Baltimore, Lancaster avenues undergo renovations

Hailing a cab and heading east towards Center City for a shopping trip or a casual dinner is nothing new to Penn students. But some local business owners are hoping that students will instead begin to look in the opposite direction -- towards University City -- for an evening or afternoon out.

This may become feasible because of a recent wave of efforts to revitalize the Baltimore and Lancaster Avenue corridors, attracting new restaurants and businesses to the area.

Last year, the William Penn Foundation awarded the University City District a two-year $440,000 grant to be used to rebuild these two dense retail corridors.

"The first year was really spent doing a lot of groundwork," Lancaster Avenue Corridor Manager Tanya Washington said. "We had to start from scratch."

So far, the UCD, an organization founded to improve the quality of life in West Philadelphia, has taken baby steps -- such as adding trash cans to the areas -- but more visible progress toward achieving the organization's goals is beginning to be evident.

United Bank, located on Lancaster Avenue, will soon see a major facelift, which the UCD is largely facilitating.

Summer interns for the UCD proposed a paint job for the bank and suggested rebuilding the fence surrounding the property. Also, the UCD helped plan and will be funding a more efficient and aesthetically pleasing parking lot.

On Baltimore Avenue, the UCD helped push Vientiane Restaurant into a vacancy which arose last fall.

Baltimore Avenue Corridor Manager Eli Massar explained that there is always a natural turnover of businesses. The UCD does not aim to displace existing businesses, but when a vacancy does arise, the organization attempts to fill it with a destination in which community members have expressed an interest, Massar said.

What you see along Baltimore Avenue is a "mix of cultures," he continued. "What you won't see is a mix of products."

For some time, the neighborhood has not had an everyday retail destination, "and we have these corridors that should have that," Massar said.

Ultimately, the revitalization projects are "aimed at making it possible to do your errands on Saturday morning" without leaving the community.

Efforts on Baltimore and Lancaster avenues began when Spruce Hill Community Association members decided they would find a way to develop the area as a safe retail location.

After raising some money and consulting surveyors and architectural planners, the community members realized they would need a full-time presence on the corridors, Massar said.

That was when the UCD became involved. With the grant from the William Penn Foundation, the projects were underway. While the grant will expire next summer, "I think we've been pretty successful, so we have reason to be fairly confident" that the project will continue to "get the attention it needs," Massar said.

"Penn deserves a tremendous amount of credit for making money available and helping to create the UCD," Massar said.

"But a lot of the success in repopulating this neighborhood comes from the symbiosis of the" community groups and Penn, particularly "the community groups' ability to leverage the investments Penn was putting in," he continued.

Despite the involvement of larger organizations, the corridors have a distinctly local flavor, and many of the new businesses are owned by locals.

"I've lived right around the corner from this place for 27 years," said Roger Harmon, owner of Abbraccio.

The former owner of the campus restaurant Palladium, which closed in June, Harmon opened his new Italian restaurant just off of Baltimore Avenue, in a location that is still visible from the corridor.

"We know the market is there," he said. "It's the commercial services that we need more of."

And that's what the UCD is there for.

"They're helpful in a million little ways," Harmon said, mentioning the trash cans, paint jobs and publicity which the UCD has provided.

Harmon said he is confident that the area is on the rise.

"Sometimes it just takes a little spark... and then a bunch of people say, 'You know, this is possible... I could start a business here,'" he said.

"I've noticed a lot of people who are not from Philadelphia... look at the address and go, 'Oh my God, that's in southwest Philadelphia. UCD has been very useful in overcoming that image."

Still, challenges lay ahead.

There's a "sense of inertia that results in decades of disinvestment," Massar said. People are used to a shoddy retail climate, and change is difficult, he explained.

Also, "there's suspicion from some people.... I think that suspicion will greatly diminish as they see some of the successes" of the project, he continued.

But at least for now, some neighbors heartily oppose the revitalization efforts.

"It's not transformation, it's transportation," said Larry Falcon, a member of Neighbors Against McPenntrification, calling the UCD's efforts "a way to displace indigenous businesses."

"Revitalization is just a catch word for displacement."

However, many of the businesses already in the area are pleased with the developments.

"I've been a destination restaurant for two years," said Greg Salisbury, owner of Rx, a restaurant located at 45th and Spruce streets.

The UCD "has been trying to change that perception," he continued, saying that with each new restaurant coming into the area, his own becomes increasingly on "the beaten path."

Additionally, the UCD helps "make the process a little easier" for new tenants by facilitating the process of starting a small business, Washington explained.

"You don't have to go to Center City" for a cup of coffee or a good meal, said Kameelah Mu'Min, a 2000 College graduate and owner of Sugar Hill Bakery, set to open on Baltimore Avenue in November.

Mu'Min credited the UCD -- which has provided her with marketing, operating and construction advice, as well as $10,000 -- with "making the environment more attractive, and sort of luring people back to feeling safe... comfortable, making people feel as if there's something worth being in University City for."

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