Development “planning” in Boston compared to the Cambridge City Council
● Preliminary Notice.
1. Boston Development Plans Contrasted to Secret / DESTRUCTIVE Maneuvers in Cambridge.
2. South Station.
A, South Station proper.
B. South Station, The Rail Yards, and Neighborhood Development.
C. North South Rail.
2. I90 (Mass Pike) growth.
A. Landsdowne Station Development.
B. The I90 (Mass. Pike) Rebuild.
3. Harvard’s coming Mass. Pike / Allston Village campus.
4. The Cambridge Side of the Charles River.
5. Caveats.
● Preliminary Notice.
1. Boston Development Plans Contrasted to Secret / DESTRUCTIVE Maneuvers in Cambridge.
NewsBreak reports that Boston Mayor Wu is drastically reducing the development planners in Boston government.
Sounds like Mayor Wu MAY BE more responsible than the Cambridge City Council.
BUT there clearly are a lot of plans in the mix for Boston that have Charles River impact.
A couple of areas of interest are South Station and the Mass. Pike (I90).
2. South Station.
A, South Station proper.
Going in over South Station is a project which clearly indicates the future for the massive rail yards south of South Station and between South Boston and the Boston’s South End.
It will create a 50% increase in the size of the Bus Terminal plus a high rise building.
Here are photos from platform level in 2021.
Below is a shot from the United States Postal Service (USPS) end of the tracks showing the beginning of the skeleton of the structure.
Below is an angle shot with the Bus Station.
After that is a shot looking down the tracks at the then not yet obscured original Bus Terminal. It is now heavily obscured as construction has progressed.
CAVEAT:
Because of the inability to tear down the USPS Fort Point Annex, this project was modified to exclude that portion.
The visible lead agency is part of the City of Boston.
● Details from show and tell - South Station Air Rights Project.
Shortly before it started, the developers conducted a show and tell of the project. To the best of my knowledge, the on line version of this gathering is the only place where the plans are readily available.
My guess is that the model shot shows projected follow-ons.
They seem to have missed the time line in the last slide.
(1) General.
Here is a Google Maps presentation of the area cropped to show the entire relevant area. It is very large. The complex follows I93, the Southeast Expressway, or to be more accurate, the Southeast Expressway was created based on the yard complex. At the top of the photo is South Station (the red graphic). Below that is the connections to the Mass. Pike, I90, with the connection to Back Bay Station. Below that is the widest area, followed by the southern area which approaches JFK / Columbia Station. The area closest to JFK has been occupied by subsidized housing for a long time.
If you are not familiar with those rail yards (they are very much massive) and are familiar with the rail approach from Philadelphia to New York City, think Manhattan. Much of Manhattan is built over rail yards just as the project going in at South Station is going in over rail yards. It is very dark on the passenger trains coming into New York City during the last few miles coming north from Philadelphia. That darkness comes from buildings constructed on air rights over railroad properties.
(2) Area 1.
Here is an enlargement of the South Station area. The triangular South Station building is at the bottom point of the red graphic. Below that can be seen the area which is shown above in the construction zone. The greyish circles are the Bus Terminal which is being expanded. It is extremely large. The massive white structure to the right of this area is the USPS Fort Point mail facility. The area to its right is the Fort Point Channel.
The new building going in over the passenger terminal yard at South Station is very clearly the beginning of much planned expansion.
MassDOT wants to tear down the USPS Fort Point mail facility and relocate it beyond the Boston Convention Center which is perhaps half a mile to the right of the picture and with its main entrance facing the street which is immediately above the South Station building, Summer Street.
Beyond the Boston Convention Center is a hotel and then, beyond the hotel and a few blocks farther below Summer Street are two large empty blocks where MassDOT apparently wants to move the USPS postal facility.
In place of the USPS Fort Point mail facility, MassDOT want to build tracks for South Coast Rail expansion to Taunton, Fall River and New Bedford. That service is now planned to go by way of a lengthened Middleborough line with the Middleborough station moved from the track from Middleborough to Cape Cod to the track from Middleborough to Taunton.
I90 and I93 have ramps connecting to each other, to local streets, and to the Bus Terminal. I90 goes underground and underwater to the right of South Station. The underground connection is greyed into the map.
Above I90 has been mostly filled in for decades with hospital construction and high rise housing. There is room for construction closest to the South Station / Bus Station complex. This is the area marked Chinatown. The recent construction has been below Stuart Street.
The area above Stuart Street is core Downtown Boston including pretty dense construction in that historical part of Chinatown. Downtown Boston is beyond the scope of this analysis.
(3) Area 2.
My second breakout of the larger map is here.
The Fort Point channel is visible following I93 and moving to the right along with the buried I90. The large U shaped building is a perhaps historical industrial building long belonging to Gillette.
Immediately under the Fort Point Channel begins the yards complex and supporting facilities. First is subway storage for the MBTA’s Red Line subway.
To the left of I93 and below I90 commences new South End residential / office construction including retail. The portion of this closest to I93 was formerly the Boston Herald Complex. This series of buildings is two or three blocks wide and runs for several blocks along I93.
Here is a photo of the area before the Mass. Pike came in. The big building is now a Massachusetts government building. I93 was built beyond the buildings to the bottom and left. The open area by the lower right corner still contains the East / West railroad to Back Bay Station and then to Worcester. The photo was provided by Phil Barber. When it was constructed in the early 70's, I90 followed the railroad.
The circled T to the right in my map breakout is Broadway Station on the Red Line in South Boston proper. This graphic is the MBTA’s symbol. Following downwards to the left of the street below the graphic are new buildings abutting the tracks which are larger than the new buildings in the South End south of I90.
The area ripe for construction starts at this point on both sides of the tracks. It includes the tracks and runs along the tracks. The South Boston edge of the construction area is the road commencing below Broadway Station. Potential construction gets wider. The Subway and Commuter Rail yards and support structures extend from the Fort Point Channel down, getting wider and wider. The big white building is a support building.
The properties on the South End side vary in their availability. The yards and support are unbroken between I93 and that street running below Broadway station. Just in this area, the possible construction on air rights is massive.
(4) Area 3.
And it gets bigger. Here is my further blow up of the next section.
On the left side of the railroad area below South Station and below I90 is a row of medium rise buildings in several new blocks of construction two or three blocks wide. This is the new South End. This construction is close to and follows I93, the Southeast Expressway
On the right, South Boston, side of I93 are those massive rail yards. The Worcester trains come through those massive yards, to the bottom left of the picture.
The rail yards include subway vehicle storage and support facilities plus commuter rail vehicle storage and support facilities. On the South Boston end is a new row of buildings already. Those buildings are larger than the buildings which replaced the area on the left.
The rail yards narrow after the big support building with the fork to Old Colony Avenue. There a lot of buildings below this point which are “underutilized.” They are followed by state owned subsidized housing in place for more than 50 years.
(5) Area 4.
Here is the bottom portion of the rail yard complex broken out from my original crop. Visible is the state owned housing.
C. North South Rail.
This is the game where Cambridge doers and shakers step in although they have been thwarted very significantly already, including one very major shot in their own foot. The Cambridge doers and shakers want to connect service to South Station and to North Station by a route up the Grand Junction Railroad, with very severe negative impact on the Charles River and its animals, most visibly the heartlessly abused Charles River White Geese. It would also mess up already bad traffic on Cambridge streets with at grade crossings. The movers and shakers have a whole bunch of excuses and plans. But that is what it amounts to. One of the plans, kept as secret as possible, would provide an off ramp from I90 to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The responsible alternative is that supported most visibly by former governor Mike Dukakis, a direct connection between North and South Station.
The South Station portion of that connection IS STILL POSSIBLE. It could be done as part of installing those tracks for South Coast Rail to Fall River and New Bedford in place of the USPS facility. They proposed (before USPS apparently put its foot down) to build North - South Rail in a level below South Coast Rail, perhaps way below by Deep Bore construction with vertical access to South Station.
This alternative is far more sensible, AND STRAIGHT, than the Grand Junction Route, especially since the Grand Junction route is so environmentally destructive and would apparently connect north of North Station, not directly to North Station.
Deep bore construction could start way back in the rail yards, or perhaps under one of several alternate tracks. Key would be the distance needed to get to the depth required under South Station and under Downtown Boston, plus possible locations for access which would work. The location really should connect to Amtrak’s Northeast operation. Construction really does not need destruction of the USPS facility, but costs would be less if it were allowed for in the South Coast Rail tracks, if, of course, the USPS facility were moved.
Naturally, of course, the various commuter / interstate rail routes are also possibilities for construction, plus the major highways. Construction in the North Station area would appear to have started with construction on I93 air rights above a tunnel created in the middle of Boston as part of the “Big Dig” when I93 was buried and I90 was connected to the Airport and Boston’s North Shore neighbors.
A little more discussion below in section 4.
2. I90 (Mass Pike) growth.
I90 (Mass. Pike) plans are being steadily seen in planning. There are multiple possible areas of construction The Prudential Center was built above the rail facilities and I90 decades ago.
Here are just those alternatives that I am familiar with.
A. Landsdowne Station Development.
One complex essentially across the street from Fenway Park is already about half constructed with two of four buildings in place, but two buildings physically over I90 are yet to come.
Here is a photo of the larger of the existing two buildings. It show the building above the platform for the east-west track to Worcester. To the right of the building and platform are the tracks and I90. The bridge straight ahead is Beacon Street running from Kenmore Square (to the right) to Brookline.
The second photo is taken from the upper part of the commuter rail station. It shows the station platform which in turn is part of the development area for the final two structures. The plans for those two buildings seem to vary with the source. Last time I checked, the developer advertised plans appeared larger than plans advertised by entities other than by the developer. Especially for the building next to what is now the Brookline Avenue bridge. That bridge is straight ahead. Fenway park is to the right and Kenmore Square to the left. Both are very close.
The Landsdowne commuter rail station is an integral part of the development. That could be the tricky part. The subway plans integrate the commuter rail station into a massive station including the existing Green Line station in Kenmore Square.
This complex belies one of the biggest “explanations” for Charles River destruction. The train station in this location is a prime part of a subway line in planning, the Kenmore alternative, which would connect the extremely valuable Harvard / Longwood Medical Area into the subway and commuter rail system.
Cambridge wants the station moved to a location a block from the core of the Boston University Campus with the station at Mountfort Street and St. Mary’s. The Cambridge alternative would run the Subway up the Grand Junction from this point. Cambridge’s preferred alternative appears now highly unlikely.
I was rather clearly the first to inform the Landsdowne Station developer of Cambridge’s plans. Not that long after that, as these things go, Landsdowne Station got a very major upgrade by the state. Looking at the second photo, the station would be physically connected to the left to the existing Kenmore Green Line station by construction of a tunnel under Brookline Avenue or its sidewalk.
For much greater detail, please see my analysis at https://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2021/06/.
Here is the historically key subway planning map of the MBTA
Toward the top on the right of the major diagonal route is Fenway Park. The Landsdowne Station area is on the other side of that diagonal route. The Harvard / Longwood Medical Area is at the bottom. The Orange Line Ruggles station from which the subway line would fork is off the map to the right. This line running that diagonal is the apparently now preferred route through Landsdowne Station. A less visible line can be noted upon careful examination. It breaks off for the Cambridge preferred route.
The subway under consideration was anticipated to go through Cambridge to Charlestown, but the Cambridge City Council and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology shot themselves in the foot. They played zoning games to allow MIT to build a monster dorm in exactly the worst spot to prevent the Cambridge portion of the subway alternative route through the Landsdowne Station area.
Here is a photo of the key building, taken from “From Cambridge to Boston with the DJ Inspire 1 Drone footage,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN-OmMzvHhw, minute 8.12. Kenmore Square is off the photo to the right on the other side of the Charles. The plan was to put the Orange Line spur under the Charles River and to go somewhere under the three part building on the lower left. It fills all undeveloped area needed to directly access the Grand Junction railroad which is this side of the building. The route would have then gone to the left. To get a feel for the scale, the brick tower on the opposite of the MIT playing fields is something like 15 stories high.
This is reported, with photos, in detail in the above blog report. Cambridge and MIT were trying to force construction of the subway route they wanted.
The stupidity of the move is exemplified by the fact that the key purpose of the proposed subway is to give efficient transportation to one of Massachusetts’ biggest cash cows, the Harvard / Longwood Medical Center. The Cambridge portion of the both alternatives for the subway route is worth a pittance in comparison to Harvard / Longwood.
Plus the route which connects to this commuter rail station, the Kenmore Crossing route, includes, along with the train connection at Landsdowne Station, an excellent terminus for the route at Kenmore Station, combining Commuter Rail and three subway lines to Brookline and Newton. The Cambridge preferred alternative would have multiple connections. Unless things have changed in a major, destructive and politically controversial way, the Cambridge route would not permit the subway to be directly linked to Downtown Boston through the Orange Line Ruggles Station as a branch of the Orange Line subway. Ruggles Station connects to a different Commuter Rail route.
The Cambridge City Council does a lot of stupid things because they maintain such a strong and misleading control over the Cambridge voter through a system of fake protective groups which have been skillfuly controlled by the City. Cambridge is focused inwards. Keeping the fake groups happy is their overwhelming interest, but the state has much more important interests. The state lives in reality.
B. The I90 (Mass. Pike) Rebuild.
Going further out from this subway proposal, I have spent years working to protect the Charles River in a rebuilding of I90 (Mass. Pike) across from Magazine Beach, the home and food of the Charles River White Geese for most of their more than 40 year residence.
This ended when the Cambridge City Council and the DCR (under its pre-reorganization predecessor) started their heartless abuse. The two have poisoned the habitat of the Charles River White Geese. They have taken away their food. They have destroyed so much of what was a mile long habitat centered on the BU Bridge that all that remains is their nesting area, and they have destroyed all the food there.
I have had major successes in the I90 rebuild project. Key in the rebuild project is the management of a responsible entity, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation. The legislature destroyed the entity previously responsible for the Charles River, the Metropolitan District Commission and replaced it with two entities, MassDOT and the Department of Conservation and Recreation. MassDOT has been the adult in the room with two destructive children, the DCR and the Cambridge City Council.
In the Charles River area, MassDOT has repeatedly stood up to outrages fought for by Cambridge and the DCR. MassDOT is not perfect, but Cambridge and the DCR approach being perfect moving in the wrong direction.
One success in the I90 rebuild project, in particular REVERSED a change which would have HARMED Cambridge and which was voted for by the Cambridge’s representatives in an advisory group of stakeholders. The other change was of major benefit to Boston, Brookline AND CAMBRIDGE. MassDOT implemented a proposal from me on which its representative shouted me down when I first proposed it.
When they thought over my proposal, it was so valuable that its was made the formal depiction of the published plans for the project’s graphic description was turned into MassDOT’s depiction of the change initiated by me.
The powers that be in Cambridge have plans for a private off ramp from I90 to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology up the Grand Junction. These plans date back at least to a 2003 study done by the MBTA.
Here is another Google Maps cropping. The bridge is the BU Bridge. The destroyed nesting area is marked by the green graphic to the upper right of the BU Bridge. The Grand Junction railroad and its bridge run through the Destroy Nesting Area of the Charles River White Geese and under the BU Bridge. The DNA is so major it is identified on the map for the benefit of people who, contrary to too many core Cambridge pols, live in reality.
The private off ramp would run off I90 at the bottom left, from slightly below the map, looping over to a WIDENED Grand Junction railroad bridge. This would run traffic from the west to MIT. Connection in the opposite direction for traffic to the west would be simple.
Here is a still from “From Cambridge to Boston with the DJ Inspire 1 Drone footage,” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN-OmMzvHhw, minute 9.13. This is a photo of the area in the map taken from the east (to the right in the map). The DNA is the triangular area bound by the BU Bridge, the Grand Junction and the Memorial Drive highway.
The movers and shakers have loudly and repeatedly demanded that the Grand Junction railroad bridge be widened as part of the rebuilding of this portion of I90. As usual, they do so by whatever excuse might achieve their goals. In project planning, MassDOT has just as consistently opposed all these games. The I90 rebuild project is ONLY intended for Boston, not for the constant games from those suicidally destructive people.
The most recent con game is analyzed at: https://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2020/12/a-private-interstate-off-ramp-to-mit.html.
Please note that questions concerning the environmental destruction at reviewing committee were deflected.
My analysis of the Mass. Pike connection may be seen at https://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2021/06/cambridge-city-council-considers.html.
3. Harvard’s coming Mass. Pike / Allston Village campus.
The above drone photo shows a corner of this project.
Here is another still from “From Cambridge to Boston with the DJ Inspire 1 Drone footage,” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sN-OmMzvHhw, minute 10.02.
The highway which starts at the Charles River at the bottom left, curves right and goes off into the distance is I90. On the left is a major of Boston University’s West Campus. The change would straighten out the highway next to BU and allow Harvard, which owns the property, to build a new campus in the area.
This area is the obvious target to move the Harvard Medical School and a lot of related schools from the Harvard / Longwood Medical Area to fascilitate expansion of those rapidly growing hospitals. Harvard, SUBJECT TO TRANSPORTATION USES, owns the open property at the above right. Harvard also owns outright a massive amount of other property in this part of the Allston neighborhood of Boston.
These medical school related relocations, and relocation from Harvard Square is obvious. The academic uses would be ideal for the area nearest the Charles.
Cambridge’s short sighted city council is drooling at the idea of destroying housing and historical buildings in Harvard Square to expand retail and related uses. The top of the triangle is very close to Allston Village which already is a student haunt. That part of the area is ideal for building massive dorms. And Allston Village can be developed to REPLACE Harvard Square as a tourist trap. More Cambridge “planning” stupidity.
As pointed out on the subway plan in Cambridge which Cambridge has been helping to destroy, the entities which control Cambridge are self-destructive. Reality is irrelevant. The most important part of the world of interest to them is the world they control. And the key Cambridge pols are accustomed to a tiny number of people lying to Cambridge voters about the way THINGS ARE DONE IN CAMBRIDGE.
4. The Cambridge Side of the Charles River.
This outrage is the primary purpose of this blog. There is a lot more on this subject elsewhere in this blog.
The Cambridge City Council and DCR are heartless abusing resident animals, poisoning their habitat and deliberately starving the most visible victims and valuable victims, the long time resident and tourist loved Charles River White Geese.
Their latest project had a destruction filing with the Cambridge Conservation Commission in which the DCR projected destruction of about 54 mostly excellent trees. That destruction estimate now exceeds 61 trees including known added destruction.
I have filed the plans with the Cambridge City Council REPEATEDLY. Please see http://www.friendsofthewhitegeese.org/ar1.htm, for details with photos.
To make things worse, THEY HAVE POISONED THE CHARLES RIVER. Here is a photo of the Cambridge City Council’s favorite activist blocking poison drainage from Magazine Beach and rerouting it into the Charles River. That poison usage was introduced by Cambridge and the state agency managing the lands abutting the Charles River, the DCR, introduced those poisons onto the banks of the Charles River at the Magazine Beach Recreation Area in the 2000's. It was previously pristine. The DCR, USING TRUMP money, paid the costs to reroute the poisons into the Charles River.
Here is a photo of the blocking of those drains and a photo of the DCR’s sign BRAGGING THAT THE DRAINS PREVENT POISONING OF THE CHARLES.
The photo of the sign is my reconstitution of three photos by Phil Barber.
The most recent outrage by the Cambridge City Council was TO PAY THE CHARLES RIVER POISONER TO MANAGE THE DESTRUCTION OF A GROVE WHICH DESTRUCTION IS SO MAJOR IT IS THE BIGGEST SINGLE OUTRAGE at Magazine Beach.
Here is a photo of that grove and a fact sheet.
This woman has been called the Cambridge City Council’s “kind of activist” by a former councilor who lies of being an environmentalist.
This woman, the Charles River Poisoner, through a Company Union fake protective group which she controls was key in the destruction of hundreds of trees and animal habitat between the BU Bridge and the Longfellow Bridge on the Charles River in Cambridge, a distance easily of a couple of miles of Riverfront.
Our video of that outrage may be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pTplCCEJP7o.
The City Manager very visibly condemned in the video was the predecessor to the current city manager. He was the third of three interrelated City Managers who created the most visible part of the tiny, but extremely vocal group of fake protective groups, which are the visible wing of the Cambridge City Government and City Council.
Multiple examples of currently ongoing destruction of the Charles River are posted at: https://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2020/10/summary-of-charles-river-outrages-by.html.
The current attacks concern the Charles River west of the BU Bridge.
A summary of outrages going up the Grand Junction from the Charles River may be read at: https://charlesriverwhitegeeseblog.blogspot.com/2020/12/a-private-interstate-off-ramp-to-mit.html.
Here are the most visible victims, the 40 year resident gaggle of the Charles River White Geese, admiring the Charles from their Destroyed Nesting Area, UNDER the railroad bridge which these destructive people are fighting to widen by whatever bizarre claim works.
5. Caveats.
This report is based on my fifty years of environmental and transportation activism in Cambridge, on the Charles River in Cambridge, and on related matters.
When I first because conscious of the outrages on the Charles River, I very quickly learned of the massive amount on interrelation in these various plans. The scope of my activities are very broad because the relationships are so broad.
It would be excessive to detail the strands I have followed, and why, but the reality is that I have participated in meetings concerning transportation construction as far south as New Bedford, MA, to understand as much as I can.
There is a very major caveat. My knowledge of planning involving area to the north of Downtown Boston are extremely limited.
Additionally, and also of necessity, this report has been cleansed of a very large amount of material in hopes of making it readable.
