Author Archives: Wil Catlin

0 Monorail Proposed in Boston

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Aerial view of the greenway in downtown Boston

Credit: Boston Herald

We have worked so hard to suppress the central artery I’m not too sure it makes sense to litter it with a monorail.

From the Boston Herald:

Minnesota-based JPods has proposed bringing their solar-powered gondola pods to Boston and Somerville, an idea that caught the attention of former city councilor Steve Murphy, who liked them for the Greenway.

JPods are among a category of vehicle called personal rapid transit, a network of small, solar-powered automated vehicles that operate on specially built guideways. They’ve been tested — in different forms — everywhere from New Zealand to Abu Dhabi and even installed in Heathrow Airport to ferry travelers from Terminal 5 to the long-term car park. The expansion of these projects always seems to end with the conclusion that they don’t move a high enough volume of people for the considerable cost. It’s just the type of problem Boston’s innovators could take on.

0 Seaport’s Northern Ave. Bridge in it’s last Months

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Seaport Northern Ave Bridge

Credit: Boston Magazine

The Northern Ave. Bridge is scheduled to come down in March. The bridge site is now the gateway to the Seaport, which continues to grow with the recent announcement of GE’s election to move its HQ to the thriving Boston submarket.

From Boston Magazine:

The rusty, sad structure that links downtown to the Seaport is set to be removed in March. But the Northern Ave Bridge wasn’t always such a rickety construction; it became a grand throughway across the Fort Point Channel after it was built in 1908. It’s also one of the remaining few swing bridges in Boston, meaning that it pivots when traffic in the water below needs to pass by.

The steel bridge was closed to vehicles in 1997—and recently to pedestrians in December 2014—after the Coast Guard asserted it was hazardous to cross and in danger of collapsing. The bridge’s demolition seems unfortunate, since the aged platform boasts a distinctive history.

 

0 Fenway Getting “Big Air Jump” in Feb

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Fenway Boston

Credot: Bisnow

Fenway Park is far more than just home to the Red Sox. It has evolved to a park that hosts many event from concerts to hockey, and now, a Big Air Jump.

According to Bisnow, “Fenway Park’s Big Air Jump is being assembled (all 26,000 pieces) for its big day on Feb. 11 and 12. And when the estimated 25,000 people stream in, the jump will be even taller than the originally announced figure, according to BostInno. The structure reaches 150 feet high and 338 feet long.”

You can read more about Fenway’s Big Air Jump on Bisnow.

 

0 Synergy Investments Sells Class B Portfolio

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Credit: Boston Business Journal

Credit: Boston Business Journal

Value in the Class B market continues to be achieved with Synergy’s sale of a 4 building portfolio.

According to Bizjournals.com, the four-property portfolio spans a combined 237,434 square feet and was acquired for an average of $379 per square foot, up by $143 from the $236 per square foot paid by Synergy and GreenOak.”

The BBJ continued, noting “the deal is the latest in a wave of local Class B transactions. For example, Webster-based property insurer Mapfre Insurance bought One Winthrop Square in October for $55 million with plans to move some executive offices there. Boston-based commercial real estate firm Winhall Cos. bought Two Liberty Square in September for $28.25 million, up more than $10 million from the $18 million the property had traded for in January 2013. And New York-based DLJ Real Estate Capital Partners in October accquired 18 Tremont St. for $77.5 million.”
You can read the full article on the BBJ’s website, here.

0 Boston’s MBTA: Least Reliable Transit System in the U.S.

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Boston commuters wait for the MBTA train

Credit: BBJ

Boston takes another 1st position in the nation, this is not a positive, however, this is The T!

Our beloved MBTA is dead last with the most breakdowns in the U.S. We are an educated Commonwealth, but we really need to get smart about how we expect our workforce to commute without operational issues beyond their control.

According to a recent article on the Boston Business Journal, “the MBTA recorded 219 major mechanical failures on its commuter rail lines in 2014 — four times the national average. (Notably, the data did not include breakdowns last year during the record-setting snowfall in January and February)…Nationally, 24 commuter railroads had an average 52 major failures in 2014.”

0 Boston Office Market Shows Strength in 2015

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Boston office market trends

Credit: Boston Real Estate Times

The region’s office market continued its upward push with rents climbing while vacancy continues to decline.

A Boston Real Estate Times article includes the following highlights to express the market direction:

  • Market-wide vacancy averaged 12.2 percent for 2015, the lowest annual average since 2002. Vacancy for the quarter remained steady from third quarter at 12.1 percent.
  • Class A asking lease rates topped $42 per square foot for the first time since 2002, reaching $42.06 in fourth quarter, 3.9 percent higher than first-quarter 2015.
  • Boston’s Central Business District had 502,000 square feet of absorption in fourth quarter and totaled 1.58 million square feet for the year, the highest annual total since 2006.
  • Vacancy in Boston’s Seaport District dropped to 8.3 percent, its lowest level since 2000, when inventory was 6 million square feet smaller than today.
  • Cambridge closed the quarter at a remarkable 2.7 percent vacancy, its lowest mark on record.
  • There was 314,000 square feet of positive absorption in the Route 128 submarkets and 328,000 square feet in the Interstate 495 submarkets.

 

0 Wayfair’s Chic Boston Office Space Reflects its Core Products

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Wayfair HQ

Credit: Boston.com

Wayfair has come to the market with creative radio and TV ads and changed the traditional office environment from cubes and offices into collaborative environment for its ever expanding workforce.

From Boston.com:

With names like “Nordic,” “Safari,” “Whimsy,” and “Cat Tree,” each room at Wayfair’s headquarters at 4 Copley Place is themed to remind employees of a motif or product the rapidly expanding company sells. While “Safari” might feature zebra-print rugs and exotic throw pillows, employees working in “Cat Tree” get to enjoy a slightly quirkier office vibe with avocado-colored wallpaper covered in playful cats.

“We have all these smaller spaces set up to look like actual living rooms using the furniture we actually sell,” said Jess Merrell, event marketer for Wayfair. “That way everything feels more comfortable to get things done. We don’t have to go to Starbucks to have a private conversation.”

0 BBJ Posts Interactive Map of Boston’s Largest Construction Projects

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Boston is rising!  We are witnessing one of the city’s largest building booms and the attached map, courtesy of the Boston Business Journal, lays out all of the active sites.

Boston real estate development map

Credit: BBJ

0 Seaport Rents Continue to Move North

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new office space in boston seaport is constructed

Credit: Boston.com

A recent Boston.com article references apartment rentals in the Seaport, but what is expected for Class A and B office rents?  Rents will continue to push Northward, which is due to limited supply in the Seaport submarket.  GE moving to town won’t dramatically move the rent needle up or down, but ancillary service providers will continue to chip away at vacancy.

From Boston.com:

“If you look at what has happened since 2011, since post crash,” [Ishay Grinberg, president of Rental Beast] said. “Rents [in Seaport] went on average from about $3,100 to $4,100, from 2011 to 2013.” Then when demand wasn’t high enough, they plummeted almost 20 percent in 2014, but went back up in 2015, increasing 15 percent to an average of $3,850 per month.
Currently, rents are high, but so are vacancies—a rarity for the Boston market….More than 12 percent of all rental units in Seaport are currently vacant, according to Grinberg, while in Downtown only a little more than 2 percent are empty. The Greater Boston vacancy rate is 4 percent. And supply is still coming into Seaport, such as One Seaport Square, will include 832 units.

0 GE Selecting from 8 Boston HQ Options

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South Boston waterfront office space

Credit: Boston Herald

What will GE’s new corporate address be?  Here are 8 locations within the Seaport that can accommodate their 2018 move.

The locations among consideration are listed out in a Boston Herald article:

  • The former Boston Public Schools headquarters at 26 School St. downtown. BPS vacated the historic 11-story, 160,000-square-foot building last year for new space in Dudley Square.
  • The MassDOT building at 185 Kneeland St. on the edge of Chinatown that is made up of three parcels totaling 5.8 acres, with an existing 104,000-square-foot office building that could be renovated.
  • Vacant land at 6 Tide St. in the Boston Marine Industrial Park, owned by the Boston Redevelopment Authority, also in the Seaport District. Current site plans call for a 355,000-square-foot development.
  • A vacant 1.8-acre Massport lot on Congress Street next to the John Hancock building known as “Parcel H” in the Seaport.
  • Massport land at the intersection of Massport Haul Road and World Trade Center Avenue. The vacant lot has the capacity for a 150,000-square-foot office building. It’s located near the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center in the Seaport.
  • Vacant land at the corner of E and D streets, owned by the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority. Both are in the South Boston/Seaport area. The D Street parcel can accommodate a building up to 75 feet in height, and a footprint of 122,000 square feet. The E Street parcel can accommodate up to 10 stories.
  • A vacant 1.2-acre Massport parcel known as “A-2” at the corner of Congress Street and World Trade Center Avenue in the Seaport area. It’s adjacent to the MBTA Silver Line; a planned parking garage is next to the parcel.
  • Two parcels of vacant Massport land, known as “D-2” and “D-3,” at the intersection of Summer and D street in the Seaport District. The approximately 4.9-acre site occupies two of the four corners at the intersection.