Menino hailed it as a spot for a landmark tower. Walsh hailed it as a property the City could offload for a lot of money. Blame the City here as much as the developer.
Also, this is worlds better than a garage and every one of those proposals was going to get VE'd and rationalized as the boom ended. For all we know, MP was the only developer that would even have stuck with it to build anything. I'm dubious that Accordia, for example, would have produced anything other than a vacant lot.
Also, I think it's worth comparing what was built to what the other teams were proposing, lest we look through rose-colored glasses. Even as concepts, we had:
Accordia - The green version of what was built, frankly. Glass with some unique accents, likely to see VE later.
Lendlease - A veiny sex toy that was supposed to be anchored by WeWork, so there's that.
HYM - This was my favorite because of the site swap with the church, but they would have had to work out the site swap with the church. Also, we all know how good HYM has turned out to be at demolishing garages.
MP - Worth noting how much the Tower was VE'd in addition to the connector. The pleats were supposed to come all the way to the ground.
Trans National - Not a serious developer, and the proposal was for two filler towers that would have been essentially invisible.
Trinity - Awful TAT design, interesting concepts for affordable residential use that probably would have doomed the project as they went around asking for handouts.
And bear in mind that the height reduction from 725' would have happened for each of these, though MP had started higher at 750. As would the shadow fight. Would other developers have persevered? MP now has a track record of building over 600' at sites in the Financial District. MT was a huge surprise when they proposed it for more than 400' and they delivered. WST exists. That's something. Tall buildings are hard.