Towering opposition
Protests kill plan for a glass-walled garden at Hancock
By Casey Ross
Boston Globe
Globe Staff / June 27, 2008
The Hancock Tower's owners dropped plans to build a glass-enclosed public square outside the Clarendon Street doors after neighbors and the famed building's architect protested that the addition would mar the tower's slender design and the views of neighboring Trinity Church.
Architect Henry Cobb doesn't like what has happened inside the Hancock Tower but is glad the exterior won't be changing.
WORRIED ABOUT HIS MASTERPIECE
Architect Henry Cobb, who designed the 60-floor Hancock in the 1960s, strongly objected to Broadway Partners Fund Manager LLC's plan for a 12,000-square-foot glass "winter garden" on the plaza at the base of the building.
Back Bay residents were also marshaling opposition, arguing the changes would have ruined the tower's architectural integrity.
Parties involved in negotiations over the plaza said Cobb, who is known to be particular about the iconic Hancock, was immediately concerned that an addition would block views of Trinity Church across the street.
The addition would have fundamentally changed the forbidding, half-acre plaza, long known for umbrella-buckling wind gusts that torment passers-by.
Now, Broadway Partners and Elkus | Manfredi Architects are instead proposing to add only landscaping and glass benches. A pair of restaurants would still be opened underground, on the concourse level, but they would be entered through the tower's lobby, not through a winter garden.
"That's certainly what I had been urging. They have been very respectful of my views," Cobb said yesterday about the end of the plan for a new structure.
Alan G. Rubenstein, director of asset management for Broadway Partners, said the plaza will remain open and views of Trinity Church unobstructed. "The constituent groups with whom we spoke led us to the realization that less would be more," he said.
Broadway Partners also faced opposition from politicians and a powerful residents' group.
"There was tremendous concern about changing the face of the building," said state Representative Marty Walz, a Cambridge Democrat whose district includes the Back Bay. "It's world famous for a reason, and there was a consistent feeling that the new structure would not be a good addition."
The initial plan, announced in January, included an enclosed seating area with a small bar for drinks or coffee. Under the new concept, that lounge would be in the Hancock's lobby, where patrons could congregate before heading down to the concourse.
Rubenstein said new portals on the north and south sides of the lobby will help patrons get to the restaurants.
Broadway may file its revised design with the Boston Redevelopment Authority as early as next week, with construction of the restaurants to be completed in about 12 months. Rubenstein said Broadway Partners has not begun speaking with potential tenants but suggested at least one occupant would be a "white tablecloth" restaurant in the mold of the nearby Davio's or Grill 23.
While there was considerable opposition to a glass-walled structure, some of the business neighbors supported the idea as a way to enliven the barren plaza, which has never realized its potential as a public gathering place.
"I thought the new structure would help with the [windy] conditions," said Meg Mainzer-Cohen, president of the Back Bay Association, which represents business and property owners. "I still think adding the restaurants is a great way to open the Hancock to Bostonians. Right now, unless you have a business meeting, most people don't go there."
The public's connection to the monolithic skyscraper diminished after its observatory was shuttered amid terrorism concerns following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
Broadway Partners' initial plan was designed to make the plaza a destination for residents and visitors. Cobb and others argued that the way to enhance the space is to preserve sight lines with the sandstone and granite facade of Trinity Church, designed by Henry Hobson Richardson.
Broadway Partners sought to accommodate those concerns with the all-glass structure, but Cobb fretted that even that would block outdoor views and interfere with the tranquility of the plaza. The glass design was inspired by spaces such as the atrium at the IBM Building and the Apple store at the General Motors Building, both in New York.
Cobb has long been concerned about changes to the Hancock, a masterpiece whose concept he finished over two harried weeks in the fall of 1967.
In a 2006 retrospective on the building's opening, he told the Globe that the building's interior had been wrecked: "The last time I was in it, I turned on my heel and walked out. . . . I'm happy that the external statement of the building is so completely independent of what happens inside it."
Casey Ross can be reached at cross@globe.com.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Moving City Hall
Tommy’s Taj Mahal demands debates
By Boston Herald Editorial Staff
Thursday, June 26, 2008 - Added 13h ago
Dealing with City Hall these days is a little like dealing with the old Kremlin - and that has nothing to do with the Cold War “brutalist” style architecture of the building.
No, it’s the mindset - a mindset that comes with a mayor who by next month will have served 15 years in the job and shows no sign of wanting to relinquish it. But next year is an election year and so a potential rival to Mayor Tom Menino has emerged from the ranks of the City Council to ask some annoying questions about an already approved capital budget.
The Council has rather limited powers but one of them is to hold hearings and ask questions and Councilor Mike Flaherty is making the most of that.
At issue is an $850,000 item for a feasibility study involving city-owned land on South Boston’s Drydock 4, part of the Marine Industrial Park. The $850,000 is only the first installment in a three-year appropriation of more than $2 million involving that same site.
It is a possible site for a future waterfront city hall Menino seems to want as his legacy. And while the current city hall building has few fans, the possibility of relocating to the waterfront seems to have only one truly ardent supporter - and that would be Tom Menino.
Now at some point the Boston Redevelopment Authority likely can and should determine what level of development that site can support. That is a legitimate expenditure of public dollars. In fact, such a study may show that the site is prohibitively expensive for a major public building.
The real problem here is that except for this week’s Council hearing all of this is being carried out without public debate or discussion. The taxpayers of this city deserve at least that much before Tommy’s Taj Mahal on the harbor takes on a life of its own.
By Boston Herald Editorial Staff
Thursday, June 26, 2008 - Added 13h ago
Dealing with City Hall these days is a little like dealing with the old Kremlin - and that has nothing to do with the Cold War “brutalist” style architecture of the building.
No, it’s the mindset - a mindset that comes with a mayor who by next month will have served 15 years in the job and shows no sign of wanting to relinquish it. But next year is an election year and so a potential rival to Mayor Tom Menino has emerged from the ranks of the City Council to ask some annoying questions about an already approved capital budget.
The Council has rather limited powers but one of them is to hold hearings and ask questions and Councilor Mike Flaherty is making the most of that.
At issue is an $850,000 item for a feasibility study involving city-owned land on South Boston’s Drydock 4, part of the Marine Industrial Park. The $850,000 is only the first installment in a three-year appropriation of more than $2 million involving that same site.
It is a possible site for a future waterfront city hall Menino seems to want as his legacy. And while the current city hall building has few fans, the possibility of relocating to the waterfront seems to have only one truly ardent supporter - and that would be Tom Menino.
Now at some point the Boston Redevelopment Authority likely can and should determine what level of development that site can support. That is a legitimate expenditure of public dollars. In fact, such a study may show that the site is prohibitively expensive for a major public building.
The real problem here is that except for this week’s Council hearing all of this is being carried out without public debate or discussion. The taxpayers of this city deserve at least that much before Tommy’s Taj Mahal on the harbor takes on a life of its own.
Harvard Art
Harvard art is on the move
By Francis Ma
GateHouse News Service
Posted Jun 25, 2008 @ 02:00 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boston — When the doors of the Fogg Museum in Cambridge close to the public on June 30, they won’t open again until 2013.
But the five-year sabbatical is for a good cause — the Harvard museum will undergo structural renovations that are 50 years overdue. Among the highest priorities: the air-conditioning and plumbing, in addition to an electrical system that pre-dates the FDR administration.
The plan also includes a bigger and longer-range goal — to add a complementary arts complex across the Charles River in Allston.
But right now the priority is the Fogg.
“Our climate control problem is a source of deep embarrassment and shame for us,” says Museum Director Thomas Lentz. “All of the systems in the building have to be updated.”
How bad is it? The electric and plumbing systems haven’t been overhauled since the museum was built in 1927.
In order to rectify this, the Harvard art collection from all three museums — the Fogg, the Bush-Reisinger and the Sackler — will be consolidated after the museum closes on June 30.
Most of it will end up in storage while a “representative overview” called “Re-View” will be on display when the Sackler reopens on Sept. 13. (The Sackler will also be closed this summer for the reorganization.) Harvard hope that all three museums will reopen at full capacity in 2013.
The proposal for the Allston location is to have a building of contemporary art (though not solely about contemporary art) that will have a dual relationship with Harvard University and the local community. It’s scheduled to break ground some time next year.
The Allston location would give Harvard the opportunity to embrace more contemporary art, a medium that has never had a home at the Fogg.
“We will never have the space that we need here,” says Lentz. “Allston will be a place where we can do things we never could.”
The idea of extending Harvard University into Allston was first hatched in 2003. Along the way, Allston residents have questioned whether or not it was going forward and whether having Harvard in Allston would be a good idea.
“I think some people assumed that the delay of the museum meant that Allston was off the table,” adds Harvard’s Director of Communications Daron Manoogian. “That has never been the case.”
Priorities simply changed. Instead of focusing on the new art museum in Allston, the university decided to turn its attention to the much-needed renovations of the Fogg. This change in thinking came mostly from Harvard’s new president, Drew G. Faust, who was appointed in February 2007.
“With Faust, it feels like the arts are a real priority,” says Manoogian. “She recognizes the possibility for a Harvard-Allston community. I think, in the past, the Allston community felt overwhelmed, especially with having to approve two buildings (a science complex and the art museum) at once.”
To help alleviate past confusion, President Faust set up a Task Force for the Arts in November of last year with the job of determining how the arts at Harvard can be implemented into other areas of study, as well as to consider what type of physical building would be needed in the future.
But for some Allston residents, it’s hard to forget the confusion of past meetings and business plans and some say there still isn’t enough communication between the community and the university.
Harry Mattison, Allston resident since 1994 and part of the Harvard-Allston Task Force, has been involved with this issue from the start.
“Some people don’t feel like Harvard and Allston are in this together,” says Mattison. “We’re also concerned about what it would be like to have Harvard as a neighbor.”
The Task Force meets regularly at the Honan-Allston Branch Library with representatives from Harvard University and the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA).This fall they will be discussing the Master Plan for Allston, which includes the proposed art museum.
So far, the meetings have addressed general concerns.
At a recent meeting, Mattison passionately voiced his concern that the neighborhood would be changing and asked whether or not Harvard knew what the new neighborhood would look like.
“Does Harvard know who will be moving into Allston? And what their needs will be?” asked Mattison.
It’s a valid question that wasn’t answered with any specifics.
Kathy Spiegelman, chief planner for the Harvard University Allston Initiative, regularly attends these meetings (which are staffed by the BRA), and she takes these concerns seriously.
“I think the challenge of this project has been how to make the edges soft,” says Spiegelman. “We want the structures to be inviting to the members of the local community.”
And now that President Faust has pushed the renovation of the Fogg as a priority, it allows Spiegelman and the Allston community to figure out exactly what the new art complex could, and should, provide.
Meanwhile, the Fogg braces for a big transition. Helen Molesworth, head of the department of modern and contemporary art, says the feeling within the walls is a sad one, and that no one wants to see the museum close.
“Most people who work in museums want to share that love of art with other people,” says Molesworth. “None of us want to pack up and close our doors. But we have a broken thing and we need to fix it.”
By Francis Ma
GateHouse News Service
Posted Jun 25, 2008 @ 02:00 PM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boston — When the doors of the Fogg Museum in Cambridge close to the public on June 30, they won’t open again until 2013.
But the five-year sabbatical is for a good cause — the Harvard museum will undergo structural renovations that are 50 years overdue. Among the highest priorities: the air-conditioning and plumbing, in addition to an electrical system that pre-dates the FDR administration.
The plan also includes a bigger and longer-range goal — to add a complementary arts complex across the Charles River in Allston.
But right now the priority is the Fogg.
“Our climate control problem is a source of deep embarrassment and shame for us,” says Museum Director Thomas Lentz. “All of the systems in the building have to be updated.”
How bad is it? The electric and plumbing systems haven’t been overhauled since the museum was built in 1927.
In order to rectify this, the Harvard art collection from all three museums — the Fogg, the Bush-Reisinger and the Sackler — will be consolidated after the museum closes on June 30.
Most of it will end up in storage while a “representative overview” called “Re-View” will be on display when the Sackler reopens on Sept. 13. (The Sackler will also be closed this summer for the reorganization.) Harvard hope that all three museums will reopen at full capacity in 2013.
The proposal for the Allston location is to have a building of contemporary art (though not solely about contemporary art) that will have a dual relationship with Harvard University and the local community. It’s scheduled to break ground some time next year.
The Allston location would give Harvard the opportunity to embrace more contemporary art, a medium that has never had a home at the Fogg.
“We will never have the space that we need here,” says Lentz. “Allston will be a place where we can do things we never could.”
The idea of extending Harvard University into Allston was first hatched in 2003. Along the way, Allston residents have questioned whether or not it was going forward and whether having Harvard in Allston would be a good idea.
“I think some people assumed that the delay of the museum meant that Allston was off the table,” adds Harvard’s Director of Communications Daron Manoogian. “That has never been the case.”
Priorities simply changed. Instead of focusing on the new art museum in Allston, the university decided to turn its attention to the much-needed renovations of the Fogg. This change in thinking came mostly from Harvard’s new president, Drew G. Faust, who was appointed in February 2007.
“With Faust, it feels like the arts are a real priority,” says Manoogian. “She recognizes the possibility for a Harvard-Allston community. I think, in the past, the Allston community felt overwhelmed, especially with having to approve two buildings (a science complex and the art museum) at once.”
To help alleviate past confusion, President Faust set up a Task Force for the Arts in November of last year with the job of determining how the arts at Harvard can be implemented into other areas of study, as well as to consider what type of physical building would be needed in the future.
But for some Allston residents, it’s hard to forget the confusion of past meetings and business plans and some say there still isn’t enough communication between the community and the university.
Harry Mattison, Allston resident since 1994 and part of the Harvard-Allston Task Force, has been involved with this issue from the start.
“Some people don’t feel like Harvard and Allston are in this together,” says Mattison. “We’re also concerned about what it would be like to have Harvard as a neighbor.”
The Task Force meets regularly at the Honan-Allston Branch Library with representatives from Harvard University and the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA).This fall they will be discussing the Master Plan for Allston, which includes the proposed art museum.
So far, the meetings have addressed general concerns.
At a recent meeting, Mattison passionately voiced his concern that the neighborhood would be changing and asked whether or not Harvard knew what the new neighborhood would look like.
“Does Harvard know who will be moving into Allston? And what their needs will be?” asked Mattison.
It’s a valid question that wasn’t answered with any specifics.
Kathy Spiegelman, chief planner for the Harvard University Allston Initiative, regularly attends these meetings (which are staffed by the BRA), and she takes these concerns seriously.
“I think the challenge of this project has been how to make the edges soft,” says Spiegelman. “We want the structures to be inviting to the members of the local community.”
And now that President Faust has pushed the renovation of the Fogg as a priority, it allows Spiegelman and the Allston community to figure out exactly what the new art complex could, and should, provide.
Meanwhile, the Fogg braces for a big transition. Helen Molesworth, head of the department of modern and contemporary art, says the feeling within the walls is a sad one, and that no one wants to see the museum close.
“Most people who work in museums want to share that love of art with other people,” says Molesworth. “None of us want to pack up and close our doors. But we have a broken thing and we need to fix it.”
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
BRA approves Suffolk, Simmons projects
Boston Business Journal
The Boston Redevelopment Authority Tuesday approved a 10-year master plan proposed by Suffolk University to build a 10-story residence hall over a redeveloped Modern Theater in downtown Boston.
Boston-based Suffolk plans to spend $100 million on that project and a new arts school and academic building at 20 Somerset St.
Simultaneously, the BRA approved Simmons College’s plan to expand its dining hall at 300 The Fenway. The college plans to add 5.898 square feet to its existing dining hall and will spend $6 million on the project.
The Boston Redevelopment Authority Tuesday approved a 10-year master plan proposed by Suffolk University to build a 10-story residence hall over a redeveloped Modern Theater in downtown Boston.
Boston-based Suffolk plans to spend $100 million on that project and a new arts school and academic building at 20 Somerset St.
Simultaneously, the BRA approved Simmons College’s plan to expand its dining hall at 300 The Fenway. The college plans to add 5.898 square feet to its existing dining hall and will spend $6 million on the project.
Copley Tower!
Copley Place seeks city of Boston’s OK for 47-story tower
Boston Herald
By Scott Van Voorhis
Tuesday, June 24, 2008 - Updated 19h ago
Copley Place owner Simon Property Group Inc. is moving ahead with plans to remake the Back Bay skyline with a 47-story condo tower that will also expand the upscale mall’s footprint.
The mall owner, in a proposal filed yesterday with City Hall, details plans for nearly 800,000 square feet of new residential and Retail space at the corner of Dartmouth and Stuart streets.
Along with 280 high-rise condos, Simon is also banking on a significant expansion of Copley Place.
The proposal calls for adding 54,000 square feet to the existing 115,000-square-foot Neiman Marcus store, which would be renovated as well. Another 60,000 square feet of retail would be added beyond that, including space for a restaurant and a winter garden.
The condo tower will include a health club, luxury day spa, library and concierge service.
“The project will enhance the urban fabric of the neighborhood and be a striking addition to the city’s skyline,” said Carl Dieterle, executive vice president for urban development at Simon, in a statement.
But state Rep. Marty Walz (D-Back Bay) said there are still significant concerns about the shadows the new tower will cast across nearby Copley Square and the Commonwealth Mall.
“A building of that height will cast significant shadows on those two green spaces,” Walz said.
Rick Stockwood, a spokesman for the project, said the tower has been specifically designed to minimize the impact of any shadows it will cast. The impact itself, which he described as limited, is laid out in a report included in the project plans submitted yesterday to the Boston Redevelopment Authority.
The shadows that cross Copley Square, for example, are confined to the late fall and winter months, Stockwood said.
sbvanvoorhis@bostonherald.com
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Boston University Angers Neighbors With Ebola, SARS Germ Lab
Boston University Angers Neighbors With Ebola, SARS Germ Lab
Bloomberg
By Brian K. Sullivan
June 5 (Bloomberg) -- At the corner of Albany and East Dedham, tradesmen are putting the final touches on a $198 million glass and steel building for Boston University. The neighbors are upset about what the school plans to keep inside.
Organisms that cause Ebola, SARS, and plague are among microbes that scientists may stockpile at a biosafety lab rated level 4, the most secure category used by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. The building in the university's medical center has provoked court challenges from South End and Roxbury residents, who say airborne germs may escape the lab and cause illness or death.
Boston University says the lab will be safe, yield lifesaving research, and help the school, city and region by adding jobs and an estimated $72 million a year in research contracts. Critics say the area's poor won't benefit. The school is likely to prevail because of the lab's potential benefits to society, said Arthur Caplan, an ethicist who follows health- policy clashes.
``It could easily bring in grants in the tens of millions of dollars,'' Caplan, 58, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, said in a June 2 telephone interview. ``It is not fair to say that it is money versus ethics, but that at the end of the day the benefits overwhelm the concerns about the risk.''
The U.S. has six such labs, none in Massachusetts. Long overshadowed by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in nearby Cambridge, Boston University, known as BU, aims to leapfrog past those schools as places where infectious germs and vaccines can be studied.
`Densest Population'
Neighborhood foes often emerge to oppose buildings where biological technology is involved. In December, New York City approved a plan for Columbia University to expand into a Harlem neighborhood. The endorsement came after opponents of the $6 billion expansion questioned whether a level-3 biolab that is part of the project would expose residents to typhoid fever.
``This is the densest population around such a lab in the country,'' said Eloise Lawrence, 34, staff attorney for the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston. ``This is also one of the hardest and difficult to navigate cities in the country. How would one get out in an emergency?''
Until the last few years, nobody had to worry about the prospect of a biohazard lab in Boston. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and the anthrax scare that followed, the U.S. decided it needed more level-4 labs to study exotic diseases that could be turned into terror weapons, said Gigi Kwik Gronvall, senior associate at the government's Center for Biosecurity, a Baltimore facility run by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, in a telephone interview June 2.
Delayed by Lawsuits
In 2003, the Bethesda, Maryland-based National Institutes of Health chose the BU Medical Center and the University of Texas as the sites of two new level-4 labs. The University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston is expected to open a new level-4 biosafety facility in November, school spokeswoman Marsha Canright said May 14 in a telephone interview. Texas already operates a smaller level-4 lab in Galveston.
BU's lab, originally scheduled to open this year, is being delayed until at least next year by two lawsuits backed by residents of Boston's South End and Roxbury neighborhoods.
The South End had a population of about 28,160 and a poverty rate of 23.9 percent, according to a 2000 Boston Redevelopment Authority report. The Roxbury section had a population of 55,663 and poverty of 27.1 percent.
`Last Breath'
``We will fight this lab to our last breath,'' Roxbury resident Klare Allen, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuits, said at a public hearing at the Massachusetts State House in Boston on May 16.
To meet the demands of judges in the court cases, the NIH in March appointed a 16-member panel headed by Adel Mahmoud, a professor of molecular biology at Princeton University in New Jersey. The panel said in a May 16 statement that the lab's approval process needs more transparency. It also said a risk assessment report should include details of the infectious agents being studied that may pose a health threat, and gauge the possibility of terrorist action against the lab.
The group plans to provide NIH Director Elias Zerhouni with a work plan on June 6. The panel will decide how the health effects should be studied, seek public comment, and issue a final report by July 2009. State and federal courts are awaiting that assessment before deciding on the lawsuits, according to the NIH.
$1.7 Billion
A BU estimate about four years ago showed the lab could bring in about $72 million a year, said BU Medical Center spokeswoman Ellen Berlin in a telephone interview on June 2. The lab will employ 660 people, including 150 Ph.D.-level researchers, Berlin said on May 13.
The neighborhoods will benefit because workers will go into the community to eat, have their dry cleaning done and shop, Berlin said.
The Brookline-based Massachusetts Association of Nonprofit Schools and Colleges, with 90 members including Wellesley College, predicted the lab could yield $1.7 billion in federal research and spending during the next 20 years, according to a May 14 letter.
``I think this is very important to the city, for the jobs it will create to the research that will be done there,'' Boston Mayor Thomas Menino said in an interview May 22.
The court cases are Allen et. al. v. NIH, et. al. 1:06-CV- 10877-PBS, Federal District Court Boston and 10 residents of Boston v. the Boston Redevelopment Authority SJC-09960, Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.
To contact the reporter on this story: Brian K. Sullivan in Boston at bsullivan10@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: June 5, 2008 00:01 EDT
Bloomberg
By Brian K. Sullivan
June 5 (Bloomberg) -- At the corner of Albany and East Dedham, tradesmen are putting the final touches on a $198 million glass and steel building for Boston University. The neighbors are upset about what the school plans to keep inside.
Organisms that cause Ebola, SARS, and plague are among microbes that scientists may stockpile at a biosafety lab rated level 4, the most secure category used by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. The building in the university's medical center has provoked court challenges from South End and Roxbury residents, who say airborne germs may escape the lab and cause illness or death.
Boston University says the lab will be safe, yield lifesaving research, and help the school, city and region by adding jobs and an estimated $72 million a year in research contracts. Critics say the area's poor won't benefit. The school is likely to prevail because of the lab's potential benefits to society, said Arthur Caplan, an ethicist who follows health- policy clashes.
``It could easily bring in grants in the tens of millions of dollars,'' Caplan, 58, director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, said in a June 2 telephone interview. ``It is not fair to say that it is money versus ethics, but that at the end of the day the benefits overwhelm the concerns about the risk.''
The U.S. has six such labs, none in Massachusetts. Long overshadowed by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in nearby Cambridge, Boston University, known as BU, aims to leapfrog past those schools as places where infectious germs and vaccines can be studied.
`Densest Population'
Neighborhood foes often emerge to oppose buildings where biological technology is involved. In December, New York City approved a plan for Columbia University to expand into a Harlem neighborhood. The endorsement came after opponents of the $6 billion expansion questioned whether a level-3 biolab that is part of the project would expose residents to typhoid fever.
``This is the densest population around such a lab in the country,'' said Eloise Lawrence, 34, staff attorney for the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston. ``This is also one of the hardest and difficult to navigate cities in the country. How would one get out in an emergency?''
Until the last few years, nobody had to worry about the prospect of a biohazard lab in Boston. After the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and the anthrax scare that followed, the U.S. decided it needed more level-4 labs to study exotic diseases that could be turned into terror weapons, said Gigi Kwik Gronvall, senior associate at the government's Center for Biosecurity, a Baltimore facility run by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, in a telephone interview June 2.
Delayed by Lawsuits
In 2003, the Bethesda, Maryland-based National Institutes of Health chose the BU Medical Center and the University of Texas as the sites of two new level-4 labs. The University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston is expected to open a new level-4 biosafety facility in November, school spokeswoman Marsha Canright said May 14 in a telephone interview. Texas already operates a smaller level-4 lab in Galveston.
BU's lab, originally scheduled to open this year, is being delayed until at least next year by two lawsuits backed by residents of Boston's South End and Roxbury neighborhoods.
The South End had a population of about 28,160 and a poverty rate of 23.9 percent, according to a 2000 Boston Redevelopment Authority report. The Roxbury section had a population of 55,663 and poverty of 27.1 percent.
`Last Breath'
``We will fight this lab to our last breath,'' Roxbury resident Klare Allen, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuits, said at a public hearing at the Massachusetts State House in Boston on May 16.
To meet the demands of judges in the court cases, the NIH in March appointed a 16-member panel headed by Adel Mahmoud, a professor of molecular biology at Princeton University in New Jersey. The panel said in a May 16 statement that the lab's approval process needs more transparency. It also said a risk assessment report should include details of the infectious agents being studied that may pose a health threat, and gauge the possibility of terrorist action against the lab.
The group plans to provide NIH Director Elias Zerhouni with a work plan on June 6. The panel will decide how the health effects should be studied, seek public comment, and issue a final report by July 2009. State and federal courts are awaiting that assessment before deciding on the lawsuits, according to the NIH.
$1.7 Billion
A BU estimate about four years ago showed the lab could bring in about $72 million a year, said BU Medical Center spokeswoman Ellen Berlin in a telephone interview on June 2. The lab will employ 660 people, including 150 Ph.D.-level researchers, Berlin said on May 13.
The neighborhoods will benefit because workers will go into the community to eat, have their dry cleaning done and shop, Berlin said.
The Brookline-based Massachusetts Association of Nonprofit Schools and Colleges, with 90 members including Wellesley College, predicted the lab could yield $1.7 billion in federal research and spending during the next 20 years, according to a May 14 letter.
``I think this is very important to the city, for the jobs it will create to the research that will be done there,'' Boston Mayor Thomas Menino said in an interview May 22.
The court cases are Allen et. al. v. NIH, et. al. 1:06-CV- 10877-PBS, Federal District Court Boston and 10 residents of Boston v. the Boston Redevelopment Authority SJC-09960, Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.
To contact the reporter on this story: Brian K. Sullivan in Boston at bsullivan10@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: June 5, 2008 00:01 EDT
Neighbors don’t want more homes
By Jessica Smith
Roslindale Transcript
Wed May 28, 2008, 12:15 PM EDT
West Roxbury -
A debate about residential development in West Roxbury turned theoretical last week when residents requested that the Boston Redevelopment Authority place a moratorium on building.
According to many who live on and around Ruskin Street, located between Corey and Weld streets, proposed construction that will add two homes to their neighborhood should be halted. The homes that developer Gary Martell wants to build on both sides of 11 Ruskin Road are being proposed to the city as of right. In other words, no variances or special approval is required to build the structures.
However, because the houses would be built in an overlay district, the BRA must approve the plans to ensure they do not disrupt the character of the neighborhood. On Thursday, residents met with the city and the BRA to discuss their concerns, many of which might be hard to address.
At issue is the size of the proposed structures and how they might impact the community. As one resident stated, the abutters “did not envision McMansions.”
“If we could stop this project, we would,” said Jay Walsh of the mayor’s department of neighborhood services.
For Kerry Brennan, who described himself as a new homeowner on the street and “the most recent person to fall in love with the feel of that street,” the issue was bigger than the block in question.
“What is the attitude about scale and density in the neighborhood? What can be done about the overdevelopment of West Roxbury?” asked Brennan. According to Walsh, development is always something that causes worry.
“We have a concern about development in general. We don’t have the legal authority to say no to this project,” said Walsh.
George Philippides, whose home abuts 11 Ruskin, said that part of the problem is the text of the zoning code and the rules governing the overlay district.
“It has subjective wording. We need to get at how people feel about the character of the neighborhood they live in,” said Philippides, who with his neighbors, asked representatives of the city to halt all building.
Another resident appealed to state Rep. Mike Rush, who was in attendance and expressed an interest in working with other politicians, although his jurisdiction does not directly cover construction in the city of Boston.
“It’s pretty obvious there’s a problem. People’s lives are going to be disrupted,” said Rush, who was joined by At-Large City Councilor John Connolly.
“I’m with you on the massive frustration. That’s my wife’s favorite street. These streets are special. This does disturb the essence of the neighborhood,” said Connolly, who had disappointing information to add. “The BRA can’t put a moratorium on building. If the BRA blocked as of right development, they would get sued.”
Connolly further described the two-week comment period that started on Tuesday, May 27, as a chance for residents to allay their concerns about the project.
“We can comment on the inappropriateness to our neighborhood,” said Gwynne Morgan.
Jessica Smith can be reached at jsmith@cnc.com
Roslindale Transcript
Wed May 28, 2008, 12:15 PM EDT
West Roxbury -
A debate about residential development in West Roxbury turned theoretical last week when residents requested that the Boston Redevelopment Authority place a moratorium on building.
According to many who live on and around Ruskin Street, located between Corey and Weld streets, proposed construction that will add two homes to their neighborhood should be halted. The homes that developer Gary Martell wants to build on both sides of 11 Ruskin Road are being proposed to the city as of right. In other words, no variances or special approval is required to build the structures.
However, because the houses would be built in an overlay district, the BRA must approve the plans to ensure they do not disrupt the character of the neighborhood. On Thursday, residents met with the city and the BRA to discuss their concerns, many of which might be hard to address.
At issue is the size of the proposed structures and how they might impact the community. As one resident stated, the abutters “did not envision McMansions.”
“If we could stop this project, we would,” said Jay Walsh of the mayor’s department of neighborhood services.
For Kerry Brennan, who described himself as a new homeowner on the street and “the most recent person to fall in love with the feel of that street,” the issue was bigger than the block in question.
“What is the attitude about scale and density in the neighborhood? What can be done about the overdevelopment of West Roxbury?” asked Brennan. According to Walsh, development is always something that causes worry.
“We have a concern about development in general. We don’t have the legal authority to say no to this project,” said Walsh.
George Philippides, whose home abuts 11 Ruskin, said that part of the problem is the text of the zoning code and the rules governing the overlay district.
“It has subjective wording. We need to get at how people feel about the character of the neighborhood they live in,” said Philippides, who with his neighbors, asked representatives of the city to halt all building.
Another resident appealed to state Rep. Mike Rush, who was in attendance and expressed an interest in working with other politicians, although his jurisdiction does not directly cover construction in the city of Boston.
“It’s pretty obvious there’s a problem. People’s lives are going to be disrupted,” said Rush, who was joined by At-Large City Councilor John Connolly.
“I’m with you on the massive frustration. That’s my wife’s favorite street. These streets are special. This does disturb the essence of the neighborhood,” said Connolly, who had disappointing information to add. “The BRA can’t put a moratorium on building. If the BRA blocked as of right development, they would get sued.”
Connolly further described the two-week comment period that started on Tuesday, May 27, as a chance for residents to allay their concerns about the project.
“We can comment on the inappropriateness to our neighborhood,” said Gwynne Morgan.
Jessica Smith can be reached at jsmith@cnc.com
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