A plan advanced by the owners of the Murphy Funeral Home on Dorchester Avenue to build a four-story building with 22 units of housing next to their current business was approved by the Boston Planning and Development Authority board on Dec. 11. The $10 million project, which will include space for a retail tenant on the ground level, was proposed last June and was the subject of public meetings over the summer.
The longtime family-owned funeral parlor would stay in business next door. The new structure will be built on five lots, including the funeral home’s existing parking lot. There will be 12 parking spaces below ground in the new building.
The unit mix will include six studios, eight one-bedrooms, six two-bedrooms, and two three-bedrooms, along with 5,309 sq. ft. of ground floor retail space. The square footage of the residential units runs between 507 sq. ft. and 1,540 sq. ft., and four of them will be affordable units in the Inclusionary Development Program (IDP).
The parking entrance would be served by a new curb cut on Belfort Street, while eliminating the existing Dorchester Avenue curb cut that serves the parking lot.
The project’s proponent, Thomas Murphy, will still need to secure zoning relief, since the multi-family and retail uses for the site are “forbidden,” according to Boston Planning dept. documents.
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