Connect Kendall Square Competition Finalists to Present Open Space Plans Mar. 25-26

Four finalist teams will be presenting their visions for open space in Kendall Square and eastern Cambridge as part of the city’s Connect Kendall Square open space design competition. This project presents a unique opportunity to create a framework for the entire open space network in Kendall Square and eastern Cambridge. The competition attracted a wide range of planning and design firms, which were encouraged to consider new thinking regarding not only open space design, but also connections, programming, place making, and the overall public realm.

The finalist teams will present their framework plans to the Competition Jury March 25-26 at Cambridge City Hall Annex, 344 Broadway, 2^nd floor meeting room. Presentations are open to the public and are scheduled as follows: Wednesday, Mar. 25 (SITELAB Urban Studio 1 -2:30 p.m.; Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc. 3-4:30 p.m.), and on Thursday, Mar. 26 (Richard Burck Associates 8:30- 10 a.m.; Framework Cultural Placemaking 10:30 a.m. -12 p.m.).

The vision as well as the planning and design goals for the framework are the culmination of work by the Eastern Cambridge Kendall Square Open Space (ECKOS) Planning Committee, which began meeting in May 2013 and has worked closely with city staff and the community throughout the process.  

The four multidisciplinary teams selected as finalists are Somerville based Richard Burck Associates, Cambridge and Brooklyn based Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc., Seattle based Framework, and San Francisco based SITELAB.  A public exhibition of the teams’ proposals is currently on display in the Google Connector lobby at 355 Main Street, Cambridge. The plans can also be viewed online at www.connectkendallsquare.com and www.cambridgema.gov/kendallopenspace.

Over the past several decades, Kendall Square has transformed from a former industrial area into a world-renowned center of biotech, high tech research, and innovation. In the past few years, the City of Cambridge has acquired three parcels in the area, which will be part of more than 5 acres of new and redesigned public open space. The framework derived from this competition will help determine the character and role of the new public open spaces in the area (which will be designed as part of separate, subsequent processes), and guide private entities as to potential programming and design of both existing and future open space as part of private developments.

For more information, contact Taha Jennings, Assistant to the City Manager, at 617-349-4302, tjennings@cambridgema.gov.