Where Philadelphia's Other Future Is Being Written: The Northeast (Pittsburgh: section 8, real estate)

[MarketStEl]

That's interesting and useful information, pookybean, and it goes a long way towards explaining why we have reached different conclusions about the future of your part of the Northeast.

I've ridden the 26 bus up Tabor Road/Avenue enough to at least know what your area looks like, and I'm also familiar with the physical environment of Adams Avenue, the closest commercial strip to you.

The Naval Support Activity facility is large enough to make the neighborhoods that border it to the east and west (yours is the latter) two different micro-environments.

Castor Avenue, where the 59 runs, is a densely developed (for the Northeast), relatively pedestrian-friendly thoroughfare with storefronts right on the street. Almost none of those storefronts are vacant. The stores are small, but most of them now cater to various ethnic groups, and as I noted before, there are a variety of them.

Adams Avenue is pretty much the opposite of this: all the retail is auto-oriented - strip malls, freestanding stores with parking out front. There's plenty of evidence of Vietnamese settlement in the area, what with all the pho restaurants now facing this street, but otherwise, you can see fraying in things like the now-empty space in that big shopping mall at Adams and Tabor avenues where a supermarket had been.

I've seen vacant, boarded-up houses over on the east side of the naval facility too, on streets like Levick and Devereaux.

Just FYI, the rowhouse next door to the one I live in in East Germantown also falls into this category. Given that the far more pockmarked streetscape of East Chelten Avenue did not come about overnight, I simply cannot dismiss your concerns out of hand as paranoia or fear of the Other. The question you ask at the end of your post is indeed the right one: How long until...?

The population stats tell me that the answer, for at least part of this area, is "a good long while." An area that is gaining residents will have plenty of pressure to keep vacant properties from remaining vacant long.

But I'd say that applies to Castor Avenue more than it does to Tabor Avenue. A trip up Rising Sun Avenue, which the Route 18 bus follows, suggests to me that Lawncrest is not functioning as the kind of immigrant magnet Oxford Circle proper is now. And that is cause for worry, for without an arriving population to replace the departing one, your neighborhood will indeed suffer the fate you fear awaits it.

[lawrencea1]

Alright so I live in Cheltenham but spent some of my childhood in oxford circle and visit there pretty frequently. I do think its a little in decline like I was turning on leonard I think off of Cottman and saw two boarded up homes. The neighborhood as long as I remember it has been working class though. I think one thing that seperates the lower northeast from North Philly is the diversity and people of all walks of life and the awesome restaurants, Steve's Prince of Steaks, Nick Roast Beef, Al-Sham, Rib Rack, Picanha Brazilian Grill all within a few blocks of eachother just to name a few. There is a pretty big middle eastern population around bustleton/Harrbison/and Knorr

[AgelessStranger]

Originally Posted by pookybean

I agree with the post above. The area is getting worse and worse as time goes on. I don't like to stereotypical and say the next north philly, but i dont know what else could describe it. I believe the area is growing, but more so because with the building up of certain areas in North Philly there is just nowhere else to go. Further into the NE is too expensive and other areas of the city are more foreign when you grew up travelling out to rising sun ave to go grocery shopping or to the mall at bustleton and cottman.

I have worked at a couple of non profits in the city and i have always noticed the NE is funded much less than other "needier" parts of the city. I dont think anyone expected the population in the lower NE to explode as it has, especially with lower income families. The Oxford Circle area has the largest amount of families with children who qualify for head start/pre k counts....yet there are the least amount of slots in that area. it just wasnt expected.

i hope that if growth wants to be encouraged in the lower NE then they (the city? government?) put some much needed attention into the area. The rec centers have been neglected, the police do not feel that these neighborhoods are a priority and rental properties with neglectful landlords all need to be addressed.

i live very close to this area, we actually have many similar problems. it feels as though the city doesnt care about these neighborhoods. we aren't far enough ne to pay a large amount of taxes and we aren't close enough to downtown to put any real effort into revitalizing the neighborhoods. i have no fear of a minority population, i want diversity in my neighborhoods and my kids schools....but my neighborhood is getting so bad it's just not worth it to me anymore.

Agree. I lived in the area of Devereaux and the Blvd for 11 years. It was such a nice neighborhood when I moved there in the early 90's. Then the boom happened and that's when the decline began IMO. After two shootings (one at the end of my block) and my youngest getting mugged for his bicycle, I got out. Hopefully those who've moved in after I left will change the area for the better but so far it doesn't look like that will happen.

[the_curious_urbanist]

For all the negatives, the Northeast is still better and more active than most cities' downtowns.

[2e1m5a]

Anyone on here live in Northwood? It seems like it has such great potential, and never really became as neglected as the rest of Frankford.

The large homes seem unique for The Northeast, and it can't hurt being so close to the Frankford Transportation Center with the El right there.

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0218...wQMfC_jfug!2e0

[Snwmn5]

Originally Posted by 2e1m5a

Anyone on here live in Northwood? It seems like it has such great potential, and never really became as neglected as the rest of Frankford.

The large homes seem unique for The Northeast, and it can't hurt being so close to the Frankford Transportation Center with the El right there.

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0218...wQMfC_jfug!2e0

Northwood has some beautiful homes, especially on the blocks west of that link, and at this point quite affordable prices. It would be a shame to see it fall to the level of neglect of the neighborhoods surrounding it.

That's one misconception that I see a lot on here in general - people writing off the Northeast as all bland, airlite rowhouses. Northwood, Lawndale, Tacony, Burholme, Fox Chase, Torresdale (the list goes on) all have a great mix of older twins and single-family homes with character.

[2e1m5a]

Originally Posted by Snwmn5

Northwood has some beautiful homes, especially on the blocks west of that link, and at this point quite affordable prices. It would be a shame to see it fall to the level of neglect of the neighborhoods surrounding it.

That's one misconception that I see a lot on here in general - people writing off the Northeast as all bland, airlite rowhouses. Northwood, Lawndale, Tacony, Burholme, Fox Chase, Torresdale (the list goes on) all have a great mix of older twins and single-family homes with character.

Yeah, I'm familiar with Tacony and Fox Chase-some beautiful homes there.

Gotta love this brick paved street in Northwood

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0223...4KtCWytgfw!2e0

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by 2e1m5a

Anyone on here live in Northwood? It seems like it has such great potential, and never really became as neglected as the rest of Frankford.

The large homes seem unique for The Northeast, and it can't hurt being so close to the Frankford Transportation Center with the El right there.

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0218...wQMfC_jfug!2e0

When I met my ex, he was living with his mother in Northwood, behind Frankford High School.*

His sister and brother-in-law lived two blocks further west, just off the Boulevard. They and his mom moved to Haddonfield about 15 years ago. Mom passed away a couple of years back, and Sis and Bro-in-Law now live in Collingswood.

*It was known as the "Frankford Annex of Central High School" when it opened in 1914, according to my ex, who's an alumnus.

Originally Posted by Snwmn5

Northwood has some beautiful homes, especially on the blocks west of that link, and at this point quite affordable prices. It would be a shame to see it fall to the level of neglect of the neighborhoods surrounding it.

That's one misconception that I see a lot on here in general - people writing off the Northeast as all bland, airlite rowhouses. Northwood, Lawndale, Tacony, Burholme, Fox Chase, Torresdale (the list goes on) all have a great mix of older twins and single-family homes with character.

Agreed. Most of those areas developed while the rest of the Northeast was still farmland. The house I lived in off Oxford Circle was built in 1946, and while there are some 1930s rowhomes nearby, those are the oldest structures in the neighborhood, whose branch library dates to 1949.

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by 2e1m5a

Yeah, I'm familiar with Tacony and Fox Chase-some beautiful homes there.

Gotta love this brick paved street in Northwood

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.0223...4KtCWytgfw!2e0

Thought I'd recognize this.

That's the 1200 block of Allengrove Street. It ends at the back of Frankford High School. It used to be completely lined with the large plane trees you see near the back of the image.

My ex's mom lived at 1103 Allengrove Street, at Large. IIRC the athletic field one block north is used for Frankford High games.

Still a very nice-looking neighborhood.

[the_curious_urbanist]

It will be better to let Northeast secede since it's suburban looking and not really appealing to live and visit. Getting rid of the Northeast would also boost Philly's statistics. Maybe then Walkscore will rank Philly #1 walkable.