You are wrong there. I grew up in the town next to AC and remember the time before the casinos. AC had pretty stable working and middle classes; the high school was considered one of the better ones in south jersey (even offered 8 different foreign languages); and the shopping on Atlantic Avenue was very good (we went there a lot for shopping). The city did have a large low-income popluation, but what truly deteriorated in AC was the tourist industry. All of the towns along the shore were suffering from a down turn, since air travel starting in the '50s made trips to Florida and California possible for family vacations. Casinos were seen as a way to bring back the tourists.

The income from the casinos not only generated a huge building boom in AC, but throughout the area. The population of Atlantic County has exploded and suburban sprawl has taken over that part of the state. But the casinos haven't really "helped" the people of AC. It took over 20 years for the city to get a decent grocery store and it's already closed. The inlet section that had good housing stock was demolished to create plastic, neo-Victorian suburban-style townhomes. When you look at the city's jobless rate now, it's really no different than before the casinos moved in. It's just that the rising property values allowed the working and middle classes to leave for other towns (Pleasantville, Ventor, Northfield). The casinos didn't "save" Atlantic City, they simply created a brand-new, tourist-oriented town.

Philadelphia is completely different - it's not desparate for tourists or money to "save" the city. With a diverse development along the river and a strong Center City, casinos will simply become another destination and complement to the other sites/jobs/attractions in Philadelphia.

Oh, I get your point. Unfortunately, you fail to see the reality of the situation. I don't have a "vision" of Pennsport. It already exists. People already live there. Stores, warehouses, and factories already operate there. You want to bulldoze them all and make a nice pretty contrived community. That would be great if it was in fact an abandoned wasteland. However, it isn't. Sounds like you are calling for emminent domain....let's get rid of the gritty and the ugly and bring in the rich and the pretty. Sorry, but this part of town is what it is. UPS isn't going anywhere and neither are the ports and the rail. A major city will always have the dirty rough side and you can't always hide it or move it somewhere else.

__________________
-Tim K

Licensed PA Real Estate Salesperson

MILES & GENERALIS, INC. GO REAL ESTATE
20 N. 3rd St.
Philadelphia, PA 19106
215-928-0221 (office)
215-928-0584 (fax)

www.PhillyLoftHouse.com : Loft-style living in a single-family home

www.LoftOn12th.com : A REAL loft in Center City

And that rough side isn't necessarily bad. In so many of the photograph books about Society Hill, I like the grittiness of the area before it was "restored". It somehow seems more real than the sanitized version we have today. Also, just because a building is used for something besides housing, doesn't mean that it has no beauty. I would take an industrial building that has character (the Richmond Power Station or Sparks Shot Tower) over any psuedo-colonial townhouse any day.

To pile on a little, anyone who thinks slots parlors and the patrons they attract, along with the grifting, prostitution and panhandling, are not "gritty" is in for a big surprise.

News flash for those with visions of pastoral parks and mixed use nirvana filled with shiny, happy (and rich) people: rich people don't feed slots and don't patronize slots parlors. They most certainly don't want to live or work very near to them either.

Any vision of the waterfront which includes gambling must grow toward full blown casinos, and a write off of any other use for the decades it will take to get there. In the mean time, a lot of things could have developed on the waterfront that I now doubt ever will or at least in my lifetime. A number of condo towers are already permitted (something like 3,000 units). Let's see now if they are ever built.

Were it not for the option holders tying up most of the prime land on the water, there is no telling what might have been there today but for the hope of this gambling windfall to a couple of property owners.

"lets build condos"


for who exactly?

The unemployed?

__________________
"

Full blown casinos, hotels, bars, shopping. Basically a big commercial district with the few condo towers there for the yup-yup singles who enjoy living in a chaotic nightlife atmos and being close to it.

Forget parks. Just stick flower planters in spots.

And in summer we need those little water misters on the sidewalks like they have in Vegas.

__________________
WHYY pays their CEO $750,000 a year. So WHYY should I renew my membership? Seems they have no problems finding money and spending it unwisely.


And this is why you should donate to PACCA, not PETA:

In September, PETA made headlines in Vermont and across the nation for asking Ben & Jerry's ice cream to use human breast milk in their ice cream, instead of cow milk

Sounds good to me.


It could make Philadelphia a real "destination"


and yuppie/hipsters would pay the same dumb amounts they do now to live in it.

(like people who think Fishtown or Pennsport "looks great" obviously have never been to Overbrook or Strawberry Mansion..better neighborhoods that are scary now but should be fixed before we start gutting industrial lands for new housing)


Then we use the money to fix actual residential sections throughout the city.

(Ya know...the hoods with lotsa parks, little traffic, mass transit...like N/W/SW/lower NW/Lower NE)

__________________
"

I see the sad reality loud and clear everytime I am down on South Columbus Blvd.. UPS isn't going anywhere, the Big Boxes and Ikea aren't going anywhere.That doesn't mean that they all shouldn't be better designed with green space,plazas and modern well-designed parking garages. For the most part people don't live from 95 to the waterfront, that area is nothing but a discombobulated retail migraine. Its terrible that of the few areas in Philadelphia to grow that mess is what the powers to be came up with. Truly frightening.

You don't have to go to far away to see how well big box retail should look like on the waterfront.Just 20 miles down 95 look at how Wilmington has done such a great job at developing their waterfront around retail, condos and restaurants.

I'm entirely convinced that many of you are immune to what quality looks like. Some of you need to seriously expand your horizons and let go of the "well this is Philadelphia and this how it is,and this is how its always going to be,and this reality."

That post industrial blight that consumes this city in the year 2006 isn't reality, its a nightmare and needs to be removed.

except that it's far less used than ours. what's wrong with UPS being so close to a train yard? that part of columbus is still used. excepting a few over the top snobs, it's just fine. it's a big river. I'm not sure why it bothers you so much that you aren't in control of everything, but there's plenty of room on the waterfront north side of cc. Even wilmington's DE river waterfront (not the brandywine that is close to the station) still houses a functioning port.

__________________
"You down wit OPM?"
Fumo: "Yeah, you know me!"