- Bayside Office Center at Columbia Point 150 Mount Vernon Street Dorchester, MA 02125
- (617) 822-7300
- Bayside Office Center at Columbia Point 150 Mount Vernon Street Dorchester, MA 02125
- (617) 822-7300
ULI Announces King’s Lynne Winner 2007 Awards for Excellence: The Americas Competition
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King’s Lynne in Lynn, MA Named Winner of the Heritage Award for Innovative and Enduring Contributions to the Land Use Industry
WASHINGTON (May 11, 2007) The Urban Land Institute in Washington, DC announced King’s Lynne in Lynn, MA has been named winner of the Heritage Award for the Urban Land Institute’s (ULI) Awards for Excellence: The Americas competition, widely recognized as the land use industry’s most prestigious recognition program.
The Heritage Award is given to projects that have established new concepts or standards that have been emulated elsewhere; are of national or international renown and have been completed for over 25 years. It is the only ULI award category where the jury needs to be unanimous in their decision, and only seven Heritage Awards have been given since 1979. Past recipients include Rockefeller Center, Disneyland, and Sea Pines Plantation in Hilton Head, SC. “Mixed-income is a buzzword today, but King’s Lynne was the first in the country,” said King’s Lynne Resident Council President Eleanor Wessell. “After 30 years of successful operation, it is the model for mixed-income housing nationwide, and still going strong.” King’s Lynne is jointly owned by the King’s Lynne Resident Council and Boston-based developers Corcoran Mullins Jennison and also managed by CMJ.
From Worst to Best: The Remarkable Transformation of King's Lynne, a Massachusetts Housing Project
King’s Lynne: A Blueprint for Transforming Troubled Public Housing
In 1970, America Park housing project was considered one of the worst public housing projects in Massachusetts, with 25% of its units condemned and boarded up. However, the tenants of America Park refused to accept housing authority renovations funds, and instead, used grant money to hire a consultant who conceptualized a privately owned and managed mixed-income community. The tenants gained public and private support for redevelopment and renamed the community King’s Lynne in 1974.
King’s Lynne was the nation’s first public housing project to be converted from public to private housing, the first to have a 50/50 partnership arrangement between public housing residents and a private developer, and the first to incorporate mixed-income housing. Thirty years after its completion, King’s Lynne is still fully leased, in top condition, and a financial success, serving as the blueprint for redeveloping troubled public housing and planting the seeds for HOPE VI, transforming public housing nationwide.
The ULI Awards for Excellence jury member J. Michael Pitchford said that King’s Lynne was a trendsetter and that all the good things we know and practice today in the transformation of public and affordable housing into thriving mixed-income communities have their roots in the experiences of King’s Lynne. King’s Lynne is still as inviting and well-maintained as it was upon completion, a perfect proof of concept.
The competition is part of the Institute’s Awards for Excellence program, established in 1979, which recognizes the full development process of a project, not just its architecture or design. The Americas finalists were selected by a jury of renowned land use development and design experts. Since 1971, Corcoran Mullins Jennison Inc. and Corcoran Jennison Companies have successfully developed over $2 billion worth of property.
King’s Lynne, a project of firsts, remains the only finalist and winner from New England in the 2007 ULI Awards for Excellence.
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