Proposals for Air Rights Parcels Due Today

Heavy Hitters Poised To Push For Pike Parcels
By Paul McMorrow
Banker & Tradesman Staff Writer



The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority’s latest offering of developable air-rights space at the intersection of Boylston Street and Massachusetts Avenue in Boston has some familiar faces jockeying for position, Banker & Tradesman has learned.

At stake is 145,540 developable square feet, spread over four parcels spanning the Pike (Turnpike Parcels 12-15). Proposals are due Friday at noon.

Adam Weiner, of Weiner Ventures, confirmed Monday he will be bidding on the parcels, but declined further comment. The Chiofaro Co. also confirmed its intention to bid on Parcels 14 and 15. Trinity Financial said it is a “likely bidder,” and has been making the rounds of politicians and neighborhood groups, but declined to elaborate.

Weiner’s group may have an inside track on the Pike parcels, thanks to a land acquisition this past spring. In May, ADG Scotia LLC purchased an 11,187-square-foot parcel from the Archdiocese of Boston for $13.85 million. The parcel, a vacant lot formerly belonging to St. Cecilia parish, abuts Parcels 14 and 15 and is seen as a staging ground that might be used to leverage more significant development.

ADG Scotia is a joint venture between John Fish’s Suffolk Ventures and Weiner’s Weiner Ventures. Weiner’s father, Stephen, is the developer behind the Mandarin Oriental complex on Boylston Street, not far from the Turnpike parcels. ADG Scotia’s public filings with the Secretary of State’s office list Stephen Weiner as an officer.

The Weiner-Fish group has an incentive to be an active developer, rather than a group of investors looking to flip their parcel. A clause in the purchase agreement stipulates that if ADG Scotia sells the St. Cecilia parcel within five years of acquiring it, half of the resulting profit will revert back to the Archdiocese.

Chiofaro, the big-ticket developer behind International Place, acquired the Harbor Garage for $155 million last November. Sources said Chiofaro was preparing his bid in conjunction with Prudential Insurance, but those reports could not be confirmed.

Sarah Barnat, a project manager at Trinity Financial, developers of the $150 million Avenir mixed-use project in the Bulfinch Triangle, described her firm as another likely bidder, but gave no further comment.

Trinity has been briefing neighborhood politicians and residents on its plans for a mixed-use project over the Pike for the past month. A source with knowledge of the developer’s proposal described it as “modest” in height, which could play into Trinity’s hands.

Appropriate size is a hurdle any developer will have to clear, because it is difficult to squeeze profit out of an air rights development that may face serious massing constraints.

The BRA’s 1998 master plan for the area, commissioned in response to Millennium Partners failed 1 million-square-foot proposal for Parcel 12, envisions only one building topping 15 stories, with the rest topping out at 14 floors. Height would be set back, too, with street-front heights only reaching between 50 and 75 feet. The Neighborhood Association of the Back Bay has said it will be evaluating bids based on the parameters outlined in this plan.

State Rep. Marty Walz held up Millennium and Arthur Winn’s Columbus Center as cautionary examples any would-be Pike developers should avoid repeating. Both proposals were “grossly out of scale,” Walz said.

“Developers would be well advised to propose projects consistent with the neighborhood,” Walz warned. She also said state aid for the decking necessary to bridge the Turnpike may not be forthcoming, especially given the for-profit nature of any proposed development.

Other developers rumored to be considering bids include the Kensington Investment Co., and Clark Construction. Calls to those developers did not yield comments.