Seaport Square Adds $5 M Innovation Center

By Veronica Grecu, Associate Editor

A $5 million plan for a new “Innovation Center” at the South Boston Waterfront that would provide low-cost meeting space for start-up businesses and support the high-tech industry was revealed last week by Mayor Thomas Menino.

Designed by architecture firm Hacin + Associates Inc, the one-story structure will include 9,000 square feet of meeting space and a 3,000-square-foot restaurant that opens on a patio across from Fan Pier Park. The Center will replace a parking lot between Seaport Boulevard and Northern Avenue, in a part of Boston “that’s growing the most,” as Mayor Menino declared during his speech at the annual meeting of the Boston Municipal Research Bureau.

Work at the 12,000-square-foot Boston Public Innovation Center will start in three weeks and is scheduled for completion by early 2013, reports The Boston Globe. Once opened, the new Innovation Center will be self-supporting, based on the revenue from the restaurant and the fees paid by the start-up companies. The project is part of a $3 billion plan that aims to create a 6.3 million Seaport Square filled with office buildings, residential towers, hotels, stores and public spaces developed by local real estate development and consulting firm Boston Global Investors.

The new Innovation Center will be managed by the Cambridge Innovation Center (CIC), notes BostInno. CIC operates six floors of a building located in Kendall Square that serves 450 start-up companies.

Illustration courtesy of Hacin + Associates website