REZONING OK URGES HOUSING, LIMITS DEVELOPMENT IN CITY'S EAST
By Mary Hurley, Globe Correspondent
The Boston Globe, October 21, 2001
The City Council Monday unanimously approved a proposal to rezone eastern Cambridge. The new blueprint for nearly one-third of the city limits commercial development and encourages housing, particularly in the industrial area of North Point, which is envisioned as a new residential neighborhood.
The vote culminated a citywide rezoning begun four years ago. Last February the council voted to rezone the city with the exception of eastern Cambridge (as well as a portion of Alewife) until the Eastern Cambridge Planning Study Committee completed its work. The deadline to approve the eastern Cambridge zoning was midnight Monday, and historically, council members would be frantically negotiating last-minute, late-night amendments to secure votes.
Not this time. Changes made in the last several weeks tended to be trade-offs: In return for an increase in the amount of allowable commercial development, developers are required to provide public amenities such as parks and affordable housing, with an emphasis on middle-income housing.
Committee members warned the council against any "11th-hour amendments," as cochairman Douglas Ling put it, noting that members supported the recent changes, which they felt tilted in favor of development interests, "with considerable reluctance."
Councilors, with little discussion on the zoning proposal, praised the $500,000, city-sponsored planning process, where debate centered on the right balance of commercial and residential development.
"The legacy of tonight will not be just the zoning, but the process," City Councilor Jim Braude said.
"The outcome is probably ideal for no one, but it represents a working consensus," said East Cambridge resident Lisa D'Ambrosio of the 19-member committee, appointed by City Manager Robert Healy in the spring of 2000.
A major piece of the rezoning effort focused on North Point, on the other side of Msgr. O'Brien Highway across from the Museum of Science and the only large undeveloped land in the city.
The 55-acre site had been envisioned as a housing district, but a major question for the committee was how much housing and commercial development to allow.
Guilford Transportation Industries/Spaulding & Slye/Colliers owns 45 acres at North Point and plans to build a mixed-use office and residential development there over the next several decades. Guilford requested that commercial development be as high as 50 percent, in order to finance major public amenities, including the relocation of the Lechmere MBTA station to the other side of Msgr. O'Brien Highway.
The new zoning allows Guilford most of the increased density it sought, with the stipulation that the T station be relocated before the city issues an occupancy permit. The project must also include middle-income housing, and the city wants Guilford to build a new high school sports facility at North Point.
Linking North Point to the rest of East Cambridge and not making it a separate community was a concern of East Cambridge residents on the committee, said Mary Ann Donofrio, a resident and committee member.
The new zoning also requires lower building heights near residential neighborhoods, with taller heights farther away. It requires a new public park, facing Binney Street, and creates "transition" areas from the commercial Broadway to the residential neighborhoods by requiring housing to the north and mixed-used development to the south.