Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Don't you live across the ocean? Why are you even here?
Don't you live across the ocean? Why are you even here?
Winthrop Center | 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
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stick n move
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
I was under the impression that dozens of millionaire condos means more black cars on the roads along with the hundreds of service employees working at each new building having to get there from whatever lower class neighborhood they can afford to survive in which when combined means thousands more toyota corollas on the pike/93, people on the commuter rail, braintree line etc. -Im not bashing them either I live in dorchester and am not rich in any way.
I was under the impression that dozens of millionaire condos means more black cars on the roads along with the hundreds of service employees working at each new building having to get there from whatever lower class neighborhood they can afford to survive in which when combined means thousands more toyota corollas on the pike/93, people on the commuter rail, braintree line etc. -Im not bashing them either I live in dorchester and am not rich in any way.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
With regards to the Filene's site, this is simply not what happened. The construction lender got vaporized in the credit crisis, and the financial sector of the entire planet was in "run and hide and curl up in fetal position" mode. Absolutely no construction lender could be found for a while, and during that while, it looked for a few months like the meltdown could spread to the entire economy. Ergo office space rents were dropping as businesses retrenched. By the time other construction lenders were willing to look at it again, the numbers didn't make any sense. That one got caught in the worst global downdraft any of us are ever likely to see (I hope), if that had all happened when it was half built, we'd have seen it sitting there half built for those years, instead of a crater. Better for us all that it fell apart at the hole in the ground stage, that made it possible to move on to what did happen.
There's every chance we'll see one or two other sites go into mothball mode in the coming years. If the approvals process were faster, it would just mean a different set of sites would go into mothball mode at each recession.
With regards to the Filene's site, this is simply not what happened. The construction lender got vaporized in the credit crisis, and the financial sector of the entire planet was in "run and hide and curl up in fetal position" mode. Absolutely no construction lender could be found for a while, and during that while, it looked for a few months like the meltdown could spread to the entire economy. Ergo office space rents were dropping as businesses retrenched. By the time other construction lenders were willing to look at it again, the numbers didn't make any sense. That one got caught in the worst global downdraft any of us are ever likely to see (I hope), if that had all happened when it was half built, we'd have seen it sitting there half built for those years, instead of a crater. Better for us all that it fell apart at the hole in the ground stage, that made it possible to move on to what did happen.
There's every chance we'll see one or two other sites go into mothball mode in the coming years. If the approvals process were faster, it would just mean a different set of sites would go into mothball mode at each recession.
odurandina
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
You might be right, but Martin is also banking on the desirability of Boston bringing in a few more big Corp HQs. One thing that was conveyed in conversations with the Chiofaro Staff is that City Hall has a vision for the future that is, jaw dropping.
Will we come out ok on transporting people around?
i realize the range of acceptability lies in the eyes of the 'beholder.' We outperform LA, Seattle, Houston, Dallas, Miami, Philadelphia, Chicago and Baltimore.
i have to admit, the future of this City literally takes my breath away.
Speaking with all you about it is an absolutely huge honor.
is any of this likely?
You might be right, but Martin is also banking on the desirability of Boston bringing in a few more big Corp HQs. One thing that was conveyed in conversations with the Chiofaro Staff is that City Hall has a vision for the future that is, jaw dropping.
Will we come out ok on transporting people around?
i realize the range of acceptability lies in the eyes of the 'beholder.' We outperform LA, Seattle, Houston, Dallas, Miami, Philadelphia, Chicago and Baltimore.
i have to admit, the future of this City literally takes my breath away.
Speaking with all you about it is an absolutely huge honor.
is any of this likely?
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JeffDowntown
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
That picture does not describe the buildings around me. Yes, it is a higher-end full service building, but hardly hundreds of service employees (I think there are about 10 total for the building, all shifts), and some of ours live in the building (it is half affordable rental). And I have never seen a black car here.
That picture does not describe the buildings around me. Yes, it is a higher-end full service building, but hardly hundreds of service employees (I think there are about 10 total for the building, all shifts), and some of ours live in the building (it is half affordable rental). And I have never seen a black car here.
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
I see height and transit investment linked. Extra height is mostly a burden on the city's public safety (police & fire) and infrastructure (transit, sanitation, power grid, water, parks).
And I'll stipulate that both rich DINKs or day-workers in a tower are not a burden on schools and social services.
I like height, but it isn't free, and I'd say 100% of the taxes from "tall" be segregated to offset the unique costs of tall.
Shadows should be the least of our worries. Shade on the common can be solved with $10k worth of overseeding of shade-loving grass.
The real burden isn't illumination, it is physical stuff & people that have to be hauled in and hauled out. Trucks have to deliver food, whether it's a Roche Bros, WFM, or a takeout. And our s*** needs to be hauled out.
There should be widespread agreement, either from a right-wing free market pay-for-what-you-use/impose, or from a left-wing public goods standpoint, that all that's require to build tall is that tall needs to pay for the costs of tall.
I see height and transit investment linked. Extra height is mostly a burden on the city's public safety (police & fire) and infrastructure (transit, sanitation, power grid, water, parks).
And I'll stipulate that both rich DINKs or day-workers in a tower are not a burden on schools and social services.
I like height, but it isn't free, and I'd say 100% of the taxes from "tall" be segregated to offset the unique costs of tall.
Shadows should be the least of our worries. Shade on the common can be solved with $10k worth of overseeding of shade-loving grass.
The real burden isn't illumination, it is physical stuff & people that have to be hauled in and hauled out. Trucks have to deliver food, whether it's a Roche Bros, WFM, or a takeout. And our s*** needs to be hauled out.
There should be widespread agreement, either from a right-wing free market pay-for-what-you-use/impose, or from a left-wing public goods standpoint, that all that's require to build tall is that tall needs to pay for the costs of tall.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
I thought I had read that it might have been a strategy of the Vornado owner to basically let sites sit like Filenes to extort money from the cities (at least in NYC). If I recall, he got a little too drunk or something while giving a talking and was perhaps a bit more truthful than he normally would have been: http://legacy.wbur.org/2010/03/09/menino-downtown-crossing . Just saying that might have played a part along with the economy collapsing.
I thought I had read that it might have been a strategy of the Vornado owner to basically let sites sit like Filenes to extort money from the cities (at least in NYC). If I recall, he got a little too drunk or something while giving a talking and was perhaps a bit more truthful than he normally would have been: http://legacy.wbur.org/2010/03/09/menino-downtown-crossing . Just saying that might have played a part along with the economy collapsing.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
That was their strategy after they lost their lender. Tried to ride out the recession that way plus get Menino to kick in more $ via tax breaks or whatever. Menino rightly told them to get stuffed.
That was their strategy after they lost their lender. Tried to ride out the recession that way plus get Menino to kick in more $ via tax breaks or whatever. Menino rightly told them to get stuffed.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Getting back on the Winthrop Square proposal, the biggest risk to Millennium's proposal doesn't look to me to be either NIMBY or shadows. I think they can get through those two issues (not guaranteed by any means). But can they obtain major financing from lenders and equity, with their exposure to risk in San Francisco? They will be facing some hard questions in the underwriting of their guarantees, and I think they are years away from being able to provide answers that are verifiably accurate. It is not yet knowable what their exposure is out there, nor is it yet knowable what anyone else's exposure is. All you can know is that floods of money will flow to lawyers, and everyone has extremely solid grounds to fight like hell. Gonna be great for the lawyers, gonna be really serious uncertainty for everyone else for years. Including anyone who's thinking of investing in, or lending to, the next big Millennium project.
Before anyone starts answering "but insurance solves all!!", go read that Bloomberg article on the SF Millennium thread. Millennium almost certainly cannot show that they are certainly and adequately insured for their exposure. I don't know how they move forward on a deal beyond the permitting stage. I can understand that they're still forging ahead on Winthrop Square, but even if they get past the NIMBY hurdle, no one should call this done until they see it actually start. This could be the next Filene's stalled site. Wouldn't that be a weird irony? (I'm not hoping for this, btw, I like their proposal)
Getting back on the Winthrop Square proposal, the biggest risk to Millennium's proposal doesn't look to me to be either NIMBY or shadows. I think they can get through those two issues (not guaranteed by any means). But can they obtain major financing from lenders and equity, with their exposure to risk in San Francisco? They will be facing some hard questions in the underwriting of their guarantees, and I think they are years away from being able to provide answers that are verifiably accurate. It is not yet knowable what their exposure is out there, nor is it yet knowable what anyone else's exposure is. All you can know is that floods of money will flow to lawyers, and everyone has extremely solid grounds to fight like hell. Gonna be great for the lawyers, gonna be really serious uncertainty for everyone else for years. Including anyone who's thinking of investing in, or lending to, the next big Millennium project.
Before anyone starts answering "but insurance solves all!!", go read that Bloomberg article on the SF Millennium thread. Millennium almost certainly cannot show that they are certainly and adequately insured for their exposure. I don't know how they move forward on a deal beyond the permitting stage. I can understand that they're still forging ahead on Winthrop Square, but even if they get past the NIMBY hurdle, no one should call this done until they see it actually start. This could be the next Filene's stalled site. Wouldn't that be a weird irony? (I'm not hoping for this, btw, I like their proposal)
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
^ You can easily guarantee that does not happen again if you set the piles on bedrock like thousands of other towers have been over time. They took a calculated risk in San Francisco and it bit them in the ass. They wont be doing that again.
^ You can easily guarantee that does not happen again if you set the piles on bedrock like thousands of other towers have been over time. They took a calculated risk in San Francisco and it bit them in the ass. They wont be doing that again.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Agreed, that'd fix it. Perhaps there are other fixes. But who pays to retrofit it? Not known. Not yet knowable. Fair warning, hairsplitting to come: their problem isn't exactly that their calculated risk has bit them in the ass. I'd phrase it that the calculated risk is going to bite somebody or a set of somebodies in the ass (developer, architect, engineer, insurers, project next door, some grouping thereof), and no one knows who that will be, nor what the bite will be. From the perspective of underwriting the next deal, that's almost worse than if the bite in the ass had happened already.
Agreed, that'd fix it. Perhaps there are other fixes. But who pays to retrofit it? Not known. Not yet knowable. Fair warning, hairsplitting to come: their problem isn't exactly that their calculated risk has bit them in the ass. I'd phrase it that the calculated risk is going to bite somebody or a set of somebodies in the ass (developer, architect, engineer, insurers, project next door, some grouping thereof), and no one knows who that will be, nor what the bite will be. From the perspective of underwriting the next deal, that's almost worse than if the bite in the ass had happened already.
odurandina
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Piles + arches or trusses can be installed. The tower will eventually sink and the load will meet them. In time, the tilt of the tower will be corrected. The design and decor of the Lobby will fall in line, and lawsuits settled. Far worse things have happened in the annals of structural engineering.
Piles + arches or trusses can be installed. The tower will eventually sink and the load will meet them. In time, the tilt of the tower will be corrected. The design and decor of the Lobby will fall in line, and lawsuits settled. Far worse things have happened in the annals of structural engineering.
Downburst
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
If you're going to use my work to support one of your non sequiturs, can you at least credit me?
is any of this likely?
If you're going to use my work to support one of your non sequiturs, can you at least credit me?
odurandina
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Indeed!! please pardon my oversight. Some time has passed since i saved it, and forgot the source.
it still, has to be one of the most ambitious, but maybe possible dream plan i have seen.
Did someone (who could he be) trash it yet?
Indeed!! please pardon my oversight. Some time has passed since i saved it, and forgot the source.
it still, has to be one of the most ambitious, but maybe possible dream plan i have seen.
Did someone (who could he be) trash it yet?
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stick n move
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Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
I said nothing about fixing the SF tower. I have absolutely no idea what theyre going to do over there. Someone asked how are they going to guarantee sinking doesnt occur again in the future to secure financing on the Boston tower and I was just saying on this tower (Boston, currently unbuilt) they are going to drill the piles to bedrock like most other towers in history and there will be no problem.
They took a risk (not drilling to bedrock) and it bit them in the ass (the tower is sinking)
I said nothing about fixing the SF tower. I have absolutely no idea what theyre going to do over there. Someone asked how are they going to guarantee sinking doesnt occur again in the future to secure financing on the Boston tower and I was just saying on this tower (Boston, currently unbuilt) they are going to drill the piles to bedrock like most other towers in history and there will be no problem.
They took a risk (not drilling to bedrock) and it bit them in the ass (the tower is sinking)
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
I wasn't talking about how they'd guarantee no sinking in Boston. I agree with your take on the Boston tower. And given that bedrock is not so incredibly deep here, that won't be unusual.
I'm talking about financial guarantees. They'll have to provide them to investors in any city, with any method of construction. Every guarantee gets underwritten by looking at all outstanding risks. That loops us back to SF.
I'm not saying they can't avoid the same risk here, I'm saying the risk they face inSF is truly unusual and very large and impossible to accurately guage. I suspect financing will be difficult, here and everywhere.
I wasn't talking about how they'd guarantee no sinking in Boston. I agree with your take on the Boston tower. And given that bedrock is not so incredibly deep here, that won't be unusual.
I'm talking about financial guarantees. They'll have to provide them to investors in any city, with any method of construction. Every guarantee gets underwritten by looking at all outstanding risks. That loops us back to SF.
I'm not saying they can't avoid the same risk here, I'm saying the risk they face inSF is truly unusual and very large and impossible to accurately guage. I suspect financing will be difficult, here and everywhere.
Re: 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District
Also, the sentence here is accurate except for the past tense on "bit". The risk they took is biting them in the ass. It will be a series of bites in the form of many payments to lawyers and if they're lucky and their lawyers are good, the bites in the ass will only be legal fees and they survive just fine. But if their insurance policies have bad exclusions and/or many dozens of other contingencies happen in court, then along with many payments of legal fees, they get stuck with a really big bite in the ass, paying for part or all of the repair. And no one, not Millennium, nor their financiers, can determine how big that future series of bites in the ass will be.
The future tense part of their problem is what makes me wonder if they're going to be doing the Winthrop Square tower, and it's all about securing financing, not about making better choices on foundations (though that'd be advisable, too, as you noted).
Also, the sentence here is accurate except for the past tense on "bit". The risk they took is biting them in the ass. It will be a series of bites in the form of many payments to lawyers and if they're lucky and their lawyers are good, the bites in the ass will only be legal fees and they survive just fine. But if their insurance policies have bad exclusions and/or many dozens of other contingencies happen in court, then along with many payments of legal fees, they get stuck with a really big bite in the ass, paying for part or all of the repair. And no one, not Millennium, nor their financiers, can determine how big that future series of bites in the ass will be.
The future tense part of their problem is what makes me wonder if they're going to be doing the Winthrop Square tower, and it's all about securing financing, not about making better choices on foundations (though that'd be advisable, too, as you noted).