Magazine Pedestrian Bridge Meeting Thursday

MassDOT is hosting a public meeting this Thursday (May 20th) at 7pm at the Morse School to discuss the construction plans and anticipated traffic and pedestrian impacts for the Magazine Beach Pedestrian Bridge Replacement Project. The Magazine crossing is an important part of three larger efforts: the state's Accelerated Bridges Program, the ongoing Magazine Beach transformation, and Cambridge CDD's effort to better connect the neighborhoods with the riverside parks.

Some more background on the project, per MassDOT:

As part of Patrick-Murray Administration’s $3 billion Accelerated Bridge Program, aimed at quickly repairing the Commonwealth’s most neglected bridges, MassDOT recently awarded a contract to S & R Corporation of Lowell for the replacement of the Magazine Beach Pedestrian Bridge. This project consists of the demolition and replacement of the existing pedestrian bridge over Memorial Drive. The new structure will have ADA compliant ramps and code compliant handrails. The project also includes the installation an over height detection system and temporary signals as well as site restoration.

Image of the Magazine Beach Pedestrian Bridge from the MassDOT ABP presentation on March 2.

Green Builidng Ordinance Nearing Approval

The work over the past couple of years to develop a citywide Green Building standard has almost reached fruition. The goal is something similar to Boston's Article 37 (one of the first and most progressive zoning standards in the country), but adding a few interesting incentives for Green Roofs and other measures. There are a few Hearings upcoming--one this Thursday--on the proposed standards (details at bottom).

Here are some of the highlights of the proposed standards, paraphrased from a memo from the City Manager to the community:

• All major new construction (and significant rehabs) would be required, at a minimum, to meet LEED green building criteria at the following levels: 25,000-49,999 sf (think small office buildings, drugstore-sized retail) would be required to meet LEED ‘Certified’ level, while 50,000 sq. ft. and larger would meet LEED ‘Silver’
• Formal certification from US Green Building Council (USGBC)/ Green Building Certification Institute (GBCI) would not be required.
• Green roofs would be excluded from the calculation of gross floor area, allowing buildings to be slightly larger (with increased income potential) in exchange for the expense of installing a green roof. As an incentive to create green roofs, decks or patios less than or equal to 15% of the green roof area and set back 10’ from all building edges may also be excluded from the calculation of GFA in certain zoning districts.
  Other green building elements that may reduce a building’s energy consumption and improve indoor environmental quality would be excluded from the calculation of GFA, including extensive wall insulation and shading devices.
• Building mounted solar energy systems (such as MIT's proposed Solar Air Conditioning System) would be defined as mechanical equipment in the zoning ordinance and hence would not be subject to FAR and height restrictions. Installation of solar systems would require a building permit and new development projects adjacent to existing solar systems would be encouraged to minimize shadow impacts on those solar systems.

Here is the info on the two upcoming meetings, per CDD's Iram Farooq, a city planner:

1. At the Ordinance Committee, May 6, 6 pm (Sullivan Chamber, City Hall, 795 Mass Ave
2. At the Planning Board, May 18, 7:20 pm (2nd Floor Meeting Room, at City Hall Annex, 344 Broadway)

Let's Go to the Beach!

With what's looking like a great weekend of weather coming up, it will be a great opportunity to head down the the Charles and see the newly reopened Magazine Beach park. The reconstruction by DCR is part of a massive, ongoing transformation of the Mag Beach area that has been underway for years (with some aspects coming under a good deal of local criticism).

At Wednesday's CNA meeting, Cathie Zusy passed along some of the park's key summer dates:

• Magazine Beach is open. The big fence is down and Cambridge Youth Soccer is already using the fields. Only the large drainage basin has a fence around it; they are still seeding this area.
• The Magazine Beach pool will be open from Saturday, June 26 to Sunday, August 29th this summer.
• There will be a meeting on the imminent rehabilitation of the Memorial Drive pedestrian bridge at Magazine Street soon, details forthcoming.

Also at the CNA meeting, some folks from CDD presented a draft report as an update on the City's effort to improve our relationship with the river and the reservation parkland. Have a look at the report here.

Image from the 2002 DCR Charles River Masterplan of an initial idea of the reconstruction.

Public Meeting about Western Ave on Wednesday

Per an email blast from the city:

Community-wide Public Meeting
Wednesday, March 31, 2010, 7:00 P. M. - 9:00 P. M.Cambridge Citywide Senior Center, 806 Mass Ave., Central Square (map). We are currently at the very beginning stages of design. The purpose of this initial community-wide meeting is to give residents an opportunity to learn about the scope of the project and provide initial input as to what they like and don’t like about Western Avenue, what works and what doesn’t work. If you cannot attend the meeting, be sure to fill out our quick survey to give us some feedback.

For more information about the project, please visit our website. On the website, you will find some great maps and other resources that help us better understand the corridor. Copies of the committee presentations and meeting notes are also available.

Community walks of Western Avenue corridor
These informal walks are led by city staff with occasional outside guests. The walks provide opportunities for neighbors to learn more about the project, and provide input to city staff. The walks are free and open to the public. Each walk will start near Central Square, go down Western Avenue to the Charles River, and back.

1. Project Overview walk: Monday April 5, 2010, 6:00pm – 7:30pm (meet at Andala Café, map): Led by Jeff Rosenblum, Project Manager for Western Ave. surface design, CDD.
2. Human Centered Design, Design for persons w/ Disabilities walk: Monday April 12, 2010, 6:00pm – 7:30pm (meet at Au Bon Pain, 684 Mass Ave, Central Square, map): Led by Chris Hart, Institute for Human Centered Design and Michael Muehe, Cambridge Commission for Persons with Disabilities
3. Traffic, Signals, and Stop Signs walk: Monday April 26, 2010, 6:00pm – 7:30pm (meet at Andala Café, map): Led by Jeff Parenti, City Traffic Engineer

All walks are on RAIN or SHINE.

A Thought Exercise

Start with a not-yet-completed street improvement project.

Add days of unrelenting, saturating rain, which causes sinkholes in the unfinished roadway. Fill the sinkholes with more rain, disguising the sinkholes as mere puddles.

Throw in some speeding cars that run into the sinkholes with a great deal of force, jarring anything not bolted to the car loose.

What do you get?

A) C-port's newest public art project;

B) a new mom-and-pop auto body shop; or

C) a severely value-engineered traffic calming installation for CDD

Nominate Someone for the CNA Board!

The deadline for nominations to the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association Board of Directors is on Wednesday, February 10th, two weeks prior to the CNA annual meeting on the 24th. Please consider tossing your hat in the ring, or nominating a motivated neighbor!

Some of the initial, potential nominees include Leslie Greis, Cathie Zusy, Elizabeth Torrey, Drew Phelps and myself (Jeff Beam). Here are the rest of the details:

The CNA annual meeting and election for four expiring Board of Directors seats will be Feb. 24, 7 pm at usual meeting place at community room of Woodrow Wilson Court, on Fairmont St., off of Magazine St. Anyone interested in being on the Board must be nominated and seconded by Feb. 10 (14 days prior to Feb. 24). Nominations and seconds of nominations can be sent to billaugustUSA@aol.com

Also on the agenda for the annual meeting:

• A presentation on aging in Cambridge and senior citizen issues, by Elaine Thorne of Cambridge CDD
• Invited speakers regarding City planning pertaining to Charles River preservation and enhancements
• Cambridge Community TV will send a representative to discuss CCTV's community and neighborhood media services. Very important agenda item:
• Jeff Rosenblum on Western Ave reconstruction, which can mightily impact the whole look and feel of the neighborhood

Lastly, an appeal in the name of fun from Bill August: "Any ideas for fun Annual Meeting stuff, we could use it (music, food, awards--annual meetings are supposed to be fun)!"

Town-Gown Presentations on Tuesday

This year's Town-Gown presentations regarding Cambridge College, Harvard, MIT and Lesley University will be this Tuesday. We took a closer look at C-port neighbor MIT's report in this post, and the full report can be viewed there (or, as always, in the Neighborhood Resources link at the top right of the blog). The other reports can be viewed in the announcement below.

The details, per the city announcement:

The City of Cambridge Annual Town Gown Presentation to the Cambridge Planning Board will be held at the Cambridge Citywide Senior Center, 806 Massachusetts Avenue on Tuesday, February 2, 2010 at 7:30pm. The meeting will also include an opportunity for public comment. The 2009 Town Gown Reports can be viewed on the Community Development Website. These reports describe current activities of the institutions, including data about student population, institutional housing and future development plans.

For more information about the Town Gown reports and presentations, please contact Clifford Cook at 617-349-4656 or ccook@cambridgema.gov.

Neighborhood Association Annual Meeting

Bill August passes along notice of next month's CNA annual meeting and Board of Directors election:

Happy New Year and happy New Decade! The Cambridgeport Neighborhood Association annual meeting and election for four expiring Board of Directors seats will be Feb. 24, 7 pm at usual meeting place at community room of Woodrow Wilson Court, on Fairmont St., off of Magazine St.

Please feel free to run for Board of Directors position, or to nominate someone who is interested. Anyone interested in being on the Board must be nominated and seconded by Feb. 10 (14 days prior to Feb. 24). Nominations and seconds of nominations can be sent to billaugustUSA@aol.com

The agenda on Feb 24 will also include presentations on aging in Cambridge and senior citizen issues by Elaine Thorne of Cambridge Community Development Dept.; and we have invited speakers regarding City planning pertaining to Charles River preservation and enhancements. Cambridge Community TV has also expressed interested in sending a representative to discuss CCTV's community and neighborhood media services.

What Central Square Needs

The City asked, and people responded: What does Central Square need to fulfill its potential as the lively, transit-oriented center of a diverse community?

Results came in two forms. One was through the "Envisioning Central Square" forum hosted by Councilors Denise Simmons and Sam Seidel in December. The comments, as reported in the Chronicle, were predictable, "the most prominent of which showed that many Central Square patrons want more shopping options, more upkeep and cleanliness and less public drinking, loitering and homeless people on the streets." In fact, homelessness dominated the conversation as any Central Square conversation must. The Chronicle's writeup includes some interesting contributions from Len Thomas of the Cambridge Multi-Service Center and Superintendent Steven Williams on CPD's Homeless Outreach Program.

The other results came (in more detail, but less frankness) in the CDD-produced summary report for the Central Square Intercept Survey, which nonetheless contains some interesting data about the public's desired retail options (hint: people want The Gap back...)
ed_survey_central
Thanks to neighbor Carolyn Shipley for the links!

Photo by Flickr user zudark. Used with Creative Commons license.

Help Shape a New C-port Housing Development

Two updates on the 625 Putnam development, approved earlier this month by the Cambridge Planning Board:

First, a notice and invitation from HRI's Jane (Jones) Carbone to neighborhood residents/abutters in a mailing today:

HRI is now beginning the next planning phase for Putnam Ave Housing -- Design Development. This stage will formalize the buildings' details and Site Plan which will show what the buildings will look like and include details of the landscape plan. This process will take 2-3 months. We would like to have you join us in this review process. If you are interested in attending meetings to provide input and discuss design ideas with our architect please contact me at jcarbone@homeownersrehab.org or call at 617-868-4858 ex. 212 so that I can schedule the meeting dates and locations.

The second update provides some details from the Planning Board's approval, supplied by CDD's Liza Paden (selected portions only. For the full text, contact Ms. Paden):

FINDINGS

1. Section 10.47.4: Criteria for Approval of Multifamily Dwellings

a. Key features of the natural environment should be preserved to the maximum extent feasible. Tree removal should be minimized and other natural features of the site, such as slopes, should be maintained.

The development parcel consists of a single story vacant industrial building and open parking lot. There are no trees on the site.

b. New buildings should be related sensitively to the existing built environment. The location, orientation and massing of structures in the development should avoid overwhelming the existing buildings in the vicinity of the development. Visual and functional disruptions should be avoided.

The proposed buildings have been located to complement the existing residential uses along Sidney Street and Putnam Avenue. The three story building along Sidney Street is in keeping with the existing residential abutters, with individual front and rear doors. All parking is beneath the Putnam Avenue building to maximize the amount of green open space. The four story building provides a transition to the abutting building site with a 65 foot height limit in the Special District 8A district. The building is designed to provide a principal access of both a ramp and steps to the porch. The Putnam Avenue façade also contains the garage entrance. The Sidney Street building has front entrances on Sidney Street.

c. The location, arrangement, and landscaping of open space should provide some visual benefits to abutters and passersby as well as functional benefits to occupants of the development.

The developer will create green landscaped areas where none currently exist. There will be plantings along the public sidewalks on both Putnam Avenue and Sidney Street. The area abutting the residential buildings is being planted to provide a landscaped buffer between the project sidewalks and the abutting residential properties. There will also be an interior landscaped area within the development.

d. Parking areas, internal roadways and access/egress points should be safe and convenient.

All parking will be located below the multifamily building and accessed from
Putnam Avenue. This access will be properly marked for pedestrian
awareness.

e. Parking area landscaping should minimize the intrusion of onsite parking so that it does not substantially detract from the use and enjoyment of either the proposed development or neighboring properties.

All parking is below the building.

2. Section 6.35.1(6) Reduction of Required Parking within a development providing affordable housing units

The Applicant presented research from other properties that they have developed and currently manage, as well as those of another nonprofit housing developer, which indicate a reduced demand for parking by the households they serve. The existing parking use of those similar projects is below .6 spaces per unit; the proposed development will provide .7 spaces per unit. The MBTA Red Line (in Central Square) and Green Line (across the river in Boston) are within walking distance of the development and the area is served by an existing MBTA bus route as well as the EZ Ride shuttle. It is expected that the general pattern of auto ownership observed in those other developments will occur here as well. With the development of this project the City will be able to designate a number of existing on-street parking spaces, now unrestricted, as resident only parking that should benefit this development and existing neighborhood residential units.

With a reduced parking ratio, there will be significant savings in construction costs for providing the underground parking, as well as time devoted to construction, since the development is designed to excavate only the footprint of the Putnam Avenue building, and to locate the parking below only that building. Minimizing the expense of underground parking makes it possible to provide such a valuable design feature and allow substantial green landscaping at the ground level where surface parking would otherwise have to be located.

There is an additional benefit of constructing a smaller garage with fewer parking spaces: A superior landscaping plan with more mature trees and shrubs can be planted in soil rather than in fill over a garage.

4. Section 5.24.4(3) Side yard Reduction to 10 feet

The design meets all zoning setback requirements with the exception of one portion of the multifamily building (at Putnam Avenue) along the northeasterly edge of the site, next to the existing vacant industrial building. The Board finds that the yard reduction at this location is reasonable, as it will be adequately landscaped and its impact is mitigated by setting back the fourth floor of the building. The yard reduction allows a shift in the location of the building on this portion of the site to provide a larger setback on the westerly side of the building next to the neighboring residential
structure.

Comment Today on C-Port Planning Recommendations

Planning recommendations for the 2009 update of the Cambridgeport Neighborhood Study have been available for the past few weeks at www.cambridgema.gov/cambridgeport (this link to the Community Development Department's C-port page is always available under "Neighborhood 5 Planning Links" in the sidebar at right). Today and Friday are the last days to submit comments on the '09 update.

Some of the recommendations that caught my eye:

• Actively keep the neighborhood informed and involved on plans for the Microcenter, Trader Joes, and Radisson Hotel sites (along the Charles River) as well as any current or upcoming zoning issues.
• Facilitate the inclusion of solar power and wind power features for new developments and existing buildings in the zoning ordinance, and look for other ways for Cambridgeport to lead in energy conservation efforts.
• Increase parking and snow removal enforcement in the neighborhood.
• Central Square has a major impact on the Cambridgeport neighborhood. The City should make an effort to further improve the Central Square area, including methods to keep the area clean and make it into more of a destination such as more trash barrels, cleaner storefronts, better variety of stores, more user friendly parking with less loading zones and clear time limits.

Contact Neighborhood Planner Taha Jennings at 617-349-4603 or via email at tjennings@cambridgema.gov if you would like a hard copy of the planning recommendations sent via mail or if you have any additional questions.