The Rittenhouse Review

A Philadelphia Journal of Politics, Finance, Ethics, and Culture


Tuesday, November 08, 2005  

RECLAIMING THE RIVERS
Further Development on the Waterfront

Can there, will there, ever be enough new housing development in Center City Philadelphia? Every week seems to bring another new project, or at the very least, a new idea or proposal, many of which, even if significantly flawed in their conception, to say nothing of their execution, past, present, or future, cannot but help strike wonder in the hearts and minds of those who know, or think they knew, this city.

The latest project, just made known, at least to me, today, strikes me as big, and surprising, news: 734 Schuylkill Ave., on the western edge of Center City, just below the South Street Bridge, in its latest incarnation a vocational education center, will be rehabbed into more than 200 condominium units by developer Sam Switzenbaum, working in conjunction with architect Robert Venturi of Venturi, Scott Brown & Associates, that according to an article by Henry J. Holcomb in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer, “Heavyweight to Go Condo.”

The Switzenbaum/Venturi project sounds clever and exciting, but, as always on such matters, I defer to a greater authority: Inquirer architecture critic, Inga Saffron, who, by the way, is now writing an excellent blog, Skyline Online. Take it away, Inga.

[Note: This post was published earlier this evening in somewhat different form at TRR: The Lighter Side of Rittenhouse.]

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