Quote:
Originally Posted by Londonee
Wow, just google-mapped around this area...pretty amazing how little there is around it. Basically surrounded on all sides by empty lots and low density housing...100 yards from a 4-track subway stop. This is obviously a step in the right direction.
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Yeah, a bunch of that low-density housing replaced what by some measures was the most dangerous housing project in the city at the time: Richard Allen, where Bill Cosby grew up. It wasn't that bad when I was growing up a little further to the east (literally on the other side of the tracks), but got real bad when the crack epidemic hit.
Razing it and building those houses provided some good homes for folks, but I imagine someday development pressure all around them might reintroduce density into that area.
Oddly, the Fairmount subway station was never terribly busy in my lifetime, and the B-R Spur platform was particularly underutilized, much like that line generally (I think the Spring Garden stop still remains closed). It'll be interesting to see what happens now with all of the development/redevelopment around it.