The Watertown Mall — home to Target, the RMV and Best Buy — could soon be sold to a developer looking to create life science lab space, according to a Boston Globe article.
The potential deal involved a sale by owners Rosen Associates Management Corp. to Alexandria Real Estate Equities, which also owns the Arsenal on the Charles and the former Mount Auburn Club. The sales price of the 18-acre-site on Arsenal Street is reportedly $125 million, according to the Globe.
The property lies in the Regional Mixed Use District (RMUD) zone in East Watertown, which allows for taller buildings (up to five stories) and more dense development (75 percent building coverage) than most areas of town. The RMUD also includes the Arsenal Yards property.
Alexandria recently announced plans to add buildings to Arsenal on the Charles, and the creation of a biotech manufacturing center run by Harvard, MIT, local hospitals and biotech companies. The firm also seeks to build life science space on the site of the former Mount Auburn Club on Coolidge Avenue
The Globe article also notes that Target has a long-term lease. Other tenants of the Watertown Mall include the Joyful Garden Chinese restaurant, Miss Maria’s School of Dance, Carter’s and Work N’ Gear.
Read the entire Boston Globe article by clicking here.
Lab space, lab space and more lab space. Personally, I’d rather see this developed into a mixed use complex (new housing along with retail/restaurants and perhaps some lab space too) versus something that won’t benefit neighborhood residents (aside from the tax revenue). I’d be fine with another Arsenal Yards. Boylston Properties have been doing a fantastic job with the entire complex. I wouldn’t mind them taking over this project as well.
It was just another step towards turning our town to their city with the help of greedy corprates.
People still need a place to shop and park.
I saw this coming 2 years ago when Arsenal Yards started going up that the Watertown mall was next on the chopping block. I just didn’t expect it this soon.
News like this makes me wish even more that Wal-Mart had come here instead of that abomination at Irving St and Arsenal that was put up instead.
Perhaps the writer could fix the first sentence to put in the missing word (“Mall”) and change “created” to “create”. Also, the Boston Globe article indicates a deal (though not yet finalized) is in place – that seems to rise above the level of “rumors” as your headline calls this.
I used rumors because they don’t have any named sources.
Thanks for the corrections.
IMO, newspapers shouldn’t even publish things they categorize as rumors. If the Boston Globe felt there was enough substance to publish without naming sources, then if I were writing this article for the Watertown News, I might headline this as “Reports of sale…”
I hope the town has some influence on this proposed project. If we lose the Registry, there are no others in close proximity. If we lose Target, not my absolute favorite store, but necessary for people looking for general items, seniors don’t have access to any big stores with assorted merchandise. Even Best Buy is necessary for tech stuff and again, there are no other options in our locale. I fear we are overdoing the biotech section and not diversifying our businesses in town.
I’m afraid I disagree with many of the commenters: Alexandria is a really good outfit and they recognize that the only way Watertown will compete with Kendall Sq in biotech is to cluster the developments. Otherwise the biotech that has been built so far in Watertown will fail. Target can go anywhere (like across the street). The Registry can go back in their old building behind the CVS. But I would rather see high-level development in Watertown rather than cheap malls. These developments bring less traffic as well. I also disagree that the Arsenal Yards is a good project. It is full of has-been chain stores. Maybe getting rid of Watertown Mall will offer a chance to revitalize Watertown Square.
I agree that clusters of this sort will help the business succeed possibly though I doubt Target could just go across the street. There is no large venue there available other than possibly Marshalls (which is smaller footprint from what Target has today). I use Target weekly and would hate to see another store go away of this sort. I believe this is one of the most profitable Targets in US? No doubt Biotech will be built here but will they have a vision to also include some restaurants , possibly DMV and Target? I would hope that DMV could move somewhere else but the location behind CVS looks utilized. Hopefully the DMV will land somewhat close to Watertown as will Target(less hopeful here given their need for some space). I would hope some balance could be maintained with respect to other business and quality of our city though easier said than done( given most of this is organic vs with purpose). With the loss of Russos and then the Stop N Shop just down the street from Russo’s, Biotech is great for tax revenue but feast or famine, not so great for the balance portion. Possibly our City can look for ways to encourage some balance with respect to multi-use/BioTech. The workers need to eat/shop somewhere..Arsenal Yards has some places but possibly so could the area of the Mall.
Target and the DMV are utilized by so many of us as a convenience that we should consider keeping them. Let’s reflect on this wave of bio-tech labs and proceed with caution.