Category: Vision

The Rozzie Arboretum Gateway Path

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A top WalkUP Roslindale initiative is a new multi-modal “gateway path” into the Arnold Arboretum directly from Roslindale Square. Please check out this detailed presentation. An introduction to our vision is below.

Rozzie Gateway Path Entrance (image courtesy Halvorson Design Partnership, Inc.)
Rozzie Gateway Path Entrance (image courtesy Halvorson Design Partnership, Inc.)

The Arnold Arboretum is not only Roslindale’s greatest park, but among the most beautiful urban open spaces anywhere. In 1880 Frederick Law Olmsted wrote: “On (these) acres much the best arboretum in the world can be formed.” Today, some of Olmsted’s “emerald necklace” plan has been realized, but much remains to be done.

We envision a new entrance to the Arboretum close to Roslindale Square, to make the park more visible and accessible to residents and visitors. The Rozzie Gateway Path would start adjacent to the commuter rail platform, and continue at grade into the park, allowing access to the open space without the need to surmount the large hill that lead to the Mendum Street gate.

The Path will continue straight parallel to the commuter rail tracks toward Bussey Street, and then connect up with the Bussey Brook Meadow path and on to Forest Hills.

Key Benefits

  • Better access to the Arboretum from Roslindale Square (and thus to transit node, businesses, Farmers Market, etc.)
  • Washington Street lacks pedestrians amenities [1] and is unsafe for bicyclists; the Gateway Path will provide a better alternative to reach Forest Hills, where walkers and cyclists can avail themselves to the many amenities around Forest Hills; continue on to the Southwest Corridor Park; or board the Orange Line. And of course vice-versa — folks coming down the Orange Line or the Southwest Corridor will have a superior route to visit Roslindale Village.
  • Current routes from Roslindale to Forest Hills through the Arboretum have steep hills and are more than twice as much distance as the proposed path
  • Hubway Bike-Share stations could be available at both ends, providing a quick, easy, low-stress route to connect Rozzie with JP and the Orange Line
  • Possibilities for improved Arboretum access from underserved neighborhoods, particularly the Archdale area

Discussion of the full route is still very much open. The crossing at South Street and Bussey presents the biggest challenge, although not an insurmountable one. For the penultimate section on the north side of South/Bussey, the route could proceed on either side of South Street subject to consideration Boston Water and Sewer Commission and flood-plain issues. With these caveats, below is one of the paths we are considering:

Rozzie Gateway Proposed Route (one of many!)
Rozzie Gateway Proposed Route (one of many!)

We have made significant progress in moving from idea to reality; if you’d like to learn more, please join our email list or contact us directly. We’d love to hear your suggestions or other feedback!

Footnotes    (↵ returns to text)

  1. An earlier version of this post (pre-3/9/16) suggested Washington Street is “unpleasant” for pedestrians. We discovered some people misinterpreted this statement as derogatory; the intent was to summarize the lack of crosswalks, benches, curb cuts, as well as the occasionally overly-narrow and poorly-maintained sidewalk space, rather than to suggest there is anything inherently wrong with or undesirable about this corridor. We intend to push hard for better walkability along this corridor, and the path effort is no substitute for that.↵

WalkUP Roslindale’s Mission and Seven Statements of Principle

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WalkUP Rozzie members have been working for some time (in person and online) to distill our mission and principles. The outcome of that effort is below, and we’d love to get your thoughts! Leave a comment here or email us directly at info@walkuproslindale.org. If you support our mission, please sign up as a supporter (your information will be kept confidential and you will receive only very infrequent email); follow us on Twitter; join us on Facebook; and/or sign up for our higher-volume discussion list.

This list was updated on October 6, 2015; find the original draft here.

OUR MISSION

We will make Roslindale the most walkable neighborhood in Boston, in collaboration with our neighbors. We strongly believe that walkability is a fundamental of great neighborhoods. Improving the walkability of our neighborhood will have positive impacts on public health, safety, social capital, economic development, and environmental sustainability. Although we speak only for ourselves, we seek improved walkability for everyone because we believe it will benefit everyone. In order to get there, we need to think both big and small. Immediate action is needed to improve crosswalks and sidewalks, organize events to bring people together around a shared vision for our neighborhood, encourage the calming of vehicular traffic, and demonstrate how the future might look by making temporary changes today. Long term, we must be proactive in addressing how our neighborhood evolves in the face of the regional development boom, and how walking interacts with all the other forms of getting around. A central conviction of WalkUP Roslindale is that common goals are better achieved together than separately and will provide evident and tangible benefits to all. To do this, we will seek partnerships and collaborate with our fellow residents and engage a broad array of community groups, businesses, non-profits, educational institutions, and city and state agencies to advance our mission.

SEVEN STATEMENTS OF PRINCIPLE

  1. Walking is an essential mode of travel, and we seek to promote it on its own and as part of an active transportation network along with bicycling and transit. We support public and private projects, policies, and efforts that advance the essential travel mode of walking on its own and in concert with bicycling and transit throughout Roslindale because these modes collectively increase the accessibility of our neighborhood, support local economic development, enhance the safety, livability, and functioning of the streetscape, and help mitigate the detrimental environmental effects of automobile use. We must also make our streets safe and friendly for children, the elderly, and people with mobility or sensory disabilities. We fully support the city’s adoption of Vision Zero, the policy goal to completely eliminate deaths and serious injuries from vehicular traffic on streets. And we look with eager anticipation toward working with the city on arriving at a shared vision and implementing GoBoston 2030, the city’s new comprehensive mobility plan.
  2. More residents, businesses, and people working in and visiting Roslindale will increase vitality. We support thoughtful, smart growth in residential and commercial intensity centered on key nodes in our neighborhood, particularly, Roslindale Square, Weld/Centre, Belgrade/Bellevue/WR Parkway, Washington/WR Parkway, Washington/Metropolitan, Cummins/HP Avenue, the American Legion Highway corridor, and the Forest Hills/Washington Street corridor. Compact, intense use of land is an essential component of lively and safe neighborhoods, supporting local businesses, and a regional approach to environmental sustainability.  We also support measured, careful growth in our established residential areas to sustain and improve their vitality as well.
  3. Parks and natural areas help make our neighborhood vibrant. We support balancing growth with a vision of health and beauty offered by integrating this growth into a network of green spaces, as recognized by landscape pioneers such as Frederick Law Olmsted. Roslindale has a great wealth of parks and natural areas. But we recognize that they are not evenly distributed in our neighborhood or equally well maintained, and there are many natural areas that require protection and enhancement. We support balancing the needs for housing, development, and growth with the need for places which offer opportunities for active recreation as well as refuge. These include parks, playgrounds, urban wilds, dog parks, community gardens, green corridors/greenways/parkways, and other green spaces. Support for high quality green space and a cleaner environment goes hand in hand with support for smart growth – we are convinced that these goals must be pursued together.
  4. We support development that promotes walkability. We support giving each proposed development a review on its own merits. If zoning relief (conditional use permit/variance) is needed for a development we believe advances the principles described here, then we will support granting that relief. As the city moves forward with a new comprehensive plan/rezoning process under the ImagineBoston 2030 banner, we advocate that the new plan and zoning be responsive to our neighborhood’s growing, diverse population and the ongoing housing shortage/affordability crisis throughout the city.
  5. We support mixed uses that promote walkability. We support a mutually-supportive mixing of uses within Roslindale’s key nodes: commercial (office, retail), residential, institutional, and modern industrial, among other uses, should be closely connected. We support local commercial enterprises and shops as a general matter, though each situation requires consideration on its own merits, and we should be mindful of the need for our commercial districts to have customers throughout the day, not just evenings and weekends.
  6. We support mixed housing that promotes walkability. We support mutually-supportive mixed housing types throughout all parts of our neighborhood – multifamily, 3-family, 2-family, single-family (townhouse/detached), at a range of price points, including affordable, middle income, and market rate. In major residential projects, we support going beyond the baseline 15% affordability standard the city currently uses. Many of us chose Roslindale because it is among the most diverse neighborhoods in the city by many measures, and new development should strengthen and enhance our unique cultural, ethnic, racial, linguistic, and economic mix.
  7. Contextual yet forward looking design makes for a more walkable environment. We support great design, regardless of style. Roslindale has a relatively consistent early 20th century “colonial” architectural character and set of building types (gabled rooflines, strong street walls, parking in the rear or underneath, massing that is modulated by architectural features, beloved public parks and squares), and new construction should be designed to fit within that context at its best while also being creative and forward looking in a way that embraces the 21st century. We view thoughtful and walkable urban design that connects and enhances the private and public realms as an absolute necessity.

Update on the Rozzie Urban Wild Effort

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Roslindale Greenbelt Protection Overlay District
Roslindale Greenbelt Protection Overlay District

Last week, we posted about a Boston City Council hearing scheduled for this Monday on protecting and enhancing the American Legion Parkway area in Roslindale. Reports are that the hearing was wildly successful. Each neighbor’s testimony, whether by letter or personal appearance, was powerful, informative, and from the heart. Together, residents from around the area made this corridor neighborhood visible to the City. City Councilors Murphy, Wu, and O’Malley showed great enthusiasm for the project, and expressed willingness to facilitate multi-departmental collaboration on behalf of the project.

Below are additional maps to supplement the ones posted here earlier. Although the city Open Space Senior Planner indicated at the hearing that American Legion area was not “Greenbelt Protected,” these maps show that it is.

Other useful sources of information:

Maps

Maps Posted for Rozzie Urban Wild Protection Hearing

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A few days back, we posted about a City Council Hearing on the “urban wild” land around American Legion highway. The entry has just been updated with detailed maps (reproduced below as well). Go check it out!

Rozzie Urban Wild Protection Hearing – Sept. 21, 2015 10am City Hall

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[Post Updated 9/20/15 – Maps Now Included]

City-Councilors-at-Large Michelle Wu and Steven Murphy are co-sponsoring a hearing before the Council’s Committee on the Environment and Parks, to discuss protecting and designating as an “urban wild” land around American Legion Highway. The hearing will be on Monday, September 21, 2015, at 10am, in the Iannella Chamber, 5th Floor of City Hall. Public hiking trails, walking/multiuse paths, and the like, are a key ingredient to a more walkable Roslindale, and are particularly needed in the sections of the neighborhood further from the Arboretum. More details below. Please support this effort!

Read More

Exactly

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IMG953432-2

This photo was taken yesterday at the Roslindale Farmers Market. I assume RVMS gathered the information and made the display. Well done, guys! Exactly the kind of thinking about the area that’s needed. Really makes the argument about how much is within very short walking distance. Our focus should be on finding ways for those steps to be easier and safer to make, increasing the number of places you can get to by walking, and supporting old and new neighbors who want to take those steps!

(Revised slightly after initial posting.)

Living on Earth and Complete Streets in Boston

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Cambridge Street Bridge
Cambridge Street Bridge with cycle track

Excellent Living on Earth piece this week about the “Complete Streets” movement, focused on Cambridge Street in Allston. The segment features an interview with then-deputy director of the National Complete Streets Coalition, Stefanie Seskin, now Boston’s Director of Active Transportation. Also interviewed is Vineet Gupta, Boston Transportation Department head of policy and planning.

It’s been nearly 75 years since World War II ended, yet much transportation planning is still based on that obsolete paradigm. The Living on Earth piece concludes on a hopeful note that the pace of change is picking up:

SESKIN: Post World War II, we embarked in the United States and in many other countries, on a massive infrastructure investment to move goods really across the country. And that had a lot of really important and good changes to the way that we built our roads in terms of safety when you’re travelling at high speeds, when you’re thinking about trucks and how they move.

LUCAS: But Seskin says while wide lanes make highways and other high-speed roads safer for traffic using them, they were never meant for cities and town centers. And yet city streets were built the same way as those high-speed roads. Vineet Gupta of Boston’s Transportation Department says that post-war engineering mentality explains why Cambridge Street is so bad for pedestrians today.

GUPTA: In those days, all they cared about was moving traffic and making traffic flow more efficient, and really not focusing on what cities really are, and what makes them livable.

LUCAS: That’s where people-oriented complete streets are different.And the idea has been gaining traction around the country.The National Complete Streets Coalition says that the number of places with complete street policies leaped from 86 in 2008 to 610 last year. Stephanie Seskin has noticed.

We haven’t seen much of this progress yet in Roslindale. It’s our job to push both elected and appointed officials to bring Complete Streets to our neighborhood sooner rather than later. We should be leading rather than trailing.

Governor Baker’s official response on Casey Arborway looks like the final word

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And the manner of the response could bode well for how our commonwealth’s new administration views major projects in urban areas

By necessity, WalkUP Roslindale’s focus is primarily on Roslindale Square and its immediate vicinity. But what is now happening with Casey Arborway — the MassDOT project currently underway to demolish the old Route 203/Casey Overpass at Forest Hills and replace it with a network of at-grade streets — also matters a lot. There is no denying that the construction has made the area more difficult to navigate in the short term: the area right now is a mix of permanent and temporary roadways and paths and demolition of the old overpass is ongoing. Ultimately, once completed, Casey Arborway promises a more connected, accessible, and livable Forest Hills for everyone.

For those who have followed the project for the last several years as it wound its way through the public process, the most regrettable outcome has been the bitter split among many politically active players in Jamaica Plain over the wisdom of MassDOT’s decision to go with the at-grade network over reconstructing or replacing the overpass. Since the decision was originally announced in March 2012, Bridging Forest Hills, the anti-at-grade group, has managed to hold itself together even as the project has moved forward through design, final approvals, selection of the contractor, and even commencement of construction this spring. The last move the group made was a petition and direct appeal this spring to Governor Baker to halt the project and consider a new direction. Putting aside the practicalities of doing that at this late stage, we all know stranger things have happened and so those on both sides of the issue were still waiting with some interest to see how the governor would respond.

And so he now has. The text of the email from the governor’s office was recently posted at BFH’s website and it does indeed look like the final word. In a brief but substantive response worth reading in full, his deputy chief of staff touches principally on the level of inclusion and robustness of the public process and the way the project evolved over time. In terms of looking forward and thinking about how MassDOT will evaluate their urban projects in the future (such as the Allston Interchange/Beacon Yards project, about which Renee Loth wrote in today’s Globe), the key passage for me is this:

The at-grade option was advanced because it ranked the highest for all forms of mobility, livability, and long term maintenance costs.

Those 3 criteria — mobility across modes, livability, and long-term maintenance costs — are pretty good measures if you’re looking to boil things down. For way too long we allowed one of those criteria and one mode within it to control decision-making. The Casey Arborway represents a new direction that I hope is replicated more often at all levels of government.

City hires new Active Transportation Director!

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This is big news if you’re in favor of walkability throughout our city.

Stefanie Seskin has just been named as our new active transportation director.

You can read the City’s announcement here, and BostInno’s short take here (it’s the second item). The prior administration’s kind-of analog position was the bike czar, which Nicole Freedman held for 7 years. Nicole did a great job, but much more can and now will be done to expand on the concept of “transportation” beyond specific modes (walk, bike, transit, car) and their designated advocates. Two quotes lifted from the press release:

First, from the Mayor:

“Boston is an active city and we are continuing to invest in our pedestrian and bike infrastructure, encouraging residents to think creatively about how they get from point A to point B. Stefanie brings leadership and talent to this new position, and I thank her for her willingness to serve.”

And from the new Director:

“I am excited to take on this new position as Active Transportation Director for the Boston Transportation Department, and I am grateful to Mayor Walsh and Commissioner Fiandaca to be given this opportunity,” said Seskin. “I love seeing so many people who already walk and bike around the city, and I look forward to working with residents to make Boston even more walk- and bike-friendly.”

So, we have a brand new official ally at the city. No excuses now for not speaking up and letting our local government know what we want to see. What can WUPR suggest to our new active transportation on ways to make Roslindale more walkable?

Follow up on 874-878 South Street — Installment 1 — Pre-filing community meeting

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Summary

Monday’s initial pre-filing community meeting on this proposed project — as yet unnamed — is now in the books. LANA board members observed more than once that the turnout was much heavier than is typical for their summer meetings. Almost everyone (other than the LANA board and a further exception that I will discuss below) was there for this project, expressing responses ranging from approval to rejection and qualifying questions/statements in between. Renderings of the project as presented at the meeting are not available electronically. If they do become available, I will update this post.

Generally speaking, if done right, this is the right kind of project for this location and should win support from those connected with WalkUP Roslindale. It is an easy walk from the site to the Roslindale Village commuter rail station and the square with its super market/bakeries/specialty food stores/restaurants, etc., and excellent bus connections into the Orange Line at Forest Hills. After several decades of decline or stasis, Boston’s population is growing again and we need more housing units to accommodate those who want to come here. We should welcome this opportunity to both do our part for our city and to bring more people close to the center of our community and support our main business district. This is not to say that there are concerns here — they are discussed below. But my own strong inclination is to support this proposal and encourage its improvement through the upcoming small project review/zoning relief process.

The Project as Proposed

Boiled down to basics:

  • Project site is located in the LC (Local Convenience) subdistrict of the Roslindale Neighborhood District (Article 67 of the Boston Zoning Code)
  • Demolition of the existing 4 storefronts and 2-family residential at the rear
  • All existing tenants (commercial and residential) are at-will/month-to-month
  • 15 off-street parking spaces at the ground/first story level
  • 15 residential condominium units on 3 levels above (all units are 2BR/2BA, approx. 1000 square feet (SF) in area)
  • Vehicular access would be over the existing curb cut and along the existing driveway from South Street at Walter Street
  • There would be no commercial space in the project as proposed
  • Two units would be required to be affordable per the city’s inclusionary zoning policy
  • Project will undergo Boston Redevelopoment Authority (BRA) Small Project Review (for projects 15 units or more but not considered a large project — entails design review of the project)
  • Variances required from the Boston Board of Appeal (per my notes) for this proposal are for Floor Area Ratio (FAR) (ratio of building size to lot area) (approx. 2.5 vs. 0.5 allowed), building height and stories (40’8″ vs. 35′ and 4 vs. 2 1/2), side yard width (5′ v. 10′ (abutting residential subdistrict width of 10′ applies)), and parking spaces per unit (1 per unit as opposed to 2 per unit for market rate and 1.5 per unit for affordable in a project of this size)

Concerns Raised

A fairly typical range of concerns was raised at the meeting, including urban design/architectural style (flat roof, flat front, not much detailing shown), height and bulk of the structure, affordability of the market rate units and whether additional affordable units can be provided beyond the two required, potential parking impacts (raised principally by those who appeared opposed to the project, with the assertion being that despite the transit-oriented and walkable location, there would be more than 1 car per unit, so the overflow parking would have to occur on on-street parking spaces that are perceived to be scarce; there was disagreement with this perception from a number of speakers at the meeting), and how much support there was for non-auto modes of travel (e.g., bicycle parking).  I personally raised the issue of the proposed elimination of commercial space at this location, but got almost no support in the room and a response from the developer/property owner that commercial really doesn’t work at this location (I acknowledge it has been limping along for the entire time I’ve lived here, though I think a single storefront or perhaps even a live/work unit or two should still be considered).

An additional concern raised in opposition to the project was that the LC zoning from which so many variances would be required is part of a neighborhood-wide Roslindale strategic planning/rezoning effort that was completed in 2007. Accordingly, to paraphrase how the argument went, there should be no deviating from that zoning because it reflects the neighborhood’s established preference, which was, it is said, to (1) preserve the existing density and character of this LC subdistrict and, more importantly, the surrounding 2F-5000 (“Two Family-5000 Square Feet”) residential subdistrict, and (2) channel development like this project to the commercial district in Roslindale Square. This specific point was raised from the outset by Wayne Beitler during the LANA Board’s Q&A and then by Carter Wilkie in the open discussion. This is not surprising, since both Wayne and Carter were members of the advisory committee that worked with the BRA on the rezoning a decade ago. While I appreciate the hard work they did on that committee and what they have both done generally to make Roslindale a better place, it is time we had a frank discussion about what our current zoning does and does not do, and how it needs to change for the better through the upcoming Imagine Boston 2030 planning process.

The Fundamental Disconnect of Our Current Zoning

Focusing first on the 2F-5000 residential subdistrict in which all of the Longfellow Area except the LC subdistrict has been zoned, it is critical to realize that “2F-5000” is itself a misnomer. When you look at the dimensional table for this subdistrict under Article 67 (the Roslindale Neighborhood Article), it’s actually a minimum of 5000 square feet (SF) in lot size for the first dwelling unit, and then a further 3000 SF for the second unit. So, it’s really a “1F-5000/2F-8000” zone. Now, consider for a moment that the most common lot size in the neighborhood is actually closer to 4500-4800 SF in area. For example, the lot for my single-family house is 4600 SF in area, and the lot sizes for the existing 2 families on my street are 4900 SF, 4340 SF, 5150 SF, and 4600 SF. In other words, the zoning that was adopted in 2007 means the majority of us are non-conforming at the most basic level.

This is not insignificant since any infill development (think of the scattered “double-lots,” many of which don’t meet the 5000 SF threshold) would have to meet this ill-fitting standard, and non-conformity applies also to additional dimensional aspects of the typical developed lot in the neighborhood, such as side yard widths (required to be 10 feet on both sides for detached structures – my house and every house on my block has at least one side yard that is narrower than 10 feet – most houses in the subdistrict do), rear yard setbacks, FAR, you pretty much name it. In addition, the parking requirement is 2 off-street spaces per unit throughout the entire Roslindale district (not just the 2F-5000 zone), with only limited exceptions right in Roslindale Square and for affordable units. I have a single space on my lot. Several of my neighbors have 1 space or no spaces at all. Overall, then, the zoning for our neighborhood, ostensibly meant to “preserve” us, actually treats us, with few exceptions, as legally not within the vision of what the neighborhood “should” be. In practice, this means that the existing zoning requires almost any change in the neighborhood’s built environment to go through the zoning relief process.

An object lesson in exactly this issue was in fact given at Monday night’s meeting. The first item on the agenda was a single-family home owner on Walter Street who was before LANA to seek support (or at least non-opposition) for his proposal to add a dormer to the upper story of his house to allow for a second full bathroom. He needed relief because the existing house, which appeared to be similar to almost every other house in the Longfellow Area, is non-conforming and the dormer would exacerbate that non-conformity. Thankfully for him, he appears to get along well enough with his immediate neighbors that this small change is not an issue. But the question has to be asked as to what kind of land use regulatory system would routinely require this level of process for such a small change?

The same mismatch of the current zoning with existing use and development, let alone what we might want, occurs in the LC subdistrict in which the South Street project is proposed to be located. The most obvious mismatch is the 0.5 FAR, with which I suspect none of the properties currently comply and which, if it were really to be complied with, represents a fundamentally dispersed, low-density suburban vision for this area. Furthermore, if the saving proposition of the rezoning was supposed to be that Roslindale Square was rezoned to accept more development, that didn’t actually happen. The two projects that have been done – the 3-story commercial building that replaced the old abandoned gas station, and the substation/funeral home redevelopment – both required zoning relief in the form of variances. In other words, the zoning for the square was so good that it had to be varied from to do two projects that the community wanted. Should they also have been told that the zoning was relatively new and they would have to live with it?

To summarize, we have what amounts to “zoning by variance” and it has been quite effective at slowing the pace of change. That may have worked in a period when Boston’s population was declining or remaining flat. It does not and cannot work when population is increasing, as it is today and appears poised to do for the foreseeable future. This is why the Mayor’s housing plan is so important to support and why Imagine Boston 2030, the citywide planning process that is just now getting going, is to important. We can no longer afford to treat any part of Roslindale as totally off limits to change, as if there were a growth boundary around the square and that is it. The square is great, but it can be better for everyone, and it won’t be better unless we welcome new neighbors within walking distance of its amenities.

What comes next?

I would expect that the developer/owner comes back to a further pre-filing meeting, whether it’s before LANA again or in a stand-alone format. If they’re willing to do that and show they’re listening by making improvements to their proposal, that would go a long way toward securing the support they’ll need. If they don’t, they’ll still be coming back to the neighborhood for their small project/zoning relief public meeting(s) and we will see what they’ve heard and not heard. Beyond that, everyone connected with WalkUP Roslindale needs to pay as much attention as we can to the Imagine Boston 2030 process when it gets rolling. We can’t let the opportunity to break out of the “zoning by variance” bind pass us by.