Post Office move would free up land

For sale: 14 acres of choice real estate on the scenic Schuylkill River, bounded by the campuses of Penn and Drexel University. Although the land is currently occupied by the main building of the Philadelphia Post Office at 30th and Market streets, Penn officials say they would love to see that scenario become a reality so the University could buy the land and put it to recreational use, possibly for the construction of a new fieldhouse and indoor track. The Post Office is desperately seeking a new location for a larger, more modern home, according to U.S. Postal Service spokesperson Paul Smith. "That building down there was built in about 1935," Smith said. "It's not the way to move mail." However, a 12-year search for a location with the adequate roads and size to handle 8 million to 10 million pieces of mail per day has yet to produce an acceptable site. Finding a large enough piece of land is the least of the problems in this case. Smith said the Post Office intends to keep the new facility inside the Philadelphia city limits. But it has proved difficult to find a location that doesn't impact on the surrounding community. One possible site, the Byberry East Industrial Park in Northeast Philadelphia, was rejected within the last couple of years because of neighborhood objections. On March 11, the Philadelphia Daily News reported that a deal for a location near Philadelphia International Airport was imminent. Smith, however, said that report was false, adding that the Post Office is currently in the process of evaluating several potential locations. Even with community support, the cost of a new facility would have to be approved by the Postal Service's Board of Governors in Washington, D.C. Smith said the land is unlikely to go in the market any time in the near future. Still, Tom Lussenhop, Penn's managing director for real estate, said Penn is interested in the land whenever it reaches the market. "I expect the University and the Post Office will work together in a collaborative way," Lussenhop said. Any future plans for the site will leave the Post Office building -- a designated historic landmark -- intact. But the surrounding parking lots, fields and loading docks could all be developed.