Mixed-Use Washington Village Wins Boston’s Blessing
The community will rise on a former South Boston industrial site.
By Dees Stribling, Contributing Editor
Boston—The Boston Redevelopment Authority has approved plans for Washington Village, a mixed-use community on the site of an abandoned industrial facility in South Boston. The property will include 656 residences, along with retail and other commercial space, plus 2.4 acres of new public space.
The plan has been gestating for some time. DJ Properties L.L.C., the community’s developer, has been in conversations with the Andrew Square Neighborhood Association and other local groups for six years, assessing the best new use for the former industrial blocks.
Over three phases, Washington Plaza will add new streets and plazas to the neighborhood to go along with apartments and condos that include some affordable units and many aimed at middle-income families. There will be a grocery store, 440 below-ground parking spaces and 120 surface spaces, a public green, and more than 150 new trees.
“The project will transform a mostly vacant, underutilized site into a vibrant mixed-use village that will be a natural extension of the surrounding South Boston neighborhood,” DJ Properties wrote in its filing with the BRA.The project’s architect is Cambridge-based Prellwitz Chilinski Associates, while Halvorson Design Partnership Inc. is the landscape architect.
Demand for residential units is high in Boston. Concurrently, boosted by the city’s robust science, research and healthcare sectors, greater Boston’s multifamily market is enjoying strong rent and price appreciation, according to Yardi Matrix data, while inventory is expanding rapidly. Year-over-year as of April 2016, rent growth in the market has been about 6 percent.
