John Hynes III
Name: John Hynes III
Title: CEO and Managing Partner, Boston Global Investors
Age: 58
Experience: 38 years
This is a transitional year for John Hynes III, CEO of Boston Global Investors and master developer of the 23-acre Seaport Square on the South Boston waterfront. After selling 12.5 acres to Newton-based W/S Development in late 2015, Hynes’ firm is wrapping up its responsibilities for the project: construction of the 326-room Yotel on Seaport Boulevard, completion of the Benjamin and Via apartment towers in a partnership with Berkshire Group, and a new chapel for the Archdiocese of Boston’s Our Lady of Good Voyage, which will relocate from its longtime home on Northern Avenue. Hynes’ own firm moved in November from the Financial District to a new office building at 55 Seaport Boulevard, where his corner office overlooks the emerging neighborhood. Office space isn’t the only change of scenery for the characteristically unfiltered Hynes, who is buying a condominium on the east side of South Boston, where his grandmother’s side of the family has roots dating back to the Revolutionary War.
Q: How do you respond to the critiques of the architecture and streetscapes in the Seaport?
A: One man’s art is another man’s junk. Media stories create perceptions and reactions and movements. I happen to like (The Benjamin) building. I think it came out great. I don’t like 100 Pier 4 (apartment tower). The true answer is we’re not done. (Pulitzer prize-winning architecture critic) Robert Campbell came out in The Boston Globe trashing the district for its architecture and the way the streetscape works. We’ve completed 5 percent of the streetscape, Bob. You never once came in and looked at the master plan. That created this constant stream of conversation about what we’re doing with our architecture. Relax, it’s going to be OK.
We have two challenges: we have a 250-foot height limit (due to Logan airport flight paths). And wherever you go on the planet, people don’t build circles and triangles. The furniture doesn’t work very well. Office buildings want to be squares or rectangles. Residential and hotel buildings want to have smaller floor plates and want to be slender rectangles, Ls or Us because that’s the way the floors lay out. So what you’re seeing is a lot of buildings that are maximizing their density at 250 feet and they all look like similar boxes with different colors. That’s why what we’ve tried to do is spend more time on the faces of the buildings.
Q: Which parcel were you thinking about for the private school in the Seaport?
A: That L block, where we ended up getting approvals for four 250,000-square-foot building sites. [Hynes begins sketching on a notepad.] We thought: this becomes a school, and there would be 650,000 square feet of condos. It’s approximately 600 units. Those would be sold to families. If you bought a unit, you were entitled to a seat in the school equal to the number of bedrooms in your home minus one. The residential brokerage community said we could sell 100 percent. (Former Boston Mayor Thomas Menino) went crazy: “What about the public schools?” I sat in the doghouse for a couple of years until we got this approved. We sold the land 15 months ago so I’m out of that program and it doesn’t appear W/S has any desire to jump into that fight.
Q: What else would you have liked to see in Seaport Square?
A: Everything else is fine. I think some assisted-living would have been a great addition to the neighborhood and would have been viable economically.
Q: Is the city’s transportation plan sufficient to handle the Seaport’s future needs?
A: I’ve always felt we should call the (Charles River Park developers) Rappaports and get their billboards which sat at the entrance to Storrow Drive: “If you lived here, you’d be home by now.” And put those on the Moakley bridge as our outdoor art. I don’t remember any complaints about the traffic in the Seaport in 2005. How do we go from no problem with 7,000 cars (on surface parking lots in the Seaport) to 4,000 cars today, or 12,000 when these projects are fully built out? Only a third of those are commuter cars. The math doesn’t make sense. The reality is the portals into the (O’Neill) tunnel were never blocked up until five or six years ago. I-93 is backing up and it’s starting in Braintree to the south and Woburn to the north. It almost never thins out. It’s not the Seaport that’s causing the traffic.
Q: You don’t use a public relations firm?
A: I’ve never been comfortable with it because most public relations’ firm personnel, none of them have ever played the game. They’ve never been in the batter’s box. They play the media game and the political game but they don’t understand our game. So we’re better off not saying anything except taking the call (from reporters) and being polite. They’re spinning messages that don’t need to be spun. There’s no need for it. We don’t work on anything that we don’t like. My dad (former WLVI-TV anchorman Jack Hynes), who was in the communications business a long time, would say, “Look, these people are just doing their job and making a living. Whatever you do, call them back. You don’t have to say anything, but have the manners to call them back.” And every time, I’m so stupid, I’d get trapped in a conversation and say something that I shouldn’t have, and the big guy (Menino) on the fifth floor would go bananas.
Q: What’s your top priority for 2017?
A: Finish what we have. We made a decision when we were formed in 2010, I made it a mission for the company that we would stay completely focused on Seaport Square. We’re now getting to that place and time where our work is almost done, so we’re actively looking what our next move is going to be. We’re looking at a half-dozen things right now.
Q: You’re moving to the Seaport when the Benjamin and Via open?
A: I decided to buy a condo in South Boston on the eastern end. I’ve got family members and grandkids over there, and I wanted to be closer to them and not so close to my work. Sitting here, I love my office. But the initial thought of being able to walk across the street and go to work was very compelling until you think about it. That’s a lot of time spent in a 100-yard radius.
Hynes’ Five Favorite Golf Courses In Massachusetts:
- Eastward Ho!
- Wollaston GC
- Hyannisport GC
- Old Sandwich
- Charles River
