Urbanism and modern design in Boston-area TOD

NorthPoint project combines pedestrian-oriented features and contemporary architectural expression.

A 15-year project that calls for building 2,700 housing units and 2.2 million square feet of commercial space within walking distance of two rail transit stations is under way in Cambridge, Boston, and Summerville, Massachusetts. Designers involved in the $2 billion-plus development, called NorthPoint, say its buildings are expected to frame welcoming public spaces while employing a largely contemporary architectural aesthetic.
The 45-acre project will put thousands of new residents and workers on what The Boston Globe says has been “a no man’s land of railroad yards and industrial space between Monsignor O’Brien Highway and Interstate 93.” A key element is a new multi-modal transportation hub being designed by Handel Architects LLP of New York, a division of Parsons Brinckerhoff, and Vanasse Hangen Brustlin (VHB) .
The station will replace the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority’s existing Lechmere Station, and will be paid for by the developers — a partnership including Jones Lang LaSalle (formerly Spaulding & Slye) and Pan Am Systems (formerly Guilford Transportation Industries).
“There will be a new urban square at the station,” says David Nagahiro, a principal at Childs Bertman Tseckares (CBT) who has been leading CBT’s work on the master planning and urban design of NorthPoint. The area around the station will become a center of dense mixed-use development, possibly including offices, laboratories, residential, retail, and a hotel.
NorthPoint’s first two buildings are under construction: a 99-unit residential building designed by CBT and a 220-unit residential structure by ArchitectsAlliance of Toronto. Both, says Nagahiro, “will be looking forward rather than looking back” in their architectural expression. Their street facades, however, will include the modern equivalent of stoops — features used by many 19th-century Boston brownstones to achieve a pleasing relationship between the private realm of the building and the public world of the sidewalk and street. Ground-floor units will be elevated somewhat, on top of structured parking. Although the parking will rise above ground level, it will not be visible from streetside — the stoops will hide it.

community process led to approval
Eastern Cambridge residents at first opposed intensive development, but the city drew them into a goal-setting process, using a multidisciplinary team organized by Goody, Clancy & Associates under David Dixon. Eighteen months of community discussions culminated in approval of a plan calling for tall buildings near the Lechmere Station and lower, mostly residential structures elsewhere, plus an open space extending through much of the site. Participants came to realize that “the more economic value they approved for the area, the more civic benefits they could get,” Dixon told New Urban News.
Because Cambridge residents expressed their dislike for large residential buildings that seem standoffish, NorthPoint’s residential structures will have front doors every 30 feet or fewer along the street, according to Dixon. NorthPoint is employing a technique frequently used in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia: giving the ground-floor units individual townhouse-like exterior entrances even if they’re in buildings several stories high. The first two residential buildings at NorthPoint will have about 44 individual entries.
There was some concern about whether people would be reluctant to buy those ground-floor units, but they ended up being the first to sell, Nagahiro reports. Much of the first two buildings at NorthPoint will command prices between a little over $300,000 and about $700,000, a range described as “mid-range” in greater Boston, one of the nation’s most expensive housing markets.
Toronto urban designer Ken Greenberg collaborated with CBT on the master plan of the development, which extends into neighboring Somerville and the Charlestown section of Boston. Michael van Valkenburgh Associates led the landscape design.
“We’re trying to create value through a good public realm,” says Kishore Varanasi, senior urban designer at CBT, noting, “It’s a 10-minute walk at most from one end of the site to the other.” The master plan allows for a flexible market and architectural response, he adds. The development will consist of 22 blocks, each of which could be assigned to a different design firm.
The Boston area, which 15 years ago produced a large volume of high-quality traditional urban architecture, seems to have gravitated toward less traditional designs and materials in the past several years. NorthPoint’s first two residential buildings “combine a palette of sleek, contemporary materials such as glass, metal, and steel,” observes Kristi Sprinkel in media relations at CBT. The transit station is expected to be a tube-shaped structure mostly of steel and glass.