PlanPhilly: Planning Philadelphia's Future

After Mat Tomezsko moved from Mantua to Fishtown last summer, he couldn't stop thinking about his neon neighbor, SugarHouse Casino.

Imagine you're in charge of an old postindustrial city with little open land and a perennially anemic economy. Then a vast district you never knew existed is discovered. It's like a scene from an experimental Czech novel: Pass through a secret door and there's a ghost street grid, handsome buildings from a grand era just out of reach, empty warehouses as big as tankers, and ships as grand as castles. Most of all, a broad waterfront, as close to the sea as your city is likely to get.

A new citizens' advisory group is in the works for the region's transportation planning and funding agency. After internal squabbles prompted the disbanding of its former advisory panel last year, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission on Thursday voted to issue its new plan for public comment.

HARRISBURG - Differences over local zoning have surfaced as a new potential obstacle to lawmakers' efforts to agree on an impact fee on Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale natural gas producers and modernize safety regulations on the drilling industry.

THIS TIME last year, it was Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, seriously wounded in an assassination attempt, who was wrongly reported dead by a slew of highly respected media outlets.

IN 1943, the Jesuit priest who taught Latin at Brooklyn Prep introduced a book-loving 17-year-old kid named Joe Paterno to the Roman epic that would change his life: Virgil's Aeneid.

As news of the death of former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno broke this morning, crowds of supporters gathered near his statue outside Beaver Stadium in shock and sadness.

A Bucks County man died from severe burns he suffered in a townhouse backyard fire around 7:30 p.m. Friday.

The identity of a man discovered in the basement of an abandoned building at 2018 W. Toronto Street in North Philadelphia Sunday afternoon remains unknown, according to police.

The Philadelphia Housing Authority paid at least $700,000 to a Washington lobbyist, channeling much of the money through the law firm Ballard, Spahr L.L.C., while repeatedly telling federal officials it wasn't engaged in lobbying, records show.

Just after 1 a.m. on May 31, the rolling hills of True Prospect Farm in Chester County lit up as a fast-moving fire raced through a barn housing 11 show horses.

I'll admit that I went to Wednesday's performance of Of Mythic Proportions hoping Kensington teenagers would explain the inexplicable - why it's easier to get a gun in their neighborhood than a job, why seven of their own squeezed into a Toyota Corolla at 10:30 on a recent school night eager to fight, why only four came home alive.

Anthony Lubrano, a 1982 Penn State graduate, major university donor and friend of Joe Paterno's, said this morning that the university's board of trustees have made things more difficult on themselves by failing to issue an apology to Paterno for firing him as head coach of the football team.

Friends and colleagues say Thomas Knudsen, the retired CEO of the Philadelphia Gas Works, is an expert at fixing large, failing, dysfunctional organizations.

The call came into Homicide about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday, just as the late news finished: A tipster was on the line with information in the Old City beating death of Kevin Kless.

Full text of statement by the Paterno family on the death of Joe Paterno:

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Key Mitt Romney surrogate Chris Christie, stepping into the charred aftermath of Romney's 12-point loss in the South Carolina primary last night, lit into Newt Gingrich on NBC's "Meet The Press" before he was even asked a set-up question.

CHARLESTON, S.C. - The biggest political rally of the primary season was hosted Friday by a fake Republican who is running for president even though he's not on the ballot and a real Republican who is not running for president even though he is on the ballot.

A minor cut and an ordinary tube of antibacterial cream inspired Frank and Leslee Jacobs to build their first medical clinic in Haiti.

The former chief executive officer of a charter school in Northwest Philadelphia pleaded guilty Friday to stealing more than $500,000 in taxpayer funds intended for the school.