mcget...@aol.com wrote:
The proposal to erect a hotel at 40th and Pine is now officially dead.
Congratulations to all of our neighbors who put so much effort into
fighting this misguided project - it is no small achievement to defeat a
large institution and deep-pocketed investors. If Spruce Hill manages to
keep its historic character and its livability for current and future
generations, it will be thanks to committed people like them. So much
time and money could have been spared if the developers had only used
common sense and initially chosen a more suitable location, like the
current site on Walnut. Perhaps they and others will learn from this
experience.
Does anyone have any information about the new plans for 40th and Pine,
other than the request to change the zoning from two to three
residences? And what's happening to the 4224-26 Baltimore Avenue site?
How long will we have to look at an empty lot surrounded by chain link
fence?
while it may seem that preventing the 11-story hotel at 40th
and pine is a victory, the fact that penn's developer wants
to put it at 41xx walnut -- same height even tho there's no
historic building this time forcing him to build it that
tall -- shows that we haven't won a thing. it's still penn
expanding the campus into the neighborhood -- in this case,
a building for university use, not community use, being
built in the neighborhood, not on campus -- and it's still
penn using private developers to do what penn wants -- in
this case, tom lussenhop and david adelman building an
extended-stay hotel for penn.
like karen allen and other neighbors pointed out earlier,
this sets precedents for penn and developers in our
neighborhood, including the property at 4224-26 Baltimore
Avenue.
and while the dp calls it 'neighoborhood development' it's
really 'campus expansion.'
penn promised in 2004 it would never extend the campus west
or north. here is judy rodin making the promise:
http://www.upenn.edu/almanac/v50/n27/rodin.html
I want to stress the point about our integrated approach.
Many urban colleges and universities had taken action on
one front or another. None had attempted to commit to
intervening holistically on all fronts at once.
Here is what we promised we wouldn't do.
First, we would never again expand our campus to the west
or to the north into residential neighborhoods. We would
only expand to our east, which was made up entirely of
abandoned buildings and commercial real estate
now we see how penn is breaking that promise, through
proxies like lussenhop and adelman.
..
UNIVERSITY*CITOYEN
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