Sheetz’s encroachment into Wawa territory has an official ETA.
The Altoona-based convenience store chain is set to open its first Philadelphia-area store on Feb. 12 in Limerick Township, Montgomery County, according to Sheetz public affairs manager Nick Ruffner.
It will be located at 454 W. Ridge Pike, across the street from an existing Wawa.
Sheetz presented its site plans to Limerick’s board of supervisors about a year ago. The area was already zoned for this type of development, officials said at the time, and no other township permits were required.
“As Sheetz continues its expansion into communities near its existing footprint, we remain committed to being the best neighbor we can be and delivering the convenience, quality, and service Pennsylvania communities have come to expect from us for more than 70 years,” Ruffner said in a statement.
A Sheetz convenience store and gas station near Carlisle, Pa. in 2020.
For decades, Sheetz opened its convenience-store gas stations in the western and central parts of the Commonwealth, while Wawa added locations in communities near its Delaware County headquarters.
Over the years, both companies expanded into other states: Wawa has more than 1,100 locations in 13 states and Washington, D.C., while Sheetz has more than 800 stores in seven states.
In 2024, Wawa moved into Dauphin County, just 0.3 miles down the road from a Sheetz.
By this October, Wawa announced it had opened its 10th central Pennsylvania store. At the time, the company said in a news release that it planned to add five to seven new locations in the region each year for the next five years — to “reach new Pennsylvania markets along the Susquehanna River.”
For awhile, Sheetz, shown here in Bethlehem, Pa. in 2018, and Wawa expanded in different parts of the state, never overlapping into the other’s territory. That’s changed.
This fall, Sheetz presented Caln Township officials with a sketch plan for a store on the site of a former Rite Aid on the 3800 block of Lincoln Highway in Thorndale, according to the township website.
Sheetz’s namesake, Stephen G. Sheetz, died Sunday due to complications from pneumonia. The former president, CEO, and board chairman was 77.
“Above all, Uncle Steve was the center of our family,” Sheetz president and CEO Travis Sheetz said in a statement. “We are so deeply grateful for his leadership, vision, and steadfast commitment to our employees, customers, and communities.”
Way back in 2022, when Philadelphians gathered on an abandoned pier to watch a man eat a rotisserie chicken, folks on social media began to wonder: “Is Philadelphia a real place?”
Sure, that perception has a lot to do with an unbelievable event that actually happened in the suburbs (Delco never fails to carry its weight), but Philly also saw its fair share of the bizarre this year, too.
As we prepare for what may be one of the most important (and hopefully weirdest!) years in modern Philadelphia history, let’s take some time to look back on the peculiar stories from across the region that punctuated 2025.
Five uh-oh
Kevon Darden was sworn in as a part-time police officer for Collingdale Borough on Jan. 12 and hit the ground running, landing his first arrest just four days later.
The only problem? It was his own.
Pennsylvania State Police charged Darden with terroristic threats and related offenses for an alleged road rage incident in 2023 in which he’s accused of pointing a gun at a driver on the Blue Route in Ridley Township. At the time of the alleged incident Darden was employed as an officer at Cheyney University.
A Pennsylvania State Police vehicle. The agency provided two clean background checks for a Collingdale police officer this year, only to arrest him four days after he started the job.
Here’s the thing — it was state police who provided not one but two clean background checks on Darden to Collingdale officials before he was hired. An agency spokesperson told The Inquirer troopers had to wait on forensic evidence tests and approval from the District Attorney’s Office before filing charges.
Darden subsequently resigned and is scheduled for trial next year in Delaware County Court.
For the Birds
The Eagles’ second Super Bowl win provided a wellspring of wacky — and sometimes dicey — moments on and off the field early this year.
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker started the championship run off strong by going viral for misspelling the most popular chant in the city as “E-L-G-S-E-S” during a news conference. Her mistake made the rounds on late night talk shows and was plastered onto T-shirts, beer coozies, and even a license plate. If you think the National Spelling Bee is brutal, you’ve never met Eagles fans.
Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts at the line of scrimmage during the fourth quarter of the NFC divisional playoff at Lincoln Financial Field on Jan. 19. The Philadelphia Eagles defeated the Los Angeles Rams 28 to 22.
Then there was the snowy NFC divisional playoff game against the Los Angeles Rams at Lincoln Financial Field; continued drama around the Tush Push (which resulted in Dude Wipes becoming an official sponsor of the team); and Cooper DeJean’s pick-six, a gift to himself and us on his 22nd birthday that helped the Birds trounce the Kansas City Chiefs 40-22 in Super Bowl LIX.
As soon as the Eagles won with Jalen Hurts as MVP, Philadelphians let loose, flooding the streets like a drunken green tsunami. Fans scaled poles and tore them down; danced on bus shelters, medic units, and trash trucks; partied with Big Foot, Ben Franklin, and Philly Elmo; and set a bonfire in the middle of Market Street.
Eagles fans party on trash trucks in the streets of Center City after the Birds win in Super Bowl LIX against the Chiefs on Feb. 9.
Finally, there was the parade, a Valentine’s Day love letter to the Eagles from Philadelphia. Among the more memorable moments was when Birds general manager Howie Roseman was hit in the head with a can of beer thrown from the crowd. He took his battle scar in pride, proclaiming from the steps of the Philadelphia Art Museum: “I bleed for this city.”
As we say around here, love Hurts.
Throngs of Birds fans lined the Benjamin Franklin Parkway for the Eagles Super Bowl Parade on Feb. 14.
A $40 million goodbye
As far as inanimate objects go, few have experienced more drama in recent Philly history than the SS United States, the 73-year-old, 990-foot luxury liner that was docked for nearly three decades on the Delaware River waterfront.
Supporters spent more than $40 million on rent, insurance, and other measures to keep the ship in Philly with the hopes of returning it to service or at least turning it into a venue. But a rent dispute with the owners of the pier finally led a judge to order the SS United States Conservancy, which owned the vessel, to seek an alternate solution.
Workers on the Walt Whitman Bridge watch from above as the SS United States is pulled by tug boats on the Delaware River.
And so in February, with the help of five tugboats, the ship was hauled out of Philly to prepare it to become the world’s largest artificial reef off the coast of Okaloosa County, Fla.
If the United States has to end somewhere, Florida feels like an apt place.
The ‘Delco Pooper’
While the Eagles’ Tush Push was deemed legal by NFL owners this year, a Delaware County motorist found that another kind of tush push most definitely is not after she was arrested for rage pooping on the hood of a car during a roadway dispute in April.
Captured on video by a teen who witnessed the rear-ending, the incident quickly went viral and put a stain on Delco that won’t be wiped away anytime soon.
Christina Solometo, who was dubbed the “Delco Pooper” on social media, told Prospect Park Police she got into a dispute with another driver, whom she believed began following her. Solometo claimed when she got out of her car the other driver insulted her and so she decided to dump her frustrations on their hood.
A private security guard holds the door open for alleged “Delco Pooper” Christina Solometo following her preliminary hearing Monday at Prospect Park District Court.
“Solometo said, ‘I wanted to punch her in the face, but I pooped on her car instead and went home,’” according to the affidavit.
I’ve written a lot of stories about Delco in my time, but this may be the most absurd.
Hopefully, she won’t be clogging up the court system anymore.
The Delco pope
Delco is large, it contains multitudes, and never was that more clear than when two weeks after the Delco Pooper case broke, a Delco pope was elected.
OK, so Pope Leo XIV is technically a native of Chicago, but he attended undergrad at Villanova University — which, yes, technically straddles Delco and Montgomery County — but Delco’s had a tough year so I’m gonna give it this one.
This video screen grab shows Pope Leo XIV wearing a Villanova University hat gifted to him during a meeting with an Italian heritage group.
Born Robert Prevost, Pope Leo is the first U.S. pope in history and also a citizen of Peru. He earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Villanova in 1977 and an honorary doctor of humanities from the university in 2014.
Center City Sips, the Wednesday Center City happy hour program, long ago earned a reputation as a rite of passage for 20-somethings who are still figuring out how to limit their intake and want to do so in business casual attire.
Things seemed to calm down after the pandemic, but then Philadelphians took Sips to another level and a whole new place this year — the streets.
Videos showed hundreds of people partying in the streets of Midtown Village on Wednesday nights this summer. Granted, the parties look far more calm than when sports fans take over Philly after a big win, but the nearby bar owners who participate in the Sips program said their places sat empty as people brought their own alcohol to drink.
Jason Evenchik, who owns Time, Vintage, Garage, and other bars, told The Inquirer that “No one is inside, and it’s mayhem outside.”
“Instead, he claimed, people are selling alcohol out of their cars and bringing coolers to make their own cocktails. At one point on June 11,Evenchik said, a Tesla blocked a crosswalk while a man made piña coladas with a pair of blenders hooked up to the car,” my colleague Beatrice Forman wrote.
In no way am I condoning this behavior, but those two sentences above may be my among favorite this year. Who thinks to bring a blender — with a car hookup — to make piña coladas at an unauthorized Center City street party on a Wednesday night?
Philly.
Getting trashed
Philadelphians experienced a major city workers strike this summer when Mayor Cherelle L. Parker and AFSCME District Council 33 couldn’t agree on a new contract for the union’s nearly 9,000 members.
Residents with trash arrive at garbage dump site at Caldera Road and Red Lion Road in northeast Philadelphia during the AFSCME District Council 33 workers strike in July.
As a result, things got weird. Dead bodies piled up at the Medical Examiner’s Office; a striking union member was arrested for allegedly slashing the tires of a PGW vehicle; and for eight days in the July heat, garbage heaped up all across Philadelphia. The city set up temporary trash drop-off sites, which often overflowed into what were nicknamed “Parker piles,” but that also set off a firestorm about whether using the sites constituted crossing a picket line.
Wawa Welcome America July Fourth concert headliners LL Cool J and Jazmine Sullivan even pulled out of the show in support of striking workers, resulting in a fantastic “Labor Loves Cool J” meme.
It was all like something out of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. In fact, the gang predicted a trash strike in the 2012 episode “The Gang Recycles Their Trash.”
The real strike lasted eight days before a contract was reached. In true Philly form, AFSCME District Council 33 president Greg Boulware told The Inquirer “nobody’s happy.”
A large pile of trash collects at a city drop-off site during the AFSCME workers strike this summer.
97-year-old gives birth to 16 kids
A local nonagenarian couple became national shellebrities this year for welcoming seven babies in April and nine more in August, proving that age ain’t nothing but a number, as long as you’re a tortoise.
Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoise Mommy, and male Abrazzo, left, are shown on Wednesday, April 23, 2025, at the Philadelphia Zoo in Philadelphia, Pa. The hatchlings’ parents, female Mommy and male Abrazzo, are the Zoo’s two oldest animals, each estimated to be around 100 years old.
Mommy and Abrazzo, Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoises who reside at the Philadelphia Zoo, made history with their two clutches, becoming the first pair of the critically endangered species in the zoo’s 150-year history to hatch eggs and the first to do so in any accredited zoo since 2019.
Mommy is also the oldest known first-time Galapagos tortoise mom in the world, so it’s safe to say she doesn’t have any time or patience for shenanigans. She’s got 16 heroes in a half shell to raise.
Western Santa Cruz Galapagos tortoise egg hatchling.
Phillies Karen
Taking candy from a baby is one thing — babies don’t need candy anyway — but taking a baseball from a kid at a Phillies game is a deed so foul and off base it’s almost unimaginable.
And yet, that’s exactly what happened at a Phillies-Marlins game in September, when a home run from Harrison Bader landed in the stands and a dad ran from his seat to grab it and give it to his son. A woman who was sitting near where the ball landed marched over to the dad, berated him, and demanded the ball be given her. Taken aback, the father reached into his son’s baseball glove and turned the ball over.
The entire scene was caught on camera and the woman, with her Kate Gosselin-esque hairdo, was immediately dubbed “Phillies Karen” by flabbergasted fans.
While the act technically happened at the Marlins stadium in Miami, Fla., it captured the minds and memes of Philadelphians so much that it deserves inclusion on this list. Phillies Karen has made her way onto T-shirts and coffee mugs, inspired skits at a Savannah Bananas game and the MLB Awards, and she even became a popular Halloween costume.
To this day, “Phillies Karen” remains unidentified, so it’s a safe bet she lives in Florida, where she’ll have better luck with alligators than with people here.
Institutional intrigue
Drama at area institutions this year had Philadelphians sipping tea like we were moms on Christmas morning, and sometimes, left us shaking our fists in the air like we were dads putting up tangled lights.
David Adelman with the Philadelphia 76ers makes a statement at a press conference in the Mayor’s Reception Room in January regarding the Sixers changing directions on the controversial Center City arena. At left is mayor Parker, at right City Council President Kenyatta Johnson and Josh Harris, Sixers owner.
It started early in January, when the billionaire owners of the Sixers surprised the entire city by announcing the team would stay at the South Philly sports complex instead of building their own arena on Market East. The decision came after two years of seemingly using the city, its politicians, and its people as pawns in their game.
Workers gathered outside World Cafe Live before a Town Hall meeting with management in July.
In June, workers staged a walkout at World Cafe Live due to what they claimed was “an unacceptable level of hostility and mismanagement” from its new owners, including its then-CEO, Joseph Callahan. Callahan — who said the owners inherited $6 million in debt and that he wanted to use virtual reality to bolster its revenue — responded by firing some of the workers and threatening legal action. Today, the future of World Cafe Live remains unclear. Callahan stepped down as CEO in September (but remains chairman of the board), the venue’s liquor license expired, and its landlord, the University of Pennsylvania, wants to evict its tenant, with a trial scheduled for January.
Signage at the east entrance to the Philadelphia Art Museum reflects the rebrand of the institution, which was formerly known as the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Finally, late this year at the Philadelphia Art Museum, things got more surreal than a Salvador Dalí painting, starting with an institutional rebrand that surprised some board members, didn’t land well with the public, and resulted in a lot of PhART jokes. In November, museum CEO Sasha Suda was fired following an investigation by an outside law firm that focused, in part, on increases to her salary, a source told The Inquirer. Suda’s lawyer called it a “a sham investigation” and Suda quickly sued her former employer, claiming that “her efforts to modernize the museum clashed with a small, corrupt, and unethical faction of the board intent on preserving the status quo.”
Nobody knows where all of this will go, but it’s likely to have more drama than a Caravaggio.
On a frigid Tuesday morning, stakeholders from across Delaware County toasted champagne and popped mini pastries under the roof of Middletown Township’s new Hilton Garden Inn.
“We may be the only Hilton Garden Inn in the world that serves Wawa coffee and drinks it all the time,” quipped hotel owner Patrick J. Burns, standing before a sea of family members, hotel staffers, business associates, and elected officials.
The 107-room, 67,000-square-foot Hilton, located off Baltimore Pike at the former Franklin Mint site, is open and welcoming guests. It’s the 42nd hotel in Delaware County and first full-service hotel in Middletown Township.
The hotel features app-to-room device integration, mobile key and contactless check-in, meeting and banquet spaces, an outdoor patio with fire pits, a fitness center, and the Garden Grill, a restaurant serving “American cuisine with local flair” that will be open to the public.
The hotel is long awaited, borne from a yearslong planning process and delayed by pandemic-era construction slowdowns. On Tuesday, attendees expressed gratitude that what was once an economic dream for the township was finally becoming reality.
The Hilton marks an important expansion of the collar county’s tourism economy, according to Delaware County’s major economic stakeholders. And as far as tourism in Delco, they say, it’s only up from here.
The bar area off of the lobby at the new Hilton Garden Inn of Middletown Township on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025.
Delaware County hosted 4.5 million visitors in 2024, according to Steve Bryne, executive director of Visit Delco. Those visitors spent $860 million, generated $1.2 billion in economic impact, and sustained 13,000 jobs. In 2025, the county is on track to sell more than one million hotel room nights for the first time in its history.
Representatives from the Hilton say it created 200 construction jobs and 40 new hospitality jobs.
Bryne said tourism to Delaware County is a “combination of everything.” The county doesn’t have one major anchor (like Longwood Gardens in Chester County, for example). Rather, it’s home to 12 colleges and universities, major corporate employers like Wawa, and sports complexes like IceWorks and Subaru Park, home of the Philadelphia Union. That means regular tournaments, business conferences, parents weekends, homecomings, and graduations — events that, collectively, help power the county’s economy.
Already, Penn State Brandywine, located down the road, has named the Hilton Garden Inn its host hotel.
Delaware County also gets spillover from visitors to Philadelphia, especially those who want proximity to Philadelphia International Airport.
The hotel is a property of Metro Philly Management, owned by Burns. Burns’ management company also owns the Courtyard by Marriott in Springfield, the Fairfield Inn & Suites in Broomall, and the Springfield Country Club, as well as numerous grocery stores and restaurants.
Patrick J. Burns, pictured at Middletown Township’s new Hilton Garden Inn on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025. The hotel is owned by Burns’ company, Metro Philly Management.
Stakeholders lauded the hotel’s location in a central, and rapidly developing, part of Middletown Township.
The former Franklin Mint complex, now home to the Hilton, has been a hotbed of development in Middletown Township since the mint shuttered in 2004. Two newer housing developments — Pond’s Edge and Franklin Station — have added over 450 units of housing to the site. Middletown Township outpaced its neighbors — Media, Nether Providence, and Upper Providence — in populationgrowth in 2024.
“Middletown Township is such a vital corridor of Delaware County,” Burns said.
The hotel’s opening coincides with major events coming to the region in the coming months: semiquincentennial celebrations in Philadelphia and in Delco, the FIFA World Cup, the PGA Championship at Aronimink Golf Club, and the MLB All-Star Game. For the PGA Championship alone, Delaware County is expecting 200,000 visitors and $125 million in economic impact.
This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.
The holiday season at City Hall was kicked off Thursday night with a lighting ceremony for what is officially called the “Philly Holiday Tree,” followed by live musical performances by Grammy-winning artists Ashanti and Lalah Hathaway.
The 50-foot-tall, 75-year-old Concolor Fir, sourced from Stutzman Farms in New York, will be displayed on the north side of City Hall through Jan. 1. The tree is bigger and brighter this year, with a reimagined base that serves as a centerpiece and more than 6,000 lights.
Mayor Cherelle Parker smiles alongside Santa during the annual City of Philadelphia Holiday Tree Lighting ceremony at City Hall on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025.Attendees wait in line for drinks during the annual City of Philadelphia Holiday Tree Lighting ceremony at City Hall on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025.Attendees with Grinch hats gather for the annual City of Philadelphia Holiday Tree Lighting ceremony at City Hall on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025.Ashanti performs at the annual City of Philadelphia Holiday Tree Lighting ceremony at City Hall on Thursday, Dec. 4, 2025.Ashanti performs a medley during the BET Awards on Monday, June 9, 2025, at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles.
Mayor Cherelle L. Parker struck a replica Liberty Bell with a large hammer at 7:05 p.m. to signal the lighting of the tree.
Cassie Donegan, the current Miss America, sang “White Christmas” and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.” The show was broadcast live on 6abc.
The annual city-run event is part of a wider event schedule to ring in the holiday season in Philadelphia, organized by Welcome America LLC, which also organizes the Wawa Welcome America festival on July 4.
I was lured to the Boscov’s at Granite Run the other weekend by a mailer I’d received advertising a one-day shoe sale — buy any pair, get the second for $1.99.
I went early to beat the crowds only to find the bounds of polite society had dissipated at the shoe department and it’d become The Hunger Games, but with footwear and senior citizen tributes (who are far more ruthless than their younger counterparts).
Flustered, I set off to browse the rest of the store. The first thing you might find yourself wondering as you wander around a Boscov’s is: “How does this place even exist?” It’s a full-scale department store that sells everything from perfume to sofas. I even discovered an entire candy counter on the second floor that during a previous visit I’d never noticed before. As it turns out, this Reading-based chain is in the fudge-making business too.
Legions of other department stores have fallen in the last few decades — Kaufmann’s, Bradlees, Hills, Hess’s — yet Boscov’s abides. The Granite Run Boscov’s is particularly a beast unburdened by the sands of time. It was previously an anchor store for the Granite Run Mall, which was torn down around it in 2016 to make way for the Promenade at Granite Run. Only Boscov’s remains of the once-storied mall. It is a rock that shall not be moved, a pillar to in-person purchasing.
The outfit
As I was browsing the brightly-lit aisles that fateful Saturday this month, wondering if the lights might give me a sunburn, my eyes fell upon something I can never unsee: matching camouflage sweat suits.
Here were outfits that managed to do what no state legislature or psychological expert ever has: They married rural and urban Pennsylvania.
Boscov’s bills these matching sweat suits as “Rustic Romance.”
As someone who spent her formative years growing up in Lycoming County — where we had the first day of hunting season off from school — I can attest that camouflage is not just for stalking prey and sitting in tree stands. It’s an entire sartorial color category all its own in rural Pennsylvania.
Camo is mixed and matched with everything and considered appropriate for all events, from weddings to funerals (think of it like Birds gear during a playoff run). I’ll never forget looking at photos from my wedding and realizing a guest from Central Pennsylvania wore a camo baseball hat to our reception.
Now, a matching tracksuit is something you rarely see in rural Pennsylvania, but it’s practically a closet-staple around Philly. You’ll see at least one person wearing one at every Wawa, Acme, or outdoor event you visit in the region.
Typically paired with sunglasses, these outfits are not only comfortable but incredibly stress-free. No need to worry about what to pair your sweatshirt with because there’s only one answer, the matching sweatpants you bought with it.
Standing stunned before these camouflage sweatsuits, which came in both his and hers, I wondered if Boscov’s had thrown back a few beverages before deciding to sell these things.
As a Pennsylvanian, I was highly offended. We the people of this fine commonwealth are more than camo and sweat suits! We are camo OR sweat suits.
But maybe, just maybe, by blending these two wildly different fashions together as the holidays approach, Boscov’s will also blend us. No more Philly, Pittsburgh, and the T in between. No more red counties and blue counties. This could be the one outfit to unite us all, while also helping us blend into woodland scenes.
When I posted a picture of the camo sweatsuits on Threads, several users pointed out that Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts recently wore a matching camouflage suit when the Birds traveled to Green Bay. I was surprised, as Hurts is typically a very stylish dude who wears Kangol hats and carries a man bag, but people suggested his outfit could have been a fashion statement indicating he was on the hunt.
Who better though to serve as the ambassador of the camouflage sweat suit and unite our state than Hurts? He’s cool under pressure, so he could take the heat of promoting an undeniably terrible outfit for the greater good, and he grew up in Texas, so it’s safe to assume he’s familiar with camo (and we already know he’s not afraid to wear it).
It wasn’t until I got home and looked at my photo of the sweat suits that I noticed there was a sign at the top of the store display billing these outfits as “Rustic Romance.”
Listen, I know that Pennsylvanians’ reputation for romance does not precede us, but that’s just insulting. There’s nothing romantic about letting your partner know you want them to look more like fall foliage.
I guarantee if you get your lady a matching camo sweat suit for Christmas, she’s not going to fawn all over you — she will hunt you down.
