A new environmental study commissioned by embattled Boston developer Don Chiofaro has found that the incremental impacts of a development at Boston’s Harbor Garage site, even for a building as high as 600 feet, are not significantly greater than those created by a building of 200 feet.
The findings boost Chiofaro’s original plans to demolish the Harbor Garage and replace it with a pair of new, mixed-use towers up to 600 feet high. The plan has come under fire from neighbors and the city, who argue the massive scale of the proposed development threatens to "canyonize" the streetscape along the abutting Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, create shadows, disrupt wind flow and disturb residents of the nearby Harbor Towers residential complex.
After Chiofaro proposed his plan, the Boston Redevelopment Authority issued new zoning regulations capping height along that section of the Greenway at 200 feet, a height Chiofaro has argued makes his plans untenable.
According to Chiofaro’s own study, all shadows associated by a building of any size disappear from the Greenway by noon every day, and almost entirely by 11 a.m. Additionally, net new shadows on the Greenway lasting longer than an hour cast by a building above the currently allowed height of 155 feet "are minimal," according to a statement.
Harbor Tower sspokesman Tom Palmer said residents were skeptical of the shadow claims in the new study.
"The shadow studies the developer conducted are for two months of the year, and even if that information is accurate we are certainly concerned about the other five sixths of the year," Palmer said in a statement.
The Chiofaro study also finds that measures planned for the project may actually improve wind conditions for pedestrians.
"This review should thankfully put the shadow issue to rest once and for all," Chiofaro, president of The Chiofaro Co., said in a statement. "This exhaustive study proves – beyond a shadow of doubt, if you will – that a building of any height casts no new significant shadows on the Greenway."
The new review also sought to downplay fears of "canyonization" in the area, or a gobbling up of open space by massive development, similar to downtown New York City.
"Considering the amount of open space near this portion of the Greenway (Christopher Columbus Park, Long Wharf, Quincy Market, Central Wharf, Boston Harbor), the review found it would be impossible to ‘canyonize’ the area, as some critics have suggested," according to a statement.
Still, the new study did little to sway the negative opinions on the project held by residents of Harbor Towers.
"The city, the state, and the neighborhood have all raised serious concerns about the extensive negative impacts of the latest Chiofaro plan, which is still three times as tall as the Greenway guidelines would allow," Palmer said. "Mr. Chiofaro cannot wish away the harm that his twin-tower scheme would do to the Greenway and the public realm along the Harbor’s edge. Most important, he has yet to respond substantively to the BRA and state findings on his project, issued almost a year ago."
The new study was filed as part of The Chiofaro’ Co.’s Article 80 impact statement for its proposed redevelopment project at the Harbor Garage. In preparing the proposal, the Chiofaro development team said it coordinated with Massport so the revised height of the proposed project complies with Massport guidelines.
The project filing with the Federal Aviation Administration has been updated to reflect the height, and the FAA circularization process is underway, the company said. A "Determination of No Hazard" is expected for the 600-plus-foot heights submitted, reflecting the proposed development’s safety for flights arriving and departing from Boston’s Logan Airport, located across Boston Harbor from the proposed development site.
