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Category: Commercial Real Estate

  • EPA will spend $2.5M in Camden to clean up site where giant dirt pile caused underground contamination

    EPA will spend $2.5M in Camden to clean up site where giant dirt pile caused underground contamination

    A 45-foot-high pile of illegally dumped construction fill that once marred Camden’s Bergen Square neighborhood was removed several years ago.

    But contamination still lurks beneath, including lead, arsenic, and PFAS — known as “forever chemicals.”

    Now, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has awarded a $2.5 million grant to excavate and clean up the 1.6-acre site by scooping out and disposing of a four-foot-deep layer of ground, now leveled with crushed stone.

    The grant was announced Thursday at a news conference with regional EPA administrator Michael Martucci, Camden Mayor Victor Carstarphen, U.S. Rep. Donald Norcross (D., N.J.), and other officials.

    “It’s a brownfield grant,” Martucci said, noting the money would be used to assess the site and clean it so it can be used for a productive purpose.

    “There’s underground contamination,” he said. “To return the site to beneficial reuse, we need to complete the environmental cleanup.”

    Martucci said the money would be awarded after Camden finds a developer for the site and submits plans for its new use.

    The site of a former tower of dirt at 7th and Chestnut Streets in Camden, N.J. is now covered in crushed stone.Frank Kummer

    Hope for a neighborhood

    Carstarphen said the cleanup brings more hope to the blighted neighborhood.

    “This is a great day for our community,” Carstarphen said. “It’s been a long, long journey.”

    The pile, the result of years of dumping construction fill and other material at the site, grew so big that it loomed over a lone home on the 600 block of Chestnut Street.

    Covered with weeds, it towered above an intersection with debris, including tires and broken concrete. Some of the waste spilled onto city property.

    The pile was removed by the city in 2024. In all, crews removed 4,000 tons of solid waste, 100 tons of tires, and 15 drums.

    Camden Mayor Victor Carstarphen speaks during a press conference about the cleanup of the site on Chestnut Street. Next to the mayor, from left, are U.S. Rep. Donald Norcross, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regional administrator Michael Martucci, Camden County Commissioner Jeffrey Nash, Camden Redevelopment Agency executive director Olivette Simpson, and BRS Inc. engineer Jennifer Taylor.Frank Kummer

    Long a blight on Bergen Square

    The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection sued one former owner and longtime operator of the site, S. Yaffa & Sons Inc.

    The 2021 suit alleged the company “unlawfully imported and stockpiled solid waste on their Camden property, including contaminated fill material, construction and demolition debris, and waste tires,” and resisted taking action after receiving numerous violation notices and an order to stop. The company sold the property in 2019, according to the suit.

    The suit also noted that Camden, with a “significant low-income and minority population,” has “been disproportionately exposed to high-polluting facilities.”

    The city shut down the site in April 2021 as an illegal dump.

    It entered into an agreement with multiple agencies in July 2022 to authorize action to take the land through foreclosure. In September 2022, officials seized the land, then owned by a contractor. Some of the land was on both sides of the street.

    Officials began removing the pile in 2023 and finished in June 2024, leaving a large open space that immediately changed the character of the neighborhood.

    File: When the dirt pile still stood next to a home on Chestnut Streets in Camden. Frank Kummer

    Next steps

    Olivett Simpson, executive director of the Camden Redevelopment Agency, said an estimated 11,800 tons of soil will be removed and the site will then be covered with clean soil.

    Camden is currently assessing what kind of redevelopment will work on the site, which is zoned for industrial and commercial buildings. Simpson said the city has already held meetings to engage the community on the site’s future, which will likely include retail and housing.

    Jennifer Taylor, an engineer with BRS Inc., a brownfield consulting firm, is working with the city to evaluate redevelopment opportunities and expects a plan to be adopted by the end of the year.

    The ground underneath must be made suitable for people to use the property, Taylor said.

    “We want the momentum of this site not to go away,” Taylor said.

    A new home was being built less than a block from the site as she spoke, something officials said would have been unlikely had the pile still stood.

  • An office-to-apartment conversion is underway in Logan Square. Here’s why it works.

    An office-to-apartment conversion is underway in Logan Square. Here’s why it works.

    The residential conversion of the former office building at 2100 Arch St. is underway, with completion expected in late 2027 or early 2028.

    Philadelphia-based MM Partners paid $12 million for the eight-story building in March 2023, with plans for 116 apartments in the Logan Square neighborhood.

    It was formerly the Jewish Community Services Building.

    But the site was quiet for a few years and the project delayed by skittish lenders who were concerned about financing more apartments in a market they saw being flooded with new supply. Construction finally began in July.

    “It wasn’t easy, but we just stuck with it and figured out a way to get it under construction,” said David Waxman, founder and managing partner with MM Partners.

    “The good part of [the delay] is we’ll now be delivering into a market with very little new supply, particularly in this part of the city,” he said.

    The project will be composed of studios, with the smallest in the 500-square-foot range, up to two-bedrooms that will be up to 1,400 square feet. There will be 36 studio apartments, 64 one-bedrooms, and 16 two-bedrooms.

    Aaron Smith and David Waxman in the midst of 2100 Arch’s conversion.Jake Blumgart

    MM Partners is planning 3,000 feet in commercial space on the ground floor of the original 113-year-old building and is considering a roof deck as well.

    In the basement, tenant amenities such as a gym and lounge are planned, and MM Partners is considering providing 1,200 square feet of rehearsal space for Philadelphia theater companies.

    “There’s a lot of local theater companies that are looking for efficient and affordable space,” said Aaron Smith, partner and founding member with MM Partners.

    In many ways, 2100 Arch St. is an ideal office building for residential conversion.

    It is relatively small at 121,500 square feet and has none of the cavernous, sunless interior space that makes more recent skyscraper office buildings so hard to convert.

    That means tenants will have access to windows without carving light wells through the center of 2100 Arch. The number of apartments is more modest than would be the case in the large towers on West Market and, therefore, easier to fill.

    “It’s not too big and not too small,” Waxman said. With a lot of large office buildings, “you have to buy it so cheap to be able to afford to just have dead space in the middle.”

    MM is working with King of Prussia-based Axis Construction Management on the 2100 Arch conversion. It is their eighth adaptive reuse project together.

    For the $26 million project, MM Partners was able to secure $6.1 million in federal historic tax credits and $500,000 from Pennsylvania’s Historic Preservation Tax Credit.

    While the original building is over a century old, half of it dates to the 1980s when it was home to BIOSIS, a life sciences database publisher.

    The room where BIOSIS, a company that catalogued life sciences research, used to keep their mainframe computers.Jake Blumgart

    The eastern section of the building was constructed in 1913, and then acquired by BIOSIS in 1966. The company grew throughout the later half of the 20th century and doubled the size of the structure to the west in 1982.

    Like other conversion projects in Philadelphia, 2100 Arch will get a 10-year property tax abatement.

    The developer acquired the building from the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, which had purchased it from BIOSIS in 1999, after the building had been vacant a short time due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

    “They had done a really nice job keeping it up,” Waxman said. “If there had been an office market for B- and C-class buildings, this could have been easily leased as office. But there isn’t. Everyone only wants to be in the nicest buildings now.”

    In sharp contrast MM Partners has adapted long-derelict buildings to new uses in other parts of the city, such as the F.A. Poth Brewing Co. in Brewerytown, which MM converted to 133 loft apartments.

    Some of those buildings had severe structural problems as a result of their long abandonment, whereas 2100 Arch was in perfectly good shape.

    “It’s a joy to work in,” Waxman said. “You have working elevators. You have a non-leaky roof. You have electricity coming in. You have sprinklers. You have all the things that these other buildings that we’ve done in the past didn’t have.”

    The view from the eighth floor of 2100 Arch, looking over the Logan Square neighborhood.Jake Blumgart

    Meanwhile, the nearby west side of Center City has become the heart of Philadelphia’s commercial life.

    West Market Street, visible from 2100 Arch’s south-facing windows, is the most successful corner of the city’s office market.

    Insurance giant Chubb’s new office building just opened next door. Burlington recently announced plans to move its headquarters into the Schuylkill Yards development near 30th Street Station.

    At 2100 Arch, “you’re close to everything, but you have a little oasis [in the Logan Square neighborhood] right next to the hustle and bustle of Market Street,” Waxman said.

  • Penn’s $520 million renovation of David Rittenhouse Lab is one of Philly’s largest construction projects

    Penn’s $520 million renovation of David Rittenhouse Lab is one of Philly’s largest construction projects

    As real estate development in Philadelphia slows, the most expensive project on the horizon is a state-of-the-art laboratory and classroom building set to replace a mid-century structure that lacks central air-conditioning.

    The $520 million redevelopment of the David Rittenhouse Laboratory at 209 S. 33rd St. will raze two-thirds of the existing structure.

    A seven-story, 325,000-square-foot replacement, dubbed the Penn Discovery Commons, will be built in its place.

    The David Rittenhouse Laboratory has housed the math and the physics and astronomy departments since 1954. While the building has been the setting for multiple Nobel and Breakthrough Prize discoveries, university leaders now consider it outmoded.

    “Those young, amazing experimenters are doing their work in this terrible, dilapidated old building that’s just not fit for purpose,” said Mark Trodden, dean of the School of Arts & Sciences, who has had an office in the building for over 17 years.

    Penn has been considering replacing the existing Rittenhouse Lab building for 10 years, with the Daily Pennsylvanian first reporting on redevelopment plans in 2024. The new structure is designed by Los Angeles-based CO Architects, which is known for West Coast eds and meds designs, along with local partner Ewing Cole.

    The project comes amid a challenging time in higher education, as Penn and other universities have faced funding cuts from the Trump administration. Last year, the West Philadelphia Ivy League school instituted a hiring freeze and other economies as a result.

    Penn is still moving forward with a variety of major real estate projects from a new wrestling facility to a new theater addition to the Annenberg Center for Performing Arts.

    But the new Penn Discovery Commons — and its more than half-billion dollar price tag — is the largest single project in the university’s pipeline and for the city in the coming years.

    It eclipses the $450 million TerraPower Isotopes factory at the Bellwether District in South Philadelphia. The only larger project in Philadelphia is the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s $2.5 billion new patient tower, which will be completed in 2028.

    Why a new building is needed

    David Rittenhouse Laboratory was built in phases, with the core constructed in 1954. It was Penn’s first new development on its main campus since the Great Depression and was seen as a sign of the university’s dedication to the city.

    The original redbrick 1954 building predates central air-conditioning and is cooled by window units.

    The redbrick portion of the existing building will be demolished.Jake Blumgart

    “It’s temperature control doesn’t work,” Trodden said. “The laboratories do not have the right structure or capabilities to do modern science. It’s just a very inhospitable place to work.”

    Penn looked into renovating this portion of the existing building, but it rivaled the cost of new construction. So the redbrick portion with the David Rittenhouse Labs’ current main entrance on 33rd Street will be demolished.

    “Many buildings built post World War II, particularly with government funding, were built relatively quickly, and they aren’t as durable,” said Mark Kocent, Penn’s university architect. “A lot of universities like us have these buildings from the 1950s and 1960s that were not well built.”

    An expansion followed in 1967, which features the space-age addition that fronts much of the block of Walnut Street between 33rd and 32nd Streets. It was designed by Carroll, Grisdale & Van Alen, a renowned modernist firm that also designed the Pennsylvania State Office Building at 1400 Spring Garden St.

    That over 80,000-square-foot portion of the David Rittenhouse Labs, built with cast-in-place concrete and brown brick, will remain and become part of the new Penn Discovery Commons.

    The 1967 expansion, seen here, will be incorporated into the new building.Jake Blumgart

    The decision to keep this architecturally distinct piece of the building will save money and reduce the project’s environmental impact.

    “The most sustainable building is an existing building, and so we evaluated this pretty carefully and [decided to preserve part of the existing building] both due to cost and sustainability and less time to tear everything down and rebuild,” Kocent said.

    Discovery Commons’ redesign also adds natural light and replaces confusing-to-navigate hallways. It will include features like a green roof, stormwater management, and increased energy efficiency.

    The new building will have 15% more research laboratory space than the current structure, and 57% more space devoted to classrooms and teaching labs.

    This interior rendering of the new building planned by Penn shows all the natural light that the new design will allow, in contrast with the existing David Rittenhouse Lab.CO Architects

    The university plans to add space for socializing outside the classroom, with the hope of fostering the kind of spontaneous interactions that spur creativity and collaboration.

    “There is this idea of scientists as the lone genius that sits in their lab or office and dreams up these wonderful ideas,” Trodden said. “Most of modern science looks nothing like that at all.”

    What’s now one floor of public space will become three stories, dubbed The Nexus, which will serve as the main entrance and a connection between the research and academic sections of the new building.

    Kocent, who trained under renowned Penn architecture professors Denise Scott Brown and Robert Venturi, says that encouraging socialization and unstructured interaction is in keeping with their ideas.

    “Denise would often say the next Nobel Prize wasn’t necessarily going to be figured out at the lab bench; it was going to be figured out at the coffee shop at the end of the hallway,” Kocent said.

    Faculty concerns about research disruption

    The seven-story Vagelos Laboratory for Energy Science and Technology just to the east, which features similar environmentally conscious design, opened in 2024. It is 112,500 square feet and cost $173.5 million to build (or $1,540 a square foot).

    Replacement of the Rittenhouse lab will cost $1,600 a square foot. Penn’s development team says that prices haven’t spiked dramatically — despite the current inflationary environment — because the preservation of the 1967-portion of the building is helping to manage costs.

    The cost is also held down because the Penn Discovery Commons contains a lot of classroom space, which is cheaper to build.

    The university plans to begin relocating the building’s tenants at the end of next year, with demolition beginning in spring 2028. Construction would take about three years, with the goal of Penn Discovery Commons being open by Sept. 1, 2031.

    A rendering of the new lab, looking to the northeast. None of the preserved Walnut Street-facing facade can be seen here.Co Architects

    The Daily Pennsylvanian reported earlier this year that some faculty based out of the David Rittenhouse Laboratory worry that relocating their lab space twice in four years could “decimate research.”

    Trodden says that he understands the faculty’s concerns and that the university is committed to taking care of their needs.

    “Everyone is rightly anxious about how this will work in practice,” he said, “but there’s a lot of thought going into it, and a lot of care being taken about individual people’s research needs, and the needs of departments.”

  • Drexel wants to sell the Academy of Natural Sciences museum. A Council bill could restrict its redevelopment.

    Drexel wants to sell the Academy of Natural Sciences museum. A Council bill could restrict its redevelopment.

    A new zoning bill by City Councilmember Jeffery Young Jr. would restrict the redevelopment potential of the Academy of Natural Sciences museum after Drexel University this month announced plans to shutter the centuries-old institution.

    Young, whose 5th District includes the museum property on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, introduced the ordinance at Thursday’s Council session.

    It would limit the allowed uses of the property and others around it to specific categories, including hospitals, government uses, libraries and cultural exhibits, and “community-supported” farms.

    Under Young’s legislation, residential and commercial uses would not be allowed. The property is currently zoned to allow multifamily residential development, unlike the other museums on the Parkway.

    Young said his legislation would simply change the museum’s zoning to reflect what has long been on the site.

    “It’s always been a cultural and civic use, so [my bill] would match the land use with the actual zoning to allow only cultural and civic type uses,” Young said. “But it wouldn’t prevent the academy from closing.”

    Councilmember Jeffery Young Jr. Elizabeth Robertson / Staff Photographer

    Drexel did not immediately offer comment on Young’s legislation.

    If the bill passes, it will make it much harder to convert the building to other uses. The owner would need to secure a variance from the Philadelphia Zoning Board of Adjustment, an often lengthy and costly process with no guarantee of success.

    During that process, any prospective developer would also be required to meet with community groups in advance of a zoning board hearing.

    Young said the purpose of his bill is to allow “the community some input on a site that has been a cultural use for centuries.”

    Instead of changing the property’s zoning to match those of neighboring museums and libraries, Young has proposed adding the restrictions to what is known as a zoning overlay — a kind of hyperlocal patch of the code — that covers his district and allows him to precisely describe what he wants to restrict and allow.

    Young said he is also considering changing the underlying zoning to match that of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Barnes Foundation, and other cultural institutions on the Parkway.

    “We are looking to do that, but the issue is that the planning commission doesn’t work for me and so they’re not on my time,” Young said. “Ultimately, we had to do what we could do from our office’s standpoint.”

    To become law, the bill would need to be approved first in the Committee on Rules and then by the full Council before heading to Mayor Cherelle L. Parker’s desk.

    If Young pushes forward, the bill is likely to pass in Council thanks to a practice known as councilmanic prerogative, in which the rest of Council defaults to the wishes of the member whose district includes a property when it comes to land-use decisions.

    Young, whose district includes parts of Center City and much of North Philadelphia, has abandoned zoning legislation that stirred controversy in the past, such as a housing ban around the former Hahnemann University Hospital campus.

    But the closure of the Academy of Natural Sciences is unpopular, and the new legislation is likely to have broad support from Council members.

    If enacted, the bill would take effect immediately.

    A surprise closure

    Founded in 1812, the Academy of Natural Sciences is the oldest institution of its kind in the nation, and its museum, which opened in 1828, is the country’s oldest natural history research museum. It houses 19 million biological specimens, including bones, carcasses, and plants.

    Drexel announced earlier this month that it was closing the museum effective Sept. 27, citing a decrease in attendance since the COVID-19 pandemic and the university’s financial woes. The decision caused an immediate uproar, including a protest on the Parkway attended by hundreds. Young vowed to “protect and preserve” the building.

    Matt LeBlanc, of Manayunk, and his wife, Alyssa, show their children, Miles and Clara, the Dinosaur Exhibit at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University earlier this month.Tyger Williams / Staff Photographer

    Leaders of Drexel and the academy have said that the “collections and their use to advance scientific knowledge will be the focus of our work for the near future” and that no final decision had been made on the building’s future.

    A source told The Inquirer the university’s ultimate aim is to relocate the collection and sell the building.

    After the announcement, Deputy Mayor Patricia Wellenbach, a top official in Parker’s administration, was named the academy’s temporary leader, serving as senior adviser while on loan from the city.

    Young and other members of Council have been attending rallies against the closure.

    “This academy has been there for over 200 years. It’s dedicated to civic and cultural education, to science,” Young said in a speech during Thursday’s meeting. “If we take that away, how will our kids learn?”

    Correction: An earlier version of the story inaccurately attributed plans to sell the museum building and relocate the academy’s collection.

  • Mayor Parker wants Council to back a tax break for redeveloping derelict buildings. Council says it’s waiting on her.

    Mayor Parker wants Council to back a tax break for redeveloping derelict buildings. Council says it’s waiting on her.

    Last November, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker announced with great fanfare that Philadelphia could create a property tax break to spur the conversion of derelict buildings, such as empty Center City office towers and vacant school facilities, into apartments.

    She had worked with legislators in Harrisburg to change state law to allow Philadelphia to pursue the legislation, which would create a 20-year property tax abatement for conversions of “deteriorated” properties.

    But 10 months later, no such legislation has been introduced in City Council, and Parker on Wednesday called on city lawmakers to consider her 20-year abatement idea for distressed properties.

    20-year tax abatement to help turn schools and offices into homes may soon be legal in Philly

    “We have an affordability crisis here in the city of Philadelphia,” Parker told reporters Wednesday. “What if we marry that challenge with these persistently vacant buildings that have gone underutilized, and we put them to their best and their highest use to incentivize affordable housing?”

    Parker’s administration, however, has not yet transmitted a draft of the bill to Council, which is typically the first step for lawmakers to consider legislation championed by the mayor.

    “Tell them, ‘Send the bill over,’” Council President Kenyatta Johnson told reporters Thursday. “We haven’t seen any piece of legislation regarding 20-year tax abatement at this particular point in time.”

    Asked about the delay, Tiffany W. Thurman, Parker’s chief of staff, said Thursday that city agencies “are collaborating to ensure the proposed legislation is legally sound and can withstand constitutional scrutiny.” She added that Parker “remains firmly committed to presenting City Council with a bill that incentivizes the development of affordable and workforce housing on vacant, publicly owned land.”

    Mayor Parker and City Council now have one year to figure out a way to bring in $216 million after reversing Philly school cuts, officials say

    On Thursday, several members of Council questioned the lack of specifics from the mayor’s office, and others were less than enthused about the idea of approving a new tax break when the Philadelphia School District is facing a funding crisis.

    “I continue to appreciate an effort to make sure that we have access to affordable housing in the city of Philadelphia,” Councilmember Nicolas O’Rourke said. “At the same time, I am very much so laser-focused and desirous of the city getting the revenue that it needs.”

    A controversial policy

    Property tax abatements have long been controversial in Philadelphia, with opponents contending that they starve the city and school district of needed revenue while favoring real estate developers.

    Philadelphia’s 10-year abatement program, which was established in the 1990s, previously exempted owners from paying real estate tax on all new construction or improvements on any type of property for 10 years.

    That program was long hailed as key to the city’s turnaround in the early 2000s. But concerns about its impact on neighborhood inequality and school funding grew over time, and Council in 2019 roughly halved the value of the tax break for new construction.

    Parker argues that the idea behind her legislation is different: She wants to see a far more narrowly targeted bill that would only help developers who seek to redevelop large, derelict buildings.

    “We’re talking about … persistently vacant school buildings that have been vacant from three up to 30 years,” Parker said Wednesday.

    The mayor also noted that the development environment has worsened dramatically since Council cut the 10-year tax abatement’s power, with soaring interest rates and construction material inflation as factors that weigh heavily on complex and large-scale projects.

    Still, many Council members are skeptical of tackling a potentially controversial measure that is seen to favor developers ahead of next year’s municipal elections, when all 17 city lawmakers will be on the ballot.

    “I’d like to get more information on exactly what the plan is because the tax abatements are, as you know, hugely unpopular,” said Councilmember Cindy Bass, who represents parts of North and Northwest Philadelphia.

    Bass said that while the abatement has spurred needed growth, she would need to see any expansion of it balanced with the needs of lower-income Philadelphians who are struggling with rising costs and property taxes.

    President Kenyatta Johnson checks his watch and gavels City Council into session on Sept. 17, as the body returns for start of its fall session.Tom Gralish / Staff Photographer

    And Johnson on Thursday reiterated his comments from earlier this year that he would like to see the newly authorized 20-year abatement include a provision that requires an affordable housing component of the projects it enables.

    “Any type of legislation like that should really focus on making sure that we’re providing a level of affordability, also senior housing,” he said. “Obviously, the devil’s always in the details.”

    But it is not clear that state law would allow Philadelphia to mandate affordability in an abatement bill, and Parker cautioned against doing anything that would exceed the city’s authority.

    “We have to make sure that whatever we are proffering, that it is directly connected to what has been enabled,” Parker said. “It has to pass legal muster for no one to question the constitutionality of what it is that we’re doing.”

    Persistently vacant schools

    A 20-year abatement would apply to empty office buildings in Center City and long-vacant industrial buildings. But Parker and administration officials have focused their pitch on revitalizing empty public schools.

    “We need to pass it because it’s going to be extremely beneficial for challenging properties,” John Mondlak, chief of staff of the Philadelphia Department of Planning and Development, said Wednesday. “You think about schools in 10 years, 20 years — they are very difficult to reposition.”

    That pitch, however, runs up against another policy issue festering between Parker and Council.

    Councilmember Isaiah Thomas said some of the hesitation to take up the abatement legislation is due to Council’s dissatisfaction with the Philadelphia School District’s facilities plan, which the school board adopted last spring and calls for the closure of 17 school buildings and the renovation of 169 others.

    Thomas and other Council members vigorously protested the plan and are still pressing for the board to reconsider it.

    “That’s our priority,” Thomas said Thursday. “I don’t want to have a conversation about schools that are vacant until we have a conversation about schools that are occupied.”

  • Pennsylvania Horticultural Society is moving its office to West Market Street

    Pennsylvania Horticultural Society is moving its office to West Market Street

    The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society is moving to West Market Street after 30 years at 20th and Arch, as the nonprofit behind the Philadelphia Flower Show requires employees to work at the office more regularly.

    The move comes as PHS prepares to mark its 200th anniversary next year.

    PHS’s roughly 100 office-based employees have worked on a hybrid schedule since 2022, president Matt Rader said. The in-person cadence ranges from a couple days a week to a couple times a month, he said.

    That will change starting in the spring at PHS’s new office at 1900 Market St., where the organization signed a 16-year lease. Rader said employees would be required to come into the office three days a week.

    In its current building at 100 N. 20th St., PHS leases 31,000 square feet, subleasing two-thirds of that space to another tenant, Big Brothers Big Sisters. Its workforce is split into two suites on different floors. The new location, at the site of the former Philadelphia Stock Exchange building, is a single space spanning 18,000 square feet.

    “Our current office space that we’re occupying is quite small because we’ve been on this largely hybrid model, and we wanted to move into a situation where we could have the team comfortably in-office three days a week and have everybody in one space,” Rader said.

    Matt Rader, president of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, in 2024.Jessica Griffin / Staff Photographer

    “PHS, despite being two centuries old, has the nimbleness of a start-up,” he said. “We’ve been in a significant chapter of growth, particularly in our neighborhood work. We do a lot of work around tree planting, community gardening, vacant land greening, small-business development, and job training across the city and region, and that work has grown significantly since 2019.”

    Staying in Center City was an easy decision, Rader said.

    “We believe very much in Center City,” he said. “We work in more than 230 city and suburban neighborhoods. So our PHS community of supporters, volunteers, staff is kind of everywhere.”

    That means easy access to public transit is important, Rader said.

    1900 Market is owned by Brandywine Realty Trust, Philadelphia’s biggest office landlord. PHS’s move was first reported by the Philadelphia Business Journal.

    As for its 200th anniversary, PHS plans to double down on its neighborhood greening work, invest more in the annual Flower Show, and launch a new vision, Rader said: “Every person, every place, gardening for the greater good.”

    “Our job is to scale up the places and people involved in using gardening to improve the health and well-being of the region, and we see this new headquarters office space as a great first step on that journey,” he said.

  • A gated community of 140 townhouses is proposed near Packer Park

    A gated community of 140 townhouses is proposed near Packer Park

    A former Philadelphia Housing Authority warehouse site at 3100 Penrose Ferry Rd. is set to be transformed into a gated community with 140 townhouses, just to the northwest of FDR Park.

    The proposal comes from Philadelphia-based Trove Capital, which bought the site from the housing authority in June for $8.5 million.

    The townhomes will be built in 28 clusters of three to seven units across the site, with each home coming with two parking spaces. The site will have an additional 141 surface parking spaces.

    The developer, Justin Vesey, calls the development Southpointe. It will also have a playground, dog park, and pickleball and basketball courts.

    A development package presented to the city describes the project as “a cohesive contemporary neighborhood with a pedestrian-scaled character.”

    The development is similar to nearby auto-oriented townhouse developments, like Packer Park, the Reserve at Packer Park, and Siena Place.

    “It fits within the character and context” of neighboring developments, said Ron Patterson, a zoning attorney with Klehr Harrison Harvey Branzburg, who represents the developer. “It’s all in keeping with the rhythm.”

    The project does not need permission to move forward from the zoning board, but it will be presented to the advisory-only Civic Design Review board on Oct. 6.

    A rendering from within the heart of the new Packer Park-adjacent development.M ARCHITECTS

    Vesey’s development team, which includes Philadelphia-based M Architects, has the support of the Packer Park Civic Association.

    “It fits in well,” said Barbara Capozzi, head of the Packer Park group. “It’s a very tough crowd down here, but they were satisfied. They signed off on it. Everybody’s fine.”

    An earlier version of the project was slightly larger, at 152 townhouses, but the developer scaled it down to widen the sidewalks and add more open space in response to feedback from the city Planning Commission.

    Patterson says some site environmental cleanup is still required, along with the demolition of the former housing authority warehouses.

    “We would like to demolish the buildings while the weather is still good,” said Patterson, who hopes to begin right after the Civic Design Review meeting.

  • Developer sues Upper Merion Township over rejected King of Prussia data center proposals

    Developer sues Upper Merion Township over rejected King of Prussia data center proposals

    Developer Brian O’Neill has sued the Upper Merion Township Board of Supervisors over its rejection last month of his proposed 4.6 million-square-foot data center campus.

    In lawsuits filed Wednesday in Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas, O’Neill said Upper Merion officials have stated in recent years that data centers — which house the equipment that powers AI — qualify as warehouses and are therefore permitted under its zoning code. They changed their tune, according to O’Neill’s team, only after residents pushed back against the plans.

    “The township issued a zoning officer’s determination letter that the proposed use was a permitted use, and then when the people started to bombard them, they did a 180,” said Marc Kaplin, an attorney representing O’Neill. “This is what happens when there is public pressure.”

    Brian O’Neill has proposed five data centers in Upper Merion Township and one across the river in Plymouth Township.John Duchneskie

    Township Manager Anthony Hamaday said Thursday that Upper Merion officials had been informed of O’Neill’s land-use appeals but that the documents had yet to be delivered to them. They declined to comment, pending a full review of the filings.

    O’Neill is asking a judge to reverse the supervisors’ denial, give his plans preliminary approval, and appoint an independent third-party “referee” to conduct an evidentiary hearing and oversee the rest of the process. In the lawsuit, O’Neill says the board acted in bad faith and denied his plans over “minor technical items.”

    At a contentious Aug. 13 meeting, the supervisors unanimously rejected O’Neill’s five data center plans on the grounds that the proposals lacked specificity, including on fire-safety-related issues, and did not meet zoning requirements. They said O’Neill’s team failed to address their many questions and concerns during the review process.

    King of Prussia data center complex is rejected by Upper Merion Township officials

    O’Neill had said his team needed more time to respond and requested an extension until Sept. 30, a request township officials denied.

    A day before the supervisors’ vote, the developer sued the township, its planning commission, and its board of supervisors, saying they violated his legal right to an extension. In response, Montgomery County Court Judge Garrett D. Page ordered a pause on township proceedings and decisions related to the data centers. That decision was vacated the next day, just hours before the supervisors’ vote on Aug. 13.

    Neighborhood pushback

    O’Neill, a longtime real estate developer in the region, is fighting to build a data center complex on five of his properties in a swath of Upper Merion Township between West Conshohocken and Bridgeport.

    A building at 2701 Renaissance Blvd., as seen in May, is one of the sites that Brian O’Neill wants to turn into a data center in Upper Merion Township.Alejandro A. Alvarez / Staff Photographer

    The developer has declined to specify who would operate the centers, though he indicated the facilities would fuel AI-powered biotech to complement his existing life-sciences complex, Discovery Labs.

    O’Neill has said the centers would emit little light and noise, operate on a closed-loop system that requires no outside water, and provide their own power. They would also be an economic engine for Montgomery County, according to O’Neill, who released an economic impact study saying the project would result in more than 10,000 jobs during construction, more than 700 permanent jobs, and more than $55 million a year in local tax revenue.

    Neighborhood groups have rallied against O’Neill’s plans, organizing on social media, packing township meetings, and displaying bright orange lawn signs opposing the project. About 18,000 people had signed a Change.org petition against the Upper Merion data centers as of Friday. Opponents have expressed concerns about pollution, light, noise, electricity prices, property values, and quality of life.

    Human reporters explain why AI data centers are so controversial in the Philly suburbs and beyond

    The pushback in Upper Merion mirrors the opposition seen across the Schuylkill River in Plymouth Township, where O’Neill has spent a year trying to get the OK to build another 2 million-square-foot data center on a shuttered steel mill outside Conshohocken. The project was set to be the subject of a Plymouth Township Zoning Hearing Board meeting on Thursday, but the meeting was canceled due to what the township called “an administrative oversight.”

    The closed Cleveland-Cliffs steel mill in Plymouth Township, outside Conshohocken, that Brian O’Neill wants to turn into a 2-million-square-foot data center. Monica Herndon / Staff Photographer

    Plymouth Township officials failed to post the meeting agenda 24 hours in advance, in violation of the Sunshine Act.

    “Out of an abundance of caution and in the interest of legal compliance and public transparency, the board will not convene as scheduled,” Plymouth Township officials said Thursday in a statement, adding that the meeting will be rescheduled.

    O’Neill has also faced off with Plymouth Township officials in recent months. In July, he filed a legal challenge to the Plymouth Township zoning ordinance, which prompted township leaders to accuse O’Neill of “throwing a tantrum” in an attempt to bully and intimidate them. O’Neill called their statements “a bald-faced lie.”

    News of O’Neill’s actions in Plymouth Township prompted a rebuke from Gov. Josh Shapiro, who had previously encouraged data center development. Weeks later, the governor signed an executive order restricting data center development in Pennsylvania, including by requiring projects to get local approval before receiving state permits.

    In a major shift, Gov. Josh Shapiro restricts data center development in Pennsylvania

    Fears about AI

    The debate over artificial intelligence has intensified in recent weeks, with executives at some of the country’s largest AI companies urging a slowdown of the technology amid fears that it may eventually wipe out humanity.

    Despite pushback, O’Neill’s team remains bullish on data centers.

    “Everybody is against data centers but everybody wants their Amazon order delivered instantaneously,” Kaplin said. “We want all these things that are powered by data centers, so you can’t have it both ways.”

    Two decades ago, Kaplin said he worked for a developer trying to get several of the region’s Walmarts approved. At the time, there was great public opposition, he said, but now “everybody is like, ‘Walmart is part of the community.’”

    “This too shall pass,” Kaplin said. “We have to have this computing power to compete in the world.”

  • Atlantic City’s iconic Steel Pier is up for sale for $85 million

    Atlantic City’s iconic Steel Pier is up for sale for $85 million

    ATLANTIC CITY — The Steel Pier, home to some of Atlantic City’s most iconic spectacles, including diving horses and Miss America pageants, and lately an amusement pier, is up for sale.

    Priced at $85 million, the pier, which was built in 1897, has been listed by the luxury New York City Serhant agency, whose owner, Ryan Serhant, is the star of Netflix’s Owning Manhattan.

    On his Instagram story Thursday, Serhant called the listing “maybe our coolest listing ever??”

    The pier has been owned by the Catanoso brothers since 2011, but the family says the next generation is not interested in taking over. “It’s kind of a succession thing,” Anthony Catanoso said in an interview with The Inquirer.

    The agency is targeting a buyer that envisions expanding the pier into a commercial hospitality venue, like a boutique hotel, a wedding venue, or an expanded amusement park, listing agent Michele Zyska said. She said luxury residential properties built over the ocean could also be a draw.

    Mayor Marty Small Sr. said the prospect of the pier lacking amusements and entertainment would be “devastation.”

    “The Steel Pier has always been the legendary part of the Atlantic City Boardwalk,” he said.

    The pier structure measures 150 feet wide and 965 feet long and is anchored 90 feet into bedrock. A perpetual riparian grant permits it to extend up to 2,850 feet into the Atlantic.

    “It’s like nothing else in the world,” Zyska said. “I keep saying that. It’s an iconic piece of American history. We’re thinking probably more hospitality, music, and maybe even residential. We do have interest in someone keeping it as an amusement park.”

    Atlantic City’s historic Steel Pier is up for sale for $85 million.Real Estate Cinema

    The Catanoso brothers originally leased the pier from Trump Entertainment after winning the lottery in 1993, and bought the pier for $4.25 million in 2011.

    They built its Observation Wheel, now a distinctive feature of the city’s casino skyline, teetered on bankruptcy, and found some stability in recent years running the pier with various amusements, bars, and restaurants.

    Catanoso said business has been good, although challenged by wage costs.

    “We’re getting older, me and my brothers,” Catanoso said. “The kids aren’t taking it over. It’s time for the next chapter. It’s a big development opportunity for somebody.”

    Miss Philadelphia Nellie Orr competes in the 1921 Inter-City Beauty Pageant held on Atlantic City’s Steel Pier. The Miss America Organization will mark the 100th anniversary, but not in Atlantic City. Orr finished second.Collection of Daryl Schabinger

    Serhant calls the Steel Pier “one of the most recognizable landmarks on the East Coast.” The listing was first reported by the New York Post.

    The agency notes the pier’s built-in helipad and previously obtained condo-hotel approvals.

    “The Steel Pier is that rarest of offerings: a piece of developable American history extending straight into the Atlantic Ocean,” the company said in a release.

    George A. Hamid Jr. built up his family’s Steel Pier in Atlantic City by finding hot new acts.SHARON GEKOSKI-KIMMEL / File Photograph

    In addition to the amusement park, there is a 40,000-square-foot building, including a sky bridge and roof.

    “How often does someone get to own a piece of the ocean?” Ryan Serhant said in a statement. “The Steel Pier isn’t just five acres on the most famous boardwalk in the world, it actually offers the chance to own the Atlantic itself and build something unforgettable on top of it.”

    The company also noted new residential projects that are in the works in that end of Atlantic City, including Kushner Cos.’ Caspian Point, K. Hovnanian Homes’ South Inlet townhomes, Colosseo Atlantic City’s Chelsea townhomes, and Zoubek Properties’ Residences at the Orange Loop.

    Anthony Catanoso, owner of Atlantic City’s Steel Pier, takes in the view from the Observation Wheel Tuesday, December 26, 2017.Jose Moreno / staff photographer
  • Why isn’t the Academy of Natural Sciences building historically protected? No one ever nominated it.

    Why isn’t the Academy of Natural Sciences building historically protected? No one ever nominated it.

    Even the Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia was surprised that the Benjamin Franklin Parkway building that houses the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University is not historically protected.

    It learned after the academy announced its museum was closing that the building is “alone among the historic cultural institutions on the Parkway” as not designated historic by the city, said Paul Steinke, executive director of the Preservation Alliance.

    The academy’s 150-year-old building houses the country’s first natural history museum. But it is not listed on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places, a status that comes with protections against major alterations and demolition.

    The museum is scheduled to close at the end of the month, and the academy plans to eventually relocate its collections and sell its building. The property’s zoning allows for low-rise, low-density residential buildings, such as townhouses or small apartment buildings. According to city records, the property’s assessed value is more than $28.7 million.

    The Academy of Natural Sciences is closing its museum after nearly two centuries

    According to the Philadelphia Historical Commission, the academy considered pursuing historic designation for the building in the late 1980s but ultimately did not. On Wednesday, a spokesperson for the commission said it does not have a nomination from anyone in hand.

    City Councilmember Jeffery Young Jr., whose 5th District includes the academy, said his office is looking into possible zoning changes to “protect and preserve that Parkway district,” including the academy’s building.

    “We want to be able to utilize every tool we have available if necessary” to “preserve that public good in that area,” Young said.

    Why hasn’t the building been designated historic yet?

    “It wasn’t thought to be threatened, for one,” Steinke said. Designation happens only when someone takes the initiative to submit a nomination to the city, he noted, and that is commonly spurred by threats of redevelopment.

    He pointed to another iconic Philadelphia spot that most people assumed was historically protected until a developer made plans to redevelop it: Jewelers Row, the oldest diamond district in the country.

    In late 2019, Toll Bros. demolished several buildings on the 700 block of Sansom Street to build a 24-story housing tower that did not materialize. Developer Pearl Properties, which later took over the site, started making visible progress on its own housing tower this summer following years of delays.

    For the academy’s building, Steinke said, the Preservation Alliance is looking into what it would take to do the necessary research, write and submit a nomination, and take it through the city’s historic designation process, which includes review by historical commission staff and public consideration by the commission and its committee on historic designation.

    “We think it clearly qualifies for local designation,” Steinke said.

    The first complete dinosaur skeleton on view to the public made its debut at Philly’s Academy of Natural Sciences

    The start of Philly’s museum mile

    The academy moved to its current location on the Parkway in 1876, when the building opened for the Centennial. The building was designed by James Hamilton Windrim, an architect most famous for designing the Masonic Temple across from City Hall.

    In the early 1900s, the academy building’s facade was redesigned in the Georgian style by the well-known Philadelphia firm Wilson Brothers & Co. Defining features of this architectural style include heavy use of red brick, symmetrical facades, centered entrances, and simple decorative elements, according to Steinke.

    The academy said financial pressures and low attendance drove its decision to close the museum after nearly two centuries.

    But Steinke said he hopes the outpouring of love and support people have been showing the museum since the closure was announced can help keep it where it is. When he visited on Sunday, he said, he “was heartened by the crowds of people, the families enjoying it.”

    “It would be a real loss to lose that museum at the start of the museum mile,” Steinke said, referring to the section of the Parkway that hosts institutions such as the Rodin Museum, Calder Gardens, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

    On Thursday, Councilmembers Young and Nina Ahmad plan to introduce a resolution that calls for Council hearings on the museum’s closure. They are also planning a rally to protest the closure at City Hall that morning.

    People came out to support and rally outside the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway on Sept. 8.Tyger Williams / Staff Photographer