Famine Memorial on the corner of School and Washington Street
Of the many parts of Boston that I have wandered through in the past few years, one of my favorite areas has been the Downtown area. The unique look of its brick and marble buildings that seem to have been there for centuries mingled with newly erected high-rises have always appealed to me. This mixture of old and new likely means historically significant monuments and buildings as well as remodeling and renovations of parts of the site. The combination, I think, could make for a very interesting read of the area. Some of the aspects of the site that intrigued me most were the Granary Burying Ground, located in the northwest side of the site on Tremont St., the luxury condo complex located at 45 Province St., and the location of Suffolk University. In addition to these fascinating aspects of the site, I found the fact that the Downtown area has several different land use types very interesting. For example, a good portion of the site I have selected is being used for institutional purposes as the location of Suffolk University as well as several churches. There is also a very small area used for residential purposes, however, a majority of the area is used commercially.
Since most of the area is dedicated to commercial land use, there is no one area where it is concentrated. However there is a pattern that the commercial use follows. Most of the retail use (stores) is located along Washington, Winter, Bromfield, and Tremont street. The office spaces also follow this pattern because many of the offices in the area are located on the upper floors of the same buildings in which the retail stores are located. In addition, there are two large hotels on Tremont St. (Omni Parker House and Nine Zero) as well as the Orpheum Theatre, located on Hamilton PI off Tremont.
Top Left: The Tremont Temple. Bottom Left: The Park Street Congrigational church. Right: Suffolk University’s Rosalie K. Stahl Center on Tremont St.
Though these areas are very interesting, the land uses that I found most interesting were the institutional and residential uses. The institutional uses for this area can be divided into churches and schools. The churches are clustered along Park St. next to the Park Street Church and the Granary Burying Ground. Park St. is bordered by Boston commons on one side and the churches/Christian institutions of some sort on the other. The entire row of buildings on the street is dedicated to Christian institutions, which I found to be rather interesting. The main question that comes to mind when passing this area is “Why?” Why did the owners or the city choose to use an entire row of buildings for religious purposes only? There is also another church (The Tremont Temple Baptist Church) located right between the Omni Parker House and Nine Zero hotels. The location of this church also raises the question of why it was placed there. Or perhaps more accurately why the two hotels where placed right next to a church since Nine Zero in particular looks as though it was constructed more recently than the Tremont Temple.
The other type of institutional use observed was Suffolk University. This institution has two buildings located in my site along Tremont Street. One of the buildings seems to be the main building located on the corner of Tremont and Bromfield St. The other is Suffolk University’s Rosalie K. Stahl Center located next to the Granary Burying Ground on the corner of Beacon and Tremont. The second building also contains a Citizens Bank branch. The location of this institution is very interesting. It seems odd that a university, which was established in the early 1900s would be located in such a densely populated area.
The residential use in this site is also perplexing. The only major residential use observed was 45 Province St. This seems to be a fairly new (built within the last 5 years) building which contains luxury condos for sale. Its placement within the Province St. area is perplexing, as the area doesn’t exactly say “luxury.” The surrounding buildings are a few retail stores and a very large restaurant called GEM, none of which add a high-end look to the area. The question of when and why this location was chosen for a luxury condominium residence tower comes to mind upon seeing 45 Province.
Overall, I believe this will be a very interesting site to investigate as there are many historical sites as well as new and modern uses of the area.
Site boundaries. (Image from Google Maps)