Recent press accounts tout yet another law firm, as well as another celebrity-chef restaurant, moving to the South Boston waterfront. This is good news for the Seaport, helping to solidify a robust Innovation District conceived by Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino.
Revitalization of the Seaport began more than 25 years ago when Fidelity Investments and developer John Drew, working with the Massachusetts Port Authority, transformed Commonwealth Pier into the World Trade Center complex with offices, exhibition and meeting spaces and a hotel. The John Joseph Moakley Courthouse, the Institute of Contemporary Art, and the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center followed. More recently, three office buildings have replaced parking lots on the Fan Pier; visitors have a choice of such hotels as the InterContinental, Renaissance, Seaport and Westin Waterfront Hotels, and construction of apartments is well under way throughout the district.
Consistent with Mayor Menino’s push for one-third of the area’s development to be residential, it is timely to look at the needs of an area that will have thousandsz more residents joining those who already live in Fort Point. Thankfully, the artist community had organized early on to buy and establish three co-op buildings, thereby ensuring relatively affordable work-live space.
In response to residents’ call for a grocery and pharmacy, The Drew Co. has aggressively been courting supermarkets as potential tenants of its new Waterside Place project. With luck, The Drew Co. and/or Boston Global Investors and its partner WS Development, the largest private property owner and developer near the waterfront, will be successful in their efforts to attract these much-needed retail uses.
Well-maintained open spaces at the Moakley Courthouse, the Fan Pier, InterContinental Hotel and Residences and the South Boston Maritime Park attract workers and visitors who enjoy the waterfront from benches and tables along the HarborWalk. But few, if any, utilize the attractive lawns, even at the Boston Children’s Museum with its many young visitors.
Please Play On Lawn
A Fort Point resident once remarked that the lawns in the district seemed uninviting to lunch time users, Frisbee players and parents and children playing ball. Perhaps signage is needed on these open spaces saying, “Please enjoy and use the lawn.” The Fallon Co.’s sponsored bean bag games, exercise classes and free programs, together with free fitness classes on the InterContinental Hotel lawn, are positive examples of programming that invite the public to actively use the area’s open spaces, and should be part of all annual operations and maintenance plans developed by waterfront property owners.
Ideally, the neighborhood’s growing residential population will continue to engage in the planning for the district. At a Saturday planning meeting last fall, scores of Fort Point residents came out to discuss an active soccer field, rather than just corporate landscaping, as part of State Street Corp.’s new office tower complex on A Street. With prodding from the city of Boston and the Boston Redevelopment Authority, a new park nearing completion by Boston Global Investors on Boston Wharf Road will include a well-designed playground, as well as a much-welcomed dog run.
Just a few weeks ago, Boston Children’s Museum officials listened as Fort Point residents and advocates called for development of a new park next to the museum designed for children and families, going beyond the museum’s initial plans focused on enhanced traffic circulation and infrastructure improvements.
The Seaport/Innovation District can set an example of how commercial and institutional interests can further engage local residents. Currently, both the Institute of Contemporary Art and the Boston Children’s Museum have free admission nights each week, which encourages local residents and families to enjoy these facilities. Better access and increased usage of the Moakley Courthouse, Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, the district’s soon-to-open Innovation Center and the Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum for local residents’ programs, activities and community programs – minus the usual fees and charges for group activities – should be part of a “good neighbor” policy.
Improved exterior signage and better usage of social media to publicize unique waterfront features, such as the Moakley Courthouse exhibition areas and Foster’s Rotunda observation deck at nearby Rowes Wharf, will make local residents aware of these special destinations. With five docks now in the Fort Point Channel, additional recreational activities on the channel, as well as cross-harbor ferry service to and from the Fort Point Channel area, should be priorities.
Menino’s vision for the South Boston waterfront calls for 24/7 vitality. As the Seaport continues to evolve, it can become the Boston neighborhood that most successfully integrates together commercial, institutional, and residential interests.
Vivien Li is president of The Boston Harbor Association, www.tbha.org.
Email: vli@tbha.org.
