CorbuGlasses

CorbuGlasses t1_ixov2mh wrote

Reply to comment by Master_Dogs in The lack of homes could strangle our life sciences industry: Why the concentration of biopharma in Cambridge and Boston would ratchet up costs, exacerbate the housing crisis, and pitch the region from its throne. by writethefuture3

It depends on the municipality but in the case of that particular project it’s technically a planning board so it’s both design review and zoning review. The hearing is for all projects of a certain size and also serves as the public meeting. They wrote the zoning and oversee it, but because it’s not strictly a zoning board there is subjectivity in the approvals.

It’s a joke and the night before our hearing and a month after we submitted all the required documentation the deputy planner sent us a list of questions that pretty much showed they didn’t know their own zoning rules nor did they spend the time to thoroughly review what we submitted. Every response was basically “see submission” or “that’s not actually what the zoning code states”.

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CorbuGlasses t1_ixluvne wrote

Reply to comment by majesticbagel in The lack of homes could strangle our life sciences industry: Why the concentration of biopharma in Cambridge and Boston would ratchet up costs, exacerbate the housing crisis, and pitch the region from its throne. by writethefuture3

It isn’t just the public, there are still lots of zoning board members in various communities that are stuck in car centric thinking.

I have an as-of-right project in an area with new more progressive zoning and one of the board members voted against because he didn’t like the new rules they had instituted. Nothing about the project, it was clearly political and he must’ve been outvoted and against the new zoning from the beginning.

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CorbuGlasses t1_ixklkvz wrote

Reply to comment by writethefuture3 in The lack of homes could strangle our life sciences industry: Why the concentration of biopharma in Cambridge and Boston would ratchet up costs, exacerbate the housing crisis, and pitch the region from its throne. by writethefuture3

Architect here. I wouldn’t go this far, but changes need to be made. The funny and sad part is that some towns have changed their zoning recently but there are still holdouts on most boards who will vote down projects that are as-of-right under the rules they wrote.

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CorbuGlasses t1_ixkl5ek wrote

Reply to comment by gregzhoba in The lack of homes could strangle our life sciences industry: Why the concentration of biopharma in Cambridge and Boston would ratchet up costs, exacerbate the housing crisis, and pitch the region from its throne. by writethefuture3

This isn’t by choice. It’s because there is so little available lab space left in Cambridge and when it is available is incredibly expensive. If you’re a smaller or startup outfit without deep pockets, the suburbs is the only place you can find available and affordable space.

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