Downtown Crossing/Financial District | Discussion

Ron: yes. As for the ex-Rogers Jewelry site, I can't tell what they are doing, if anything at all. The whole building is empty and decrepit.

BD: yes, there have been a number of gyms there, though at this point Winter has become Summer. The owner (the sign in the window may give a clue to his identity) is a philistine who milks this pathetic old structure, waiting for the day when the abutting Arch Street Church gets redeveloped into a high rise. I assume his strategy will be similar to Belkin, and that he believes ownership of this building gives him a foot in the door for the larger project. The Arch Street Church project was going to be a 40 story-ish office building, but vaporized during the last "once in a lifetime" economic collapse of the late 80's. At least they didn't dig the hole first.
 
The latest gym is still in that building, they seemed to have moved to the upper floor and their entrance is a single glass door on Arch St that used to serve as CVS' fire exit. Sad and strange.
 
You have to negotiate the bum gauntlet and tip toe through the urine to get to it.
 
More exercise! It's all included in your membership! :)

BTW: I don't know how I missed this before, but it is sheer brilliance:

tobyjug said:
Put water in the hole, let it freeze, and voila: Clark Rockefeller Center.
Click to expand...
 
I'm sure I agreed to that post already, but it's a damn good idea to waste time until spring.
 
I honestly believe that come spring, what with Obama in office and the hope he brings, the banks letting loose some of the bailout money for development projects and with the small help of the Mayor's office with their loan initiative, things will start happening. This whole country, let alone Boston, needs a re-boot and I think it will happen. After all, what's the alternative?
 
I am no where near as optimistic as you. These banks aren't lending the money that was given to them, they are using it to pay off their bad debts.

Think of it this way: You have a giant credit card bill and lose your job. Then someone gives you a whole bunch of money and says "Go out and spend this!" What do you do? You still have no job and a whole lotta debt. You probably try to pay off your credit card as much as possible.
 
One problem in your logic Van-banks aren't jobless. There are still 'good investments' out there, and they still get revenue. They needed the bailout because they had so many 'bad investments' that their revenue would no where near cover the costs of paying their debts. Now that the debt is on Sam's House, they can use their previous revenue to achieve a state where they can lend money-and hopefully, not make the same mistakes they did before.

Although, I am doubtful this will happen by the spring.
 
Yes, there are good investments, but the only liquidity you can drown your sorrows in is in soup and gin companies.

Real estate, though, just doesn't taste as good right now as Campbell's.
 
I'm usually skeptical about claims of the "terror" in DTX, but I must admit to being a little down today. We had yet another ritual Friday 4 pm shooting. This time the lead was flying by Temple and Washington. I was barely out the front door wandering over to the Brattle Bookstore for a weekend book, and nearly got rundown by all the cruisers and ambulances responding to the violence.

I say it without being facetious: you are safer at midnight in DTX than on any Friday afternoon. I wouldn't want to be one of the folks stuck riding the Silver Line with the troublemakers.

It will be interesting to see if it makes the papers. City Hall doesn't like this sort of press. The politicians must do better than holly wreaths and civil service Santas.
 
So I got off the T at DTX today and holy shit did a bomb go off? Toby your pictures don't really express the largess of the demolition. It felt like Ground Zero. While I was taking pictures I over heard a number of people walking by talking about the tower and why there is a giant hole in the ground.
 
The section of Washington Street from Borders Books north to the Old State House is becoming really desolate. More storefronts are vacant than occupied, and one of the big occupied ones, FedEx-Kinko's, has a sign saying that it will close for good on December 31.
 
Teen hurt in shocking downtown shooting
By O?Ryan Johnson and Christine McConville | Saturday, December 27, 2008 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Local Coverage
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1141398

Downtown gunplay turned tourists and bargain-shoppers into crime witnesses during a shooting yesterday afternoon that sent a teenager to the hospital with a bullet wound to the hip and left the city?s busy tourist spot stunned by violence.

?A shooting in broad daylight? This is insane,? said Sean Kenney, 52, of Ireland, who brought his family to Boston for the holiday but vows never to return. ?I?m just glad my wife and children are already at the hotel.?

Witnesses said a group of five to nine men in their late teens or early 20s were on the corner of Washington Street and Temple Place, when one pulled a gun and fired at the victim.

?(The shooter) couldn?t have been more than 3 feet away,? said a witness, who himself was no more than 20 feet from the shooting. ?The guy stumbled across the street towards the sausage stand and fell down.?

At the time of the shooting, the shopping district was filled with people. There were bargain hunters from around the world and Bostonians making holiday returns. There were also several mother-and-daughter pairs leaving ?The Nutcracker? at the nearby Opera House. As the shots echoed off downtown real estate, the group scattered, but two MBTA Transit Police spotted them fleeing and gave chase.

?There were four shots. It was bang, bang, bang, bang,? said a 61-year-old Boston woman who had hit the stores at the Corner Mall after she left her downtown office job. ?There was a man running. He was well dressed. And he was being chased by a police officer with a pony tail. She was running with her gun drawn.?

The female transit officer chased two men down Washington Street toward City Hall, then veered left toward Boston Common and split up. A male transit cop chased three men down Temple Place toward Boston Common.

No one has yet been arrested for the shooting. Police superintendent Raphael Ruiz said the gunman was described as a dark-skinned, Hispanic male in his early 20s wearing a red cap and dark colored jacket.
 
Ron Newman said:
What happened? Did someone try to rob Macy's or one of the jewelry stores?
Click to expand...

It is all about punks from somewhere else bringing their beefs to my neighborhood. Maybe that's the downside of living in a "crossing". And it is usually on a Friday. It is always 3:30 to 5 p.m., in "broad daylight" as the frightened Irish tourist observed. This is the sort of story you used to read about the South End 20 or 30 years ago before hipsters like Jimbo...er, Johnny A moved in.

Enjoying life in DTX is like enjoying Francois Villon. Either you do or you don't. But if I were a retailer, I wouldn't want to bet my living on the patronage of those who do.
 
tobyjug said:
It is all about punks from somewhere else bringing their beefs to my neighborhood. Maybe that's the downside of living in a "crossing". And it is usually on a Friday. It is always 3:30 to 5 p.m., in "broad daylight" as the frightened Irish tourist observed. This is the sort of story you used to read about the South End 20 or 30 years ago before hipsters like Jimbo...er, Johnny A moved in.

Enjoying life in DTX is like enjoying Francois Villon. Either you do or you don't. But if I were a retailer, I wouldn't want to bet my living on the patronage of those who do.
Click to expand...
^ sort of like living in Dot
 
Well, there may be some glimmer of hope for the old McDonald's space, as when I walked by this morning, workers were tossing all the old McDonald's food equipment into a dumpster on the street.
 
"Violence rises in Hub shopping area
Crossing into gangland
By Jessica Van Sack / The Beat | Monday, December 29, 2008 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Local Coverage

As Mayor Thomas M. Menino eyes ambitious plans to revitalize Downtown Crossing, cops on the ground say they?re seeing more gangbangers gravitate toward the hapless tourist and shopping haven, where a brazen daylight shooting sent tourists and shoppers ducking for cover Friday afternoon.

?We?re seeing more and more gang kids here,? one law enforcement source said. ?For them, this area is like an oasis.?

In front of Macy?s on Friday, crowds of bargain-hunters instead got bloodshed as a hail of gunfire rang out and a 19-year-old male took a bullet to the leg. The frightening scene featured MBTA Transit cops with their guns furiously chasing after two suspects who bolted from the swarm.

?Downtown Crossing has done very well this holiday shopping season,? said Dot Joyce, Menino?s spokeswoman. ?We hope this one incident doesn?t deter them from shopping there in the future.?

Yet this wasn?t an isolated incident. Gangbangers who traverse the area also turned violent Oct. 3, when a man opened fire on a crowd of rivals near Bromfield Street. No one was hit, but amid the wild melee, two men were stabbed. Cops at the time were looking for six teens.

Like Friday?s shooting, the violence broke out on a weekday shortly before rush hour. Days later, Boston Police Superintendent Daniel Linskey called together a full-court press of transit cops, school police and youth workers to brainstorm ways to tackle youth violence in Downtown Crossing.

Rosemarie Sansone, a former city councilor who now heads the Downtown Crossing Partnership, said her organization is meeting with cops this week to discuss the recent violence.

?Public safety is our number one concern,? she said.

Linskey disagreed yesterday that the area is falling prey to gang violence. He did acknowledge deploying more specialized units to the area. Their presence was on full display yesterday as bicycle cops patrolled bustling Washington Street.

Downtown Crossing has long been the grittiest downtown enclave, but local merchants say the blight resulting from the closure of Filene?s seems to have coincided with the area?s increased attractiveness to gangbangers, truants and drug dealers alike.

?There?s more drug dealers on the street,? said 18-year sausage vendor Gabriele Ruiz. ?At the same time, there?s more police.?

Al Rackard, a security guard at the Corner Mall, calls the cops every day, he said, mostly on youth who loiter, fight or shoplift.

?I guess it?s now the place to hang,? he said. ?This is the crossroads for everyone who?s trying to get away from somebody.?
Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view.bg?articleid=1141762"
 
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