Locals Belabor Lab Construction

Community members weighed in on the most recent development plans for Harvard-owned properties located next to the Arnold Arboretum at a meeting in the Boston neighborhood of Roslindale last night.

The University plans to construct a three-story building on Weld Hill that will house administrative offices and labs specializing in genetic and environmental research. The project is estimated to cost a total of $29 million.

Harvard submitted its first proposals in March 2003, but allowed the project to lapse before refocusing its attention on the site this fall.

“There was a sort of hold put on it in order for the academic planning to catch up,” said Kevin McCluskey ’76, Harvard’s director of community relations for Boston.

At last night’s meeting, held at the Roslindale Hebrew Rehabilitation Center, State Rep. Jeffrey Sanchez said the delay suggested that Harvard was conflicted about their plans for the site.

“Your issues—Harvard issues—work it out,” said Sanchez, who represents the district where the arboretum is located. “But when it comes to the community we want a clear message.”

But Director of the Arboretum Robert Cook said the project was back on track and that it had received the “green light” from the Harvard Corporation in a Dec. 5 meeting.

The plan discussed last night eliminates many of the more controversial elements—like the destruction of an historic farmhouse—of the original proposal.

Instead of three new facilities, the University will construct just one 40,000-square foot building on Weld Hill, an approximately 15-acre parcel of land owned by Harvard on the periphery of the arboretum.   

While members of a community task force did not object to the plans presented at the meeting, they accused the University of neglecting more specific issues of concern.

“What I see tonight is a lot of responsiveness from the design standpoints that have already been raised,” said Carter Wilkie, a member of the Longfellow Area Neighborhood Association Board of Directors.

“But we’ve sort of danced around the elephant in the room,” he added. “I’m concerned that we haven’t really gotten into the meaty issues.”

In three letters submitted to the University since 2003, task force members have asked the University to guarantee the protection of open space and offer community benefits, like school programs and policing.

Fears of “institutional creep” also permeated the meeting, prompting demands that the University address its long-term plans.

“I think I must have missed something somewhere,” Sanchez said. “I thought we were master planning.”

Gerald Autler, project manager for the Boston Redevelopment Authority, said Harvard was tentatively set to submit an institutional master plan for the area in April 2006 after soliciting residents’ feedback.

“There is no timeline here set in stone,” Autler added, “Our objective is to address all of the issues in a timely way.”

Autler proposed that the task force and the University reconvene in mid-January to formulate principles to guide the development of the rest of the site.

The 265-acre Arnold Arboretum in Jamaica Plain houses a collection of over 14,000 different plants and receives 250,000 visitors a year.

Originally Harvard property, it was donated to the city in 1882 to be included in the park system designed by landscape architect Frederick Law Olmstead. Boston then leased the park back to Harvard for 1,000 years.

—Staff writer Natalie I. Sherman can be reached at nsherman@fas.harvard.edu.