I-90 Interchange Improvement Project & West Station | Allston

[TheRatmeister]

"Human scale"

proceeds to show massive boulevards and skyscrapers

 

[BosMaineiac]

"Human scale"

proceeds to show massive boulevards and skyscrapers

Here’s to hoping at least one of those massive boulevards (looking at cattle dr) has a dedicated transit median for bus and later light rail.

I agree, though, that massive boulevards should certainly be limited in this new neighborhood. I would think only 1 road going E/W and 1 N/S should have more than 1 travel lane in each direction

 

[Equilibria]

I'm desperately hoping that common sense will prevail and both the neighborhood and station will be "Beacon Park".

Or just "Allston".

Boston has a "West Station" that serves a similar purpose to North Station and South Station. It's called Back Bay.

 

[TheRatmeister]

Also just going further: The plan here is basically Seaport 2.0. A crap ton of commercial space, some luxury housing, not a lot else. Is that actually what Boston needs? It seems filling the northern hafl of the area with high density low-rises would be better, and help the area merge into Allston rather than sticking out like a sore thumb.

 

[nortor]

There is a survey on that website to share your thoughts https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1...3BCA/viewform?mc_cid=3a21aec91d&mc_eid=UNIQID. I shared that I think that both future proofing for a light rail corridor (via a busway or greenway with appropriate grading and connections) and ensuring the streets are actually human scale and safe for pedestrians should be prioritized in this new development.
I agree that more housing should be a priority as well (though I don’t think high rises are a big issue).

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Is this even what Harvard wants to build here, or is the state just wild-guessing at a bunch of blanks? The land owner's active input doesn't seem to prominently feature in these plans.

 

[The EGE]

My open-answer for that survey:

1. It is critical to prioritize housing at this location, especially since it has strong transit and bike/walk connections to major job centers and universities. This is a very rare opportunity to actually address the region's housing crisis by building dense, high-quality housing. Non-residential development should prioritize integrating those residents into the city (schools, daycare, grocery stores, commercial space affordable for small/new businesses) rather than offices or lab space. While some of the latter development is desirable here, the overall plan should add significantly more housing than jobs.

2. Streets should be built for people, not cars. All streets should have wide sidewalks and physically protected bike lanes and no more than one general traffic lane per direction. All intersections should incorporate modern design standards (bulbouts to reduce pedestrian crossing distances, no slip lanes, etc). Streets and signals should prioritize sustainable modes even if that inconveniences auto traffic. In particular, bikes and pedestrians approaching the rail station should not have to cross Pike ramps at grade. There should be no auto parking on block faces - what little parking is needed should be underground only, as surface parking uses valuable street space for low-productivity auto storage. Loading areas (freight and passenger) should be planned into the design, with freight loading off-street / in alleys as much as possible.

3. The site plan should also prioritize transit connections and service quality, including futureproofing for expansion. Any street (including Cambridge Street) with buses should have dedicated, enforced bus lanes and transit signal priority. Right-of-way should be reserved - likely on Cattle Street - for a future high-capacity (BRT or light rail) spur from Beacon Park or the Green Line B Branch to Harvard University, similar to that previously proposed for the Urban Ring. The rail station should be futureproofed for various possible Grand Junction service scenarios, including conversion to light rail.

4. The name "West Station" needs to be dropped. The analogy to North Station and South Station does not make sense - it is much further from downtown Boston than they are, and it is unlikely to be an intercity hub. "West Station" is also generic and has no connection to Boston or the neighborhood. Some version of "Beacon Park" or "Allston" would provide better wayfinding/branding and integrate the site into the existing neighborhoods.

 

[TheRatmeister]

"Constraint: There must be more stacking of different uses"

this plan was done by morons.

Anyway, here's my response:

1. This plan seems to entirely neglect what Boston needs. We don't need another Seaport, we need housing and areas where people can live.
2. Despite all the talk about human scale, you seem to have no idea what those words actually mean. Wide boulevards and skyscrapers are not human scale, low to medium rise (4-5 stories or fewer) with narrow streets designed for cyclists, pedestrians, and transit are.
3. You seem to treat mixing building uses as a drawback. Have we learned nothing from the high "separation of functions" planning of the late 20th century? Using lower floors for offices or retail and higher floors for residential is a key tool for making neighborhoods more pleasant to be in. Mixed use planning decreases travel times for residents, increases tax revenue, and creates a livelier city.
4. This plan does not reconnect Allston. Despite receiving a reconnecting cities grant, this plan opts to cleave Allston apart with high-rises rather than highways. Allson is defined by its medium-high low-rise density which has existed for over a century at this point, any plan for the area should be thinking about how to take that concept, which originated as transit-oriented development around the streetcars, and bring it into the 21st century with modern building designs. How could we use row-houses, triple-deckers, etc to drive density and create livable neighborhoods rather than highrises, and how should density be planned smartly to not feel like lower Manhattan, overwhelming and larger than life? Go read some Jan Gehl books if you need ideas.
5. Transportation is not adequately addressed with this plan. How will buses and other surface pass through this new area? How will West Station be designed not just as a Regional Rail infill station, but a future transfer hub between the Worcester Line, the Urban Ring, and a future Everett-Waltham subway line utilizing the Grand Junction corridor?
6. West station is a terrible name that vastly overstates its importance and makes no reference to its location. It should be called Beacon Park or Beacon Park Yard.

 

[Equilibria]

Also just going further: The plan here is basically Seaport 2.0. A crap ton of commercial space, some luxury housing, not a lot else. Is that actually what Boston needs? It seems filling the northern hafl of the area with high density low-rises would be better, and help the area merge into Allston rather than sticking out like a sore thumb.

So you're saying that this will be a bunch of new buildings that by dint of being new will be expensive. Yeah. So was the Back Bay. So was the South End. New stuff is more expensive unless you're building public housing.

Also, you can fit more housing in mid-rises than triple-deckers.

 

[TheRatmeister]

So you're saying that this will be a bunch of new buildings that by dint of being new will be expensive.

No I'm saying it will be primarily commercial space with a few penthouse apartments. Commercial -> Residential conversions aren't impossible but they're not an immediate thing and I think it's been pretty well demonstrated at this point that they aren't very popular with developers due to cost.

Also, you can fit more housing in mid-rises than triple-deckers.

If you only build triple-deckers, maybe. But the brownstones of the South End are denser than Seaport while also being a better place to live. Add in some taller buildings on street corners and the larger thoroughfares, plus a couple high-rise blocks for offices and lab space, and you've got yourself a neighborhood people actually want to live and work in. Here's what 25k people per square mile can look like, with buildings generally not higher than 4-5 stories.

 

[as02143]

Gosh this all looks like "YIMBY urbanism" meets "edge city" - like a Tysons Corner, Irvine, Walnut Creek, Seaport, Bellevue, or Century City but smaller, Harvard, and less ambitious.

Is this even what Harvard wants to build here, or is the state just wild-guessing at a bunch of blanks? The land owner's active input doesn't seem to prominently feature in these plans.

It seems like it's what BPDA wants to be built here.

 

[Longfellow]

I’m confused how skyscrapers “cleave” a community apart. And why we would want 5 over 1s instead of that. Cities are made of buildings, including tall buildings. Tall buildings should not be scary. They are non animate. A tall building has never endangered me or scared me

 

[Longfellow]

I guess to elaborate more, this is how people in Ohio talk about us, people who live in triple deckers. Oh, it’s unlivable, how can anyone live this way? We do it fine. People do live in tall buildings. Lower Manhattan - 50k/sqmi LES - 87k/sqmi… if you new built homely triple deckers on this brownfield site, it would probably be even more expensive than living in the back bay. I’m not sure what that does for affordability. We are extremely behind on housing production, we don’t need to build camberville again, we already know what that looks like.

 

[22marc]

I don't know how anyone is complaining about highrises in this spot. Asking for "high-density lowrises" is just going to give you the same slop they're building on the Everett/Chelsea line. Why can't we do what Canadian cities have been doing this past decade? Highrise apartments and condos spammed around a transit station.

Burnaby, BC for reference

 

[TheRatmeister]

Why can't we do what Canadian cities have been doing this past decade? Highrise apartments and condos spammed around a transit station.

You can, but that's not the only way, or even the best way, to have density. Coal Harbor, in downtown Vancouver, is less dense than the brownstones of the South End. If maximizing the number of units is what you're after, skyscrapers aren't the best way to do that. Population density in the South End is over 50k people per square mile. The 11th Arrondissement of Paris has a population density of over 100k people per square mile despite nearly all buildings being around 6 stories or shorter.

 

[kdmc]

You can, but that's not the only way, or even the best way, to have density. Coal Harbor, in downtown Vancouver, is less dense than the brownstones of the South End. If maximizing the number of units is what you're after, skyscrapers aren't the best way to do that. Population density in the South End is over 50k people per square mile. The 11th Arrondissement of Paris has a population density of over 100k people per square mile despite nearly all buildings being around 6 stories or shorter.

Yorkville in Manhattan has all of those beat with a density north of 150k per square mile. It looks to me like it started with the urban fabric of the South End (5 story rowhouses on small, narrow lots in a tight street grid), and while many of those mid rises are still there, it's grown up with serious high rises, peppered throughout without disrupting the street grid.

Unfortunately, new resi in Boston seems to follow the exact opposite strategy: mid rises on huge lots, each of which can only ever be redeveloped if you knock down the whole damn superblock.

I feel like debating mid vs high rise is a red herring. What really matters if we want density is a tight grid of small lots, which can start at whatever height you want, and then be progressively developed upwards by lot or by small cluster of lots (especially if the 2-staircase rule is ever eliminated). This is exactly the drum that @Charlie_mta has been beating over and over again in all the greenfield neighborhood development threads.

 

[KCasiglio]

I feel like debating mid vs high rise is a red herring. What really matters if we want density is a tight grid of small lots, which can start at whatever height you want, and then be progressively developed upwards by lot or by small cluster of lots (especially if the 2-staircase rule is ever eliminated). This is exactly the drum that @Charlie_mta has been beating over and over again in all the greenfield neighborhood development threads.

Jane Jacobs' 4 principles for good urbanism remain undefeated. Small blocks. Mixed Use. Diverse buildings. Density of people.

 

[F-Line to Dudley]

Yorkville in Manhattan has all of those beat with a density north of 150k per square mile. It looks to me like it started with the urban fabric of the South End (5 story rowhouses on small, narrow lots in a tight street grid), and while many of those mid rises are still there, it's grown up with serious high rises, peppered throughout without disrupting the street grid.

Unfortunately, new resi in Boston seems to follow the exact opposite strategy: mid rises on huge lots, each of which can only ever be redeveloped if you knock down the whole damn superblock.

I feel like debating mid vs high rise is a red herring. What really matters if we want density is a tight grid of small lots, which can start at whatever height you want, and then be progressively developed upwards by lot or by small cluster of lots (especially if the 2-staircase rule is ever eliminated). This is exactly the drum that @Charlie_mta has been beating over and over again in all the greenfield neighborhood development threads.

https://sunnysideyard.nyc/

The Sunnyside Yard air rights vision in NYC offers up a useful comparison for why the BP vision is so half-cocked. Housing (and affordability of housing) -first, transportation hub and mobility second. Small, walkable blocks instead of chunky blocks and stroads. And congruent (or transitional) density with the rest of the neighborhood instead of jarring change. It's pretty much everything we want here spelled out in plain English.

It can be done. The Planning Dept. just did no comparison-shopping with how other cities are treating similar-size slabs of new development.