Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut
They changed locations after nearby residents expressed concerns that the building would harm the neighborhood's identity. I think it's important that everyone remember that new journalism transfers messaging from the halls of power, unexamined, directly to consumers. This history and analysis was not gathered by a reporter examining the literature and investigating. (Fox news, DP, and The Public Record all have similar missions in the service of power.) In one sentence, the NIMBY nature of the neighborhood is juxtaposed with the charitable, and immediately responsive, love from the university and its partners. In future, the news stories about the hotel occurrence can be assembled without reference to the articles which showed them kicking and screaming. This history and journalism allows the university to look forward not backward. These NIMBY neighbors will remind future city planning commissions of the prostitutes and gangs from Clark Park. I think those NIMBYS around 40th St. should keep the Clark Park process in mind as they wait for the new plans to develop 40th. (Penn waited 7 years after huge public opposition, to take Clark park quietly.) In the future, there won't be any notice leaked before the development of 40th and Pine begins. A subcommittee of the Spruce Hill zoning committee will provide community enthusiasm for the new project. The coordinated shock and awe media campaign should be expected between Thanksgiving and New Years. And some new community non-profit groups should be expected to form a 40th and Pine Partnership that will represent the community at invitation only meetings. Glenn On 12/10/2010 6:25 PM, UNIVERSITY*CITOYEN wrote: On 12/10/2010 8:49 AM, krf...@aol.com wrote: The DP had yet another take... including this truly memorable paragraph: In 2009, developers announced they planned to build the hotel at 40th and Pine streets. They changed locations after nearby residents expressed concerns that the building would harm the neighborhood's identity. The project site was then moved to Walnut Street to fit in better with the road's commercial aesthetic. I'm afraid that the Penn people really believe this the penn people and the hotel developer believe the hotel is in the interests of penn. it appears some residential buildings on walnut and 41st are being torn down from the road's commercial aesthetic to accommodate this hotel/office project. some background about the penn tower hotel, part of the penn health system and owned by penn health system: http://www.upenn.edu/almanac/v42/n33/pennmed.html .. UNIVERSITY*CITOYEN You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named UnivCity. To unsubscribe or for archive information, see http://www.purple.com/list.html. No virus found in this incoming message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.com Version: 9.0.872 / Virus Database: 271.1.1/3307 - Release Date: 12/10/10 02:37:00
Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut
Hi Tony There's lots of issues that you and Al are discussing and I don't want to get involved with those about who was in favor of the hotel and how far away they lived. My objection to your post is only the one you make regarding the 40th and pine site continuing to be a vacant building and that eyesore bothers you each time you walk by. You also seem to be blaming misguided radicals for having achieved this result. Two points Tony: 1) sorry that you had to endure a dilapidated house on your block. I would guess that the owner did not have the resources to upgrade or maintain the property. However, you seem to imply that the vacant, dilapidated property on 40th and Pine has a similar history to the one on your block. You seem to ignore that the property at 40th and Pine is owned and maintained by the U of Penn. When Penn bought the property seven years ago it was an occupied structure. Although it was supposedly in deplorable condition then, the on-going deterioration is not the fault of either misguided radicals nor by some cash-strapped home-owner. It is owned by the same University that just bought a 23 acre site a few blocks away and is turning it into a park and the same University that has contracted to buy 20 more acres another few blocks away (the Dupont site) all for tens of millions of dollars all to apparently leave as open-green space. I don't want to knock the open-green-space, but it certainly seems to indicate that they are not short on cash for properties. The 40th and Pine site is only about 10,000 square feet. The renovation cost would be a few million dollars. It would be lots for you or me, but it would seem Penn could handle it. Your comparing the mis-use of 40th and Pine with an empty house on your own block seems to be a stretch. 2) Your post seemed to also indicate that the zoning fight pitted some crazy radicals who had equally crazy anti-development ideas against some poor-honorable owners who just wanted to improve the area and bring a bit of business to good-olde Univ City. I would say that this is a mis-characterization of the two sides and of the issues. The essential issue was whether the 40th and Pine area was part of the U Penn commercial corridor that extended from Walnut and Chestnut St or whether the area was a residential one. Would building a 100,000 sq foot structure on the site of a single family home negatively impact the other residents nearby? Imagine several homeowners on your block banding together to try to benefit financially by allowing a massive commercial hotel to be built in their backyards. The many residents including those from the Woodland Terrace block insisted that by defining 40th and Pine as a commercial one might/would ruin the residential character of their block and that U of P had actually promised to stop commercial development beyond 40th Street to encourage the residential growth in the area. The arguments in front of the Phila Zoning Board were a fair fight with highly competent attorneys on both sides. In the end, Tony, when you walk past the 40th and Walnut site where the 100,000 sq foot hotel has been re-located don't you feel that that site is the correct one for this massive structure and it's hundreds and hundreds of occupants? No jobs and no development money was lost to the UC area no services for extended stay patient families was lost. Maybe we can all join together and get Penn to address their vacant, dilapidated structure and spend some of their vast, impressive energies on 40th and Pine. Guy -Original Message- From: Anthony West anthony_w...@earthlink.net To: UnivCity listserv univcity@list.purple.com Sent: Sat, Dec 11, 2010 10:43 pm Subject: Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut I attended several community meetings and my description is precise. By law, zoning concerns are restricted to, what is it, people living or owning property within 1,000 ft of the property? Both you I fall outside this line. Most of the big mouths about the 40th Pine site were not neighbors as defined by law. (I can name half a dozen who were, and I tip my hat to them for winning their case.) As for your nonsense about my outspending you, I own one building in one city and one neighborhood -- right here -- my home -- which I am struggling to hang onto in the midst of a terrible recession. How many buildings do you own? How many cities do you own property in? I spent zip money on zip hotel wars, yes, I care zip as well. I can't afford to spend on stuff like real-estate lobbying about something 4 blocks away none of my business. How much did you spend, to move this hotel from Pine St. to Walnut St.? You wanted it, you bought it, for whatever reason. But you didn't do it in my name or in the name of our community. Nobody who cares for their community deliberately lobbies in favor of leaving a long-term, dilapidated,
Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut
In a message dated 12/11/2010 10:45:03 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, anthony_w...@earthlink.net writes: Every time I walk past this crumbling monument to misguided radicalism at 40th Pine, I wonder how long it'll be until it burns. Or, as President Reagan famously said to Jimmy Carter. There you go again. Always at your service, Al Krigman
Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut
As for your nonsense about my outspending you, I own one building in one city and one neighborhood -- right here -- my home -- which I am struggling to hang onto in the midst of a terrible recession. How many buildings do you own? How many cities do you own property in? I spent zip money on zip hotel wars, yes, I care zip as well. I can't afford to spend on stuff like real-estate lobbying about something 4 blocks away none of my business. How much did you spend, to move this hotel from Pine St. to Walnut St.? You wanted it, you bought it, for whatever reason. from krf...@aol.com: And, surely, one of the objectives of what's supposed to be a world class university should be to inculcate in its students sensibilities for justice, consideration of others which viewpoints that may differ from their own, and a realization that you can't have everything your way simply because you can outspend the people you either disagree with or don't care about. Tony, I'm confused. I thought Al was talking about the in loco parentis doctrine and the mission of great universities. I reread Al's statement and still believe the same. The first three paragraphs of his post were entirely regarding the university with nothing about you. He only referenced you in his last sentence. He showed disbelief in your assertion that few nearby residents opposed the 40th and Pine hotel, whether you actually believed your own stuff. Do you think your angry tirade may all be based on a little mistake? I wouldn't want anyone to think that you had created a straw man with which to get angry. It's always a pleasure to study the literature from civic association leaders, journalists, and UCD committeemen. Yours, A loud-mouthed citizen journalist On 12/11/2010 10:43 PM, Anthony West wrote: I attended several community meetings and my description is precise. By law, zoning concerns are restricted to, what is it, people living or owning property within 1,000 ft of the property? Both you I fall outside this line. Most of the big mouths about the 40th Pine site were not neighbors as defined by law. (I can name half a dozen who were, and I tip my hat to them for winning their case.) As for your nonsense about my outspending you, I own one building in one city and one neighborhood -- right here -- my home -- which I am struggling to hang onto in the midst of a terrible recession. How many buildings do you own? How many cities do you own property in? I spent zip money on zip hotel wars, yes, I care zip as well. I can't afford to spend on stuff like real-estate lobbying about something 4 blocks away none of my business. How much did you spend, to move this hotel from Pine St. to Walnut St.? You wanted it, you bought it, for whatever reason. But you didn't do it in my name or in the name of our community. Nobody who cares for their community deliberately lobbies in favor of leaving a long-term, dilapidated, abandoned building on their block. I lived with that problem on my block for 10 years, was so glad when it was finally solved! But that's what you lobbied for, what you've achieved. Every time I walk past this crumbling monument to misguided radicalism at 40th Pine, I wonder how long it'll be until it burns. --Tony West On 12/11/2010 9:51 PM, krf...@aol.com wrote: In a message dated 12/11/2010 7:04:57 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, anthony_w...@earthlink.net writes: /All right. How about A few nearby residents and a large number of faraway ones expressed concerns, often heatedly. In the end, their concerns carried the day with the ZBA and the hotel project moved three blocks north, on another mixed-use corridor street?/ /But I doubt the DP's readers are interested in reading a history of disputes among neighbors several years ago. It's a readership which largely turns over every 4 years, don't forget. They don't need to measure how concerned the townies were, back when. Surely for them, the focus is more on what's coming next. / No, not at all. They wrote In 2009, developers announced they planned to build the hotel at 40th and Pine streets. They changed locations after nearby residents expressed concerns that the building would harm the neighborhood's identity. The project site was then moved to Walnut Street to fit in better with the road's commercial aesthetic. The truth was that the University and their developer cohorts were dragged, kicking and screaming, from the deserted Penn-owned site at 40th Pine by members of the community -- after having engaged one of the city's top real estate attorneys, spending huge amounts of money, and lying through their teeth to get the zoning changed so they could build the hotel there. And, surely, one of the objectives of what's supposed to be a world class university should be to inculcate in its students sensibilities for justice, consideration of others which viewpoints that may differ from
Re: [UC] hotel and office building on walnut
krf...@aol.com wrote: They wrote In 2009, developers announced they planned to build the hotel at 40th and Pine streets. They changed locations after nearby residents expressed concerns that the building would harm the neighborhood’s identity. The project site was then moved to Walnut Street to fit in better with the road’s commercial aesthetic. The truth was that the University and their developer cohorts were dragged, kicking and screaming, from the deserted Penn-owned site at 40th Pine by members of the community -- after having engaged one of the city's top real estate attorneys, spending huge amounts of money, and lying through their teeth to get the zoning changed so they could build the hotel there. And, surely, one of the objectives of what's supposed to be a world class university should be to inculcate in its students sensibilities for justice, consideration of others which viewpoints that may differ from their own, and a realization that you can't have everything your way simply because you can outspend the people you either disagree with or don't care about. quietly, quietly, the university and its pawns (ucd, campus apartments, co-opted community organizations) continue to redefine -- physically and narratively -- our community in terms of penn's agenda. structures planned and developed by campus apartments are replacing residential buildings in order to promote the interests and activities of penn. local businesses are being replaced and facelifted by ucd and campus apartments in return for votes for penn's upcoming bid. meanwhile the university continues to claim that it is engaging locally and improving the neighborhood. the identity of the neighborhoods surrounding the pine street hotel was -- and is -- this: neighbors excercising their civic duty in the name of responsible development over a decade ago, penn made the decision to put the penn tower hotel -- which included extended stay suites for visitors to the university and its hospitals -- to other uses. now penn has decided it needs to build another extended stay hi-rise hotel, not on campus property, but in our neighborhood. how long will it be before this new hotel becomes obsolete? and how long will it be before penn decides to build another must-have hi-rise-for-penn elsewhere in our neighborhood? .. UNIVERSITY*CITOYEN You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named UnivCity. To unsubscribe or for archive information, see http://www.purple.com/list.html.
[UC] Clark Park Christmas Caroling Postponed
Hi, Everyone, The weather forecast for this afternoon is very spotty, so let's wait until next Sunday, December 19, to sing at the tree in Clark Park, at the maintenance house near 45th Regent St. at 5 pm. Sorry about that, but unfortunately, Mother Nature has the final say. See you next Sunday. Fran You are receiving this because you are subscribed to the list named UnivCity. To unsubscribe or for archive information, see http://www.purple.com/list.html.
