Sixth Straight Year of Population Gains for Philadelphia

According to new census data, Philadelphia sees its sixth year of population gains. Over 7000 new residents moved to Philadelphia last year. While Philadelphia is still in 6th place as largest city in the US it marks a departure from projections that originally projected Philadelphia would be losing population.

This is a bullish sign for Philadelphia and urban places on the whole. More people are choosing to live in cities and we will see this trend continuing for some time as this country re-urbanizes.

$19m Of Improvements Coming To the Parkway

The city just announced that work will commence immediately on over $19m worth of improvements to the Parkway including more bike lanes, one less car lane and a cafe pavilion. This is definitely a step in the right direction but would like to see more car lanes eliminated and add some retail so the Parkway is less like a highway. Link to story.

Philadelphia To Double Number of Bike Lanes - Nice Move

According to an article on philly.com:

The city's proposed new bicycle network, now undergoing final revisions, will roughly double the miles of marked bike lanes to about 400, not counting 40 or so miles of separate trails on parklands. The bike lanes will come over the next decade as streets are repaved.

We applaud this, the key is really uniting all the bike lanes into a more cohesive transportation network, perhaps link to burbs, septa (imagine changing stations and secure bike storage at regional rail stops).

Temple Issues $150 Million In Bonds To Finance $1.2 Billion Neighborhood Development

Temple University recently sold $150 million worth of bonds to begin work on a decade long $1.2 billion dollar neighborhood redevelopment project designed to make North Broad Street a 24/7 vibrant urban area. Temple is taking a similar approach to what University of Pennsylvania undertook in University City and Columbia University did in Morningside Heights. Here is a link to a story on Philadelphia Business Journal.

Philadelphia Commercial Corridors Getting 440 More Big Belly Solar Trash Cans

Using a combination of stimulus money and city funds, Philadelphia Commercial Corridors will be getting 440 more solar powered Big Belly trash cans - for those that don't know these are the new trash cans all over Center City with built in compactors. They are great as they run on solar power, require fewer pick ups and hopefully less littering as they don't fill up like the old school trash cans. Here is hoping W. Girard Avenue in Brewerytown are getting some.

See article here from the Inquirer.

Philadelphia Parks Commissioner Calls For 300,000 New Trees

The City of Philadelphia wants to plant 300,000 trees in its goal to be the greenest city. We like this. As a small part of this initiative MM Partners is planting 14 trees this Spring along W. Girard Avenue, 1200 Block of N. Taney Street and 1300 Block of N. 29th Street in Brewerytown. We will send post photos once they are planted.

Here is a link to an article in the Inquirer about this initiative.

New Septa Trains Debut - Pretty Pretty Nice

Septa has spanky new trains that debuted today, check them out here:

Brewerytown Clean Up Project - Philly Spring Cleanup 2010

MM is proud to have participated in cleaning up the playground/ball field at 31st and Thompson Streets in Brewerytown as part of the Philadelphia Spring Cleanup Project. Mr. James Carter of the Greater Brewerytown CDC coordinated the event and did a great job getting neighborhood residents and kids to chip in. We were blown away by the sheer number of cleanup projects throughout Brewerytown.

Sick ESPO (Steve Powers) West Philly Handrawn Map On Philebrity

Check it out on Philebrity:

Arts Grants Doled Out By City of Philadelphia

The City of Philadelphia awarded $500,000 in Creative Industry Workforce Grants to a number of great projects, see full article here, list below:

Connection Training Services - $60,000
2243 W. Allegheny Street (North Philadelphia)
Creation of the North Philadelphia Creative Arts Center and Gallery at the Allegheny Business Center, an arts incubator for ex-offenders

Crane Old School, LP - $100,000
1425 N. 2nd Street (Kensington)
$1.7 million conversion of an historic school into multi-tenant artist and commercial arts space, including the new Pig Iron Theater School

Octo Enterprises Incorporated - $100,000
2214-14 Alter Street (Point Breeze)
Industrial building renovation and expansion for new artist workspace

Olney Cultural Collaborative - $20,000
An initiative of the North 5th Revitalization Project, a program of the Korean
Community Development Services Center (Olney)
Office renovation for neighborhood cultural programming initiative

Revolution Recovery - $40,000
7333 Milnor Street (Northeast)
Artist workspace and office space at recycling facility for a new artist in residency program.

Underground Arts at the Wolf Building - $50,000
340 N. 12th Street Associates, LP (Callowhill)
Creation of a Multi-disciplinary Arts Venue

Vox Populi - $30,000
319 N. 11th Street (Callowhill)
Creation of multi-disciplinary performance venue and additional artist studios

2215 East Tioga Street Gallery & Studios - $100,000
2215 East Tioga Street (Kensington)
Rehabilitation to create an art gallery and sculpture garden

Sorry, Aaron, But This Does Count Towards Your 15 Minutes of Fame...

This just in: MM Partners very talented Director of Property Management, Aaron Smith, is having a brief moment of Philberity. Check out his only-in-Philadelphia camera phone pic. Link.

Mural Art Programs' Love Letters Valentines Weekend

MM Partners strongly supports the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program and their many amazing programs. We recently turned one of our storefronts over to them to put on an art show featuring local artists. While we are not directly involved in the Love Letters exhibit we think it's amazing and will certainly be at the opening this Friday. Here is a link to coverage on the Cool Hunting blog. Link to Love Letters website.

Retooling Industrial Sites Exhibit

Retooling Industrial Sites Exhibit

Center for Architecture, 1218 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA

Join us for a First Friday reception to celebrate the opening of the exhibit on February 5 from 5:30 to 7:30pm.

Retooling Industrial Sites showcases the work of over 30 design firms in transforming old industrial sites back to productive use and features inventive examples from Philadelphia and cities across the country. The exhibit is intended as a forum for the growing interest in industrial sites and urban manufacturing and the important role of design in making industry a positive part of urban neighborhoods.

The projects selected for the exhibit represent a diverse mix of built and un-built work from warehouse conversions to brownfield redevelopment to neighborhood master plans which include new factories, office space, schools, housing, interpretive historical sites, and mixed-use development. Also on view, will be a series of Jacob Hellman photographs, featuring vacant Philadelphia factories.

Cool Philadelphia Photographs by Phillybits, Flickr Group

Came across this photographer on Phillyist, very cool stuff. Check out this photo of old Septa trolley cars. Here is a link to the artists Flickr Page - Phillybits. Lots of great philadelphia photos on there.