For those who don’t have information on obscure Pennsylvania laws at their fingertips, Act 135 allows a court-appointed conservator to bring a blighted property into code compliance, or alternatively facilitate its redevelopment. This statute has caused some controversy over the years for all the obvious reasons. But at the same time, it’s been a useful tool for facilitating construction of new homes on properties that have been vacant for years and physically deteriorating, as we saw a few weeks ago in Fishtown.

So we were happy to see another example of Act 135 doing its thing at 817 N 41st St. in Belmont, where a project is working its way through the City’s zoning approval process and should result in the construction of a new six unit building. A triplex stood here for many years, slowly deteriorating and racking up numerous violations, ultimately getting demoed about a year ago. After years of litigating, the conservator and equity holder are finally in agreement on a development plan.

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817 N 41st St. in 2020 - it's the building to the left of the pole
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Current view, now a vacant lot. The vacant lot to the south has been redeveloped in the years between the two photos

As the Act 135 process has unfolded, some zoning issues have added a layer of complexity to the situation. Until 2023 (after the court had approved the conservatorship) this parcel was zoned for multi-family use, which is how the city’s zoning records indicate it’s been used for decades. But in the spring of 2023, City Council remapped the east side of this block for single family houses, even as similarly sized apartment buildings remain allowed by-right on the blocks of 41st Street to the immediate north and south.

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The development site on a single family zoning block of 41st St between two blocks that allow muti-family

The proposed design for the new building mirrors the adjacent building at 815 N 41st St., which was constructed in the last few years. The zoning at the time allowed a quadplex, but the owners successfully appealed to the ZBA for an extra two units and got approved. While the brick facade of the new building will match the neighboring buildings, they trade a porch for windows for the basement floor. With the zoning board always pushing for buildings to provide additional light and air for any partially below grade rooms, we can understand the choice.

There’s been a fair amount of redevelopment in Belmont and Haverford along the Lancaster Avenue corridor recently, often with the ZBA granting variances to facilitate denser projects than zoning would allow. We would love to see the City proactively legalize apartment buildings here while there are still a decent number of sites where adjacent vacant lots could be consolidated and turned into apartment buildings. But for now we’ll just be grateful when these lots become plexes instead of only single family homes.

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41st between Parrish and Reno streets, across the street from Calvary St. Augustine Episcopal Church
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ZBA stiff arming a misguided downzoning

The ZBA approved the project, with the support of the Belmont Alliance. Once this project gets started, there will still be one vacant lot on this little block between Reno and Parrish Streets, and we would expect that the owners of that property will seek a similar variance sometime in the future. As for the half dozen vacant lots just on the other side of Reno Street, perhaps we’ll see some consolidation and even more density sometime soon, as this section of West Philadelphia continues to fill in after years of disinvestment.