In local news

[magid]

Back in 1998, Lesley College bought the Art Institute of Boston, and they're now proposing to move that campus from Boston to Cambridge. That would require expanding their current space in and around Porter Square. Their plan includes moving the North Prospect Church (which they've already bought), as well as new construction. Those who oppose it are trying for landmark status for the church.

Cambridge approved a variance for a new biotech park along Binney St.

Brookline Street in Cambridge is being reconstructed, including redoing the pavement, sidewalks, and water and sewer lines, plus putting in bike lands and more street trees, plus dealing with issues of problematic runoff into the Charles. It's supposed to be done by this fall (a one-year construction project that stays in the projected time frame would be great :-).

The Mormon chapel on Brattle St. (across from Longfellow House) burned down a couple of weeks ago; the fire has since been declared accidental. I found this out in a circuitous way, with a former orker contacting me on Facebook, inviting me to a party celebrating getting her PhD from Harvard (math). It was going to be at that chapel (which is where she got married; the only time I'd been inside the building), but had to shift it.

A tour of the urban orchards around Boston.

There's a new partnership minyan in Newton, Yedid Nefesh.

Comments

[sethg]

A few years back, when our ("modern, Orthodox") shul's rabbi announced that he wanted to retire, there was some debate among the shul machers. Some wanted us to hire a forthrightly Modern Orthodox rabbi to be a successor, arguing that the niche of "Orthodox yet not right-wing" was not really filled by any other shul in Boston, and if we want to attract members we should differentiate ourselves. Others wanted to hire someone with more black-hat credentials, arguing that the trend in Orthodoxy is to the right and if we want to attract members we should follow the trend.

And since then, two minyanim in the immediate area straddling the Ortho/traditional-egal line have been established; first Washington Square, and now Yedid Nefesh.

We coulda been a contendah.

[magid.livejournal.com]

It's an interesting trend. I find that I'm rather more right-wing in a lot of my thoughts about/approaches to a number of halachic issues, which feels a bit strange to me.

[tapuz.livejournal.com]

There's a new partnership minyan in Newton, Yedid Nefesh.

interesting....

[magid.livejournal.com]

If you end up going, I'd love to hear about it.