City says 'no' to more parking for Roxbury development
Rather than tearing down the original yellow brick hospital building, Kensington is looking at a renovation that would transform the long-vacant building into 164 apartment units, with parking for 124 cars.
Kensington Investments came to Roxbury in 2015 with big plans for the former Radius Hospital site at 45 Townsend Street: A total of 311 units in brand new buildings that would attract upscale renters.
But abutters to the site raised alarms about what wasn’t included in the project: Parking for more than a third of the units. The developers planned just 200 parking spaces. Abutters objected vociferously and the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA) advised Kensington to go back to the drawing board.
Now in their third iteration, Kensington’s plans for the site have evolved substantially. Rather than tearing down the original yellow brick hospital building, Kensington is looking at a renovation that would transform the long-vacant building into 164 apartment units, with parking for 124 cars.
At a city-mandated meeting of abutters and community members last week, Kensington officials said they were constrained by the city’s own parking guidelines, which allow .75 parking spaces per unit at 45 Townsend Street.
“The biggest challenge was the lack of parking,” said Garrison Trotter Neighborhood Association member Connie Forbes, who attended the meeting. “The overall project looked pretty good, but we felt it wouldn’t work without more parking.”
Abutters on Townsend Street, a three-quarter-mile long street with parking on only one side for its entire length, say the competition for on-street parking would make it impossible to park.
“It’s already horrible,” said Nefertiti Lawrence, who lives next to 45 Townsend. “There’s almost no on-street parking.”
As it is, the street absorbs overflow parking from the mosque at the corner of Washington Street, from visitors to the Council Tower elderly building on Washington and from guests and family members of tenants in Academy Homes, Lawrence said.
“There are a whole lot of times when I have to park on Washington Street or Walnut Avenue,” she said.
A Boston Planning spokesperson, commenting on background, referred The Reporter to the city’s Transportation Demand Management Point System, which dictates how many parking spaces a developer can include in its project.
The city’s guidelines take into account factors such as proximity to public transit, grocery stores, and jobs. The goal is to limit car use in Boston, according to the city’s Transportation Department website:
“The TDM point system tool allows developers to choose from a wide variety of strategies to help manage people’s travel choices. These strategies incentivize people to: drive less, ride transit and bike more, carpool, and use carshare.”
Neighborhood activists reached by The Reporter said the city’s calculations do not take into account the realities of life on Townsend Street: families that depend on cars to transport children or the elderly, the current lack of available on-street parking, and the lack of reliability of local transportation options.
The route 42 bus, which runs along Washington Street between Forest Hills and Nubian Square, passes the Nubian Market, which sells groceries. But that bus is not reliable, according to Mike Kozu, executive director of Project RIGHT.
“The 42 bus is infrequent and irregular,” he said. “During school arrival and departure, buses on that route are over-filled.”
According to the MBTA’s website, 45 Townsend Street is a 15-minute walk from the Jackson Square Orange Line station. And it’s approximately one mile from the Stop and Shop on Centre Street. Kozu said tenants paying a market-rate rent of around $3,000 for a unit in the proposed Kensington development would likely rely more on vehicles.
“They will have a car or two,” he said. “Townsend Street and the surrounding streets will be impacted because tenants and their guests will be competing for spots.”
Kensington Chief Operating Officer Charlotte Lewis acknowledged that parking was the main sticking point for abutters, but she said the firm’s hands are tied by the city’s parking guidelines.
“As the 45 Townsend Street project is subject to the City of Boston’s Article 80 review process, we are required to comply with the city’s policies and guidelines,” she said in an email. “One of these is the Boston Transportation Department’s Maximum Parking Ratios.”
Kensington faced stiff local opposition to its plans for 45 Townsend Street during its Article 80 review. Now because its latest iteration of the plans is a supplemental filing to the ongoing process, the group held two meetings — one with Garrison Trotter Neighborhood Association and another with the impact advisory group — over a period of six weeks. The public comment period began January 30 and ended March 16.
Forbes said city officials heard loud and clear from community residents about their parking concerns and should be flexible in its guidelines.
“If a developer wants to create parking and the community wants it, the city should allow it,” she said.
