Simon’s Coffee Shop and Keezer’s clothing store would be at least temporarily displaced during construction of a proposed six-story, 71-unit building in Neighborhood 9, the project’s developers said at a public meeting Monday. Also displaced would be a Walgreens, but the developers said they wanted to bring back the small businesses.
“We’re hoping that … we can work out some arrangement where they could come back,” said Adam Siegel, a principal of Old North Development and Cambridge’s SGL Development, which bought the property at 1740 Massachusetts Ave. two weeks ago. “We understand we’ll likely have to accept less than full-market rate leasing terms, and we’re okay with that.”
The loss of the legacy retailers near Porter Square provoked almost as much concern at the meeting, which drew about 14 people in person and roughly the same number online, as the usual issues when large residential projects are introduced: noise, traffic and parking.
The developers said conversations started with Simon’s owners on Monday, and they had reached out to Keezer’s. Old North has plans for five retail spaces. The one it has tabbed for Simon’s would move that business to the north facing Linnaean Street. Access to the apartment building lobby would go on Massachusetts Avenue. Designs include a replacement basement space for Keezer’s. Walgreens, now at street level, could also be part of the basement space.
“Most places, you would say basement space is never going to work for retail, but this one has been remarkably successful over the years,” said Peter Quinn, the building’s architect, referring to Keezer’s and its predecessor, the Hollywood Express video store.
A lengthy construction cycle
The project will take 18 to 20 months of construction, developers said at the neighborhood meeting to neighbors, after demolition of the current building in the summer or fall of 2026.
A tentative design includes 40 studio apartments, 17 one-bedroom, nine two-bedroom and five three-bedroom units. The unit sizes are “generous,” developers said, including studios of 500 square feet and three-bedroom units of about 1,300 square feet. About 20 percent of the living space will be affordable. There would be a fitness center and green roof usable by tenants, near a solar array.
No parking is proposed for cars, but the building will include 75 underground long-term bike parking spaces, as well as a dozen more short-term bike parking spaces by the cafe. A loading zone off Linnaean will have space for one vehicle.
“Catastrophic” for traffic, parking
Adding more than 100 residents to the area, some of whom would certainly bring cars, was the most-voiced fear after the loss of the businesses. “Traffic and parking is going to be catastrophic,” one neighbor said, joined by a resident who said they regularly had to park their car up to four blocks away. Also noted was the problem of street cleaning, which removes half a street’s parking spaces, and the ongoing redesign of Massachusetts Avenue, which could eliminate more than half of its street parking spaces. In addition, alarm was expressed that the new design does away with a small commercial parking lot outside the Walgreens on Linnaean Street.
Siegel said that “people that live here likely will choose not to have a vehicle because of the location of the project and all the transit options available to it, as well as the car sharing available, bus access, the bicycle access.” He acknowledged that “the people that do have vehicles will need to find an on-street space that may be a little ways away.”
The new building would be 70 feet high and around 61,300 square feet, far bigger than the current 12,616-square-foot structure built in 1894. Developers said it wouldn’t stand out significantly, pointing to a five-story apartment building across Linnaean Street. Nearby six-story buildings include1651 and 1654 Massachusetts Ave. and 1810 Massachusetts Ave.
Developers said they were building to allowed zoning without seeking special permits, which eliminates some complications on the path to construction. Cambridge Savings Bank is Old North’s backer for the property acquisition and predevelopment loan, Siegel said, but whether another lender comes in for the vertical construction “will be up to the market.”
So far, expenses look in line with what Old North projected when the partners began working on the proposal five months ago, Siegel said, even with Trump administration tariffs causing fluctuations. “What happens from now until we break ground? Your guess is as good as mine,” he said.
A raft of developments
The development is one of several taking shape in the area, including 2070 Massachusetts Ave., on the other side of the square in North Cambridge, a 12-story all-affordable tower of 73 homes that could start work in 2027; a pair of affordable-housing buildings that could go as high as 15 stories each at 1826 and 1840 Massachusetts Ave. on little-used parking lots sold in November 2024 to the nonprofit developer Just A Start; and, in Somerville’s part of Porter Square, a four-story building with 20 units at 32-40 White St. Potential rezoning of North Massachusetts Avenue from the Cambridge Common to the Alewife Brook Parkway could also increase density and height for residential buildings.
The Old North principals took notes and thanked people who commented in person and online, including a couple of architects and urban planners. To former city councillor Dennis Carlone, who offered advice on such things as shadows, materials and colors, Siegel said the design offered “was our first rendition, but we’re open to modifying that, definitely.”
This was the first of three planned community meetings, and may have had lower attendance because it was at the Cambridge Community Center in Riverside, far from Neighborhood 9. Siegel conceded this was not ideal, but he and his Old North business partner, Brendan Seaver, had “to hold a meeting in order to start our process,” and said they did not get a response from closer venues on a city-provided list. “No one else was opening their doors.”
The next meeting about the project will be at a Porter Square Neighborhood Association meeting set for 7 to 9 p.m. Nov. 20 at 1815 Massachusetts Ave. A third meeting, hosted by the Neighborhood 9 Coalition, is planned tentatively for Dec. 10 at the Graham & Parks School, 44 Linnaean St. The developers will appear before the Planning Board in January.
The Somerville proposal had its first meeting in September; the parking-lot buildings will be presented to the public Nov. 20 at a meeting of the Porter Square Neighbors Association.
A stronger
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A reasonable building. But a different picture than when City Councillors have described their vision of housing on top of ground floor retail, and the reporting here seems to minimize the impact. Walgreens, the majority of the ground floor today, and an anchor of the neighborhood, will be banished. Simons sent to the less valuable side street. Seems like we are reducing the commercial space by 75% or so.
Siegel and Quinn were behind a large lab-office building they proposed for White Street in Porter Square in Somerville a few years ago, that now seems to be taking on a different shape, after the original project evidently fell through or was rejected. (Or both.) Cambridge Day had a useful article back then that might be of interest to residents of the Baldwin neighborhood now:
https://www.cambridgeday.com/2022/08/30/lab-building-that-would-overlook-porter-square-to-be-introduced-to-residents-at-online-meeting/
Cambridge urgently needs more housing, and this project is a smart, well-placed step forward.
Adding 71 new units, including affordable ones, on Massachusetts Ave near the Red Line and several bus routes is exactly how the city should grow.
It’s also commendable that the developer plans to bring back local favorites like Simon’s and Keezer’s at below-market rents instead of replacing them with chains.
Construction will cause short-term disruption, but freezing housing around Porter Square isn’t sustainable. The area already has six-story buildings, strong transit, and excellent walkability. This is a perfect place for residents to live car-free and support local shops. Parking is a poor excuse to deny people housing, especially in a walkable neighborhood.
Projects like this will keep Cambridge inclusive, diverse, and livable.
The policies that brought us the housing crisis are not sustainable. It is good to see Cambridge taking action.
Parking and traffic? Building more housing near the Red Line and major bus routes reduces car dependency and with it, parking and traffic problems.
Avoiding new housing over those concerns only makes things worse. It will ensure that more and more people will drive and park here.
This is exactly the type of project that we need more of in Cambridge, replacing single-story commercial along corridors with multi-story housing with right to return for the displaced small businesses.
I hope there’s a way we can support Simon’s and Keezer’s while they’re closed for construction.
The location doesn’t seem that bad for this, but moving the coffeeshop to the side street will lose walk in business (important since there will be less vehicle access to the block with the lost parking spaces).
Who’s going to pay for the expanded sewer and water needs for the location? The added electric grid capacity? These things are constantly being ignored. Our city reservoir is only so big, the more people added to the city the less there is during droughts (like we have just had this pas t summer). The big new underground substation by MIT is years from completion for electricity balancing for needs all over the city. The rest of us who live, work and own here will end up footing the bill for these things.
Pretty awesome that the builders will bring 70 homes, including around 14 affordable homes, to Mass Ave and that they will not just keep but subsidize Simon’s and Keefer’s!
I live nearby, and while I am not opposed to developing this lot for housing, I do hope that the building won’t have the generic, faux luxury appearance like the drawing. And please do not give the building a silly, cheap name like “Pathmark”, the name of this developer’s relatively new residential building by Davis Square.
I know these post-performance promises never pan out but I still really appreciate developers acknowledging that we wish we could have nice things, even if it’s in bad faith.
I don’t see displacement or banishment in this plan. A lot that’s been stuck at 3 stores + 0 homes, since 1894, will now have space for 5 stores + 71 homes, since a zoning reform was enacted this year.
More housing with less parking is a good thing for a congested city with a housing crisis… But there are still some big problems with this project.
A loading zone with space for a single vehicle is nowhere near sufficient for a building with five storefronts plus 100 car-free residents. We can get rid of the parking but let’s be realistic about the number of delivery and ride sharing vehicles which will be coming and going.
And it’s disappointing to see the lack of larger 2 and 3 bedroom units. We need more family housing. It’s unfortunate make more money by squeezing as many tiny studios as possible. And 500 square feet is not “generous” by any stretch.
New zoning was a good first step, but now let’s add incentives for adequate loading zones and larger unit sizes.