Housing Headlines

BOSTON --- The failed bid for Amazon's new headquarters now history, HYM Investment Group is back to pushing its master plan for the 161-acre Suffolk Downs site. The plan, which includes 10,000 new homes of which 900 would be affordable, is drawing the attention of advocates and local leaders like city councilor Lydia Edwards, who would like to see more affordable housing to offset rising prices and displacement in neighborhoods like East Boston.

SUDBURY --- By the required two-thirds majority, special town meeting voters OK'd the transfer of a town-owned site and the necessary zoning to developer Christopher Claussen, who is planning to build 274 apartments on the former Melone gravel pit site. The vote is a compromise as the gravel pit project was preferable to the Ch. 40B housing proposal Claussen had previously proposed nearer to the town center.

SOMERVILLE --- The Globe's Tim Logan takes a deep dive into the politics of making over Somerville's Union Square neighborhood and how it "epitomizes, in many ways, the transformation of much of blue-collar Boston into something entirely new — and the chafing and tussles over turf that often accompany such change."

BROCKTON --- The building that Mayor Bill Carpenter has described as the most important property in the city's downtown revitalization efforts has been seized by the Brockton Redevelopment Authority by eminent domain and turned over to developer Ted Carman, who has plans to transform the city's tallest building into 55 apartments within steps of the commuter rail.

QUINCY --- The National Grid lockout has put a halt to natural gas line work, leaving thousands of new housing units and businesses across the state empty and forcing some to turn to propane as a temporary fix as they wait for gas service to be installed.

BOSTON --- Saying change is needed to meet the region's housing shortage, the Boston Globe published an editorial urging passage of Gov. Charlie Baker's Housing Choice legislation now, with the promise that House leadership will tackle more systemic reform in the next session.