 A rendering of the planned library and housing project at 55 Hudson St. in Chinatown – credit, Stantec Set to begin development in Boston’s historic Chinatown, an affordable housing complex will perch atop a branch of the Boston Public Library system. It’s been 60 years since Chinatown had a BPL branch, and activists see it as the full-circle closure of a saga that began when it lost that branch all those years ago. Demolished as part of a plan to thread Interstate 93 through town, the Chinatown library was located on Tyler St., near stretches of brick rowhouses inhabited by immigrants. A temporary library was opened nearby. The rowhouses were demolished as part of an urban renewal project around the same time, which drove up rents and forced many residents to relocate to cheaper neighborhoods. Now however, the interstate artery was demolished in 2008, and since 2021, the city has aimed at following New York City and Chicago’s lead of building affordable housing atop libraries—a community service at the very feet of the community that uses it. “Families who live here will not only have affordable homes, they will also have a library just steps away, a place for children to learn, for elders to connect, for workers and students to find opportunity and to do so in community together,” said BPL President David Leonard, according to the Boston Globe. Designed by Italian architecture firm Stantec, the 12-story mixed-use development project on 55 Hudson St. will include rental and subsidized condominium units on the top 10 floors. “Seventy years ago, Hudson Street was a vibrant and tightknit immigrant community,” said Angie Liou, executive director of the Asian Community Development Corporation. “If it were not for the organizing of long time activists … we would not have reclaimed these parcels for community uses.” Furthermore, BPL’s West End branch, on Cambridge Street near Mass. General Hospital, will be built over with an additional 13 floors containing 111 apartments. “An essential function of modern libraries is to be a gathering space for residents of the neighborhoods we’re in,” Leonard said in 2023. “By building housing and libraries together, we’re dramatically improving the overall benefit that we’re having on the community.”Upham’s Corner is the third library location being proposed. Boston to Open Series of Affordable Housing Developments Atop City's Public Libraries |
