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Castle Island Halloween proposal playing out as yet another yuppie-vs-native battle
By adamg on Thu, 06/23/2016 - 10:37am
The Globe reports on the war of words over a promoter's plan to convert the Castle Island fort into a horror show for Halloween:
Fright Island’s critics worry the family-friendly South Boston they cherish is under siege as younger professionals flock to the neighborhood, and handing Castle Island over to blood-covered zombies and beer-buzzed millennials would just accelerate that trend.
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Comments
Millennials are parents too now
The oldest Millennials are about 35 and are becoming parents themselves. Time to stop equating them all with partying college kids. (I'm saying this as a Gen Xer myself).
Instead of directly going to "NO," why don't they try to find some balance here. Maybe have a less scary "kids hours" for the little ones? Something like this could serve both families and young adults looking for something fun to do. Heck, the Zoos and museums do it!
Worried about traffic? Why not have a shuttle that will deliver folks from the Broadway and Andrew T stops to cut down on that?
There has to be a way to make this stuff happen so that everyones' panties get untwisted.
The article indicates there
The article indicates there will be a shuttle and off site parking, and that there will be a family friendly event at the castle in late october.
With compromises they still say no
Southie is fast becoming the new Beacon Hill or North End
The knee jerk reaction to everything from it residents now is NO.
Love it
Just like I planned several years back. The SoBo Revolution is almost complete!
Beacon Hill & The North End?
No freakin' way. Especially not Beacon Hill. Maybe an upscale Allston. Southie is the new hotspot for kids literally right out of school, like early-mid 20s. Beacon Hill & North End residents have established careers and A LOT more money than the new Southie generation.
That comparison flew right over your head
I was referring to the attitude of its residents.
The "I got mine, you can piss off" attitude of both Beacon Hill and North End.
100% wrong
1 bedrooms in southie are going for $2500/month. It's absolutely not the area kids move to after college. The average age of people moving to south boston now is probably late 20's to late 30's.
10 years too late
You are literally 10 years too late with that comment. Recent grads can't afford SoBo now. They live in Dorchester and EaBo.
I've seen townies get priced out and I've seen young 20s bros get priced out.
Beer-Buzzed Millennials
Would make a good band name. But just Beer-Buzzed Millennials or The Beer Buzzed-Millennials?
BBM
Just Beer-Buzzed Millenials, I think.
:)
how is this bad for long-time locals?
i don't get it.... this seems like a great event for all residents. two beer maximum. everybody gets to enjoy and Castle Island is a perfect venue. Southie residents LOVE to complain about any change. the whole city is changing. we need great events for family and friends. I've lived in City Point for over a decade - Southie is not exactly a rowdy neighborhood. deal with it.
traffic
Nothing new may be approved, as it will obviously add.....traffic.
i'll play along....
sure, i get it. traffic is inevitable. between their proposed plans for bus' and ride share it'll eliminate some of the traffic.... but Day Blvd and Summer St (via Broadway) are two major roads.... they can easily handle the traffic without any epic disruption to local traffic. the length of Broadway that would be used is negligible and there are no traffic lights just one stop sign. it's really easy to take an extra two turns in Southie to avoid those major roads too.
So there must not be any traffic during the day
when people flock to Castle Island to enjoy a picnic or a stroll around Pleasure Bay? There must not be any traffic near the beaches either in the summertime.
October for Halloween? I don't see the problem. There won't be any more traffic than there already is during a typical summer weekend day.
The concern should not be about millennials
Why do we want to go out of our way to “attract younger people” to Castle island? Are we worried about them? If they want to stay away, (and I do see plenty of younger people there so I don’t believe this), let them stay away. The lines at Sullivan’s are long enough.
I’m sure plenty of long time residents of South Boston would enjoy a Fright Night as much as younger, (but maybe not living in South Boston for very long) people. But I don’t think that’s the reason for allowing them in or not.
Will they show respect for the historic elements of the fort and surrounding area? Will people who don’t want to be involved in a Fright Night still feel welcome? Will enough money be raised for the fort to be sure it is properly maintained and maybe even open when I visit Castle Island?
Easy answer
Because it is a state facility, and you need support from outside of your area to pay for it.
Unless you want to pay special loads of extra taxes to keep it open when nobody outside your area sees any value in it.
Funny how much this is so like the "I own the free parking and you can't have it" attitude that pervades the same area.
God forbid
we have anything fun in this city.
They need to make one more Southie movie
But instead of cool gangster noir stuff, it's just all old, bitter people complaining about everything while drinking iced Dunks with the extra foam cup on it and of course, double parking.
All while
Planning what beach house they'll buy when they finally cash out all the equity they're sitting on.
Fright Night
The prospect of drinking, urinating and vomiting people stumbling through my neighborhood (City Point) on their way back home isn't very appealing.
The free Haunted Castle organized and run by the Castle Island Assc. is a hit every year for parents and kids alike.
huh?
the only time i see people drinking, littering, urinating etc. is the Southie teenagers that leave smashed bottles of Twisted Tea, garbage, fireworks, and spray paint. we all coexist, and i was a teenager once too, so whatever, but I think you may be living in some alternate reality if you think this event would destroy the perfect City Point neighborhood.
Where are people parking
if they are walking through the City Point neighborhood? Resident-sticker-only parking?
resident parking
Event goers may chose to take public transportation (the MBTA) and need to walk thru the neighborhood to catch a bus. Or they may chose to drink more at local bars.
P and Broadway
isn't that far into the neighborhood (one block from Farragut) for the buses. I would like to envision hordes of people taking the bus to Castle Island, but the reality is few will. The rest will get back into their cars from parking on Day Blvd. or the actual lot at Castle Island and drive wherever they're headed next (like they do every day there).
Castle Island
I read the usual comments knocking this neighborhood. Nothing unexpected here. Please continue.
In Fallout 4
...Castle Island has been repurposed as The Castle, the headquarters of a local militia group trying to help out citizens in the postapocalyptic wasteland. Before you can join them, you have to help them clear out The Castle, which has been overrun by huge mutated xenophobic highly aggressive crab-things, the Mirelurks.
I am beginning to wonder if maybe the Mirelurks are just original Southie residents who refused to move out after the bombs fell.
Not to open a bigger can of worms here
and I'm not originally from my neighborhood or even this state either. But original Southie residents are probably not the ones opposing this...
Seriously? Now a haunted
Seriously? Now a haunted house is too scary for little kids? How about DON'T GO WHEN IT'S HAPPENING.
Everything in this city does not have to cater to kids. Maybe they could have something during the day for the tykes and then at night something for the adults.
The Fear at Fenway
A few years ago Fenway park hosted the Spooky World event "The Fear at Fenway". Why isn't that venue being used? John Henry (Boston Globe owner) doesn't want it there. A centrally located facility with experience handling large groups of people in Boston.
Let's see
A modern baseball facility (that could possibly be in use for baseball games), or an old Fort. What would be "scarier"?
Nothing scarier than a men's
Nothing scarier than a men's room at Fenway park near the end of a game!
World Series
goes until Halloween. The regular season does't even end until the first week of October.
Stay inside and keep your tinfoil hat on a little longer, or at least do some basic research.
So we just have to make sure
it's cleared out by mid-October? No problem! This team ain't making it past the ALDS before this contract runs out.
The scariest thing about
The scariest thing about Castle Island is those bathrooms! Do they ever get cleaned? The haunted house should be in the women's restroom for a true fright.
Should a state park be turned over to a for-profit entity...
... for a paid-admission event for weeks, depriving everyone else of its use while their event is going on? That to me is the real issue, not traffic or parking or alcohol or anything else.
The article also mentions the Red Bull Flugtag on the Esplanade, but that is a free-admission event. So not really comparable.
The fort is rarely open
So letting a private entity rent it isn't a big usurpation of a public space.
Would they be renting only the inside of the fort?
Or would this also affect access to the surrounding park and fishing pier?