Seaport Square (Formerly McCourt Seaport Parcels)

Looks like we may need a couple new threads here. I know Parcel A never really broke loose, so perhaps H and J will stay in this thread. But M needs its own space.

Not to confuse this thread with too many renders at once, but is there an up to date chapel drawing out there? I've seen three of four very different renders, none of them recent.
 
On the subject of parcels, the master developer really needs to rename Q Park. I'm fine with Autumn Lane Park if it has to be called that (though that would still be awful), but telling people that you bring your dog to run around at Q Park elicits bewildered faces, let me tell you all.
 
datadyne007 said:
Broken up massing!!! Varied heights! Varied setbacks! My heart be still!!!!

Actually looks really good. Very excited about this now.
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OK, who let the architects lose? These actually look well designed! A near first for the Seaport.

Funny real estate irony -- these buildings will likely increase the value of their bland neighbors, who get to look at this cluster as an interesting view. While the bland neighbors reduce the value of this interesting cluster, because these buildings look out on the blech.
 
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JeffDowntown said:
OK, who let the architects lose? These actually look well designed! A near first for the Seaport.

Funny real estate irony -- these buildings will likely increase the value of their bland neighbors, who get to look at this cluster as an interesting view. While the bland neighbors reduce the value of this interesting cluster, because these buildings look out on the blech.
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Notice who it is. It's a joint venture between CBT, KPF & Reed-Hilderbrand. CBT is consistently trying to break the boring-as-all-hell Seaport boxy stump mold with 22 Liberty, 121 Seaport Blvd, etc. They seem to be just as disgusted as we are with how the Seaport is turning out.

Edit: If anyone saw my previous edit, it was incorrect. CBT was not the architect of Park Lane. That was Arrowstreet. My bad.
 
BostonDrew said:
Construction fencing going up around parcels H (Chapel) and J (Yotel) today
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I've asked the moderators to create a new Developments topic:

Good Voyage Chapel | Parcel H@Seaport Sq | Seaport

And to include in it some of the earlier discussion such as that we had at around the time of groundbreaking (Starting at Post 2001 in this thread)

Today I learned that the architect is Stantec (via its purchase of ADD Inc)

There's also an article from the Boston Pilot (a church publication) that gave more details, including that the current chapel won't be torn down until the new one is open
In December 1952 Cardinal Cushing celebrated the first Mass at the current chapel, built on land donated by Frederic Dumaine Jr., President of the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad Company, which transferred the property to the archdiocese for the price of $1.

The new 5,000 square foot structure, capped by a steeple and including a choir loft, will be located at the intersection of Seaport Boulevard and Sleeper Street and will be part of a 23-acre, $3.5 billion development of what is called Seaport Square. The new chapel is slated for completion in late 2015 and the current Our Lady of Good Voyage will remain open until the new structure is complete.
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Another piece of good news: the new massings/floorspace presented in the area plan (above) show seaport Square Parcel G, albeit just a place holder, as two distinct triangles. Looks like that marketing rendering we saw months ago that everyone was salivating over is, for the moment, the true placeholder on that parcel. Hopefully they reveal it soon.
 
Was going to post this in the "Where am I?" thread but, LOL, it's easy to tell.

 
Sorry for the separate post but here's a (new?) banner on the fence outside B & C parcels.



 
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21742337871_4dcefc3992_b.jpg
 
$359m sale may speed Seaport’s completion
By Tim Logan
GLOBE STAFF OCTOBER 23, 2015


The last big chunk of open land in the Seaport is being sold in a $359 million deal that is likely to accelerate completion of the bustling new district.

WS Development of Chestnut Hill is buying the remaining 12.5 acres of the tract, known as Seaport Square, with an eye toward building offices, housing, and shops where a dwindling number of parking lots now sit.

It’s one of the priciest land deals ever in Boston. And at 2.8 million square feet of permitted space over 10 blocks, it’s among the biggest developments in the city.

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WS, best known for retail developments such as The Street in Chestnut Hill and Legacy Place in Dedham, says that beyond the skyline-altering buildings they’ll put up, they plan to bring lots of street life to a district that critics say lacks a certain vibrancy today.

WS hasn’t hired architects yet, but Marks said his firm aims to avoid the boxy glass towers that characterize much of the Seaport. He points to the elliptical glass tower that Skanska USA recently started on Seaport Boulevard and the terraced condo buildings BGI presented to the city as signs of progress. And he said he’d like to follow on that with more creative — and user-friendly — designs.

“We’re going to bring in art, music, skating rinks, chessboards, farmers markets, pianos,” Marks said. “We want to build places where people want to be.”
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more ... http://www.bostonglobe.com/business...for-million/zAO9SQy5NCmXRf5sF3aX8K/story.html
 
Cue Sicillian..... and rightfully so.

Paid for whole property
$204 million for land
+$80 million in Permits

$284 Million total.

Land sales (flips)
$87.7 from Skanska
$72 Million from Berkshire
$80 Million (guess on the Celona Deal)
$359 Million from WS
$598.7 Total (estimate)

$314.7 Million in profit or $30.7 more in profit than the total investment. Holy Crow!!!

This, as has been stated, is a huge part of why we get underwhelming developments.
WS says all kinds of good things about bringing more exciting design and street activity. I say good luck to making attractive developments that anyone can afford to rent, lease, or live in while turning any kind of profit.

$359 Million for half of the land that cost $284 million (including permits) 9 years ago. That today would put the whole 23 acre site at well over $700 million today.
 
Taking a ten thousand foot view

If you really go back to the mid 1990's and to what Pritzker and other initial developers proposed and envisioned, and all the manifold possibilities for this property and then NOW see what this neighborhood is becoming you would have to call it an ABJECT failure not financially or in terms of what it means to the city, but in terms of hor our vetting and review process works.


These parcels have all been vetted to the nth degree by all sorts of review committees, and at the end of the day I think best case scenario that what this neighborhood became is no better than what was initially proposed. It in fact may be worse.

This is a cold, sterile, Un Boston neighborhood and the worse part is it took 20-30 years of bickering and over regulation to get there.

If I had to make one statement about the development of the seaport it would be that is a TESTAMENT to the fact that all the layers of regulation that these projects must go through DOES NOT LEAD TO BETTER PROJECTS OR BETTER CITIES. If anything it has produced worse. It is rather something we do irrational reasons related to our human emotions.

Don't get me wrong I know the Seaport is hot, and I know it will be an assett to the city, but at the end of the day this neighborhood should have been developed 20 years ago. The City of Boston likely cost itself millions and millions in the name of making a perfect project, and at the end of the day that was a failure.

They should have let this neighborhood develop organically and it would have been no worse, probably better and been developed decades ago!
 
I see what you're saying but development here hinged on completion of the big dig didn't it? That was ~15 years ago and then the Great Recession happened so I don't think you can blame everything on over regulation.
 
Nepatz - There is plenty of room for criticism, but why do the absentee landlords who simply flipped propety not get any blame? Surely many of the bureaucrats and committees you're blaming were nothing more than pawns in the game for private developers to paid too much, timed the market over several economic cycles, and now need to maximise returns.
 
617 said:
I see what you're saying but development here hinged on completion of the big dig didn't it? That was ~15 years ago and then the Great Recession happened so I don't think you can blame everything on over regulation.
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Not only that, but 20 years ago the Seaport Square land was owned by Frank McCourt.

You can argue that approvals here haven't moved the plans beyond the big footprints favored by developers (and by their tenants) but I don't think you can claim that they made it worse. What Hynes, Skanska, and WS want is big floorplates with boxy elevations and lots of parking. What we have here is big floorplates (but getting smaller) with boxy elevations (that are becoming less boxy) and some parking (but also street-level improvements insisted upon by the City).

Now, it's reasonable to point out that the first two issues are getting better because they were hammered by the Boston Globe, not because they were regulated by the BRA. Again, there's a case to be made that approvals haven't been effective in creating human-scaled urbanity here. Frankly, though, the only alternative would have been for the BRA to acquire Hynes' property though eminent domain, split the lots, build the roads, and sell it off in pieces after conducting a detailed plan with strict design guidelines.

We're going to see how that works in the 21st Century when Somerville starts redeveloping Union Square, but that's definitely more government involvement, not less.
 
Edit: with prices for each

Parcels bought (from Suffolk Deeds)

Parcel D $53,391,425
Parcel F $13,000,000
Parcel G $131,270,546
Parcel H $1,000
Parcel H2 $1,000,000
Parcels L $137,023,462
Parcel N&P $20,516,567
Parcel Q $3,000,000
etc. $1,000

Total: $359,204,000

So, they bought the park parcel, too. That's interesting.
 
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