TC said:shockingboston, What would you and/or the community rather see built on the site?
shockingboston said:TC said:shockingboston, What would you and/or the community rather see built on the site?
If I had ?say? I would recommend housing (not condos), some retail, a jazz/blues restaurant and a facility to accommodate the local youth (something like a Boys and Girls Club, YMCA or a youth center).
I believe the site is big enough to create separation for the different possible user types for the site (i.e. adults attending the jazz/blue club are not standing in line that crosses in front of the youth center).
NU is limited by its location; NU should seek expansion opportunities on Huntington Ave, Park St., or maybe finally complete the proposal for the air rights over the T tracks.
NU is definitely a growing university, but it can?t just expand anywhere they want because they can afford it.
That is First Church in Roxbury's churchyard in the center of the picture above, so I doubt development will happen there any time soon, although an addition was added to the rear of the church for the UU Urban Ministry. In addition, the land to the right of the church is being developed as we speak. You can see the new construction. The other empty lot along Roxbury Street backs onto a sheer rock face or a large retaining wall (I'm having trouble picturing it despite having driven past it yesterday) and is unsuitable for development. A couple of the other large spaces have institutional owners and were never residential--the Dillaway Thomas house, which is part of the Roxbury Heritage State Park is across the street from the church on the top of the picture and there is a convent or other RC church building there as well, if I'm not mistaken.xec said:And here's the scene deeper into Roxbury.
Cityrecord, those pics are meant to show the overall low density of development in Roxbury, not specific lots that could be built on. Not knowing the details of each unbuilt lot I can't post pics only of those available for development. I don't expect that every empty lot in Roxbury can be developed, but as the pics show there are so many that it's impossible none of them can be developed. They can't all be part of some historic property, or on a ledge, or otherwise encumbered so they can't be built on. The point is Roxbury is not squeezed for space, so it's not like the community is losing land that's desperately needed for housing.cityrecord said:That is First Church in Roxbury's churchyard in the center of the picture above, so I doubt development will happen there any time soon, although an addition was added to the rear of the church for the UU Urban Ministry. In addition, the land to the right of the church is being developed as we speak. You can see the new construction. The other empty lot along Roxbury Street backs onto a sheer rock face or a large retaining wall (I'm having trouble picturing it despite having driven past it yesterday) and is unsuitable for development. A couple of the other large spaces have institutional owners and were never residential--the Dillaway Thomas house, which is part of the Roxbury Heritage State Park is across the street from the church on the top of the picture and there is a convent or other RC church building there as well, if I'm not mistaken.
Those three proposals are for parcel 3 and NU's proposed dorms are on parcel 18. There's some confusion about this. My understanding is that one of the developer proposals for parcel 3 did include dorms, but that went over badly so NU came out with the current proposal to build dorms on 18 instead. None of the pics I posted show parcels 3 or 18. Here's a wider view that shows the lay of the land. The pic I posted is the area with the ?.As to the other pictures, I think the top one shows why Roxbury residents might not want a dorm there. We shouldn't forget that there are three proposals for the site and the other two may have more community support.
Last I heard all three proposals for parcel 3 were likely to fall thru because none could get sufficient funding, so an even better question to ask is what are Turner and the community activists doing about the situation. The time and energy spent fighting NU over P18 could be better spent fighting for whichever P3 proposal catches their fancy.A better question to ask might be which of the three proposals does Chuck Turner and people in the community support, instead of railing against people in Roxbury for having a negative opinion of one of the plans.
Neat. Bowesst and several other people have almost posted pics of my place here or on SSP, but everyone has just managed to miss it.Roxxma said:You got a birdseye of my house in this photo.
Yeah, but don't you think it might be a little misleading to show pictures of Roxbury purporting to show low density if you don't know what the development status is? I mean, anyone who doesn't know Roxbury would look at the picture I analyzed and say, "Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!"xec said:Cityrecord, those pics are meant to show the overall low density of development in Roxbury, not specific lots that could be built on. Not knowing the details of each unbuilt lot I can't post pics only of those available for development. I don't expect that every empty lot in Roxbury can be developed, but as the pics show there are so many that it's impossible none of them can be developed.
Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!cityrecord said:I mean, anyone who doesn't know Roxbury would look at the picture I analyzed and say, "Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!"
It's not misleading at all. The pictures aren't purporting to show low density, they show low density. Which is unrelated to development status. Whether land can or can't be further developed doesn't alter its existing density of development.cityrecord said:Yeah, but don't you think it might be a little misleading to show pictures of Roxbury purporting to show low density if you don't know what the development status is?
Well, here I could ask if it isn't a little misleading to analyze that particular picture. It's obviously a unique situation, but using it as the basis of a rebuttal implies similar conditions are common throughout Roxbury. Ironically, the analysis actually supports my position since you say that next to the church there was an empty lot that is currently being developed. See? Even next to a historic church there was room for new construction! :wink:cityrecord said:I mean, anyone who doesn't know Roxbury would look at the picture I analyzed and say, "Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!"
Yes, I do, but I don't see the relevance. Unless you're saying that every other unbuilt lot in Roxbury was also part of the town common and also deserves preservation.Ron Newman said:That churchyard is the former Roxbury town common; you don't think it deserves preservation?
OK, more confusion. I thought MJ was involved with the Albany Fellows project. There was a thread about it on the old site. As for P3, I don't recall the details of the funding problem but it had something to do with it being insufficient to cover the cost of leasing the land.sidewalks said:Where did you hear that the developers couldn't get funding? My understanding is that one firm was allied with the Magic Johnson's private equity fund. Those are pretty deep pockets.
ablarc said:Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!cityrecord said:I mean, anyone who doesn't know Roxbury would look at the picture I analyzed and say, "Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!"
What difference does it make that you can give reasons?
xec said:At this point I'll bow out of the discussion, but I'd like to suggest that you spend some time on Virtual Earth looking at aerial and bird's eye views of Roxbury. I think you'll eventually come to the conclusion that exclaiming "Wow, look at all that undeveloped land!" is much more reasonable than exclaiming "Wow, there's so little land left to build on!". Unless ablarc's succint argument already led you to that exclamation.