New map looks to expand Penn 'bubble'

With the release of the University City District’s new map of area businesses, Penn students may find the “Penn bubble” can be more than just Spruce and Walnut streets.

The new publication lists all 180 businesses in the University City region, including restaurants, shops, hotels, farmers’ markets and arts venues.

The map shows the “breadth and depth” of University City, UCD spokeswoman Lori Klein Brennan said.

Brennan said the map could help Penn students find new venues in the area surrounding campus.

Psychology Professor Paul Rozin, who studies cultural psychology, said people tend to revisit a place they liked before. “We are creatures of habit,” he said. “There are people that like to vary their experiences and there are others who don’t.”

“A lot of things in your life you like because you happened to go there and it was an accident,” he added. “There’s a general battle in life between doing what’s familiar and doing something new.”

UCD has already delivered approximately 100,000 copies of the map to hotels in and around University City and plans to distribute “tens of thousands” more throughout University City, according to Brennan.

Hotels such as the Sheraton, Inn at Penn, Doubletree, Hyatt, Omni and Marriott already carry the maps on their brochure racks. They are also available at University City bed and breakfasts, the Philadelphia Convention Center and 30th Street Station.

Several years ago, UCD created a visitor guide, but the organization decided to recreate the old publication as a map that would be more compact and portable, Brennan said.

So far, the map is popular among businesses and is often requested by customers.

“We’re blowing through them here,” said Adam Baru, general manager of Distrito Restaurant, located at 3945 Chestnut St. “I think people are really excited and are definitely taking them.”

Vinny Lisa, operations manager at the Sheraton Hotel — at 3549 Chestnut St. — said the maps are “easy to read.”

Other businesses awaiting the maps are enthusiastic about the new publication.

“The maps will be extremely useful,” said Dennis Bartelme, co-owner of Cornerstone Bed and Breakfast, located at 3300 Baring St. He added that the maps will be of particular use for his guests interested in visiting Penn and its surrounding businesses.

Prospective students and their families have been in need of a map like this before, he added.

College sophomore Lydia Camper said without the map, she would usually “look stuff up on the University City map on PennPortal.”

“I didn’t know this existed,” she said.

Students interested in obtaining the map can pick one up at University City District office, located at 3940 Chestnut St.

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