Can the Schuylkill ever play a role like the Chicago
River or Paris' Seine - a source of beauty and vitality that unites riverside
neighborhoods like Center City and University City rather than dividing them?
It's a decades-old dream, but key pieces are finally
falling into place, according to civic leaders and developers who joined a
panel discussion Tuesday at the Union League sponsored by the Central
Philadelphia Development Corp.
On both sides of the river, new projects such as
Brandywine Realty Trust's 47-story FMC Tower at 30th and Walnut Streets and PMC
Property Group's million-square-foot complex planned at 2400 Market St. are
paying closer attention than their predecessors to the streetscape and river.
Amtrak and Drexel University have kept a similar focus as
they pursue long-standing visions for underused areas around 30th Street
Station.
Amtrak offered space once used for parking along Market
Street for a University City District minipark called the Porch, now used for
concerts, farmers' markets, and even miniature golf. As Drexel moves eastward,
it has dubbed the asphalt-heavy blocks west of the station as Innovation
Neighborhood - a home for technology partnerships and other business
development as well as for education and academic research.
"The time does seem to be right," said Keith
Orris, Drexel senior vice president, as he presented a slide depicting the
barren block of John F. Kennedy Boulevard west of the station - mostly known
now as the stop for BoltBus and Megabus - as a vibrant street lined by a mix of
towers, storefronts, and sidewalk restaurants.
Drexel's counterpart to the south and west, the
University of Pennsylvania, has worked for years to better link its campus with
the neighborhoods across the Schuylkill where many students live.
That effort was helped by forward-thinking reconstruction
of the South Street Bridge, said Center City District president Paul R. Levy,
who moderated the panel and offered a historical perspective on the challenges
of integrating two neighborhoods that he said provide about 55 percent of the
city's jobs. He said the rebuilt bridge functions as a pedestrian and bicycle
bridge as well as an automotive bridge, "with a lot of amenities we would
not have done 20 or 30 years ago."
Even smaller changes can have impressive effects, he
said. Levy said two simple changes to the Walnut Street Bridge - adding
pedestrian-scale lampposts and removing highway-style signs directing traffic
onto the Schuylkill Expressway - have helped discourage drivers from speeding
across the span and into University City.
Panelists suggested that Center City and University City
will benefit if they continue to be magnets for millennials, the post-1980s
generation known as being less eager to drive than its predecessors, and
attracted by cities with good transit and amenities geared to pedestrians and
cyclists.
"If you believe the statistic or the quote that 75
percent of the labor force will be millennials by 2025, University City is clearly
a place you that want to be," said Jeff DeVuono, executive vice president
and senior managing director for Brandywine Realty Trust.
DeVuono said a publicly traded development company such
as Brandywine cannot get too far in front of the market. But he said that in
the decade since Brandywine built the Cira Centre north of 30th Street Station,
University City's population has grown from about 42,000 to 50,000. He said the
company was confident of the area's vitality - and willing to bet "there
will be more people living and working there tomorrow than there are
today."
Similar confidence was voiced by Jonathan Stavin, PMC's
executive vice president, who offered a conceptual rendering of the 2400 Market
St. complex and called it "the most exciting multiuse project that
Philadelphia has ever seen."
Stavin said the 300-unit residential section of the
project would include a mix of two- and three-bedroom units as well as the
smaller apartments more common in the neighborhood. He said the complex would
also offer amenities such as on-site retailing that would attract empty nesters
as well as younger workers. Although a tenant has not been identified, plans
also include a hotel on the site.
But Stavin said a key element of the design was a
bridge-level connection between Market and Chestnut Streets - something now
lacking along the Schuylkill's east bank - to take advantage of the river's
proximity.
Levy said that kind of focus reflects a clear change for
the better in developers' thinking.
"People are no longer just building buildings,"
he said. "They are looking at how the buildings connect the pedestrian
fabric of the city."
Source: Philly.com
No comments:
Post a Comment