Finishing Touches For Waterfront Square

The final building in the Waterfront Square development is ready to be built, marking over two decades of development along Ocean Avenue.

The Zoning Board of Appeals granted several variances for a brand new, 12-story, 230-unit residential apartment building to be built by principal Andy Montelli and Post Road Realty, LLC at Lot 2, 656 Ocean Ave.

Parking will also be included in the building and it will be included in the rent – a bone of contention with the city since other developers have forced people to park in the street or pay extra for the privilege to park in the building. The building will also have a coffee shop.

Attorney Corey Rhodes, who represents Post Road Realty, said this is the final vacant parcel in the Wonderland Transit Oriented Development overlay district better known as WTOD.

“Post Road is a marquee developer and recently renovated the Charleston Chew factory and completed the recent development of the Harley Davidson building in Everett,” Rhodes said. “They have been lauded for their attention to detail and high quality. This is the keystone building of the WTOD.”

The lot is currently being used by the Department of Recreation and Conservation as its maintenance facility as a new DCR maintenance and bath facility are built.

Rhodes said: “It will sit between Ocean 650 and the Vanguard, just north of Wonderland station. It will finish Waterfront Square which has spanned the last two decades,”

The building will be built with steel, concrete and glass. Seventy percent of the development will be studio and one-bedroom units.

“We justly believe this is going to be the gem of Revere Beach,” Rhodes said. “We want to promote it to young professionals who commute to Boston via the T. These will be good-sized units, not micro units.”

Rhodes gave a brief history of Waterfront Square, which was created under former Mayor Tom Ambrosino, the DCR and then the MBTA. The MBTA parking garage, with 1,400 parking spaces and the Markey pedestrian bridge were also part of the project. Developers have taken formerly underutilized vacant lots and spurred on economic development in Revere.
There is also access for the fire department along the side and back of the building. There will also be an easement for maintaining the Eastern County Ditch.

The variances were for side yard setback, minimum parking ratio and maximum floor ratio.

“I want to emphasize the importance of this being the final development project in the Waterfront Square development plan,” said Bob O’Brien, director of Economic Development for Revere. “I commend the quality of this development team. They’re exactly the kind of developer Revere wants.”