First Street Assemblage, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Located along the block of First Street between Charles Street and Hurley Street, this project will create a new vibrant neighborhood containing a 118-unit apartment building, an 18-unit building on Charles Street and 14,800 square feet of ground floor retail space along the entire First Street edge. The site will also contain 28 surface parking spaces for retail customers accessed from Hurley Street and not visible from First Street.  A parking garage will extend underneath all of the buildings providing parking for 142 vehicles and 160 bicycles.  A half-acre on-structure park will cover the garage and tie the buildings together providing a central open space and a mid-block pedestrian connection between Charles and Hurley Street.
The proposed development pursues the four major urban design goals framed by the Eastern Cambridge Planning Study (ECaPS) and the PUD 4B guidelines: 1) Provide significant housing 2) Reinforce and enhance the residential quality of Charles Street and pedestrian experience on the block between Second Street and First Street 3) Create a lively active experience on First Street with continuous retail frontage and appropriately scaled buildings, and 4) Provide significant open space and mid-block connections. Through negotiations and cooperation of multiple landowners, the project has been able to create a development that accomplishes all four major goals.