A development battle is brewing in Boston’s Back Bay, where a prominent local stakeholder could hold the key to derailing a 33-story hotel and residential tower proposed by one of the city’s most well-known hoteliers.
Officials from the social activism nonprofit YWCA Boston “strongly oppose” a $225 million proposal from Trinity Stuart LLC, which includes principals from the Saunders Hotel Group, to turn the former John Hancock Hotel & Conference Center on Stuart Street into a sleek new hotel and residential tower to be called 40 Trinity Place.
The development team includes Jordan Warshaw, a principal with HRV Development, and Jeffrey Saunders and Gary Saunders. They want to redevelop the existing hotel and conference center – currently called Boston Common Hotel – into a 220-room hotel with meeting space, 142 residential units, 100 parking spaces and ground-floor retail with restaurants.
The partners purchased the property, located immediately adjacent to the private University Club and the YWCA, from the John Hancock Life Insurance Co. for $22.6 million.
But top brass from the YWCA, which abuts the proposed project site, expressed their opposition in a comment letter submitted to the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA). The project is currently under review by the public agency.
The YWCA property at 140 Clarendon St., the hotel and conference center on the corner of Trinity Place and Stuart Street, and the private University Club at 426 Stuart St. are all direct abutters. According to the public letter from the YWCA, the new owner of the hotel and conference center, the Y and the club share an access area in the rear of the three properties. The YWCA also claims that the three entities share legal rights in the area, which the Y uses primarily for loading access and parking.
Here’s the kicker – the YWCA is claiming that its parking and other property rights at the site preclude the project from being built as currently proposed, at least until the proponent has addressed such rights in a written agreement.
“We have residents and commercial tenants and a hotel in our building that all need to be able to load and unload everything in that space, and we’re working to figure that out with the developer,” said Sylvia Ferrell-Jones, president and CEO of YWCA Boston. “We’re not opposed to the idea of a project at that site. But we need to protect what we have, particularly our financial assets.”
An easement can have very specific language regarding uses of space. But typically, an easement grants a legal right of access to an entity for ease of travel, and could even be for a resident that needs access to their home through, perhaps, a parking lot. But legal doctrine exists to prevent “overburdening” an easement with, say, traffic volumes deemed too heavy for the space in question, said Mark Vaughan, a senior partner and real estate attorney with Riemer & Braunstein in Boston. If that happens, typically the parties need to come to some form of agreement to relieve the burden, he said. Thus far, Trinity Stuart has not proposed how to address a potential adjustment of the easement rights, according to the YWCA’s letter.
Additionally, for Trinity Stuart to build the tower it wants, the partners must persuade the University Club to sell development rights the club possesses at the site. That will require a vote by club members, who are meeting internally to discuss the issue, according to a source close to the proceedings. That source said the vote will likely just be a formality. But the club will also be expanding into space in the new tower if the project is approved, and club officials need to determine how much expansion space they will require.
Precedent Is Set
This certainly wouldn’t be the first time abutters with a shared easement have helped stop a project in the city.
Possibly the most high-profile example is the Boston Harbor Garage, famous locally – some might say infamous – because it’s owned by International Place developer Don Chiofaro and other partners. He bought the Harbor Garage, which is tied to the two high-rise residential Harbor Towers, for about $155 million in 2007. Two years later, he filed plans for two buildings – a 40-story-office and a 59-story hotel and condominium tower. The proposed heights, however, were too high for City Hall’s liking. Although he formally withdrew that plan last year, Chiofaro has been looking at an undeveloped site ever since.
Another piece of the chess match keeping Chiofaro in check is the close tie between the garage and the Harbor Towers’ ownership and residents. The Towers’ ownership has a legal easement for mechanical equipment to be housed in the garage, as well as a long-term lease for half of the garage for use by residents. So far, the Towers’ ownership has mostly expressed frustration over the process and opposition to the project.
‘Not Going To Lose Any Parking’
Jordan Warshaw, partner in the Trinity Stuart development team, downplayed possible legal obstacles to 40 Trinity Place, and said the firm has been encouraged by the comments received. He said they are now forging ahead with a new sense of what neighbors like and don’t like about the project.
The property owners need to review and consult the easement documents if and when changes are made to those shared access or parking areas used by the YWCA, he told Banker & Tradesman. It’s still not clear at this point if the new hotel project will actually change the easement’s use, he added. That will likely become clearer after the BRA issues its scoping determination, which will detail elements of the proposed project that the applicant must study, analyze and mitigate, according to the agency’s website.
“The Y wants to be sure they have unobstructed access to parking spaces behind the Y post-construction, the same as it is pre-construction,” Warshaw said. “Our plan does not impact the Y’s parking or access at all. They’re not going to lose any parking as a result of our development.”
Still, the easement issue is one that the developer will need to work on in order for the project to move forward, said Susan Elsbree, the BRA’s director of communications.
Email: jcronin@thewarrengroup.com
