In West Philly

Cliché be damned, in Cedar Park, neighbors are showing how seriously they take being members of a community. When Elena's Soul (4912 Baltimore) caught fire on Christmas Eve, its subsequent demolition toppled more than one business. Its neighbors on each side caught wind of falling debris to such an extent, owners were

One way development and improvement projects are incubated at public institutions in a city facing a stressed budget, is through workshops organized by smaller organizations who connect the necessary professionals to the communities in need.

The goal is for the project to go from the whiteboard to the parcel, so to

University City, University City. Oh how there’s so much building these days in your part of town. When the projects are finished, it will mean a new Market Street west of 30th Street Station. One that area administrations have dreamed about for decades.

First, there’s the new Drexel business school. This past

For the 5100 block of Chester Ave. in West Philly, Farm 51 could represent an important marker in the rebuilding process for a block.

A few years ago, the northwestern side of the 5100 block of Chester featured run down homes and a few vacant lots. Before one of those lots

One of the seeds on the budding Baltimore Ave. commercial corridor suffered a tragic end on the afternoon of Christmas Eve when Elena’s Soul burnt down just shy of 50th and Baltimore in West Philadelphia.

The hope is its neighboring businesses, Gary’s Nails and the Cedar Park Café, can survive the structural stress created by the

Maybe it was yuletide. Or maybe it was realizing what makes a neighborhood charming. Whatever it was that inspired the City to bid $20K more than they said they could to save a neighborhood garden from development, it happened.

According to Plan Philly, City representatives bid $71,500 at a Sheriff’s Sale

One of the most appealing off the main thoroughfare neighborhood parks we’ve encountered in a while, sits in West Philly at the corner of 48th and Chester streets, locked up and largely unused.

Squirrel Hill Falls Park was envisioned by local artist Danielle Rousseau Hunter. It’s a cozy forest-like corner pocket

Now that City crews have demolished a strip of buildings at the southwest corner of Farragut and Market Streets right near the 46th Street El Station to ostensibly make way for Enterprise Heights, we wonder how much of the initial plans for this stalled-for-a-decade $75M project are part of the present plans.

Enterprise

In Walnut Hill, The Paul Robeson House at the corner of 50th & Walnut stands as a living monument to neighborhood revitalization through remembering its history. It’s to rebuilding in Walnut Hill as Mural Arts is to beautifying blank building walls in neighborhoods across the city.

Today, the house stands as monument to

Over the summer, we brought an old warehouse at 31st & Spring Garden to your attention, noting the likelihood of new student housing in a vacant lot behind the dilapidated old structure. At the time, we spotted a zoning notice at a vacant lot across the street, on the southeast