Together, those and many other developments promise to provide what the waterfront lacks: sustained activity on streets that currently empty out after 5 p.m., when thousands of office workers head home for the night.
“It’s incredibly important to get residences down there,’’ said Ed Nardi, a principal of Cresset Development, which is proposing to build the 197-unit complex on D Street. He said he hopes the project will “add a 24-7 element to the area’’ and give more reasons for retailers and growing companies to move there.
The waterfront, branded the Innovation District by Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino, has already proved successful at attracting new companies. By the city’s count, more than 90 businesses have moved there during the past two years, helping to spur construction of new complexes like Liberty Wharf (also by Cresset Development) and Joseph Fallon’s 23-acre Fan Pier project.
But the district remains in the early stages of its redevelopment, with much of its landscape still fenced-off industrial yards and massive parking lots. In many places it still feels desolate and windswept, with few walking connections among its restaurants, attractions, and scattered public parks.
The upcoming apartment projects will fill in some of that empty space and begin to generate around-the-clock activity, but real estate specialists said it’s an open question whether people will move to the area en masse if it doesn’t have basic retail options such as a supermarket.
“It will be interesting to see at what point people start to look around and say, ‘We need the rest of the neighborhood to catch up before we move in,’ ’’ said Greg Vasil, chief executive of the Greater Boston Real Estate Board. “They may decide to wait because the other amenities are not there yet.’’
Many of the proposed projects would address that shortcoming by incorporating new retail stores and restaurants into their buildings. At Seaport Square, developer John B. Hynes, has talked of opening a cinema complex as part of a multistory retail base that would also include other retail shops, restaurants, and possibly a supermarket.
