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Yes, this is true. Not really comparable, and, regardless, what are the options for our city exactly? We currently have, and have had for decades, a dead area in the heart of our city that has shown an almost unbelievable resilience to positive change for some reason. It is currently ground-zero for the teenage criminal gathering point to stage their domestic terrorism attacks all over the city. The Sixers organization would almost certainly provide a huge security presence and probably fund extra Septa police in the area.
The pros as I see it are:
- Completely transform and rejuvenate a lost section of our city that is literally in the very center of our city's core.
- Increase and improve our public transportation in a section that desperately needs some added attention and Septa police presence.
- Turn a lawless stretch of our city into a high-security area so hundreds/thousands of teens can't take the subway and meet to execute their domestic terrorism initiatives.
- Bring in millions more of revenue to bars and restaurants (including Chinatown venues). Regardless of what the naysayers claim, I find it very hard to believe that fans in Philly won't pregame. Look at Xfinity Live in the stadium section. That place is absolutely jammed on game days. Why does everyone against this stadium proposal think fans will suddenly stop doing this? Bars and restaurants would be hopping on game days.
- The stadium itself would be a venue for cool events in off-season in the heart of our city - something we don't really have anywhere currently except the stadium complex, which might as well not even be in the city limits it's so disconnected from most neighborhoods.
- All of the above would be done without any taxpayer contribution or impact.
The cons as I see them are:
- Traffic would increase, obviously
- Chinatown may be impacted in some capacity, but I still haven't read or heard anything that actually explains this. Most of the residential Chinese population lives north of Vine Street. The streets from Market to Vine are retail operations that, I would imagine, want more people traffic.
- More activity on Market Street?
Basically, though, in my mind it comes down to this - what are the alternatives? From the Gallery to the Fashion District to the random burner cell phone and sneaker stores, everything around there has been a huge failure since the 80s (if not earlier). I know there are many pie in the sky thoughts about what could/should go there, but what proposals are actually in the works from major companies to invest billions into the Market east section?
1) The proposal won't "increase and improve our public transportation" beyond having five-car trains on the Ridge Spur on event days and maybe some more frequent Regional Rail and MFL service around events. One of the reasons I liked this proposal, as I explained above, is because the site chosen sits atop the best rail transit infrastructure in the region. However: Moving it to the Disney Hole site across Market and two blocks east offers the same connectivity (switching the longer walk to the site from the Broad-Ridge Spur to Regional Rail). I suspect this proposal is where it is as much to shore up a floundering downtown shopping mall makeover as anything else, maybe more so.
2) Increased security patrols can be implemented just as easily at the SWC 8th and Market as at the NEC 11th and Market, and you also get a parking lot turned into something more useful in the process. I realize that this might require acquiring 833 Chestnut (the one surviving fragment of the Gimbels department store that once took up just about all of this square block), but I'd say that the acquisition would be more worth it.
3) Xfinity Live! (a Cordish Companies project) is more the exception to the rule than the rule. Most of the research I've read on spinoff effects of sports arenas concludes that the patrons don't spend much money in neighboring businesses pre- or post-game; instead, the concessions inside the arena capture most of the money fans spend on food and drink related to the arena event.
Cordish specializes in building entertainment facilities of this type, some of which (like KC Live! in my hometown of Kansas City) are located near arenas (in its case, the Sprint^WT-Mobile Center, which has no major league sports team playing in it; when I was researching this article on the Power & Light District, where the Cordish complex is located, for Next City in 2015, I read an article about the arena that quoted someone saying that "Garth Brooks is our anchor tenant"), and some (e.g., Fourth Street Live! in Louisville) are not. But it appears that the Cordish entertainment centers generate their own traffic and revenue related to what may be going on in the arena rather than snare money from arena-goers; they allow those who don't have tickets to the arena event to experience it vicariously. Most businesses around arenas can't do that.
Also: Most of Chinatown's residents live in Chinatown proper, not Chinatown North (above Vine Street). The block group that contains all of Chinatown proper (Arch to Vine and 9th to 11th streets, plus 11th to Marvine streets between Race and Vine) had 2,213 residents in 2020, while the block group to its northeast (Vine Expressway to Green Street, 6th to 10th) had 851 residents and the one to its northwest (Vine Expressway to Broad, 10th to Hamilton) had 1,563. The Chinatown part of both block groups runs from 9th to 11th, Vine to Buttonwood, which is only part of each block group, so I'm pretty sure that the sum of the two portions is less than 2,213. Chinatown is one of the city's most densely populated neighborhoods. (49,443.54 ppsm). The overwhelming majority of those retail storefronts on Chinatown's main streets and interstitial alleys have residences over them.
If, as Tom Lee (I think correctly) pointed out to me, the majority of 76 Place patrons continue to drive there the way they do to events at the Wells Fargo Center despite the superior transit connections, Chinatown's streets won't be able to handle the extra traffic. Now, I would hope that Lee is wrong and people do use transit more to get to the arena because of those connections. Those who still drive would nonetheless place a strain on local streets and parking. It would be marginally better for a Disney Hole site simply because the street to its north is wider (Market) and the one to its south has less congestion most of the time (Chestnut), plus you'd be closer to 5th and 6th streets, both of which are better equipped to handle larger traffic volumes.
Last edited by MarketStEl; 04-17-2023 at 10:35 PM..
The block across the street from the proposed 76 Place is empty and ready to be demolished for possibly the best Live! venue in existence. Maybe throw 3 levels of parking below street level and boom. Done.
30-40 levels of residences over that and you've completed the most dramatic transformation of a resilient stretch of blight. The blocks to the east would fill in immediately to capture the critical mass created.
The block across the street from the proposed 76 Place is empty and ready to be demolished for possibly the best Live! venue in existence. Maybe throw 3 levels of parking below street level and boom. Done.
30-40 levels of residences over that and you've completed the most dramatic transformation of a resilient stretch of blight. The blocks to the east would fill in immediately to capture the critical mass created.
Just sayin...
Sorry, there's a CVS drugstore and a charter high school in the former Grants/later Woolworth's building at the SEC 11th and Market.
The building to its south on 11th has a Honeygrow fast-casual eatery and a co-working facility in it.
I think there are also a few small merchants still in place to the east of the CVS, though I'm pretty sure the Marshalls store has closed or is supposed to if it hasn't yet.
Property acquisition costs would be higher to obtain all the properties in the block bounded by 10th, 11th, Market and Chestnut (and the Victory Building @ 10th & Chestnut, which TJU owns and which is also on the city historic register, couldn't be demolished without proof of hardship) than they would to acquire the parking lot that takes up 3/4 of the block bounded by 8th, 9th, Market and Chestnut.
Sorry, there's a CVS drugstore and a charter high school in the former Grants/later Woolworth's building at the SEC 11th and Market.
MarketSt, It's a CVS and then SEVEN empty store fronts including some large store spaces like the Robinson building and Marshall's. It's an empty block for retail.
MarketSt, It's a CVS and then SEVEN empty store fronts including some large store spaces like the Robinson building and Marshall's. It's an empty block for retail.
Yea, not sure what Sandy is trying to say? The adjacent residential Market East project is the length of Market and back to Ludlow, not Chestnut.
Market from 10th to 11th back to Ludlow is vacant (and awful looking) except the CVS (which can easily move) and the charter school, a perfect block for demo/redevelop.
Aquisition costs for that Charter school and the cvs would pale in comparison to the value of that block as a marque property supporting a major urban arena. If I were preit (whom I think is the owner of those empty storefronts), I'd be freeing up cash and securing funding at a feverish pace.
That kind of development could fix a lot of the mistakes they made with the Fashion District fiasco. Not many companies get a second chance like this.
Yea, not sure what Sandy is trying to say? The adjacent residential Market East project is the length of Market and back to Ludlow, not Chestnut.
Market from 10th to 11th back to Ludlow is vacant (and awful looking) except the CVS (which can easily move) and the charter school.
There's a Rite Aid too, but to the point: pharmacies aren't "retail" in the middle of the supposed "Market" district.
But anywho, I'm still undecided between Rhynhart and Domb. Gym's army of internet trolls is making a lot of the online discourse insufferable. What's funny though, is the few of us on here still, all seem to be on the same page. I don't get how so many people can just be like "she's the best and everyone else is Donald Trump-lite!". It's beyond stupid.
I was actually surprised and happy to see the Inquirer bash her imaginary budget plans. Like when you realize her whole "schools" plan relies on a massive increase in facilities funding from Harrisburg, it is just imaginary.
Parker, who is not my choice, made a great point in the Fox debate: you can't go to Harrisburg with your bullhorn and army of activist lawyers telling everyone in the PA GOP that they're morally bankrupt and at the same time put your hand out and ask for money. It's nonsense. It's imaginary. It's what happens when you view yourself as someone who "walks into a room and system's of oppression fall". Savior-syndrome
There's a Rite Aid too, but to the point: pharmacies aren't "retail" in the middle of the supposed "Market" district.
But anywho, I'm still undecided between Rhynhart and Domb. Gym's army of internet trolls is making a lot of the online discourse insufferable. What's funny though, is the few of us on here still, all seem to be on the same page. I don't get how so many people can just be like "she's the best and everyone else is Donald Trump-lite!". It's beyond stupid.
I was actually surprised and happy to see the Inquirer bash her imaginary budget plans. Like when you realize her whole "schools" plan relies on a massive increase in facilities funding from Harrisburg, it is just imaginary.
Parker, who is not my choice, made a great point in the Fox debate: you can't go to Harrisburg with your bullhorn and army of activist lawyers telling everyone in the PA GOP that they're morally bankrupt and at the same time put your hand out and ask for money. It's nonsense. It's imaginary. It's what happens when you view yourself as someone who "walks into a room and system's of oppression fall". Savior-syndrome
That Rite Aid closed.
I've seen Gyms social media army... the good ole saying "you can't argue with stupid" comes to mind. And it seems like an oddly high amount of her following is young, white, and generally privileged...
Meanwhile the common sense folks (from all walks of life) are split amongst the other candidates.
Does it feel like Gym is losing a bit of steam or at least facing harsher than than expected criticisms, maybe a sign of hope that sanity may prevail.
I've seen Gyms social media army... the good ole saying "you can't argue with stupid" comes to mind. And it seems like an oddly high amount of her following is young, white, and generally privileged...
Meanwhile the common sense folks (from all walks of life) are split amongst the other candidates.
This is always one of the biggest things that grinds my own gears. I will admit that I grew up with tons of privilege. I grew up outside of New Hope in a safe and wealthy area. My older sister went to Columbia. I go on nice vacations every summer. I can see I benefited from having a good family and community around me. I will never pretend I personally speak for the working/retail class. But I will say, I have a good eye for recognizing privilege lol. And that's why all these weird privileged young white kids who go around screaming "ACAB!!!" at protests and propping up people like Helen Gym as a "champion of children and the working class!" is so f'n bizarre and gross.
Let's break down the reality:
Philly is a poor city in a rich region. Why is that? Well poverty and unemployment are higher. Okay, then why is that? Well according to 5 dozen studies by the world's greatest research firms all conclude that Philly has a bad tax structure that makes a lot of new business simply setup outside the city limits. Couple that with the workers then not sending their kids to the public schools, people not opening small biz to support the professional workers, etc, etc, etc, you get to where we are today.
So what's Gym's plan? Stop the tiny business tax cuts. Treat new people and investment as "evil gentrification". Lie to people that there's $10 billion just laying around that can upgrade the school facilities. Not prosecute shoplifting or illegal gun possession. Not implementing street cleaning. Basically doing exactly what Jim kenney did but this time with "feel-good" vibes that make the white privileged kids make themselves feel good.
Quote:
Does it feel like Gym is losing a bit of steam or at least facing harsher than than expected criticisms, maybe a sign of hope that sanity may prevail.
I'm not sure. I think the real wildcard has been and is Charelle Parker. There's a good chance she's capturing more of the black vote than most people realize.
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