We’ve got an old bridge over the Fort Point Channel. It’s going to be decorated for the next few years with flowers in boxes. Why is this important? Let’s place it first. It is the Northern Avenue Bridge connecting Northern Avenue where it passes between the Moakley Courthouse and the Barking Crab in the Seaport Read More…
Commentaries
Downtown View: Too Much Weirdness
Just when you think life in our fair city can’t get any weirder, you hear about something even more weird. According to a friend of mine who happened to be out walking early one Friday morning on Charles Street, the trash haulers might have a nice little business on the side. Two guys with Capitol Read More…
Downtown View: Parking Lot Worries
I’m worried. It’s about a surface parking lot. It seems silly to worry about a parking lot, but that’s the way it is. Maybe it will turn out okay, but things have a way of getting out of hand. Let’s hope I’m wrong. This parking lot lies on the Esplanade near Charles Circle. That location Read More…
Downtown View: More Sex Scandals, Please
After Hurricane Sandy, bruising presidential and senatorial campaigns that lasted far too long, and a continuing hospital watch over Mayor Menino, fatigued Bostonians needed a good sex scandal. Our prayers were answered, courtesy of CIA director David Petraeus, General John R. Allen, the financially-challenged Tampa twins, and biographer and upper-arm specialist Paula Broadwell. Of course, Read More…
Downtown View: Living Green
If you live in downtown Boston, you’re already living a green life. You probably walk more than you drive. About half of us don’t even own a car. Most likely, you’re living in an old building. That’s the greenest place to live since someone has repaired and restored the building rather than tearing it down Read More…
Letter in Response to Globe Editorial on Noise Ordinance
The following letter was sent to the Boston Globe in response to a November 5th editorial in the paper, Party ordinance would be harsh on young Bostonians. Dear Editor, I strongly object to the editorial of November 5th concerning the noise ordinance proposed by Councillor Sal LaMattina. This editorial displays ignorance of the seriousness of Read More…
Downtown View: The Evidence of Daffodils
So I’m sitting in front of the fireplace on a rainy day listening on my husband’s iPad to Paul McCartney singing “Yesterday.” I’m reading Michael Ondaatje’s “The Cat’s Table.” I’m thinking that “Yesterday” might be one of the world’s finest songs. I’m thinking Paul McCartney is a prodigious talent in a great big field of Read More…
Downtown View: Good Neighborhoods, Good Halloweens
Matt Conti alerted me to this. More about Matt later, but for now, consider what he found. Zillow.com is a real estate web site that appears to be growing in influence. It is filled with listings, but also celebrity real estate gossip and assessments of real estate industry health across the country. Recently it rated Read More…
Downtown View: School Principles
When should a principle be disregarded? When the principle stands in the way of a good neighborhood. A case in point has developed on Beacon Hill. The Park Street School, which, typically in contradictory Boston, is located on Brimmer Street, wants to buy the adjacent house at 124 Chestnut Street and attach it to the Read More…
Downtown View: Testing the Lottery
Gambling news recently has been all about casinos. This focus will likely go on for several more years as developers duke it out over the three locations. Forgotten in all of this has been the Massachusetts Lottery, which, over the 40 years it has been in operation, has churned out almost $91 billion in sales, Read More…
Daffodil Dalliance on the Greenway – Wednesday Night Meeting Scheduled
Planting 10,000 FREE Daffodils on the North End Parks of the Rose Kennedy Greenway shouldn’t come encumbered with much controversy. Done correctly it would make for a very friendly and colorful Spring ’13, unless this particular “Friends” group runs into the bureaucratic obfuscation of the Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy and their newly, self-appointed State Lobbyist Read More…
Downtown View: Greenway Cooperation–The Way To Go
Ah, the Greenway. That wonderful replacement for that awful highway. Ah, the Greenway Conservancy. That wonderful idea that has turned awful at times. But there is a ray of hope. A change for the better? Shared goals developed by formerly antagonistic players? Everybody on the same page? We’ll see. Cooperation between Conservancy staff and horticultural Read More…



