Changing Skyline | Address alone does not make
Philadelphia's Ikea 'urban'
Ever
since Ikea opened its first American store in Plymouth Meeting in 1985, it has
been planting its recognizable blue-and-yellow boxes at highway interchanges
around the country. This week, however, the giant furniture chain departed from
the corporate script and debuted its first "urban" store, on Columbus
Boulevard in Philadelphia, with a view of the City Hall tower. But beyond the address,
it's hard to see what distinguishes Ikea's Philadelphia store from its 20
suburban showrooms. The vast blue shed bobs in an asphalt sea. Like many Ikea
stores, Philadelphia's is a member of an exclusive "power center"
that features an archipelago of big-box retailers, including Lowe's and Best
Buy. Ikea's front door is located far, far back from Columbus Boulevard. That
street is at least graced by sidewalks; there are none around the back, where SEPTA's Route 7 bus stops. You call that urban? Ikea does, and says it
is proud of its boldness. Two decades ago, when it set up shop along the
Pennsylvania Turnpike, the privately held Swedish company would never have
considered a store within Philadelphia's dense confines, even though Columbus
Boulevard is easily accessible to regional highways. No matter which direction
you go, convenient ramps to Interstates 95 and 76 await. Clearly the world has
changed in 20 years. Ikea's arrival in South Philadelphia is evidence that
America's antipathy toward cities is mellowing. Instead of seeing poverty and
danger all around, national chains now see a great untapped market of
disposable income. As desirable interchanges fill up and the suburbs saturate
with malls, cities have become "the last frontier of American
shopping," says retail consultant Paco
Underhill, author of the recent Call of the
Mall. Now city residents can shop for bargains without schlepping to
the suburbs. Although it's certainly
nicer to be courted by national chains than ignored by them, being the target
area for a major big-box expansion program poses serious challenges for
Philadelphia. Will national chains suburbanize the city, or will the city
urbanize the chains? Sadly, it looks like
the former. The first wave of chains to colonize Philadelphia are rapidly
turning dense and variegated thoroughfares like Washington Avenue and Broad
Street into generic highway strips, full of widely spaced fast-food restaurants
and drug stores. When Trader Joe's, another chain that calls itself urban,
opened a store on Market Street in Center City, it didn't bother to include a
front door. Store officials expect customers to drive into a rear parking lot. Perhaps the city wasn't
paying attention when the doorless Trader Joe's
slipped in, but it fought hard to win the Ikea power center, which was
developed by Ken Goldenberg of the Goldenberg Group, a major political contributor.
The 44-acre site, once a rail yard that served the city's port, had to be
rezoned by City Council from industrial to commercial. That was the moment for
the city to determine whether the Ikea center could be more than just a
standard-issue strip mall. So limited were the city's expectations, however,
that it considered Ikea the ultimate prize. Contrast the results on
Columbus Boulevard with those in Atlanta, which will be home to Ikea's next
"urban" store. There, the developer is turning the site of a former
steel plant into a New Urbanist-style complex that
includes an apartment house, office tower, theater and shopping center. Ikea
intends to build its usual blue box, but it will be integrated into a
neighborhood. The mix of uses will give the Ikea a sense of place and a
connection to Atlanta, something an ordinary shopping center could never
possess. The mix will also help increase Atlanta's density - and viability -
rather than diminish it. Philadelphia's Ikea
site would have been a fabulous spot to incubate such a neighborhood. The power
center overlooks the Delaware River and the remnants of the city's maritime
heyday, including several terra-cotta-clad pier-terminals and the mothballed
USS United States. Yet because the city lacks a coherent waterfront policy, it
let another riverfront opportunity drift by. Ikea, to its credit,
has used the harsh beauty of this landscape to give its prototype box some
character. The store was situated so its glass-enclosed, second-story
restaurant perfectly frames the waterfront view. Because the glass sticks out
beyond the plane of the building, you can catch glimpses to the north and south
of the city skyline and the Walt Whitman Bridge. It may be the first big box
with a view. Ikea's location, just
four miles from Center City, could justify its urban claim. "We like that
it is part of a neighborhood where people can walk," said Joseph Roth, who
oversaw the store's construction. Of course, only the
most hardy South Philadelphians are likely to venture along pedestrian-unfriendly
Columbus Boulevard. The rest will have to drive or take one of four bus routes:
7, 25, 64, or 79. Ikea should be applauded for convincing SEPTA to detour the
25 bus into the parking lot. But it's too bad SEPTA didn't do anything to improve
the other lines. A truly "urban" Ikea would have built a sidewalk
along Weccacoe Street, which runs behind the shopping
center and is on the Route 7 line. Ikea should have also taken advantage of its
riverfront site by including outdoor amenities such as a park, playground or
cafe. If Ikea were the only
chain coming to town, these would just be quibbles. But at Oregon Avenue and
21st Street, developers are putting the finishing touches on another power
center that will be home to BJ's Wholesale Club and
Home Depot. Another developer is now eyeing an even more urban location, the
Philadelphia Parking Authority site at 32d and Market Streets, for yet a third
big-box mall. The proposed Center
City slots parlor will likely be a variation on the big-box concept, featuring
a windowless casino instead of nearly windowless retail space. Although no site
has been chosen, Goldenberg, Ikea's developer, owns one of the prime
contenders, the property at Eighth and Market Streets. Without a planning
vision from the city, these massive and bland boxes will further suburbanize
the character of Philadelphia's downtown. They may be convenient, but don't
call them urban. <hr
size=1 width="100%" noshade color="#cccccc"
align=center> Contact architecture critic Inga Saffron
at 215-854-2213 or [EMAIL PROTECTED].
Read her recent work at http://go.philly.com/ingasaffron. |
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