Thursday, June 20th marked a significant milestone for Boston's Allston-Brighton neighborhood as a ribbon-cutting ceremony officially opened Building A at Allston Yards.
Spanning over 1.2 million square feet, Allston Yards is a mixed-use transit-oriented community conceived on the site of a former suburban-style shopping center. The completed neighborhood will comprise offices, retail, and open space. The newly inaugurated Building A houses a state-of-the-art Stop & Shop grocery store, alongside other retail stores aimed at supplying essential services and stimulating local commerce.
Located adjacent to Boston Landing—a hub for office spaces, residences, and sports facilities that host the Celtics and Bruins training facilities and the New Balance Corporate Headquarters—Allston Yards is conceptualized with an emphasis on connectivity, community engagement, and accessibility.
VHB has played a pivotal role in the site’s transformation. Our team has been intricately involved since the project's inception, addressing site challenges and advancing development. VHB has a long working history with Stop & Shop and the development team, both locally and nationally, providing integrated engineering services—permitting, environmental, and site/civil engineering services—for numerous developments. Moreover, Allston Yards is located near both our Watertown headquarters and Boston office, making the project one that is close to home for more than 500 VHB employees.
Looking ahead, the second phase of Allston Yards calls for the construction of 719 units of housing, parking, retail, and 375,000 square feet of office space. VHB worked on plans to convert the existing retail space and parking lot into a new four-block complex with new roads, utilities, sidewalks, and cycle tracks. The project embraces multimodal initiatives from the City of Boston. VHB collaborated with the MBTA to provide new connections to their station, utilizing underused MBTA right-of-way areas for new sidewalks and bike accommodations. Additionally, VHB addressed challenging traffic issues at the Everett Street/Guest Street intersection.
The success of Allston Yards is a result of the collaboration between VHB and key partners: Stantec, The Bozzuto Group, Southside Investment Partners, New England Development, Copley-Wolff Design Group, and others.
Future phases will continue with additional residential and office buildings, aiming to seamlessly integrate into Boston's urban fabric and set new standards for quality and integration.
Learn more about how VHB partners with developers for mixed-use projects.
