Visit to Big Apple has officials thinking about food on Boston Common by Dan Salerno
It has become one of New York City’s most popular spots in recent years, a small, somewhat unassuming burger stand nestled in a corner of previously almost unknown Madison Square Park.
It’s called The Shake Shack, and although it doesn’t seem like much, in a city of Michelin Star restaurants and celebrity chefs this humble stand is as popular as anything else in town, with lines in nice weather frequently snaking hundreds long. What beckons locals and tourists alike is the Shack Burger, which has been named New York’s best in a slew of recent rankings, along with creamy frozen custard and, for those who want, cold beer.
More important than any particulars of its culinary success, however, is the Shake Shack’s impact on a previously underutilized public space. Madison Square Park has gone from sleepy afterthought to destination greensward almost overnight. In 2003, the Madison Square Park conservancy envisioned the food kiosk as the cornerstone in a larger renovation project aimed at injecting life back into the space. Five years later, that plan has been a success, and because the shack was partially financed by the conservancy, a portion of the proceeds for every burger and every concrete (a super thick frappe) sold goes to help with park maintenance.
Thus, it is no surprise that the Shake Shack was one of the key stops made during a recent fact finding mission to the Big Apple by Boston officials, who went in search of ideas to improve and revitalize Boston Common. Along with the Shake Shack, the officials also visited the more upscale Boathouse in Central Park and a Bryant Park cafe.
The consensus reached by the delegation is that the Common, occasionally marred by crime and vagrancy, could greatly benefit from a restaurant or a full time food kiosk that would bring more people and more vitality to the space.
“Attracting people to a park makes a park busy and make that park safe,” said Councilor Mike Ross, who was part of the delegation. “The busiest parks tend to be the safest and nicest parks. There’s no reason the Boston Common could not be a catalyst for the entire downtown area to be drastically improved.”
Ross said that no specific idea is currently being considered, but that the discussion will certainly continue in the coming weeks.
Stewart Desmond, deputy director of the Madison Square Park conservancy, said that a food kiosk can indeed bring positive uses to the park, and that the success of the Shake Shack has exceeded even their loftiest expectations,.
“For us it has been a tremendous success in bringing life and safety to the park,” said Desmond, and even those who originally opposed the building of the food kiosk now believe the change was for the best.
But any similar project in Boston has hurdles to overcome, not least among them convincing the Mayor Menino’s office and the public at large that the idea is a good one. The Mayor’s office would not commit to the idea, saying only that it remains open to any ideas for improving the Common.
One stumbling block would be the acquisition of a liquor license, never easy in Boston. A previous restaurant venture near the Frog Pond did not succeed because diners could not have wine with dinner.
State Senate race: Wilkerson and Chang-Diza square off at debate by Dan Salerno
Seeking for the second time to unseat incumbent Diane Wilkerson, challenger Sonia Chang-Diaz squared off with the veteran state senator in a debate at Emerson College Wednesday night, covering a range of issues from education to casino gambling.
The debate, moderated by State Representative Martha Walz, demonstrated little substantive difference between the two progressive Democrats on most key issues. Instead, it brought to light the same question that was central to their last electoral contest for the Second Suffolk District seat: do voters want an experienced voice, or fresh perspectives on old problems?
“We need new leadership to tackle some serious problems,” said Chang-Diaz in her opening statement, stressing her experience as a public school teacher and her deep ties to the community.
Wilkerson, who has served the Second Suffolk District since 1992, stressed the importance of her statehouse experience, particularly the value of the seniority she has built up over her 16 years in office. “We don’t want to lose that,” she said, while acknowledging that she and Chang-Diaz differed very little on many key issues. “The difference is I’ve been doing it,” she said.
Both candidates weighed in on one issue that is of particular importance to Beacon Hill and Downtown: the coexistence of residential neighborhoods with ever expanding institutions, particularly universities.
Chang-Diaz pointed to the recent agreement between Suffolk University and the Beacon Hill Civic Association as an excellent example of how public involvement can help shape private and institutional development for the better. The agreement, she said, could help provide a road map for future discussions between institutions and communities.
Wilkerson also stressed the need for communities and institutions to work together, saying that transparency was the most vital part of the process. Ultimately, she said, both the neighborhood and the institution will benefit from working together. “There has never been a project that I’ve seen that has not been made better by the public process,” said Wilkerson.
Both candidates took strong stances against casino gambling, differing only in their willingness to criticize Governor Patrick. Chang-Diaz lamented the regressive nature of casino gambling as a revenue source, as it tends to take money from low income people who can least afford to use it, but praised Patrick for facing the realities of the state’s budget shortfall. Wilkerson, meanwhile, lambasted the Governor and those behind the casino plan for looking for “the easy way out” of the state’s fiscal problems. She cited a recent study that showed up to 20% of Massachusetts residents would wind up with a gambling addiction if the casino were to be built.
Neither candidate would endorse the idea of using an increase in the gas tax to help cover a $20 billion shortfall in the transportation infrastructure budget. “This is not the right time for that,” said Chang-Diaz, a sentiment echoed by Wilkerson, though both said changing gas prices might make the idea more palatable in the future. “I don’t think either of us can give you an answer of where that $20 billion can come from,” admitted Wilkerson.
On the subject of education, both Wilkerson and Chang-Diaz said that adding more charter schools was not the right solution for struggling city schools. Wilkerson said that more accountability was needed from teachers and administrators, and said that the old property tax method of funding education was no longer sufficient or fair. Chang-Diaz, who worked for several years as an urban public school teacher, said that making oppositional distinctions between charter schools and district schools was not a productive part of the conversation. Although Chang-Diaz did not get into the specifics of how she would boost funding for education, she did promise to be a tireless fighter for public schools.
Ultimately, the debate was not one that translates well to written report: purely on the issues, there was little to distinguish the candidates. The choice for voters will come down more to personal instinct about each candidate competence and abilities. In their 2006 contest, Wilkerson barely held on to her seat, beating Chang-Diaz by less than 800 votes after a recount. The eight term senator has long had the support of voters, but she became politically vulnerably after pleading guilty to four counts of income tax evasion in 1997.
More than 100 swimmers jumped in the Charles by Sun staff
More than 100 swimmers jumped into the Charles River for the Second Annual Charles River One-Mile Master Swim Race organized by the Charles River Swimming Club and supported by the Charles River Conservancy off the Boston Esplanade. Swimmers embraced the open water swimming experience after decades of work and hundreds of millions of dollars spent cleaning up the river.
Concerned by extensive changes to the exterior design of the current building, the Bay Village architectural commission has asked a developer to rethink its renovation plans for 110 Arlington Street.
The proposal in its current form called for significant changes to the exterior windows, as well as very visible addition to the top of the building, according to the presentation by Gary Hendren.
According to Hendren, the changes to the window size and placement are necessary to make the space usable as a living space, because he windows as currently placed are too high to be usable.
But commission chair Mark Stevens said that the fenestration pattern was too drastically different from what is currently there. “Our responsibility as a commission is to protect exterior design,” he said. The commission could never approve something that so drastically altered the appearance of such an old building.
“I don’t understand what’s going on with the windows,” added commission member Sally Worthington, who said she did not know why the pattern had to be changed at all, and asked if changes to interior design could fix the problem of the window height.
The new rooftop addition also drew criticism from the commission. Stevens said that a more appropriate change would be the addition of a penthouse set back from the ledge to make it less visible from the street, as is typical of other penthouses in the area.
Hendren will return to the commission with an updated design that more closely preserves the current design and fenestration pattern. However, he was uncertain about how much could be accomplished without at least lowering the height of the windows.
100 Arlington Street is the former Unitarian Universalist Association building in Bay Village. The new owner wishes to turn the upper floors into a family home.
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