News
Boston Waterfront Takeoff
September 21, 2011
| Boston's nearly 400-year-old waterfront has started a new phase with the May launch of the nation's largest construction project: the $900M, 1.1 M SF HQ for Vertex Pharmaceuticals. This morning 600 CRE pros filled a Renaissance Hotel ballroom to learn what's next. | |
 | |
| Event panelist Boston Global Investors? Charles Reid says the 6.3M SF Seaport Square project that it's developing with Morgan Stanley and WS Development is about to start construction. AvalonBay, Alex Twining, and WS Development will build 750 rental apartments, 350k SF of retail and entertainment, and a 12k SF innovation center for start-ups.New England Development's Steve Karp, who will soon start construction on 350 rental apartments on Pier 4, says the easier transit access to the waterfront transformed it into a regional destination. | |
 | |
| Key investors sat on this morning?s NAIOP panel: The John Drew Co's John Drew, Cresset Development's Ed Nardi, HFF?s John Fowler, BGI's Charlie Reid, and NED's Steve Karp. Ed, who this summer opened the wildly successful Liberty Wharf with its harbor front restaurants and boutique office space, says Cresset was the beneficiary of billions of dollars? of public infrastructure investment and planning efforts. With the crowds Liberty Wharf has attracted, the Vertex project and other developments ready to start, John Fowler says the capital markets believe in the Boston waterfront. |
