Somerville Infill and Small Developments

dshoost88 said:
FWIW, I've read articles that break down the construction cost to $533/sq. ft. When factoring that this is going to be an energy-efficient school offering STEAM programs and the facilities along with them (chemistry labs, modern HVAC systems, high volume broadband & wi-fi infrastructure), I suspect the numbers add up.

Northeastern University's new science & engineering building cost $225 million for 220,000 sq. ft., or more than $1,000/sq. ft.
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dshoost -- NEU is building a Science and Engineering Building -- highlight the words Science and Engineering -- that means a building full of sophisticated labs, prof's offices with lots of power and cooling and ventilation

Sommerville is building a High School -- that means in addition to a few Science and possibly some Engineering labs there are things like classrooms for Science, English. Math, French, Spanish, History -- no offence to any of those disciplines but they don't need anything special. Then there' real high energy density spaces such as a Cafeteria, the floor of a Gymnasium and a lot of parking, athletic fields-- very very expensive to construct

Sorry not even close

As I pointed out in my original post on the subject the cost per sq ft is even greater than GE is spending on its new World HQ

Curtatone would do much better making sure that the students who graduate can read and write and add and multiply than compete with Newton for the most expensive HS

Added -- comparison with MIT.NANO one of the most complex and sophisticated construction projects in US history

Total cost $ 350 M for 200k sq ft [gross]

Somerville HS

Total Cost $256M for 404.7k sq ft [gross]

Ref MIT.NANO
  • A 200,000 square-foot facility that more than doubles MIT’s shared fabrication and imaging capabilities
  • Two floors of high-performance cleanrooms optimized for energy efficiency, safety, and future flexibility
  • Spaces for prototyping and packaging synthesis, imaging and microscopy, materials and thin film growth, and numerical design
  • The most environmentally quiet space on campus, a basement level optimized to meet the most stringent nanoscale imaging requirements for low-vibration and low electromagnetic interference (EMI)
  • Meeting spaces for collaboration and conversation, as well as offices for research staff
  • New undergraduate chemistry teaching laboratories, to support the hands-on experimentation that is critical to training future leaders in science and engineering
  • A new outdoor courtyard nestled between MIT.nano and the main group, providing an informal setting for the MIT community to congregate and collaborate
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datadyne007 said:
I'm in the industry and can tell you the cost of this IS insane.

Billerica is currently building a $187m 300,000 SF high school that the MSBA is putting up $100m for and the rest is on Billerica thru debt exclusions like Somerville has proposed. The MSBA seems to be getting A LOT looser with its money lately and it's mostly going to well-off towns (Lunenburg, Billerica, Somerville, Newton...)
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Billerica is not a slum, but I would hardly call it well off. Nowhere near the affluence of a place like Newton.
 
fattony said:
You can eyeball a proposal and know off the top of your head that it should cost more than $100M, but less than $256M? Very impressive. You must also do very well at guessing how many M&M are in the jar.
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I'm a strategy consultant and I have done some engagements where we include the price of new buildings (typically for expansion/outsourcing). So I took the sqft and multiplied it by an average price per square foot for an urban area with a high COL based on my experience. Nothing too earth shattering. Also I am pretty solid at those kind of questions given how they are a part of strategy consulting interviews.

But back to the project, it seems like this is overboard for a high school. We need to balance having awesome facilities but not spending a quarter billion on a high school.
 
So, from what I can gather, the $256 million includes a larger than average contingency fund given the challenges of the site. From what I've heard, the rear of the site is steeper than the stairs/escalators at Porter, so it's nothing to scoff at.

Additionally, I'm under the impression that the project isn't really just a school. Spring/Winter Hill are getting some much needed extra parking (especially for snow emergencies) and the city, in theory, will be able to consolidate services into a single location with the restoration of the old high school building.
 
BuilditDenser said:
I'm a strategy consultant and I have done some engagements where we include the price of new buildings (typically for expansion/outsourcing). So I took the sqft and multiplied it by an average price per square foot for an urban area with a high COL based on my experience. Nothing too earth shattering. Also I am pretty solid at those kind of questions given how they are a part of strategy consulting interviews.

But back to the project, it seems like this is overboard for a high school. We need to balance having awesome facilities but not spending a quarter billion on a high school.
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I was being a bit snarky, so thanks for the level-headed response.

Some numerical support for your original "insane" assertion is very helpful.
 
fattony said:
I was being a bit snarky, so thanks for the level-headed response.

Some numerical support for your original "insane" assertion is very helpful.
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Fattony -- just remember this is an estimate for a project which has not really been designed let alone constructed. Given that we are talking Somerville and a public project -- How many would be willing to bet their ..... that the project will colme in on time and under budget

Wnen / If this thing is finished in say 2025 -- it will have cost well over what MIT is spending building the ultimate incubator of the nano-future
 
fattony said:
I was being a bit snarky, so thanks for the level-headed response.

Some numerical support for your original "insane" assertion is very helpful.
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So tiptoeing around NDAs, the typical cost per sq ft for a manufacturing factory is about $900 including tooling (my area of expertise is manufacturing really big things). This number includes tooling and other factory support items. Renovations cost about $200 per sq ft. Using these numbers, a new state of the art 320,000 sqft factory + 80,000 sqft in factory renovations would be about $302,000,000. Now tooling, intense foundation work, high bay ceilings, cranes and other items are huge expenses. For this reason I would reduce the amount about a third to convert to a school. So my max estimate is $200 million, realistic about $180 million. This is extremely crude math and shows that I have very little knowledge about schools.


One project for reference
http://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/boeing-shows-off-new-777x-wing-center/ (cost per sqft is $833 - the figure includes tooling and cranes)
 
Expensive high schools seem to be a thing around here. Waltham's due for a new one as well, which might end up costing nearly $300 million.
 
Well you know, the education system is Massachusetts' crown jewel really. And right now, it's what provides continued confidence in the local economy for the long term.
 
Worcester built a new high school for $70ish million back in 2011. Inflation has been nearly 1% a year since 2011 so that's a nonissue. Does an additional 600 students, a hill, and building it in Waltham or Somerville really add $200 million to the price of it? I'm all for nice high schools but at some level we need to start questioning why these stuff are so expensive. For example: 410,000 seems massive for 1,800 students (227 sqft per kid) . Acton Boxborough HS is 325,000 sqft for 2025 students (160 sqft per kid and AB has 2 gyms and two student lobbys ).

AB source:http://www.dmberg.com/Project Sheets/ABRHS.pdf
 
These other schools: how comparable were their sites? Exurban? Flat? Greenfield (rather than rebuild-in-place)?
 
The High School definitely needs to be updated. There is no doubt that they could have brought forward a less expensive option, but it still would have been at least $150 million. I think the Mayor just decided go shoot the moon, and with his political capital he got the vote.

It will increase rents in Somerville (sidebar, with the highest residential exemption in the state much of the tax burden in Somerville falls on rentals) and increase the already high cost of living there. But it's also consistent with their "worst to first" philosophy.

Will it improve educational outcomes? Sure hope so, for that price.
 
masswich said:
The High School definitely needs to be updated. There is no doubt that they could have brought forward a less expensive option, but it still would have been at least $150 million. I think the Mayor just decided go shoot the moon, and with his political capital he got the vote.

It will increase rents in Somerville (sidebar, with the highest residential exemption in the state much of the tax burden in Somerville falls on rentals) and increase the already high cost of living there. But it's also consistent with their "worst to first" philosophy.

Will it improve educational outcomes? Sure hope so, for that price.
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Masswich -- that's the fundamental problem "Shoot the moon" and the Ramses-II complex -- i.e. Giant Plaque -- Somerville HS rebuilding and expansion 2018 Joseph Curtatone Mayor

if they imposed a rigorous certification and regular re-evaluation of the teachers and the programs coupled with merit pay -- they would get much more "bang for the proverbial buck" -- but much less of the Ramses-II effect. But of course Joe couldn't do that as its anathema to the Teachers Union.

In my HS, in a quite-well-off suburb of Hartford -- because of crowding, all of the math classes including Advanced Placement Calculus were conducted in a cluster of double-wide modular housing units. These were located some hundred feet away and were connected to the main complex by a weather-proof but unheated tunnel constructed from steel pipe and plastic sheet. However, -- the 2nd class nature of the facility, didn't stop six of us in my graduating class from going to MIT. Full disclosure the school did have an IBM 1620 computer [it was purchased as a refurbished unit] for us to play with -- so when it came to spending money they knew where to invest it for the most "bang for the buck"
 
masswich said:
it's also consistent with their "worst to first" philosophy.
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This is exactly the point. Somerville's schools have a group of families slowly moving up the grades of upper class parents invested in the idea of Somerville becoming the best place in the Boston area to raise a family. Everyone already knows the Red Line and soon the GLX give access to both downtown Boston and Kendall. The big concern is the schools. This is a 9-figure signal that Somerville is serious about improving the schools.

These types of moves are why 2 and 3 families that were crackhouses in 2013 in Davis are going onto market as sets of 800K-1MM condos on a regular basis.
 
whighlander said:
In my HS in a quite-well-off suburb of Hartford because of crowding, all of the math classes including Advanced Placement Calculus were conducted in a cluster of double-wide modular housing units connected to the main complex by a weather-proof but unheated tunnel constructed from steel pipe and plastic sheet. Didn't stop six of us from going to MIT.
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So, why doesn't MIT just construct building 20 instead of NanoLab? It would be a lot less expensive. Being a temporary wooden structure didn't prevent it from being one of the most productive buildings at MIT for decades.
 
Really...we're off on a Somerville High School :: MIT tangent?


Don't take the thread-derail bait, guys. You know exactly what routine is playing out here and why.
 
dwash59 said:
This is exactly the point. Somerville's schools have a group of families slowly moving up the grades of upper class parents invested in the idea of Somerville becoming the best place in the Boston area to raise a family. Everyone already knows the Red Line and soon the GLX give access to both downtown Boston and Kendall. The big concern is the schools. This is a 9-figure signal that Somerville is serious about improving the schools.

These types of moves are why 2 and 3 families that were crackhouses in 2013 in Davis are going onto market as sets of 800K-1MM condos on a regular basis.
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Dwash -- you can't be serious -- if the family has the income to afford the $800k to $1M condo in the former crack house -- they can afford to send their kids to a private school, or at least to Matignon High School in Cambridge.

Somerville needs to fix the teacher's union problem before they can ever claim even 25th place on the "Somerville becoming the best place in the Boston area to raise a family"

Current Somerville HS graduation rate is 81.2% compared to the Mass state-wide average of 87%. 69.4% of the graduates [tied with Chelsea] attend a college of university just above Lawrence and below Revere in rankings.

Sorry -- but Even if the Mayor had enough money to build another KAUST [King Abdullah University of Science and Technology -- about $25B spent by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to found a new city and university on the Red Sea] campus on the Mystic -- unless Somerville is serious and fixes the union problem -- they will never attract the mix of good teachers, active and participating parents and students interested in learning to get to near the top.
 
dwash59 said:
So, why doesn't MIT just construct building 20 instead of NanoLab? It would be a lot less expensive. Being a temporary wooden structure didn't prevent it from being one of the most productive buildings at MIT for decades.
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Dwash -- Give it a rest -- in 1940's Blg 20 was sufficient to invent much of the modern world-- aka the MIT Radiation Lab which was associated with more Physics Nobels than Los Alamos. That's because the technology of the times was vacuum tubes and resistors the size of your finger.

Somerville HS to be 21st C ready needs to have a few nice chemistry labs and a few nice biology labs with some fume hoods and one physics lab with a fair amount of electricity supply. The rest of a HS is just empty boxes for classrooms, teachers private areas, libraries and slightly larger empty spaces for basketball courts, cafeteria, auditorium -- an old warehouse or office building can be repurposed quite well for the above. Typically, most of a new HS is involved with land -- but Somerville already has the land.

However, when you are manipulating atoms to create new materials and such -- you need really clean places with lots of really clean air. When you are trying to image things on the scale of individual atoms, you need very stable and electromagnetically quiet places. When you are trying to do both you need to build an MIT.NANO. When you want it to be a lasting addition to the campus as opposed to the semi-permanently temporary structure of building 20 you need to spend some on MIT.NANO for the aesthetics.
 
Enough about MIT. A top University in the world that has more money than god and a need for world class labs is not comparable to a public high school. We all know you went to MIT - congrats on getting in 70 years ago.

To Arlington's question, the Waltham HS may be built on a new site. The land acquisition cost was $4 million so that isnt driving the absolute massive cost. Not sure if the site is on a hill or would need any extreme modification.

Also I do not think that students learn better in a $300 million hs vs an older or cheaper building. The quality of learning at Lexington HS is basically the same as Newton North which is the same as AB which is the same as CC (or close enough). Some of those schools are brand new, some are older.
 
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