and the capacity of the technology re: volume of air.
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As for the NRDC suit, you ought to stick to IT, because you evince little understanding of the law, or the legal process,

You might want to read the NRDC press release on this lawsuit, which unequivocally states that the case involves air quality in southern California. It is not a national lawsuit, with national implications. If NRDC wanted to do that, it would choose a different venue.

http://www.nrdc.org/media/2008/080529.asp
 
Re: Columbus Center

Stellarfun, both the problem and the solution are simpler and clearer than you imagine.

Here?s my view. But it?s not just mine. So far, every I-90 corridor resident who has learned how they would suffer from this vent scheme shares this view.

● WHEREAS: EPA hasn?t yet set a UFP standard, and Massachusetts hasn?t yet started monitoring, but public health officials are aware of the public health risks from UFP air pollution;

● WHEREAS: the tunnel-ization of the I-93 and I-90 corridors worsens the exposure rates for many people, because it concentrates the pollution below and exhausts it into offices, homes, and communities above;

● WHEREAS: the problem that makes UFPs more dangerous along I-90 and I-93 in Boston ? concentration in tunnels and exhausting via vents ? also presents a rare opportunity to mitigate that very same danger;

● WHEREAS: the latest proposal is to concentrate air pollution captured as far away as 6 blocks west and 6 blocks east, and exhaust all of it through Columbus Center?s 5 vents (3 open-air, 2 mechanized);

● WHEREAS: other proposals across the I-90 corridor in Boston would do likewise;

● WHEREAS: this inexcusable assault on the health of people working and living over the corridor, and several blocks north and south, is unnecessary, and remediation is possible;

● WHEREAS: six business partners (MTA, CalPERS, CUIP, MURC, CWCC, and BRA) expect to consume public funds and public property to generate profits for 99 years;

■ THEREFORE, the 6 profiteering partners should publicly identify the optimum solution, and apportion the costs among themselves. If not, the people who work and live in areas affected by the proposed pollution have every right to halt it, or to be compensated for the lost work days, illness, premature death, and funeral expenses that the proponents? vent scheme causes.

Correction #1: Your mis-characterizations such as ?MBTA trains at Back Bay station? diminish and dismiss the railway portion of the overall problem. All diesel railway engines ? freight and passenger trains ? generate UFPs, across Boston?s entire I-90 corridor; it?s not just ?MBTA trains at Back Bay Station.?

Correction #2: Yes, I read the National Resources Defense Council press release. Yes, the suit is local, and yes, the example used in is air quality in southern California, and yes, NRDC wants California?s clean-air plan improved. But the prosecution of the case, and the resulting changes at EPA, will be national in their scope and their impact. A suit doesn?t have to be filed in a federal court to have a national impact.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned Flaherty said:
Stellarfun, both the problem and the solution are simpler and clearer than you imagine.

Here?s my view. But it?s not just mine. So far, every I-90 corridor resident who has learned how they would suffer from this vent scheme shares this view.


Correction #1: Your mis-characterizations such as ?MBTA trains at Back Bay station? diminish and dismiss the railway portion of the overall problem. All diesel railway engines ? freight and passenger trains ? generate UFPs, across Boston?s entire I-90 corridor; it?s not just ?MBTA trains at Back Bay Station.?

Correction #2: Yes, I read the National Resources Defense Council press release. Yes, the suit is local, and yes, the example used in is air quality in southern California, and yes, NRDC wants California?s clean-air plan improved. But the prosecution of the case, and the resulting changes at EPA, will be national in their scope and their impact. A suit doesn?t have to be filed in a federal court to have a national impact.
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Ned, I suggest you visit a lawyer, narrate all your whereas clauses, and ask him or her to file a motion in Suffolk Superior Court, seeking an injunction against the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority, the City of Boston, and whomever else you choose to join as a defendant. The injunction would prohibit the Turnpike Authority and the City from further executing any lease or sale of rights on property either owns to any developer, including Winn & Cassin, until such developer provides for the installation and operation of an pollution control system to eliminate, to the greatest feasible extent, UFPs from the vented air associated with that development. To be uniform, the injunction should apply to all projects proposed to be built over the Turnpike, including, for example, the Kenmore Square project, the BU transportation hub, etc.

In other words, put your money, in this instance lots of money, where your mouth is.
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Re: trains at Back Bay station. AMTRAK trains, except for two, are all electric, and don't discharge UFPs. There are no freight trains in Back Bay as there are no freight yards or freight spurs east of Back Bay. The trackage in South Boston is accessed through Readville.

Re: the NRDC suit. Again, don't betray your level of legal ignorance and mis-perception. The NRDC suit was filed in the Ninth Circuit, a Federal appeals court with jurisdiction for California. The Ninth Circuit is a Federal court, not a state or local court. (Federal courts have jurisdiction over cases where the Federal government, in this case EPA, is a party.) If NRDC wished to challenge a national standard, or a national implementation plan, etc, or seek a ruling with national application, the more usual venue for such is the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia circuit.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Ned Flaherty said:
● WHEREAS: EPA hasn?t yet set a UFP standard, and Massachusetts hasn?t yet started monitoring, but public health officials are aware of the public health risks from UFP air pollution
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If there is no standard, why does CC have to follow it then? I also agree with Stellar. CC was not required to mitigitate the impact of UFP. Yes maybe they did promise to make sure UFP will not create a toxic zone but a promise is not the same as a requirement. If you are afraid of UFP so much, move out of the city and into the suburbs, there's no UFP there. This is a city, pollution comes along with it. If you don't like it, don't live in it.
 
Re: Columbus Center

DarkFenX said:
If there is no standard, why does CC have to follow it then? I also agree with Stellar. CC was not required to mitigitate the impact of UFP. Yes maybe they did promise to make sure UFP will not create a toxic zone but a promise is not the same as a requirement. If you are afraid of UFP so much, move out of the city and into the suburbs, there's no UFP there. This is a city, pollution comes along with it. If you don't like it, don't live in it.
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There is a history in Federal anti-pollution laws of requiring that sources use what is sometimes termed as best available technology. One reason for requiring such is to put competitive industries on a relatively equal footing with regard to the costs of pollution control. Such technology is required regardless of the concentrations of a particular pollutant in the air or water.

What Ned fails to realize with respect to the NRDC suit in Southern California and why the regional air quality boards are resisting the lawsuit is that the remedy would likely be to restrict truck traffic on freeways, so the amount of pollutants discharged are less because the vehicle miles are less. So the trucks get pushed onto secondary roads, their engines burn less efficiently, and overall emission levels get worse.

As there is no technology that will do what Ned would like, neither Columbus Center nor any developer is going to be compelled to scrub the air flowing out of the vents.

But if he were successful in his hypothetical (for the moment) suit in the sense that a court ruled that Massachusetts should establish a UFP standard for air near major urban highways, and assuming the state then needed to take steps to achieve that standard, there would be two remedies: greatly reduce all traffic on the Mass Pike east of Allston (banning all diesel trucks for example), which will ensure fewer UFPs reach his condo, or buy out his condo and his building and tear it down. The latter solution is not radical. The South Essex Sewage District bought out a row of homes across the street from a new sewage treatment plant because the property owners complained about the odor, and then tore them down. (The odor is no longer really there; the resulting greenscape is a testament to property owners whose bluff was called. Their backyard neighbors, presumably happily, still live in their houses.)
 
Re: Columbus Center

stellarfun said:
The latter solution is not radical. The South Essex Sewage District bought out a row of homes across the street from a new sewage treatment plant because the property owners complained about the odor, and then tore them down.
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And this is also the explanation for a formerly occupied ghost neighborhood of empty streets in Playa del Rey, west of Los Angeles International Airport. In this case, the complaint was noise.

Surfridge Ghosttown

surfridge_street.jpg
 
Re: Columbus Center

I've persisted in this protracted digression about air quality standards because Ned's assertions, if unchallenged, take on an aura of credibility and legitimacy.

Some of it, at least to me, seems transparent. For example, why doesn't Ned cite the health hazards posed by fine particulates, for which there are abundant studies, and ask that these be scrubbed? The answer would seem to be that Massachusetts attains the air quality standard for fine particulates, so there is not an argumentaive leg to stand on.

Thus, there is resorting to the potential risk of UFPs, for which there are no standards, no measurement in Massachusetts of ambient concentrations of this pollutant, and very few studies that seek to correlate health risk with exposure. A large field of unknowns which is then seeded with fears and simplistic solutions.

I'll predict that removing UFPs by scrubbing 5.3 million cubic feet of air a minute (using the ventilating standard for 100 cubic feet of air per highway lane foot and 54,000 lane feet near Columbus Center) would require a facility bigger than Columbus Center itself.
 
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