Developers reach $55M deal on project over Boston highway

BOSTON (AP) — The developers of a major proposed project that would span a section of the Massachusetts Turnpike in Boston near Fenway Park have closed a deal with the state’s transportation agency worth $55 million.

Developers, Meredith Management and IQHQ, agreed to buy the air rights over the highway from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation on Friday, the Boston Globe reported.

The project will build a 2-acre deck over the highway and then a 350-foot (107-meter) tower that includes lab space meant to attract life-science companies as tenants, the newspaper reported. It will be located between Brookline Avenue and Beacon Street.

In the first phase of construction, the company will drive 500 piles into the sides and median of the turnpike and then lay 90,000 square feet (8,361 square meters) of steel over top as a foundation for the building complex.

Meredith Management and IQHQ will pay the $55 million lease upfront.

The site, dubbed the “Fenway Center project,” will be the second major project under construction above the turnpike. Lane closures required for construction will be coordinated between the projects, officials said.

“We’re confident that the traffic management plan, the highway management plan, is a good one,” Scott Bosworth, undersecretary of transportation and chief strategy officer at MassDOT, told the newspaper. “It will not lead to any substantial impacts to the motoring public.”

John Rosenthal, the head of Meredith Management, called the project, “a new gateway into Boston.” The tower does not yet have tenants, as construction is not expected to be completed for at least four years, the newspaper reported.