Philadelphia is showing off a little bit, and that's fantastic

With just a few days before the arrival of Pope Francis, Philadelphia is already another place. Say what you will about the laughable abundance of port-o-potties, Philadelphia looks phenomenal. 

I decided to take the long way home from the gym this evening to pass through City Hall and Dilworth Park. Long burnt out bulbs in the bizarre orbs illuminating the building's corridors have been replaced, casting a bright light on every priceless work of Victorian Gothic craft adorning the grand building. City Hall's gates are up, at least the pair flanking Dilworth Park. The fountains remain on, despite the passage of Labor Day. Even City Hall's north apron, once packed with cars, is free of clutter.

Along North Broad Street, a tall stained glass window has been installed inside the Pennsylvania Convention Center's rarely used main entrance, and it seems to be finally seeing the usage it had always intended, almost as if the expansion is finally receiving its grand opening.

But more than anything that can be said for Philadelphia's recent transformation are the lights. The bright, white, glorious lights!

The dingy yellow street lamps, the dimly lit light posts that I can only assume were dully designed to detract moths, have been replaced by extremely bright LEDs and bright white lampposts. 

After twelves years in Philadelphia, this is the first evening I've managed to recapture some of the excitement of being in a city entirely new, and so much of that is because the evening streets don't look like the urban battlefields of the early 1990s. Last week, and for the last twenty years (or more), the sidewalks were awash in a foreboding sepia tone that cried, "these streets aren't safe." For years I had to inform visitors from back home, "trust me, this neighborhood is safer than Georgetown. It's just the lights. They trick you." 

For the last few months, Philadelphia has been checking off a long overdo to-do list and the end result of so many seemingly mundane improvements is staggering. Tonight's Philadelphia might be for the tourists, but next week it's for us. 

But this is bigger than just a cleaner, brighter city we'll enjoy long after the Papal Pilgrims have left. The city we see tonight is a living postcard that the world will see over the next few years. Unlike the last Papal Visit in 1979, one that saw hundreds of photographs, perhaps thousands, we live in the digital age. Images of this new Philadelphia will be immortalized on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, literally millions of photographs, online, and immediately available. 

Pope Francis won't be in Philadelphia for four more days, but already his followers have begun flooding in. Step outside and take a look. Tourists are everywhere, standing in awe, marveling at our architecture and history, and in doing so, reminding us just how marvelous and awesome our city truly is.

Images and places the world knows by heart, iconic monuments and monoliths like Big Ben, the Eiffel Tower, and the Washington Monument are the stuff of 99 cent post cards right now because this week, this 300 year old city is something new, something the world has forgotten and most have never seen. 

Beyond Philadelphia's history - a City Hall clock tower that is, by the way, 250 meters taller than Big Ben and not much newer - tourists are witnessing a city that is building. On my walk to work, my lunch break, and walking home I saw dozens of visitors pointing up in awe at Comcast's Innovation and Technology Center impressively under construction. Around the corner, 1919 Market is rising. The future sites of the W Hotel and the SLS International have been fenced off signaling something new is in the works. East Market installed its crane at 12th and Market, the hub of Philadelphia's hotels.  Those who arrived by train or walked to the Schuylkill River saw the FMC Tower well under way and a University City skyline that looks less like the urban suburb it once was, and more like the extension of Center City it's becoming. 

No one is getting what they expected, and perhaps this is the one aptly timed moment where Philadelphia's tiresome national and international reputation will be its salvation. Those attempting to grab a glimpse of the Pope in New York or Washington, D.C. will be getting the New York and D.C. they're accustomed to seeing on television. But those visiting Philadelphia will be getting a city they only thought they knew, one they weren't prepared for, and one they will continue to talk about for months. 

Despite the headaches leading up to this week - mostly frustrations to those of us who live here - Philadelphia has done something very right: we're showing off. We're finally, after decades of Negadelphian rhetoric, bragging to the world about the things that make this city right. 

As annoying as the parking nightmares, traffic jams, shunted subways, and general mobs of people may be, it is but one weekend that stands to change the way the world views Philadelphia, and when we come back from whatever shore town we flee to this weekend, we might find ourselves living in a city with the World Class reputation it once owned and has always deserved. 

It Begins

It's begun. If an abundance of lanyard-clad tourists haven't tipped you off, the port-o-potties should have. 3000 portable toilets, to be specific, have been placed along major and some not-so-major routes throughout Center City and the Parkway. If you don't feel like doing your math, that's about 1 for every 250 prospective Papal pilgrims.

If the sight of that many portable crappers isn't funny enough, social media has had a field day with the way-too-easy play-on-word musings:

"Holy Sh*t! Literally."

"It's gonna be a sh*tshow!"

"The streets are looking pretty sh*tty."

...or any of the endless things you can do with the word "Pope."

The projected numbers have been scaled back from a one-time estimate of 2M to somewhere between 800,000 and 1.5M, but with visitors flooding in as early as today, it's pretty clear that the event isn't going to flop. With many tourists already wearing their Papal Passes, it looks like the word of potential headaches got out and visitors came prepared. 

Those who arrived today got the special treat of a Philadelphia cleaner than it's been in a long time, and the opportunity to visit the Parkway's museums and the city's restaurants before the rest arrive.

For this Godless Yankee, I have a Hyundai at Enterprise waiting to take me to Rehoboth for an aptly timed beach break.

Local News Crews Strike: Do they have any leverage?

When CBS3's unions overwhelming voted to join NBC10's strike prior to the upcoming Papal visit, most Philadelphians probably asked, "what's CBS?" 

Following in the footsteps of SEPTA's usual modus operandi, 65 photographers and technicians from NBC and 75 from CBS are leveraging Pope Francis's visit to negotiate the new terms of contracts that ended in July. Perhaps a smart move for a utility like SEPTA - which has been relatively cooperative - do the local affiliates at NBC and CBS really have that much leverage?

Yes, both news networks obviously want as much coverage on the ground as possible, but with such a wildly publicized event, won't they already have it? It's doubtful either network wants to be run through the ringer for hiring scabs, but when your parent companies are the press, they own the ringer.

In fact, if no negotiations are reached by the eleventh hour, MSNBC and CNBC will already have staff in the trenches and CBS could have, oh, I don't know, the CW? It's not as either network is going to completely bow out of this event, whatever the outcome. 

Either way, there will be hundreds, perhaps thousands, of photographers and technicians funneling content and resources back to Philadelphia's local affiliates, with or without local staff. And as for any potential bad press: with all eyes on the Pope, is anyone paying attention to a local squabble and union rhetoric?

SEPTA: Still "Getting There"

I don't want to side with the Washingtonian rhetoric that dubbed Philadelphia a second-rate stopover, but Philadelphia and our city services have been making our town look like the Mayberry of major metropolises ever since the Pope announced he'd be dropping in. While a lot of the problems rest with the antics of the U.S. Secret Service, Philadelphia has been capable of handling this kind of influx since Day 1. And since Day 1, Philadelphia should have been working with the Secret Service to prove that. 

Street closures make sense. We deal with that on New Years, major conventions, and last week's Welcome America! concert. All cities close streets when they anticipate a bunch of road warriors inexplicably expecting convenient parking. 

Where Philadelphia failed was with SEPTA's reluctance to accommodate those who won't be driving in. 

Don't think SEPTA can handle it? 

Well think about this: Philadelphia's vast network of rail-lines have been handling throngs of residents, commuters, and tourists since the early 1900s. As one of the earliest mass transit systems in North America, Philadelphia's been ferrying passengers in and around the city since trolleys were pulled by horses. 

In the mid 20th Century, Philadelphia was home to two million residents, 500,000 more than today. And back then, a lot more of us relied on public transportation. To this day nearly every inner city rail-line is still in operation and the regional rail system has expanded to the airport. 

But instead of jumping in front of the task at hand, instead of using this event as an opportunity to showcase Philadelphia's massive transit system, rather than saying, "Yeah, we got this," SEPTA was burning the midnight oil to engineer ways to opt out of the ordeal. 

And what happened? Those two million pilgrims once planning to come to a perfectly capable Philadelphia started canceling their reservations, and now hotels are having trouble giving rooms away. 

Yes, we knew that the Papal Visit was going to be a royal ass ache. But Philadelphia is a massive city that deals with ass aches every day. We should have risen above it and proven that we were ready, willing, and able to deal with anything. But instead we cowered in the corner, gave the Secret Service carte blanche, and the national audience exactly what they already think of Philadelphia.

A Little War of Words

Philadelphia's a hard sell. It doesn't seem to matter how far we go - never mind how far we've come - many in the mainstream press still seem determined to watch Philadelphia fail. We might be on the verge of curing AIDS and cancer, but we can't seem to shake our reputation as a "second-rate stopover" town. Those aren't my words, but the words of Washington Post journalist Frances Stead Sellers in a harshly penned article about Philadelphia's upcoming preparations - or lack thereof - for our Papal Visit. 

Criticism is deserved, and no media has been more critical on the subject than our own journalists right here in Philadelphia. Local articles wax and wane between maniacal assurances that the event will be "incredible" to borderline panic, while regional memes employ pterodactyls and swamp monsters to protect the Pontiff. The local media has done everything it can to give us the words we want to read - along with some much needed comic relief. But with information lacking in sensical substance and often contradictory, we're still left wondering if the city outside the #popefence might wind up looking like the Zombie Zone we keep joking about.

But Sellers' article didn't focus on the problems our local media has been discussing, and barely treaded into the reality of the event's sheer size, as if a swell of more than 1.5 million pilgrims was just an average boat show. 

Instead, she condescendingly stated that Washington and New York will host Pope Francis "in stride" ignoring that neither city will be hosting a public Mass. In terms of His Holiness's visit to the United States, D.C. and New York are the second-rate stopovers.

To be fair, Sellers - despite a few choice words - seemed to attempt diplomacy. She also fired off a small journalism war between our two cities. Holly Otterbein of Philadelphia Magazine accused the Post of trolling Philadelphia. David Warner used the City Paper to remind Washington that it's built atop a swamp, and in the casual nature of his paper, that our dick is bigger. 

Neither did much to counter Sellers' claim (a claim that would have been taken in stride had she not gut-punched us with that "second-rate stopover" thing) and Washington's counter commentary was just as classless. 

Benjamin Freed of Washingtonian unearthed an aptly Philadelphian "pugilistic" from his thesaurus and fired back at Philadelphia, referring to the Constitutional Convention as a "small political" gathering and the assertion that every Papal pilgrim will be coming from New Jersey, then delving into the tired fallacy that Philly has a Rocky fueled inferiority complex. 

Warner's City Paper commentary is a rant if I've ever read one, but he was one of the few journalists to point out that the vast majority of Philadelphia's preparation headaches have been caused by the U.S. Secret Service, the authoritarian overlords from Sellers' and Freed's Washington, D.C. 

Despite the smug nature of Freed's Washingtonian article, he quotes Sellers as a Philly fan. Rising above the words of Freed, this former Powelton Village and Italian Market resident had gushing words for Philadelphia's "rowhouses, restaurants, and theaters" and goes on to refer to Washington as a "government town" with "large parts of which close down on the weekends." 

Although Freed ignores - or perhaps is simply oblivious to - Seller's thinly veiled categorization of Washington as an industry town with a dead downtown, Sellers seems to get Philadelphia and ultimately ends up on top of the bitter exchange of words she obviously never meant to start, likely wishing she'd reserved a bit of print to point out her local roots and affinity for Philadelphia. 

As for Otterbein and Warner, well, Philadelphia's renaissance is something none of us are accustomed to, here or elsewhere. Yes, Philadelphians are a bit combative. We're no longer a "second-rate stopover" but we aren't completely removed from our bleak history. Those words strike a nerve in any seasoned Philadelphian and that should be expected. 

Philadelphia has received an enormous amount of praise lately, but the praise is new, and new things are fragile. Philadelphia is a very real city with very real people, people who've been here a long time and know how much hinges on - or stands to be lost at - the hands of this renewed global interest in all things Philadelphia. 

However unfounded, editorialized, or just plain made-up: media matters, and flip words from jazz-handed journalists - journalists in industry towns that reinvent themselves at the end of each national election, or powerhouses that continue to reach further into the belly of the 1% - have profound implications for cities that have to autonomously foster our identities. 

We aren't a government town, and we're not going to handle the Papal Visit like a State Dinner, a Presidential Inauguration, or Ryan Seacrest's New Years' Rockin' Eve. We're going to handle it like the very real, diverse, and economically integrated city that we are.

On September 28th Pope Francis will leave. CNN, MSNBC, FoxNews, and every major newspaper in the United States will be spinning a few isolated incidents into a frenzied disaster, incidents that any reasonable person would expect amongst a crowd of 1.5 million people. Freed will feel vindicated and can go on justifying his bloated Beltway mortgage, the Otterbeins and Warners will retort, and a week later, the media will move on to the next story when they realize that the only people with a vested interest in Philadelphia's nonexistent failures are journalists with nothing better to talk about. 

The Day Philadelphia Stood Still

With a month before the Papal Visit, Philadelphia and the Secret Service have finally released their strategies for dealing with the impending ass ache, or so it seems. And to the surprise of no one, it's going to be a royal nightmare. 

Is it going to be a zombie apocalypse? No. Will visitors have a bad time? Probably not. Is Philadelphia going to be dragged through the mud by the mainstream media? We're used to it.

This is a unique event. Upwards of two million pilgrims are expected to descend upon Philadelphia over the last weekend in September, and that's exactly why it's not going to be as bad as some expect. If this were the world's largest software expo or just ordinary tourism, yes, it would be an epic disaster. 

But those shelling out $500 a night for a chance to see Pope Francis aren't coming here for Beyonce or Madonna, they're coming here as devout Christians, the most devout. Yes, the mainstream media is going to cherry pick those most vocally frustrated by the city's stifled services and spin a few expected - and isolated - incidents into catastrophes. But overwhelmingly, what we can expect is the world's biggest, and dullest, Comic-Con. 

In that regard, the city did one thing right. Hats off to City Hall and the Secret Service for securely pinning in a bunch of docile puppy dogs. 

Unfortunately, neither organization was charged with the job of solely protecting two million peaceful parishioners. Their task was to secure a massive event within a working city of 1.5 million people, within a metropolitan area of more than five million. But they've treated it like the Catholic equivalent of Burning Man, one that equates Philadelphia with a desert that happens to have subways. 

Closing schools and office towers is one thing. We're simply getting a free holiday. We'll work from home and make up class time. We'll be fine. What has been ignored and perplexingly continues to go unmentioned are the thousands of service employees that will be expected to work overtime over the course of the weekend, and expected to find a way here.  

Many hotel and service employees rely on minimum wage, and thusly don't live within walking distance of their Center City employers. They live in North, South, and West Philadelphia, in Fishtown and the suburbs, in New Jersey. Many more work in the suburbs and rely on the Schuylkill Expressway and regional rail, and until recently, didn't know the extent to which major suburban corridors would be affected by Pope Francis's Center City visit. 

Those tasked with servicing the Pope's two million visitors should have been given dibs on SEPTA's limited trans-passes, but they're expected to play the same game as those visiting. And if they don't land a pass, they're not quite sure how they're getting to work. 

It's not surprising that Philadelphia's City Hall has managed to neglect its own citizens. Since the visit was first announced, City Hall has been focused on two things, and neither are its own citizens: securing the tourists and how the city will look on CNN. Why should we expect more from a City Hall that has addressed the Parkway's homeless problem with a plan to put a few tokens in the front row during Pope Francis's mass while booting the rest to, well, no one knows. 

I'm certainly not religious, but I was baptized Catholic. In my limited understanding of Catholicism, I know that charity plays a big role, and barring underpaid service employees from jobs they need to perform and hand picking a few of our city's thousands of homeless residents as tokenism seems to be about the most un-Catholic thing you can do. 

On September 28th, the trifecta of the mainstream media - CNN, Fox, and MSNBC - will probably do an in depth analysis of a catastrophe that didn't happen, and our own bozos at Philly.com and Philadelphia Magazine will troll the blogosphere. But Philadelphia will return to business-as-usual and within a week, the world will forget about The Day Philadelphia Stood Still.

But over the course of one weekend, underpaid employees will be camping out in broom closets with no way home and even more will fear losing their jobs with no conceivable way to get to work. One of the nation's biggest events, one allegedly rooted in charity, has proven itself to be nothing but a spectacle, and Pope Francis and his cohorts no more noble than a Kardashian. 

Maybe I'll be proven wrong. Maybe the Pope will bypass tokenism and delve into the city's very real homeless problem and expose it for what it is. Maybe he'll hop an El train to Kensington and the Vatican will reimburse the city's minimum wage employees for their lost earnings. Prince Charles wasn't above greeting locals in Mantua in 2007. 

People keep talking about how different Pope Francis is. Philadelphia could be his chance to prove it. Will he come here and do what's dryly expected, or will he color outside the lines? 

Papal Countdown: Spin-Room Edition

With 55 days before the arrival of Pope Francis, this week's unanswered questions have stepped aside for a blame-game between City Hall and the Secret Service, namely over who said SEPTA should be shunted and businesses should close. 

Well, at the moment nothing has been officially "said," at least regarding what 1.5M Philadelphians should do on September 25th. However, on Thursday, the Secret Service wanted to make it clear that they did not order businesses to close or suggest running limited rail service. 

With growing frustrations amongst residents, those in City Hall have become visibly frustrated themselves. It's understandable but also unacceptable. As leaders of the nation's fifth largest city, they should not only be versed in their own security protocol, but also in working seamlessly with Federal and Foreign security administrations. 

If the Secret Service's comments are any indication of how City Hall should have been behaving over the past 11 months, it seems City Hall should have stepped aside and let the professionals iron out the details. 

No thanks! I'll be in Rehoboth for a two-dude wedding celebrating America's definition of Family.

But we live in #becausePhiladelphia. Everyone has an "expert" opinion on our city's unique quirks, and not one of those opinions is unanimous. Like a 15 year-old who's sure he knows how to drive, City Hall snuck his dad's Cadillac out of the garage and made a mess all over town. 

Instead of being faced with 1.5 frustrated Philadelphians not knowing what we should do in two months, City Hall is now being scolded for running over the neighbor's petunias and leaving two 40s in the backseat of the Caddy, and the Secret Service is faced with the fallout of rogue speculation run amuck because City Hall failed to sit there and behave. 

Perhaps the Secret Service didn't know what it was getting into with #becausePhiladelphia.

With a shit-show imminent, we can at least be sure we won't be paying for it. At least not most of it. Because of a lawsuit that arose from the city's last Papal Visit, it appears the archdiocese will be covering the cost. Whether that cost is the projected $45M, or more, it still won't cover the collateral fallout of the city's ineptitude. And we only have Mayor Nutter and City Council to thank for that. 

With no firm word on road closures and uncertainty around how to purchase transpasses, cars will be unknowingly towed, hourly employees will lose pay, and residents will find themselves stranded. Ironically, the Vatican won't be covering the city's humanitarian toll. 

How Much Does it Cost to Host the Pope?

It's a tricky question. It cost the U.S. $2B to host the country's last Olympics in Salt Lake City. National Conventions, like the upcoming Democratic National Convention to be held in Philadelphia this year, are expected to cost around $60M. 

Whether you're going international with the World Cup or regional with a corporate convention, the cost of hosting public events usually comes with a precedent, and the potential profit typically exceeds the cost.

But Papal visits don't come with the same expectations. In fact, the rarity of such events provides no expectations whatsoever. If you want to know how much it will cost Philadelphia to host Pope Francis in September, you're going to have to wait until he's long gone. 

As it stands, no one knows for sure what will happen. Mayor Nutter said that details will be provided next week, but hasn't he been saying that for months? The Secret Service is less optimistic, stating we may not have final details until September, three weeks prior to the event. 

Mayor Nutter, proving that he's likely done with public office of any kind, was blunt, stating, "I'm not planning to give every nut case in the universe...advance information." Remember when Mayor Nutter seemed like a friendly lame duck and didn't sound so much like a belligerent Mayor Street? 

He's obviously frustrated. But his frustrations are only exacerbating his failure to lead. With the Secret Service and the U.S. Military at the city's disposable, City Hall has been exclusively focused on the Papal visitors. As if Philadelphia is hosting the world's largest County Fair, complete with 142 square miles of clear land for hay-rides and tractor pulls, the city has completely ignored its 1.5M residents and a city that will need to operate in tandem with the event.

In order to function, Philadelphians need to know the very basic logistics of the event: What streets will be closed? Will there be checkpoints and where? And, if we need to get out of town, when will we need to leave? We needed to know this a year ago.

For many Philadelphians without the freedom to flee, there are thousands of service industry employees - waiters, bartenders, hotel staff - that will be expected to work overtime during the event. Many of these employees don't live in Center City, some in the suburbs. How will they get to work if roads are closed, SEPTA is shunted, and bridges are blocked? 

Will hotels be sacrificing valuable rooms for their employees living in Conshohocken and New Jersey, or will they be expected to crash in utility closets for the weekend? Hourly employees blocked by security will just have to eat a weekend's salary and hope their employers understand. It would be Christian of the Vatican to give them a Visa gift card. 

All of this on behalf of the State's decision to handsomely accommodate the Church. Where is the Vatican's input into all of this? If the Catholic Church is funding any of the Secret Service and Military details - resources reserved for matters of State - it hasn't been made apparent. 

As City Hall struggles with ensuring a safe visit for Pope Francis and his guests, they've essentially told 1.5M Philadelphians, and 6M Greater Philadelphians, "You're gonna have to deal with that when the time comes."

#popefence Bradley Wrenn 

One thing they've secured is an epic disaster, one that might easily rival Philadelphia's notoriously divisive Bicentennial Celebration. Poor planning forced thousands to cancel plans and avoid Philadelphia altogether in July of 1976. Like the Bicentennial Celebration's overestimation of 100 thousand visitors, our expectation of 2M pilgrims may be grossly misguided. 

Vistors have been planning for the Papal visit for over a year now. Hotel rooms booked twelve months ago were booked under the assumption that Philadelphia would be operating at some level of efficiency. But Philadelphia is a big city and an even larger region. Thousands of hotel reservations were made beyond Center City, in the suburbs, and New Jersey and Delaware. 

With complications looming and no final response from City Hall, will visitors that reserved rooms in the suburbs or at the airport be walking to Logan Square, or will they simply be canceling their reservations. 

The sad truth is, we don't need attitude from Mayor Nutter and City Hall, we need answers and guidance. 

Small shore towns in the Carolinas are accustomed to guests that book rooms and houses years in advance, did those presiding over the nation's fifth biggest city honestly fail to recognize the fact that City Hall needed to make plans before their visitors from Germany and Argentina? 

The biggest crime in all of this is City Hall's complete absent regard for its own citizens, the "deal with it" language from our own mayor, and a complete failure to offer a single inkling as to what the city's 1.5M residents are expected to do on Friday, September 25th. 

At this point, City Hall has already lost its credibility. "Next week" is a year too late. 

A Disaster Only God Himself Could Orchestrate

As much as I've come to love Philadelphia, I will admit, it's often a place that infuriatingly makes no sense. It took this farm raised Southerner a good decade to finally learn to tune out the Northeast Rage and another few years to find my own. 

It's the kind of place where convenience stores form "three separate lines" instead of funneling the next customer to the next available register. It's the kind of place where every business will always have one door locked for no apparent reason. It's the city that says, "sir, we're closing in 15 minutes." If it's going to take you more than 15 minutes to find me a headlight for a '97 Civic, I'll order it online. 

The people certainly don't help. When I first moved to Philadelphia, I was a bit surprised it wasn't as dirty as its reputation. That's not to say it's clean, but for all the bitching and moaning about the place dubbed "Philthy," it's only slightly dirtier than New York and cleaner than quite a few other cities. I was quickly corrected, "it's not the place, it's the people." I was told that by a local.

And it's true. It's a volatile place, one in which you're hard pressed to find personal accountability. The most basic misunderstandings end in screaming matches on heavily trafficked streets and the biggest end in the courtroom. "It's not my fault" should be the city's motto, and while we're at it, add it to The Garden State's license plates as well. You could get mowed down by a white BMW headed for the Ben Franklin Bridge running a red light and it'll still be your fault, even if you're sitting in your backyard. And while we're on the subject, it's apparently okay to run red lights, as long as you honk your horn. 

Of course it's not just the small annoyances that carry no rhyme or reason. They're likely the trickle-down fallout of city and state bureaucracies that tend to lob a bunch of red rubber balls across the white line and hope they hit a thing or two. Traversing Philadelphia is a lot like driving across Logan Square: close your eyes, clench your butt cheeks, and hope you come out the other side in one piece. 

That brings me to Philadelphia's next up-and-coming ass ache. I'm not talking about tomorrow's Fourth of July celebration or the game of human bumper cars that is the Pennsylvania Convention Center on any given weekend. I'm talking about September's Papal visit. 

More than two months away, and I'm already on edge. That's not uncommon. Given my aforementioned rant, I frequently play out argumentative scenarios in my head about things that never happened, because I know they would happen and the unnerving ways they'd play out. But this visit really is going to be a nightmare on par with nothing the city has ever seen, short of a Victorian era influenza outbreak or perhaps the American Revolution. 

If you've ever read about the city's disastrous Bicentennial celebration or the last Papal visit, think that, times infinity. 

Why? Well I doubt you even have to ask. The city is projecting a swell of 2 million pilgrims to flood Philadelphia the weekend on September 26th. While City Hall, transit authorities, and the Philadelphia Police Department seem to be working diligently on making his visit a safe one, specifics are sparse and rumors abound. For one weekend, Philadelphia will grow in population to the nation's third largest, that is if its 1.5 million residents don't flee beforehand. 

But fleeing could easily become one of its biggest problems. Center City roads will be closed, SEPTA's subways will be operating at minimal stops, regional rail will be reserved for those who purchase special passes, and, get this, Center City might even be fenced in with an 8 foot wall. 

Yes, you read that correctly: Center City could be fenced in by an 8 foot tall wall four miles long. 

If you've ever seen 1981's Escape from New York, you've probably already booked a bunker in Montana and planned your exit a week in advance. Pomp and circumstance can only do so much. Philadelphia's September of 2015 is going to go down in history as the dystopian fantasy it's setting itself up to become. 

Get Out or Get Ready

Part of that won't be due to the crowds, the complex travel that will need to be arranged for visitors who've already booked hotel rooms outside the Papal Wall, or even the security that's gearing up to make Marshall Law look like Mayberry. It's also because Philadelphia and the United States aren't the same places they were the last time we received a Papal visit in 1979. The Pope will be in town for the World Meeting of Families, and the Supreme Court just ruled that America's truly legal definition of "family" includes quite a few who clash with some of the Catholic Church's aging ideals. 

Two weeks ago, it seemed that every reasonable gay, lesbian, or bisexual Philadelphian would have been ready to hightail it to Rehoboth Beach or Asbury Park for the weekend. And that probably would have been the case had Archbishop Charles Chaput not given gay and lesbian families a formal unvitation. Without going into the brazenly hypocritical statements made by Chaput (think phrases like "welcoming environment" paired with dozens of social caveats), he essentially said gay and lesbian families are welcome, as long as they don't point out why they're not welcome. 

Naturally this didn't just ruffle feathers in Philadelphia's LGBT community, but also any watchdog whose ears perk up whenever a religious dictator attempts to pull rank. And that's exactly what Chaput has done, and he probably would have been better off barring gay and lesbian families, or simply keeping his mouth shut. 

I don't know how things work in the Vatican or behind the doors of his Basilica, but closing roads, shunting transportation services, even building a goddamn wall on the Catholic Church's behalf doesn't make Pope Francis or any of his underlings Supreme Leader for the weekend. We still retain our Rights to Assemble, Speak, and Protest. For the first time since Roe v. Wade, the Catholic Church has found itself at odds with the Supreme Court of the United States, and its timing won't bode well for any hope of a purely peaceful event. 

Personally, I'll be in Delaware. For me, Catholicism has about as much clout as Scientology or those building "Little Salt Lake" across the street from the Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul. I won my battle, and my church is the United States Constitution. But for those fighting for additional rights within the private confines of their church, for legitimate recognition within their spiritual domain, they have every right to shout their beliefs from the Parkway, and I have to imagine the Parkway's namesake might be right there beside them. 

They'll just have to climb an eight foot wall and walk a few miles to get there. 

Days Numbered for City Hall Parking

Ever since Dilworth Plaza was reborn as the wet and wild Dilworth Park, the north side of City Hall has looked worse than ever. Walking towards North Broad Street through or around City Hall, you might be wondering where the Walmart is. That's because every day of the week there are anywhere from a few to a lot of personal vehicles treating the north apron like a suburban parking prairie. 

PhillyMag.com

It's ugly. PhillyMag.com called it crap.

Ramping up for a visit from the Pope and the upcoming Democratic National Convention, the city is finally recognizing the lingering blight throughout Center City that might be caught in the backdrop of an international news broadcast. But we're not just hosting the Vatican and a bunch of politicians, we're also prepping for millions of visitors who will be taking billions of pictures and posting them to Instagram.

Well, the north apron of City Hall is about to get a makeover that will help it blend into Dilworth Park a little bit better. While permanent bollards will put the kibosh on the abundance of civilian parking, eradicating parking in and of itself isn't that exciting. What's more noteworthy, particular for our upcoming tourists will be more greenery and the fact that City Hall will be keeping its mature trees. Finally, someone in Philadelphia recognize the value of a living tree!

The changes obviously won't be as dramatically transformative as Dilworth Park, but not everything needs to be in order to be just as significant. 

However there are some questions that remain to be answered. 

For one, what will happen to the parking that has been allowed to run rampant over the last few years? Will it be condensed to the Northeast corner of City Hall or will City Hall simply tell its employees to walk from the dozens of parking lots and garages a few short blocks away? And two, will City Hall use this redesign as a misguided opportunity to formally accommodate permanent parking spaces on the apron?