The big pout

Tom Menino should stop whining and give Frank McCourt's waterfront proposal a serious look

Mayor Tom Menino is faced with a momentous decision. He can do what's best for the future of the South Boston Waterfront and, indeed, the entire city. Or he can pout, the better to indulge his ample but fragile ego. So far -- unfortunately, but unsurprisingly -- he has chosen the latter course. But it's not too late for him to get over his tantrum and get back to the business of the people.

Late last month, developer Frank McCourt, who owns 25 acres near the waterfront, unveiled an audacious proposal: to unite his property with a 16-acre parcel, owned by the Pritzker family, that directly abuts the harbor. In this proposal, profit would play a secondary role to smart urban planning. The Pritzkers' plan for offices, hotel space, and housing has been widely criticized as too tall and dense, walling off the waterfront from the surrounding neighborhood. McCourt's alternative would shift the heavy-duty development to his own property, opening up the Pritzker land to uses more appropriate to a harborside location. As an incentive, McCourt proposes a profit-sharing arrangement with the Pritzkers, who otherwise would stand to lose under McCourt's plan.

Granted, McCourt hasn't exactly gone about this in a way designed to win friends and influence people. Rather than negotiate ahead of time with the Pritzkers and with Menino's office, he instead unveiled his proposal to the press. Rather than form a partnership with the city, McCourt formed a partnership with the Conservation Law Foundation, a respected environmental group whose role, in this instance, appears to be limited to threatening a lawsuit if Menino doesn't push for a less-dense development on the Pritzker property. Then, too, the Pritzkers' proposal, flawed though it may be, would help revitalize what has traditionally been a wasteland area. McCourt -- who operates parking lots on much of his property -- has been, until now, more a part of the problem than a part of the solution.

Menino's stubborn embrace of the Pritzkers and his refusal to deal with McCourt, though, smacks of Old Boston, the Boston of politics and revenge. McCourt and the Pritzkers reportedly don't get along. And it has apparently been some time since McCourt and Menino exchanged Christmas cards. In a recent column in the Boston Globe, Brian McGrory quoted a Menino who seemed far more upset that McCourt had not shown him the proper deference than with any of the specifics of McCourt's plan. "Do I have to be the tail here? He's doing everything his way," Menino said of McCourt. McGrory accurately observed that "too often, Menino, a good man, is overcome by his worst instincts."

His worst instincts aside, the mayor's objections are, in part, understandable. The Pritzkers' plan is good to go, and would represent a huge improvement over what is there now. Menino wants to make it happen before the next recession or the end of his mayoralty, whichever comes first. But another six- or 12-month delay is nothing when compared to the fact that the decisions made today will have to be lived with for the next 100 years or more.

The waterfront represents the city's first chance since the 1800s, when the Back Bay was built out of filled-in swampland, to create an entirely new neighborhood. The decisions made then were visionary. If the South Boston Waterfront is to be a vibrant neighborhood, developers, city officials, and neighborhood activists must be no less visionary. McCourt's plan is worth a serious, thoughtful look by the mayor and his advisers.

Menino has reportedly declined even to return McCourt's calls. That's wrong. The mayor owes it to the people of Boston, and to the legacy he's so concerned about, to at least pick up the phone.

Maybe he'll even like what he hears.

What do you think? Send an e-mail to letters[a]phx.com.