Housing Headlines

In a study of three years of meeting minutes from 97 Massachusetts communities, Boston University researchers found that nearly two-thirds of residents who spoke up at public meetings did so to oppose housing developments and that the typical speaker is eight years older than the average local resident, has lived in a home more than five years longer than average, and is more than twice as likely to vote as the typical resident. “The people who show up to these meetings are overwhelmingly opposed to construction of new housing, in ways that are way out of whack with public opinion,” said Katherine Levine Einstein, a BU political science professor and one of the study’s authors. “And, socioeconomically, they are not representative of their communities.”

The recent groundbreaking of the 675-unit Harborwalk at Plymouth Station is just the latest example of developers transforming abandoned properties of the once-thriving maritime industry into waterfront mixed-use communities with market-rate housing, restaurants and retail. The list includes Marina Bay in Squantum, The Launch at Hingham Shipyard, condos at the old Welch Co. building in Scituate Harbor and Seascape at Weymouth.

HAVERHILL --- Scrapping the plan for a city-owned parking deck that would've required city council's OK of a $1.12 million bond, Mayor James Fiorentini came back two weeks later with a downsized parking plan that would cost less and have the same number of spaces, convincing the council to OK a transfer of $500,000 from the stabilization fund to support the idea. The parking is part of developer Sal Lupoli's plan to continue the city's development of land along the Merrimack River with a 10-story mixed-use building with three floors of apartments.

Noting that housing proposals for the Hanover Mall and in Scituate are being shaped so as to limit the amount of school children, the Patriot Ledger runs an editorial which asks, "Where are young families going to live? We are willing to accommodate singles and empty-nesters into our towns, but are we exiling working families with two or four or more children to someplace beyond exurbia?"

MANSFIELD --- The redevelopment of the former Merckens Chocolate Factory into a mixed-use development is good to go now that Red Leaff Development has secured a $32.5 million construction loan from Citizens Bank. The factor redevelopment will include 130 apartments, with 19 affordable apartments and eight units of workforce housing.

PLYMOUTH --- Gov. Charlie Baker was on hand for the groundbreaking ceremony for the 300-unit Harborwalk Apartments and the unveiling of Plymouth Station, the new name for the Cordage Park Commerce Center. Long a symbol of Plymouth's industrial past, the former rope factory site has rallied as a site for businesses, but this week's Harborwalk event - a joint venture between Cathartes and Janco Development - is a major milestone for the property, which was rezoned for housing under the state's Chapter 40R option in 2006. "We’ve done many transit-oriented development initiatives over the past four years, and they all basically have the same set of ingredients,” Baker said. “The most important ingredient of all is you have to have the folks on the private side who want to make the project happen, who are aligned with the folks on the local level who really want to see it through."