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Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

bostonplans.org

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Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#41

Post by pimlottc »

steveBK123 wrote: post #7

There was a cool OddLots episode recently where they talked to a guy who does Office to Residential work and some of the complexity. One thing he talked about, which I didn't know anyone did, was to actually cut through the ceiling/floorplate of buildings to basically "donut" them. This is necessary because many office floorplans are huge with modern HVAC and when converted into residential you end up with either und…

This looks like the episode of OddLots you're talking about:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-07-07/what-it-a...

They talk about converting 180 Water St by adding an internal atrium; it's also one of the conversions illustrated in the recent NYT article about the difficulties of office-to-residential conversions:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/03/11/upshot/office...

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#42

Post by thfuran »

kibwen wrote: post #22
mlyle wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is necessary because many office floorplans are huge with modern HVAC and when converted into residential you end up with either undesirable or illegal apartments due to lack of windows/egress/etc. Couldn't you just wall off the middle? I mean, you do get another set of windows on the inner courtyard, but it seems expensive to perform such major surgery on a building.

If you don't use the center of the building, then you only have room for one "ring" of residential units, whose windows face the exterior of the building. If you cut a donut hole down the center of the building, now you have room for two rings of units. Furthermore, in places like NYC, developers are allowed to "bank" the floorspace that comprised the donut hole and add new construction on top of the building so that…

They have limits on building square footage but not height? Or is that a weird loophole in a height restriction?

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#43

Post by abange »

tiedieconderoga wrote: post #18

It's a fine idea if good candidates for conversion can be found, but shouldn't they fix up their dilapidated public transit system before inviting more density into their urban core? Just today, one of their rail cars caught fire at an elevated station, and their broken fire suppression system did nothing but flood the ground floor when the firefighters tried to use it. Wu's push for more housing density along the ci…

I believe that part of the issue is the MBTA is a state level organization not city level. Wu doesn't have the power to fix the T. I agree that adding more load to an already crumbling system doesn't seem like a great idea but empty office buildings create their own problems by leaving "Dead" blocks or areas which can invite crime and decay.

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#44

Post by micromacrofoot »

tiedieconderoga wrote: post #18

It's a fine idea if good candidates for conversion can be found, but shouldn't they fix up their dilapidated public transit system before inviting more density into their urban core? Just today, one of their rail cars caught fire at an elevated station, and their broken fire suppression system did nothing but flood the ground floor when the firefighters tried to use it. Wu's push for more housing density along the ci…

There's a new general manager, Phillip Eng, who's actually a transit enthusiast rather than some random bureaucrat... if he can't fix the issues plaguing the MBTA no general manager can. This is a long problem though, they're trying to fix decades of unaddressed maintenance issues.

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#45

Post by stathibus »

fasthands9 wrote: post #35
vkou wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're going to hold solving the housing crisis hostage to having proper public transit infrastructure, we're never going to solve the housing crisis.

Yeah. I realize there are tax breaks in her bill but in theory getting more people living in these dense areas will raise ridership on the subway a lot and raise taxes as a whole - which would pay for things like repairs which the OP complains about.

No amount of ridership or city tax revenue would make the MBTA solvent. It's a sinking ship that is beyond rescue without massive federal intervention. Nobody in MA wants to say that though, because it's an admission of failure.

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#46

Post by mlyle »

kibwen wrote: post #22
mlyle wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is necessary because many office floorplans are huge with modern HVAC and when converted into residential you end up with either undesirable or illegal apartments due to lack of windows/egress/etc. Couldn't you just wall off the middle? I mean, you do get another set of windows on the inner courtyard, but it seems expensive to perform such major surgery on a building.

If you don't use the center of the building, then you only have room for one "ring" of residential units, whose windows face the exterior of the building. If you cut a donut hole down the center of the building, now you have room for two rings of units. Furthermore, in places like NYC, developers are allowed to "bank" the floorspace that comprised the donut hole and add new construction on top of the building so that…

> Furthermore, in places like NYC, developers are allowed to "bank" the floorspace that comprised the donut hole and add new construction on top of the building so that overall square footage remains the same.

Oh, yah, that's cool. You probably have a lot of systems surrounding the building (and ingress/egress) designed for that total volume.

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#47

Post by ethanbond »

steveBK123 wrote: post #36
mlyle wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is necessary because many office floorplans are huge with modern HVAC and when converted into residential you end up with either undesirable or illegal apartments due to lack of windows/egress/etc. Couldn't you just wall off the middle? I mean, you do get another set of windows on the inner courtyard, but it seems expensive to perform such major surgery on a building.

Depending on local laws.. windowless apartments are illegal. windowless bedrooms are illegal. etc.

I think they’re suggesting just having dead space in the middle.

Re: Boston mayor announces residential conversion program for office buildings

#50

Post by metadat »

xattt wrote: post #19
mlyle wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is necessary because many office floorplans are huge with modern HVAC and when converted into residential you end up with either undesirable or illegal apartments due to lack of windows/egress/etc. Couldn't you just wall off the middle? I mean, you do get another set of windows on the inner courtyard, but it seems expensive to perform such major surgery on a building.

Donuted buildings will forever remind me of the Ponte Tower building. (1) https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/02/th...

The South African Building That Came to Symbolize the Apocalypse

https://archive.today/qfZ91

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