Final Volpe filing improves its Third Street Park, and North Point and Union Square buildings sell
When plans for the 14-acre Volpe parcel return to the Planning Board on July 20 for a rezoning petition filed June 21, there will be a few notable changes, including a Third Street Park redesigned for more combined open space and a community center expanded to 25,000 square feet from 20,000. (And a community center endowment promise of $10 million, up from $3.5 million.)
These are the final zoning documents, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which won rights to develop the parcel in 2016. Work began in 2019 to enable the first part of the project: relocating the federal Volpe Transportation Center, which is paying for its new building by letting go of the rest of its land.
Around the federal research building will be 1.7 million square feet of commercial development, including retail, and approximately 1,400 housing units, or 40 percent of the development, according to publicly released plans. But with residents led to believe over the years that there would be a 7.5-acre Kendall Square park, the radical decrease to an arguable 3.5 became a sticking point for Planning Board members in April.
Seven members gave preliminary approval to allow for the final development plans to be submitted, but there was grumbling about the open space feeling “squeezed” between buildings, and some residents expressed doubt that what was planned would be enough for a growing population.
Here’s what the open space plan and Third Street Park looked like in April:
In other development news:
- The Avalon North Point and Avalon North Point Lofts buildings have been sold by AvalonBay Communities for $325 million to Blackstone, a global company with Cambridge offices in Kendall Square. The sale was noted June 26 on the Bldup real estate industry platform. The buildings straddle Glassworks Avenue in the North Point neighborhood, near its Cambridge Crossing development. Avalon North Point is a 22-story structure with 426 units; the loft building has 103. Amenities in the high-end properties include an indoor, heated pool, private theater, sports club and an entertainment lounge.
- Union Square Station Associates has acquired 50 Webster Ave., Somerville, for $19 million, and will turn it into a 280,000 square-foot mixed-use life-sciences building, according to a spokesperson for the project. Bldup reported the sale June 29. It’s part of the massive Union Square Revitalization Plan that was approved by Somerville’s planning board in December 2017 with up to 1,000 new homes and some 157,000 square feet of public space improvements. The Webster Avenue plot is the farthest from Union Square itself, but the green line extension stop – a spur from the Lechmere station – will be just to the north; residents on that side of the building will be able to look down and see (and hear) trains arrive.
This post was updated July 7, 2021, to correct a description of a 50 Webster Ave., Somerville, project.
3.5 acres for 1400 housing units works out to just 109 square feet per unit. Not exactly the copious open space that we might hope for.
We weren’t “led to believe” there’d be a 7-1/2 acre park; that’s what the zoning said. In addition, the first “study” commissioned to upzone the ECaPS zoning by a million square feet or so specifically reaffirmed the 7-1/2 acre park. Notably, MIT had two members on the developer-heavy study committee. Over the years we were told that all that development in Kendall Square would eventually get the 7-1/2 acre park, which every city official and consultant agreed was necessary to support the need the development was creating. Then, surprise, once redeveloping Volpe became a reality instead of a dream that might happen some day, we were informed that we were silly fools to have believed the zoning, the reaffirmation and the repeated assurances from everybody who was involved in making these decisions. Open space is apparently for other people, not us in East Cambridge, Wellington-Harrington and The Port.
“ Open space is apparently for other people, not us in East Cambridge…” There are 11 acres of open space at Cambridge Crossing. Nearby, there’s another 8.5 acres at North Point Park. Do those not count? And what about Toomey Park? That’s another 2.2 acres of open space.
All of those are specific mitigation for specific projects, although I might spot you North Point Park, since that was mitigation for the Big Dig and, not for nothing, was opened after years of delay only because of a concerted campaign by East Cambridge residents targeted at DCR and the governor. The 7-1/2 acres at Volpe has been held out since ECaPS as mitigation for the millions of square feet of development in Kendall Square. Its importance was reiterated in the K2 recommendations, which were instituted and used to provide justification for another million square feet of commercial development in Kendall Square. The study group, which was dominated by Kendall Square developers, somehow saw fit to include that. The current wave of development will bring tens of thousands more residents and workers to the Kendall Square area, which already doesn’t have enough open space for them. That’s probably why they come up to the East Cambridge residential neighborhood parks at lunchtime to use the athletic facilities, or did in the Before Times. The various developers at North Point recognize that the millions of square feet they’re building need that much open space in order to be successful in the long term. Too bad too many developers in Kendall Square, though not all, prefer to sponge off others.
It’s surprising to me (if anything is surprising in Cambridge) – that building plots R3 and C3 next to the 6th St walkway park currently contain a large grove of mature oak trees which will all be destroyed. It would be a much smarter place to locate the new park. Not only to preserve those trees but to enhance the 6th St walkway.
And the proposed park at the corner of 3rd and Broadway is largely open paved parking, currently with mature trees on the perimeter – more suitable for building….. Why are folks who care about these things not really focused on this aspect?
And if anyone told you that they will try to move the existing large trees to the new proposed park?? I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn you may wish to buy…