Once outright avoided because of its industrial contamination, waterfronts now represent some of the most valuable and sought-after real estate and public space opportunities in our cities. William Penn knew the importance of waterfront land when he made the Delaware riverfront all common space, and later requiring public access to the river’s edge when the economic forces became too strong. With the erection of I-95 along the Delaware, we officially lost our connection to Philadelphia’s original riverfront while park space along the Schuylkill River flourishes. Different cities around the country have used different approaches to riverfront development, but the most successful ones have emphasized a balance of public space and private development. Former Mayor John Street commissioned the most recent planning process for the central Delaware, which Mayor Nutter has helped realize by reconstituting the Delaware River Waterfront Corporation and focusing them on implementing the citizen-driven vision.
A suggested get together with the Las Vegas casino mogul to familiarize him with the Civic Vision for the Central Delaware creates friction among advocacy group members.
At the Historical Society Thursday night, a prominent scholar in indigenous culture and leaders from two Lenape tribal nations paid tribute to the 1682 Treaty of Friendship, reached at Penn Treaty Park.
Council's committee on the rules unanimously passes along amendment that would eliminate height restrictions along seven blocks of the Central Delaware. Casino properties in the CED may be exempted.
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Led by Penn Praxis and funded by the William Penn Foundation, the Central Delaware Riverfront visioning process engaged more than 6,000 Philadelphians in the creation of an action plan for the riverfront that would extend Philadelphia's intimate fabric of human-scaled streets and parks across the chasm of I-95 to the largely suburban geography of the automobile-scarred central Delaware.