Get your mall buys delivered

Massachusetts mall-goers, who don't want to be saddled with their shopping bags, soon may have a new way to get their purchases home.

California startup Deliv has jumped into the same-day delivery fray, offering the service to malls through crowdsourced drivers.

And Simon Property Group, the largest owner of malls in Massachusetts, hopes eventually to roll out same-day delivery to its customers at Bay State retail centers.

Shoppers at Simon's Stanford Shopping Center in Palo Alto, Calif., now have two options for shopping hands-free.

They can have their purchases from participating mall retailers sent to their homes for $10, as long as they're within 15 miles of the center.

Or they can have them sent to a central mall location and pick them up when they're done shopping, or have them loaded into their cars curbside, for free.

Simon started the service Monday to "elevate" its customer service, according to spokesman Les Morris.

"Our expectation is that it will be successful, and we can roll it out to more properties," Morris said. "At the end of the day ... if, because of this delivery system, there are stores that are even more productive, it's a win-win."

Approximately 50 retailers are participating in Deliv's same-day service, which also is offered online.

At the Stanford Shopping Center, they include Sony, Hugo Boss, Lucky Brand, Bose, Johnston & Murphy, Kate Spade, Crate & Barrel and White House/Black Market, Morris said.

Founded in 2012, Deliv has raised $7.8 million in venture capital funding from companies including Cambridge's General Catalyst Partners.

Its service is now offered in nine malls in California and Chicago.

Deliv generates revenue from fees paid by the retailers and malls — currently $5 to $15 per delivery — who can opt to charge customers or offer free deliveries, according to founder and CEO Daphne Carmeli.

The key to the business model is getting as many packages and as many stops per route, so the cost of delivery comes down, said Carmeli, whose company hires the drivers.

"What I wanted to do was build a company where we would not have to be a two-sided marketplace, where we would have to acquire demand in every city," Carmeli said.

"We wanted to find an opportunity where we could immediately plug into a demand stream."

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JP condos have energy to spare

New contemporary townhouses in the Woodbourne section of Jamaica Plain are designed to create more energy than they use so that utilities cost nothing.

Part of Boston's Energy Positive Green Building Program, GFC Development partnered with Hub architecture firm Utile to build the just-completed two-unit attached townhouse at 64-66 Catherine St. on land owned by the city. The purpose of this and other such projects in the city is to show that housing can be designed to be both completely energy independent and stylish without costing a huge amount more to build. This project meets the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Platinum designation, the highest rating.

The three-story townhouses on Catherine Street are on the market for $595,000 each. They feature high-end white kitchens, tiled bathrooms, 8-foot doors throughout and third-floor master bedroom suites with cathedral ceilings and a skylight.

The exterior of the building is dark-brown Hardie Plank, with unfinished shiplap cedar clapboard accents and a rear sloped roof pointed 42 degrees south that holds 21 photovoltaic electric panels for each unit.

These panels provide all the energy needed for the electric-only townhouses, producing 8 percent more energy than they use, according to preliminary testing. Homeowners will earn credits from electricity given back to the grid.

The townhouses are 
superinsulated, with 8 inches of icynene foam insulation in the walls, Alpen windows and a multilayered rubber roof. Windows are deep-set to attract winter sun and the first-floor concrete floor acts as a thermal mass to retain heat. The condos are heated and cooled when needed by wall-mounted Mitsubishi electric AC/heat pumps.

We took a look at staged model Unit 1, a 1,416-square-foot three-bedroom that has a fenced-in backyard and a driveway that will fit two cars.

You enter the unit through a foyer with polished cement floors, a wood bench and a closet holding the unit's 80-gallon solar hot water heater.

To the right sits an open living/dining area with large windows and a glass back wall with a door to a cedar fence-enclosed backyard. There's a patio with Hanover permeable pavers and a rainwater irrigation system.

Back inside, an adjacent open kitchen has recessed compact fluorescent lighting and polished cement floors. There's Parapan high-gloss white cabinets, many pantry sized, above and below white quartz countertops. There's an island with a stainless-steel sink and Mirabelle single-handle faucet. The white appliances are high end, including a Kitchen Aid refrigerator, a Jenn-Air oven, a Whirlpool electric stovetop with a Cristal range hood and a Bosch dishwasher.

Behind the kitchen sits a half bath with a white solid-surface IKEA vanity.

Stairs with white ash treads lead to the second floor where there are two ash-floored bedrooms and a full bathroom off a hallway that holds a closet with a high-efficiency Bosch washer and dryer.

The recessed-lit bedrooms on this floor have big windows with transoms, but are on the smaller side. Between them is a bathroom with beige porcelain tile floors and surround for a Grohe showerhead and deep soaking tub. There's also a white IKEA vanity with Grohe fixtures and a built-in linen closet.

The entire third floor of the unit is a master bedroom suite that features a good-sized bedroom with large windows with transoms, recessed lighting and a skylight. There are three closets, one a large walk-in that could serve as a nursery.

The en-suite master bathroom has slate-colored porcelain tile floors and surround for a walk-in shower with a glass partition. There's a linen closet built in and a white IKEA vanity with Grohe fixtures.

The townhouse is built on slab and does not have a basement.

But there is a dedicated driveway that will hold two vehicles next to the unit, with permeable Hanover pavers that allow grass to grow between the stones. The yard will be landscaped with low-water-use plants and grass.

• Address: 64-66 Catherine St., Unit 1, Jamaica Plain
• Bedrooms: Three
• Bathrooms: Two full, one half
• List price: $595,000
• Square feet: 1,416
• Price per square foot: $420
• Annual taxes: To be determined
• Monthly condo fee: $240
• Features: Architect-designed two unit townhouse designed for high energy efficiency; lots of large windows with transoms; open living/dining area with glass wall and door to back yard; kitchen with high-gloss cabinets, white quartz countertops and high-end appliances; third-floor master bedroom suite with ash floors, cathedral ceiling, skylight and large walk-in closet; porcelain-tile bathrooms; ash floors on top two floors; 40 solar panels on south-facing sloped roof; cedar-fence-enclosed backyard with rainwater irrigation system; driveway holds two vehicles L Location: About a mile from Forest hills Orange Line T station and retail offeringsalong Hyde Park Avenue; two miles from Jamaica Plain centerL Built in: 2013
• Broker: Coldwell banker agents Ellen grupert at 617-256-8455 and Janis Lippman at 617-869-0496

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Hospitals get $25M NIH grant

The National Institutes of Health has awarded a group of researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston Medical Center and Brigham and Women's Hospital a $25 million grant to determine the most effective treatment for the most severe form of peripheral artery disease, which can lead to amputation.

The four-year trial will enroll 2,100 patients at 120 clinical centers in the U.S. and Canada and will compare traditional bypass surgery with the less invasive alternative of endovascular treatment for patients with critical limb ischemia, or CLI.

"This is a huge deal because CLI affects thousands of people in this country alone," said Dr. Alik Farber, chief of the division of vascular and endovascular surgery at BMC and one of the trial's principal investigators. "The problem is it's unclear which procedure is better in terms of saving legs."

Endovascular treatment is a smaller procedure with less risk, Farber said, but it also is thought to be not as durable, meaning that the patient may have to have it done more than once.

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B.R.A. to give ‘blighted’ tax break to Garden complex

The Boston Redevelopment Authority is set to approve a $950 million redevelopment of the former Boston Garden site next week — including $7.8 million in tax breaks for the city-designated "blighted" area — despite neighborhood objections to a 600-foot tower among the three-building complex.

The Menino administration confirmed a 15-year tax deal yesterday and that a Star Market supermarket will be part of Boston Properties and Delaware North's project near the TD Garden.

The tax deal was reached to "secure the critical tenant and create tax certainty" during the first phase of the 1.87 million-square-foot mixed-use project, the announcement said.

"It's a mistake to offer any tax breaks for economic development purposes," said David Tuerck, executive director of the Beacon Hill Institute. "The better policy would be to have a tax rate that is low enough to encourage economic development without having to provide special favors to every supplicant who comes along wanting a subsidy."

The project includes a 497-unit, 600-foot residential tower; a 20-story, 306-room hotel; a 25-story office building; 235,000 square feet of retail space; a 40,000-square-foot TD Garden expansion; and an expansion of the North Station parking garage.

"The tax certainty provided by the 121A agreement will benefit our tenants, securing the mix of uses and public benefits long desired by the community," Boston Properties senior vice president Bryan Koop said in a statement.

Menino and BRA director Peter Meade weren't made available for comment. Meade met with the Boston Garden Impact Advisory Group yesterday to inform the neighborhood stakeholders of the news.

Six of 13 members who favor a 400-foot tower instead of a 600-foot tower and object to the "blighted" status wrote to Menino this week, alleging their concerns weren't given serious consideration. Member James Zahka said he still feels ignored. "If you live near a transportation node, get ready for 600-foot buildings," he said.

The project will generate $32.3 million in revenue over 15 years, versus 
$5 million in property taxes should the land, vacant since the 1990s demolition of the old Boston Garden, remain undeveloped, BRA spokeswoman Melina Schuler said. "This is an opportunity to have a signature building in this part of the city," she said. "We feel that a tower up to 600 feet would be appropriate."

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Red Sox eye more booze sales

The Red Sox hope to ramp up the availability of alcohol at games and other Fenway Park events.

The team wants to hike the number of concession stands selling liquor and extend sales until the end of the seventh inning. That would include adding liquor sales outside on Yawkey Way — in addition to the already-offered beer and wine — and expanding sales of all three to Fenway concerts and other events.

The request comes less than three months after the Boston Redevelopment Authority inked a controversial $7.3 million deal that lets the team shut down part of Yawkey Way for concessions during games and other city-approved events.

"Within a month, they're finding a way of making more revenue from the deal," said Matthew Cahill, executive director of the Boston Finance Commission, a city watchdog group that's been critical of the deal because there was no public bidding process and the city failed to extract a yearly base payment and revenue-sharing from the Red Sox. "This is why the BRA should have crafted a better-worded document. I certainly hope the police are being brought into this conversation."

Red Sox spokeswoman Zineb Curran said the team wants the same conveniences for all events at Fenway Park. "One improvement we are pursuing is reducing concession lines with enhanced efficiency at existing points of sale in high-traffic areas around the park," she said.

The team is slated to appear before the Licensing Board today to increase the number of concession stands selling liquor from five to eight.

Fenway Park starts selling alcohol when park gates open — usually 90 minutes before game time. Liquor sales stop two hours after a game's start or at the bottom of the seventh inning, whichever is earlier, while beer and wine sales stop 2.5 hours after a game's start or at the end of the seventh, whichever comes first. The team now wants to stop selling all three at the end of the seventh or "earlier, at "management's discretion."

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App lets you pay parking tickets

Getting a parking ticket is never a pleasant experience, but a new app makes paying them in Boston a little less painful.

Terrible Labs has developed TicketZen, which can be used to pay parking tickets by scanning them with a smartphone camera.

"Three taps, you have paid your parking ticket and you are on with your day," said Cort Johnson, of Boston-based Terrible Labs.

The app is faster and easier that traditional methods, said Johnson, such as paying at city hall or online, or mailing in a payment.

"That experience is relatively antiquated and we wanted to make it a very user friendly experience," said Johnson.

The iPhone and Android app works by scanning a barcode already on Hub parking tickets and developing it was easier, he said, because of the cooperation of the Mayor's Office of New Urban Mechanics.

Chris Osgood, co-chairman of the office, said they welcomed the outside support and innovation.

"Any way that we can work with people in the community to make Boston a better place to live, that's worth it for us to try out that experiment," Osgood said.

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Clergy may sue if panel OKs bid

Clergy in Revere and East Boston are watching today's planned vote by the state Gaming Commission on a Suffolk Downs casino in Revere.

"If that happens, we will pursue legal means," said Tim Bogertman, associate pastor of First Congregational Church of Revere. "That's something we're considering."

Bogertman and 22 other clergy yesterday signed a letter urging the commission to honor the Nov. 5 referendums in East Boston and Revere, when Suffolk Downs was proposing a casino resort in both communities. Revere voted yes, but East Boston rejected it.

Since then, Suffolk Downs has found a new casino partner, Mohegan Sun, and it has shifted the project onto the Revere portion of its property.

"We're concerned about what's happening to the democratic process," said the Rev. David Searles of East Boston's Central Assembly of God Church.

Trent Sheppard, a collegiate chaplain who lives in East Boston, said "all options are on the table," but he said the clergy might leave any legal action to the lay group No Eastie Casino.

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Suffolk: We eyed Revere from start

Suffolk Downs casino officials are claiming in a memo to the state Gaming Commission — due to decide the project's fate today — that ballot questions were purposely crafted to let them build in Revere if East Boston voters rejected them.

Opponents say that shows the racetrack tried to deceive voters in both towns.

Sterling Suffolk Racecourse LLC and Mohegan Sun, in a Dec. 2 memo obtained by the Herald, cite the different wording of the two ballot questions. Eastie voters, who rejected the casino Nov. 5, were asked to approve a gaming establishment "to be located at Suffolk Downs in East Boston." Revere voters, who approved the casino, were asked to approve a gaming establishment on the "Suffolk Downs property off of Winthrop Avenue."

"Winthrop Avenue is in Revere," the memo reads. "A Revere-only gaming establishment fits precisely within the scope of this question. This was by design ... they wanted to ensure that if East Boston voted no, the ballot question in Revere would give Revere the opportunity still to be a host community for a property located only in Revere."

The question of voter intent is central to today's deliberations by the commission, which will decide if the Nov. 5 vote and related agreements can apply to the recently hatched plan to build only on the Revere side of Suffolk Downs.

Opponents say the idea was always that Eastie and Revere voters had to give a thumbs up for any casino to be built at the racetrack, and any argument to the contrary is disingenuous.

"It's a very, very far-fetched idea that people were aware and were fully cognizant that the intention of the developers was to build a casino no matter what," said Pedro Morales, lead organizer of anti-casino group Friends of East Boston. "First of all, if you did that and you didn't explain it to anybody, that's very deceptive. Everybody was led to believe that it was going to be one development that needed the approval of both communities."

Revere Mayor Daniel Rizzo said Suffolk Downs' posture toward Revere has long been "if this doesn't go the way we want in Boston, we'll be coming to talk to you."

"That has always been very, very clear to me," Rizzo said. "In fact, when they were getting eerily close to not being able to strike a host community agreement with Boston, they were getting very edgy and concerned that they might have to pivot back to Revere and work on a Revere-only project."

The Gaming Commission's decision on Suffolk Downs' Revere proposal comes amid a whirlwind of high-stakes activity. The commission received a thumbs up from its investigative arm yesterday on the suitability of MGM to pursue a license in Springfield, and will issue a decision soon after questioning casino executives for hours. On Friday, the commission will convene to discuss a land sale plan from Wynn Resorts, which wants to build in Everett. Monday, the commission will hold its first hearing to determine if Wynn is suitable to seek greater Boston's lone casino license.

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Getting to know all about you

Expect to hear more about the "quantified self" movement — the name for a growing mass of devices, apps and technologies that sense, save and synthesize everything about you. And we do mean everything.

We've all heard about wristbands that track your heart rate and fitness. But what about a device that maps every place you've ever been, everything you've ever said and everyone you've ever met? It could happen sooner than you think.

"2014 is going to be the year where consumers are literally going to wake up to how much information they create and wonder where it's all going," Chris Dancy, 45, of Denver, a quantified-self trailblazer who has made headlines for the reams of data he collects on himself.

Evidence that we are on the cusp of a personal data revolution exists in the devices we already own: Smartphones are increasingly logging personal data, with the Samsung Galaxy S4 automatically charting the temperature, humidity and air pressure of the user's environment. The Moto X phones are constantly listening to surrounding audio. The new iPhone 5s tracks motion, and an increasing number of apps track our digital movements. Favorites, an app for iOS and Android, monitors communication with loved ones and notifies you when it's been too long since you've called grandma.

Another product aimed at self-insight is the upcoming audio-recording wristband Kapture, which constantly records audio in 60-second increments. If something has happened that you want to remember, you simply press a button and the previous 60 seconds are saved. The Kapture is a precursor to something that will be truly revolutionary: a continuous audio archive stream. No longer will you and your mate quarrel over who said what and when. You'll settle the matter with what amounts to a self-Google search. The possibilities are endless — not all of them good, or under current wiretap laws, even legal.

Eventually, more comprehensive devices will emerge, pulling together these disparate metrics. The same wristband or smartphone that records your audio will also chart your movements, speed and heart rate, along with the air quality, the weather and more. You'll be able to tell where you were in any moment in time — where and at what precise second your child said his or her first word, for example.

Dancy is already collecting hundreds of data points about his personal health and whereabouts via the many devices he uses on and around him. It may seem incredibly eccentric, but in an age where advertisers and big companies are collecting tons of information about us, why not get ahead of your own personal data and use it to get to know yourself better, and eventually, to improve your life?

Dancy predicts that the health sector will see the first big wave of these devices, with a snowball effect that will eventually result in consumer adoption.

"Within 24 months there won't be an occupation not affected by wearable computing and personal data," Dancy said.

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PowerShell a treat for iPhone users — but not many others

Logitech PowerShell Controller + Battery ($99.95, Apple Store)

Expected to be the first of many devices that turn your iOS 7 Apple device into a gamepad, the PowerShell is reminiscent of the iconic Nintendo controller from the 1980s. This device also charges your 5th-generation iPod touch or iPhone.

The good: It's a cinch to pop your iPhone into this no-fuss controller and enjoy a growing number of games that are compatible.

The bad: It seems disjointed to have a controller attached to your smartphone that can only control that smartphone within a game. The buttons on the controller are useless when it comes to opening your email or answering a call.

The bottom line: Destined to be seriously considered as a stocking-stuffer by many, the PowerShell is only for a select few game-
obsessed consumers. If it were half the price, it could be an 
option. But for the current cost, wait until a better iOS gamepad comes to market.

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Hackers get crack at DOT traffic data

Members of the tech community will come together next weekend to sift through a trove of data from the state Department of Transportation, and brainstorm ideas focusing on how people get to their destinations.

"We recognize the immense potential the tech community in the commonwealth could bring to us," said Rachel Bain, project manager for big data in transportation for MassDOT.

The two-day hackathon, starting Friday and hosted by MassDOT at Cambridge tech event space Hack/Reduce, will give the 100-plus coders and developers expected to sign up a chance to turn raw transportation data into a usable visualization — an image, or interactive application, for example. The focus is on travel behavior, road and rail comparisons, and the energy, environmental, and social impacts of the method of transportation people choose, according to organizers who include Massachusetts Big Data and the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative.

Participants will have access to some of the data DOT has collected, including real-time traffic information, fare and ridership information for the commuter rail and accident data.

"We hope the visualizations that people are able to produce will help inform us better about what is going on in our transportation system, about traffic in general and the way people move around the state," Bain said.

Marcela Rodriguez, an independent web developer, says she plans to participate in the hackathon because of the possibility of producing something that could have an impact on how people live their lives.

"There's a lot of opportunities to contribute and make a difference," she said. "Transportation and travel are just very interesting fields."

Rodriguez said she has a couple ideas for what she will produce, likely related to train routes.

Three prizes of $2,000 — provided by the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative — will be awarded, one each to the project that best uses the DOT data, the project that is the most visually compelling and the crowd favorite.

Adriane Cochrane, executive director of Hack/Reduce, said hackathons that have a beneficial theme are more popular.

"Anything that is civic in nature definitely excites people," she said.

More than a week before the hackathon, spots were more than half full, she said.

"People aren't coming out for the prizes, it's about learning and collaborating and finding peers with the same interests," Cochrane said.

The state hopes to come away from the hackathon with new information about transportation trends, Bain said. "The hacker community could have a really positive impact in transportation planning," she said.

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Dash-ER will deliver your christmas tree

In years past, Hadley Stephens had always gone Christmas tree shopping with her parents or bought a tree of her own that was small enough to carry. But this is her first year being married, so it was time for a change.

"My husband and I talked about going out to one of those farms to cut our own tree, but we didn't have time," said Stephens, 31. "We were also nervous about attaching it to our car. You never know what might happen."

So, in search of a convenient way to get a tree, her husband stumbled upon one on Foodler.com, the home of Dashed, a Boston-based food-delivery service they'd used a handful of times.

Less than one hour and $90 later, a 9-foot Balsam Fir was delivered to their door and erected in their South Boston loft.

"We definitely were not expecting to find that they deliver trees," Stephens said. "We were pleasantly surprised."

If all of this sounds almost Grinch-like to those of you who consider shopping for a tree a tradition not to be tampered with — even if it does leave a trail of scratches on the roof of your car — your numbers may be dwindling.

This is the second year Dashed has offered the service, which runs through Christmas Eve and costs a flat rate of $19.99, not including the cost of the tree.

"We saw such demand last year that we decided to offer it again," said Phil Dumontet, who started Dashed in 2009 by delivering meals from Maurizio's in the North End on his Trek mountain bike.

That first year Dumontet made $150,570. By last year, he had hired nearly 100 employees in five cities, and the company's revenue had grown to $4.6 million.

"We started to look at what else we could deliver," Dumontet said.

So the company began offering a menu of trees: a Balsam Fir and a Fraser Fir, both of which come in various sizes, and a potted, 2-foot Alberta.

This year, Dashed wasn't the only company to branch out into Christmas trees.

The ride-sharing app Uber did a one-day trial run last Thursday, delivering a
7- to 8-foot Fraser Fir for $135, including tree, stand and scarf.

"We were excited to roll it out and see how it did," said Meghan Verena Joyce, general manager of Uber Boston, declining to reveal how many trees were delivered. "Our bread and butter is giving people access to reliable transportation around the city. So this was an exciting experiment for us."

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