Fenway neighbors worry about loss of open space in Winsor School expansion

By Sara Brown, Town Correspondent

As the Winsor School moves ahead with its plan to build three new buildings on its Longwood Area campus, a Fenway neighbor has expressed concerns about the area's loss of open space.

The city redevelopment authority recently approved plans to increase the size of the girl's school by adding a health/wellness and performing arts on the site of the school's current gym, expanding the school's main academic building, and building a 10-story mixed use commercial building on Longwood Avenue and Brookline Avenue.

"We have issues with the commercial project at Longwood and Brookline and the trend of the 'endowed campus' as a non-profit's means of producing income by selling off its campus," Frederica Veikley, a Fenway Civic Association board member, said in an e-mail.

"Ultimately I believe this loss of open space we have seen so much of in the Fenway is unfortunate for everyone -- students included -- when we lose both the physical and cultural context that these historical instutions were given as the first to be established along Olmsted's new Emerald Necklace Park system."

Another concern, she said, is whether Winsor and other institutions expanding their campuses intend to remain in the area, or if "their conversion to income producing property is an interim step along the way to ultimate relocation."

Veikley pointed out that the Winsor project is the third time a Fenway institution has replaced their tennis courts with commercial space.

"Emmanuel's tennis courts were where Merck now stands; Simmon's tennis courts became parking and then yielded to an underground parking garage leased to Childrens [Hospital], and now Winsor's tennis courts going for a commercial development site."

The loss of open space, she said, will put more strain on existing open spaces like the Back Bay Fens.

Veikley added that there seems to be general agreement that the academic buildings are positive additions for the school. "

Winsor and their faculty and students have been good neighbors and they and their environmental programs have been especially valuable for building young peoples' understanding and appreciation of the Riverway park system," she said.

Sara Brown can be reached at yourtownsara@gmail.com. Your Town: Fenway-Kenmore on Twitter: @FenwayKenmore.