Winthrop Center | 115 Winthrop Square | Financial District

tobyjug said:
Early enthusiasm is not predictive of wonderful results. Exhibit A- Four Seasons tower.
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I can say for sure that the impact as you walk down summer st, across the bridge and toward SS, this thing will be a PRESENCE
 
Gunner02 said:
I can say for sure that the impact as you walk down summer st, across the bridge and toward SS, this thing will be a PRESENCE
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That’s fair.
Unfortunately it won’t result in this:
A35EB30E-FDDF-4390-B724-454635E0BFE8.jpeg
 
FK4 said:
That’s what I was alluding to.

DZH, I appreciate your enthusiasm, and hope I can get excited about this one one day. But the fact is, I doubt I will. It should’ve been taller.
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I must admit, this is currently the Boston skyscraper project that I am least excited about.
 
Nibbles O’Plenty said:
There will not be much more to come that has any height at all. Try to enjoy what is happening.
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who cares if it’s tall-Ish and why should anyone be at all excited about it just bc it’s not short and there’s not “much more to come that has any height at all?” Boring is boring and, if anything, boring and big/tall is worse than boring and unassuming.
 
As disappointing as this seems to many at 691', it was never going to be able to get more than maybe 1 floor taller. Granted, 700'+ is a nice mental barrier to break, but the FAA really precludes height here.

We'll probably never see a Philly-type skyline like I saw on the previous page, but this is why we need to really scream for height in the few places where height is actually possible. Hurley should be going mid 700's instead of a 400' cap, to help lessen the outsized impact of a future 800'+ in the area. The Hynes convention site would be perfect for breaking 900' (Liberty Place 3 anyone?) and also going tall at the Kings parking garage would be prudent.

Otherwise we're forced to rely on Cambridge, and they don't seem to have the appetite over there although maybe that will change once Volpe and MXD both go over 400'. North Point would have been a perfect location for an exclamation mark of a tower, but they arbitrarily capped that at 250' and unintentionally made the entire area both overly oppressive while remaining woefully uninspiring. Constellation Center coulda woulda shoulda shot for the stars, instead of being the same height as literally everything around it (just under 300').

I really don't see where else we could go very tall. Unfortunately the area that makes the most sense, that being the financial district, has both strict FAA rules as well as shadow-on-the-parks problems.

It still blows my mind that Boston Properties goes 1070' in San Francisco, while shortchanging us height-wise in 2 key potential areas to go tall, at the Hub residential site and Back Bay Garage. If you study the FAA map we honestly have so few sites that could potentially surpass the Hancock; this is why I blow my top every time we under-build on another one! People say I just scream for height but I am realistic. We're not going to level the old neighborhoods, nor should we, so we are extremely limited in options. I wish people cared more. As we're seeing here, a 400'+ building is barely even noticeable, while a new tallest would literally redefine the city. If you think this one is disappointing, just wait until the fat slob 400' version of 1 Bromfield is built, instead of the futuristic, slim, curvy 709' version.

Unfortunately, I too see the trend of putting up some (pretty) tall buildings coming to a screeching halt after South Station Tower. As I'm pushing 40, I just hope that I can live to witness a new tallest built in this city. In the meantime, our wholly overrated/mediocre sound-alike city Austin TX is currently constructing an (ugly) upper 800's and has a 1000'+ tower expected to be built next year. It's amazing how we have been building so much relative to what we're used to, and yet are barely treading water on the national stage on top of annually falling behind multiple other international cities nobody's ever heard of (hyperbole but who knows more than 10 Chinese cities?). Even European cities, like Warsaw, are outbuilding us and pushing for heights that "soar" too much to ever be built here. Australian cities are going for broke (Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast). Both Mexico City and Monterrey have supertalls coming/built and it blows my mind where the demand is coming from in some of these cities. South American cities too, like Bogota, are building like crazy. I feel like I would be a lot more satisfied with what's going on in Boston if (A) I didn't know about all these other cities, and (B) I didn't have to witness half of the major expected projects here either fail or be downsized. From a skyline perspective, a proliferation of labs and NIMBY's does not equal keeping up with the Joneses, at all.

On a positive note, once South Station Tower is done I finally expect the skyline to "level up" in the sense that it will be head and shoulders better than what I was used to from the mid 1990's on. We'll have gone from 2 buildings over 200m to 6, and 5 over 600' to 10. Every angle of downtown will not only have, but essentially be dominated by, a minimum of 1 of these new buildings. It's going to make a huge difference. I think we'll all be very satisfied for a couple years with that new skyline configuration, before the restlessness really kicks in by the late 2020's!!!!!
 
DZH22 said:
As disappointing as this seems to many at 691', it was never going to be able to get more than maybe 1 floor taller. Granted, 700'+ is a nice mental barrier to break, but the FAA really precludes height here.

We'll probably never see a Philly-type skyline like I saw on the previous page, but this is why we need to really scream for height in the few places where height is actually possible. Hurley should be going mid 700's instead of a 400' cap, to help lessen the outsized impact of a future 800'+ in the area. The Hynes convention site would be perfect for breaking 900' (Liberty Place 3 anyone?) and also going tall at the Kings parking garage would be prudent.

Otherwise we're forced to rely on Cambridge, and they don't seem to have the appetite over there although maybe that will change once Volpe and MXD both go over 400'. North Point would have been a perfect location for an exclamation mark of a tower, but they arbitrarily capped that at 250' and unintentionally made the entire area both overly oppressive while remaining woefully uninspiring. Constellation Center coulda woulda shoulda shot for the stars, instead of being the same height as literally everything around it (just under 300').

I really don't see where else we could go very tall. Unfortunately the area that makes the most sense, that being the financial district, has both strict FAA rules as well as shadow-on-the-parks problems.

It still blows my mind that Boston Properties goes 1070' in San Francisco, while shortchanging us height-wise in 2 key potential areas to go tall, at the Hub residential site and Back Bay Garage. If you study the FAA map we honestly have so few sites that could potentially surpass the Hancock; this is why I blow my top every time we under-build on another one! People say I just scream for height but I am realistic. We're not going to level the old neighborhoods, nor should we, so we are extremely limited in options. I wish people cared more. As we're seeing here, a 400'+ building is barely even noticeable, while a new tallest would literally redefine the city. If you think this one is disappointing, just wait until the fat slob 400' version of 1 Bromfield is built, instead of the futuristic, slim, curvy 709' version.

Unfortunately, I too see the trend of putting up some (pretty) tall buildings coming to a screeching halt after South Station Tower. As I'm pushing 40, I just hope that I can live to witness a new tallest built in this city. In the meantime, our wholly overrated/mediocre sound-alike city Austin TX is currently constructing an (ugly) upper 800's and has a 1000'+ tower expected to be built next year. It's amazing how we have been building so much relative to what we're used to, and yet are barely treading water on the national stage on top of annually falling behind multiple other international cities nobody's ever heard of (hyperbole but who knows more than 10 Chinese cities?). Even European cities, like Warsaw, are outbuilding us and pushing for heights that "soar" too much to ever be built here. Australian cities are going for broke (Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast). Both Mexico City and Monterrey have supertalls coming/built and it blows my mind where the demand is coming from in some of these cities. South American cities too, like Bogota, are building like crazy. I feel like I would be a lot more satisfied with what's going on in Boston if (A) I didn't know about all these other cities, and (B) I didn't have to witness half of the major expected projects here either fail or be downsized. From a skyline perspective, a proliferation of labs and NIMBY's does not equal keeping up with the Joneses, at all.

On a positive note, once South Station Tower is done I finally expect the skyline to "level up" in the sense that it will be head and shoulders better than what I was used to from the mid 1990's on. We'll have gone from 2 buildings over 200m to 6, and 5 over 600' to 10. Every angle of downtown will not only have, but essentially be dominated by, a minimum of 1 of these new buildings. It's going to make a huge difference. I think we'll all be very satisfied for a couple years with that new skyline configuration, before the restlessness really kicks in by the late 2020's!!!!!
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It seems unhealthy to obsess over minutia like this at 1am no less. Even in a forum of like minded individuals you sound... out there.
 
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DZH22 said:
As disappointing as this seems to many at 691', it was never going to be able to get more than maybe 1 floor taller. Granted, 700'+ is a nice mental barrier to break, but the FAA really precludes height here.

We'll probably never see a Philly-type skyline like I saw on the previous page, but this is why we need to really scream for height in the few places where height is actually possible. Hurley should be going mid 700's instead of a 400' cap, to help lessen the outsized impact of a future 800'+ in the area. The Hynes convention site would be perfect for breaking 900' (Liberty Place 3 anyone?) and also going tall at the Kings parking garage would be prudent.

Otherwise we're forced to rely on Cambridge, and they don't seem to have the appetite over there although maybe that will change once Volpe and MXD both go over 400'. North Point would have been a perfect location for an exclamation mark of a tower, but they arbitrarily capped that at 250' and unintentionally made the entire area both overly oppressive while remaining woefully uninspiring. Constellation Center coulda woulda shoulda shot for the stars, instead of being the same height as literally everything around it (just under 300').

I really don't see where else we could go very tall. Unfortunately the area that makes the most sense, that being the financial district, has both strict FAA rules as well as shadow-on-the-parks problems.

It still blows my mind that Boston Properties goes 1070' in San Francisco, while shortchanging us height-wise in 2 key potential areas to go tall, at the Hub residential site and Back Bay Garage. If you study the FAA map we honestly have so few sites that could potentially surpass the Hancock; this is why I blow my top every time we under-build on another one! People say I just scream for height but I am realistic. We're not going to level the old neighborhoods, nor should we, so we are extremely limited in options. I wish people cared more. As we're seeing here, a 400'+ building is barely even noticeable, while a new tallest would literally redefine the city. If you think this one is disappointing, just wait until the fat slob 400' version of 1 Bromfield is built, instead of the futuristic, slim, curvy 709' version.

Unfortunately, I too see the trend of putting up some (pretty) tall buildings coming to a screeching halt after South Station Tower. As I'm pushing 40, I just hope that I can live to witness a new tallest built in this city. In the meantime, our wholly overrated/mediocre sound-alike city Austin TX is currently constructing an (ugly) upper 800's and has a 1000'+ tower expected to be built next year. It's amazing how we have been building so much relative to what we're used to, and yet are barely treading water on the national stage on top of annually falling behind multiple other international cities nobody's ever heard of (hyperbole but who knows more than 10 Chinese cities?). Even European cities, like Warsaw, are outbuilding us and pushing for heights that "soar" too much to ever be built here. Australian cities are going for broke (Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Gold Coast). Both Mexico City and Monterrey have supertalls coming/built and it blows my mind where the demand is coming from in some of these cities. South American cities too, like Bogota, are building like crazy. I feel like I would be a lot more satisfied with what's going on in Boston if (A) I didn't know about all these other cities, and (B) I didn't have to witness half of the major expected projects here either fail or be downsized. From a skyline perspective, a proliferation of labs and NIMBY's does not equal keeping up with the Joneses, at all.

On a positive note, once South Station Tower is done I finally expect the skyline to "level up" in the sense that it will be head and shoulders better than what I was used to from the mid 1990's on. We'll have gone from 2 buildings over 200m to 6, and 5 over 600' to 10. Every angle of downtown will not only have, but essentially be dominated by, a minimum of 1 of these new buildings. It's going to make a huge difference. I think we'll all be very satisfied for a couple years with that new skyline configuration, before the restlessness really kicks in by the late 2020's!!!!!
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While I also want Boston to build higher to break up the skyline, building tall buildings is not a reliable economic indicator to rank cities. Some of the cities you mentioned would gladly trade one of their 800 footers for just a small piece of the investment and capital coming into the Boston area right now.
 
Blackbird said:
"This" being an ugly apartment bloc? 🤔
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Yeah I was confused too. That looks like "Claude Monet paints modern-day Philadelphia." Then I was wondering what Tremont on the Common would look like if Monet painted it. Then I realized that Toby is probably saying we're not getting Philly's Comcast towers, with Impressionist facades or otherwise. And I was glad. But then finally I got to thinking it would be cool if 45 Province had a big impressionist mural on its big blank wall...:unsure:
 
I never appreciated the original Comcast Center until the Comcast Technology Center was built. Really though, all I want is a Liberty Place type of building in Boston. It wouldn't even dwarf our existing Big 3, but would actually embrace the extra height which our tall towers do not.

1634828546981.png


Or how about something like Cleveland's Key Tower, just without the ugly red key?

1634828598044.png


How about Charlotte's Bank of America, only taller than the Hancock due to its crown?

1634828823767.png


One building like this to cap off Back Bay over 900' and another to cap off North Station area over 800' I mean, look at how 1 single supertall (admittedly taller than we could get) absolutely changed the face of San Francisco and made it go from feeling stale to a futuristic metropolis.

Before (not particularly old due to their sinking/tilting Millennium Tower on the left)
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After
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I'm not saying I love that design but I just want to see something transformational in my lifetime, as transformational as the Hancock was back when it was built. The current crop has been really nice, but it's second tier (in terms of height) compared to what many similar sized cities have been getting, like the San Franciscos and Philadelphias of the world. Of course we're already a great city and we don't NEED to get a taller building. But ya know what, we didn't NEED to win the World Series in 2004 either, cause it's just baseball, yet it allowed millions of people to check off that empty box in their lives. This feels like my personal Red Sox curse, born a few years after the last tallest building was built in Boston, adopting that as my favorite hobby, and quite probably leaving this world unsatisfied whenever I get to the end of that line.
 
Many of those other cities also don't have a major international airport right next door to contend with heights. There was nothing ever really controversial about Winthrop Center other than Menino and those later pushing for a super tall on a site they all knew damn well couldn't go over 700' - not because of NIMBYs or anyone else, but, because of the FAA. I would also contend that building height, while cool for skylines, does not define a city or its importance - if it did, Tokyo, Paris, Rome, Milan, DC, etc would all be in the same or worse boat than us.
 
bakgwailo said:
...There was nothing ever really controversial about Winthrop Center other than Menino and those later pushing for a super tall on a site they all knew damn well couldn't go over 700' - not because of NIMBYs or anyone else, but, because of the FAA.
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Due respect, but this is not true. I attended public meetings for the latest round of designs (once it was clear the height would be at 700' or thereabouts) and there was significant community protest from 'Friends of Public Garden,' Beacon Hill residents, etc. about this. It was not smooth sailing. Do a google news search for "Millennium winthrop tower" and set the date range to 2016 - 2017 and you'll see a lot of coverage about opposition.
 
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Don't forget the Globe article, I think by Shirley Kressel, contending that building 691' at Winthrop Square was akin to building a skyscraper directly on the Common itself!!! That was peak crazy right there.

Again, the FAA map is very clear about areas that can go tall. Back Bay (high spine portion) has a couple spots that could push over 900' (unless of course there's a sliver of shadow somewhere), particularly Hynes and Kings garage. North Station area could go 700's, even over 800 on some of those empty lots by the ramp or where that 12 story West End apartment building is next to Alcott. Hurley could probably go at least 750', and seems to require more remediation than the Winthrop Garage (ie, let's push for some height here). Kendall could get close to 1000' at many spots near the river, but then it drops to 500' a couple blocks back (ie Volpe only had 1 sliver of the site that could have gone for broke, and they're not). North Point was really the perfect location, in the 1000' zone and without any nearby NIMBY neighbors, yet they decided to blow literally the best opportunity in the whole metro and make everything short and FAAAAAATTTTTTTT.

That's pretty much it. Back Bay, North Station, or a Kendall miracle, otherwise we just might end up the world's "boomingest" city that's stuck with a tallest building over 50 years old. Not only that, but a building that went from top 20 in the world to out of the top 1000. The Hancock is beautiful, and was a marvel of engineering at the time, but it's no longer a *special* building to still be a city's tallest in 2021.

When the Red Sox won in 2004, fans didn't suddenly become richer, have nicer houses, better education, or anything like that. But what they did gain was a permanent slice of happiness that had been missing from their lives. For me, each new large tower (Millennium Tower, Four Seasons, State Street, now this) has added to my permanent happiness level, but a new (classy/tasteful) tallest building is the cherry currently missing from the top of that sundae.
 
bigpicture7 said:
Due respect, but this is not true. I attended public meetings for the latest round of designs (once it was clear the height would be at 700' or thereabouts) and there was significant community protest from 'Friends of Public Garden,' Beacon Hill residents, etc. about this. Then there was Millennium's "Let Boston Rise" campaign, and counter-protests about how Millennium had "astroturfed" to get "supporters" to show up at meetings. It was a mess.
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Sure, I guess to me that was from the original RFP from the City pegging it for 800' when in reality there was no way it would even crest 700' due to the FAA, which I also refuse to believe the BPDA didn't already know about. It's almost if BPDA used the trick developers use: propose at a size/height double what you actually want so after review you "downsize" to what you wanted in the first place :ROFLMAO:

So, yeah, I guess I didn't mean there wasn't any controversy (there was a bunch - oh no shadows on the common on one day in January for 20 minutes!), more that - I don't think it really should have been controversial at all given the FAA limits and where it is in downtown. And I meant more that it wasn't NIMBYs that cut down the height, but the FAA (not that NIMBYs didn't come out against the project in general - that they in fact failed). I guess my point was more that there was/should have been nothing controversial about a sub 700' in Downtown, and that it all pretty much worked out, and I would wonder if the FAA's limit were higher, I think it would have just went taller (regardless of NIMBY opposition).
 
The interesting thing about Philly is that it has notably less buildings over 500'/150m, as well as a few less over 400' than Boston, yet the skyline makes your jaw drop and the whole downtown feels like an absolute powerhouse any way you experience it.

Just nothing like either Comcast building please. The new one in particular is just.... Not.... Good..... Undeniably huge, but why did it have to look like that? Give me those Liberty Place siblings any day. Our cities are close to the same size, yet Philly has this in-your-face big city feel to it that's lacking here, and those handful of huge statement buildings are a major reason why.

By the way, that brownish building in the middle between Mellon Bank (white with triangle) and 1st Comcast (darker glass top with dark square near the top) is 738', almost 50' taller than Winthrop Square which will top downtown. The tip of Mellon Bank's triangle comes in at 792', so you can visualize the Hancock there and the Pru/1 Dalton about 1 floor taller than that brown building. For top level firepower, we are completely outclassed and just a couple buildings can make a city feel substantially bigger.

20210806027 by Joseph Schmitt, on Flickr
 
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