Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia has proposed to build a 1,005 car parking garage in Grays Ferry. The neighborhood community as well as CHOP healthcare members, citing pollution concerns, are fiercely resisting this proposed development. But let’s actually take a step back and look at why this is a much deeper issue at its core.
Pollution is no stranger to the Grays Ferry neighborhood. The neighborhood used to be located by the Philadelphia Energy Solutions oil refinery, which was one of the oldest refineries on the East Coast. The refinery closed in 2019 due to a massive explosion that left five people injured and caused millions of dollars in damages. You can find residents’ concerns about pollution from the nearby refinery dating back to the 1880s. But nonetheless, there is a deeper issue — Grays Ferry is a working-class neighborhood made up of Irish, Italian, and Black residents that has seen racial tensions since the 20th century.
These conflicts reached a feverish pitch in the spring of 1997: a Black family was attacked by a mob of white men outside of a Catholic church, and Christopher Brinkman, a white 16-year-old, was killed by two Black men during a robbery. This led to then Philadelphia Mayor and Penn lecturer, Edward Rendell hosting an interfaith service with the controversial leader of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan. The church service was a compromise to stop the NOI from leading a march through Grays Ferry, which Rendell believed would lead to heightened tensions.
Nowadays, we have a large institution, CHOP, trying to assert its control over the tensions throughout this neighborhood. CHOP has stated that they have been “promoting child and community health in the Grays Ferry neighborhood through several community-requested initiatives.” Whether CHOP has been promoting community health doesn’t matter if they’re actively promoting a project that will bring harm.
I understand that parking is a tough issue especially for large, urban hospitals like CHOP. This parking lot would expand staff parking and allow families of patients to park closer to the hospital. Nonetheless, as someone who had respiratory issues as a child due to car pollution from a nearby freeway, extra traffic is horrible. My asthma affected everyday activities that I enjoyed as a kid.
Furthermore, parking garages cause a huge negative environmental impact in communities. Parking garages can cause the urban heat island effect, which is when dark asphalt absorbs solar radiation leading to increased temperatures. Additionally, parking infrastructure leads to an uptick of greenhouse gas emissions which exacerbates climate change. To make matters worse, the flooding risk of building on the current grass field could potentially lead to increased inundation with the removal of naturally porous grass. Grays Ferry is already at a high risk of flooding due to its close proximity to the Schuylkill River. Any way you slice it, this parking garage is a net negative to the people of Grays Ferry, who have been battling internal and external threats for well over a century.
Even though CHOP and Penn are two separate institutions, their strong partnership brings the University squarely into this debate. CHOP is the primary pediatric training unit for Penn Medicine, and many CHOP doctors hold positions at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. CHOP is an illustrious institution that brings in millions of dollars of economic activity for the City of Philadelphia, but that doesn’t give it the right to push around a neighborhood.
Penn itself has had issues with the local community due to the expansion of its campus which has pushed many Black residents out and led to local strife and resentment. A vibrant working-class Black community used to exist between 32nd and 40th street but was forced out by the University through eminent domain.
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Penn, knowing how land conflict can damage community relations, should urge CHOP to find an alternative to the parking garage, as this garage will harm community relations and, more importantly, the health of the residents of Grays Ferry. As an institution who centers child care, CHOP should reconsider the impact of this garage on the children of working-class families in Grays Ferry.
KAMAU LOUIS is a first-year graduate student studying City Planning from Orlando, Fl. His email is louis3@upenn.edu.
