Somerville Redevelopment Authority to Consider Union Square Revitalization Plan Wednesday
The plan will likely involve proposals for the Union Square Green Line station and a new library.
The Somerville Redevelopment Authority was scheduled to meet Wednesday evening to discuss a measure called the "2012 Union Square Revitalization Plan," according to an agenda for the meeting.
The plan is likely connected to an effort by the city to purchase parcels of land in Union Square for the construction of the Green Line Extension's Union Square Station.
Earlier this month, the city announced a memorandum of understanding with the MBTA to purchase land in Union Square and provide a permanent easement to the transit authority so it could build and operate the station. In return, the MBTA agreed to make the station operational by late 2016 or early 2017.
When the city made the announcement, it said the Somerville Redevelopment Authority would likely acquire the parcels on the city's behalf for an estimated cost of around $8 million.
The parcels the city plans to acquire are located near the intersection of Prospect Street and Webster Avenue.
The Revitalization Plan might also involve a proposal to build a new main-branch library in Union Square—another project that would require the city to acquire land, likely along Washington Street around Ricky's Flower Market.
Based on the agenda for Wednesday's Somerville Redevelopment Authority meeting, the authority will move to declare part of Union Square a "decadent area." It will also move to submit the 2012 Union Square Revitalization Plan to the Somerville Board of Aldermen.
The Board of Aldermen is scheduled to take up the matter Thursday night.
According to the Massachusetts law cited in the Somerville Redevelopment Authority agenda, a "decadent area" is defined as follows:
“Decadent area”, an area which is detrimental to safety, health, morals, welfare or sound growth of a community because of the existence of buildings which are out of repair, physically deteriorated, unfit for human habitation, or obsolete, or in need of major maintenance or repair, or because much of the real estate in recent years has been sold or taken for nonpayment of taxes or upon foreclosure of mortgages, or because buildings have been torn down and not replaced and under existing conditions it is improbable that the buildings will be replaced, or because of a substantial change in business or economic conditions, or because of inadequate light, air, or open space, or because of excessive land coverage or because diversity of ownership, irregular lot sizes or obsolete street patterns make it improbable that the area will be redeveloped by the ordinary operations of private enterprise, or by reason of any combination of the foregoing conditions.
Matt C
8:42 am on Wednesday, August 15, 2012
How long until Magoun Sq. is considered a Decadent area? The only real capital investment you have seen in the last few years was Magoun Saloon, CVS and most recently Daddy Jones. There is defiantly a hope that with the flux of new residents coming into the local neighborhoods and the hundreds of new neighbors that we will see an uptick in investment there. Currently many of the storefronts are empty and we have seen 10's of businesses cycle through but are not able to be successful.
Courtney O'Keefe
10:04 am on Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Great points, Matt C,
There is a group of us who are focused on the economic improvement of Magoun Square and are proposing creative ways of cleaning it up and connecting the storefronts to the needs of the community. Unfortunately, the low rents charged by property owners make it cheap enough for lack luster business models to lease and fail. Case in point, the psychic and a couple of boutiques. We do have a beer & wine store beginning construction in the fall and a "market" (hopefully) opening soon.
Joe Beckmann
2:44 pm on Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Is Union Square "decadent" because of Somerville Rising, or does Somerville Rising prevent or retard further "decadence?"
Matt C
3:51 pm on Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Joe - is your question: Does Somerville Risings desire/mission to block or significantly change a project that would bring 40 new units of low income housing to union sq something that would limit economic and commercial development or enhance it.
Before we answer that we need to think about what we as a community want union sq to be - do we want to see new businesses come in that are like Capones, Solucao, Casa b, Farmers Market and Sherman Cafe come in that cater to a crowd that can afford higher end products and services (pasta that is $4/lb vs $1, meats that are $6/lb vs $4 and coffee that is $2 vs 1) or do we want the new business to cater to a crowd that cannot, or struggles to afford those products and services.
For me the answer is pretty obvious - I want union sq to continue to be the destination that it is with business like those i mentioned which bring me into union sq. regularly and grow into a bigger destination for others who spread the word on the amazing stuff you can find in union sq. That said people that can afford to buy the products will help those businesses grow and prosper and bring in new businesses that would continue to attract those types of buyers.
USR's work is unfortunately slowing the redevelopment of the abandoned site , but their reasoning for doing so remains sound.
Eric Fellinger
1:00 pm on Tuesday, August 28, 2012
I refrained from comment upon first read of this, but after stweing a while I can't get over it.
You know, I love Casa B as much as the next guy, and our rich and expanding culinary environment is really helping put Union Square on the map.
But really the thing that would make the biggest difference to my life would be a CVS/Rite Aid/etc I can walk to! The major inconvenience I've experienced is the closing of the McGrath Hwy Sunoco... now I've got to walk twice as far for milk and eggs! That's the kind of business everyone supports, and having a building dedicated to working families earning on the order of 30% of area median isn't going to scare higher-end consumers away.
Aside from these pragmatic arguments, though, do you really mean to say that Somerville ought to oppose housing opportunities for sub-median earners, and accept displacement of those already here, so that we can have more places to enjoy a $2 to $4 cup of coffee? Because I think there's a bit of a moral issue there.
You don't create something by opposing something. You want the market to support development of high-end condos to house people who'll support high end buildings? Great. The market's not there. 181 Washington sat on the market for over a year before their broker approached SCC. What have you done, or what will you do, to proactively encourage the kind of environment you want in Union Square?