Rittenhouse Square and Development

Inga Saffron, the architecture critic for The Philadelphia Inquirer, has written a nice piece on the possible impact of development projects on Rittenhouse Square. Those developments include three new apartment towers, a 10-screen movie complex facing the park on the 1900 block of Walnut and a parking garage to hold 500 cars.

You can track some of the history of the movie complex and garage project by visiting this old post in EllipticBlog. Here's what Saffron has to say about the proposed garage and theater:

So, instead of privately funded housing, a $35.4 million publicly funded garage will be built on the square. It will pay no property taxes. The garage will bring 500 more cars to the overburdened square. Yet, owners of private garages just two blocks north, on Market Street, complain they can't fill their spaces in the evenings and on weekends...

...Individual residents continue to fight the Parking Authority's plan in court. On May 25, the Common Pleas court is expected to decide whether the agency can tear down three historic buildings on the site. Meanwhile, other residents have been waiting for more than a year to learn whether the state Supreme Court will consider their appeal of the city's zoning variances.

One thing we already know is that a garage and theater are not what zoning experts call "highest and best use." The frenzy of apartment construction around Rittenhouse Square is proof that this site has a better use.

| "Changing Skyline | Throngs from a garage and theater pose a threat to Rittenhouse Square" by Inga Saffron |

| Rittenhouse Square - from EllipticBlog's Photo Album |