Boston ZBA Approves 82-Unit Jamaica Plain Development, Denies South End Lodging Expansion

BOSTON -- June 3, 2025, Boston's Zoning Board of Appeal approved more than a dozen projects at its June 3 remote hearing, anchored by a unanimous vote to advance an 82-unit mixed-use rental development at 3390 Washington Street in Jamaica Plain with 19 affordable units representing roughly 23 percent affordability. Attorney George Morancy presented the project on behalf of developer Christopher Tracy, noting that affordability exceeds both the city's standard 13 percent threshold and the 17 percent target under the Jamaica Plain planning study Plan JP Rocks; board member Eduardo Valencia praised the affordability commitment while expressing concern that the project had shed an estimated 60 to 80 units during community review from an original count of roughly 150 to 160 units. The board also unanimously approved a 14-unit rental building at 17 Linden Street in Allston, a revised, downsized project that had been denied in August 2024, and a 320-square-foot hydroponic container farm for the West End House Boys and Girls Club at 105 Alston Street, expected to yield 6,000 pounds of fresh produce annually. The sole denial of the day came at 507 Massachusetts Avenue in the South End, where the board voted 6-0 to deny without prejudice a lodging house expansion into a garden-level space, after the Planning Department cited plans that labeled the proposed suites as storage rather than livable area in a coastal flood resiliency overlay zone.