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Friday, March 29, 2024

An initial rendering of graduate student dorms proposed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. (Image: Bldup)

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has submitted plans for a Vassar Street dorm to serve 690 graduate students, taking up 327,000 square feet and 10 stories over two buildings around a large central plaza, according to Bldup, a development-tracking platform.

The project, proposed for 269-301 Vassar St., Area II, and identified so far as the MIT West Vassar Dorm, is across from the school’s Briggs Field and would replace a surface parking lot and the campus police station. Just two weeks ago the institute presented plans for its College of Computing at 51 Vassar St.

The institute is developing the project with American Campus Communities to “allow MIT the financial flexibility and resources necessary to expand bed capacity and expedite capital renewal improvements,” Bldup said. Construction could begin this year or in 2022.

Other developments

In development news related to Cambridge, if not directly affecting it:

  • BioMed Realty, a major life science and tech real estate owner in Kendall Square, announced Tuesday that it was buying a 162,000-square-foot office building and neighboring 7.5-acre site in Somerville’s Assembly Square, which it plans to develop into a 1.3 million-square-foot campus of offices and labs – with some retail, a roof deck and open public recreation and amenity areas – taking shape right by the retail and entertainment of Assembly Row. “It opens the door for our city to become a pioneer in the biotechnology space,” Mayor Joe Curtatone said in a press release. It follows close on the heels of news BioMed is buying a 482,000-square-foot building in Boston’s Seaport.
  • Harvard’s “Enterprise Research Campus” in Allston is underway with a letter of intent filed there by development partner Tishman Speyer for 900,000 square feet: a quarter-million of residential space across two buildings; 440,000 square feet of offices and labs; and a 250-room hotel with a 75,000-square-foot conference center. Bldup posted the news Friday.