The Philadelphia Zoning Board of Adjustment is likely to give significant weight to the City Planning Commission's recommendation to approve plans for a hotel at 40th and Pine Streets, but community opposition still has the project up in the air.
After hearing from developers as well as long term residents of the area, the City Planning Commission recommended on Tuesday that the ZBA approve the 11-story extended-stay hotel.
City Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell, whose district includes Penn and the surrounding area, said the Planning Commission's recommendation "will hold a lot of weight" with the ZBA.
Peter Kelsen, a Philadelphia zoning and land-use lawyer unaffiliated with the hotel, agreed.
"In my experience, this Zoning Board and this Planning Commission listen to each other pretty well," Kelsen said.
But the ZBA is ultimately independent, and the Planning Commission's recommendations are advisory rather than binding, he added.
Blackwell said "developers have continued to not give an inch" to community concerns, and local residents don't yet have a unified stance on the project.
In 30 years of serving on city council, "I haven't seen many like this, where there's still no consensus," she said.
Carl Primavera, the attorney representing the hotel developers, wrote in an e-mail that he believed the ZBA would approve the project.
Some local residents have expressed concern about the dense flow of visitors and traffic that a hotel would generate, but developers say the hotel would be used for extended-stay visits only.
Still, Primavera could not absolutely guarantee that the hotel would be restricted to extended-stay guests.
"The design of the rooms and rate structure will create the market for extended stay," he wrote.
He compared the concept to a restaurant "like Le Bec Fin; it's not designed as a take-out restaurant, but it is possible, not likely, that someone will go and order take-out."
Erik Jensen, another Philadelphia real estate attorney not connected to the case, said zoning decisions like these are "very political processes."
In addition to normal zoning statutes and economic considerations, ZBA approval is influenced by the effects of a proposed development on local politics, Jensen said.
"If a development is going to bring jobs to a community, that's a powerful impact, because jobs mean votes," he said.
Commercial developers trying to build in residential neighborhoods in Philadelphia have faced mounting opposition in recent years, according to Kelsen.
Blackwell predicts that the ZBA will hear the hotel case in about a month.
If some members of the community still have concerns about the hotel at the time of the hearing, Blackwell said, her office will "certainly not take a position on the issue, though we usually give the zoning board a recommendation one way or another."
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Maybe yes, maybe no. The Italianate house is a gem but it is in a state of collapse. The whole street is very dense with the fancy rowhouses and imposing single family houses. A multi-story hotel could botch the whole neighborhood. On the other hand, the closest comparison to West Philadelphia is the Garden District in New Orleans, and there are a few precious hotels there that enhance the whole neighborhood. Poets and writers take up residence for months at a time. Remember, this was the neighborhood where Ezra Pound and Hilda Doolittle fell in love. The place has ghosts.
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This is the type of press release cloaked as journalism which needs to be challenged. Ms. Hart has portrayed the overwhelming opposition in the community as that of low functioning NIMBYs. Yesterday, a retraction of her previous false portrayal (classic NIMBY) of my testimony was published. The developers and the University Dept of Real Estate have no credibility in the community. Ms. Hart's one-sided, spoon-fed reporting misleads readers about serious issues. The development team and U. operatives have been continuously dishonest even lying during official recorded testimony. The PCPC/PHC create false records which cloak the backroom deals and conflicts of interest.
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Does anyone else notice there are endless food options at Penn but getting a room for visiting parents is virtually impossible during the bookends of the academic calender? Penn has no problem enabling obesity and alcohol abuse but does zilch for the people who fork over the checks.
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an extended stay facility is a great idea, but 11 stories high in the middle of a quasi residentialneighborhood seems kind of "dense" to me. But if that what it takes to make the project financially feasable then go for it developer!!
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How is this a bad thing at all? We need to gentrify this area. Build a hotel. Do anything and everything possible to raise property values and make this area safer... (not put together well b/c it's 3:00 am and I'm tired).