The 3600 block of Haverford Avenue has been in the news over the last few years, as the City attempted to condemn all the properties on the block in an effort to combine four city blocks and construct a supermarket in Mantua. Artist James Dupree owns a studio on this block and wasn't so keen on losing his property, he fought the condemnation and ultimately succeeded in his efforts. If you pass by this block today, you won't need more than one guess as to which building is an artist's studio.
Across the street, at 3612 Haverford Ave., we recently spied a zoning notice. This building was an auto repair shop at one point in its history, but it appears that it's been vacant and blighted for at least a decade. The zoning notice indicates that developers are looking to demolish the building and replace it with a five-story building with ground-floor commercial and 21 apartments. The property is zoned for industrial use, so they're not getting a refusal for the height, but they are surely getting refusals for the residential use. A project like this certainly seems like it'll be student housing, though we can't confirm this as public record doesn't reflect any recent sales for the property.
There has definitely been some student housing development on nearby blocks of Haverford Avenue, but this would be the first such project on the 3600 block. It's worth noting, this block is one of the worst looking blocks in the area, but we can imagine this changing in the near future. Though the PRA announced two years ago that the supermarket plan was in jeopardy because of the situation with Mr. Dupree's studio, they have torn down a few dozen buildings on nearby blocks in the last half year or so. This suggests to us that the supermarket plan is still very much alive, though we weren't able to easily find updated info on the project since 2014. Has anyone in the neighborhood heard anything new about this plan recently? Do you think that Penn and Drexel students will be into living on this block? Do you think the ZBA will approve the project in the first place?