Parcel's fate is `up in the air'

At the Millennium Bostonian Hotel, people paying more than $300 a night look out upon it. Tour buses drop hundreds of visitors there each day, giving them one of their first vivid impressions of the city. But it's not a sight that city promoters would be likely to approve.

A 1- acre patch of downtown real estate in the heart of one of the city's busiest tourist areas, it is strewn with piles of construction debris, wooden produce pallets, and other detritus left by vendors from the nearby Haymarket. It also serves as home to a band of squatters who have set up camp, where they have been seen passing bottles while sitting on makeshift chairs around a wooden cable spool turned on its side for use as a table.

The piece of ground, known as Parcel 9, was once occupied by the elevated Central Artery and is slated for development as a piece of the promised parkland jewel, the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway. Nearby residents and merchants say they have waited patiently for construction to begin and for the problems to be moved out, but time has gone by without any changes.

``It's horrendous," said Tom Houle, a driver for King Ward Coach Lines of Chicopee, who dropped off a load of tourists yesterday. ``You should see it on market days. It smells, too."

Turns out, Parcel 9 is a no-man's land . Boston police say it is under State Police jurisdiction, while officials at the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority, which officially controls the parcel, say they have been counting on Boston police to help patrol the area.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino put the blame back on the state yesterday. ``This dump will not be tolerated," he said. ``I want it removed as quickly as possible."

Turnpike Authority officials say Big Dig contractors are using the parcel as a construction staging area, but that they often aren't at the site and haven't properly maintained it. ``It's kind of an ongoing issue," Turnpike Authority spokeswoman Mariellen Burns said.

She said that workers have asked the squatters to go somewhere else and have on occasion removed parts of the makeshift camp, but that people keep returning.

Late last month, after holding a press conference to announce his resignation just yards from the site, Turnpike Authority chairman Matthew J. Amorello apparently asked that something be done.

``I remember he was looking in there and was displeased," Burns said.

After Globe inquiries yesterday, Burns said Turnpike Authority officials ordered the contractors to clean it up and secure it better, possibly by putting up a fence.

At the site yesterday, there were empty vodka bottles, beer cartons, blankets, backpacks stuffed with clothes, and an old car seat set up like a couch. An umbrella propped up by bricks from a nearby pile provided shade at the makeshift picnic table.

Residents and merchants said that a handful of people have been staying there on a regular basis for months and that as many as eight gather at the site each day. They sometimes get into fights, at least once throwing bricks at one another and yelling.

``I figured it was going to end eventually," said Jack Plewa, whose apartment overlooks the parcel.

Shortly after noon yesterday, a brisk wind carried the acrid smell of rotting vegetables and trash across Blackstone Street and into Haymarket Pizza, where dozens of customers were lined up for lunch. Owner Al Sciola said he hasn't complained to authorities about the mess, mainly because he, too, figured it would be cleaned when construction on the Greenway got underway, but also because he wasn't sure whom to complain to.

``It's up in the air here," he said. ``Nobody knows who owns what."

Development plans for the parcel are uncertain. At first, the site was slated for a hotel, but that plan was scrapped in favor of housing, and now city planners say any development is likely to be several years off.

One visitor yesterday, Dan Monahan of Whitman, observed wryly that officials have called the proposed greenway a jewel of the city.

``This," he said, leaning on a concrete barrier next to the parcel, ``this is the diamond in the rough."

Donovan Slack can be reached at dslack@globe.com.