PHILADELPHIA | Lowrise/General Developments Thread

[Nova08]

Philadelphia-based LucasPye Bio announces first contract manufacturing partnership
https://www.bizjournals.com/philadel...lphia-bio.html

Large-scale bioprocessing of new drug candidates for human clinical trials and post-regulatory approval will take place at LucasPye's future contract manufacturing facility that it's planning to build at an undisclosed location in Philadelphia. The company is in the final stage of lease negotiations for its planned manufacturing plant in the city.

[nemesisinphilly]

Does anyone have an update on the Alterra led project at 12th and Reed. This is the city owned land - parking lot, fire station, police fleet building that are all being repurposed.

I believe the final community meeting was this Tuesday with the Passyunk Sq civic. I was curious if any new information or details were revealed?

[New2Fishtown]

Originally Posted by nemesisinphilly

Does anyone have an update on the Alterra led project at 12th and Reed. This is the city owned land - parking lot, fire station, police fleet building that are all being repurposed.

I believe the final community meeting was this Tuesday with the Passyunk Sq civic. I was curious if any new information or details were revealed?

Detailed docs submitted to CDR:

https://www.phila.gov/media/20210721...021-Review.pdf

[nemesisinphilly]

Originally Posted by New2Fishtown

Detailed docs submitted to CDR:

https://www.phila.gov/media/20210721...021-Review.pdf

Thanks for this. Any word on who the grocery tenant may be? 19k sqft seems in line with something like an Heirloom Giant or a Trader Joes.

[GtownFriend]

545 NORTH BROAD: Excavation equipment on site!

[TempleGuy1000]

Originally Posted by GtownFriend

545 NORTH BROAD: Excavation equipment on site!

Excellent. I was going to point out yesterday that that camera you shared from Clemens construction for the Broad and Noble project turns far enough north to capture two of the low-rise projects near Spring Garden

[mcgrath618]

Originally Posted by GtownFriend

545 NORTH BROAD: Excavation equipment on site!

Great news. This project is superbly designed.

[PHLtoNYC]

New Apartment Building on 2nd Street Will Fill a Surface Lot at Last

http://www.ocfrealty.com/naked-phill...rface-lot-last

Very nice looking project. CDR info within. Of course the Historical Commission advised for a shorter building... I don't get it... At least they are merely an advisory voice for this.

[Justin7]

Originally Posted by PHLtoNYC

New Apartment Building on 2nd Street Will Fill a Surface Lot at Last

http://www.ocfrealty.com/naked-phill...rface-lot-last

Very nice looking project. CDR info within. Of course the Historical Commission advised for a shorter building... I don't get it... At least they are merely an advisory voice for this.

2nd St facade looks good, but...

I know people need a place to put their trash and all, but Strawberry St. has the potential to be a beautiful narrow back street. Wish we could appreciate that more here.

[TempleGuy1000]

I have a friend who knows I like following construction developments. They work in the insurance industry and a few days ago got several submissions from Haverford Properties looking to buy a variety of types of insurance for two apartment buildings at 601 North Columbus Blvd where Festival Pier was. Don't know if the designs have changed since last year's CDR submission, but would love to see this move forward!

https://www.phila.gov/media/20200805...Submission.pdf

[PHLtoNYC]

Originally Posted by Justin7

2nd St facade looks good, but...

I know people need a place to put their trash and all, but Strawberry St. has the potential to be a beautiful narrow back street. Wish we could appreciate that more here.

That is how I feel about Canal Street off of Delaware Avenue, more of an after thought rather than a focal point of the large project in the works.

The little alley streets are a unique aspect of Center City, and provide a very European feel, don't see that in many other US cities.

[cardeza]

Originally Posted by GtownFriend

545 NORTH BROAD: Excavation equipment on site!

Which project is this? Drawing a blank.

[mcgrath618]

Originally Posted by cardeza

Which project is this? Drawing a blank.

9 story apartment building with ground floor retail. Decent, traditional-ish looking facade. White.

[TonyTone]

Delete.

[TonyTone]

Hey Mcgrath how many Rail Trolley Lines are Left and how many are planned to come back?

[mcgrath618]

Originally Posted by TonyTone

Hey Mcgrath how many Rail Trolley Lines are Left and how many are planned to come back?

6 trolley lines. The 10, 11, 13, 15, 34, and 36.

The 15 is currently being restored/extended by about 3 miles to its original terminus of Richmond and Westmoreland. Trolley service will resume following completion of an overhaul of the PCC IIs and when I-95 construction is finished.

There are talks to restore the 23 (Chestnut Hill to Oregon Ave via Germantown Avenue) and 56 (Erie Avenue). I could see the 56 happening in the semi-near future, but the 23 probably isn’t coming back. The most I could see would be Chestnut Hill to Broad, with a transfer to the BSL.

There are limited talks to construct new trolley routes along the following routes:
1) Delaware Avenue. There was a trolley run by volunteers in the nineties along the Philadelphia Harbor Belt, but when the city took over the Cherry Street Pier they packed up shop and moved to Scranton. DRPC is in charge of this. It’s unknown whether it’ll be SEPTA or PATCO providing the service.

2) Belmont Avenue. In the city’s recent Transit Plan, they highlighted the need for service to City Line from Center City. While they admitted that this may be achievable through better utilization of the Cynwyd Line, I suspect that a trolley running from USciences to SJU now might sound quite appealing.

3. Centennial District/Zoo. In the above transit plan, the city also highlights the need for better access to the Centennial District and the Zoo. While the 15 already serves the Zoo, its routing is circuitous for anyone trying to get there from Southwest Philly, and most of the city for that matter. A line running from 34th northward seems to be what they have planned, however I do not know how serious they are about it.

4. Airport. They’ve talked about extending the 13 to the Airport for decades now. We’ll see.

It’s also important to note that the trolley modernization is still happening, albeit slowly. Recent setbacks have pushed it back even further, but there is still a serious push at SEPTA to update both the trolleys and the busses. Both networks are being completely redesigned both from a graphic design and routing standpoint, along with the subways. This is in addition to new LRVs that SEPTA is getting to replace all six existing lines.

I’ve seen the proposed redesign. It’s quite nice, unless you’re especially attached to the numbers the trolleys and busses currently have. It’s just a shame, because SEPTA’s graphic design and maps used to be pretty good, but feel off somewhere around the turn of the millennium.

[Busy Bee]

^ What's the point of the renumbering???

[mcgrath618]

Originally Posted by Busy Bee

^ What's the point of the renumbering???

Navigation and wayfinding.

I recently had a group of people visit Philly for the first time. At one point, we were on the 13 heading towards 33rd. My friends were observing the trolley map and remarked, “No wonder you know so much about Philly transit. This is a f%cking labyrinth.”

I love the current numbers, and I’ll be sad to see them go if the redesign ends up getting pushed through, but I don’t blame SEPTA and a lot of transit activists for wanting to update and change the numbers. Navigating Philly can be really confusing.

They might also just change the graphic design and keep the existing numbers. Of the several options presented, one of them was just sprucing up signage and changing fonts. It looked nice.

[HBus]

Originally Posted by mcgrath618

6 trolley lines. The 10, 11, 13, 15, 34, and 36.

The 15 is currently being restored/extended by about 3 miles to its original terminus of Richmond and Westmoreland. Trolley service will resume following completion of an overhaul of the PCC IIs and when I-95 construction is finished.

There are talks to restore the 23 (Chestnut Hill to Oregon Ave via Germantown Avenue) and 56 (Erie Avenue). I could see the 56 happening in the semi-near future, but the 23 probably isn’t coming back. The most I could see would be Chestnut Hill to Broad, with a transfer to the BSL.

There are limited talks to construct new trolley routes along the following routes:
1) Delaware Avenue. There was a trolley run by volunteers in the nineties along the Philadelphia Harbor Belt, but when the city took over the Cherry Street Pier they packed up shop and moved to Scranton. DRPC is in charge of this. It’s unknown whether it’ll be SEPTA or PATCO providing the service.

2) Belmont Avenue. In the city’s recent Transit Plan, they highlighted the need for service to City Line from Center City. While they admitted that this may be achievable through better utilization of the Cynwyd Line, I suspect that a trolley running from USciences to SJU now might sound quite appealing.

3. Centennial District/Zoo. In the above transit plan, the city also highlights the need for better access to the Centennial District and the Zoo. While the 15 already serves the Zoo, its routing is circuitous for anyone trying to get there from Southwest Philly, and most of the city for that matter. A line running from 34th northward seems to be what they have planned, however I do not know how serious they are about it.

4. Airport. They’ve talked about extending the 13 to the Airport for decades now. We’ll see.

It’s also important to note that the trolley modernization is still happening, albeit slowly. Recent setbacks have pushed it back even further, but there is still a serious push at SEPTA to update both the trolleys and the busses. Both networks are being completely redesigned both from a graphic design and routing standpoint, along with the subways. This is in addition to new LRVs that SEPTA is getting to replace all six existing lines.

I’ve seen the proposed redesign. It’s quite nice, unless you’re especially attached to the numbers the trolleys and busses currently have. It’s just a shame, because SEPTA’s graphic design and maps used to be pretty good, but feel off somewhere around the turn of the millennium.

They’ve talked about restoring the 23 since the day they converted to buses. It’s not going to get restored. Cars and trolleys had a horrible coexistence on Germantown Avenue.

The 56 has been in SEPTA plans for years too. I’m at the “I’ll believe it when I see it” stage regarding any expansion of trolley service.

[cardeza]

a lot of the tracks for the 56 have been paved over. There is little change this route is coming back. One thing you have to remember is that when they discontinued these lines they also closed the maintenance facilities where the cars were serviced. There are only 4 locations where trolleys can be serviced in the SEPTA system, one in west philly, two are in SW philly and one is at 69th street. There is nowhere to store or service rolling stock for lines that do not connect with tracks that run to these facilities. The investment would be massive to restore service to any old lines- not likely to happen with so many competing interests such as K of P rail line, replacement of existing kawasaki trolley cars and needed replacement of 45 year old commuter rail cars. SEPTA needs a lot of stuff from a vehicle perspective, hard to see where additional trolley infrastructure fits in when you consider the magnitude of the needs that are out there.