The Hub on Causeway (née TD Garden Towers) | 80 Causeway Street | West End

cadetcarl said:
...the city is supposed to act as an extension of the public's will to suppress that impulse in service of other goals (e.g., civic beauty).
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I agree, we need to have public officials (elected and appointed) with a more evolved and nuanced understanding of aesthetics, both in terms of urban planning and the design of individual buildings; how things look, and how things "fit," and the synergies between these related priorities.

cadetcarl said:
We are collectively too smart to just throw our hands up and say it's impossible to make money on skinny buildings.
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Ah, the wisdom of crowds...

The more inclusive the "we" is, the further from a desirable result we seem to get. And to be clear, I'm all for inclusiveness, but we're woefully unprepared for it.

The real issue is that as a society, we fail completely to educate children, teenagers, and adults in any substantive matters about the built environment. Nothing in History, or Civics, or Sociology. Every person, every day, interacts with the built environment, yet too few of us are granted the tools, the syntax, the grammar to have an intelligent conversation about the built environment.

This is the hill I'll likely die on...
 
You might be right there--even on this board filled with enthusiasts, we can't really agree on what makes a good building.
 
Does anyone know why this project has no marketing materials yet? I find it odd that a project of this size doesn't have its own website, and it isn't even listed on Boston Properties' website.
 
atlantaden said:
Hahaha, lunger or the proper lungah, a word I hadn't heard in freaking years, it must be indigenous to the Boston area! In all the years since I moved away to Florida and now Atlanta, I've never heard that term used, evah! Thanks for the laugh, Shmessy!
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Hey, it never leaves us, Den I've been living in Maryland for over 30 years now and I cahhhhnt shake it off!
 
Boston City Hall and the Geisel Library have to be on any top 100 list of architectural blunders.
 
^ I plan on photographing Geisel this summer.

And today happens to be its architect's birthday.
 
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Central Library (as it was called in the late '80s) was The go-to study bldg when you had an exam or project to finish. Muir campus was far too social and distracting.

HUL (Humanities Undergraduate Library/now, SSHL) was far too distracting for serious study due to it's balcony views of every, beautiful force of nature imaginable. It's located at the far south end of Revelle next to the Theatre.

Revelle and Muir are basically all brutalist bldgs.

The world class surf spots like Big Rock, Windansea, Black's and La Jolla Cove are quite a bit more inspiring than the campus buildings.

Check out the talking forest. it's only about 1/3rd its (80's size area) but interesting in any case.
 
Charlie_mta said:
Chicago is the city of the big shoulders, and these projects you linked to are an heir to that heritage. Boston has been a bit prissy and provincial by comparison.

The two closest towers in this one would have fit nicely for the Hub on Causeway:

725_Randolph_Hero.jpg
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Boston needs THIS at 65 Martha or North Station Yards.
 
Charlie_mta said:
The two closest towers in this one would have fit nicely for the Hub on Causeway:

randolph_2large.jpg
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I had some difficulty seeing he image you linked, so I did some digging. I agree, this is a handsome and "quiet" piece of classic modernism.

Link to the architects' brief.
 
Is there a reason why we can't do something like this - a 3-4 story podium with a slim tower? I get the project economics, but I would think this set up would let more light through to the street while a tall slim tower would get the number of units the developer needs to get a profit (as well as cast a narrow shadow).
 
Comment on this project from the BXP earnings call:

https://seekingalpha.com/article/41...-results-earnings-call-transcript?part=single

We have signed retail users for 30,000 square feet of the Hub spaced over the garden which gets us to over 90% of the retail space committed and we're now at 88% of that total project leased.

Demand for space in the city of Boston continues to grow as technology tenants are expanding at pace that we've never seen, and it's as strong as we have ever seen it. With our lease with Rapid7 at the Hub on Causeway and the remaining space at Pier 4 being committed most of - not all of the new existing inventory under construction begun.

In addition, Amazon and Wayfair are close to very significant expansions in the Seaport and the Back Bay and we continue to work with an anchor tenant for the tower at the Hub on Causeway.
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As you can see from our press release, we've been very busy this quarter. Owen describes some of our investment activity in asset sales. We've also been active in the debt markets. Last week we closed a $180 million four year construction loan with a syndicate of banks to fund construction of the residential component of our Hub on Causeway development
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