(Unused parking in Northern Liberties | Image: Bright MLS) One of the long-running sagas we've been following here since 2016 is the push from Council President Darrell Clarke and 3rd District Councilmember Jannie Blackwell to increase minimum parking requirements in the zoning code—an idea so bad there's a whole 800-page book devoted to how terrible it is. Continue reading

(Image: Jon Geeting) New York City could become the largest U.S. city to adopt ranked-choice voting this November, if voters there pass a ballot referendum recommended by their Charter Revision Commission. A win there could help provide a momentum boost to recent efforts to bring RCV to Philadelphia and Pennsylvania.  Continue reading

(Multi-family buildings have a better per-unit value for our tax abatement spending | Image: PMC Property Group) Some prominent members of the Building Industry Association signaled their openness to some type of compromise on reforming the 10-year tax abatement on property improvements at their recent conference, Michael D'Onofrio reports, raising the question of what kind of Plan B is best for those concerned about potential impact of any changes on housing creation. Continue reading

(The biggest change will be replacing the rest of the coin-operated meters | Image: ZD Net) The Philadelphia Parking Authority announced this week they'll be replacing their existing green parking kiosks with new models that use people's license plates to store payment info, rather than the paper tickets that you put on your dashboard now. But what seems on its face like a pretty ho-hum procurement story actually has some larger and more interesting policy implications, or at least it could if the PPA and city officlals want it to.  Continue reading

(Photo: Plan Philly/Eyes on the Street, used under CC-BY-NC-ND 2.0) Several high-profile demolitions of historic buildings, most notoriously on Jewelers Row, have increased the salience of historic preservation politics in Philadelphia recently. The Mayor convened a Historic Preservation Task Force to revamp local preservation policy, and there are now three bills in City Council that aim to make historic designation more attractive for property owners. And there is indeed a good case to be made that Philadelphia, as a city whose brand is so tied up in its historical significance, should be doing more to incentivize historic preservation and generally make it easier to designate historically-significant buildings for special demolition protections. It would be better if more developers would reuse older buildings more often instead of tearing them down to build new.  At the same time, there's one area where our preservation policy is basically getting it right—even though many advocates don't like it—and that is the relatively high bar for creating new historic districts where whole neighborhoods, or large sections of neighborhoods, are placed under strict regulations for alterations or demolitions of existing buildings, and even the aesthetics of new construction.      Continue reading

(Dumpster Alley | Photo: Bill West) Over the past year, the Kenney administration's transportation team, SEPTA, the Philadelphia Parking Authority, and the downtown business community have spent a lot of time thinking about different solutions to worsening traffic congestion, and the administration has even piloted some ideas like expanded loading zones, and more regular enforcement of the bus-only lanes on Chestnut and Market.  Continue reading

(How to fix land disposition) A package of Land Bank process reforms moved out of a key City Council committee this week, and now goes to the full Council for approval. If enacted, the changes would represent some important advances for the Land Bank in terms of a more transparent and rule-based process for selling city-held land, but unfortunately, they still leave the biggest problem untouched—the City Charter's requirement that City Council pass an ordinance to sell any land. With the ordinance requirement still in place, District Council members will continue to exert as much influence over land sales as they always have, and the new and improved process will amount to little more than official window dressing.  Continue reading

The Inquirer editorial board flags an important issue that will be decided during the next Mayor and City Council, which is whether or not to renew the Pennsylvania Intergovernmental Cooperation Authority—better known by its acronym PICA—which is set to expire in 2023. Continue reading

(Image: Google Streetview) The financial math for creating new parking garages in Philadelphia doesn't work anymore, Meir Rinde reports, quoting Parkway CEO Rob Zuritsky, who says the company is looking to get out of the parking business and redevelop all of their Center City surface lots.  Continue reading

(Image: Google Streetview) If you've ever rode the Market-Frankford Line into Fishtown, you may have noticed a large lawn as you approach the Girard station with a huge sign in it that says "The Notorious Galdo Parcel."  Continue reading