ROGER CASSIN
‘The crown jewel’
While the Columbus Center mixed-use project in Boston’s South End rolls ahead – with a Zoning Commission meeting planned for later this month – the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority encouraged about 300 real estate professionals to consider other air rights parcels for development during a program held by a national industry group last week.
Stephen J. Hines, chief development officer of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority, said at Thursday’s National Association of Industrial and Office Properties event that the trend of covering portions of the turnpike with parks, housing and office space is catching on in other parts of the state. There have been inquiries for similar air rights developments in the city of Newton, he noted.
“There’s certainly been a conversation, but Newton cares very much about its environment and it would take a lot of discussion for it to succeed,” he said.
Newton exhibits a couple of examples of Turnpike development, including a Star Market built over the interstate. Hines said that, like Boston, there are several bridges in Newton that separate neighborhoods and are of interest to developers.
The Turnpike Authority controls 125 miles of land jutting through the state, from Stockbridge to Boston. In the downtown alone, 23 air rights parcels total more than 44 acres – more developable land than the Central Artery.
The highest-profile cluster of those parcels, soon to be the Columbus Center, will take its final step in the public process on Nov. 19 when the developers appear before the Boston Zoning Commission. Roger Cassin, managing partner of Winn Development Co., said that he hopes that will be the last public hearing.
Once completed, Columbus Center will blanket more than six acres of the Turnpike with parks, luxury condominiums, rental units and retail space, connecting the South End, Back Bay and Bay Village neighborhoods. Winn Development began working on the project in the mid-1990s. In the past 30 months alone, Columbus Center developers have hosted 120 meetings about the project.
“As one of the first developers on the scene, we cherry picked and chose what we thought was the crown jewel,” Cassin said.
Winn’s first plan of two adjacent towers died quickly. The group revised its plan, which, after dozens of discussions with community groups and the Boston Redevelopment Authority, calls for the development to spread across three air rights parcels. It would include a 35-story structure at Clarendon Street and Columbus Avenue, a 200-room hotel, spa, retail space, 160 luxury condo units and a park. Another 11-story structure would contain 192 housing units.
Three-Year Process
While Winn Development waits for the go-ahead to begin construction, it continues to search for additional capital and tenants.
Cassin said that the development would provide several cafes, subsidized rents for local entrepreneurs, a local grocery store and a 630-space parking garage. Cassin predicts that 2,000 jobs would be created during the three-year construction process, along with an additional 200 hotel industry positions.
Columbus Center also would emphasis public transportation and pedestrian-friendly streets with signals at the intersections of Berkeley Street and Columbus Avenue, Berkeley and Beacon streets, Arlington Street, Stuart Street and Columbus Avenue and Berkeley and Boylston streets.
The development would create a new MBTA Orange line entrance at Columbus Avenue and Clarendon Street and rebuild the MBTA Green Line stop at Berkeley Street. Additionally, Columbus Center would distribute free, one-year MBTA passes to residents and provide 10 on-site Zipcar spaces.
The development also would provide more than 200 short- and long-term parking spaces for neighborhood residents in Bay Village and the South End.
In the fall of 1998, Mayor Thomas Menino appointed a Strategic Development Study Committee to develop a vision for the dozens of air rights parcels. The process lasted more than 18 months and included more than 50 community meetings. The board emphasized a desire to fill in the gaps between neighborhoods and along streets with mixed-use properties, promote the use of public transportation and use architecture to create a new vitality.
“We’re taking parking lots and eroded edges of the Turnpike and creating them into vibrant parts of our city,” said David Dixon, principal of planning for Goody, Clancy & Assoc., president of the Boston Society of Architects and the author of the Civic Vision for Turnpike Air Rights in Boston.
The mayor’s committee has received several awards for its work, including recognition by the American Institute of Architects and the Boston Society of Architects.
Kristie DiSalvo may be reached at kdisalvo@thewarrengroup.com.
