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PHILAPHILIA: Dead-Ass Proposal of the Week - Enterprise Heights
This complex at 46th and Market could have renewed energy in an extremely sorry area of the city, but it just never happened. To be fair, an extremely down-scaled version of this might actually be built, so not all hope is lost.
PHILAPHILIA: Dead-Ass Proposal of the Week — Enterprise Heights
Enter the Enterprise Center. Founded in 1989, the Enterprise Center acts as an incubator and accelerator for local small businesses. In 2001, they founded the Enterprise Center Community Development Corporation (TEC-CDC). This group would extend the reach of the Center so that they could not only help grow small businesses, but also keep them working and employing in the Walnut Hill neighborhood. Among other plans for the area, they announced a massive project in 2002 that could change Walnut Hill forever.
The idea was huge: a $75 million, 500,000-square-foot, mixed-use complex that consisted of offices, retail and residential units, and would be green as fuck. It would be called Enterprise Heights. Citizen's Bank committed to the idea and the U.S Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration gave over $429,000 for architectural plans. The firm of Erdy-McHenry, the crazy motherfuckers behind the Piazza at Schmidt's, were commissioned for the design.
This is how it would look if you jumped out of a plane overhead the day after a big snowstorm
The project would have to be built in four phases. First up was a super-high-tech, $13 million, 84,000-square-foot office and retail tower that was planned to break ground in early 2003. That time came and passed without any construction. Then the pricetag for the first phase was bumped up to $20 million, this time with a groundbreaking set for the end of 2003. Again, that time came and passed.
How the project would look if all the buildings in the area were painted gray.
A few years went by and it became clear that the massive complex wasn't happening, though it seems that no official announcement of the project's Dead-Ass status was made or what happened to that commitment from Citizen's Bank. Around 2005 or '06, TEC-CDC knocked down the idea to just one building that would be called the Plaza at Enterprise Heights. The Plaza is something that may actually be built, but the plans keep changing. The first Plaza plan was for a tall building that would have 160,000 square feet of condo units and 75,000 square feet of retail, with a 10,000-square-foot green roof. Erdy-McHenry did the design once again.
Those stupid barcode-looking window fenestrations will be the biggest scar of our architectural time period.
Then, in 2007, real estate listings started popping up for a 30,000-square-foot version of the Plaza with a totally different and much goofier-looking design. The address for this one would be 2 Farragut Street, and it was set for a 2008 completion date that would coincide with the renovation of the 46th Street (Farrugut Street!) El Stop.
What?
After that, the Plaza idea actually started to get some funding! In 2009, the city was able to secure $5.5 million for the project through a Section 108 loan and Brownfield Economic Development Initiative grant awards. In early 2010, the state was able to loan TEC-CDC $135,000 for the geothermal heating and cooling system for the new building (I told you it would be green as fuck). Finally, in September 2010, Gov. Ed Rendell's famous $4 billion going-away present to Philadelphia included $10 million for the Plaza at Enterprise Heights. By this point, there was yet another redesign, this time from Olaya Studio and PSZ Architects:
And now, time for something completely different.
It's at least nice that the Provident Mutual Life building's getting used for the police station. That building is too amazing to let sit vacant, and the police department deserves a regal as hell building for its headquarters.— thegreengrass- Actually, Farragut St. changes its name to 46th St. north of Market St., so the station's name is not entirely inappropriate.— littleguy
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