Beacon Hill’s historic but dim gas lampposts, whose gloominess this year seems to match the weather around them, will stay that way a bit longer, while the city waits for new mantles to arrive.

At first city officials pointed the finger at Keyspan, whom they suspected had reduced the flow of gas to the lampposts. But, after receiving a firm denial from the gas company, they began to look within the lanterns, where they discovered many of the mantles they had replaced in the summer and fall had already broken. So they ordered 7,200 new ones, enough to outfit 2,400 of the 2,800 fixtures in the Back Bay, Beacon Hill, Charlestown and Bay Village, according to Jennifer Mehigan, the mayor’s deputy press secretary.

And those 7,200 are coming all the way from India. Apparently, there are only two manufacturers in the world of which the city is aware, Mehigan said. For fifty years, the city’s Street Lighting Division purchased all its mantles from Auerlicht in Germany, but that company went out of business in 2003. In January, 2004, it started using mantles purchased from Veritas in Malta. “We have not had any issues or complaints about mantles until now,” said Mehigan, “so we are thinking there is something wrong with those mantles or it has to do with replacing them in the cold weather.”

The mantle industry again changed in 2005, when Indo International in India bought the rights from Auerlicht in Germany to make the original model. Now the city will get 7,200 of the ones it likes — the ones that had worked so well for it in the past.

Beacon Hill’s historic gas lanterns, whose dimness this year have prompted public safety concerns all over the neighborhoods, may have been at the root of the third robbery at Primo’s Convenience Store in recent months.

At 9:30 p.m. on February 17, a store employee set the security alarm and surveillance camera, locked up and left the store, which is at the corner of Joy and Myrtle streets. Just minutes later, Temple Street residents Wendy Lavalle and Vin Catania, who were walking down Joy Street toward the store, saw a man smash its window, reach in and grab something, and then escape in a getaway car driven by another individual. They immediately summoned police.

Store manager Jog Saini said they believe the suspect was standing by the gas lamppost, watching as his employee closed the store. But because several mantles in the lantern are broken, his employee did not see the man. Evidently, as soon as he left, the suspect broke the window directly adjacent to the lantern and stole lottery tickets.

“I don’t know how to describe how I feel,” said Saini. “I don’t feel good about this. I had never had a problem before this year. I hope the city fixes the lamps. The streets should be safer.”

Saini believes the suspects may be the same that broke into Deluca’s a week earlier and into his own twice before. At about 9:00 p.m. October 30, a black man wearing a cap and a mask pointed a gun and demanded that the same employee hand over money from the cash register. The robber, who was holding the gun to the back of the employee’s head, then assaulted him in the head several times with the gun and pushed him to the ground. He fled with an indeterminate amount of money. After that, a new security system with a surveillance camera was installed.

Again in mid-January, two men wearing masks were videotaped on the store’s security camera as they pried open the door, entered the store and stole the cash register, cigarettes and lottery tickets. The store was closed at the time, but the alarm system was off because a night delivery was expected. The door was quickly repaired and secured, and the delivery schedule changed.

“Now, I put the cigarettes, lottery tickets and money away at night,” said Saini. “But what else can I do?”

credit: D. Harney



Accomplished organist Harry Huff played the C.B. Fisk organ at King’s Chapel as part of the noon hour concert series hosted every Tuesday at the chapel on School Street.

Caption: Antiques at 99 Charles will be moving soon.
credit: Shannon O’Connor


Antiques at 99 Charles will soon be Antiques at 119 Charles. Co-owners Jack Bone and Michael Riendeau are moving down the street, where the sign “antiques” points to the new store they are renovating and getting ready for the public.
“We’re doing it all ourselves,” Riendeau said. “All the painting and plastering. It’s more like heavy duty cosmetic work.”

Previously, the site of the new store was the Antique Co-op owned by Laurie Chase which had been at that location for twenty-six years. 119 Charles became available in January, so Bone and Riendeau grabbed the chance to have a new space.

Antiques at 99 Charles had been at the same address since 1994. “This place is quite a bit bigger,” Riendeau said. “We just needed a change. We outgrew the old place.”

Riendeau said that Antiques at 99 Charles had a verbal agreement with the landlord, but he and Bone never renewed their lease. “They just never mailed it to us. And this place became available.”

Riendeau said that he and Bone love the new space because they enjoy the view of the different people walking by, and it’s all on one level. “It’s going to be more of a gallery,” Michael said. They are excitedly preparing for the transition.

“We are going to move everything piece by piece from the old store,” Michael laughed. “Everyone I know is going to help. We’ll wrap everything up and carry it down the street.”

Antiques at 119 Charles Street will open on March 1.

Not much activity took place on Cambridge Street last week since snow and ice occupied much of the work area.

Electricians from Mass. Bay pulled ground wire connected to street lights and Best Electric “cut more loops,” according to John Lepore, project supervisor for Mass. Highway, which is responsible for Cambridge Street’s reconstruction.

Lepore said Best Electric was scheduled this past weekend to do major work at the Grove Street intersection causing traffic lights to be out for more than an hour. Work like this is typically done on weekends when traffic is light.

Lepore is optimistic that the new traffic lights at Grove Street will be working this week, but he has been optimistic before.

Not much attention was paid to the appointment of Boston's new fire commissioner in the city's dailies. Commissioner Roderick Fraser sort of flew in under the radar screen. He's young, energetic and the first civilian commissioner appointed to the post in nearly three decades.

The commissioner came to Beacon Hill recently where he met with the firefighters from Engine 4, Ladder 24, Car 3 at 200 Cambridge St. He's been making the rounds throughout the fire stations in the city, visiting with all the Boston Fire Department and getting to know the men and the infrastructure of what is arguably one of the best departments in the nation.

"I guess there's really no controversy surrounding my appointment," Fraser joked over lunch recently with members of the Beacon Hill Times editorial staff. "I don't do drugs, I'm not a political insider, and after my shift is over, I go home to my wife and kids...I guess I'm boring."

Hardly.

Fraser grew up in East Millinocket, Maine. He received his bachelor of science in marine engineering, from Maine Maritime Academy and was commissioned in the US Navy in April 1986. Fraser spent the next 20 years serving in the Navy in a variety of assignments, culminating in commanding USS Underwood, a guided missile frigate.

Fraser led the ship and crew through a deployment to the Northern Arabian Gulf during Operation Iraqi Freedom and was the scene of action commander responsible for protecting the Iraqi offshore oil terminals at Al Basrah and Khor Al Amaya. He was also responsible for training the Iraqi Navy in anti-terrorism, force protection, ship handling and maritime security procedures.

During his Naval career, Fraser was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal, Navy Commendation Medal with two Gold Stars, Navy Achievement Medal with one Gold Star and numerous unit awards and commendations.

So why was Fraser on Boston's short list when Mayor Thomas Menino was looking to replace Commissioner Paul Christian who retired last year?

"I was the director of naval firefighting training," said Fraser.
"I also specialized in chemical, biological and radiological defense."

Impressed yet?

Fraser served as the director of damage control and firefighting training at Surface Warfare Officers School Command, Newport, RI, from 2000 to 2002, and as the director of engineering training from 2002 to 2004. During this assignment, he was responsible for directing 12 Navy courses of instruction that trained all US Navy officers, from the position of commanding officer down to division officer in marine engineering principals and operations, damage control and shipboard firefighting.

Additionally, he worked to bring new firefighting technologies into the Navy and established a new course to train Navy combat systems department heads in the maintenance and quality control programs and procedures for all Navy combat systems equipment.

It's this experience that made Fraser an attractive candidate for the post of commissioner.

"I like his ideas of bringing the department forward with more training and better technology," said one district chief, Richard Hartnett.

As the city's lead agency on chemical, biological and radiological defense, Fraser plans to have the Boston Fire Department take a stronger leadership role in developing a long-range training program for the department. The plan includes interagency planning and training. Additionally, Fraser will work to improve the diversity of our fire department to better reflect the communities it serves.

"I am deeply honored to have been appointed the 37th commissioner of the Boston Fire Department by Mayor Thomas Menino," said Fraser. "As we take pride in our heritage, we also look to the future to new challenges. I am proud to lead this department in this new century as we strive to improve the services we provide our community."

T station complements neighborhood for now

Secretly and stealthily, the Charles/MGH T station opened on February 17. The Times didn’t know about it ahead of time, and nobody else did either. T officials said they didn’t know for sure if they’d be ready. Riders found out when they crossed the street, found a locked chain link gate at the entrance they used during construction and finally spotted a small sign that pointed to the main entrance of the new station. They found they could actually get across the circle at ground level without getting killed.

The station isn’t yet done, but it looks good. The materials look as if they’ll last. While not luxurious, they are handsome and appropriate. The inside space feels large and airy. But some neighbors have said they have regretted the amount of visual space the station takes up in the circle.

There is no getting around it — a structure now exists where there wasn’t one before. But it appears there was no other way to solve the problem of getting people up to the overhead tracks. If the T had buried the tracks, that would have been a different story. But to bury the station would have meant constructing a tunnel under the Charles, digging up the circle to bury the station and then boring a tunnel into Beacon Hill to meet up with the tunnel that now exists. Several years ago, a feasibility study focused on a plan like this. Given the authority’s financial constraints, that plan was dead on arrival.

How does such a station, which cramps an intersection and features overhead tracks, complement its location rather than degrade it? After all, we’ve learned that overhead transportation is bad both visually and acoustically.

In the past decade or so, we’ve systematically removed overhead transportation structures — the aerial Central Artery, the Orange Line that darkened Washington Street and the Green Line that made Causeway Street dark and dank. In the late 1970s we removed the station at Sullivan Square. At this point few stations — Science Park is the closest — remain that perch above roadways and require patrons to climb or ride to the platform above. Will Charles/MGH, now bright and cheerful and graffiti-free, degrade the area around it as other overhead structures have done?

It doesn’t have to. First of all, a large portion of the station is now at street level, so there is no space underneath to collect debris and provide darkness for illegal activities. Second, in theory, the copperized wall that workers are building in fits and starts on either side of the outdoor tracks as they lead into the Beacon Hill tunnel supposedly will reduce the train noise.

Finally, the station is made of glass. It’s not open air, but it is better than a solid brick wall in that location.

The glass, however, reminds us of the most important way the T can make the station a complement rather than a detriment to the neighborhood. It can keep the glass clean. It can make sure the escalators always work. It can erase graffiti within moments of its appearance. It can clean the station floors often to keep away dirt and debris. We’re wary, because poor maintenance has been an inbred habit in Boston’s public spaces.

We urge the T to rise above the usual standard of Boston maintenance. We urge Mass General, the Beacon Hill Civic Association and the new Liberty Hotel owners to keep on the T to make sure they keep it up.

We can live with a good-looking station that replaces open air. We just can’t live with more dirt and grime.