This giant sidewalk is a perfect example of superfluous public space that should be sold off and built on. The bulge in the street kills the streetwall, adding to the Greenway's amorphousness, and, even if it didn't, the one-story buildings on Cross wouldn't be enough to define the space. There should be a narrow 5-10 story building on the current parking site, leaving Cross St. a small, alley-like space, preferably pedestrianized (there's plenty of loading and unloading room on the six-lane Rose Kennedy Surface Expressway, anyway).
Of course, this will never happen. Cafes with big outdoor eating areas are probably more realistic, but it wouldn't really help the more serious aesthetic issues at play here, which require height and definition. At the very least it would revert to dead space for most of the year.
