KENSINGTON: The Ups and Downs of a Downtown Tower Project

摘要

The 27-story Kensington apartment tower that broke ground in October will fill a gaping hole in Boston's Downtown Crossing neighborhood. Taking more than 20 years from inception to groundbreaking, the project illustrates the challenges of developing a major rental project in a congested urban setting. Property acquisition began in the late 1980s. The site originally consisted of six separate lots and buildings, some privately owned, and other lots or alleys owned by the city or public agencies. "Some smaller lots were not for sale originally, or had their ownership interests tied up in estate settlements," says Ralph Cole, executive vice president for Kensington Investment Company. It took the developer until the late 1990s to get all the lots in its hands.