It was. It's been vacant for almost 20 years now, though.

Really the only fast food we don't have here that I've had anywhere else in New England and would maybe like is a Sonic, but it's far from the highest priority.

Honestly I've never cared about the fancy supermarkets. Even when I've lived somewhere that had them, I shopped elsewhere.

Costco I can get behind though, whether in Worcester proper or a town over. It's ridiculous that we have to drive an hour to get to one.

Big cinemas that keep up-to-date with new releases are dying everywhere, not just here. Whether that's just people preferring to stream at home, or the marketing required to get big blockbusters on your screens not being financially feasible without unrealistic attendance rates, it's undeniable and only accelerated by the pandemic. Just recently Regal Cinemas has been going through a bankruptcy. Clearly Worcester and all surrounding towns can only sustain one of the big cinemas, and Blackstone is just where it ended up.

If anything I'd like to see the old Olympia Theatre on Pleasant St be updated to be a modern 2-screen theater. Though it looks like the current owners are placing their bets on making it another tiny indoor music venue.

Wouldn't get your hopes up. A month ago I got a ~$350 bill, so lowered my thermostat to 61. My most recent bill was ~$425.

There's also the fact that the WRTA is not directly under the control of city government. The city council and various committees have much more control over where a parking garage goes than they do on the hiring of more bus drivers and restructuring of bus routes.

Looking at Zillow there are currently three condos for sale near downtown that are either directly on or within a tenth of a mile of Pleasant St, which has a bus route. Granted that's still not a ton of options but it's also the middle of winter. It's pretty near comparable to the number of options someone looking for a single family home in Newton Square or Tatnuck would be facing at the moment, for example. Or really just most single requirements imposed on a search would get you to that limited a selection.

But maybe there are other requirements that haven't been specified that limit the options even further.

For what it's worth, where these and other apartments are being built (walking distance from the hub) is pretty much the ideal location to live in if you want to use the current bus system. Having basically any bus be able to take you home is a massive improvement.

I don't really get what most of you have against the Worcester Target? Granted I've had the good sense to avoid it (and basically every store) leading up to Christmas, and I've never tried to buy perishable food items from them, but as far as everything else goes I've generally been able to find what I was looking for and check out in 20 minutes or so.

In that case the apartment complex would be at best neutral in its impact on local infrastructure.

How many of those nearby employers pay enough to live in one of these shiny new apartment complexes?

I suppose if they are former Boston residents that still work in Boston, it would be a convenient spot for using the commuter rail. So in that sense at least, they wouldn't be adding to commute traffic.

The structure of our current bus system isn't terrible, it primarily suffers from not hiring enough drivers. This is most noticeable with service being reduced on some Fridays, etc. Beyond just hiring enough to guarantee basic functionality, a hiring increase could extend hours of service and increase bus frequency (possibly alongside a one-time purchase of more buses). All of this could happen without reinventing our roads, and could be funded for years on what citywide BRT implementation would cost. There are a couple key spots where I agree BRT could be especially useful (Main St, Shrewsbury St) and maybe these could be implemented earlier, but for the most part I'd like to see these more basic improvements to our bus system first. If the city lacks the political will to do even that, then big projects like BRT are a pipedream.

At least it's mixed use. But it still astonishes me that people who can afford to pay new luxury apartment rents would willingly choose to live that close to the interstate. Especially not being guaranteed a parking space, despite the state of our infrastructure basically requiring a car.

Yes, we do need more housing. On top of the 20,000 people who have already arrived here, the exodus from more expensive Boston area towns shows no sign of slowing. Worcester is projected to still be one of the hottest real estate markets in the country in 2023, and that's what's driving these new market rate residential buildings being built. Not some sort of sympathy for the people already here.

There's no real incentive for developers to build so much housing that rents and property values go down even a little. That's the real problem with relying on the market to fix things. These market rate housing developments will slow things getting worse, so I'm not really complaining about them existing. But to really tackle the housing crisis requires more. Even in your Houston example "build more housing" was such a small part of what was actually successful.

Why settle for a small grocery? People still use physical grocery stores, and that building is one of the few downtown that can support a full size one. Penalizing people who live downtown by forcing them to either endure the inevitable higher prices and limited selection of small groceries or cling to their personal vehicles as they fight over insufficient downtown parking so they can get to a "real" grocery isn't right. Whether the original building is kept or a new one built, this should be heavily considered.

If it's feasible to convert the upper levels to residences, sure, but as you point out the building has layout issues for that. If movie theaters weren't so dead (especially in pandemic world), I'd say a small theater with a few screens could go there since the city doesn't have one at all anymore, but unless they see some sort of post-pandemic recovery I don't see that being successful either. So I'm not really sure what the best idea would be for the upper levels. Maybe a new building is needed after all.

Depends on some things. 

Are you expecting a city to mean that you don't need to have a car to get around? If so, Worcester isn't what you're looking for. The transit system is very lackluster, and it usually takes about an hour to get from one place to another without being lucky enough to find two places on the same bus route. That's pretty typical of most of the US though, so if you insist on great transit your options are going to be very limited. 

Are you looking for a job IN the city? Depending on the type of work you are looking for it may be hard to find work in the city proper, though generally there are plenty of opportunities within a 30-45 minute commute regardless. Really, employment is something I'd advise you get sorted before committing to the move anyway. 

Massachusetts as a whole leans pretty liberal, but central MA in particular is probably the most conservative region of it. It's less true of Worcester itself, more the surrounding towns. You'll still run into plenty of people who agree with you politically, just don’t expect to never run into a Trump supporter here because of the overall reputation Massachusetts has.

We have some of the most severe winters in the state, so that's something to be prepared for as well.

Other than those concerns it's a decent city, above average in terms of social events, music venues, outdoor spaces, cool restaurants, etc. If you like baseball we have a shiny new ballpark.

At least the recent burst of business closures are ones that only opened a few years ago. Factor in the pandemic, and they never really had time to establish roots in the Worcester community in the first place.

Are these commercial locations actually unaffordable? I'm unclear on whether they are being left vacant or new businesses are moving in shortly. That also holds a bunch of weight when it comes to if/how much improvement is happening.

Rising residential prices definitely have a negative impact on people who have lived here a long time, but I'm not sure the same is true of these business closures.

When you reach a certain density of businesses on a given street, the street parking is less useful. Increasingly you can only rely on the space immediately in front of your business. And the 2-4 parking spaces in front of a restaurant aren't going to come anywhere near filling the place.

What would honestly help the businesses in that area a lot would be a frequent (say, every 15 min) shuttle that ran a small route from Kelley Square, up Water St, across Franklin St, stopping at the bus hub, and going down Green St back to Kelley Square. And have it run LATE. At least until midnight. Could stop waiting at the hub after the last commuter train leaves, since other buses all stop running before that.

A car dealership lot seems a bit oversized for just one restaurant.

Dalat, Red Pepper, Sushi Miyazawa

Are there any planned construction projects ready to go once this funding is available?

Is that Belmont Street then? If so that looks completely different.

I'm guessing more luxury apartments.

Is this a service the city had to provide with the last big street name change (MLK Jr Blvd)?