MXD Residential Tower | 121 Broadway | Kendall Square

dhawkins said:
Took a little bit of Googling but found it under 300 Binney Street address. Broad Institute Selects HGA to Design 225,000 Square-Foot Lab and Office Space for Advanced Biomedical Research in Kendall Square
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Yeah, it's an expansion of the Broad Institute into this building (which was formerly Biogen). Apparently the Broad is all-out gutting this thing (which wasn't even that old to begin with - 2015, maybe?). Likely due to their unique lab use needs.

Presented in a design review submittal to Cambridge Redev. Authority - "300 Binney St. - CRA Design Review"
 
Thats interesting. I know theyre doing essentially the same thing to that brutalist building over by ink block, plus the old hancock building in the seaport. I’m sure theres a couple others I’m not thinking of too.
 
bigpicture7 said:
Apparently the Broad is all-out gutting this thing (which wasn't even that old to begin with - 2015, maybe?). Likely due to their unique lab use needs.
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It wasn't a lab building before, and they are completely retrofitting it to be a lab building. It was 5 floors of offices before, with ground level features like childcare and a gym.
 
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The new pedestrian cut through on the left side of this image is amazing. Makes walking to Kendall a couple minutes faster. And you get a great view of the construction site!
 

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Interesting excerpt from the article: "121 Broadway’s distinction could be short-lived as MIT moves ahead with redevelopment of its nearby Volpe Center redevelopment. The master plan includes one residential building approved for a 456-foot height."

Never realized that there was another residential tower in the works that surpasses this one. Looking forward to Cambridge getting both of these great additions.
 
beck4537 said:
Interesting excerpt from the article: "121 Broadway’s distinction could be short-lived as MIT moves ahead with redevelopment of its nearby Volpe Center redevelopment. The master plan includes one residential building approved for a 456-foot height."

Never realized that there was another residential tower in the works that surpasses this one. Looking forward to Cambridge getting both of these great additions.
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Cambridge authorities these days all of a sudden regarding height???? Bring it on!

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beck4537 said:
Interesting excerpt from the article: "121 Broadway’s distinction could be short-lived as MIT moves ahead with redevelopment of its nearby Volpe Center redevelopment. The master plan includes one residential building approved for a 456-foot height."

Never realized that there was another residential tower in the works that surpasses this one. Looking forward to Cambridge getting both of these great additions.
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In early versions of the plans, there were not any buildings that tall. Will have to search the interwebs...
 
johnmcboston said:
In early versions of the plans, there were not any buildings that tall. Will have to search the interwebs...
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This article from 2017 talks a bit about it: https://news.mit.edu/2017/cambridge-city-council-approves-mit-volpe-zoning-petition-1023
^Fourth photo in the slideshow shows a birds eye aerial (lol because that's a fun way of showing something tall without it looking tall)

height limits ranging from 170 feet to 500 feet (one residential building is slated for a potential 500-foot height);

Obviously after 7 years there is change, especially since that was just vision/massing, but these 'limits' I believe are still set.
 
johnmcboston said:
In early versions of the plans, there were not any buildings that tall. Will have to search the interwebs...
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There was. This is a pretty early version with the current u/c residential on the right, the taller upcoming volpe residential is the one with the spire. 121 broadway has changed a lot and the taller res wont look like this either.

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Page 1 of this thread I posted this and a bunch of others, some of which the links are unfortunately broken now.

https://archboston.com/community/th...121-broadway-kendall-square.5826/#post-352086


The most recent massing model from 2023 is this which #bancars posted in the Parcel C3 thread.
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https://volpe.mit.edu/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/2023_05_10-Community-Meeting-r10.pdf

Its not posted in the c3 thread but at the bottom of the presentation there appears to be a ground floor view of tower r3 in the background.
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Geez, you weren't kidding about steel going up fast. Is there going to be parking under that building (up/down construction there?) Amazing what a signed lease will do. But also funny that building is going up like lightning, but the existing 2 story building, there it's twin will be, seems to have no activity...
 
What would a new Class A office/lab building serving as the HQ for a large pharma company be without prodigious underground parking?! Cross section from the filing. Not sure how the construction is getting done, with the vault area needing to be massively excavated.

(EDIT: better render showing both towers on the Binney side)

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