Bird-infused rendering by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.
The owner of numerous industrial facilities and warehouses in South Boston and a Toronto developer have filed plans for an eight-building development on parcels along Pappas Way and West 1st Street in South Boston that would include 205 residential units, life-sciences lab space, a supermarket and a rebuilt one-acre park along the Reserved Channel.
In their filing with the BPDA, Pappas Enterprises and Oxford Properties Group say their 1.74-million-square-foot project - nearly as large as the Edison-plant replacement project - will include two 11-story life-sciences buildings, a 10-story building, shorter lab and office buildings and two six-story residential buildings.
Pappas owns part of the roughly 13 acres of the proposed development but leases most of the land from Massport.
The proposal lists the need for 1,161 parking spaces at the complex, currently a desolate stretch of parking lots and low-slung warehouses and garages that does not have any MBTA bus stops. However, the companies add that "the proposed parking space count will continue to be refined through discussions with the community, City, and Massport" on ways to comply with both the area's ban on new parking spaces for commercial buildings and the city's goal of "reducing vehicle miles travelled by 50% by 2030." The filing does not specify how many parking spaces the site currently has.
The plans call for construction of four new short roads from Pappas Way and West 1st Street and an extension of F Street into the development. The companies say these roads will be designed as "robust slow-speed infrastructure" aimed at prioritizing the movement of pedestrians, bicyclists and scooter riders over drivers, through traffic-calming approaches such as sidewalk bump-outs at crosswalks.
The plans call for 970 spaces for parking bicycles. Spots on each block will be reserved for ride-share drivers to pick up and drop off riders.
Also to be resolved through ongoing meetings with officials and the community: The exact nature of the units in the residential buildings - which would sit along West 1st Street.
In addition to a public park along the Reserved Channel, the plans also call for a publicly accessible "civic pavilion."
The view from the Reserved Channel:
Because the development would sit right across Pappas Way from the Reserved Channel, the companies say they will build the buildings and key infrastructure above what the city now projects for flooding in 2070.
In addition to the BPDA, the project will also need approval from Massport and state environmental officials.
The two companies say that in the long term, the project could be extended across 29 more acres of land that Pappas leases from Massport along Pappas Way and E Street. However, the filing states that this land is currently in use by a series of industrial and commercial clients, who would be allowed to continue their leases with Pappas.
Pappas holdings. Lots marked with dashed lines are the ones proposed for redevelopment now:
Reserved Channel Development filings and meeting schedule.