General Boston Discussion

Charlie_mta said:
I kind of like this one, though when it goes it won't break my heart. It has a definite sixties look, which I generally like.

800px-Bowdoin_station_headhouse_from_the_south%2C_April_2017.JPG
Click to expand...

What's great about this image, to me at least, is that it shows that Le Corb was on to... something... when he was designing Harvard's much-reviled Carpenter Center. If he'd had much better execution, I feel like he would've come up with a structure that had this kind of presence/environmental context.

Yet instead he blew it (to me at least) and created this hulking, gloomy, shadow-haunted fortress. I'm sure others will disagree with take, but I'm sticking to it!
 
DBM said:
What's great about this image, to me at least, is that it shows that Le Corb was on to... something... when he was designing Harvard's much-reviled Carpenter Center. If he'd had much better execution, I feel like he would've come up with a structure that had this kind of presence/environmental context.

Yet instead he blew it (to me at least) and created this hulking, gloomy, shadow-haunted fortress. I'm sure others will disagree with take, but I'm sticking to it!
Click to expand...
The Carpenter Center is ostensibly brutalist, but I see in it a lighter touch compared to many other brutalist buildings. The Carpenter Center has finer, slimmer features, more diversity of textures and angles, and it's pieces look slimmer and lighter, not so hulking and massive as on a typical brutalist building. But, yeah, the subway entrance at Bowdoin Sq does go even further away from Brutalism. It has a more refined and understated (non-brutalist) 60s look, a close relative to the 1950s mid-century look, which I absolutely love.

Here's a more complimentary photo I took of the Carpenter Center:

47777809852_6102e40b25_b.jpg
 
Last edited:
chrisbrat said:
gorgeous! ^^^
Click to expand...
I was going to high school just about two blocks from the Carpenter Center when it was built, and when it was done I used to walk up that ramp that passes through the center of the building every day from Harvard Square to the high school and back, oftentimes stopping in the art studio/museum to see what creativity was happening inside.. Aside from the nostalgia component, I really love this building. It looks more mid-century modern to me than brutalist. The concrete makes it look brutalist, but the form is more mid-century modern. Also, the pedestrian ramp up to and through the building fascinated me because the clean circular columns and the simple rectangular concrete superstructure (deck) of the pedestrian ramp was pretty much identical to the 1950/60s LA freeway overpasses, including the 4-level "Stack" interchange in the center of LA. It is unfortunate that this building gets a bad rap for being brutalist, when in my opinion it's a great building and a cut above the typical brutalist hulk.
 
Last edited:
Charlie_mta said:
Also, the pedestrian ramp up to and through the building fascinated me because the clean circular columns and the simple rectangular concrete superstructure (deck) of the pedestrian ramp was pretty much identical to the 1950/60s LA freeway overpasses, including the 4-level "Stack" interchange in the center of LA.
Click to expand...

Somewhere, somehow, I can hear Reyner Banham off in the distance singing this building's praises.
 
Charlie_mta said:
I was going to high school just about two blocks from the Carpenter Center when it was built, and when it was done I used to walk up that ramp that passes through the center of the building every day from Harvard Square to the high school and back, oftentimes stopping in the art studio/museum to see what creativity was happening inside.. Aside from the nostalgia component, I really love this building. It looks more mid-century modern to me than brutalist. The concrete makes it look brutalist, but the form is more mid-century modern. Also, the pedestrian ramp up to and through the building fascinated me because the clean circular columns and the simple rectangular concrete superstructure (deck) of the pedestrian ramp was pretty much identical to the 1950/60s LA freeway overpasses, including the 4-level "Stack" interchange in the center of LA. It is unfortunate that this building gets a bad rap for being brutalist, when in my opinion it's a great building and a cut above the typical brutalist hulk.
Click to expand...

I appreciate your vigorous defense of the building--and I've realized that my grievance with it overwhelmingly resides in the vast underspaces of it. There's just way too much overhang to it, once you're underneath the superstructure--and it creates a very alienating, gloomy, "go away!" atmosphere, I feel.

I look at the underspaces and they look to me like the optimal settings for some heinous misdeeds--like a mass execution, or brutal beating a la the tunnel scene in "A Clockwork Orange."

This, to be precise. That's a very dystopian view corridor, if you ask me--a perspective that Michel Foucault would've exploited in his critiques of surveillance, etc.

Again, though, I totally respect that others admire it as a masterpiece. No one can dispute its bold, clean sculptural forms.
 
In 2021, Boston Planners Approved More Parking Spaces Than Homes
3371-Washington-Street_creditBPDA.jpg


“According to year-end statistics compiled by the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA), City of Boston planners approved dozens of construction projects in 2021 that could give the city 7,887 new homes, 6 million square feet of new commercial space, and enough parking to store 8,668 more cars.

Nearly three-quarters of that new parking – 6,441 spaces – would be built in transit-accessible neighborhoods within a quarter-mile of an MBTA station.

Over the course of 2021, the BPDA approved 71 new development projects that include a combined total of 17.1 million square feet of real estate inside the city’s boundaries…”

https://mass.streetsblog.org/2022/0...ners-approved-more-parking-spaces-than-homes/
 
Arenacale said:
Really don't know where else to post this, but I figure it's relevant if any of it comes to fruition, since it would free up at least a chunk of the current JP VA campus.

Click to expand...
It doesn't say much about the Jamaica Plain VA hospital. that I could find. I'm a veteran and had a minor operation in that hospital., and they did a great job. I hope they keep on functioning at that site as they so effectively have. Wars aren't going away, unfortunately, and US veterans will continue to need extra care.
 
It does say that the JP campus was built in the 1950's and is in bad shape, they recommend consolidating some services on campus and moving others to West Roxbury and Weymouth in order to free up space for sale or development and lower operating costs.
 
Scott said:
It does say that the JP campus was built in the 1950's and is in bad shape, they recommend consolidating some services on campus and moving others to West Roxbury and Weymouth in order to free up space for sale or development and lower operating costs.
Click to expand...
That would be a disadvantage to veterans, as the Jamaica Plain hospital is centrally located on the Green Line, but the other two are out in the suburbs and not near any rail transit.
 
Charlie_mta said:
It doesn't say much about the Jamaica Plain VA hospital. that I could find. I'm a veteran and had a minor operation in that hospital., and they did a great job. I hope they keep on functioning at that site as they so effectively have. Wars aren't going away, unfortunately, and US veterans will continue to need extra care.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, the condition of the main tower is a huge issue. The exterior skin is in abysmal condition and inside the plumbing is aged beyond it's useful life. 1F (the newer building along South Huntington) is still in great shape and would be maintained, but repurposed as an outpatient clinic. The listed Facility Condition Assessment deficiencies of $561.6M is somewhat low and from a few years ago, there's an update to that number due in the next month or so. It would still serve veterans, but most of the surgical and specialties would move elsewhere.
 
Arenacale said:
Unfortunately, the condition of the main tower is a huge issue. The exterior skin is in abysmal condition and inside the plumbing is aged beyond it's useful life. 1F (the newer building along South Huntington) is still in great shape and would be maintained, but repurposed as an outpatient clinic. The listed Facility Condition Assessment deficiencies of $561.6M is somewhat low and from a few years ago, there's an update to that number due in the next month or so. It would still serve veterans, but most of the surgical and specialties would move elsewhere.
Click to expand...
Moving the surgical and specialties away from JP would not be ideal, but I suppose if the VA provided their own bus service from the current JP hospital to the new site, it might be an acceptable level of service. I hate to see veterans get sidelined,
 
JumboBuc said:
Closing the Bedford VA would open up a HUGE development opportunity in a desirable residential market. That site is enormous, but the condition of the current facility is a disgrace.
Click to expand...
It might end up being McMansions on 2 acre plots. The VA isn't on a main road
 
Arenacale said:
Unfortunately, the condition of the main tower is a huge issue. The exterior skin is in abysmal condition and inside the plumbing is aged beyond it's useful life. 1F (the newer building along South Huntington) is still in great shape and would be maintained, but repurposed as an outpatient clinic. The listed Facility Condition Assessment deficiencies of $561.6M is somewhat low and from a few years ago, there's an update to that number due in the next month or so. It would still serve veterans, but most of the surgical and specialties would move elsewhere.
Click to expand...
For what it's worth, this is the FY2022 proposed fiscally unconstrained 10 year project list for the VA sites in the Boston Area. Published before that assessment report, so any execution on those recommendations will be in the FY23 or 24 report. For now, I don't see any prospect for the sites to shift fundamental usages anytime soon, though it looked like W Rox and Brockton were planned to get new clinical capabilities and the JP tower reclad.
Screenshot_20220327-004349_Adobe Acrobat.jpg
Screenshot_20220327-005209_Adobe Acrobat.jpg
 
Last edited:
Scott said:
It might end up being McMansions on 2 acre plots. The VA isn't on a main road
Click to expand...

As far as Bedford goes, it's kind of a main road. I live literally down the street from it by two thirds of a mile and I see them walking/biking/scooting to the retail area on a daily basis, so I'm pretty familiar with the area. There's another proposal just west on about 50 acres (no specifics yet on how many units but it's calling for "single-family, townhouse, duplex, and apartment structures, including a three-story residence for the elderly") that the planning board has been very receptive to, so maybe something that isn't just single families on 1.25 acre lots could happen at the VA........ maybe?
 
I lived in the area too for quite a while and that comment based solely on the recent history of how Bedford has been zoned not on how much I like the town. I think Bedford is cute with a number of pretty good restaurants.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top