Westwood Station Developments

Quote:
Originally Posted by commuter guy View Post
Mcus29,
I think vanshnookenraggen got a kick out of your internet research indicating potential mbta expansion because he created those maps himself as kind of a dream scenario of mbta expansion.
Vanshnookerraggen wrote:
Basically. Yeah, sorry to sound like a dick but it was too perfect.
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Ahh... Good job Vanshnookerraggen. There's a lot of good options in your maps. I've gotten a little revved up and hoping for some of the scenarios. It did seem a little to good to be true.
 
chris86 said:
this is my first post,
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home depot has been out of the picture for almost a year.

there is quite a bit of traffic mitigation measures in place - that information is mostly public info available from many sources

i've never heard anything about section 8 housing, can you point to a source?

there are financial measures in place for additional school children, if a certain amount are added to the system then money in escrow goes to the town to help offset thee costs
 
Some people appear to be victims of their own notions. Section 8 housing in a project of this magnitude wouldn't be feasible.
 
Developers: Westwood Station Worries Without Merit
By Paul McMorrow
Banker & Tradesman Staff Writer


It?s been a long slog for Westwood Station?s developers, Cabot, Cabot & Forbes, who have been fighting the town?s planning process, their neighbors, competition from Legacy Place in Dedham, the economy and incessant rumors of their own downfall.

But they got a rare bit of good news for the 4.5 million square-foot mixed-use development that?s rising, ever so slowly, atop an old University Avenue industrial park: The town of Westwood approved critical changes to its master plan last Tuesday.

Still, both Jay Doherty, CC&F?s president, and Westwood Town Manager Mike Jaillet, insist the development?s prospects remain robust ? to say nothing of viable.

Jaillet said the project ?is moving forward and on target for the approvals it needs,? and CC&F should clear any remaining regulatory hurdles ?by the first of the year.? The developers would then have at least three months to pull building permits and close on their construction loans, before beginning vertical construction in March.

?There will be steel in the air in the spring,? Doherty insisted. Demolition is complete, and ?for the past two to three months,? Doherty said, contractors have ?been doing aggressive horizontal construction,? building the utilities backbone, installing pads for vertical construction and completing ?the first phase of roadbed construction on a couple miles of roads.?

?We were racing the clock on paving,? he continued. ?We?re going to hold off until the weather warms up. By most measures, we?ve been doing substantial work for three to four months, and we?re doing very substantial work now.?

Unsurprisingly, Doherty said financing is the biggest challenge remaining.

?It?s bloody awful out there. I feel good today, and good about the next day. We wake up, read the obits, and if our names aren?t in them, go to work.?

Commonfund Realty financed Westwood Station?s horizontal construction as an equity investment. Doherty feels he has lined up a good cadre of ?two to four lead lenders we feel good about.?

While Legacy Place steams ahead in neighboring Dedham, Westwood Station has been plagued by regulatory delays and political infighting. The combination of legislative spectacle, frozen capital markets and an absence of vertical steel have made the project a target of incessant whispers.

Rep. William Galvin, the Canton lawmaker who?s currently blocking a vital Westwood Station bill at the State House, said he?s heard rumors ?about their financials. I?ve heard their construction loan was pulled. I heard the Commonfund was looking for outside backing. I heard that the project was shut down for now.?

?I?ve heard the rumors and the concerns,? added Westwood Rep. Paul McMurtry, ?but it?s just a rumor. But sometimes, rumors have a way of becoming reality.?

Jaillet is more direct: ?People would prefer the project die.?

The pace of regulatory reviews has encouraged talk of such a death. Jim Kosteras, whom Westwood hired to help expedite the first phase of design reviews, characterized the permitting process as ?exhaustive,? and called it ?way beyond what I?ve seen? in Boston and Somerville, where he?d previously worked as a planner. Kosteras?s contract expired in June. Since that time, Westwood has worked ? slowly ? to reconfigure the site master plan in such a way as to accommodate parking, shipping and receiving needs for prospective anchor tenants Wegmans and Target. In the meantime, national commercial lending dried up.

Kosteras said he can?t fault Westwood for its pace, noting that the suburb?s small planning staff is wrestling with a project that?s ?maybe bigger than anything the BRA is reviewing right now.?

At the same time the development has wended its way through the local approval process, it has fallen victim to a darkly comical sideshow at the State House. Westwood Town Meeting voters approved a beer and wine license for Wegmans in May, but since August, it has been held up by a pair of House lawmakers.

One, Angelo Scaccia, was appeased when the town also approved a special beer and wine license for Wegmans competitor Roche Brothers. The second, Galvin, remains incensed over traffic impacts to his Canton district. ?The roads can?t take it,? he said recently. ?It?s going to be a mess for years.?

The State House battle hasn?t greatly affected the project?s construction schedule, though it has kept Wegmans from inking its lease ? a fact that, in turn, has given the development a stench of uncertainty that hampers further leasing efforts. McMurtry, who has responded to the Wegmans delay by stalling virtually all House business since August, said waiting until January when the full House could advance the Westwood bill on a formal vote puts the development at risk.

?We look like idiots,? Jaillet moaned. ?People are looking to do everything to kill the project.? Still, he added, ?We?re absolutely committed to this, and to getting beyond individuals? ability to be disruptive.?
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good article. for someone who has worked on this project for over 2 years it frustrates me that the project has been (and will remain in) a holding pattern for as long as it will be
 
I really despise the tactic of delaying until funding runs out. It really grinds my gears. I hope this gets built. I will be out of college soon and this is an attractive(read: affordable?) alternative to the city.
 
grinds-my-gears1.jpg
 
What I did on my Thanksgiving vacation by garbribre

I am surprised that nobody has taken any pictures over the past two years, despite a few posters who said they would take some.
These are for all you pre-construction freaks.

Mounds of rubble. Wanna climb it! Wanna scavenge! Who gives good brick?
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Been so long since I've driven through here, I cannot recall what was here before.
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On the station parking structure. The only renderings visible along the entire length of University Ave.
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What's up with the building in the second rendering? Either it's meant to be on an angle or the renderer has no sense of perspective.

Anyway the architecture looks as dull as possible but it's Westwood so I'll take it.
 
Westwood Station project comes to halt

Boston Business Journal - by Michelle Hillman
Thursday, February 12, 2009, 6:00am EST

The developers of the 150-acre Westwood Station, one of the largest mixed-use projects in the state, are suspending work on the site as they struggle to secure a construction loan.

The developer of the 4.5 million-square-foot project, Cabot, Cabot & Forbes of New England Inc., said the first phase, about 1.7 million square feet, including 1.1 million square feet of retail, was scheduled to break ground at the end of the second quarter. The groundbreaking has been pushed back about six months until September. However, if September rolls around and the developers don?t have a loan, the project doesn?t move ahead.

?The nature of the economy clearly dictates you move at a slower pace,? said Jay Doherty, president of Cabot, Cabot & Forbes. ?Right now you couldn?t close a construction loan. You can talk seriously with banks about it. We?re not sure when the construction (financing) market will be alive.?

The first phase is estimated to cost about $700 million, but the price tag could be reduced if the project qualifies for state and federal funding. The total cost of the project upon completion is reported to top $1.5 billion.

Doherty?s equity partner is Wilton, Conn.-based Commonfund Realty Inc. Doherty said Commonfund has not shut down funding for the project and ?is continuing to fund very substantial expenditures on a monthly basis well into the seven figures.?

While the first phase of the project is made up largely of retailers, very few have pulled out of deals, according to several real estate sources. Previous reports indicated the project is 80 percent pre-leased to 90 tenants including Kohl?s, Talbots and Best Buy. Few, if any, retailers signed up to lease space at the project have gone under, said real estate sources.

Officials from Cabot, Cabot & Forbes met with Westwood town officials last week to discuss the future of the site given the fact that the construction is not progressing.

Doherty said while the ?strategic focus is not on trying to accelerate on site construction,? he stressed: ?We?re alive." Westwood Station has fallen prey to unfavorable market conditions that have seized up credit markets and made large-scale development nearly impossible.

Chris McKeown, project manager for the town of Westwood, said the developers were ?going full bore but scaled back until the economic outlook brightens.?

?The developers and the town are both saying, ?Let?s be pragmatic about it,? ? McKeown said.

McKeown said the developers are continuing to finish design and planning of the site. He said members of the development and construction teams met last week to discuss ways to stabilize the site until development can officially move forward.

Last November Doherty began reducing the cost of the first phase of the project in order to make the project more attractive to prospective lenders. At the time he said he needed a construction loan by the ?warm weather months next year.?

?The irony is, had the permitting gone faster, I think they?d have a much bigger problem than they have now,?

McKeown said. ?They are ready to go when the credit markets and the economy come around.?

Link
 
State offers $55M for Westwood Station project
By Herald Staff | Friday, January 22, 2010 | http://www.bostonherald.com | Real Estate

The state is willing to spend up to $55 million for infrastructure improvements that could jump-start the controversial $1.5 billion Westwood Station complex.

In a letter sent Tuesday, the state?s Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development agreed to provide up to $19 million for the construction of Westwood Station Boulevard and for changes to the intersection of Canton Street and University Avenue.

And MassDOT offered up to $36 million to build a new ramp off Interstate 95 North at Dedham Street in Canton, to widen the ?Dedham Street Corridor,? and to modify the ramp off I-95 South at Blue Hill Drive.

The state?s investment is expected to allow construction of the 4.5 million-square-foot project to start later this year if the developers can meet certain application and settlement deadlines.

The first phase of the development is expected to include 400,000 square feet of retail with a Wegmans supermarket and Target store. More retail, plus offices and housing, are envisioned for the transit-oriented development as the commercial and residential real estate markets improve.

The project cleared a major hurdle earlier this week when the Supreme Judicial Court agreed with a lower court ruling that an environmental challenge by the neighboring town of Canton was invalid because it was filed too late.

Jay Doherty, CEO of co-developer Cabot, Cabot & Forbes of Boston, declined comment. Westwood Station?s other developers are Newton?s New England Development and Commonfund Realty of Wilton, Conn.
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Article URL: http://www.bostonherald.com/business/real_estate/view.bg?articleid=1227364
 
Westwood Station Boulevard? Can anyone come up with a good street name anymore?

I mean, University Avenue is ridiculous here, because there isn't a university for miles (WTF is with this name!?) but at least it sounds halfway normal.
 
I've never understood the name 'University Avenue' in that area. To my knowledge there has never been a college anywhere near it.
 
Why am I not surprised that all the infrastructure money for Westwood STATION has nothing for the actual stop that would serve the compound?

Even if amtrak does own the station, how about a few dollars for it?
 
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