[summersm343]

Originally Posted by Knight Hospitaller

Inga weighs in on "Good Bart" and "Bad Bart," including Broad & Washington. Mostly bad these days, I have to agree. There's no accounting for inspiration/taste, or lack thereof. However, pushing bland stuff that violates multiple zoning rules from the get go is just bizarre:

http://mobile.philly.com/beta?wss=/p...g&id=368486621

From the article:

Blatstein declined to release drawings because he says the details are still changing. But his plan for Broad and Washington, which he showed me during an interview this week, is especially worrisome because of the site's prominence.

The empty lot, next to the High School for the Creative and Performing Arts, is the missing link between expanding Center City and revitalizing South Philadelphia. The development will shape the future of Washington Avenue, another broad street that is evolving into a residential boulevard.

Now he's back to a single, 32-story apartment building on top of a podium. Who knows what will be included when Blatstein presents the project to the Civic Design Review Board on March 15?

In the current incarnation, the lone tower sits on a 50-foot-high podium that spans the four-acre block. The structure can accommodate three large retailers, but its main purpose is to provide space for 650 cars. The plan calls for nearly 1,000 apartments.

Blatstein has big plans for the garage. In the plan he showed me, the roof would become the platform of a sky "village" of free-standing houses, arranged to mimic the center of Aix-en-Provence. Like the real French town, those rooftop structures would have shops at the bottom and apartments above. There's plenty of room, Blatstein argues, because the L-shaped tower would occupy only the northeast corner of the podium.

If the village concept sounds familiar, that's because it is recycled from the casino Blatstein proposed on the site of the old Inquirer building. The idea of a rooftop shopping mall disguised as a French village sounds like something you might find on a Florida highway, circa 1980. Not exactly a millennial magnet.

Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/living/...3TA1Kpj6z6H.99