The Oval

Those dedicated to improving the Ben Franklin Parkway will soon be one step closer to helping it become what it was always meant to be.

Originally intended to be a European style thoroughfare slowly taking Philadephians to and from the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the posh neighborhoods beyond, it never really caught on.

A decade or two after the museum and thus the Parkway was completed, the American love affair with the car began. Couple that with decades of suburban flight and suburbanization and the Parkway became just another freeway out of town.

Luckily for us we haven't mess with it too much. And a century later we're finally starting to appreciate it for what it is, a park.

Over the last decade improvements to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, its expansion, the opening of the Barnes Museum, and general street improvements and bike lanes have attracted countless joggers, cyclists, strollers, and picnickers, some of them long time Philadelphians who never realized what an asset this space was.

For a month this summer a pop-up beach will replace the useless parking lot in the middle of Eakins Oval. What's that mean? Well, it's just simple fun. They'll be sand, "lifeguard stands," a beer garden, and movies at what they're dubbing "The Oval."

It's obviously not as substantial as a new gallery or museum, but the real hope lies in the subtext of the plan. With all the improvements made to the Schuylkill Banks, the PMA, The Waterworks, and the Parkway itself, this lingering parking lot has led even our more curmudgeonly Philadelphians to ask why it's there.

The Oval is undoubtedly a litmus test to gauge interest in a relative large public space that's rarely used, thus justifying eliminating the parking lot and enabling easier access. 

Day Tripping: Camden

After a walk across the Ben Franklin Bridge I decided to explore the better parts of Philadelphia's eastern counterpart, Camden, NJ. As expected, "better" is extremely relative in this part of the Garden State. Aside from the aquarium, after a decade in Philadelphia I've never actually seen Camden but from across the river or the interstate.

It's hard to explain what's so scary about this place. It has a surprisingly walkable downtown with some interestingly rich architecture, but even with a concert, baseball game, and Cirque du Soleil, a few blocks from the waterfront the only souls that can be found are in cars...everywhere.

Perhaps that's what makes it so scary. Were it not for all the traffic, it felt like the second act of a zombie movie. With the exception of the undead factor, it's probably not far from reality. Even the worst parts of Philadelphia have active pedestrians, and even when they appear unsavory, seeing enough people on foot can make you feel safe. Lack of street life kills a city, and worse, kills safety. It's easy to drive passed a crime and not even notice, and just as easy for criminals to act when they know this.

Rutger's campus was a ghost town and that certainly didn't help. But beyond campus, City Hall, clean and iconic, was desolate on a Saturday afternoon. It's obvious that money has gone into improving the streetscape but it clearly hasn't convinced anyone Camden is a better place.
 

Those who live in the restored townhouses closer to the core and the RCA lofts near the water are fortressed in their homes, surrounded by gates with parking at their door.

What life could be found was on the river in the endless acres of tailgating, drunken teenagers, and police officers struggling to direct traffic through a city that decided to turn off it's traffic lights on the rare occasion that it would actually see traffic.

Locked down for the Thunderdome.

If you're on foot, you're left darting across traffic at your own risk, followed by a glare from an officer that says, "how dare you walk." It might be an apt accusation. The parking lots on the waterfront have a footprint the size of Society Hill.

It's unfortunate for the city, which hosts a collection of amazing architecture and an historic core with a wealth of potential.

New Jersey is an odd place, particularly it's major cities. The state shrugs a political disregard for its struggling urban spaces, taxing a dwindling working class into oblivion in lieu of its suburbs. Meanwhile most of those suburbs service major cities in other states.

That disregard is carried over in its citizens and visitors chucking beer cans into the Delaware River as police officers look on and laugh.

It's a lawless place.

 

Like Detroit and dying Rust Belt towns, Camden's fate is uncertain. It's riverfront attractions, Rutgers University, and Cooper Medical Center certainly help the city stay afloat. But as Philadelphia is learning, improving a city requires it to evolve, a feat that can't be met without new residents and a new mentality. 

 

 

If those who reside in Camden continue to work and play in other cities and states, the city is nothing more than a poor suburb that happens to look like a city.

 

Suburbs are finally learning the lessons that our major cities spent the last decade tackling. Moving forward in some respects means turning back the clock. Parking lots and drivability produced successful suburbs like Cherry Hill and King of Prussia in the mid-1900s, but it's a dying and unsustainable infrastructure, one that much of New Jersey still clings to.

 

In a state attached to its mid-century nostalgia, it's hard to say if South Jersey will ever understand the dynamic infrastructure they have in Camden laying in wait.

 

Day Tripping: New Castle

I spent a recent Sunday afternoon wandering the quaint streets and waterfront of New Castle, DE. Here are just a few pictures from the mini-adventure.

 





Old New Castle Courthouse

 

 

Emanuel Episcopal Church on The Green

 

 

Old Library Museum

 

 

 

One Riverside

What happens when a city produces a wildly successful riverfront park? Well turns out people want to live there. Take note, DRWC.

In what skyscraper nerds are hoping is the second of many high rise apartment buildings to line the Schuylkill Banks, Dranoff Properties hopes to join The Grove by adding 21 stories to Center City's side of the river. Architecture nerds are hoping that it looks good.

The new high rise would replace a surface parking lot at 25th and Locust near Fitler Square. The high density dwelling proposed at an already impressive location will undoubtedly raise the eyebrows of its posh brownstone dwelling neighbors. 

However, ironic as it is, Center City West residents are often less resistant to new developments than their residential counterparts in more transitional neighborhoods just outside Center City, especially when those projects erase scarring surface lots.

Until a rendering is released, most of the leeriness will probably stem from Dranoff's reputation for hokey neo-classical design and cheap materials.

The Grove will soon be the Schuylkill River's newest high rise addition.

Where's City Hall's Apology?

With the alleged suicide of Ron Wagenhoffer, seven are now dead as a result of the collapse at 22nd and Market.

Meanwhile the media can't keep its facts straight, one moment claiming that Wagenhoffer blamed himself for the tragedy, and redacting it the next. That's a pretty big fact to get wrong. In fact, that's the entire premise of the story.

And where's our Mayor? He's at a conference in Chicago leaving his spokesman, Mark McDonald to handle his publicity nightmare.

Councilman Kenny called him out on it, and McDonald played politics by accusing Kenny of playing politics.

Come on, Nutter, we've all seen enough political dramas to know this scene by heart. When your office is under fire and the press is asking for answers you don't have, you get out of town until the heat is off. Give us some credit.

And while you're at it, how about an apology?

I'm certainly not going to blame anyone for a man choosing to take his own life, but it's no stretch to imagine that had the Mayor and City Council been managing their city - doing their jobs - instead of covering their asses or cowardly hiding, more death could have been avoided.

Instead, they sat back and allowed the blame to be heaped on the shoulders of one crane operator and one inspector, hoping that the public eye ignored the fact that their own ineffectual policies and regulations are as responsible.

Those running this town are busy doing what they do: satisfying the status quo. L&I is pandering the "he was a model employee" rhetoric. City Hall has doled out their own politically correct "L&I followed the rules" bullshit. Not one apology from a career politician has come without a caveat.

I just want one elected or appointed official to look at a camera and say, "me, my office, and City Hall played a role in this tragic event and I'm sorry."

Historic Walkabout in Fairmount Park

Sometimes even I get tired of my opinionated rants and just want to look at - or take - pretty pictures. Yesterday I decided to wander around Fairmount Park and explore its history. At the time I didn't realize that Fairmount Park manages at least 45 historic homes and I only scratched the surface.

After botched attempt to find the ruins of The Cliffs, an historic home lost to arson in 1986, landed me unknowingly in the middle of a wooded frolf course, I reluctantly abandoned my quest and headed north.

Most of the mansions can be enjoyed from Fairmount Park's Boxers' Trail, named for Philadelphia's legendary Joe Frazier.

Clunie (Mount Pleasant)
Built: 1761-1762
Architect: Thomas Nevell (Apprentice to Edmund Woolley, architect of Independence Hall)
Resident: John and Margaret Macpherson
Occupation: Privateer (Pirate)
Location: Mount Pleasant Drive
Status: Museum

 

Rockland Mansion
Built: c. 1910
Resident: George Thomson
Occupation: Merchant
Location: 3810 Mount Pleasant Drive
Status: Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia



 

Ormiston Mansion
Built: 1798
Resident: Major Edward Burd
Occupation: Pennsylvania Supreme Court
Location: 2000 Reservoir Drive

 

 

Woodford Mansion
Built: 1756, addition 1772
Resident: William Coleman
Occupation: Pennsylvania Supreme Court
Status: Naomi Wood Collection Museum

 

 

Historic Strawberry Mansion
Built: 1789
Architect:
Resident: William Lewis
Occupation: Judge
Status: Museum

 Adjacent to Historic Strawberry Mansion are the ruins of the 19th Century Strawberry Mansion Music Pavilion, designed by Horace Trumbauer.

 

A sidewalk just north of the mansions takes you down stairs and through the woods. Across the street is an inconspicuous stone opening, taking you down more stairs and deeper into the woods, landing you at the recently rediscovered Frank Furness Gate on Kelly Drive.

 



Lemon Hill Mansion
Built: 1800-1801
Architect: Owner
Resident: Henry Pratt
Occupation: Merchant
Status: Museum

 

 

From Lemon Hill Mansion you will find one of the most astonishing views of the Philadelphia skyline.

 



 

Philadelphia Legends

This is the Saffroness that I love to read! In a recent Changing Skyline column, Inga Saffron challenged convention and colleagues without an ounce of self deprecating Negadelphianess, and proved just how much she loves this city given she could easily snag a job droning on and on about how great "better" cities are that everyone already knows are great.

While his products were products of their time, Bacon was inarguably a visionary. Even Penn Plaza and its underground concourse, as sterile as they are, were novel in their prime. He experimented, but just as importantly he built.

I'd take her comments further and say that there is no question that we're better off having had him, in spite of The Gallery and I-95.

Had he developed our city beyond the 70s we might actually have a Penn's Landing worth walking to. It's no coincidence that his retirement coincided with the beginning of four decades of design studies and architectural competitions that, to this day, have gone nowhere.

Without him Society Hill would be a blighted extension of South Philadelphia, a midcentury perception responsible for his interpretation of an expendable South Street. Because of him we have Queen Village and Hawthorn sidling up to some of the city's most expensive real estate that he created.

Philadelphians have a nagging reputation for bragging about our faults, a reputation that a century later, keeps Frank Furness and Willis Hale only locally appreciated. Bacon and Saffron are no exceptions to the rule, and the fact that they maintained or maintain a local loyalty only make them more exceptional at their jobs.