I'm guessing it's none of our business what is taking them so long. Consider how long the Big Ugly sat vacant before Orens got their hands on it and be happy that it won't be much longer now. I remember the same kind of harping about what was taking Tony Goldman so long to start work on his 13th St acquisitions and look how well that is turning out.

__________________
Cheers,
Jayfar
--
“I am indeed well aware of the history of Conventional (sic) Hall, both globally and locally, and can assure you that we are carefully exploring avenues for its future.” -- Penn President Amy Gutmann 5 days before demolition began.

People are inordinately impatient with some of this stuff.

The Orens Bros. have a track record. This is not their first project. This is almost an exact duplicate of the Shoe Factory, only slightly more ambitious.

Exactly right. Everyone is jumping all over with this... Let me clear some of this up from my perspective as I just bought one and am moving in next week...

There are a few reasons why it's taking longer than it should:

1. Every unit is custom built. They won't touch an unsold unit until they have a prospect who tells them what to do with it (ie, where to build walls, how tall, bathrooms, kitchen...)

2. Each unit has to be more or less sold/completed before they can apply for their C.O. on each floor. They're going ground up.

3. Floors 4-6 are already sold out and they're begining their next phase.

4. They had a lot of community issues with the Arch Street Comission and were forced to not do a few of the things that were planned. A structure was supposed to be built on the roof, which would raise it an additional 8 floors with a clocktower on top. The community board said no because it would obstruct their view (?). Additionally, they're all concerned about excess population and parking.

They're pushing ahead fast now. The lobby is finished, floors 4-6 are finished...

Floor 1 is commerical space and floor 2 is combination commercial/residential space.

Floor 3 is being built last. Right now, it's being used for supplies, but they plan on building expesive and larger units on that level as the ceiling is a lot higher than the other floors (with the exception of the penthouse floor).

All in all though, it's looking great!

Are there prospective tenants yet for any of the commercial space?

I believe they are currently accepting requests and hoping for something like a small supermarket or convenience store or coffee shop or something like that. I know they did say that they're trying to steer away from things like dry cleaners... lol

Are they planning on painting the drab exterior?

They already painted it once, but I believe they're painting it again. The beige is staying, however

It looks bad now because the commercial part isn't sold/done yet. When that's finished, I'm sure it will be a 180.

As a resident, my biggest concern is with the current tenants that live under that bridge...

The lobby is all marble with floura and there are two tall glass elevators that overlook the cira and the river

My unit is facing SE and the view is right down JFK. I have the view of the murano, commerce all the way down to city hall. It's really nice during the daytime. I can't wait to see it at night! That should be awesome with all the lights.

When Comcast is built, that will be right in my view as well.

The only thing I don't like is that building that used to be/is occupied by Philadelphia Ed... The roof is REALLY ugly. However, I don't want them to rip it down cause they'd probably put a tower right in front of my window.

It looks like they're redoing the building though, so I don't think it's going anywhere.