Robert A.M. Stern, 86, a leading architect over the past six decades who left his imprint on Philadelphia by designing the Comcast Center and the Museum of the American Revolution among other notable buildings, died Thursday, Nov. 27, at home in Manhattan after a brief pulmonary illness, his family said.
Mr. Stern also wrote respected architectural histories, taught at Columbia and Yale universities, and was dean of Yale’s School of Architecture from 1998 to 2016.
“Bob had a great sensitivity to urbanism in design. You can see that in Philadelphia, where his work certainly sits well where it is placed,” said developer John Gattuso, who worked closely with Mr. Stern on the Comcast Center, completed in 2008, the redevelopment of the Navy Yard, and other projects.
“He was less concerned with theatrical architecture, the gymnastics, and understood how buildings contribute to a sense of place that resonates with people,” he said. For that reason, Gattuso said, “he tended to be underappreciated.”
Stern and his firm designed the 975-foot Comcast Center, the headquarters for the cable and telecommunications giant, completed in 2008.
The 975-foot-tall shimmering Comcast Center, the company’s original skyscraper on JFK Boulevard, straddles the tracks and concourse of Suburban Station, a commuter gateway to the city. An airy 120-foot glass atrium connects the building to the station, providing for a dramatic arrival from below, and overlooks a public plaza.
“The Comcast Center may be his finest work in Philadelphia,” said architecture critic Inga Saffron, who writes for The Inquirer. “The scale is right. It’s not fat. It’s tapered.”
Classical indentations in the 58-story building draw the eye upward, she said. “It’s a good dignified skyscraper … Buildings like this are embedded in the city.”
Mr. Stern’s firm was also known for luxury apartment towers. In Manhattan they include 15 Central Park West, a limestone-clad condominium at the southwest corner of Central Park that was internationally hailed.
The firm’s work also includes university buildings, including the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia; Weill Hall at the University of Michigan; and Miller Hall at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va., among many others.
In Philadelphia, Mr. Stern’s firm prepared the master plan for the Navy Yard, and designed buildings on Crescent Drive in that development and the 10 Rittenhouse condominium, as well as the American Water tower on the Camden Waterfront — and the LeBow College of Business at Drexel University.
Robert A.M. Stern designed the former U.S. headquarters for GSK at Five Crescent Drive in the Navy Yard, Philadelphia. He and his associates put together the master plan for the redevelopment of the massive property.
Mr. Stern was a proponent of post-modernism, a style of architecture that incorporated classical elements. He moved further in that direction as his career went on.
Philadelphia’s Museum of the American Revolution was built in a Georgian style. But to Saffron, it was perhaps too much, and more out of place to the city.
“He embraces classicism more and more,” Saffron said. In the case of the museum, “It’s a schlocky classicism,” in contrast to the relatively modest scale of the historic buildings in Old City.
“It’s like Independence Hall on steroids,” Saffron said.
The latest Robert A.M. Stern Architects design in Philadelphia is nearing completion, a massive life sciences research building at Drexel University, on Cuthbert Street, by Gattuso Development Partners.
In an interview with the New York Times when he was 84, Mr. Stern said he still wasn’t using a computer and drew “everything by hand.”
Born in Brooklyn on May 23, 1939, Mr. Stern earned a bachelor’s degree from Columbia and a master’s in architecture from Yale. In 1966, he married photographer Lynn Gimbel Solinger, a granddaughter of Bernard Gimbel, the department store magnate. They had a son, Nicholas, and later divorced.
Mr. Stern is survived by his son, three grandchildren, and other relatives.
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker unveiled her planning process for the future of Market East earlier this month to a room packed with many of the city’s top developers, lobbyists, and business leaders.
Her news conference followed the announcement that the alliance between the Philadelphia 76ers and Comcast had plans to demolish buildings on the 1000 block of Market Street, without saying what they plan to do with the soon-to-be vacant space.
A Comcast executive’s promise to “turbocharge” development on the beleaguered corridor did not quiet dissent in the packed room from a group of historic preservationists who stood solemnly holding signs reading “No More Holes On Market Street” and “No Plan, No Demo.”
The moment captured a recurring dynamic in modern Philadelphia, a city where over 70% of buildings reportedly date to before 1960 but only 4.4% of them have a degree of protection from demolition by the Historical Commission.
Now two bills in City Council would require property owners to get a building permit for a new structurebefore they move forward with demolition.
“This bill is about putting commonsense guardrails in place,” said Councilmember Jeffery “Jay” Young, who represents much of North Philadelphia and part of Center City.
His bill, which covers his entire district, requires a building permit before a property owner can demolish a structure, with exceptions for dangerous buildings.
“It ensures property owners are prepared to move forward responsibly and that residents aren’t stuck living beside another empty lot with no timeline or plan,” Young said in a statement.
“This isn’t about slowing down development; it’s about preventing speculative demolition that destabilize blocks. This is about preserving communities,” Young said.
Councilmember Jamie Gauthier’s bill would enact similar rules for parts of University City, where higher education institutions are dominant, as part of a larger package of land-use regulations.
Builder and developer advocacy groups say the legislation is a potential new burden on a key economic sector that’s been flagging in recent years.
The Building Industry Association (BIA), the trade association for residential developers, cautioned that new regulations were especially unwelcome in a time of higher interest rates and high construction material prices, especially as Parker makes housing a centerpiece of her agenda.
“I’m not sure why Council would create more barriers for delivering new homes,” said Sarina Rose, president of the BIA and an executive with the Post Brothers development firm. “It’s a really bad time to do that. Unfortunately, some old buildings simply are not good fits for adaptive reuse.”
The BIA and its allies are backing legislation that would make it easier to demolish some older buildings for new construction.
Councilmember Mark Squilla introduced legislation the week before Thanksgiving that would weaken protections for structures nominated to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places.
At the same time, Parker promises to pursue legislation in the next year to prompt adaptive reuse or demolition of underused buildings by offering a 20-year property tax abatement.
Demolition policy in other cities
In a city as old as Philadelphia, razing buildings is often a fraught process.
Currently the only safeguards against demolition come with a successful nomination to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places, and in the handful of neighborhoods protected by conservation zoning overlays, property owners have to get building permits before demolition (a template for Gauthier and Young’s bills).
But given the city’s economic and demographic doldrums in the second half of the 20th century, municipal government enacted most of the demolitions of unsafe and abandoned buildings, usually in lower-income neighborhoods.
Mayor John F. Street’s Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, the centerpiece of his administration, spent half its $300 million (in George W. Bush-era dollars) on demolishing thousands of buildingsin the early 2000s.
That dynamic changed in the last decade, as low interest rates and a surge of new residents juiced real estate development to levels not seen in the city for generations. The private sector began to regularly outpace city government in demolition permits, as developers cleared the way for new projects.
Preservationists pushed back. Under Mayor Jim Kenney’s administration (2016-24), the movement demanded new policies such as a demolition review requirement. Before an applicable building could be razed, municipal authorities reviewed its historic merits and adaptive potential.
Similar policies of varying strength exist in cities from Santa Monica, Calif., to Chicago. In the latter case, it applies to buildings from before 1940 that were included in a citywide survey of historic places.
Demolition of New Light Beulah Baptist Church at 17th and Bainbridge Streets, a block below South Street.
During Kenney’s administration, a preservation task force called for a survey and demolition delay as in Chicago, but no elected officials championed the ideas.
Laws like the ones Gauthier and Young are proposing are less common but are used in municipalities like Spokane, Wash., and Pasadena, Calif. Similarregulationsexist for properties in Philadelphia’s conservation districts.
In Spokane, the regulations apply to buildings in the downtown core, those along commercial corridors and buildings on the National Register of Historic Places, which is more of an honorary designation that affords protections.
“You have to have that building permit in hand, plus you have to show us that you have the financial backing to build that replacement building,” said Megan Duvall, Spokane’s historic preservation officer. “If you also can’t show us that you have the construction loan in hand, we won’t allow you to demolish that building.”
Why City Council is acting now
The sudden renewal of interest in demolition policy began when St. Joseph’s University sold much of its West Philadelphia campus, acquired through a merger with University of the Sciences in 2022, to a charter school operator founded by student housing mogul Michael Karp.
After the sale, Gauthier proposed placing controls on the sprawling higher education footprint in her district.
As higher education comes under acute financial and demographic pressure, she fears that building sales by struggling universities could result in demolition and resale of newly vacant lots to developers without the wherewithal to complete projects or speculators with no desire to build quickly.
“The safety and quality-of-life in our neighborhoods should not be disrupted by incomplete or uncertain projects,” Gauthier said in a statement. “I believe requiring responsible development practices is a commonsense approach in today’s uncertain development market.”
Jeffery “Jay” Young outside Independence Hall.
Young’s bill covering much of North Philadelphia and parts of Center City followed the introduction of Gauthier’s legislation. Neither bill has been passed by City Council.
According to the Philadelphia Planning Commission, from January 2022 through November 2025 approximately 580 demolition permits were issued in Young’s district. The Department of Licenses and Inspections said that with a few tweaks, his proposed bill would be enforceable.
Young says his legislation was inspired by frequent calls from constituents who hate the vacant lots that dot their neighborhoods and are frustrated with promised development that never comes to fruition. Both bills exempt buildings in poor condition that are considered dangerous.
While welcoming this spate of demolition regulation, preservationists would prefer citywide policies, not district by district.
“These bills are important first steps, and this is the moment to build them into a modern, citywide framework consistent with approaches already used in several peer cities,” said RePoint, the preservation advocacy group that protested the mayor’s Market East announcement, in an unsigned statement.
Real estate industry backlash
At the same time, Philadelphia’s development industry is embarking on its own campaign to ease existing preservation rules and to push back against these new bills. Both Gauthier’s and Young’s bills have been critiqued by business groups and by the zoning lawyers who often represent developers.
“This is one-tenth of the city of Philadelphia, just based upon a political subdivision [that] changes every 10 years,” Matthew McClure, a prominent zoning attorney, said in testimony about Young’s bill before the Planning Commission. “It’s the exact opposite of planning.”
Groups including the Building Industry Association are backing a new bill from Squilla that the Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia fears will stoke more demolitions.
It would require a new 30- to 60-day window before a building nominated to the local register of historic places could be given protection, which critics believe will incentivize owners to tear down empty buildings quickly.
The mayor’s proposed 20-year property tax abatement proposal for adaptive reuse projects also allows room for demolition if buildings are considered unadaptable, which preservationists fear will bring back the wrecking ball-forward incentives of the city’s earlier abatement policies.
In the last week, groups like the Preservation Alliance have pivoted from thinking about new demolition regulations to playing defense.
“We’re still trying to wrap our heads around it all,” said Paul Steinke, the Preservation Alliance’s executive director. “It’s a lot to take in, and it’s happening after a decade or so of a building boom where we lost a chunk of the historic fabric.”
Center City was resilient this year, reporting slight increases in foot traffic and overall retail occupancy despite high-profile closures along Market Street.
About 84% of Center City storefronts were occupied as of October, up one percentage point from the same time last year, according to the Center City District’s annual survey of business owners. Occupancy has hovered around that point since at least 2023 and has yet to recover to its pre-pandemic level of 89% in 2019.
So far in 2025, an average of 343,540 people walked through Center City each day, an increase of more than 3% from last year, the survey found. Each section of Center City, from the beleaguered Market East to the thriving Rittenhouse Square area, saw at least a 1% bump in average daily foot traffic, according to the survey.
Some retail corridors, however, are looking more vibrant than others.
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Market Street continues to struggle on both sides of Broad Street.
As of October, the office-centric western side of Market had the lowest occupancy in Center City at 62%.
Market East, the future of which continues to be debated by city stakeholders, had a 72% occupancy rate. It has been impacted by a slew of recent closures, including Macy’s, Rite Aid, Iron Hill Brewery, and Giant Heirloom supermarket. The Center City District calculates occupancy rates by number of storefronts, not total square footage.
On Chestnut Street, the eastern and western sections have vastly different occupancies. The eastern side recorded a 71% occupancy rate in October, according to the survey, while 81% of stores on the western side were occupied.
Walnut Street continues to be the district’s shining star, with 86% occupancy in both the eastern and western sections, according to the survey. In the report, the Center City District highlighted several new additions, including the luxury women’s fashion company Aritzia and North America’s first Nike Jordan World of Flight store.
The report once again highlighted the success of the Open Streets program, during which roads are closed to car traffic and become pedestrian walkways for shopping and dining. There have been 21 Open Streets events since its inception in September 2024, with more planned for December and next year.
The events bring out more than 10,000 people on average, according to the report, and typically result in a 65% boost in businesses’ foot traffic and a 39% bump in sales volume.
An Open Streets in April. There have been 21 Open Streets events since its inception in September 2024, with more planned for December and next year.
Looking to the future, the district surveyed 700 Philadelphia renters to ask what types of retailers they’d like to see more of in Center City.
“Downtown residents seek convenient access to everyday goods, full-service grocery stores and home furnishing options — all within walking distance,” district executives wrote in the report, noting that these types of businesses could fill vacancies in office buildings or in the concourse around Suburban Station.
“CCD looks forward to convening office district stakeholders in 2026 to discuss a coordinated retail attraction strategy that could reposition the office district as a place to accommodate many of the retailers Center City is currently missing.”
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story included an incorrect comparison between 2025 and 2024 for occupancy on Market Street.
Philadelphia developers may soon benefit from a 20-year property tax abatement to convert large, underutilized properties into residences.
Buried among the litany of provisions in the state budget and fiscal code in Harrisburg, which both passed last week, new language was included that allows Philadelphia to exempt “improvements that convert deteriorated property into residential housing units” from property taxes for up to 20 years.
If a building is deemed too difficult to convert to housing, the new legal language will allow a developer to demolish a building and still get the abatement.
The legislation defines “deteriorated property” as “any industrial, commercial or other business property, or property previously used for government purposes, including a school” that is located in what the legislation calls “a deteriorating area.”
It isnow up to City Council and Parker’s administration to craft a local law within the confines of what the state government newly allows. According to state law, local officials must also define what geographic areas under their purview qualify as “a deteriorating area.” Council President Kenyatta Johnson says he supports the 20-year abatement.
The abatements would “ensure that there are no vacant office buildings here in the city, and …incentivize the building of affordable housing,” said Parker in an interview. “That’s where I think it’s going to matter the most.”
Shuttered schools and the Roundhouse
Currently, the city has a10-year abatement that applies to all residential properties for renovations — which includes conversions — and a half-strength abatement for new construction that begins with a 100% break on a project’s property taxes and then tapers by 10% annually over a 10-year period.
Parker said that her administration worked with State Sen. Vincent Hughes (D., Philadelphia), State Rep. Jordan Harris (D., Philadelphia), and State Sen. Joe Picozzi (R., Philadelphia) to get the new language into the contentious Harrisburg budget.
The administration is now working on crafting legislation to present to Council early next year. She sees it as a crucial incentive in her H.O.M.E. effort to build or preserve 30,000 units of housing.
Parker emphasized that while the new legislation is meant to help solve the office market crisis in Center City, she is most excited for it to be applied to shuttered public schools and other large, underused buildings in outlying neighborhoods.
“We have a menu of options, and this tool, this puts our efforts on steroids to build affordable housing in the city of Philadelphia,” Parker said. It is a “public good [that is] underproduced and has to be incentivized, and not just in Center City.”
Lewis Rosman, the city’s chief deputy solicitor, pointed to the architecturally unique former police headquarters known as the Roundhouse as a property that could possibly benefit from the 20-year abatement as a way to demolish the existing structure and build a new one.
“If you have a property like the Roundhouse that you can’t directly turn into housing, you got to take it down,” said Rosman, who helped write the statelegislation. “It will be a new development, but presumably under enabling legislation from Council that will be implemented, it would be subject to the abatement.”
Impact on affordable housing?
Real estate groups in the city hailed the new legislation out of Harrisburg as a tool to fight blight and reactivate historic buildings.
“For years, [we have] advocated for tools that make it possible to convert blighted, deteriorated properties into vibrant residential communities, and this expanded abatement authority does exactly that,” said Sarah Maginnis, executive director of the Commercial Real Estate Development Association’s (NAIOP) Philadelphia chapter.
Mayor Parker said she plans to include provisions in thecity’s abatement legislation to support affordable homes.
“This is not a blanket windfall for billionaires,” Parker said.
Councilmember Jamie Gauthier, who chairs City Council’s housing committeeand has been a champion of affordable housing, said she also supported the concept of a 20-year property tax abatement for residential conversion with the proviso that the city requiresome housing for lower-income residents in exchange for the tax incentive.
“Construction costs are really high right now, and we need more housing, so I’m not against an abatement that would generate more housing,” said Gauthier. “At the same time, if we’re going to incentivize developers through a vehicle like this, it needs to have an affordability component.”
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker speaking at a press conference on the future of Market East earlier this month. Jessie Lawrence, Philadelphia director of planning and development, is pictured left.
But developers with expertise in residential conversions warned against adding additional requirements, saying that the incentive is not generous enough to support below-market-rate rents.
“A 20-year abatement without any strings attached will make a difference in Philadelphia,” said Leo Addimando, managing partner with Alterra Property Group, which has successfully executed many office-to-residential conversions in the city. “But if you attach any strings to it, you neuter it.”
Addimando said a 20-year tax abatement could make some conversion projects viable by allowing developers to qualify for better financing, lowering their borrowing costs. But he argues those cost savings are not enough to pay for housing that would be affordable to low-income renters.
Addimando said the subsidy could probably allow fordevelopers to create lower-priced units for households who earn 120% to 80% of area median income — less than $123,000 to $85,000 for a family of three — but he assumed city policy would want to help lower-income families.
At the King of Prussia Mall, you can add some slime (the fun kind) to your holiday shopping experience this year.
Fresh off the opening of the first-ever Netflix House, the Montgomery County mall this week welcomed the Sloomoo Institute’s first Philly-area location. The sensory slime experience’s latest outpost is called a Sloomoo MiniMoo, and it’s a scaled-down, 3,000-square-foot version of its flagship stores.
For between $24 and $26 a person, King of Prussia Sloomoo customers can design their own slime, choosing from different textures, colors, scents, and charms. They can also smush slime onto the wall, send it flying through the air with a slingshot, go elbow-deep in vats of slime, and take slime-making classes.
Guests can also browse slime toys and other squishy, sensory gifts at the Sloomoo retail store, no ticket required.
“King of Prussia is a playground for families,” cofounder Sara Schiller said in a statement, “and we’re bringing a world of slime designed to spark curiosity and pure, unfiltered joy.”
Customers play with slime at another Sloomoo Institute location. The King of Prussia Mall opened a Sloomoo MiniMoo experience this week.
They opened their first location in New York in 2019, went viral on TikTok during the pandemic, and then expanded nationwide, opening outposts in Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, and Los Angeles. A Sloomoo MiniMoo also recently opened in Boston.
Earlier this year, the founders told CNBC that Sloomoo brings in as much as $4.3 million a month in revenue from ticket sales alone.
A look inside the King of Prussia Mall’s Sloomoo MiniMoo experience, which opened this week ahead of Black Friday and the holiday shopping season.
At King of Prussia, Sloomoo MiniMoo welcomed its first customers last weekend, but it will celebrate its grand opening this Saturday, when the first 200 ticketed customers will receive a complimentary hot chocolate and “limited-edition Philly Cheesesteak-themed slime,” according to company officials. The first 100 guests on Saturday will get a bag charm.
Aside from Sloomoo, the mall has welcomed several other new stores, restaurants, and interactive experiences since August. A few retailers, including Lululemon, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Mejuri, have also expanded or relocated.
As holiday shopping season kicks into high gear, customers can check out the following new additions:
Shoppers sit with their bags at the King of Prussia Mall on Black Friday 2022.
If you’re doing holiday shopping later in the season, or taking a trip to the mall between Christmas and New Year’s, you might be able to visit the following stores. All of them are set to open their first Philadelphia-area locations this December:
In early 2026, Adidas and Columbia Sportswear are set to open stores in the King of Prussia Mall. Exact locations for those stores have yet to be announced.
The mall’s current owner, PREIT, plans to sell the property to LA Partners, previously known as Lubert Adler Real Estate Funds, PREIT leadership confirmed Thursday, noting that the sale is still pending. PREIT did not disclose the price of the sale.
PREIT, which is based in Philadelphia, also sold the Exton Square Mall to Abrams Realty & Development in March. PREIT also owns the Cherry Hill and Moorestown Malls.
PREIT CEO Jared Chupaila said in a statement that the sale reflects the company’s “commitment to disciplined balance sheet management and liquidity generation.”
“We believe LA Partners is uniquely positioned to build on the multipurpose hub we have laid the groundwork for, which has long served as a central part of Plymouth Township and the surrounding communities,” said Chupaila.
PREIT has faced financial challenges in recent years. The business has filed for bankruptcy twice since 2020, and most recently emerged from bankruptcy as a private company in 2024 helmed by a group of investment firms.
The Plymouth Meeting Mall, for its part, has tried to undergo a makeover in the last few years, following the 2017 closure of its anchor, a215,000 square-foot Macy’s. Amid PREIT’s plans to “diversify the tenant mix” at the mall, nearly half the tenants there were either dining or entertainment businesses in 2018.
Lubert Adler’s other properties include the Bellevue in Center City, which recently underwent extensive renovations, and the Battery, a former power plant in Fishtown redeveloped into a multipurpose complex.
A spokesperson for LA Partners did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.
Peter Abrams, managing partner for Elkins Park-based Abrams Realty & Development, said the Plymouth Meeting Mall site “is the best-located large parcel of real estate in the Delaware Valley.”
“There’s a lot of dead and dying malls in this country, and some of us, like myself and Dean Adler, understand the opportunity and aren’t afraid of the challenges, which are many,” said Abrams, who is behind proposed development plans at the Exton Square Mall.
Boscov’s at Plymouth Meeting Mall on June 6, 2020.
Consumers had already been shifting toward e-commerce before the pandemic. But as COVID forced nationwide shutdowns in 2020, some of PREIT’s tenants were forced to close, couldn’t pay rent, or didn’t want to, intensifying issues for the mall owner.
Prior to the pandemic, PREIT sold off malls and tried to transform others by adding supermarkets, movie theaters, and apartments.
Through the most recent bankruptcy process, PREIT shed $800 million in debt and gave up its stake in the Fashion District in Center City. When it emerged from bankruptcy last year, PREIT owned 13 malls across Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia.
It’s a time of struggle and transition for many malls across the country, including several in the region that havesurvived beyond their heyday. In the Philadelphia suburbs, plans are in the works to redevelop mall sites including the Exton Square Mall and the former Echelon Mall in Voorhees.
Officials for the Bellwether District say they are in “late-stage negotiations” with potential tenants to occupy the first of many buildings planned for the 1,300-acre former refinery site in South and Southwest Philadelphia.
However, Amelia Chassé Alcivar, a spokesperson for HRP Group,the site’s owner, said during an update on the project Tuesday that she would not comment on potential tenants.
She was responding to a question from environmental advocate Mitch Chanin about whether a data center is a possible use on the site of the Philadelphia Energy Solutions (PES) refinery that closed in 2019 after an explosion and fire.
“I want to emphasize that no official announcements have been made at this time, so I cannot confirm … I cannot deny,” she said, adding that, “I would just generally preach caution if you’re reading anything in the press that is not confirmed by us on the record or by the company on the record.”
Chassé Alcivar said that there are no plans to build a traditional power plant on site.
A recent BillyPenn article cited a union official who said a cogeneration plant is being discussed for the site. Cogeneration is considered a nontraditional technology that simultaneously, and efficiently, produces heat and electricity on site.
Chassé Alcivar said solar installations are being planned for at least some of the six million square feet of rooftops the development will have when fully built out over several phases in years to come.
“I will share with this group that we are in late-stage negotiations with several prospective tenants,” she said.
What’s the Bellwether District?
HRP, which was spun off from its parent company, Hilco, is building two massive commercial campuses on the site of the former refinery.
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It plans about 14 buildings for a 750-acreindustrial campus with the potential for 10,500 jobs.
And it plans a series of smaller buildings on a 250-acre innovation campus, originally slated to house mostly life sciences companies, with the potential for 8,500 jobs. The buildings are being designed for uses such as bio-manufacturing, processing, production, and tech.
In all, HRP plans for about 14 million square feet of buildings across the two campuses.
The ground of the sprawling site was tainted by 150 years of petroleum-related uses. As a result, it is undergoing a complex environmental remediation.
Sunoco is responsible for contamination up to 2012. HRP is responsible for contamination after that. The two companies are coordinating cleanup with the state Department of Environmental Protection.
Remediation is expected to be ongoing for years. Some of the soil will be capped by buildings and parking lots. Barriers are being installed to prevent vapors from volatile organic compounds in the ground from penetrating work areas in the buildings.
What’s complete and what’s coming
HRP says it will invest more than $4 billion into the redevelopment.
So far, HRP has completed a 326,000-square-foot class A warehouse on its 750-acre industrial campus with poured concrete floors and structural steel column supports off 26th Street.
It is finishing a second, 727,000-square-foot warehouse adjacent to the first with a planned boulevard leading into the campus for a total of little more than 1 million square feet.
Last month, Bellwether applied for a permit for a 1.4-million-square-foot building titled DrinkPAK warehouse. California-based DrinkPAK is a large manufacturer of alcoholic and non-alcoholic canned beverages.
DrinkPAK’s website lists two existing facilities: The first in Santa Clarita, Calif., and a second scheduled to open this year in Fort Worth, Texas. A map shows a third facility projected to open in 2027 in the Northeast with a marker showing an area in Southeastern Pennsylvania.
Chassé Alcivar did not comment on that project during the meeting.
Other updates:
HRP said it is planning to widen the intersection of 26th Street and Penrose Avenue from three lanes to five. The intersection will have two left turn lanes, one straight lane, and then two dedicated right turn lanes. And a new boulevard entrance at 26th and Hartranft Streetsis being created, featuring roughly seven lanes in and out.
The company plans to plant 10,000 trees, bring buildings up to LEED standards, and to be solar ready. LEED certification is a system developed by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) to verify a building’s sustainable design, construction, operation, and maintenance.
Weekly readings of a benzene monitor are being taken as part of the THRIVEair Community Air Monitoring Project (CAMP) in Southand Southwest Philadelphia. THRIVEair is a partnership between Drexel University and Philly Thrive, a local environmental justice organization.
HRP has launched a new driver education pilot program for students enrolled in construction and automotive career and technical education programs. Lack of a driver’s license has been cited as a barrier of entry to jobs.
An affordable housing project slated for a junkyard in Cedar Park took a step forward Wednesday, when a Philadelphia judge rejected a neighbor’s challenge. The courtroom victory brings the 104-unit, two-building project, which was conceived in 2020, closer toreality.
Common Pleas Court Judge Idee Fox ruled that the new zoning of a triangular group of parcels on Warrington Avenue, which allows for buildings up to seven stories, was legal.
Melissa Johanningsmeier, who lives next to the planned development, sued the city to stop the project in 2023, arguing that the building was inconsistent with the city’s goal of preserving single-family homes in Cedar Park.
Johanningsmeier said in court filings she would be harmed by the parking, traffic, and loss of green space if the project were to proceed.
The homeowner told Fox during a two-day October bench trial that there was widespread discontent with the project in the neighborhood.
The judge seemed skeptical, as Johanningsmeier’s attorney didn’t provide witnesses or evidence to support claims ofwidespread backlash to the project that has been promoted by City Councilmember Jamie Gauthier.
It was not for her to decide whether the project was the best idea, Fox said, but whether the zoning was constitutional.
“If the community is unhappy with what’s being done, they have the right to express their concerns to the councilwoman at the ballot box,” Fox said.
Junkyard controversy
The project dates to 2020, when New York affordable housing developer Omni formulated plans to add 174 reasonably priced apartments to the West Philadelphia neighborhood.
But the developer’s plans for the junkyard at 50th and Warrington met opposition due to theproposed buildings’ height — six stories — and parking spaces for less than a third of the units.
Omni’s plan required permission from the Zoning Board of Adjustment to move forward, which was more likely to succeed with neighborhood support. So they compromised.
A new design unveiled in 2021 pushed the buildings back to the edge of the site,to avoid putting neighboring homes in shadow. A surface parking lot would offer 100 spaces for the 104 affordable apartments.
These concessions appeased almost all of the critical neighbors and community groups.Many of them supported Omni before the Zoning Board of Adjustment, which granted the project permission to move forward.
But Johanningsmeier remained a critic. She lives on the border of the property and challenged the zoning board’s ruling in Common Pleas Court. Judge Anne Marie Coyle ruled in her favor, arguing the new building “would unequivocally tower over the surrounding family homes.”
In the aftermath, Gauthier passed a bill to allow the project to move forward without permission from the zoning board. Johanningsmeier then sued over that legislation as well.
Councilmember Jamie Gauthier in City Council in 2024.
Affordable housing and fruit analogies
The issue at the heart of the case was whether a zoning change to allow for large multifamily buildings was considered spot zoning on the small parcel, which Johanningsmeier’s lawyer argued was inconsistent with the types on buildings on surrounding properties.
Just because the “mega apartment buildings” are for residential use doesn’t make the project similar to the surrounding zoning, which mostly allows single-family homes and duplexes, Edward Hayes, a Fox Rothschild attorney representing Johanningsmeier, toldJudgeFox on Wednesday.
“A cranberry and a watermelon are fruit,” Hayes said. “They are not the same.”
And while affordable housing is a laudable cause, the attorney said, that doesn’t mean that the city should “shove it down the throat of a community” in the form of large buildings that are out of character with the rest of the neighborhood.
An attorney representing the developer, Evan Lechtman of Blank Rome, told the judge existing buildings of similar height are nearby, across the railroad track in Kingsessing.
“We are transforming a blighted, dilapidated junkyard into affordable housing,” the developer’s attorney said.
Johanningsmeier’s lawyer, Hayes, declined to comment after the ruling, which could be appealed.
Gauthier celebrated the outcome as a victory against gentrification.
“Lower-income neighbors belong in amenity-rich communities like this one, where they can easily access jobs, healthcare, groceries, and other necessities,” said Gauthier. ”I hope the court’s ruling puts an end to gratuitous delays.”
Housing advocates note that the years of neighborhood meetings and lawsuits over the project are an example of why housing, and especially affordable units, has become so expensive to build in the United States.
In the face of determined opposition from even a single foe, projects can incur millions in additional costs.
“It’s a travesty that one deep-pocketed opponent has been able to block access to housing for over 100 families in my neighborhood for years,” said Will Tung, a neighbor of the project and a volunteer with the urbanist advocacy group 5th Square. “It’s more expensive than ever to rent or buy here, and this project would be a welcome change to its current use as a derelict warehouse.”
When a Marriott representative visited the construction site of the W Philadelphia hotel in Center City in January 2019, months after the project should have been completed, the concrete floors were so uneven that a pen placed on the ground rolled downhill.
The construction of Philadelphia’s largest hotel, home of the W and the Element, both part of the Marriott umbrella, began in 2015 and had a strict 2018 deadline for completion. Delays led to an avalanche of nearly 30 lawsuits with the site’s owner, construction contractor, and design company pointing fingers at each other.
The W, which comprises 295 rooms of the 51-story building, eventually opened in 2021, roughly three years late.
Bringing to a close 25 of the lawsuits, a Philadelphia judge issued a 69-page memo last weeklaying out the saga and finding the construction company responsible for the project going “off the rails.”
Common Pleas Court Judge James Crumlishfound that the construction contractor, Tutor Perini Building Corp., subcontracted the concrete work to a company that botched the job. And despite knowing about the problems, which were detrimental to the entire project, Tutor denied the issues for months.
The judge’s finding comes after trial testimonies that took five months as the parties “turned this litigation into a challenging behemoth that made any effort at resolution impossible,” Crumlish wrote.
A yearslong saga
The saga began when Chestlen Development LP, the owner of the site, picked Tutor as the construction manager. The agreement capped the cost of construction at $239 million and required completion within 1,017 days after April 2015.
An attorney for Tutor did not respond to a request for comment.
From the outset, Tutor suffered “chronic turnover of its personnel,” the judge wrote, resulting in the loss of “institutional knowledge of key decisions.”
Tutored subcontracted the concrete work to Thomas P. Carney Inc. Construction, a Bucks County company.
When a different subcontractor, Ventana DBS LLC, began installing the wall-window systems, they immediately noticed a “big problem,” according to the judge’s memo. In many places the concrete wasn’t level or did not meet the elevation requirements in the design.
Tutor pushed back, denying that there was a problem, while quietly attempting to grind the edges of the concrete slabs to address the issue.
While denying the problem, Tutor hired outside advisers to evaluate the concrete work. But they confirmed the problem too.
Finally, in March 2018, Tutor shared the outside reports that acknowledgedCarney’s shoddyconcrete work with Chestlen’s representative for the project.
As summer 2018 began, it was clear that the project would not be completed on deadline.
In September 2018 Tutor asked Chestlen for an extension, which the owner rejected, saying the request came “months if not years after some of the concrete issues started to become apparent,” according to Crumlish’s memo.
The remediation of the floor began in April 2019 andwas completed in October.
The sidewalk area of W Philadelphia and Element Philadelphia Hotel under construction, looking northwest along the 1400 block of Chestnut Street July 2, 2019.
The building finally obtained a certificate of occupancy in April 2021. But Marriott couldn’t open the W until August because over a hundred window vents were inoperable because Tutor failed to follow the design.
“Tutor knew that the floors did not meet specifications but did not timely disclose its knowledge to Chestlen or consult with it,” Crumlish wrote. The judge further found that Tutor refused to work with contractors to remediate the problems in 2017 and 2018, and proceeded to install interiors over the deficient concrete floors.
The blame game
Throughout the litigation, the parties all blamed one another for various problems and aspects of the delay.
Costs and liens piled up.
Chestlen paid Tutor $239 million for the construction, accrued over $40 million in damages as set in its contract with Tutor, and paid tens of millions to remediate the floors. The property is “clouded with over $155 million in liens,” according to the judge’s memo.
Crumlish concluded that Tutor breached its contract when it failed to oversee the concrete work and the window-wall installation, and generally didn’t fulfill its obligations.
“Every delay in the performance and completion of the project is the responsibility of Tutor and Carney,” the judge said. The judge will decide on the amount of damages following hearings scheduled for January.
Chestlen’s attorney was unavailable to provide comment. Carney did not respond to a request for comment.
The W hotel is located where One Meridian Plaza used to be, before that building suffered a devastating fire in 1991 and was finally demolished in 1999.
Filling the vacant lot, a mere block from City Hall, became a top priority for policymakers during Mayor Michael Nutter’s time in office. The hotel proposal eventually received $75 million in taxpayer support across local, state, and federal funding sources in addition to other legislative assistance.
The project was developed by Brook Lenfest, son of the former Inquirer owner H.F. “Gerry” Lenfest, whose foundation continues to own the newspaper today.
The Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA) is planning sweeping layoffs that will affect almost 300 of the agency’s 1,200 employees, beginning in January 2026.
The cutbacks are the result of dramatic changes in how PHA, which provides affordable housing to thousands of families across the city, does maintenance and repair work. Instead of directly employing union electricians, carpenters, and other workers, beginning next year, the agency will contract out for those jobs as needed.
“This is a housing program, it is not a jobs program,” said Kelvin Jeremiah, the president and CEO of PHA, in an interview.
“Do I use the resources that we have to protect residents, to advance the availability of affordable housing to the families that are most in need? Or do I use those limited resources to fund positions that I don’t need?” Jeremiah said.
There are 620 members of the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council employed full-time by the agency as maintenance staff. Jeremiah estimates that by almost halving that number PHA will see a cost savings of $24 million annually.
The agency said it currently costs $15,500 to maintain a single unit of traditional public housing annually, due to the agency’s complex work rules, which require many different union workers to make repairs. Most other multifamily providers have dramatically lower per-unit maintenance costs.
“PHA has engaged the unions throughout this process and can proceed with this policy decision without additional approvals,” an agency spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
Although in-house building trades workers will constitute the majority of lost jobs, other positions will also be affected, including 33 managerial roles in PHA headquarters. Overall, PHA’s workforce will shrink by about 20%.
“We are going to talk and try to offer some alternatives, but this is an issue of price sensitivity and we have to understand, given the new environment, that there are less funds to do the same mission with,” said Ryan Boyer, business manager for the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council, whose unions represent many of the affected workers.
The Philadelphia Housing Authority Headquarters is planning sweeping layoffs that will affect almost 300 of the agency’s 1,200 employees, beginning in January 2026 in Philadelphia, on Wednesday, Nov. 19, 2025.
More with less?
The cutbacks come amid an aggressive $6.3 billion plan unveiled earlier this year, through which the agency hopes to expand its housing portfolio by 7,000 units while rehabbing the 13,000 units it already owns.
Jeremiah said that the staff reduction should not be seen as PHA doing more with less, and that it will not limit the agency’s ability to execute his planned expansion.
“We will not be doing less than what we’re doing now, but we have been doing too little with too much,” Jeremiah said. He said other market-rate and affordable housing multifamily operators are able to do unit repairs for far less than what PHA pays.
“My colleagues have all been doing this at substantially less cost,” Jeremiah said. “The only difference between us is that they have an operating model that does not require six different trades to do a single thing.”
Kelvin A. Jeremiah, PHA President & Chief Executive Officer, at PHA headquarters, in Philadelphia, May 21, 2025.
Because PHA’s layoffs will affect hundreds of members of Philadelphia’s influential building trades unions,Jeremiah said, he has been negotiating with Boyer on the work-rule changes.
“My reaction is one of disappointment. However, we remain partners with PHA and we will still build most of the stuff on the capital side,” Boyer said. “I don’t want it to be lost that when they build stuff, they will still be members of the Philadelphia building trades working, and there will still be members doing maintenance work.”
Jeremiah said maintenance technicians, laborers, and painters will be the only trades that remain directly employed with the agency after the work-rule changes go into effect.
The electricians union, IBEW Local 98, said it is still studying PHA’s new policy.
PHA will also still work with the trades for discrete repair and maintenance jobs within the agency’s housing portfolio but will no longer directly employ as many workers full-time, Jeremiah said.
The Trump effect?
PHA’s layoffs, and its expansion plan, are unfolding during a period of uncertaintynationwide for affordable housing policies and organizations like PHA.
Nearly all of PHA’s funding — 93% — comes from the federal government, according to the agency.
“If Congress and the administration coughs, it impacts us,” Jeremiah said. “If there is a reduction [in funding], it impacts us.”
Jeremiah said he is seeking to operate within the mandates set by Trump’s administration while continuing to support PHA’s tenant base and plans.
“Subsidizing employment … is just not the way to go at a time when we’re looking at less funding on the horizon,” Jeremiah said. “Where am I to get the funds not only to do more developments, acquire more, and preserve what we have at the same time[that] we have a workforce that is, quite frankly, I will dare to use the word bloated?”
Waves of layoffs
Despite the layoffs, Jeremiah believes the agency will still be a rich source of jobs for the building trades unions as the $6.3 billion plan unfolds. He points to an analysis of PHA’s 10-year plan byeconomic consulting firm Econsult Solutions, which said it would create 4,900 jobsannually in the city.
The first round of 260 job losses will hit in mid-January 2026, although Jeremiah says 93 of those workers will be retained in new positions as maintenance aides, laborers, and painters. A further 116-position reduction will occur next summer.
A vice president of development, Greg Hampson, also recently left PHA, although the agency declined to comment on that case. Jeremiah said that several vice president and director-level positions will be among the coming layoffs.
The last major round of layoffs at PHA was in 2016, when 14% of the staff was cut. Those positions were mostly administrative roles.
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story misstated the number of employees impacted.
