Volpe Transportation Center Development | Kendall Sq | Cambridge

[pixelsand8]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Couldn't agree with you more pixels. "Green" ideology too often trumps common sense and leads to excessive demands for "open space justice." Just as bad are the activists who shout for more housing then denounce dense residential proposals as profit machines for greedy developers. Kendall is a goose that truly lays golden eggs, it needs to be protected from activist zealotry.

To clarify, I lean pretty far left on most issues, economic and social, so I sympathize with what I think most of the stuff these terms are supposed to represent. Words like "green" and "open space" could stand for something very important, but I can never be sure because they have no clear, agreed upon definition. That's why I tend to go by results - ie "how much affordable housing is actually getting built?", and "how much land is it taking up?", and "how does that effect our ability to build more?" etc. I want numbers and figures, not idealistic concepts like "equity".

I do think when seen through this lens there are a lot of bad developments that probably do need to be stopped (cough Alewife, cough). Land is hugely scarce and when it gets developed you want it done right, but you can't stonewall every single developer every step of the way. You have to know when a compromise makes sense, and how to view that as a step towards your ultimate vision rather than a loss. I'm looking at the situation for "Mass + Main" as an example of a developer making affordable housing and parking concessions in exchange for height, but getting continual push back for more. I can't help but wonder how far it's going to go before the developer gives up, and you've lost 47 units of affordable housing for who knows how long you have to wait till another developer takes a crack at it.

 

[DigitalSciGuy]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

With the improving weather, I've been walking around a lot more lately and am desperately grasping at straws for well-programmed open space (in Boston and Cambridge) and am just finding more 'outdoor rooms' going to waste. I'd love to see this site turn that around for Kendall, but I'm worried by this newer park on Marina Park Drive:

The otherwise chill jazzy music is always blaring from the outdoor speakers in the bushes and makes it feel like they're just trying too hard to make the space a thing. It's barren, has not nearly enough furniture to feel like a space where you're allowed to be near people and the admittedly bare trees never seem to fill in enough of a canopy to make the space feel intimate.

Then you have this little number at the corner of India and Central Streets near the Greenway.

I don't know if this is usually filled with auxiliary seating for the adjacent restaurant, but it's a real waste of a space that tons of tourists and business people pass through daily. This could be a mini Bowling Green where I can go sit and eat my lunch away from the agoraphobia-inducing, shadeless Greenway.

Bringing it back to Kendall, there's that park in front of the Genzyme building. They get it close to just right, but the large number of trees on the site are mostly shading the...grass?...in an area you can't really sit because it's not mowed...

Then when the folding tables and chairs go out, they seem to be dotted around the lot, mostly without umbrellas and directly under the sun, again creating this weird space that seems to encourage people to stay away from each other and also assumes that people are okay with sitting in direct sunlight on a warm/hot day.

Furniture you can move around, but trees you have to get right. Continuing with examples that I really like having personally experienced them, I'd love to see whatever public space we get from redevelopment of Volpe to be something like Greely Square Park at 34th Street and Broadway in Manhattan.

Come to think of it, all of the parks I've loved in New York City have all had great tree cover over at least half of the lot to balance out all the direct sunlight. They've all had plenty of places to sit, something even Cambridge's Common seems to not want you to do.

Pretty sure I'm preaching to the choir here, but I can't help but feel increasingly passionate about finally getting a space that feels like it wants you there, rather than just 'open space'. More relevant to the development, if they somehow needed to incorporate lab space (if only to establish an anchor tenant for some future developer), I don't think I'd want to sit in that space if there weren't major sound mitigation from either trees or orientation of the HVAC.

 

[atlantaden]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Enjoyed your thoughtful insights about the small parks situation in Boston/Cambridge but I have to wonder if the weather (your pic of NY's Greeley Square was taken during the summer months, not the best comparison to mid-April's weather either in NY or Boston) during your walk didn't affect the numbers of people hanging out. I'd suggest you take the same walk during a beautiful summer day and see if the concerns that you describe remain.

 

[George_Apley]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

NYC does parks very, very well. Boston already took the hint by hiring the same guy who redid Bryant Park to redo the Mall on the Common. Cambridge should get a clue.

 

[dwash59]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Pretty sure I'm preaching to the choir here, but I can't help but feel increasingly passionate about finally getting a space that feels like it wants you there, rather than just 'open space'.

Not sure about that, we've been told that the median of Memorial Drive and the strip behind the Royal Sonesta are quality spaces.

Kino -- you have to walk a bit further downstream

• In front of MIT there is a reasonably wide median suitable for frisbee as well as the strip along the river between the MIT boathouse and the MIT Sailing Pavilion where the moving cars are quite a bit further away than 6 feet
  
• further down past the Longfellow Bridge there is the Cambridge Esplanade -- a quite nice reasonably wide piece of green behind the Sonesta and the other buildings along Land Blvd with only a 1 lane quiet street to cross

 

[shmessy]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

With the improving weather, I've been walking around a lot more lately and am desperately grasping at straws for well-programmed open space (in Boston and Cambridge) and am just finding more 'outdoor rooms' going to waste. I'd love to see this site turn that around for Kendall, but I'm worried by this newer park on Marina Park Drive:

The otherwise chill jazzy music is always blaring from the outdoor speakers in the bushes and makes it feel like they're just trying too hard to make the space a thing. It's barren, has not nearly enough furniture to feel like a space where you're allowed to be near people and the admittedly bare trees never seem to fill in enough of a canopy to make the space feel intimate.

Then you have this little number at the corner of India and Central Streets near the Greenway.

I don't know if this is usually filled with auxiliary seating for the adjacent restaurant, but it's a real waste of a space that tons of tourists and business people pass through daily. This could be a mini Bowling Green where I can go sit and eat my lunch away from the agoraphobia-inducing, shadeless Greenway.

Bringing it back to Kendall, there's that park in front of the Genzyme building. They get it close to just right, but the large number of trees on the site are mostly shading the...grass?...in an area you can't really sit because it's not mowed...

Then when the folding tables and chairs go out, they seem to be dotted around the lot, mostly without umbrellas and directly under the sun, again creating this weird space that seems to encourage people to stay away from each other and also assumes that people are okay with sitting in direct sunlight on a warm/hot day.

Furniture you can move around, but trees you have to get right. Continuing with examples that I really like having personally experienced them, I'd love to see whatever public space we get from redevelopment of Volpe to be something like Greely Square Park at 34th Street and Broadway in Manhattan.

Come to think of it, all of the parks I've loved in New York City have all had great tree cover over at least half of the lot to balance out all the direct sunlight. They've all had plenty of places to sit, something even Cambridge's Common seems to not want you to do.

Pretty sure I'm preaching to the choir here, but I can't help but feel increasingly passionate about finally getting a space that feels like it wants you there, rather than just 'open space'. More relevant to the development, if they somehow needed to incorporate lab space (if only to establish an anchor tenant for some future developer), I don't think I'd want to sit in that space if there weren't major sound mitigation from either trees or orientation of the HVAC.

Look at all of those examples. What do you notice?

The successful areas have STREET LEVEL Retail/Restaurants. The unsuccessful ones have walls and space that say "nothing happening -go away". Boston does "go away" really, really well. I just got back from a week in London and I am depressed at how vibrant the sidewalks are there and how much the buildings INVITE street level activity.

 

[DZH22]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Boston does "go away" really, really well. I just got back from a week in London and I am depressed at how vibrant the sidewalks are there and how much the buildings INVITE street level activity.

I have been to London a couple of times and it has its share of "go away" areas too. Canary Wharf and the area around the O2 are a couple of examples. It's not necessarily doing "new" better than Boston. It's just that it's tough to compare Boston to a huge old European city like London. They just aren't in the same league, and they're not supposed to be.

Compared to other North American big cities, Boston is easily in the top 5 for street level vibrancy. Personally, I would say Top 3. It holds its own, and then some.

This project is a good opportunity to get stand-out height and a good deal of housing for Kendall. Hopefully it can bring enough residents and interest to better activate the immediate surroundings as well. Ideally I'd like to see an office, a tall residential, and a huge lab, with less open space. How big is this site exactly?

 

[DigitalSciGuy]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Enjoyed your thoughtful insights about the small parks situation in Boston/Cambridge but I have to wonder if the weather (your pic of NY's Greeley Square was taken during the summer months, not the best comparison to mid-April's weather either in NY or Boston) during your walk didn't affect the numbers of people hanging out. I'd suggest you take the same walk during a beautiful summer day and see if the concerns that you describe remain.

Perhaps I should've phrased it more as a culmination of my experiences of these spaces over the 5 years I've lived in and around Boston while making frequent trips to New York to visit friends/family. In your reply, are you suggesting that these spaces are, in fact, filled for 8-hours or more each day or are you genuinely curious as to whether this is the case?

At least with respect to the park at Marina Park Drive, I'd stick around if they'd stop blaring jazz music in a contrived attempt at creating atmosphere. If they really want jazz music out there, get a jazz quartet to play in the evenings. Maybe I'm totally missing something and the loud music is actually just masking some awful HVAC noise?

Relating it back to the Volpe site, if a square were placed inside development on the perimeter of the property, would tree cover be enough to mitigate sound from HVAC from either housing or labs? Is there a way to ensure that PTACs either aren't allowed in the development at all or at least are blocked from inclusion on units facing the square? Also, to what effect can building materials be used to dampen sound from buildings around the site, let alone any new buildings built here? If I remember correctly, sound from lab HVAC is a major issue identified in the master plan/scoping documents for more residential in Kendall to be truly viable.

NYC does parks very, very well. Boston already took the hint by hiring the same guy who redid Bryant Park to redo the Mall on the Common. Cambridge should get a clue.

Are you talking about the Brewer Fountain renewal or some other plan for the rest of the Common that I seem to not be able to find? I feel like I've heard of this, but I've been unable to find anything in a quick search of the Friends of the Public Garden site and Archboston.

This project is a good opportunity to get stand-out height and a good deal of housing for Kendall. Hopefully it can bring enough residents and interest to better activate the immediate surroundings as well. Ideally I'd like to see an office, a tall residential, and a huge lab, with less open space. How big is this site exactly?

Just measured in Google Earth and the main portion is a rectangle about 260m (850ft) along Broadway by 130m (420ft) along 3rd Street. The full area of the property looks to be about 56 sq km (600k sq ft).

Looking at the site, I also realise that it would be nice to have better permeability of the site. Extend 5th Street up to Binney and down through Broadway. You'd effectively end up with 4 blocks for development. The existing tower could be renovated and built into one of the perimeter blocks of development. USDOT could rebuild its two lower-slung office/labs in a building across the extended 5th Street, maybe with a multi-storey skybridge to allow federal workers to cross between the buildings without having to go through security.

Arguably, the site is large enough that it could fit at least a couple of slender 250-300ft towers to get some height diversity and allow the perimeter buildings to be built at a more human scale that hit an average closer to 25m height on the interior streets and 45m height along Broadway. The 8-storey wall on the 3rd Square apartments feels like it's straddling that line between claustrophobic and human-scaled. It's hitting roughly a 3:2 height-to-road width ratio (~30m height to ~20m property-to-property street width).

I'm thinking maybe something like a mini Via Verde on each block, where the perimeter buildings can step up to the height of the tower and offer roof decks and public outdoor rooms inside each block; definitely retail, indoor community spaces - heck, maybe even a new public library (to supplement the one up 6th Street) - on at least 80% of the ground floor to activate those spaces.

 

[Arlington]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Holy crap, I WISH that was built!

Edward Durell Stone basically designed only 1 building, he just made it taller (Amoco or GM), or shorter (Kennedy Center). Here is the man himself (center) gazing at the NASA -Electronics Center (Volpe site) model.(click for big version from NASA archives)

 

[atlantaden]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Perhaps I should've phrased it more as a culmination of my experiences of these spaces over the 5 years I've lived in and around Boston while making frequent trips to New York to visit friends/family. In your reply, are you suggesting that these spaces are, in fact, filled for 8-hours or more each day or are you genuinely curious as to whether this is the case?

I'm only suggesting that these Boston parks/areas that you gave as examples are probably used much more during the late spring, summer, and fall months (during good weather) than what is shown in the pictures. I know that Christopher Columbus Park, Copley Square, and Post Office Square are three examples of smaller parks that are very active, are very popular, during the good weather times that I've been there over the past many years. The only point I was making was that weather is definitely a factor in a park's usage. But I also agree that the parks I've been to in Manhattan are wildly popular and for good reason!

 

[vanshnookenraggen]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Here is the man himself (center) gazing at the NASA -Electronics Center (Volpe site) model.

Is that Volpe or SUNY Albany?

 

[Shepard]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

I'm patiently waiting for Davem or CharlieMTA's map of the future street grid...

 

[citylover94]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Volpe, SUNY Albany the short building goes all the around the taller building.

 

[George_Apley]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Are you talking about the Brewer Fountain renewal or some other plan for the rest of the Common that I seem to not be able to find? I feel like I've heard of this, but I've been unable to find anything in a quick search of the Friends of the Public Garden site and Archboston.

The fountain was a major part of it, yes. Here's an article from 2011:

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/bost...s/2011/02/28/boston_common_set_for_face_lift/

 

[whighlander]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

This starting to turn into Crazy Volpe Pitches

Let's remember that the development of the part of the site not needed for the approximately 400k sq ft for the new Volpe Center has to pay for the whole project

Volpe wants at least part of the facility to have large floor plates for multipurpose uses so consider a hypothetical structure:

• 2 to 3 acre site to provide adequate security set back
• 3 story 40k sq ft foot print pedestal [120 k sq ft total] gross total about 420 k sq ft
• a relatively slim 20 story admin /office tower with about 15 k gross sq ft per floor [about 300 k total]
• That leaves about 10 acres for:
  • streets, sidewalks, foot paths, driveways
  • parks
  • high density development

This is going to have to be mostly buildings and streets not very much left for the parks -- perhaps 3 acres

 

[Scipio]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Another Cambridge Day piece on the site:
http://www.cambridgeday.com/2015/06...volpe-sky-high-cheung-tower-put-on-the-table/

1000 feet is still being discussed, 350 feet seems to be the current minimum consensus, and 500 feet seems to be realistic for the main tower on site.

There's some quibbling over affordable housing percentages (13/15/17.5/20) and the share of low income and middle income within that affordable housing percentage. The consensus seems to be 15% total affordable with 10% low income and 5% middle income.

Cheung is still reminding people that the higher you go the more affordable housing you get. Mazen wants the architecture to be "world class" if it is really going high.

 

[Equilibria]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Another Cambridge Day piece on the site:
http://www.cambridgeday.com/2015/06...volpe-sky-high-cheung-tower-put-on-the-table/

1000 feet is still being discussed, 350 feet seems to be the current minimum consensus, and 500 feet seems to be realistic for the main tower on site.

There's some quibbling over affordable housing percentages (13/15/17.5/20) and the share of low income and middle income within that affordable housing percentage. The consensus seems to be 15% total affordable with 10% low income and 5% middle income.

Cheung is still reminding people that the higher you go the more affordable housing you get. Mazen wants the architecture to be "world class" if it is really going high.

Sounds like if some developer were to come forward with a stunning proposal higher than 500 feet - not 1,000, but maybe 700 - the City Council would consider it on its merits. As a resident, I'm happy they're not laughing this idea out of the room. They actually seem willing to consider quality without fear of shadows.

Also, I'm pretty dubious that this is the "best development site in the world." Best in Massachusetts, maybe. I'm giving the US title to Ground Zero (although you could convince me that Hudson Yards wins out). That might be the best in the world, too, although I don't know enough about all the development sites in the world to say for sure...

EDIT: Mocked this at 1000'. It's easy to do in Google Earth, so I only took the one picture. Try it yourself for other views

EDIT AGAIN: Here it is at about 650', with three other towers on the site and the Kendall Square Initiative:

 

[fattony]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Wow, 650 looks pretty sharp.

1000 looks absurd and East Cambridge would have a collective conniption fit.

Neither is ever happening. I predict 300 feet.

 

[lexicon506]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

1000 looks absurd and East Cambridge would have a collective conniption fit.

A truly iconic 1,000 ft. tower could do wonders for the brand identity of Kendall Sq. across the world and lift the area's often sagging self-confidence as an innovation capital. Out of place? Think the Eiffel Tower.

I'm also willing to bet it would lead to a 1,000 ft. proposal at Back Bay Station. No way Boston cedes the crown that easily.

 

[Equilibria]

Re: Volpe Transportation Center Development Cambridge

Wow, 650 looks pretty sharp.

1000 looks absurd and East Cambridge would have a collective conniption fit.

Neither is ever happening. I predict 300 feet.

You know, I don't hear much "never happening" talk in that CambridgeDay article. I think it would be supported with the right design (and enough affordable housing).

650' seems to be the sweet spot. 500' looks a bit stubby, while 1,000, as you say, looks absurd. The building makes an enormous impact from a lot of places even at 650, though. It would be visible all the way out the Turnpike the way the Hancock and Pru are now (and Four Seasons will be). Google Earth is a wonderful program when it works.