The late, great Thomas M. Menino left this earth more than a year ago, but even from beyond, Boston’s longest-reigning mayor has continued to dominate the city’s development scene.
Menino oversaw a building boom of historic proportions that reshaped downtown Boston over the last two decades. But the last of the mega-projects proposed during Menino’s last years as mayor are either approved and under construction or moving through the last stages of the city review process.
Now Mayor Martin J. Walsh is finally about to get his first chance at putting his own stamp on Boston’s skyline after nearly two years on the job. And the new mayor’s reform of the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) – long criticized by developers and neighborhood activists alike – will also surely be put to the test as well.
“There will be a significant number of big ones that start to break ground that came, soup to nuts, under Mayor Walsh,” said Brian Golden, director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority.
A new series of striking towers and mega-projects are now getting ready to move through the City Hall review process, most with little or no connection to the Menino years.
A mix of bold new tower plans and neighborhood housing, the new developments will give Walsh – and for that matter key lieutenants like the BRA’s Golden – a chance to build their own legacy.
In what amounts to the start of a new era, the Cronin Group last week unveiled plans for a 22-story condominium tower by the harbor in the Seaport District. No cookie-cutter proposal, the tower features an unusual nautical-themed design the developer credits to a call from Walsh for more innovation in city architecture.
The proposal has the look of a fancy crystal flower vase with ridges on the side that look a bit like billowing sails. Love it or hate it, is a welcome departure from the forest of boxy glass high-rises that have taken shape in the Seaport/Innovation District.
Proposals for a pair of major new neighborhood housing developments are also poised to start moving through the city approval process. Hundreds of thousands of square feet of new apartments and shops have been proposed along the Dorchester Avenue corridor in South Boston near the Andrew Square T station. And millions more may be on the way over the next few decades as developers and city officials eye the potential of the area. Another city planning effort that could yield big housing gains is the focus on the Washington Street corridor from Forest Hills to Egleston Square.
The proposals stem in part from a Walsh Administration planning initiative focused on paving the way for new strategic development hot spots around the city.
Additional development zones in other neighborhoods will be rolled out over the next few months, Golden said.
The Mistakes Of Mayors Past
Meanwhile, back in downtown Boston, city development officials are poised to start evaluating several bids to redevelop a crumbling city-owned parking garage in the Financial District into downtown Boston’s next big mega tower.
OK, the idea of building a tower where the Winthrop Square garage sits does go back to Menino. Before a confab of city business leaders in 2006, Menino unveiled plans for a frankly preposterously large, 1,000-foot tower, all to be built by a wealthy travel company owner with no major development experience. Dubbed “Tommy’s Tower,” the proposal never got off the ground.
This time around, Walsh and Co. are fielding bids from some of the city’s top developers, including veteran waterfront developer Joe Fallon and former City Hall development chief-turned-master-builder Tom O’Brien.
But getting developers to the table and propose big new plans is one thing. Making sure they can get through what the city approval process in a reasonable amount of time – while satisfying neighborhood concerns – is something else altogether.
Time is much more of a factor now than it was two or three years ago, with the economic cycle and real estate market “mature” at this point, Golden notes.
No developer wants to miss the development cycle because he got bogged down in an endless series of neighborhood squabbles and design spats with city planners. Nor do city officials want to be accused of rushing over neighborhood concerns to get a project in the ground.
It is a tricky balance, and one that Menino (and for that matter, other previous mayors) struggled with.
Fan Pier took decades to develop, while the Columbus Center air-rights tower, which would have bridged the ugly Turnpike canyon dividing the South End and the Back Bay, never managed to get off the ground.
The Walsh Administration paid big bucks for a blue-chip consultant to perform a top-to-bottom review of the Boston Redevelopment Authority, spending the last year implementing some of those recommendations.
One key change for developers is aimed at reining in the unwieldly design-review process that typically takes place after a project is formally approved by the BRA board. Some projects have been tied up for months, or even years, as city planners fiddle with the design.
As part of its revamp, the development authority will now begin reviewing the design well back in the approval process. The BRA’s board, for the first time, will also be able to directly oversee the design-review process, with monthly updates.
“We want to move expeditiously on quality projects, but always the public interest must come first,” Golden said. “We won’t rush things.”
One of the first big tests of this new system may come with effort to turn the broken-down Winthrop Square garage into a gleaming new Financial District tower complex.
Golden believes a winning proposal can be picked and plans approved by the end of 2016.
If so, that would be record time for a mega-project to work its way through the Boston approval process. We’ll just have to wait and see.
But when it comes to Boston development, it’s finally show time for Walsh and Co.
Email: sbvanvoorhis@hotmail.com.
