MA Casino Developments

[TheRifleman]

The Garden is centralized has direct access to Commuter Rails
Along with Orange and Greenlines: No need to Drive.

The only way to get to the casino is to drive. Wake the fuck up.

This is why the Casino would been better located in the city of Boston.

85% of people that are attending a game or an event take the Mass Transit: People have the option to drive into the city and know what they are getting themselves into:

That won't be the case for the casino: 100% need to drive somewhere to get to the casino.

This is why I'm so upset with our Leaders given taxbreaks or tax incentives to help these developments to lower their costs when the Transit Grid needs a massive upgrade which would help make things become more efficient throughout the city.

 

[davem]

Except they won't. Maybe more people from the burbs will, but people who live in the city are going to have an inherent desire to get there via transit. The casino isn't that far a walk from Sullivan, and once the rotary is blown up it will be a much more pleasurable experience. If people walk across the Mass Ave bridge they will do this to. Besides, its not like there won't be a bus and shuttles.

High rollers are going to drive no matter where a casino is. Tourists will probably take a cab or a hotel shuttle, since most don't seem to drive when here. The majority of locals will take the T, because they are used to walking and making connections and switching modes. People from the burbs may or may not drive. And if you don't think people are driving to Fenway or the Garden right now, well, I've got a bridge to sell you.

I mean Jesus, Sullivan is closer to the casino than my house is to the nearest bus stop. A walk I make every day. Just because you never use the T unless it's a single seat ride on HARD RAILS, Rif, doesn't mean a lot of other people won't.

 

[Arlington]

The only way to get to the casino is to drive.

But not during rush hour (has this sunk in?), and not as big as a rush hour (as demonstrated above). Saturdays are (already) by far the biggest traffic day of the week in total trips per day because we live in Henry Ford's America and cars are even moreso a leisure/social tool when they're not being used for work.

Think about it: everyone who has a car makes *several* shop/leisure/chore/sport trips on Saturday who, during the week may make just 1 commute trip or only go by transit). Zipcars sell out on Saturdays for the same reason: people jump out of the dense, transit-accessible paths to do their ideosyncratic thing on Saturday. They do it all day long and everywhere a car can go.

So Saturdays are BUSY-BUT-RARELY-CRUSHED because it is all spread out evenly and never builds to a painful peak. (Notable Saturday crushes, like Christmas Shopping prove this rule. Cars only peak when NEAR EVERYONE decides to go the same place at the same time: Commute. Christmas Shop. Thanksgiving Wednesday between 3 and 6pm.) Outside that, no one venue holds near everyone or enduringly-crushes the road grid.

Which anyone with a normal reaction to facts (or stress) has seen.

Even Bieber can't draw to the Casino beyond the limit of its largest performance-venue seating (anyone have a number?). 1,000? 5,000? (actually, you need to pick a performer whose demographic is legal to gamble, so maybe Timberlake? Buble?). If you really can draw more than that, you will be at the Garden still.

Any other peak loading on the circles (Wellington, Santilli, Sullivan, Sweetser(99@16)) is already goingn to be handled with the $500m over 15 years, including 20m for Sullivan early on, that Wynn has already committed to. You sound like you're precommitted to saying "that's half what we need" no matter what number we come up with.

 

[George_Apley]

The Garden is centralized has direct access to Commuter Rails
Along with Orange and Greenlines: No need to Drive.

But people do. Thousands of them do.

The only way to get to the casino is to drive. Wake the fuck up.

Then let's push for the fist leg of the UR from Lechmere to the Airport via the Eastern Route. Get a stop for Gateway/Wynn. Advocacy can be done without Doomsday bullshit.

This is why the Casino would been better located in the city of Boston.

Sure. In the Seaport. But it's not.

85% of people that are attending a game or an event take the Mass Transit: People have the option to drive into the city and know what they are getting themselves into: That won't be the case for the casino: 100% need to drive somewhere to get to the casino.

I don't know the facts on this, but I'll guarantee you that WAY more than 15% of people drive to Garden events.

This is why I'm so upset with our Leaders given taxbreaks or tax incentives to help these developments to lower their costs when the Transit Grid needs a massive upgrade which would help make things become more efficient throughout the city.

City tax breaks don't go to transportation upgrades because city property tax revenue does not go to the MBTA or DOT.

 

[pixelsand8]

The casino isn't that far a walk from Sullivan, and once the rotary is blown up it will be a much more pleasurable experience. If people walk across the Mass Ave bridge they will do this to.

Not to argue your point but you can't compare the Mass Ave bridge to Alford Street. One has beautiful skyline and sunset views and is always crowded due to being a major connection between two very pedestrian heavy areas. The walking route from Sullivan to the proposed casino is ugly, industrial and desolate. Nobody is going to walk that unless they have to.

 

[Arlington]

The walking route from Sullivan to the proposed casino is...

...8/10ths of a mile, generally considered too far for most people (who consider 3/10th to 5/10th of a mile to be their limit for being worth a T-and-Walk trip). Very clever reworks at the T station and a shortcut bridge to Wynn's waterfront might cut that walk to 7/10ths, at best. It will always be a long walk.

I agree that "nobody will walk" is the best guess we have now.

It is, however, near-perfect for a shuttle bus:
- 2 stops
- Both stops visible from the other
- You'll practically be able to see your bus coming as soon as it leaves the other end.
- Homogeneous ridership (I bet Wynn shuttles his customers from Sullivan and his employees to Wellington to give everyone a ride with "people like us")

[The walk] is ugly, industrial and desolate.

That's true today. But Wynn's going to dress up his quadrant and screen the bus garage from view. The good people-watching and picturesque boats of his waterfront promenade may be visible from even mid-bridge.

Sullivan's makeover will dress up two more quadrants. And the bridge will no doubt get cheap touches like flags, lighting, or even hanging plants. The usual tricks.

That leaves the un-fixable, un-movable power station quadrant (and points out that a Casino for all its faults is just about the only thing willing to be on a brownfield site).

I wouldn't be surprised if Wynn pays to have the power station power-washed and better screened. We're certainly going to get trees and street furniture to better screen it from view at eye level.

 

[davem]

I will admit I was posting from my phone and underestimated the distance.

If Wynn does want to capture pedestrians, building a path in front of the windmill and a pedestrian bridge across that small inlet to the front of the "mall" would be a great way to cut a third of a mile off.




Thinking out loud, how much would it cost to move the transformers(?) along Alford Street to somewhere else? It looks like there is a lot along Robin Street that isn't used for anything more than to push dirt around. If those transformers were moved and something was built in front of the power plant, it would transform that whole area drastically. The north side has already gotten this treatment with the redevelopment along Charlton Street. I still firmly believe that Lower Everett (as I've decided it's now called) could really be a middle class haven.

 

[pixelsand8]

Thinking out loud, how much would it cost to move the transformers(?) along Alford Street to somewhere else? It looks like there is a lot along Robin Street that isn't used for anything more than to push dirt around. If those transformers were moved and something was built in front of the power plant, it would transform that whole area drastically. The north side has already gotten this treatment with the redevelopment along Charlton Street. I still firmly believe that Lower Everett (as I've decided it's now called) could really be a middle class haven.

The area is officially called "The Lynde", sometimes referred to as "Lower Broadway". A documentary was recently made on it;

http://malden.wickedlocal.com/article/20140608/News/140608605

 

[whighlander]

Thinking out loud, how much would it cost to move the transformers(?) along Alford Street to somewhere else? It looks like there is a lot along Robin Street that isn't used for anything more than to push dirt around. If those transformers were moved and something was built in front of the power plant, it would transform that whole area drastically. The north side has already gotten this treatment with the redevelopment along Charlton Street. I still firmly believe that Lower Everett (as I've decided it's now called) could really be a middle class haven.

Davem -- these are NOT your daddy's local distribution transformers

Everett / Mystic Station is fully integrated in the overall Transmission Grid not just of Greater Boston but all of New England -- for generations

You have terminations of at least 5 major Transmission Lines tieing Boston to the rest of the Metro Region as well as feeds to most of downtown Boston and Cambridge

Conveniently and coincidentally here's a map from a story

Seabed power line plan stirs debate

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...GdLMKdMZM7mO/igraphic.html?p1=Article_Graphic
about proposals to bolster the electric grid

Note where all these terminate!

In short -- it would be easier to move the State House to open up the view of the Millenium Tower from Cambridge

 

[Shepard]

The cable is fifty pounds a foot?

Wow.

 

[whighlander]

The cable is fifty pounds a foot?

Wow.

Shep -- this cable is carrying a lot of power

from the article from which the map was copied [with my annotations [bolded]

Matt Valle proposes to bury 50 miles of high-power cable in the ocean floor, using an underwater robot that resembles a lunar rover.

The robot would dig a trench 4 to 6 feet deep in an arc from Salisbury to Lynn for a power line that would bring 520 megawatts of electricity from the Seabrook generating station into Greater Boston [through Everett]

....“It’s a buried system. It is protected against extreme weather — high winds, flooding, icing,” said Valle, president of New Hampshire Transmission, a subsidiary of NextEra Energy, one of the country’s largest power companies.

But there is one major drawback: With a price tag of more than $1 billion, SeaLink looks on paper to cost about $350 million more than a competing project, which includes a new 25-mile transmission line running from Londonderry, N.H., to Tewksbury, as well as upgrades to the existing high-voltage power network.

To put it in context -- there is 1968 MW of new natural gas fired and relatively new gas/oil fired generation capacity located at Mystic Station [Total Number of units: 8; 6 natural gas, 1 oil or natural gas, 1 oil Total Capacity: 2,002 MW]

in the following picture of Mystic Station from Excelon website
http://www.exeloncorp.com/powerplants/mystic/Pages/profile.aspx
1) the newest combined cycle natural gas fired units are the short fat smoke stacks to the extreme right
2) the tallest stack near center is the 70's vintage oil/gas fired traditional steam turbine [comparable in capacity to the new units]
3) everything to left of the Tall stack is essentially a potential superfund clean-up project except for the transformer switch yard along Alford St.

The cable would essentially bring an additional 25 to 30% of capacity when needed

 

[HenryAlan]

I wouldn't be surprised if Wynn pays to have the power station power-washed and better screened. We're certainly going to get trees and street furniture to better screen it from view at eye level.

I assume the power station will get a wall and some tall bushes. Things like this are not so hard to hide, but for some reason, what is normal elsewhere in that regard doesn't usually happen in Boston.

 

[dshoost88]

From today's Globe:

At Wynn casinos, we all look bronzed

By Casey RossGLOBE STAFF DECEMBER 19, 2014

Casino mogul Steve Wynn is expected to release new renderings of his Everett gambling resort in January. He is a man famous for his laser-like focus on the biggest and smallest details of his properties, and the way they affect the psyche of his guests.

From the look of his resorts in Las Vegas and Macau, it is fair to say Steve Wynn is obsessed with bronze glass.

The color bold and unusual, makes his buildings stand out on the skyline. But according to Wynn, his selection of bronze glass actually has more to do with the physical appearance of his guests than the exterior wow factor of his resorts.

The bronze, he said, “makes people’s skin look prettier; people look more attractive in rooms that have warmer light,” the casino mogul told the Globe earlier this year.

“One of the things that happens with glass is that the wavelength of the light affects the color palette on the inside of the room.”

A spokesman for Wynn Resorts said the bronze glass is a proprietary blend, designed specifically for its casino properties. It is one of many custom creations Wynn has ordered up to make his resorts stand out from the crowd of gilded competitors.

Wynn is known for personally inspecting every hotel room in his resorts and sending detailed notes to staff. He spends $2 million a year on fresh-cut flowers at his Vegas properties and replaces 8,000 flowering plants in their lobbies every three weeks.

He has also created a special artificial turf called “Wynn lawn,” a custom-made fake grass he invented because he did not like the look of other options on the market. (Artificial turf is required at casino properties in Vegas because of water-conservation regulations.)

Suffice it to say, the turf is one innovation Wynn will not need to include in his plans for Massachusetts. On the polluted Mystic River waterfront, he can plant all the fresh grass he wants.


Got an idea for this column? E-mail yourstoryhere@globe.com

 

[Savin Hill]

Third resort casino in Mass. is a risky bet

The governor who legalized gambling said enough is enough, and that the state should not give out the final license in the Southeast region.

To him, the third resort license has in effect already been doled out to the Mashpee Wampanoag, an Indian tribe seeking to open a casino in Taunton. Under the federal Indian gaming law, the tribe, on its own, can operate a gambling palace on tribal land. They don’t need the state’s permission.

“It was never anticipated that there would be more than three destination resorts,” Patrick said.

State law allows for up to three casinos and one slots parlor. This year, the commission awarded licenses to MGM in Springfield, Wynn Resorts in Everett, and Penn National Gaming for a slots complex in Plainville.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...s-risky-bet/qghhqQh0hvfHNgr3luQuSM/story.html

 

[datadyne007]

This past weekend's Globe had a story about Wynn Everett. The original design has been scrapped completely and a new slick curved bronze glass tower is expected, much like his ones in Vegas. The hotel rooms have also been increased from 500 to over 600. No renders will be released until Wynn presents in January. The article also went into some interesting detail about how Wynn has his architects build scale models so he can look with some kind of periscope to see what the guest views in the lobby and casino are.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/20...atchful-eye/VkLq8RMTcyEoCvcq9l8DYO/story.html

(I've reached my 5 article/month limit. Apologies for spotty details - posting from memory.)

 

[whighlander]

This past weekend's Globe had a story about Wynn Everett. The original design has been scrapped completely and a new slick curved bronze glass tower is expected, much like his ones in Vegas. The hotel rooms have also been increased from 500 to over 600. No renders will be released until Wynn presents in January. The article also went into some interesting detail about how Wynn has his architects build scale models so he can look with some kind of periscope to see what the guest views in the lobby and casino are.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/20...atchful-eye/VkLq8RMTcyEoCvcq9l8DYO/story.html

(I've reached my 5 article/month limit. Apologies for spotty details - posting from memory.)

I hope that the casino haters get to read the article -- Wynn is trully committed to making the Wynn Everett into a show place

This sort of tinkering has driven the projected cost of the Everett resort to $1.75 billion, he said, up from $1.6 billion in September when Wynn’s riverfront project won the Greater Boston casino license over a competing plan by Mohegan Sun in Revere.

“If you do it right you can spend a billion-seven-five, which is as much as Bellagio cost,” said Wynn, chairman of Wynn Resorts, speaking of the extravagant Vegas casino he opened in 1998. “You can spend that in Boston — sophisticated, wealthy town with people who know the difference.”

Visitors passing through the hotel’s front doors will enter a tall space with 30-foot ceilings and immediately meet two indoor gardens, each about 2,200 square feet, where the casino’s staff will build 25-foot flower sculptures.

“A working carousel, working Ferris wheel — all in flowers,” he said. “Or it will be a hot air balloon or a Faberge egg. They’ll be changing all the time.”

Stores and restaurants will branch off the lobby. Wynn is importing several fine dining concepts from his Las Vegas resort, such as the upscale SW Steakhouse; Andrea’s, an Asian fusion restaurant named for Wynn’s wife; and “a very serious buffet.”

Above the registration desks to either side of the lobby, Wynn plans to build a midlevel floor, 16 feet above the lobby floor, with a coffee shop on one side, a bar on the other, and glass railings to not interrupt the views.

WYNN LAS VEGAS/ASSOCIATED PRESS

This $28 million Popeye statue by Jeff Koons will be a lobby staple in Everett, Wynn said.

“The lounge and the coffee shop look into the gardens,” he said. “And because they’re only 16 feet up, they’re really in the space. It’s not a second floor, it’s a mezzanine. And that technique of involving people in the space, I’m going to exploit in the entire hotel.”

Once he decided to add the mezzanine level, Wynn said, he had to imagine the rest of the lobby from the point of view of people in the lounge and coffee shop.

He decided the front of the hotel should be a wall of glass, 26 feet high and 130 feet long, looking out to the Mystic River, the casino’s boat dock, and the Boston skyline. The tricky part, he said, was designing an unusually tall porte-cochère, the covered structure over the front door.

 

[Jahvon09]

That is nice that he wants to build a tower in Everett similar to the 2 towers in Las Vegas!!

 

[Jahvon09]

Heard on the news yesterday, that Boston's Mayor Marty Walsh is planning to sue the MGC (Massachusetts Gaming Commission), claiming that Steve Wynn & Everett are not working with the city on how best to solve the problems with the surrounding street / road plans for access to the proposed hotel / casino!!

I thought that this was now a done deal when it was voted upon in November and Everett won the rights to have the thing planned & built!! Politics always screws up stuff, causing aggravating & annoying bloody delays!!

 

[TheRifleman]

In my opinion this is a done deal: But Walsh and other mayors have valid concerns on Traffic and I don't think anybody really has addressed this issue.

I don't believe 60Million dollars will solve the traffic scenario

The only other X-factor could be how bad did Monsanto destroy the land. Wynn has already came out and said they might not be able to clean the land entirely so they might cap it.

 

[Jahvon09]

Kinda reminds me of lawsuits resulting from the once constant ongoing delays of two big mega projects that at first had gotten off to a shaky start;

1. The new World Trade Center in New York.

2. The Millennium (Filene's) Tower at Downtown Crossing.