RODE Spotlight: Katie Cressall's Work With The Fairmount Corridor Visioning Team

The BSA Foundation assembled a team of designers to produce renderings and other visualizations to illustrate potential development along the Fairmount Indigo corridor as part of a project for the Boston Foundation. The work grew from the Boston Planning and Development Agency (formerly BRA) comprehensive planning study and other neighborhood documents already complete.

RODE architect Katie Cressall joined the Fairmount Corridor Visioning Team to specifically address the Blue Hill Station. The process included engaging the community at the Design for Equity Panel at ABX, a charrette with CDC staff, and a community forum with neighbors in Dorchester, Mattapan, and Hyde Park. It presented a great opportunity to learn more about community development in our neighborhoods, as well as the ways in which the community influences urban design.

Through her focus on the Bill Hill station in Mattapan Katie learned about some of the neighborhood’s main concerns. She created visual renderings to help support and stimulate conversations with community leaders and others - translating the planning study and its dense planner/architect lingo into an image that families, business owners, and other community members could easily understand and that encouraged everyone be a part of the project.

Katie helped to develop the before and after view shown below, which depicts a concept for the new Blue Hill Train Station, as well as the urban infill scale that the city is encouraging. The process of working closely with the community, as well as with other architects and planners was very inspiring and will continue to impact how she collaborates at RODE.