Life Sciences Bldg | 4054 Mystic Valley Parkway | Wellington | Medford

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Plans for a proposed life sciences development on Mystic Valley Parkway will be unveiled at a community meeting in September.

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Rise Together / Rise Development proposes the now-standard life-sciences building about 8/10 of a mile walk from the Wellington T, on the site of what is currently a Bertucci's (and next to the Middlesex court building)

4054 Mystic Valley Parkway
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Rise Together is really betting strong on Orange Line "North".. I like it (as a business plan), it's a gold mine out in the open.

Architecturally, the base reads as a gimmick that's alien from the rest of the building, but I think the rest of the building is tastefully done.
 
Orange Line "North".. I like it (as a business plan), it's a gold mine out in the open.
I agree. Once the Orange Line has 4.5 minute headways during rush hour and 95% OTP in an all new fleet, it really will become much more of a peer to the Red Line.
While it may be (I haven't checked) that the Red is seeing more development in total (though Davis-Porter-Harvard-Central are looking kinda stale), North Orange is seeing a bigger change from "before" to "after" at nearly every station:
  • North Station towers
  • Community College (access to "New Lechmere")
  • Sullivan Square (the next "Assembly" once it gets its grid)
  • Assembly as the "proof of what can be done"

Sadly Wellington itself, given the rail yard and parking lot is a bit of the hole-in-the-middle-of-the-donut for its walkshed, ensuring that the station is 0.2 miles away from anything you've gone there to do.

And I'm still waiting for that Infill station at Medford St in Malden (midway on one of the larger gaps in the HRT system...that between Wellington & Malden Ctr)
 
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There is soooo much land around here.
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Ive always wondered if theyd ever come up with a comprehensive plan to redevelop this area with a new street grid and dense infill development. The entire triangle is an enormous parcel of land, right near transit, being wasted with acres of parking lots, strip malls, and open space. I wish they would come up with a masterplan that would allow new buildings to be built according to where the new roads are going to go. With transit close by it seems like a huge missed opportunity if they dont.
 
Agree with all this. Probably much better to be building tons of dense housing out here instead of competing with slightly more in town locations for labs.
 
There is soooo much land around here.
View attachment 16983 Ive always wondered if theyd ever come up with a comprehensive plan to redevelop this area with a new street grid and dense infill development. The entire triangle is an enormous parcel of land, right near transit, being wasted with acres of parking lots, strip malls, and open space. I wish they would come up with a masterplan that would allow new buildings to be built according to where the new roads are going to go. With transit close by it seems like a huge missed opportunity if they dont.
I always wondered what the history of that giant marsh/forest in the middle was. Is it super contaminated? Is it just a remnant of the larger marsh that never got filled for some reason? I suppose its pretty much impossible to fill wetlands nowadays but in my imaginary vision for that area that could be the park anchoring the larger surrounding development and could have a system of boardwalk pathways throughout. And maybe a parkland link to the mystic valley parkway negotiated with one of the developers of those sites.
 
It seems like the marshy patch with the WEEI tower is just the part that developers never thought to landfill surrounded by the parts they did fill

A quick check on HistoricAerials.com suggests roughly:

1943: Parkway built east-west across wetland on both sides (turning Wellington from a north-south-east Tee into a four points intersection


1958: commercial bulidings along parkway on its north side (eg the Bertuccis site and this thread site) Meadow Glen Drive in Theater seems to go from 1960 to 1980.

1968 ish, McDonald Park is fill atop marshland (using the spoils from cutting I-93 through the Fells hills)

1973 ish: shopping mall / parking lot

(dates may off due to map lagging reality)
 
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I think that's (above) the old render (with curvy, interesting ground level). The more recent render has been Value Engineered down to the ground floor closely following the angles of the floors above.
 
I've long wanted that northside of MVP to be taller so as to give more people better access to McDonald Park which today is a very "drive-to" destination (if anyone uses it all :-(
 

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