Boston, MA

Boston’s future depends on whether we remember lessons from the past – The Boston Globe

Published

1 year ago

August 27, 2023

Boston’s future depends on whether we remember lessons from the past – The Boston Globe

In the 19th century, Boston was home to the American Industrial Revolution, the abolition movement, and the women’s rights movement. It was known as the “Athens of America,” and its population grew so fast that we needed to fill in the South Cove, South End, Back Bay, and parts of East Boston and South Boston.

The mud flats in the Back Bay, later filled in for development, were plainly visible in this 1858 photo taken from the State House.Boston Public Library

What followed? From the early 1920s, when a national recession prompted the region’s industrial base to shutter and chase lower-cost labor, through the 1980s, a decade that ended with the embarrassment of the Charles Stuart murder-suicide, Boston was an urban basket case. In 1959, Boston’s bonds were rated at just above junk level. In 1950, the population of the city was over 800,000; by 1980, the city had lost nearly 300,000 people. As recently as 1982, the Brookings Institute declared Boston the most blighted big city in America.

As a land-use attorney, I talk regularly with real estate development clients grappling with the question of whether to continue to invest in Boston. After all, the future for the city seems shakier than it has in a generation, with Boston wrestling with housing, transportation, climate change, and equity crises. Hybrid work has emptied downtown, shuttered businesses that cater to workers, and threatened the city’s tax base.

To answer my clients’ questions, I felt I had to better understand why Boston triumphed for nearly a century, then stagnated for seven decades, only to succeed again over the last three decades. Starting in 2017, I read every book I could find about Boston history. I found nearly 300 of them by scouring used bookstores and hunting them on the web. I was looking for patterns and practices that have coincided with urban success and failure, which I describe in a forthcoming 800-page book, “A History of Boston.”

The Boston Public Library main building, which opened its doors in 1895.CHARLES KRUPA

What have I learned?

Colonial and Federal-period Boston, as the financial capital of New England, enjoyed a maritime (fishing and whaling) / agrarian (farming) / mercantile (trade) economy. The region’s whaling ships spanned the globe and provided the oil that lit cities like London, its trading ships called upon ports in China, India, Russia, and (sadly) Africa (as part of the triangular trade in enslaved persons). Yet, by the 1840s, Boston’s tripartite economy was in steep decline, with farmers leaving the region for the fertile grounds of the Ohio River Valley and the Erie Canal funneling the nation’s products to New York instead of Boston.

But Boston proved itself resilient. A city of ideas, Boston in the 19th century embraced religious reform (Unitarianism), philosophical exchange (Transcendentalism), educational advances (led by pioneers like Horace Mann), medical innovation (Susan Dimock, Dorothea Dix), and prison restructuring. Famous as the center of the American abolition movement in the 1850s, Boston is less well known for the nation’s first civil rights movement, in the 1840s, when the city’s free Black community used all the tools that later became familiar during the 1950s and 1960s civil rights movement in the American South — civil disobedience, picketing, lobbying, leafletting, and litigation — to integrate places of worship and employment and, finally in 1851, the schools (even if that integration, as we learned in the 1970s, proved short-lived). Boston’s willingness in the 19th century to accept new and diverse ideas — ideas that challenged orthodoxies — laid the foundation for the innovation that drove the American Industrial Revolution and made New England a manufacturing powerhouse.

The African Meeting House on Beacon Hill.Wendy Maeda/Globe Staff

Yet when those mills started closing in the 1920s, after the 1920 recession and the shutting of the country’s borders to immigrants in 1924, Boston did not reform its economy. For seven decades, Boston did not innovate. Instead, Boston retreated to tribalism — white vs. Black, Protestant vs. Catholic — shutting out diverse people and ideas. “Banned in Boston” was a real thing; Boston had a city censor into the 1980s! Rather than investing in the city as it had in the 19th century, Boston tore down its dense neighborhoods in the name of urban renewal and highway building, letting people and jobs move to the suburbs.

It turns out that for cities to evolve and thrive, innovation must be actively cultivated by creating inviting spaces that bring together diverse people with diverse ideas. The three Ds — density, diversity, and good urban design — are the foundation for city building. Only when Boston reembraced these principles, starting with the backlash against urban renewal in the 1960s and finally more broadly in the 1990s, did the city finally reinvent itself with its knowledge-based economy of the last three decades.

These principles are our best local response to the concurrent crises we face today. Building dense housing in the city and near public transportation addresses our housing shortage and gets people out of their cars, improving our roadways and reducing carbon emissions — and creates the conditions in which we have learned from our history that innovation thrives.

The pandemic shook our faith in urbanism. Yet the vaccines that helped us get past the worst of COVID-19 were all created in urban areas, including Moderna’s here in Greater Boston, and some of the best hospitals to treat the effects of the pandemic were in the city. Remote working sure is convenient, but innovation depends on bringing people together again. We knew these basic principles of urbanism in the 19th century (even if that term was not known then), we forgot them through much of the 20th century, and we’ll need to remember them in the 21st.

Daniel P. Dain, a partner in the Boston law firm of Dain, Torpy, Le Ray, Wiest & Garner, is the author of “A History of Boston,” due out on Sept. 19. He will be discussing the book at the Cambridge Public Library at 6 pm on Sept. 18, in an event sponsored by the Harvard Book Store.

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Boston, MA

Below freezing temperatures again today

Published

8 hours ago

January 15, 2025

Press Room

The winds are still going Wednesday, but the air temperatures remain at respectable levels. Highs will manage to weasel up to 30 in most spots. It’s too bad we’re not going to feel them at face value. Instead, we’re dressing for temps in the teens all day today.

Thursday and Friday are the picks of the week.

There will be a lot less wind, reasonable winter temperatures in the 30s and a decent amount of sun. We’ll be quiet into the weekend, as our next weather system approaches.

With mild air expected to come north on southerly winds, highs will bounce back to the low and mid-40s both days of the weekend.

Showers will be delayed until late day/evening on Saturday and into the night. There may be a few early on Sunday too, but the focus on that day will be to bring in the cold.

Highs will briefly sneak into the 40s, then fall late day.

We’ll also watch a batch of snow late Sunday night as it moves up the Eastern Seaboard.

Right now, there is a potential for some accumulation as it moves overhead Sunday night and early Monday morning.

It appears to be a weak, speedy system, so we’re not expecting it to pull any punches.

Enjoy the quieter spell of weather!

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Boston, MA

Boston City Councilor will introduce

Published

17 hours ago

January 14, 2025

Press Room

BOSTON – It could cost you more to get a soda soon. The Boston City Council is proposing a tax on sugary drinks, saying the money on unhealthy beverages can be put to good use.

A benefit for public health?

“I’ve heard from a lot of residents in my district who are supportive of a tax on sugary beverages, but they want to make sure that these funds are used for public health,” said City Councilor Sharon Durkan, who is introducing the “Sugar Tax,” modeled on Philadelphia and Seattle. She said it’s a great way to introduce and fund health initiatives and slowly improve public health.

A study from Boston University found that cities that implemented a tax on sugary drinks saw a 33% decrease in sales.

“What it does is it creates an environment where we are discouraging the use of something that we know, over time, causes cancer, causes diet-related diseases, causes obesity and other diet-related illnesses,” she said.

Soda drinkers say no to “Sugar Tax”

Soda drinkers don’t see the benefit.

Delaney Doidge stopped by the store to get a mid-day pick-me-up on Tuesday.

“I wasn’t planning on getting anything, but we needed toilet paper, and I wanted a Diet Coke, so I got a Diet Coke,” she said, adding that a tax on sugary drinks is an overreach, forcing her to ask: What’s next?

“Then we’d have to tax everything else that brings people enjoyment,” Doidge said. “If somebody wants a sweet treat, they deserve it, no tax.”

Store owners said they’re worried about how an additional tax would impact their businesses.

Durkan plans to bring the tax idea before the City Council on Wednesday to start the conversation about what rates would look like.

Massachusetts considered a similar tax in 2017.

Logan Hall

Logan Hall is an Emmy award-winning reporter who joined WBZ-TV in November 2024.

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Boston, MA

Patience over panic: Kristaps Porzingis and the Celtics struggles

Published

1 day ago

January 14, 2025

Press Room

Patience over panic: Kristaps Porzingis and the Celtics struggles

The Celtics aren’t playing great basketball. Coincidence or not, this stretch has coincided with the return and reintegration of Kristaps Porzingis. In 23 games without the big man, Boston has a record of 19-4—with him in the lineup, that falls to a much less flattering 9-7 record.

This has put his value on trial, and opened the door to discussions about whether a move to the bench could be helpful for everyone involved. It’s not a crazy idea by any means, but it’s shortsighted and an oversimplification of why the team has struggled of late.

While Kristaps attempts to slide back into his role, there’s an adjustment period that the team naturally has to go through. That’s roughly 13 shots per game being taken from the collective and handed to one individual. It’s a shift that can impact that entire rotation, but it’s also not unfamiliar to the team—by now, they’re used to the cycle of Porzingis’ absence and return.

KP hasn’t been the same game-breaking player that we’ve come to know, but he’s not that far off. He isn’t hunting shots outside of the flow of the offense, and the coaching staff isn’t force-feeding him either.

This table shows a comparison in the volume and efficiency of Kristaps’ most used play types from the past two seasons. Across the board, the possessions per game have remained very similar, while the efficiency has taken a step back.

He’s shooting below the standard he established for himself during the championship run, but the accuracy should come around as he gets more comfortable and confident in his movements post-injury. Porzingis opened up about this after a win over the Nuggets, sharing his progress.

“80-85%. I still have a little bit to go.” Porzingis said. “I know that moment is coming when everything will start clicking, and I’ll play really high-level basketball.”

In theory, sending KP to the bench would allow him to face easier matchups and build his conditioning back up. On a similar note, he and the starters have a troubling -8.9 net rating. With that said, abandoning this unit so quickly is an overreaction and works against the purpose of the regular season.

It may require patience, but we’re talking about a starting lineup that had a +17.3 net rating over seven playoff games together. Long term, it’s more valuable to let them figure it out, rather than opt for a temporary fix.

It can’t be ignored that the Celtics are also getting hit by a wrecking ball of poor shooting luck in his minutes. Opponents are hitting 33.78% of their three-pointers with him on the bench, compared to a ridiculously efficient 41.78% when he’s on the court. To make matters worse, Boston is converting 37.21% of their own 3’s without KP, and just 32.95% with him.

Overall, there’s a -8.83% differential between team and opponent 3PT efficiency with Porzingis in the game. This is simply unsustainable, and it’s due for positive regression eventually.

Despite his individual offensive struggles, Porzingis has been elite as a rim protector. Among 255 players who have defended at least 75 shots within 6 feet of the basket, he has the best defensive field goal percentage in the NBA at 41.2%. Players are shooting 20.9% worse than expected when facing Kristaps at the rim.

Boston is intentional about which shooters they’re willing to leave open and when to funnel drives toward Porzingis. Teams are often avoiding these drives, and accepting open looks from mediocre shooters—recently, with great success. Both of these factors play into the stark difference in opponent 3PT%.

The numbers paint a disappointing picture, but from a glass-half-full perspective, there’s plenty of room for positive regression. Last season, the starting lineup shot 39.31% from beyond the arc and limited opponents to 36.75%. This year, they’ve struggled, shooting just 27.61% themselves, while opponents are converting at an absurd 46.55%.

Ultimately, the Celtics’ struggles seem more like a temporary blip, fueled by frustrating shooting luck and a slow return to form for Kristaps, rather than a reason to panic. The core of this team has already proven their ability to perform together at a high level, and sticking with the current configuration gives them the best chance to break out of the slump.

Allowing Porzingis to round into shape and cranking up the defensive intensity should help offset some of the shooting woes. As Porzingis eloquently put it, “with this kind of talent in this locker room, it’s impossible that we don’t start playing better basketball.” When water finds its level, the game will start to look easy again.

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