So after all that hooraw, we are left with this fact: the Campus Inn's
height was the problem.
But height was never a desire of either Penn or the Sheraton. The
project's height was forced on them by the Philadelphia Historical
Commission -- a pricey, unproductive, incoherent City agency that could
easily be cut back by 65% in the current budget crisis without any loss
to Philadelphians. The HC ordered the "high design"; and then voted
against it and for it and against it and for it. This incoherent,
marginally-productive governmental body wasted the neighborhood's time
and society's dime. It stirred up bitter feelings in our community with
its incompetent and indecipherable rulings. It has stuck us with an
undevelopable property and a hideous eyesore at 40th & Pine Sts.
Most other cities have an HC, but Philadelphia's HC is notoriously
resistant to working in balance with surrounding communities. Our
preservationist hardliners are motivated by an intoxicating mix of
purism and power. All Philadelphia is a victim of its rogue HC, but our
neighborhood is among those that would suffer most.
The current City budget crisis provides us with a rare opportunity to
trim the harmful excesses of agencies like the HC, that are dedicated to
preventing economic revitalization of our struggling city in 9 cases
out of 10. First of all, we can live without it totally. Any valid and
valuable purpose it might serve -- as a public storehouse of historic
building information -- can be maintained much more cheaply without any
of the damaging regulatory superstructure that is making a mess out of
Philadelphia's historic neighborhoods.
-- Tony West
krf...@aol.com wrote:
Mr. Adelman replied the last time we didn’t have opposition to the
use. The problem was we had an old historic property that we were
adding to our building and we were creating height.
The height was the problem.
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