SHIFTperception: An Urban Revisioning of Washington Street

With the recent news of Boston's Downtown Crossing seeking to become a new Business Improvement District, as well as the ongoing problems of the stalled development at the old Filene's Building and a growing number of empty storefronts in the area, map-lab decided to take a more in depth look at possible solutions.

To understand where Boston's future should be, obviously we must first examine its past. As with many cities in the post-WWII era, Boston adopted the super block mentality for spurring development. In the case of Downtown Crossing, it destroyed a viable & beautiful building fabric and streets themselves to make way for large-scale suburban-esque retail approaches. With them came more knockdowns to make way for the parking structures thought to be needed to draw suburbanites to the urban centers for their shopping. We learned that it fails over time due to the eradication of smaller businesses  and the “turning of the back” to the residents themselves.

To revitalize the once vibrant core of Boston, we proposed to remove the cars and return Washington Street (within the borders of the Downtown Crossing district) back to the pedestrians. Rationalizing traffic flows are key to overcoming poor 20th century planning. We created an “inner beltway” which dedicates two-way traffic to better move localized traffic to the larger capacity arterials. By doing so it frees the smaller scale feeder streets from continuing to act as “shortcut” thru streets and putting unnecessary traffic into the Downtown Crossing area.

A new plaza acts as a gateway at the Old State House, connecting Washington Street to the existing Fanueil Hall pedestrian zone. The Washington Street Pedestrian Zone, now free of cars, is dotted with new trees as well as small scale modular structures. These structures will house a diverse collection of small businesses which allows for a more sustainable economic model, more similar to the Washington Street which existed before the city planners decided to suburbanize this part of the city.

The creation of a transit hub at the newly named BEDFORD SQUARE (previously a parking lot), gives a rejuvenated theater district a proper front yard with an urban square beset with the existing mbta: orange line stop (chinatown) as well as a new strategy with the silver line. A simplification of the routing of the silverline BRT’s that come from Dudley Square (Roxbury) to now BEDFORD SQUARE then directly to South Station, then loops back, is now a clear mode of operation and assists making the new square a true destination point.

Our proposal for Washington Street ties back to our original idea of seizing opportunities to evoke change in the “failed state” mentality and work as a whole to overcome issues. In the case of stalled tower development, a design for a central gathering space for the MIDDLE of the “blighted site” serviced by all local restaurant owners as a “pot luck” cafe.

The Winter Street extension of the pedestrian zone will be converted into a restaurant row, whose critical mass evokes a more European Streetscape while attracting users at all hours of the day and night.

Click the image below to see the full board.