Wasn’t Starr proposing Frankford Hall a true “planting the flag” moment as well?

I’d say the domino is falling down in East Kensington as we speak!

That is 100% true, the Sunoco/Wawa on Allegheny is insane. I wonder why the spillover is worse given East Kensington and Port Richmond have the same CP (Squilla).

Fishtown/East Kensington has been an area that pretty much blended into one tbf, but Fishtown and Richmond have always been distinct from one another, even by ethnicity. Back in the day, Fishtown was mostly an Irish enclave while Port Richmond is the cultural center of Philly’s Polish activity. Still mostly holds true to this day.

100% to everything you said. It’ll never be a “Fishtown” (and that’s perfectly fine too btw), it’s too much a family oriented community with “deep roots” that aren’t going anywhere, given how affordable the area is.

Another thing is the lack of potential for adaptive reuse in the neighborhood. There’s very few warehouses mixed into the neighborhoods since all the industrial areas were on the river stemming from the train viaduct. You have to follow the viaduct north of Aramingo/the black bridge for the larger developmental opportunities, but at that point you’re a little too close to K&S/K&A for any true revitalization/reuse to occur at the present moment. Interesting to see how it unfolds in a decade or so…

Port Richmond will definitely be one of the "next dominos to fall" and I'm excited to see less and less vacant storefronts on Richmond, but I also think there are some limiting factors to deter its growth from ever reaching Fishtown's level.

1.) Majority of the buildings are 2 story rowhomes vs. 3 story + scattered warehouses; limits your renovation potential, such as adding a home office/study in addition to a nursery or adding lofts for example. 2.) Lack of access to the El. The Trolley will help but that'll still take 10-15 minutes to reach the Girard stop. 3.) More generational old-timers than Fishtown who have stronger opinions on "change" in their neighborhood (to say the least)

Scheduled to come back this fall.

If he said "Norris Square" or "East Kensington", he wouldn't have been wrong tbf

But he's wrong though; Fishtown and Port Richmond have been distinctly separated by the traintracks down Lehigh Ave. since the 1870s. If he's referring to the weird triangle of "Olde Richmond", that was part of Port Richmond until they drove i95 through the neighborhood.

The Sixers are not a charity, they’re a sport organization. I don’t know why people are expecting them to act like Habitat for Humanity, even though they’re more than happy to invest 50M+ into the community…

Like it or not, the Sixers will not play in South Philly after 2030. Whether we lose million of tax revenue to Camden due to these bad faith arguments will be another story for later on.

Because people are arguing in bad faith. An even better question to ask is: WHAT kind of proposal would Chinatown be okay with at this parcel? The way it’s currently zoned, any developer could plant a 40+ story tower/condo there with zero community engagement needed. Is that not going to cause the same amount of outrage as this project, even after the Girard was just built across the street with zero issue? Is that a better deal than the 50M+ in community funds the Sixers could offer to Chinatown to invest in keeping the neighborhood intact?

That’s what I really want to know because the fact of the matter is the current use of 10th and Market as a mall failed twice and the owners want out ASAP. This parcel will be changing soon regardless of opinion.

“But that’s not a good enough reason for me!!” - half this sub

People living in some socialist utopia where the Sixers should single-handedly revive North Philly with an arena, ignoring that the same calls for gentrifying the neighborhood were given when Temple wanted to build a stadium by their campus. There are very few locations as accessible as above Jefferson and they want up to 50% of folks taking transit to the game, it’s that simple. And of course the Sixers are keeping their financials in mind, they’re a fucking sports organization, do you expect them to be guided by the goodness in their heart over everything?

What “all that space” on the waterfront are you even talking about? The Market street section next to Penn’s Landing the sixers already bid on and failed to win? Nothing on the waterfront is anywhere accessible as being on top of one of our transit hubs so that argument is a non-starter and will only lead to the Sixers ending up over the bridge, losing the city tens of millions in tax revenue.

Very unfortunate the Schuylkill Valley Metro plan failed in the early 2000s. Could’ve avoided this boondoggle while easing the possibility of Amtrak expanding their services to Reading by renovating the tracks ahead of time…

It’s not a schtick. Nutter had some tough times in office navigating budget cuts and the recession, but he left this city in a much better place than his predecessor and probably feels irked that his successor is leading us back down the drain we crawled up from.

Philadelphia citizen has done some solid coverage for the mayoral race if you haven’t had the chance to check out their page.

Except one of them answered how they’ll avoid conflict of interest and the other candidate dodged the question

This is a separate facility owned by a few companies then Sunoco, then Honeywell, which then spun off into what is now AdvanSix. It's the one immediately adjacent to 95. This plant has been producing phoenol since the 50s and is actually one of the largest phenol producing facilities in the country.

Rohm & Haas sat more back towards the mouth of old Frankford creek on the Delaware and was even more massive. This plant closed in 2009 and the location is currently used to store vehicles. A NY-based developer bought the plot in 2020 but haven't seen any updates since. I used to always mix these up myself.

Not much left of Philly's rich chemical past.

Rohm & Haas sat further back by the bridesburg boys and clubs club and was demolished in the late 2000s.

What a comparison. You really thought that was a good zinger, didn’t you?

Typical Reddit anti-sport circlejerk bitching about the renovation of a historical public golf course that needed to be fixed up.