0 Winthrop Square Garage Project Looks to Add Developer

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Wil Catlin

Credit: Boston Globe

The shuttered city garage on Federal Street was on center stage at the Great Hall at Faneuil Hall, so to speak. What is in store for our future?

From the Boston Globe:

Six teams of developers and architects, eager in their suits, stood by posterboard presentations and 3-D models and explained the tall towers they’d very much like to build on the site of the Winthrop Square Garage in downtown Boston…Looking at the presentations, one could be forgiven for forgetting that these developers are vying to build one of the tallest buildings in Boston. Sure, everyone had a scale model of their full tower, but most focused their energies on the space where the building meets the street, and on the soaring public halls, pocket parks, and black-box theaters they’re promising to enliven it. After all, that’s where most Bostonians would experience these buildings most of the time.

The BRA says it wants to name a developer soon, but expect it to be months, not weeks, before that happens. The authority hasn’t yet opened financial documents attached to the proposals, which detail offers to purchase or lease the site and each team’s wherewithal to build the thing. After that’s done, BRA real estate chief Ed O’Donnell said, the authority is likely to winnow the pack down to a few finalists and invite them in for another round of interviews. While O’Donnell insists he’d like to name a developer while the real estate market is still hot, reading between the lines that sounds more like it will happen in August or September than in July.

0 Office Prices in Downtown Crossing Continue to Grow

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Wil Catlin

Credit: Banker and Tradesman

Office trades in the Class A and B segments continue northward with the latest on West Street in Downtown Crossing for $16M.

From Banker&Tradesman:

There’s “another category where they [real estate investors] see potential for price appreciation: class B office buildings…The latest example: 33-41 West St. in Downtown Crossing, a fully-leased leased office building recently acquired by a New York developer for $16 million.

At $472 per foot, it’s one of the highest prices paid for a property in the category, said Robert Tito, a principal with NAI Hunneman in Boston…Built in 1899, the 38,000-square-foot structure was last acquired in 2008 by SMC Management of Watertown for $7.2 million.”

0 Millennium Partners Adds Downtown Crossing Cafè

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Wil Catlin

Credit: Bizjournals.com

Another caffeine fill up station is coming to Downtown Crossing to serve the ever-growing day and night population.

According to the Boston Business Journal, “Millennium Partners has leased a space in Downtown Crossing’s historic Burnham Building to Caffè Nero, a European coffee house, which will bring the 335,000-square-foot commercial space at the building and the adjacent Millennium Tower to full occupancy…The coffeeshop will be located on Summer Street less than half a mile from Downtown Crossing’s first Caffè Nero, which is located at the base of Millenium Place, another high-end condominium complex developed by Millennium Partners. Caffè Nero also has locations in Jamaica Plain, the South End and the Longwood Medical area.”

You can click through to jump to the BBJ article.

0 With Boston’s Economic Growth comes… Traffic

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Wil Catlin

Image Credit: Wbur

Traffic in major cities like Boston is nothing new. Traffic for me had necessitated leaving my house in Metro West by 5:45 AM to ensure my inbound commute doesn’t take more than 25 – 35 minutes.

According to a report on wburg.org, “Greater Boston is the sixth-most-gridlock-plagued urban area in the country, and it’s costing you a lot of time and money…The average driver in the region spends 64 hours a year — a workweek-and-a-half — stuck in traffic. That’s twice what it was in Boston just 30 years ago, adding about $1,400 a year to the average commuter’s costs.”

The full article is available on WBUR.org.