Education First (Phase III) | 10 North Point Blvd | Cambridge

I was out in North Point yesterday and they're really starting to ramp up construction. Lots of potential with the mixed used paths! I wish these buildings (the development as a whole) were more integrated though. This is sort of turning into a dense office park instead of a neighborhood.
 
sm89 said:
I was out in North Point yesterday and they're really starting to ramp up construction. Lots of potential with the mixed used paths! I wish these buildings (the development as a whole) were more integrated though. This is sort of turning into a dense office park instead of a neighborhood.
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The development plans have always looked more like an office park than a neighborhood. It's as though the various developers over time have thought this was the burbs.
 
sm89 said:
I was out in North Point yesterday and they're really starting to ramp up construction. Lots of potential with the mixed used paths! I wish these buildings (the development as a whole) were more integrated though. This is sort of turning into a dense office park instead of a neighborhood.
Click to expand...

The economy of this kind of planning drive that feeling. Kendall, Seaport, Northpoint all suffer from this and as I have posted too many times ... there is nothing you can do about it given the way our built environment develops. We let the markets drive what is possible, and what is required and put very little oversight on them ...and guess what? This is what you get. So ... this is the physical manifestation of our values. Bask in its freedoms.

cca
 
cca said:
The economy of this kind of planning drive that feeling. Kendall, Seaport, Northpoint all suffer from this and as I have posted too many times ... there is nothing you can do about it given the way our built environment develops. We let the markets drive what is possible, and what is required and put very little oversight on them ...and guess what? This is what you get. So ... this is the physical manifestation of our values. Bask in its freedoms.

cca
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But there are SO many ways in which the-powers-that-be do not "let the markets drive what is possible". Density, use, and height restrictions are foremost among them. These sort of things we exercise a shitton of "oversight" over, and what we end up with is far from what an unrestrained market would produce.

Some aspects of development and design draw a huge amount of attention from the public and the regulatory authorities that represent them, while other aspects get little to no attention.

The issue is not that we let the market dictate development, the issue is that we let the market dictate some design decisions but not others.

This is particularly pronounced in the suburbs. In the 128-belt town where my parents live, developers are given carte blanche to buy up charming and affordable pre-war ranches and colonials, tear them down, and put up soulless McMansion Hell-style 5-bedrooms in their place. There's a market for that, and just about anyone can do it with little municipal resistance. But god forbid a developer seek to build more than one housing unit on a single lot, which there is also a market for. Then they're chased out of town by the regulators.
 
The plan for Suffolk Downs seems to go against the market with small blocks of dense residential and retail planned. Assembly Square seems to be going in a different direction as well. Maybe if the Northpoint buildings were built where their huge park is and the park was spread around the perimeter of the cluster of buildings instead of the other way around, it would have made for a better urban feel.
 
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JumboBuc said:
But there are SO many ways in which the-powers-that-be do not "let the markets drive what is possible". Density, use, and height restrictions are foremost among them. These sort of things we exercise a shitton of "oversight" over, and what we end up with is far from what an unrestrained market would produce.

Some aspects of development and design draw a huge amount of attention from the public and the regulatory authorities that represent them, while other aspects get little to no attention.

The issue is not that we let the market dictate development, the issue is that we let the market dictate some design decisions but not others.

This is particularly pronounced in the suburbs. In the 128-belt town where my parents live, developers are given carte blanche to buy up charming and affordable pre-war ranches and colonials, tear them down, and put up soulless McMansion Hell-style 5-bedrooms in their place. There's a market for that, and just about anyone can do it with little municipal resistance. But god forbid a developer seek to build more than one housing unit on a single lot, which there is also a market for. Then they're chased out of town by the regulators.
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You make good points. The thing I have learned is that business drives taxes (expecially in Cambridge where there is so much tax coming from the business side) and land is expensive, and the city has no desire to force restrictions that tend to make the built environment: Multi-parcel blocks, density with punctured open space, and buildings that engage the street in active ways with retail and publicly accessible spaces). Thus ... we get what we get ... and generally there is not enough loud position to demand better. I vow to keep trying till my dying day because I believe in it .... but ... I understand why what we see at Northpoint happens. Its not wrong, it just is not the best we can have as a community. Unfortunately, there is no apparent value in that so nothing changes.
 
When there's a culture that politicians must control development, you get the development that politicians think citizens want, not the experimentation and traditional forms the market would supply.
 
goldenretrievers said:
more...
(source BLDUP)

34178155533_1bafee583e_b.jpg


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34988851455_0cedc09838_b.jpg
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Damn but that render cyclist gets confused easily and often. Maybe he's always just about to pass through and then he looks over and says, "Dammit, who is this dude taking my photo every five seconds? Can't a man in a floppy red cap just bicycle without everyone staring?"
 
timsox6 said:
Damn but that render cyclist gets confused easily and often. Maybe he's always just about to pass through and then he looks over and says, "Dammit, who is this dude taking my photo every five seconds? Can't a man in a floppy red cap just bicycle without everyone staring?"
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*hipster waldo
 
Nice!

Yeah, a lot of their vehicles look like they're gone for good now, too.

That happened a few weeks ago, too, but then they returned...
 
By 24 Sep, nearly the entire lot was cleared.

Today, these were erected (and they look great in evening light).

I did not bike past them on my way home, but I surmise they could be part of the ceremony/celebration accompanying a groundbreaking. Either that or the Circus is in town!!

YTMH6vCh.jpg
 
What's the story with the (nearly) empty parcel between EF1 and EF3?
 
Water department pump station. Immovable object.

cca
 
^Presumably could build over / around it? Or is the surrounding soil immovable too ?
 
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