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The Cambridge Planning Board unanimously voted in a Tuesday meeting to recommend two petitions to increase height limitations for residential buildings along Massachusetts Avenue and Cambridge Street to the City Council.
The vote comes eight months after a city-wide rezoning legalized multifamily housing throughout the city. Since the upzoning, the Cambridge Community Development Department has shifted its focus to revitalizing individual squares and corridors.
In the finalized petition for Mass. Ave, the allowed height of residential buildings, currently capped at six to seven stories, will increase to eight to 12 stories – with the exception of Porter Square, which will allow up to 18 stories with a special permit.
Cambridge Street will increase allowed heights from six to eight stories if the building incorporates spaces on the first floor that promote foot traffic, like community centers, retail spaces, and some offices. The rezoning will also allow increased heights of up to 15 stories in squares along Cambridge Street.
The new zoning regulations will increase housing options and promote foot traffic, according to the CDD.
Daniel Messplay, the city’s director of community planning and design, said the adoption of the petitions would allow for 3,260 more housing units citywide — an 18 percent increase from the current zoning predictions, without consideration of other factors that might affect development.
The petitions first came to fruition after CDD staff spent more than a year workshopping the rezoning proposal with affordable housing providers and developers, small business owners, and neighborhood residents.
Despite the CDD’s extensive efforts to engage with residents, some still expressed concerns that they had not been properly consulted before the petitions were drafted.
“When people talked about hearing from the community, the most often mentioned members of the community were the city council and the various kinds of developers,” Cambridge resident Tom Rossen said.
“I don't think you have the community engagement that you think that you have,” he added.
During the public comment section of the meeting, many residents spoke in opposition of the zoning proposal after the Cambridge Citizens Coalition sent out an email urging residents to push back against raising height limitations.
Residents expressed concerns that the petition would change the character of the neighborhood and the new units would not be affordable.
“We keep selling these things as producing affordable housing,” said Cambridge resident Heather Hoffman. “At the same time as we have people giving us numbers that each of these apartments will cost a million dollars.”
Others said the change will lead to a lack of open space, parking shortages, and empty storefronts.
In response to resident concerns, members of the Planning Board said they agreed that there is some degree of uncertainty about whether the new units would be affordable.
Planning Board member Theodore “Ted” Cohen said that while he had “small comments” on some of the language used in the petition, none of them were “big issues.”
“I think this is an attempt to solve a big problem we have,” he said. “And if it doesn't work well, then, you know, the city can amend it again.”
To ease worries that the rezoning would change the character of the city, the CDD outlined a “neighborhood edge” transitional zone with an eight-story limit to provide a gradual change in allowed height from Mass. Ave to neighborhood streets.
The new zoning would also allow the construction of hotels, movie theaters, breweries, and some other retail spaces without having to obtain a special permit from the city.
“The intention behind all of these changes is to remove barriers to uses that fit well within the corridor and would contribute to a vibrant mixed-use environment,” Evan Spetrini said.
The ordinance committee will discuss whether to recommend the proposal to the full city council over the course of the next two weeks.
“Everyone talks about the rapacious developers. Well, who else is going to build the housing?” Cohen said.
“Maybe this isn’t a perfect solution, but I think it is an attempt to do something. This is a valid attempt,” he added.
— Staff writer Diego García Moreno can be reached at diego.garciamoreno@thecrimson.com.
— Staff writer Summer E. Rose can be reached at summer.rose@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @summerellenrose.
