Re: Rose Kennedy Greenway
I'm surprised anyone remembered me. By the way I?m missing the preposition "to" in my last post. Find where I left it out and win a prize.
So if you want a rant, I'll give you a rant. I don't post often but I read a lot therefore I have a lot to say. To make up for this I promise to take my digital camera out more and post some pictures.
I really think some of you guys are overstating your points here. I don?t appreciate homogenized urban places or family friendly locals because there usually visually dull, or contain nothing of interest to me. But there is nothing inherently wrong with that. Furthermore I don?t believe in this theme park-ization or whatever you might call it of urban development. I believe it?s merely the same thing that has always been happening in cities just in a different form.
To address the first issue. It?s important to keep in mind that the city is the regional hub of economic and social activity. As a result there are a diverse array of residents living in different kinds of neighborhoods who demand different things out of the city. One example, Quincy Market acts as the regions draw for many suburban families who want to spend a day shopping in Boston rather then in Natick or Burlington. It attracts commerce and generates economic activity; otherwise it would have been lost to the suburbs. As much as you may deride its existence it is a great asset to the city. One could make the argument that without places like Faneuil Hall, Quincy Market, the Aquarium or the Freedom Trail, all products I believe of the White administration in the 80?s, (when the city started to turn around) people wouldn?t have wanted to come back into the city and then start investing in it again. Though I might not want to go down there on a Saturday, a lot of other people do. Are the abundance of shops, restaurants, shoppers, street musicians and entertainers as well as hotels, offices and now parks around Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market bad because families want to go there? I?d say it?s a pretty successful urban environment.
CZSZ said, in regard to family friendly and homogenizes uses crowding out the city?s public spaces, ?EnchantedVillage/Chowder Fest and other nonsense that occupies City Hall Plaza on its two purposeful days?? Here are some other functions that City Hall Plaza holds in the summer: A BBQ Beach Party, Hip Hop Festival, Free Gospel Fest, Cape Verdian Beach Party and now and again they get a circus and I think theres even a market there on weekends correct me if I?m wrong. Granted I?m really only interested in the BBQ, and possibly the gospel music but overall that doesn?t sound particularly homogeneous or dull.
I am a 20 something working professional and as far as I am concerned, and I?ve been here 5-6 years, I have been able to find plenty of lovely places within and around the city that I can use without being bothered by tourists or suburbanites. Neighborhoods like Central and Inman Square, Allston-Brighton, JP and Brookline have served me pretty well. I've found plenty of interesting places with like minded people in this city. I've enjoyed events in the Common, Downtown and in the Seaport, found independent bookstores, good bars and lovely parks. If your looking for a good bar, restaurant, concert space, bookstore or coffee house PM me I'll recommend something. I can go on but the real point is there are enough different places for everyone in this city that we don?t need to vilify and marginalize places like Quincy Market, the Seaport and The Greenway because they fit with our vision of what the city should looks like. I still not going down to Quincy Market because there nothing there I want to buy. But I could still go down there and appreciate what a pleasant public space it is while I watch the crowds at any time of day and in any season.
Now if you want to discuss ways to make enhance these areas that?s a different topic all together. I have plenty of ideas about that.
Now to my second issue. In order to create vibrant urban places you need to create the spaces within which they can function. With an example like the seaport you basically a blank slate, all the land you need but no way to attract investment. Fact is with the economics of the day you?d like to attract businesses to the area before you start to build. In order to do that you need a reason for people to go down there, a museum perhaps, or a convention center, maybe a outdoor concert space. Any use that will create other uses, hotels, restaurants, shops etc are preferable. That creates the critical mass necessary to start an area growing. In olden times that could have been something as simply as a factory, now it?s a convention center. Lets not forget cities exist for reasons independent of utopian planning principles. Once someone creates the space then its there and given time many different tenants may inhabit it, the uses will evolve and so will the character of the neighborhood. I don't see how thats not happening in the seaport.
If now-a-days, to get the project off the ground you need large corporate tenants who have the capital to take the risk and invest in the building then so be it. If you want to build a consortium of small business owners who pool their money together and invest it in a new project, so they can carve out a place within the neighborhood I would encourage you to do so. But what is most important to the city is that it create the space to grow and expand. Now as far as not laying the ground work for the area, they extended a highway, put exits in, paved a few new streets, added a mass transit line and put in place zoning regulations to govern the growth. What more do you want the city to do.
My overall point is that if a city functions the way it should it will provide the space so that all the social and commercial activities of its large and diverse citizenry are represented somewhere with in its greater political boundaries. Conventioneers, tourists and family?s are ?real? people too. The processes of development are just as natural as they ever were. This myopic view presents Boston has some sort of theme park is a unfairly critical. Boston functions pretty well, arguable better than all but 10, maybe 5 places in the entire United States. Not that we need to cut it some slack but lets at least keep the criticism constructive.
