The Triangle

Issue date: 5/22/09 Section: Ed-Op

Media Credit: Olivia Garrity

With the advent of the new Powelton Pizza location, it would seem that Lancaster Avenue is ripe for further development, and in a recession no less.

The Lancaster Avenue of which I'm speaking stretches from 34th Street out to Spring Garden. Ostensibly, the critical mass for the coming success of the street is upon us. There is a 7-Eleven, an upscale Mexican Outpost, Zocalo, four pizza places, The Fencing Academy, two hair salons, one tanning salon, a dry cleaners, bike repair and skateboard shops, Lemon Grass, Green Line café, a bank, Scooter's Pub and an exterminator supply store. Variety it has, but why is Lancaster not Drexel's "Sansom Street?"

The lack of design, overall plan, and speculating landowners on this stretch of Lancaster could be to blame. The basic ingredients of any good street design are present, but are simultaneously missing as well. Pedestrian-scaled lighting (no taller than 10 feet in height), properly pruned street trees (to allow more sunlight to reach the sidewalk), quality walking surfaces (the sidewalks on the 3400 block being treacherous at best), and attractive exterior lighting are the foundations needed for the avenue to create visual sophistication. Some of these recommendations will wrongly be interpreted as a desire for a curated landscape of national chains, a la Suburban Square in Ardmore. However, by dictating a basal consensus on traditional beauty, Lancaster will be in the position to gracefully continue its evolution from major toll road, to disinvested street, to its current incarnation of burgeoning commercial strip.

The block-long Lancaster Mews (which houses the aforementioned dry cleaners and Lemon Grass) suffers from cluttered storefronts, non-transparent shop windows, unlit night time displays, and small, uncongenial retail space configurations. Some of these problems could be solved by the landlord mandating specific tenant design guidelines to encourage an engaging streetfront. A more substantial investment by the building owner could be undertaken to transform some of the retail spaces also. Physically combining storefronts to create more commercially marketable spaces would be ideal. Admittedly, without a more relaxed credit market, such repositioning may not be possible at this time; however, letters of intent from credit worthy retailers will only help a developer's construction loan application. Fortunately, many storefronts already have desirable sizes for small businesses, (albeit with provincial interior layouts) so going to the expense of merging them isn't always necessary.

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