Columbus Center: RIP | Back Bay

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Re: Columbus Center

Boston will never look like Manhattan. It's missing the extensive grid and that really sets much of the tone for the look of Manhattan. There are plenty of places in Manhattan with low scale buildings and no highrises in sight. Still the straight sightlines and streetwalls make a scene Boston can never reproduce. Boston also lacks the the grand 20th century buildings and amazing variety of quality of architeture. Boston doesn't have the wealth or business prominence for the extensive and extreme height.

INMO, if anything, integrating the best of Manhattan is a goal Boston should strive for rather than shy away from.
 
Re: Columbus Center

TedG said:
Pelhamhall thinks the short brick buildings on Stanhope Street are ugly. I think glass and concrete skyscrapers are ugly. Ron Druker wants to tear down the historic Art-Deco Shreve's building and replace it with one of these. The MFA has already torn down half of its historic building to replace it with a big glass cube. Where Park Square once was we now have an ugly hotel.
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Agreed that demo'ing the Shreve building is a disaster.

However the MFA hasn't torn down any of its historic building; the entire building by Guy Lowell will remain. The east wing (and hopefully the IM Pei west wing soon too) will be demolished to create Foster's glass spine. If this turns out half as beautiful as his redo for the BM in London then the museum will be amazing.

Isn't this the embodiment of the contrast between old and new that others on the board are saying is what makes Boston unique?

There is a fine balance between preserving what give the city its richness and texture and the inexorable march of 'progress'. Alas most cities including Boston never seem to find the right balance and we lose some jewels and get stuck with some empty, banal boxes.
 
Re: Columbus Center

[size=+2]Consultants tapped for financial review of Columbus Center[/size]

by Scott Kearnan, South End News Contributor ? September 11, 2008

ConsultantsHiredSENews11-Sep-2008.jpg


Though their construction site has been dormant since March, developers of the Columbus Center have tapped new resources to push forward with the massive residential/retail complex. The owners of the development, including Boston?s Winn Development, have retained Related Properties of New York and the Beal Companies of Boston to serve as development consultants on the project. The consultants have been asked to conduct a thorough review of the project and determine how, or whether, the Columbus Center should move forward.

?Both The Beal Companies and The Related Companies have been retained as development consultants to perform a review of Columbus Center, which will include an evaluation of costs to determine the financial viability of the project,? said Bruce Beal Sr., of the Beal Companies. Beal is developing The Clarendon, a luxury condo development located near the proposed Columbus Center site. ?As owners of the neighboring site The Clarendon, we care deeply about the future of these parcels,? added Beal.

In a Boston Globe article published last week, Beal elaborated that his team was ?excited and encouraged by what we?ve seen so far,? though he declined to reveal specifics.

The current moratorium on construction reflects the Columbus Center?s financial woes: Work on the center, an $800 million project that would be built over the Massachusetts Turnpike by the South End/Back Bay border, began in November 2007, but was abruptly stopped in March 2008. At the time a spokesman for Winn Development, Alan Eisner, said the developers had concerns about the project?s finances and that they were waiting to hear about the status of loans and grants they hoped to receive from the state. Shortly after Winn halted construction those loans and grants fell through. In April, Governor Deval Patrick?s administration denied the developers? application for a $20 million Massachusetts Opportunity Relocation and Expansion Jobs grant, better known as a MORE grant, and redirected the $10 million from the grant that it had preliminarily awarded to the project away from Columbus Center and towards other unrelated projects. Patrick?s office cited the halt to construction as a sign that the developers were not ready to begin immediate work on the project. The loss of the MORE grant prompted MassHousing to pull out of more than $20 million in loans it had agreed to give the project. MassHousing argued that the MORE grant funding was crucial to the success of the project (see ?Columbus Center hits more snags,? April 10).

Since then, the construction site has been essentially abandoned, developers have scrambled to find new funding, and neighborhood residents - particularly those on Cortes and Isabella Streets directly overlooking the site - have complained about the adverse effects the abandoned construction site has had on quality of life: lost parking signs, closed sidewalks, unsightly debris and the practical dangers of a construction zone left unattended with no clear sign of when or if development will continue.

?There are delays, and we haven?t been pleased with them. They?ve probably frustrated us as much as they have the residents,? said Mac Daniel, spokesperson for the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority (MTA). The MTA is currently leasing the land for the Columbus Center project, and has been in talks with the developers since March to determine whether to grant their requested 18-month ?continuance on any further construction.?

The parties have yet to reach a decision, and the protracted talks have exacerbated local frustrations. At a neighborhood meeting in May 2008, MTA executive director Alan LeBovidge promised concerned residents that the agency would entertain negotiations with the developers for just one more month; if there was no assurance of continued progress at that point, said LeBovidge, the MTA would assume that ?this [construction] is not going to happen? and would press for full rehabilitation of the razed construction area (see ?Columbus Center countdown,? May 29).

Some rehabilitation has taken place: at the end of August, the developers initiated a clean-up process that is intended to address some of the neighborhood concerns. But with the lease negotiations continuing well past the last issuance of a one-month deadline, residents remain concerned about the continual postponement of a decision and what it bodes for the lumbering fossil of the project.

?We feel the project is important enough that we move carefully during the negotiation process and not act hastily,? said Daniel. ?We?ve been frustrated by the delays, but at the same time we hope to make the necessary inroads.?

The next opportunity to push things forward is a meeting between the developers and the MTA on Sept. 15. ?If there is still an impasse reached, then I think the executive director?s words to the residents back in May will hold true,? added Daniels. Another meeting, scheduled for Sept. 25, will again bring together the MTA with residents for a status update and the opportunity to address questions and concerns.

Moving forward, the answers to some of those questions will also come from a different source. According to the State House News Service, McDermott Ventures will replace Regan Communications as the public relations firm handling the project.

?When Related Companies and Beal were retained as development consultants for the Columbus Center project, the development team asked that all communications be coordinated through one party,? read a statement provided to South End Newsby McDermott Ventures, explaining the PR switch. ?McDermott Ventures has represented the Beal/Related team for the past five years and will handle all external communications during the analysis.?

Link to South End News site: http://www.mysouthend.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=&sc2=news&sc3=&id=80261
 
Re: Columbus Center

[size=+2]Columbus Center update: Sept. 25 meeting postponed[/size]

CCUpdate-Sep25meetingpostponed.jpg
 
Re: Columbus Center

I believe that the main tower, in the current plan, is 420 ft. and 35 stories.
 
Re: Columbus Center

[size=+2]Columbus Center Update[/size]

Meetings indicate movement on project

South End News ? September 25, 2008 ? by Scott Kearnan

A meeting scheduled for Sept. 25 between neighborhood residents and developers of the Columbus Center project has been cancelled due to an internal scheduling conflict. The meeting, originally announced in the South End News two weeks ago, would have been the third major meeting in ten days between organizations involved with the development of the beleaguered project.

The meetings have yet to yield any identifiable progress on a construction site that has remained dormant, save sporadic clean-up efforts, since March of this year. But rumblings have emerged that The Beal Companies of Boston and Related Companies of New York, tapped earlier this month as financial consultants by the Columbus Center developers, might be identifying ways to save the cash-strapped project.

Earlier this month, and shortly after Beal and Related were identified as consultants by the owners of the project, Massachusetts Turnpike Authority (MTA) spokesperson Mac Daniel confirmed that a meeting was set between the developing parties and the MTA for Sept. 15. The MTA is currently leasing the land for the Columbus Center project, and has been in talks with the developers since March to determine whether to grant their requested 18-month ?continuance on any further construction.?

Neighborhood residents, concerned about the practical and aesthetic repercussions of a permanent construction zone and eyesore, have been clamoring for a resolution and have grown increasingly frustrated with postponed deadlines for a decision. At a neighborhood meeting in May 2008, MTA executive director Alan LeBovidge promised residents that the agency would entertain negotiations with the developers for just one more month; if there was no assurance of continued progress at that point, said LeBovidge, the MTA would assume that ?this [construction] is not going to happen? and would press for full rehabilitation of the razed construction area [see ?Columbus Center countdown,? May 29].

Negotiations did continue, and when pressed for an explanation by South End News, MTA spokesperson Daniel identified the Sept. 15 meeting as the new goalpost for progress.

?There are delays, and we haven?t been pleased with them. They?ve probably frustrated us as much as they have the residents,? said Daniel at the time. ?If there is still an impasse reached [after September 15], then I think the executive director?s words to the residents back in May will hold true.?

Since the statement, Daniels has not returned multiple phone calls inquiring about the Sept. 15 meeting, which was closed to reporters, and negotiations remain ongoing between the Columbus Center developers and the MTA.

On Sept. 17, another meeting was held between the developers, representatives of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) and a small handful of community residents.

Among the residents was Ned Flaherty, a longtime critic of the project. Following the meeting, Flaherty began circulating via e-mail a memo of notes gleaned from the discussion. According to Flaherty, Beal?s Senior Vice President and General Counsel Peter Spellios identified costs associated with building seven acres of tunnels underneath the Columbus Center complex as the single most prohibitive element in moving the project forward. Flaherty said that the meeting emphasized a search for ?cost cutting? alternatives.

Other attending residents came away with a different analysis of the meeting. ?I don?t think I recall tunnels being mentioned,? said John Shope of the Bay Village Neighborhood Association. ?The discussion was mainly about finding ways to construct the site platform [over the turnpike] in a way that was financially viable.?

The development team says that all angles of the project are still being examined, and that it is too early to deem any single facet as the most prohibitive element.

?The tunnel costs are only part of our analysis,? said a statement released by The Beal Companies. ?We are reviewing the engineering and construction methodologies of the entire project top to bottom to be sure that every possible cost efficiency is explored and implemented.?

Also aired at the meeting was a new deadline for a viability report, to be prepared by the development team, on the future of the project.

?They said they would have news for the community and for us by November 15,? said BRA spokesperson Jessica Shumaker. ?At that point, they would come back and say whether they thought the project should go forward.? Shumaker categorized the Sept. 17 meeting as an ?update? and an opportunity for the developers to announce that ?they will be studying ways to bring the cost [of the project] down, and deciding from there whether to proceed.?

A follow up statement released by The Beal Companies did not reiterate the Nov. 15 deadline: ?We anticipate having a recommendation for the development team by the end of the year, at the latest.?

However, the development team also acknowledged community frustrations over the stalled project. ?The truth is, we would like to get back to the community as soon as possible,? said the developers in a statement. ?But we first need some time to complete our study. That said, we sympathize with a community who has seen a tremendous amount of starts and stops and will do our best to meet deadlines we have discussed with the community.?

Critics like Flaherty aren?t holding their breath. ?MTA and its developers have missed every major deadline they set for themselves over the last 13 years,? said Flaherty. ?So it?s no surprise that this week?s meeting ... wasn?t held.?

Other residents feel more comfortable with the level of communication.

?Frankly, I think we?ve had lots of communication,? said Shope. ?My position is that I don?t want to be invited to a meeting unless there is something to discuss.?

http://www.mysouthend.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=&sc2=news&sc3=&id=80825
 
Re: Columbus Center

So Ned, per your notes (according to this article), you state that the consultants find the cost of capping the highway the most cost prohibitive aspect of this project. I'm wondering if this changes your opinion that it is cheaper to build on top of a highway as it is to build on raw dirt, or are these consultants incompetent? Or, are they lying to help "California" steal more money from taxpayers?
 
Re: Columbus Center

Here is another article from the Back Bay Sun regarding the canceled meeting:

Columbus Center update: Sept. 25 meeting postponed

by Sandra Miller

The Columbus Center project continues to stop and start and stop again. A September 25 meeting about Columbus Center with the Cortes Street neighborhood and the Mass. Turnpike has been postponed, due to a schedule conflict from the Turnpike?s executive director. A rescheduled meeting will be announced soon, a Turnpike spokesperson said.

In the meantime, a meeting last week with the Columbus Center Community Construction Committee had developers stating they are still looking to build the deck all at once.

?They would not be changing the project,? said Deputy Director for Community Planning Randi Lathrop. ?They are particularly focusing on the platform.?

For 13 years, residents, city and state officials and developers have been working on the ambitious Columbus Center, which promises to link the South End and Back Bay by building over the turnpike and creating a hotel, residential, and retail complex. The project has received public subsidies totaling $116 million, but when the developers? request for more money was rejected, the project stalled and developers requested an 18-month extension to find more financing. The deadline to approve that extension has passed.

According to the cost consultants investigating the financial viability of the project, they may have found a less expensive way to build the seven acres of tunnels below the skyscraper complex.

that was first proposed 13 years ago. Beal?s Senior Vice President and General Counsel Peter Spellios said the "deck" would be called a "platform" due to a different and cheaper engineering technology that can be used. Such changes to the project are the key to making the project affordable, said Spellios.

Before the end of the year, if approved, the project will resume construction, continue its temporary suspension, or be canceled, said McDermott. City officials confirmed that the project would not differ from plans made and approved in 2003.

However, all involved look anxiously to a viability report due November 15 from Related Properties of New York and the Beal Companies of Boston. They were hired by the project?s owners, MacFarlane Urban Realty Co. and WinnCompanies, to evaluate the center?s viability, said Bruce Beal Sr., of the Beal Companies. CalPERS (California Public Employees Retirement System) is the primary financial backer of the project.

"The current go-or-no-go analysis is the final round, and there will be no more chapters after that," said Pamela McDermott, a spokesperson for the developers.

The meeting was also attended by McDermott Ventures? president and executive vice president, Mayor's Neighborhood Coordinator Tabitha Bennett, BRA Senior Planner Mary Knasas, John Herbert of the South End Ellis Neighborhood Association, John Shope of Bay Village Neighborhood Association, Lynn Andrews of Cortes Street residents, and Karen Lassiter and Joel Miller of Pope Condominium.

The BRA reports that the Columbus Center Committee is working with the developers to fix up the site in the meantime. ?They are going to move equipment and trailers, see if parking can be restored, and clean up the site as much as it can,? said Lathrop. ?Beal and Related will come back around November 15, and we?ll be meeting back with the construction committee.?

That?s another dubious deadline, said Columbus Center watchdog Ned Flaherty, of 75 Clarendon Street Condominium, who also attended last week?s meeting. He notes a long list of missed deadlines, including those set by the Turnpike Authority to approve the construction delay, a November 2007 deadline to have bank financing by January 15, then February 15. In April, the owners said they would regroup, talk to lenders, work with city and state officials, and come back with a new plan, according to one news story. But Columbus Center President Roger Cassin came back empty handed from a visit to his California financial backers.?We are spending $5 million a month on this,? Cassin told Banker & Tradesman. In May, the MTA set a June deadline to renegotiate, but the developers again missed that deadline, so the MTA extended that deadline to July. ?The owners missed that deadline, too,? said Flaherty.

Flaherty said experts disagree on whether the project can be saved, citing a meeting held last week where air rights developer John Rosenthal reportedly told Boston Redevelopment Authority and turnpike officials that such a project is cost-prohibitive, and that he believes that most of Boston's 23 air rights properties will never get developed.

According to Flaherty, the MTA still needs to revise the project?s lease. ?The developers defaulted on the 99-year lease signed in May 2006, when they failed to start construction on time and failed to obtain bank loans,? he said. ?Under the original lease, the seven acres of tunnels were to have been completed in October 2008, but nothing was ever built. And the latest version of that lease allows the developers to postpone completion to 2025.?

He also noted a revised agreement is needed with CSX, the freight railroad that owns some of the rail lines that would run through tunnels underneath the project; and a new lease is needed for Manulife Insurance, which donated land and funding for Garcia Park, but meanwhile has rented the land to Columbus Center for temporary equipment and materials storage.
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LINK

The two quotes in bold above I did not see in the South End News article (Maybe I just missed them when I read it). It looks like we are heading into crunch time. Hopefully, Beal and Related can work on the deck and get the cost cut back significantly, dump most or all of their public subsidy, and then start construction soon. While I believe that the resuming of construction prior to the end of the year is a bit ambitious, I feel like with these two new companies in the mix, CC just may have another chance at life...
 
Re: Columbus Center

Before the end of the year, if approved, the project will resume construction, continue its temporary suspension, or be canceled, said McDermott.
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How informative.
 
Re: Columbus Center

Well, at least that narrows the range of options, doesn't it.
 
Re: Columbus Center

atlrvr said:
So Ned, . . . you state that the consultants find the cost of capping the highway the most cost prohibitive aspect of this project. I'm wondering if this changes your opinion that it is cheaper to build on top of a highway as it is to build on raw dirt . . .?
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Re-read my post 1278 on 21 August 2008.

It?s still true, when comparing equivalent projects in the same neighborhood, that total development costs (not merely construction costs) are lower in air rights than on land. _ None of the facts that made that true have changed.

All that?s happened is that politicians are now being asked to swallow two stories:
1 ? The cost-cutting consultants just discovered the real problem: _tunnel cost.
2 ? Those same consultants just solved the problem that they discovered: _ build cheaper tunnels.

In 2005, the owners bragged that they?d already spent one decade paying $38 million to 100 engineers, lawyers, and architects for the current design, so if that is true then it?s unlikely that these suddenly cheaper tunnels would create such huge savings. _ Also, the owners have been cutting costs for 13 years, and everything that?s left is required for sales or for safety, so since the city and state won?t allow design changes, there?s nothing more to cut.

The owner-developers and their consultants can blame project failure on any problem they might wish to fabricate, and then appear to save the day with any solution they might wish to fabricate. _ But until the Commonwealth finishes a GAGAS (Generally Accepted Government Accounting Standards) public audit of the actual costs, revenues, profits, and subsidies, no one can know the extent to which government is being made wealthy, or getting robbed blind.

The continued secrecy of the financials indicates the latter, because owners who aren?t robbing anyone have nothing to hide.

Roger Cassin?s claim that he performs arithmetic differently than other people do ? and that his way of adding and subtracting digits is a company secret ? is more ludicrous than ever (?Developers decry data disclosure,? Boston Globe, 16 May 2003.)
 
Re: Columbus Center

^ So the consultants are both incompetent and lying, since you are saying their suggestion to lower the cost of tunneling wouldn't create huge savings, and that the project failure is for a reason they are "fabricating".

You, however, didn't allow for the fact that it really is more expensive, which I find odd. You state.

It?s still true, when comparing equivalent projects in the same neighborhood, that total development costs (not merely construction costs) are lower in air rights than on land.
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Since you mentioned "same neighborhood" as a qualifier, I'll point out that these same consultants are well into construction on a 30+ story highrise less than 300 feet from the site of Columbus Center. If it is more expensive to build on land, how did they manage to do it a block away, while they are indicating that the cost of the tunnels is prohibiting Columbus Center?
 
Re: Columbus Center

atlrvr said:
. . . So the consultants are both incompetent and lying. . .
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No. _ Re-read my message. _ I did not say the consultants are incompetent, nor did I say they are lying.

atlrvr said:
. . . you are saying their suggestion to lower the cost of tunneling wouldn't create huge savings . . .
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No. _ Re-read my message. _ I didn?t say that cheaper tunnels ?wouldn?t? create savings; I said they are ?unlikely? to do so, and that only a public audit will prove whether they do.

atlrvr said:
. . . you are saying . . . that the project failure is for a reason they are "fabricating".
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No. _ Re-read my message. _ I said that consultants who don?t disclose their data can fabricate whatever problems and solutions they wish, because no one has the data to prove anything one way or another.

atlrvr said:
. . . it really is more expensive . . .
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Untrue. _ Re-read my message. _ I did not say that ?it? is more expensive; I said that ?total development costs on land? are more expensive. _ I also said that an honest cost comparison requires equivalent projects in the same neighborhood; these two projects are nowhere near equivalent.

atlrvr said:
. . . these same consultants are well into construction on a 30+ story highrise less than 300 feet from the site of Columbus Center.
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In the land-versus-air cost comparison, it means nothing that a different proposal from a different owner got half-built nearby. _ A valid comparison requires equivalent projects. _ Although both proposals were for thirty-some floors, if that alone leads you to treat these two projects as equivalent, then you?re light years from understanding any of this, because such a comparison requires hundreds of factors, and you?re making your conclusion after considering only one of them.

atlrvr said:
If it is more expensive to build on land, how did they manage to do it a block away, while they are indicating that the cost of the tunnels is prohibiting Columbus Center?
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No one ?did it? one block away. _ In 3 years, one owner has half-built one project; in 13 years, another owner never built any part of a very different project. _ So what? _ The cost comparison you?re attempting is invalid to begin with: _ you are comparing two different owners, attempting two different projects.
 
Re: Columbus Center

*My head hurts*

You're using semantics to avoid the real issue.

Fine....I'll ask one last question.

What do you suppose the motivation for the consultants, Beal and Related (who are building a nearby high-rise), to conclude that the major barrier to Columbus Center is the cost of tunneling?
 
Re: Columbus Center

Apparently, "reporting" to the Back Bay Sun means, "taking some guy's quotes and just repeating them, without checking their accuracy."
 
Re: Columbus Center

This is what I got from Ned:

blah blah blah blah.

Sorry Ned but we've been saying CC is a different project from other buildings since like forever? It is built on air rights which requires a more complex strategy to build to avoid traffic problem, building a deck without collapsing, venting the tunnel, etc etc. No matter what or who develops the project, it will always be different. And yes, it will cost more even if the Clarendon was the same size and design. They can easily plant the core into the ground. CC on the other hand, requires that the deck is stable enough for support beams to divert the weight onto the wall and it also requires that the wall of the pike be strengthen. Until you give us proof that building a tower over air rights is more expensive than over land, I suggest you stop arguing. It's freaking common sense.
 
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