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Owner of burned-out old factory in West Roxbury to try again for permission to replace it with condos
By adamg on Mon, 10/17/2016 - 3:16pm
Landlord Michael Argiros goes before the Zoning Board of Appeals on Nov. 1 to seek permission to build a 40-unit, three-story condo building on Lagrange Street near Centre where the old Armstrong asthma-inhaler factory now molders.
The board rejected his proposal in April, in part because he planned to use modular components built in a factory rather than using more traditional building techniques. The board took the action even though construction methods are not normally considered zoning issues.
Argiros and nearby residents have been feuding over the property for more than two years now, with some residents saying they will resist anything short of some single-family homes, stores or a parking lot for the nearby businesses on Centre Street.
The building has been surrounded by fencing since it caught fire in September, 2014.
Argiros's hearing is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. in the board's eighth-floor hearing room in City Hall.
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Comments
I think he should show up
I think he should show up with a proposal to put a single house on top of a 4,000 car parking garage. The house will cost $70million and all the parking spaces are deeded to the house. Neighbors will still say there is not enough parking and will be worried about the "type of person" who would move into their neighborhood.
WR NIMBYs
WR NIMBYs seem to think that if it is a 40 unit building, there will be 80 cars constantly enteering and exiting the property, causing untold gridlock on Lagrange and Center. They ignore the fact that the majority of people will be taking the commuter rail, and the traffic impact will be minimal.
And don't get me started about the rifraff that they think will be coming if they are high end rental units.
i will fight tooth and nail
to keep this blight in my neighborhood, just incase something new and shiny comes in that doesnt meet my exacting parameters
NIMBYs ASSEMBLE!
n/t
People who resort to name
People who resort to name calling over neighbors wanting reasonable proposals assemble.
It would have been nice if
It would have been nice if the owner cleaned up the place after the fire. It's mess around there. he may get more support if he showed he cared about the cleanup after the fire.
Why should he help the
Why should he help the neighborhood out when they're irrationally and childishly against anything he proposes? Let them look into the degraded mess they're insisting stays there.
It's not "irrationally" if
It's not "irrationally" if they don't want a bunch of condos in a residential area that is mostly single family or buildings that are smaller.
What's immature is letting your resentment over people who already own property call them names and NIMBYs, as if no one should care about what is built near them.
Does it have to be single family housing? Probably not, but a somewhat smaller building would make the people who've and made that community what it is for years more cooperative.
Eyesore puts on pressure
"You can have this eyesore, or you can have something new and clean."
"New end clean" doesn't have
"New end clean" doesn't have to be dozens of apartments so someone can maximize their profits when most of the housing in the immediate vicinity are single family. Nice little strawman you set up.
Sounds like he's been trying
Sounds like he's been trying to clean it up by building a non-burned building. If it were me, I wouldn't invest in demolition and disposal either until I knew I was going to get to build something and make the money back.
Well ...
The building was in decent shape (for a closed factory, that is) when he passed papers - it only caught fire after he became the owner. No, I'm not accusing him of anything, but it's not like he bought a distressed property at a, um, fire sale. We haven't even gotten into the flooding and freezing that happened when a pipe to the factory burst after the fire.
He'd love to do that, by building
Why should he put any effort in to cleaning it up right now, when the neighborhood is trying so hard to keep him from ever making any money from his investment? Only way to clean that up is to approve a redevelopment.
I just have one question
Shouldn't this building be preserved as the "Burnt Out Former Asthma Inhaler Historic Site?"
Just throwing it out there.
Primatene Mist
Well maybe you can propose that to the facebook group that wants it to come back.
https://www.facebook.com/BringBackPrimateneMist/
And for those who are too young to remember this...
Or they could just rename the whole neighborhood
BOFAIHS, pronounced BO-fays. Though if we'43 just talking condos, I like the ring of The Residences at the Former Asthma Inhaler Factory. Or just go short and cryptic and call it The Inhaler.
Primatene
Or how about calling the new complex what was made there...
"The Primatene"
Even if you're not asthmatic,
Even if you're not asthmatic, these condos will make you gasp!
zba+prefab
Still don't understand why this was rejected based on prefabrication. I've been to ZBA meetings and I'm assuming all of the unions showed up and argued they would be hurt by this as the labor moves out of state, but it's not as though construction unions around Boston are hurting, 2016-17 are the busiest years ever, and yet when the owner tries to save on construction costs by prefabricating his zoning appeal gets denied? Absolutely ridiculous.
Everyone wants to reduce housing prices. Well the cost of construction is a main driver, and the costs would go down if unions didn't act like the world was ending because you wanted to prefabricate a piece of your building in another state.
Drive around West Rox residential streets sometime
Lots and lots of contractors, carpenters, plumbers, electricians etc... live there as well as other 'blue collar' union folks like cops and firemen. This is union labor wagon circling because they'd prefer to keep the offsite prefab genie in the bottle for now.
light industrial use
asma inhaler factory was a great back in the day. many people had decent jobs there. Now it will be another prefab condo going up, just what we need...