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Originally Posted by Redddog
You take 0% of how business actually works into account.
The greyhound station closure had nothing to do with the city. Greyhound decided that their customers would be just fine standing on the side of the road, a la Megabus. They didn't renew the lease and gave 0 $hits about that station. It was a haven for homelessness and crime anyway. If for some reason, 76 Place falls through, it will sit and crumble before anything moves into that old urine soaked station. The Mall screwed up the theme. They were on the right track when they were focusing on a high-end outlet mall concept. We moved from Brooklyn to orange county NY and they had an upscale outlet mall. People would literally fly from foreign countries to go to that place. If they did that, it would have killed in Philly. Factor in Covid and the fact that groups of teens were allowed to roam and terrorize shoppers at will and you have the entire story there.
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The Greyhound station should've never closed to begin with, especially considering that we're not some city of 75K people, but a major city of over 1.5M. Therefore, the station should've stayed open until the developers could buy the land, then build the proposed arena. Even if the homeless was loitering around, it was still no excuse to not renew the lease and decamp to 7th and Market, considering that hundreds of thousands of people need the bus to head to their destinations.
If anything, the blame for the reason why intercity Greyhound buses are either an hour late or cancelled has a lot to do with the fact that there's no intercity bus facility within the city, and much of the blame has to do with Greyhound and the city of Philadelphia for allowing this to happen and allowing bus riders to stand on the street with no seating, no shelter, no concessions, and especially no restroom facilities. It's even worse when you have little children and babies and there's no sanitary facilities to allow the little ones to relieve themselves, wile other major cities like NYC, Boston, DC, Chicago, SF, LA, and even smaller cities like Ft Myers, Richmond, and Albany have such facilities.
Plus the Fashion District isn't the only mall that's struggling in Greater Philadelphia, let alone, the rest of the country. Burlington Center Mall closed several years ago, leaving Moorestown Mall as the only enclosed mall in Burlco, and Echelon Mall in Voorhees closed over a decade ago. In fact, a lot of malls nationwide are either closing or downsizing. The mall that I used to patronize, Military Circle Mall in Norfolk, VA when I was in the Navy had closed a few years ago and the site is now being redeveloped as a major residential and commercial site.
COVID did do a number on the Fashion District, but it also did a number on a lot of malls and shopping districts across the country. The roaming teenagers in the Fashion District is just the product of Philadelphia's demographics plus it's social problems with the education system plus Philly's issue with crime. Either way, Philadelphia has never really had a concrete plan to improve it's education system (Vallas during the Street years as let go because he was doing too good of a job), nor has it had a visionary way to really reduce crime.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redddog
I will never understand how people have Chinatown dead and gone if this happens. Why? Because DC? Two VASTLY different scenarios that assume the same exact outcome. DC Chinatown was contracting at a record pace well before that arena was built. The gentrification that happened there was gonna happen regardless of an arena. It's one of the most expensive towns I've ever lived in and that area was ripe for development. The arena gets all the blame but the DC Chinatown was changing rapidly. We talked about that extensively when we lived there, before the arena. And the Asian community in DC made a fortune when they decided to sell their properties to developers. I continue struggle to understand how increased foot-traffic and patronage to Philly Chinatown businesses spell the end of Chinatown. If someone could explain, I'd be grateful.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinat....#Demographics
https://boundarystones.weta.org/2020...-dcs-chinatown
https://wisdateline.org/12104/global...c-s-chinatown/
You forget that when DC's Chinatown was contracting, the same can be said for the white residents who were leaving DC for the suburbs in Montgomery County, MA, and VA, and black residents, who were also leaving for PG County. DC overall was declining beginning in the 1960 Census all the way to the 2010 Census. It's nadir was in 2000 when DC had it lowest number of people since the 1930 US Census, only to record positive growth in 2010 for the first time in 60 years since 1950.
You obviously think that all the Chinese population lives in Chinatown, but the Chinese community is dispersed in other parts of the city such as South Philly and NE Philly, as well as in Cherry Hill, NJ. Chinatown is the first Asian settlement in the Delaware Valley and should be treated as historic the same way Independence Hall, Old City, and Elfreth's Alley are treated, albeit not as old as those sites. If the arena is built, while technically the arena won't be in Chinatown, it's basically just a block away from Chinatown, and like the DC arena, will raise the rents astronomically to the point where a majority of the Chinese residents, most of them lower income, won't be able to afford their own community.
I guess I should change my position to anti-arena to pro-arena since we don't need any more "segregated areas" and since we have to accept the "post-racial society" that's been pushed by MSM, then a lot of lower income and affordable neighborhoods within the city should have to make way for gentrified and bland neighborhoods which are devoid of some "flavor"!!! I get your position, no Chinatown, no South Philly, no North Philly, no West Philly, just another post-racial wasteland, that's the Philly we should all strive for!!!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Redddog
You obviously know the Nets (and NY sports in general). I think you're confusing the viability of a sports franchise with the current standings in the league. I grew up in Cleveland. If you went by the standings, the Browns would have been dismantled decades ago (and no jokes about the move to Baltimore, please). I do agree that Barclays and 76 Place are similar situations (if I read you correctly). The areas that surround these two arenas are similar - a major stretch of commercial with heavy residential as well. I lived in Park Slope and walking distance from Atlantic and Flatbush. It's very similar to the Philly site and works quite well from a traffic perspective. Most of the complaints center around non-NBA event where people are more likely to take drive services like Uber or limos. But the businesses in the area are killing it. The other complaint is that there is no more walk-in opportunities anywhere when there is an event because everything is sold out.
At any rate, the assumptions that are being taken as certainty are crazy to me. This arena would put the 6ers more in-line with other major sports teams. I wonder why only in Philly is it a major issue.
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What do you mean that the new arena would place the Sixers "more in-line" with the other major sports teams??? I can understand what Detroit has done concentrating all it's sports venues (Ford Field, Comerica Park, and recently Little Caesars Arena) around it's downtown, but the catch is that all the venues are closer to one another, the same way that the Sports Complex has it's venues close to one another. Also, Chicago has all it's venues away from it's downtown. The closest is Soldier Field, but the Cubs play in the North Side, the Sox play in the South Side, and the Blackhawks and the Bulls play in the West Side, and I don't see any scramble for either sports teams to play anywhere in Chicago's downtown. The LA Lakers won 6 of it's NBA titles at the old Forum, and it's first 5 titles in Minneapolis, while our NBA titles have been won each at the old Civic Center and at the Spectrum. There's no assurance that Embiid and Maxey will continue to play for the Sixers until 2031, and who's going to be the next star to take over after 2031 is the huge question? The Browns was a completely different situation because there was a lot of history with the Browns going all the way back to Paul Brown, the 4 consecutive AAFC titles, and their 4 NFL titles pre-Super Bowl years, and the rabid fanbase that had backed the team until that fateful moment back in 1995. Cleveland deserved to have an NFL team!!!
Atlantic Ave is a major E-W artery from Downtown Brooklyn all the way to Jamaica, Queens while Flatbush Ave is a major N-S artery from the Manhattan Bridge to the Rockaways. the proposed arena is at Market St between 10th and 11th Its, so while Market is fairly wide, it's not wider than Atlantic nor does it really have Atlantic Ave's utility as an LIRR ROW nor is it really a major thoroughfare, as Chestnut and Walnut serve that capacity in West Philadelphia until about 28th St, where Market then serves as PA 3 briefly going westbound from JFK Blvd at City Hall to 32nd St or eastbound via Market St.
At Market East, it's a two lane thoroughfare each way between Juniper St to Front St, and while there are parallels between Atlantic west of Flatbush, it transforms into another street east of it, and Flatbush is basically and urban highway north of Atlantic. 10th and 11th Its aren't highways nor are they even major arteries in that sense, and my thought is how would 10th and 11th Its be able to actually handle all that traffic the way Atlantic and Flatbush are able to handle such traffic, and mind you, this is Brooklyn, in NYC, which has the best subway system in America, if not the world, and there's up to 9 subway lines serving the Atlantic Ave - Barclays Center station and a couple more subway lines a couple blocks away at the Lafayette Ave subway station, as well as the LIRR terminal compared to the one subway line along Market St and Market East Station, which only covers to five county region, northern DE, and Trenton, NJ. It's basically apples and oranges at this point, and the proposed arena isn't going to be the next MSG or even Barclays Center because of the paucity and the lack of frequency of mass transit!
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