"Form Follows Place" - Public and Private Roles in Visioning East Milton Square

By Michael A. Wang

I recently had the opportunity to co-chair a day-long Urban Land Institute Technical Assistance Panel [TAP] that contemplated the future of East Milton Square. This neighborhood center is one of only three business districts in a community where commercial uses contribute a mere 3.8% of the Town’s tax revenue. While East Milton Square has very passionate and engaged neighborhood stakeholders, it remains a village center that is characterized by physical barriers – most notably, it is bisected by I-93 – that present challenges to its walkability and overall cohesiveness.

Aerial of East Milton Square & Proposed Manning Park Redesign

The 2015 Milton Master Plan championed the introduction of mixed-use development into the Town’s commercial cores to expand the diversity of housing types and, in turn, to stimulate the integration of more commercial and civic amenities. Creating a “Vision Plan” for each of these districts through a process that effectively engages residents and local business owners would certainly be an excellent first step.

 In recent years, a great deal of focus has been directed towards renovating the Manning Community Park, which sits atop a depressed southeast expressway. While a thoughtful redesign of this significant open space, including more pedestrian-friendly connections across the busy surface roads of Granite Avenue and Bryant Avenue, will make this park more usable, it may never become the “center of gravity” for the district given its perch above the highway. In fact, one of the ULI panel’s primary conclusions was that the Town might want to consider expanding its Business District to the east of the highway along the Adams Street corridor as it reaches out towards the Quincy line.

Rethinking East Milton Square’s Business District

One key question for any community contemplating the revitalization of a commercial core is how to be proactive in promoting the kind of development that is compatible with the surrounding neighborhood. When thinking about the critical role of public-private partnerships in this equation, community leaders should not only look at what incentives would attract private investment but, also, what improvements the public sector could make to enhance placemaking potential.

 The Town of Winthrop is doing just this, as they take concrete steps to implement their 2017 Center Business District [CBD] Master Plan. This plan, authored by Form + Place in conjunction with MassDevelopment and the Metropolitan Area Planning Council [MAPC], identified a long list of action items for the Town to address, including improvements to infrastructure, the rethinking of the “connective” role of public open spaces and changes to zoning regulations that would stimulate appropriate mixed-use development.

Revitalizing Winthrop’s public realm

Regardless of which community, ensuring that there is an understandable and reasonable approvals process in place is essential for attracting quality private development. But, as evidenced by recent resistance to proposed mixed-use development in East Milton Square, having a community vision in place that local stakeholders have already bought into is equally important. Embracing local developers who share in the vision and have a first-hand understanding of the community is often likely to yield more contextually-sensitive proposals. Larger national developers, however, are often the ones who may have the resources to withstand lengthy approvals processes and this may result in more formulaic development solutions.

 A well-conceived “Vision Plan” can create a road map for public investment in a key mixed-use commercial district. Identifying placemaking goals that promote a safe, walkable center is a logical starting point for any community. Whether integrating the tenets of Complete Streets, identifying new public open space for a range of active and passive uses or incorporating design guidelines that shape how buildings interface with the ground plane, there is so much that communities can do to shape the character of their commercial centers. Proactive community investment in the public realm and infrastructure, more often than not, will serve as a huge catalyst for the influx of private development dollars.

*Use this link http://milton.vod.castus.tv/vod/?video=80ee396d-5f0f-467e-b6ac-a246ff666808 to see the full Milton TAP presentation starting at minute 10.

Completing the Picture with Art and Great Events: Placemaking in the Hospitality World

By John Rufo

“Well conceived and harmonious spaces allow people to relax, to be present in the moment and to enjoy themselves. Meeting people where they are is really important.”

- Andrea Finard, Harbor Hotel Co-Owner

Last weekend we journeyed to Provincetown for a reception of the art exhibit “Ocean Allure” at the Harbor Hotel. The hotel is owned by friend and client, Todd Finard, who conceived of the exhibit, along with his wife, Andrea. The hotel regularly hosts art events, and in this show they wanted to change the vibe of the main public spaces and create some buzz around the theme of the hotel’s oceanside setting and the significant role of art in the Provincetown community. Andrea Finard explained, “we ask ourselves what might make this experience better, more fun, or memorable - vacation time is finite. This season, we worked with 4 talented artists (John and Caroline Rufo, Edgar Stewart and Thanassi Kuliopulos) whose artwork had a really strong synergy with the environment that the hotel strives to provide.  Guest feedback has been overwhelmingly positive.” The reception served to catalyze interest in both the season-long art show and the hotel, but what I hadn’t quite imagined was the degree to which the art and the location could work together to heighten the experience of place.

The hotel (really a motel originally) was built in the 50’s when the allure of the road and a new national highway system was the thing that mobilized America to get out and see the country. When they bought the hotel in 2011, the Finards and their partners renovated it, “peeling back the 60’s, 70’s, 80’s and 90’s architecture that covered over and all but made invisible the original mid century modern vibe”. Branded now as a “retro glam hip hideaway”, the main public spaces – reception / library / bar / restaurant - convert easily into a welcoming art gallery that is both intimately scaled and expansive as it opens dramatically to an outdoor fire pit and sweeping views of Cape Cod Bay and Provincetown Harbor.

The owners of the Harbor Hotel understand the potential for art and space to meld, in order to connect with the local community. At Form + Place we approach placemaking as both an extension of the building realm and a wholly public undertaking that embraces the power of art and thoughtful programming to provide purpose and meaningful focal points in public spaces. Art in the placemaking continuum works at many scales. Whether it’s fine art, performance art, sculpture, wall murals, etc., it pushes the conversation beyond the site and building to engage cultural and social aspects of the community.

As a painter, I love to marry art with the local community in a way that rings true, and within our firm, we feel the same way about architecture. Designing buildings is a rewarding and creative process, but experiencing them and engaging with the community in a space that facilitates connectedness, is one of architecture’s higher purposes, and a driving force at Form + Place. The Finards embrace the importance of creating unique experiences that ground the “getaway weekend” in good placemaking, good food and great events. “When it comes down to it”, says Todd, “carefully curated art creates a new level of placemaking that accentuates the space and reinforces our brand, all while heightening community connections”. The day before the "Ocean Allure" reception happened to be Gallery Night in P-town. Commercial Street was electric with conversation and noise that spilled out of the galleries and beckoned people into the restaurants, pubs and cafes.

Of course, this experience is common in P-town, which is sought out for its art, and therefore all visitors are sure to take in a healthy dose of fine art. The location of the Harbor Hotel at the east end of Commercial Street is ideally suited to extend that gallery experience. The bar and fire pit create a kind of wide open venue that is quite a contrast to the tighter spaces of Commercial Street deeper in the East End gallery district. The setting of the Harbor Hotel has a way of luring you in to pause and reflect on the visual stimulation that is Provincetown. Maybe that’s the most important role of features like fire pits and public art; whether it’s in an urban context or at the edge of the bay, stopping to breath and consider the things you did and saw that day is one of the important experiences of getting away.

Bay View Rooms along hotel's front facade

It will be interesting to see what the next stage of evolution is for the Harbor Hotel’s placemaking aspirations. One could imagine a different kind of front door / street edge to the property. Maybe one that prioritizes place over parking while softening the experience of the customer moving from the hotel to the water’s edge. The extension of the lobby /gallery / bar spaces into the fire pit with the vista of the waster beyond is so successful and alluring… the potential, like the view, is almost endless!

Technical Assistance Panels: The Power of Teaming ULI, Professional Expertise and MassDevelopment

By Michael A. Wang

Among the diverse initiatives that the Urban Land Institute and MassDevelopment champion to help communities across the Commonwealth, the day-long Technical Assistance Panel [TAP] charrette is one of the most engaging for panelists and stakeholders alike. The December 12th TAP in Ashland, MA, co-chaired by Michael Wang of Form + Place and Jamie Simchik of Simchik Planning and Development, brought together professionals possessing a wide range of expertise from land planning, architecture and landscape architecture to market analysis, environmental permitting and the real estate development world.

Fire Station

Masonic Lodge

Stones Public House

The Ashland TAP, not unlike recent panels in other Massachusetts communities - such as in Yarmouth, Dedham and Leominster - was a 12-hour brainstorming session that asked panelists to tour the focus area, review documents [recent studies, zoning, etc.] and conduct a series of interviews with the goal of addressing a few key questions posed by Town leadership. In Ashland’s case, experts were asked to make recommendations for how the Town might stimulate economic development in a downtown that already has a variety of assets, including a collection of architecturally distinct buildings and a surrounding area rich in natural resources – river, parkland, etc. Ashland does have some fairly unique challenges, however, ranging from an active commuter rail line that bisects Main Street on grade, a commuter rail station relocated outside the typical “walkable” TOD radius, and some environmental concerns stemming from a nearby Superfund site.

As with many outer-ring suburban communities, revitalizing the core often centers on the need to create a “there” there. Among the recommendations that the panel put forward, the incentivization of multi-family residential development in the downtown – ideally in a mixed-use equation – was identified as an essential driver. But attracting a critical mass of people to live in the core clearly requires a holistic vision for what downtown Ashland can become. The Town is currently studying how improvements to the streetscapes can simultaneously improve traffic flow and create a more pedestrian-friendly environment. The panel felt that revisions to the zoning that would promote development patterns to reinforce the definition of street walls [continuity], create opportunities for more density and facilitate a diverse mix of uses [i.e. restaurants/coffee shops] would go a long way towards attracting private investment. This must happen in conjunction with improvements to infrastructure and thoughtful consideration of how to reshape the public realm to allow for the integration of memorable spaces that can be programmed for active and passive use.

Technical Assistance Panels can be a key stepping stone and present a rare opportunity for communities to gain insights from a group of experts that do not have any specific allegiance to their community. Often local efforts get bogged down by the anti-development sentiments of a few outspoken stakeholders who spread fears of the potential disastrous impacts on school systems, traffic and parking. In many cases, studies have shown that these concerns are unfounded or can be reasonably mitigated.  With a number of key development parcels already under Town control, Ashland is in a good position to push forward a catalyzing project or two.  Partnering with private land owners who have significant holdings in the downtown will be an essential component to bringing Ashland's vision for a new town center to fruition.

Sketch Diagram of Key Opportunities from TAP Charrette