Radian (Dainty Dot) | 120 Kingston Street | Chinatown

Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

joebos said:
Did the NIMBY's tell them to build something boring? You have this very black and white way of blaming everything on one party. I think NIMBYism is BS but in this case it sounds like the city/BRA is the problem.
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It's the NIMBYs who first opposed the first design. They said it's beautiful but too tall. Sometimes you can't keep the same design even if you lopped off just a few floors or feet. They need the square footage to make the same amount of revenue. But yes I do agree I was too quick to blame. This is the BRA's fault as well.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Now if the BRA had half a brain they would realize that you cannot tell people what is iconic. There are so many icons in this city, but not everyone agrees on them.

Yes the Hancock is an icon, mainly because it is by far the tallest building in the city. It is also very attractive to many. However, plenty of people prefer the Pru. Many find the Custom House tower to be the better "icon" or even Rowe's Wharf imposed in front IP as the iconic face of Boston. Then again is could be the State House or Fenway Park or even the dreaded City Hall.

If a 30 storey residential tower were built and built beautifully, and became an icon to some people.... so what. How does that hurt other areas? I can't believe more than a handful of people would start to associate a small residential building (not a tower) with what Boston is all about, or in other words become an icon.

They want the Greenway to be the icon of the area, but that is backwards. As the greenway is basically open space, you need to surround the greenway with icons. You don't go to open space in a city strictly because it is open space. You go there as a break from what you really came to the city in the first place for. You came in for the ammenities, the history, the shopping, the site seeing, etc. Open space is available in abundance out in the burbs, but it is meant to be an oasis in the city.

You don't surround an oasis with a bunch of boring things that nobody cares about. If everything sucks around said open space, why would you be in the vicinity anyways. You surround the open space with activities, shopping, restaurants, and you allow for great sight seeing along the open space. How? By surrounding it with sights. As many iconic buildings aroung the greenway as possible should be the goal, not 2 or 3 with a bunch of bland filler around them to draw your eye to the 2 or 3 BRA approved "gems".

The Taj Mahal is more than just a few nice domes. Every inch of the building is covered in the most ornate detailing you can think of. The same in the vatican. You do not just create one icon and surround it with bland, you give the eyes an overload of beauty. That is what keeps people coming back.... what they missed the last time.

2 or 3 beautiful buildings around the greenway. I can see that in one afternoon. Why do I or the family of 6 from Mansfield come back next Saturday? We've seen it all. We go elsewhere.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Most buildings are just texture and fabric, and should be. I wish more people designed to be part of the larger fabric. Then the icons would be exactly what they are meant to be. Iconography objects with meaning. To quote a Pixar film "If everyone is special, no one is."

I was at the Chinatown neighborhood meetings when the first design was shown to the neightborhood and the BRA. It was WAY more Miami than something that responds to this particular context.

I have no problem with the new proposal. It is solid but not a home run. No one is trying to win the Pritzker Prize with one of the thousands of condo buildings being built. Thank god the design is not another of the West End clones.

cca
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Listening to the BRA you would think the city was being inundated by icons. Please. This argument for background buildings simply sounds like a justification for cheap, boring buildings.

The first iteration of this building was sleek and contemporary, but I wouldn't necessarily call it iconic.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

briv said:
The first iteration of this building was sleek and contemporary, but I wouldn't necessarily call it iconic.
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Iconic using Boston's sadly depleted sense of aesthetics. Most other places it would have needed another 30 stories to qualify.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Can't we just go back to the first design? That was such a beauty...
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

briv said:
Listening to the BRA you would think the city was being inundated by icons. Please. This argument for background buildings simply sounds like a justification for cheap, boring buildings.

The first iteration of this building was sleek and contemporary, but I wouldn't necessarily call it iconic.
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Your second paragraph holds the key to the stilted, mysterious reasoning. Start with the proposition that the process was always likely to turn this project into a manure pile. Accepting that as foreordained, why would the officials cloak themselves and the inevitable result in such novel, preposterous, embarrassing language? What person or proposal would suffer most from the adoption of such an attitude? What would the motivation for using this language be? And who would have such a motive?

Class? Hands, anyone?
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

OK. I give up. Answer key:

1) Because they were told to strike the appearance of a new theme.

2) Don Chiafaro/Aquarium tower.

3) Vengeance.

4) Mayor.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Re: Icons.

"My friend said to me, 'Ms. Midler, you have a new theme song.' I said, 'Girlfriend, I got a million theme songs. I got no act!'"
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

atlrvr said:
Preservationt: If you are going to destroy the majority of the existing building, then it loses its historical significance.

Developer: Ok. I'll just tear it down then.

Preservationist: Oh :(

_______________________________________________________

Community Group: It's a great looking design, but it is too tall!

Developer: No problem. I'll knock off a couple of stories to show that I'm sensative to your demands, and then dumb down the design to make up my profit margin, leaving you with a nearly as tall, but much uglier tower. Thanks for the feedback.

Community Group: Oh :(

___________________________________________________________________

BRA: Per Section 90, you need to consider feedback from all affected parties.

Developer: I did, see!

BRA: Splendid work. :)
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Wow -- so someone has finally documented the BRA process! All you need to add is the Mayor's thumbs up.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

While watching the Pet Shop Boys perform this evening it suddenly struck me how ridiculous it is for people to criticize the 120 Kingston tower. For one thing, I don't consider it "on the Greenway" any more than the nearby State Street Financial Tower. I recommend that those of you who don't live in Boston check out Google maps. The tower would built kitty-corner to the old "Surface Artery". The streets near the proposed tower have always been there. The building will shadow over a six-lane street not any sort of greenery. The "Rose Kennedy Greenway" doesn't start there; it's further down the street near where the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston is located.

Also annoying? The surrounding buildings are higher than the proposed tower. One Financial Center is 180 meters and 46-stories tall. The Federal Reserve Bank of Boston is 187 meters and 32 stories tall (the difference due to the big hole in the middle?). State Street Financial is 153 meters high and 36 stories and 125 State Street is 138 meters and 30 stories tall.

Not out of place at all.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

I think a few rows of trees were added to Surface Artery (curses be upon the name) and it was declared part of the Greenway. The new little park along it in Chinatown was always designated the Greenway's "Chinatown parcel".

Not that this diminishes your arguments, but that's why people make Greenway-related arguments against it.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

JohnAKeith said:
For one thing, I don't consider it "on the Greenway" any more than the nearby State Street Financial Tower. I recommend that those of you who don't live in Boston check out Google maps. The tower would built kitty-corner to the old "Surface Artery". The streets near the proposed tower have always been there. The building will shadow over a six-lane street not any sort of greenery. The "Rose Kennedy Greenway" doesn't start there; it's further down the street near where the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston is located.
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Huh? 120 Kingston abuts the Chinatown Park which is most certainly part of the Greenway. Check out Google Maps or the MTA website or the Conservancy website...

I agree though that there is certainly height precedent in the area. There is no reason to reduce height here.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Yes, although I failed to mention the Chinatown park, I am aware of its existence. It is very attractive.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

I like the Chinatown park, but its connectivity to the rest of the Greenway is weak. I suspect that many pedestrians who try to walk the Greenway stop at Dewey Square thinking they've reached the end. Maybe they should take a lane out of the Surface Artery south of South Station to strengthen the connection.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

Why this obsession with making the Greenway "connected"? The only places where it comes close to working are those that are the most discrete parts.

Plus the last thing developments like 120 Kingston need is ever more parkland becoming an unambiguous part of the sacred Greenway.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

The idea of connected parks goes back to at least Olmsted. Besides our own Emerald Necklace, you can find similar ideas in Cleveland and Chicago.

Don't we complain about the broken connections in our old park system, such as Fenway to Charlesgate to Esplanade, and the Sears parking lot that used to separate the Fenway from the Riverway?
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

I'm glad you mention this because I think the Emerald Necklace is a dangerous precedent to invoke for the Greenway.

The Necklace already has a coherent design, and it is not located in the city's downtown core. It functions in relation to its urban surrounds in a very different way than the Greenway should. Downtown, circulation in all directions and connection in the urban fabric, not threads that disrupt it, ought to be preserved.

The Necklace presents similar challenges to its urban context. Perhaps the way it works with the city that surrounds it ought to have been better conceived. But calling for it to be better connected is to call for the maintenance of a coherent park system, unlike the Greenway, and it means fewer challenges for nearby neighborhoods than an interconnected Greenway would.
 
Re: 120 Kingston, 29 Story Tower in Chinatown

For some reason I thought of this thread when I read this NYTs article this morning:

NYT: Off With Its Top! City Cuts Tower to Size
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/10/arts/design/10building.html?_r=1&ref=arts

"Amanda Burden, the city planning commissioner, said the tower?s top, which culminates in three uneven peaks, did not meet the aesthetic standards of a building that would compete in height with the city?s most famous towers."

The solution they came up with was to slice off the top of the building.
 
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