MIT East Campus - Kendall Square Gateway | Cambridge

stick n move said:
The green line extension includes a new Lechmere station.
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Yes, one that is even further from Kendall square than the current station.

Lechmere is simply too far of a walk to Kendall (~1 mile to these new buildings on Main Street) to be an effective daily commute for most people. EZ Ride is the only bus service between NS, Lechmere, and Kendall and it isn't even open to the public (you need a sticker from your employer).
 
fattony said:
Yes, one that is even further from Kendall square than the current station.

Lechmere is simply too far of a walk to Kendall (~1 mile to these new buildings on Main Street) to be an effective daily commute for most people. EZ Ride is the only bus service between NS, Lechmere, and Kendall and it isn't even open to the public (you need a sticker from your employer).
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The new Lechmere station is just across the street, not so much a substantial move. The additional walking distance will be more than offset by the improved headways.

EZ Ride has a $2 cash fare if you don't have a sticker. Not necessarily the most reasonable when any T bus would be a free transfer, but it is definitely publicly accessible.
 
I'm still of the position that Cambridge needs to get over their excitement about tax revenue from commercial in this area and start pushing for building a lot more housing around Kendall. You don't need buses or trains for commuters when they can walk to work.
 
dwash59 said:
I'm still of the position that Cambridge needs to get over their excitement about tax revenue from commercial in this area and start pushing for building a lot more housing around Kendall. You don't need buses or trains for commuters when they can walk to work.
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I think that is lost on a lot of planners. The transportation system that cities are built around have two feet (and some wheelchairs).
 
So they're definitely demolishing the Eastgate tower? Why did they not just build the towers that they're building, taller. Imagine that... This is like the Pru of Boston. Yes its ugly but not in an 888 Boylston or Waterside place type of way. Its ugly in a dark and drab type of way. I actually like these old concrete towers, or old towers like the pru with cool intricate metal facades. Theyre ugly in a built during a depression type of way haha. I think they're cool because they give a spectrum to the skyline. You need all of these on any great skyline. I mean you can build beautiful new-build skylines for sure, but they don't have soul like an NYC or a Chicago has. NYC would not be anywhere near as great as it is if it didn't have the huge spectrum of architectural styles littered all over its skyline. You can walk up and touch a building that was the tallest in the world almost 100 years ago like the Chrysler then the ESB. Thats cool. Then you have buildings that were built this year that are incredible too like Tower Verre. That building looks like it could be built in almost any era though it doesnt really fall into an era. None the less its amazing. But central park tower say for example a blue glass boxy tower is a 21st century tower.

Having a spread of heights, materials, roofs, height/width, etc is needed for top tier skylines. Even Hong Kong has a huge spread of Chinese architecture. Its not the same as America but every country has its own styles. I dont think they had an art deco era like we did, maybe... Im not an expert, but they have old-new buildings all over their skyline and it looks great. Having filler is actually extreeeemely important too. Having a lot of filler that spreads the skyline out, fills it in, gives a range of heights, and then having precisely placed iconic towers in say central downtown, on the edges, around the center lowering in height, near important sites like big train stations...etc will give a great skyline. This is what separates world class skylines from mediocre ones or just good ones. Having every tower on the skyline brand new like London and they are all trying to fight for attention and be iconic and better than everything else is an absolute mess. It looks like an architectural fist fight going on. If they had years of high quality filler and then built these "iconic" towers it would have looked much much better. Oh well one thing they can say is its a unique skyline and its not done yet either so maybe they can pull it together. They should be experimenting with lots of different towers to see what will bring all of this together now. Filler towers and junk are not the same thing though. Filler can actually be really nice, but its just not just an icon, centerpiece, things like that.

Take these in Dubai for example. Theyre filler, but overall theyre very nice buildings. They are not iconic, theyre copy and paste, way shorter than the other towers, but theyre really nice towers. Thats a great example of filler it doesnt have to be crap... although it can be that too..

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Anyways I wish they had kept Eastgate and just made the new towers taller. Or build another one on the site, fit it in somewhere. Losing this is definitely a loss for Cambridge and honestly this tower is an icon for Cambridge because it was the tallest, best aspect ratio tower that Cambridge had for so long. This is one of the things that when you think about Cambridge and any semblance of a skyline it had, you thought about this.. this was it, this was Cambridge.
 
stick n move said:
Anyways I wish they had kept Eastgate and just made the new towers taller. Or build another one on the site, fit it in somewhere. Losing this is definitely a loss for Cambridge and honestly this tower is an icon for Cambridge because it was the tallest, best aspect ratio tower that Cambridge had for so long. This is one of the things that when you think about Cambridge and any semblance of a skyline it had, you thought about this.. this was it, this was Cambridge.
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Eastgate is falling apart, IIRC. MIT is replacing it for operational reasons, not because there needs to be a net zero on towers.
 
Nothing is in its place yet in the renders.

In its place is that triangle plaza in the middle of the screen with the thin tower and boxy tower on the left and short brick building on the right. Thats weak how much height is being lost, 2 towers being demolished, and the 3 going up are short. The thin tower looks nice, really the only nice one, but hopefully the 4th one they build on this site in place of Eastgate is nice too and equally as tall as whats being lost. They really just could have done a re-clad on it. Guarantee they could have done something nice with that tower. Strip it to the frame and they could have just done the go-to that everyooooneee does and blue glass it up. Slanty roof it and its perfect. They could have built 1 more floor on it too. Somehow the mechanicals are only that tiny little box because theres like an outdoor area in the top floor with trees and stuff. Use the roof now as the floor plate, make it an observation deck out of steel on top of the roof, glass, normal roof, mech screen above that.

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Look at the top floor now its like an office tower with outdoor patios. I really dont understand where the mechanicals for this tower go as the box should be the top of the elevator shaft with the pulleys and stuff. Either way the roof could have been the floorplate for an outdoor observation deck. The top floor could have been a restaurant with its high ceilings. Then the glass would just rise up 1 more floor above the roof to keep the people in and do the slanty thing... Boston needs and outdoor observation deck and this could be a cool spot because instead of it being on the tallest building in the actual city, it could be looking at the city. I liked this about the top of the rock in NYC instead of being on the Empire State Building you get to see it from Rockefeller ctr. Its powerful seeing it from the top of another building. This definitely has potential with a reclad and some shnazzing up.





 
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The massing for building 2 is very similar to building 3. At least the place holder. I'm pretty sure you can see it in earlier images on this thread where the physical model in 238 is shown.
 
Stick, it's been discussed before. While it's unfortunate, that tower wasn't designed with maintenance in mind. Everything is encapsulated in concrete and not repairable. It was a poor design in the first place, and that's why they decided it needed to go. Also I've asked before whats going on its place, it's a weird large blocky building.
 
Jouhou said:
Stick, it's been discussed before. While it's unfortunate, that tower wasn't designed with maintenance in mind. Everything is encapsulated in concrete and not repairable. It was a poor design in the first place, and that's why they decided it needed to go. Also I've asked before whats going on its place, it's a weird large blocky building.
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Another lab/office building similar to building 3.
 
Jouhou said:
Stick, it's been discussed before. While it's unfortunate, that tower wasn't designed with maintenance in mind. Everything is encapsulated in concrete and not repairable. It was a poor design in the first place, and that's why they decided it needed to go. Also I've asked before whats going on its place, it's a weird large blocky building.
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Rest of the world seems to operate with concrete towers just fine
 
jass said:
Rest of the world seems to operate with concrete towers just fine
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Sure, but not with buried mechanicals in concrete chases built into the exterior of the building that serve all units. I believe that is the poor design that makes keeping the building a very costly endeavour.

They are replacing all of these units and then some in building 4 at SoMa.
That doesn't mean I'm a fan of replacing a nearly 300 foot residential high rise with another 12-14 storey lab/office building. As much as lab space around here is desirable, so is oodles of new housing.

Labs need to start going higher. The leases per sf around here more than justify the added cost of building higher as has been shown to be possible and profitable.

Kendall developers have to stop being afraid of unleased lab space exceeding 2%. Need to build more to be ahead of all the companies taking every last square foot. They are of course afraid of being the ones holding the bag on an empty 500K sf lab building. But, the reward right now seems to far outweigh that risk.

That and MIT could absorb that hit and use the building for academic space if push came to shove.
 
SeamusMcFly said:
That doesn't mean I'm a fan of replacing a nearly 300 foot residential high rise with another 12-14 storey lab/office building. As much as lab space around here is desirable, so is oodles of new housing.

Labs need to start going higher. The leases per sf around here more than justify the added cost of building higher as has been shown to be possible and profitable.

Kendall developers have to stop being afraid of unleased lab space exceeding 2%. Need to build more to be ahead of all the companies taking every last square foot. They are of course afraid of being the ones holding the bag on an empty 500K sf lab building. But, the reward right now seems to far outweigh that risk.

That and MIT could absorb that hit and use the building for academic space if push came to shove.
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My understanding is the limit to high rise labs is more physics than cost (at some point no amount of money beats the laws of physics).

The problem is with the required high velocity ventilation (required for safety). Aerodynamic drag is a third power function of the physical dimensions of a ventilation duct. The longer the duct (higher the building) the more power or space (or both) required to move the air. At some point you reach the point of totally diminishing returns (the building is either all duct space or all blowers). 10 stories seems to be where the shit hits the fan, so to speak.
 
JeffDowntown said:
My understanding is the limit to high rise labs is more physics than cost (at some point no amount of money beats the laws of physics).

The problem is with the required high velocity ventilation (required for safety). Aerodynamic drag is a third power function of the physical dimensions of a ventilation duct. The longer the duct (higher the building) the more power or space (or both) required to move the air. At some point you reach the point of totally diminishing returns (the building is either all duct space or all blowers). 10 stories seems to be where the shit hits the fan, so to speak.
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Taking that as a given, even if you only have 10 stories of labs you can still stack non-lab space on top of that. Plenty of "high tech" workers don't need vents and sophisticated plumbing, and can work in space fitted out as offices. (See, e.g., Takeda moving their US HQ to the Boston area from suburban Chicago; Takeda already has a presence in Cambridge and surely only a fraction of their 1,000 Chicago employees need lab space).

The Vertex buildings on Fan Pier are a good example of relatively taller "lab" buildings that are only partially labs. My understanding is that a lot of the Vertex lab space vents out the side of the buildings about seven floors up, and doesn't go all the way to the roof.
 
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JumboBuc said:
Taking that as a given, even if you only have 10 stories of labs you can still stack non-lab space on top of that. Plenty of "high tech" workers don't need vents and sophisticated plumbing, and can work in space fitted out as offices. (See, e.g., Takeda moving their US HQ to the Boston area from suburban Chicago; Takeda already has a presence in Cambridge and surely only a fraction of their 1,000 Chicago employees need lab space).

The Vertex buildings on Fan Pier are a good example of relatively taller "lab" buildings that are only partially labs. My understanding is that a lot of the Vertex lab space vents out the side of the buildings about seven floors up, and doesn't go all the way to the roof.
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Good point.
 
JumboBuc said:
Taking that as a given, even if you only have 10 stories of labs you can still stack non-lab space on top of that. Plenty of "high tech" workers don't need vents and sophisticated plumbing, and can work in space fitted out as offices. (See, e.g., Takeda moving their US HQ to the Boston area from suburban Chicago; Takeda already has a presence in Cambridge and surely only a fraction of their 1,000 Chicago employees need lab space).

The Vertex buildings on Fan Pier are a good example of relatively taller "lab" buildings that are only partially labs. My understanding is that a lot of the Vertex lab space vents out the side of the buildings about seven floors up, and doesn't go all the way to the roof.
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Specialty gases, waste water connections, exhaust, power requirements. It helps to know what equipment is (or could be) going into the space before you just slap the "lab space" label on it. Just gets a bit more complicated (expensive) in a high rise where leaving enough space for additional vents and lines comes at a premium per square foot above just regular power, network and bathroom plumbing.

Still if you consider the cost of getting highly qualified people together in a lab space and making them productive and surrounding them with teams of people that will make them more innovative and productive, then it makes just as much sense to build high rises for scientists and engineers in an innovation area like Kendall or the Seaport as it does to put bankers, lawyers and insurance salesmen in lofty places in the financial district.
 
tangent said:
Specialty gases, waste water connections, exhaust, power requirements. It helps to know what equipment is (or could be) going into the space before you just slap the "lab space" label on it. Just gets a bit more complicated (expensive) in a high rise where leaving enough space for additional vents and lines comes at a premium per square foot above just regular power, network and bathroom plumbing.

Still if you consider the cost of getting highly qualified people together in a lab space and making them productive and surrounding them with teams of people that will make them more innovative and productive, then it makes just as much sense to build high rises for scientists and engineers in an innovation area like Kendall or the Seaport as it does to put bankers, lawyers and insurance salesmen in lofty places in the financial district.
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As a per working for the company who designed the mep systems for vertex and takeda as well as BMR's blackfan building which is taller than all of them. I'm trying to stop the narrative of can't because it has already been proven wrong.

SoMa building 3 is going 12 storeys of lab, parcel G at CX is going 12 storeys of lab. 10 is not the cut off. The premium to go taller is not going to stop people from locating in Kendall for lab space. The premium isn't even that much.

The vertex labs do exhaust out the roof. The air handlers are at the mid level (level 9) double height mech level. The intake air is all here, which cuts the duct work in the core in half. Labs are 100% outside air, so the exhaust risers are generally equal in size to supply.

I've mentioned a different approach in the past, which is, lab is King in Kendall. Why not put labs on top and office or other mixed use below. There is any issue with this as far as permissible chemical quantities in higher levels. At vertex this required a dedicated solvent delivery and waste system. Money. But, not a showstopper. 18 storeys at blackfan built 15 years ago, shows we can got taller.

The issue as I see it. Is more about developer risk. They are afraid to break the mold that has been a proven winner. The problem is. A 5 storey lab footprint will basically not change incredibly for 10 or 15 storey. Not enough anyways. That's a lot of SF that needs to go on the next site. The available sites vs. demand is quickly disappearing in the heart of Kendall. Sprawl in all it's forms causes negatives.

You make a good point about needing to know what could go in a building. That's what we do all the time when we design these developer lab/office buildings. Our experience helps drive that. It also helps limit what can really go in, and gets written into lease agreements. They change all the time when a big heavy comes in to take the whole building.

When vertex took fan pier it was still in core she'll design and could be adapted on the fly. Similar with Pfizer at 610 main and Millennium (takeda) at 300. Not always the case, so as experts we need to help guide the design. It definitely possible, but limitations and expectations need to be understood going in.
 
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