Office and multifamily developers say Wellington Circle fits many of the criteria for successful projects including MBTA Orange Line access and planned improvements to pedestrian and bicycle connections.
Wellington Circle’s 28 lanes of converging traffic may be a scourge for motorists, but are a lure for developers. They view its 200,000 daily vehicle counts as a formula for replacing tired strip malls with higher uses, such as office parks and multifamily housing, near the Medford-Malden line.
Factors intensifying redevelopment projects in the area include the success of Federal Realty’s nearby Assembly Row in Somerville, the lure of transit-oriented development near the MBTA’s Orange Line station, new parks and improving connections to the long-inaccessible waterfront, and potential ripples from the 2019 opening of the billion-dollar Wynn Boston Harbor casino in Everett.
“Wynn is going to drive employment in that area and more entertainment down the road from where you live,” said Lars Unhjem, vice president of development for Mill Creek Residential, which is nearing completion of the 347-unit Modera Medford apartment complex off Revere Beach Parkway. “It reinforces our positioning here: that you’re just outside downtown Boston with discounts from those costs and improving amenities.”
On the office side, developer John Preotle is in talks with a potential anchor tenant to jump-start construction of an approved 115,750 office/lab building in the River’s Edge development on Revere Beach Parkway. Malden-based Combined Properties is building a 55,000-square-foot speculative office building at 295 Canal St. in Malden, where economic development officials are looking to the industrial Commercial Street corridor as a potential growth area for high-wage jobs.
Bouncing Back From Telecom Bust
The state created a regional authority, the Mystic Valley Development Commission, in 1996 to oversee redevelopment of 215 acres on both sides of the Malden River spanning portions of Medford, Malden and Everett. Many of the parcels were contaminated from past industrial uses such as plating and tanning companies.
The area was initially marketed as “Telecom City” with hopes of luring the booming sector and generating more than 7,000 jobs. After the telecom bubble burst in 2001, the neighborhood was renamed “River’s Edge” and a more balanced development approach emerged, including housing.
Preotle, Lane & Assoc. acquired 30 acres on the Medford side of the river and developed one office building, 200 River’s Edge, while selling two parcels to Criterion Development Partners for a pair of apartment complexes, 100 and 150 River’s Edge, containing a combined 504 units.
The second building, which is scheduled for completion in early fall, also will contain 18,500 square feet of retail space that’s currently available.
Preotle and broker Transwestern Consulting Group are now marketing 115,750 square feet of office and lab space in a second Gensler-designed building, 400 River’s Edge.
“We’re talking with a group that would take a big chunk of space and if that comes to pass, we would definitely proceed,” Preotle said. “If it doesn’t, we’d have to redirect our sights and possible proceed with a spec building.”
More than a decade after a Telecom City strategy failed, economic development officials are looking to attract job growth with a mixed-use development strategy around Wellington Circle.
Average asking rents in Medford’s 667,000-square-foot class A office market were unchanged from the previous year at $39 per square foot in the second quarter, according to Perry Brokerage Assoc. research. The vacancy rate was 33 percent, up from 24.6 percent in 12 months, partly reflecting First Marblehead Corp.’s move from One Cabot Road to 200 Clarendon St. in Boston.
As part of Massachusetts Department of Transportation’s Woods Memorial Bridge replacement project, new pedestrian and bicycle paths are being built under the Revere Beach Parkway overpass, connecting River’s Edge to Wellington station.
Vision Of A ‘Thriving’ Commercial Street Corridor
Just to the north, the MVDC – which is run by staff from Malden’s redevelopment authority – is working with Malden officials on a new strategy for the Commercial Street corridor. The area is primarily occupied by low-density retail and industrial buildings.
MassDevelopment funded a study which will recommend an optimal mix of land uses and design guidelines, with a priority on employment growth, said Deborah Burke, executive director of the Malden Redevelopment Authority.
“The city wants to create jobs and balanced mixed-use development to make it a more thriving area, in light of the fact you have amenities such as the river and you’re sandwiched in between two public transit stops,” Burke said, referring to Wellington and Malden Center.
Similar to River’s Edge, the success of National Development’s Station Landing project followed a failed single-use approach to redeveloping a 16-acre shopping center property as a traditional office park.
Newton-based National Development acquired the bank-owned Station Landing property in 2004 and gained approvals for one of the region’s first high-density mixed-use developments in the suburbs. It built 650 condominiums and apartments above 100,000 square feet of shops and restaurants, with a Main Street layout rather than large surface parking lots.
“Wellington Circle at the time did not have the greatest of reputations and we felt we really had to put a new brand on it and build a new neighborhood,” said Ted Tye, managing partner of National Development. “Most communities did not really understand this concept of creating urban development. To Medford’s credit and I think to ours, we explained it well and they embraced it.”
The final phase of Station Landing, the 190-room AC Hotel by Marriott Boston North, was completed in 2016. Station Landing’s mixed-use development model is being replicated at such recent projects such as Assembly Row in Somerville and Arsenal Mall property in Watertown, as well as National Development’s Ink Block in Boston’s South End.
