I used to work right up at the edge of this area back some 15 years or so ago.  The Fort Point Channel was convenient, relatively easy off the rush hour jammed expressway and, more importantly, by the gateway to the commuter rail at South Station.  Convenient.  There wasn’t a great deal more you could say about it.  Sure, you could continue on down the road, through the flats – a section of the city known for its open air parking lots, a few notable restaurants and the World Trade Center complex.  There were other reasons to go there, sure, and I did, but for reasons and with an impact now long removed.

I have been back three times in the past week, for three different reasons… and I have been struck by the change, the expansion.  It is an entirely new section of Boston, one I hardly know.  I stated to a colleague while there: “plop me down here and I would not know which city I was in.”  Truth.

The construction continues, amplifies, expands.  Crisscross cranes and work-in-progress lightbulbs decorate the area and illuminate skeleton towers rising.

This shot above is toward the downtown from the WTC area which is substantially updated.  Seconds after taking this long-exposure photo, a security guard asked us to leave.  No photographs while on the property, he offered.  We weren’t disappointed as we got what we came for and because the already frigid night was becoming even more uncomfortable.