The Benjamin & VIA (née One Seaport Square) | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

I hope this development is going to have lots of bright lights between buildings B and C. It would be really cool to be coming up the steps from Courthouse Station and arriving at a busy pedestrian corridor well lit with plenty of retail options. Will really make the experience in my opinion and generate interest to keep people coming back for more.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

The seaport episode of Chronicle is on right now.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Deetroyt said:
I hope this development is going to have lots of bright lights between buildings B and C. It would be really cool to be coming up the steps from Courthouse Station and arriving at a busy pedestrian corridor well lit with plenty of retail options. Will really make the experience in my opinion and generate interest to keep people coming back for more.
Click to expand...

I'm guessing we'll be seeing Seaport Blvd featured in some movie in the not so-distant future -- Matt Damon, or Ben Affleck or that Burger-guy's brother in some:
  • Big Crime set now
  • Big Crime set in the future
  • Climate Change
  • Terrorists
  • Super Heroes

your choice

The key is that through the magic of movie making a motor cycle or fast car chase can begin on Vassar Street -- Continue on Binney St -- Cross the Longfellow [with someone shooting from a Red Line Train] and morph into an endless-Seaport Blvd -- and End up with the lead character enjoying cocktails at the top of the Millennium Tower with the Sun [sinking -- err rising] into Boston Harbor in the background

Kind of a hybrid of: Blown Away, The original Thomas Crown Affair, and The Departed -- all of which defied the laws of geometry and Topology

But -- the big scoop -- no more Gritty Boston -- now and forever more -- its Glittery Boston :p
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Deetroyt said:
I hope this development is going to have lots of bright lights between buildings B and C. It would be really cool to be coming up the steps from Courthouse Station and arriving at a busy pedestrian corridor well lit with plenty of retail options. Will really make the experience in my opinion and generate interest to keep people coming back for more.
Click to expand...

Sounds like Chestnut Hill's 'The Street', but less suburbanite playground. That said, I'm really looking forward to the execution here of the retail programming. Will it feel like Assembly Square's Downtown Disney-esque drive-to urbanism or will it feel more like Fenway's recent redevelopment that seems truly organically urban?
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

The renderings show that the next parcel down from this will have the same huge retail podium as this so this will really become a great entertainment/bar/restaurant destination.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Render I have never seen. Looks very engaging to street life. I like the colors.

Seaport-Square.jpg
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

I think a protected bike track down the median of seaport blvd would be a great way to use that huge median. Put planters on both sides with trees/plants and the track down the middle. I think that would help put the dead zone to use. I realize there are already two on both sides but I think this would be more beneficial to biker safety.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

stick n move said:
I think a protected bike track down the median of seaport blvd would be a great way to use that huge median. Put planters on both sides with trees/plants and the track down the middle. I think that would help put the dead zone to use. I realize there are already two on both sides but I think this would be more beneficial to biker safety.
Click to expand...

There's arguments for and against centre-street cycle tracks, but the biggest issues are:
  • how they resolve at the ends of your street
  • how you get to and out of the cycle tracks as a bike rider

I'm not entirely sure that DC has successfully resolved these with their tracks on Pennsylvania Ave and I'm skeptical about the execution on Causeway St as part of the Connect Historic Boston project.

It would suffice to remove the median, narrow the travel lanes, and put the balance of street width toward cycle tracks along the side of the street and the buffering from parking, like this:
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

I'm all about bike facilities, so it's good to see this discussion going on here. But I've noticed recently that a lot of developers are using the city of Boston's 30 year bike plan to guide their decisions. That is, if the 30-year plan has bike lanes on a given street, the developer puts those in, if not, then the developer claims in their paperwork that there is no plan and no demand and so therefore they won't build the facilities. In the case of the Seaport, the 30 year plan calls for cycletracks on Northern Avenue but only bike lanes or buffered bike lanes on Seaport Boulevard.

Obviously the 30 year plan is not the law of the land in any way, and developers are somewhat free to do either more or less than the plan puts forth-- if the Northern Avenue Bridge never re-opens, I doubt that cycletracks will be built on Northern Avenue, as that is why they were originally "planned" there. I for one hope to see cycletracks on every major street in Boston in the coming decade, but who knows if the needs of the cycling community can overcome the simple value-engineering we've seen so many times in the Seaport already.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Nothing substantial was included in the inter-agency South Boston Waterfront Sustainable Transportation Plan that I and a number of other residents and advocates participated in. It was nevertheless frustrating that even our best plans with everyone at the table can't be visionary - or maybe this is one of those times where none of us is as dumb as all of us...

It's not simply some discernable 'cycling community' that needs better infrastructure. It's every person in the Boston region who needs this kind of safer, healthy and active, economic activity-inducing infrastructure. I'm growing concerned and frustrated that we're not only being held back by communal planning processes, but also allowing concerns about 'practical realities' to temper what should be ambitious goal posts. I'm concerned GoBoston 2030 won't reveal anything more ambitious for this corridor...
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Are there any plans to redo the rest of Northern Ave and the intersection by Sleeper Street? The traffic on this narrow road was backed all the way to the Pier 4 intersection last night. Seems unsustainable as it currently is.
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

falcon42 said:
Are there any plans to redo the rest of Northern Ave and the intersection by Sleeper Street? The traffic on this narrow road was backed all the way to the Pier 4 intersection last night. Seems unsustainable as it currently is.
Click to expand...

Falcon -- the whole is one giant construction zone -- the term unsustainable is not relevant

Come back circa 2020 when most of what is currently underway will be open for business -- then we can start to see how sustainable things are turning out to be -- and what might need to be done [as in Kendall's current traffic reworking]
 
Re: One Seaport Square | Parcels B-C@Seaport Sq. | Seaport

Not sure if anyone noticed/mentioned it, but two of the three cranes are now gone.
 
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