Development Will Continue

The North End is poised for another solid year of development and investment.

There remains in this neighborhood a great number of older properties owned by longtime North End families which have not yet been rehabbed. In addition, the number of vibrant restaurant, cafe and small specialty stores that dot the neighborhood will not decrease. In the future, those numbers will increase.

The North End is all about opportunity and will continue to be that way in 2012 and for many, many years to come.

The North End grows increasingly more popular as a tourist attraction, as a restaurant draw, as a place to live for the younger people making Boston what it is today and in the decades to come. In 2012, all that is natural that comes with that popularity will be attempted.

Never in the history of this venerable neighborhood have its present residents been empowered with so many opportunities to guide development or to stop it entirely.

The proliferation of liquor licenses and the opening of new restaurants nearly always causes a public outcry or at least a plea for sanity from city zoning officials.

The New Year will be another test of the North End’s resolve to maintain itself as a livable place while continuing the effort to keep it a place where families – old and new – can coexist in one of the city’s most dramatically changing and growing neighborhoods.

That ongoing battle will accelerate in 2012.

It should be an interesting year and a solid business year as well.