HYM Investments is seeking approval to build 6.1 million square feet of commercial space and 10,000 housing units on the 161-acre Suffolk Downs site spanning parts of East Boston and Revere. Image courtesy of HYM.

A Boston City Council member is warning that lessons from development in the city’s Seaport District must be heeded as Suffolk Downs is redeveloped in East Boston, and calling for a major overhaul of the city’s planning and development agency.

“I fear that we’re not going to learn certain lessons from the Seaport,” Councilor Lydia Edwards, who represents the North End, Charlestown and East Boston, told WCVB’s “On The Record” on Sunday. The lessons, she said, include being “intentional about who is going to live there,” requiring transit-oriented development, and planning for police, fire and schools.

Edwards shared similar concerns with Banker & Tradesman earlier this year.

City Councilor Michelle Wu this month called for abolishing the Boston Planning and Development Authority, asserting that the agency is making the problems stemming from development in the city worse and is too wedded to powerful people who have certain connections.

Edwards largely concurred with Wu’s assessment, citing a need for environmental viewpoints at the agency and an examination of displacement impacts caused by development. “We need to revamp and modernize the whole thing there’s certain perspectives that are just not there,” she said.

Edwards said the city needs quarterly, neighborhood-based reports on variances and a community counsel, or neutral lawyer to guide people through the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals.

“I don’t think you should need a lawyer or someone who has an in to represent you in front of your own government,” she said.

Boston City Councilor: Heed Seaport Lessons at Suffolk Downs

by State House News Service time to read: 1 min
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