Downtown Crossing/Financial District | Discussion

Your anus says what?

From yesterday's Globe article:

The Midwood development is the latest in a buzz of development to hit Downtown Crossing. The city estimated there are 2,900 residential units in the neighborhood, with 1,350 more under construction, including college dorms.

Indeed, Menino kicked off his walking tour of Downtown Crossing at the Hayward Place parking lot on Washington Street, where a $200 million, 14-story residential and retail building is planned.
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Hayward Place??????????? BEEEEE SEERIOUSSSSSS!
 
Feel the buzz.

L10901522.jpg
 
Along the way, he singled out improvements such as new greenery-filled planters
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Has anyone else seen these?

Does anyone else agree with me that they look like shit?
 
^^^

Yes, now that you mention it, I noticed them while walking thru Downtown Crossing this morning. There huge to the point that they are somewhat of a sidewalk obstruction (I was walking next to other pedestrians and had to fall back when my path was blocked by these round planters). I saw three of them grouped together on the street corner in front of CVS (Summer and Chauncy Streets). The sidewalk is fairly wide so you can pretty much walk around them, but they are fairly large.

Overall I think they are very underwhelming, not hideous, but not good looking either.
 
You that ugly gray that concrete becomes after a few years outside without being cared for?

These came in that color.

These things are brand new and they look 10 years old.
 
I think the planters are all right, nothing spectacular but better than nothing IMO.
 
Down by the parking lot across from the Paramount (I refuse to call it a development site) the planters practically eliminate the sidewalk. I'll admit that together with the hanging plant baskets, it looks jolly and pink, even if though incommodes the passersby.

I was quietly enjoying numerous adult beverages at Vinalia last night. The Mayor was there trying to con the mugs (I mean pursuade the investors) about the many wonderful opportunities available in the neighborhood. The Guinness was good.
 
BRA eyes Downtown ?Meeting Place?
By Donna Goodison
Saturday, July 12, 2008


Downtown Crossing businesses next week will receive a take-home blueprint of city consultants? recommendations to turn the area into ?Boston?s Meeting Place.?

The executive summary will capsulize Toronto-based Urban Marketing Collaborative?s branding and identity strategy work for Downtown Crossing over the last two years and urban design goals.

?It?s a marketing tool to be used by retailers and property owners to entice people to Downtown Crossing,? said Randi Lathrop, the Boston Redevelopment Authority?s deputy director of community planning.

The city?s revitalization efforts are becoming more apparent in the long-struggling district. Its work was buoyed this week by news that Midwood Management plans a $200 million, 28-story retail and residential project at Bromfield and Washington streets. Mayor Thomas M. Menino said the $650 million redevelopment of the Filene?s block by Vornado Realty Trust will force other property owners to spruce up their businesses. The city will work with new retailers to improve building facades as they move in, he said.

?The facade of a building is really what sells a business and invites you in,? Menino said.

The Downtown Crossing Partnership will lead a renewed effort to establish a business improvement district (BID) for Downtown Crossing. The plans call for raising up to $4 million annually from property owners to fund a public-safety program, events and marketing. The BID will take 12 to 18 months to get off the ground, according to Lathrop.

Though past efforts have failed, Menino said there?s increased support this time around.

?It?s a different form of a BID district than we had before,? he said. ?It?s more about promotion of the district and what it looks like.?

Vornado backs plans for a BID, said Russ DeMartino, vice president of development. ?We?re part of very successful BIDs in New York City, and we?re very supportive of it,? he said.

The city also is designing a new interactive Web site to market Downtown Crossing and its stores and eateries.


Link
 
What will really push DTX into a desdination would be to keep it open later. I remember going to a show at the Orphium that got out at 10:30pm and everything around there was closed. Washington St could be so much more (and as much as it pains me to say this), it could be the Times Sq of Boston (it used to be the Herald Sq of Boston).

The city needs to do a better job of connecting the Theatre District with DTX. There needs to be a flow of people to give the whole area life. Once you get people moving in and out then more people will want to be there. The biggest obstacle to this is the dead zone from Macy's to Hayward Pl. There is no life down at this end of DTX and that leaves people to wander and get lost even though they are just around the corner from the Theatre District.

Here's an idea, how about the city cuts a new street from the corner of Washington and Essex St diagonally to the corner of Stuart and Tremont St. With the new W Hotel going up, this would give the pedestrian a visual landmark to continue walking south and west from DTX. This would also connect Chinatown to DTX and the Theatre District better by creating an anchor square, a nexus if you will, where multiple neighborhoods end and begin. This lets the pedestrian know where they are and where they can go.
 
I think the Mayor for Life should personally install a giant "MAPPIN" at DTX -- presumably as near to the old shoppers park as can be accomodated by the construction at Filenes

By the way -- whatever becme of the bronze art iembedded in the street (Asartoon) that was installed during Kevin White's nearly Mayor for Life tenure?

Westy
 
A better model for Downtown Crossing is the rabbit-warren of streets around Shibuya.

2577285748_710dbbe610_b.jpg


(One of my favorite shots from my trip in April of '06)
 
Ah but there is no Giant or ottherwise Mappin

Neon is nice at night -- but you need a Mappin to really put a place on a Map during the daytime

westy
 
vanshnookenraggen said: "Here's an idea, how about the city cuts a new street from the corner of Washington and Essex St diagonally to the corner of Stuart and Tremont St. "

This same concept at exactly the same location was proposed by the BRA in their 1967 comprehensive plan for Boston. In their proposal it would have been a pedestrian only street. One open to vehicular traffic would be better, as your idea would provide.
 
I think replacing the theaters which were torn down to relink the district would be better than cutting an odd angle street. New theaters on the corner of Washington and Lagrange and Washington and Stuart, perhaps one more at the corner of Tremont and Stuart, would make the connection to the rest of the theater district complete.
 
Waldorf said:
What is this Mappin you keep mentioning?
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I think this is what Westy's referring to...in the last paragraph.
From Howie Carr's column (mocking the mayor's Boston accent) in the Herald the other day.


In Mumbles? Hub, stuff ?mappens?
By Howie Carr
Sunday, July 13, 2008 - Updated 1d 7h ago
+ Recent Articles Boston Herald Columnist


Mumbles Menino - he?s not just your mayor, he?s your tour guide. Got the can?t-afford-to-go-on-vacation summertime blues? Is the price of gasoline, and in a few months heating oil, keeping you close to home this summer?

Mumbles feels your pain. Let?s go straight to the audio, all of which you can hear at bostonherald.com. As we join the mayor of summer, he is speaking at the Frog Pond on the Boston Common:

?These cost increases can get away-a havin? summer fun ba only we let it.?

That?s right. Or, as FDR might have put it, ?We have nuttin? ta fear ba fear itself.?

So Mumbles, what would you suggest people do, if they?re flat broke and can?t leave the city?

?When you tryin? to plot your summer fun, look for the oversized mappens, they?ll be at different lo- attractions across our city.?

Mappens? Usually I can figure out whatever Mumbles is babbling about. This time, I drew a blank, until someone pointed out that the city has been putting up, not mappens, but map pins, giant ?oversized? map pins at alleged major tourist attractions. I actually saw the ?mappen? on the Common on Friday.http://www.bostonherald.com/news/opinion/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1106662
 
I dont know much about the theater scene. I know Bostons is pretty good, but could it support that many new theaters?
 
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