Our real estate notables laid down the development trends they'd like to see laid to rest in the coming year.
Jonathan Berk, real estate attorney, founder of the BuildingBOS blog and member of Boston's Onein3 Council: Our irrational fear of micro-units… We've talked about 'em for years; living in an apartment "the size of a shoe box" is now actually an option we should revisit in earnest in 2015. We need to take a serious look at any and all creative housing options to keep a young startup economy in Boston. By giving the startup community affordable innovation housing, it will allow them the ability to continue to start and grow businesses here, now essential to our growing economy.
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Lara Gordon, a broker in Cambridge and Somerville: The focus on super-deluxe buildings—we need more units for the middle-income set.
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Charles Cherney, a broker in Cambridge and Somerville: Not venting cooktop.
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David Bates, a Boston broker and our Bates By the Numbers columnist: New luxury development plans for both apartments and condominiums.
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Paul McMorrow, Boston Globe op-ed columnist and CommonWealth magazine associate editor: Condo developments with one parking spot per unit at Broadway and Andrew stations.
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Nick Warren, president and CEO of Warren Residential: I want to see some creative architecture start happening in Boston. It seems like the focus is on designing buildings to blend in instead of inspire. While there are certainly situations where that is called for, we need to start pushing the boundaries a bit more. There are limited development opportunities in an established city like Boston so we need to take advantage of the opportunities to create iconic buildings when they come.
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John A. Keith, a Boston broker: Micro-units (if they're even still a thing). Bocce courts.
· Our The Year in Curbed Boston archive [Curbed Boston]
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