Sale finalized; future development of Exxon tank farm in Everett can proceed

[shmessy]

So I could be wrong but judging by the render and going off of basically every other neighborhood redevelopment project it seems like they want to add a lot of lab/office space. For the extent of the housing crisis that were in all of these different redevelopments seem to have huge amounts of planned lab space compared to housing. Whether at suffolk downs, dot ave in southie, harbor point, assembly, cambridge crossing, fenway center, union point, boynton yards, kendall/volpe, allston yards, beacon yards, enterprise research campus, arsenal yards/watertown mall, riverside, alewife…etc. it seems that labs are the main priority and housing fits in where theres room left over.

Now that were nearing the peak of the lab boom but are still very much deep in the housing crisis shouldnt we be tweaking the ratio of these projects? Boston seems pretty full and like theres not a lot of room to add much housing, but then when you look at all of the redevelopment areas mentioned above thats an absolutely enormous amount of land to be redeveloped. If that was all used strictly for housing I wouldnt be surprised if you could add 100,000 new units combined across all the different areas. Even half of that would be a massive relief. If labs are oversaturated right now and theres super high demand for housing why arent we building some of these new developments as 100% or majority housing? It seems like it would be a no brainer.

Hopefully, with all those factors, added in with decreasing interest rates soon (watching the Fed starting next month), progress on this fundamentally important goal can begin in earnest soon. The interest rate scenario seems to be the only missing piece at this point.

 

[Charlie_mta]

So I could be wrong but judging by the render and going off of basically every other neighborhood redevelopment project it seems like they want to add a lot of lab/office space. For the extent of the housing crisis that were in all of these different redevelopments seem to have huge amounts of planned lab space compared to housing. Whether at suffolk downs, dot ave in southie, harbor point, assembly, cambridge crossing, fenway center, union point, boynton yards, kendall/volpe, allston yards, beacon yards, enterprise research campus, arsenal yards/watertown mall, riverside, alewife…etc. it seems that labs are the main priority and housing fits in where theres room left over.

Now that were nearing the peak of the lab boom but are still very much deep in the housing crisis shouldnt we be tweaking the ratio of these projects? Boston seems pretty full and like theres not a lot of room to add much housing, but then when you look at all of the redevelopment areas mentioned above thats an absolutely enormous amount of land to be redeveloped. If that was all used strictly for housing I wouldnt be surprised if you could add 100,000 new units combined across all the different areas. Even half of that would be a massive relief. If labs are oversaturated right now and theres super high demand for housing why arent we building some of these new developments as 100% or majority housing? It seems like it would be a no brainer.

The respective cities should enact zoning of these parcels to mandate residential, at least on major portions of the development sites. That would require some political courage and foresight.

 

[mssrro]

Whatever that "rendering" shows, I'd be very surprised to see any large new spec projects for office/lab for the forseeable future. Even if a developer was bold enough to try, good luck finding a lender that's willing to finance it after they scan our latest vacancy rates.

 

[Hufer]

As some folks already mentioned, I gather in saying there is no value in preserving those Tanks at all, just for the sake of imitating/applying a solution done overseas that provably had different historic context. My main concern is all about the site CLEAN UP & PREP for the new use, given its prior Petro-chemical use.