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PHILAPHILIA Empty Lot of the Week: West Market's Reliable Surface Lot
With the Forum closed, there's been talk of redevelopment on a forgotten stretch of Market Street. But it looks like things will get worse before they get better.
PHILAPHILIA Empty Lot of the Week: West Market's Reliable Surface Lot
A weekly series of foul-mouthed investigations into empty lots, dead-ass proposals and other design phenomena in Philadelphia. Find more stories like this at Philaphilia.blogspot.com.
2116-2124 Market St. -- Oh, West Market Street in Center City. What did you do to deserve such a horrible existence? How has development passed you by lo these many years? How did you miss out on all the development that surrounds you? Why are you more empty now than you were in 1850?
The 2100 and 2200 blocks of Market Street are pieces of shit ... and they've been that way for a loooooooong time. Even 100 to 150 years ago, it was nowhere you wanted to be. This empty lot, stuck in the middle of the shitbaggishness, is one of several in the immediate area, but it's the newest and saddest. In the ancient past, this lot consisted of a coal yard and a single row house at 2120 Market St. that had a row of trinities behind it. By 1875, houses filled the rest of the site except for at 2116-2118 Market, where a small industrial building filled the space.
By time the 20th century rolled around, the predecessor to the fire station that sits immediately to the east of this lot had been established. Some of the houses became small commercial buildings with storefronts. The industrial building, known as the Estate of Stewart Maloney, started its journey as a series of car factory/dealerships.
In 1909, the Philadelphia Fire Insurance Patrol opened their third station at 2122 Market (not to be confused with the fire station at 2110 Market). Fire Insurance Patrols were something every major city had in the olden days. They would come in after a fire to prevent further damage to a structure caused by the putting-out of the fire itself. The main goal was to reduce the amount of insurance claims due to fires in commercial buildings and valuable residences. They were phased out in the latter half of the 20th century, but NYC's Fire Insurance Patrol lasted all the way up to 2006.
The lot in 1908. The old fire station is to the left. The industrial building is immediately next to it, then the row of houses-turned-businesses. The Fire Insurance Patrol Station No. 3 is the fancy-looking building in the middle. It was just finishing construction at this point. Picture from PhillyHistory.org, a project of the Department of Records.
By the 1920s, all the houses on the row were gone. Either they were replaced with commercial buildings or altered beyond recognition as a house. The Stewart Maloney Estate industrial building was expanded upward in 1914 based on designs by the Ballinger firm. It would continue being used as different auto factory/dealerships until 1936. That was the year that the Benn Family's famous furniture store first moved onto the block to start its 58-year reign as the ultimate dick-kicking discount furniture store of the region.
A sequel to the Reliable Furniture Company started by the Benn Family patriarch, Nate Ben's Reliable became a famous discount furniture store that was super popular despite never advertising for its entire existence. Rich and poor alike were served by Nate Benn's. Sightings of famous local athletes, up to and including Wilt Chamberlain, were a common occurrence. The business became so successful that, by the 1970s, the family owned most of this block and large portions of the 2200 and 2300 blocks of Market.
In 1990, the Benn brothers were convicted of stealing more than $1 million of sales-tax revenue over the course of at least 20 years. Nate Benn himself died before doing any time, but his two younger brothers were in state correctional facilities for 2.5 years (not bad considering they each faced a 563-year sentence). The store declared bankruptcy in April 1993 and manage to stayed open until December 1993, surviving the march of skyscrapers down Market in the late '80s and early '90s.
After the store closed, the Benn properties were purchased by STB Investments in U.S. Bankruptcy court for a total of $4 million with the intention of making room for a future skyscraper. The Zoning Board of Adjustments approved the demolition of the old Benn properties on the 2100 block (except their appliance store at 2106-2108 Market, still standing) and this empty lot was born.
If you think this lot is crappy now, it was supposed to be a lot worse. STB's original plan was to move Les Gals to the former Nate Benn's Reliable Appliance Store space at 2106-08 Market and knock down even more buildings to create an even bigger lot that would have filled most of the block. They tried to convince the city to move the fire station to where the Forum Theater is located, but failed.
This lot was only supposed to last 5 years, but has managed to last 19. Both hope and fear are in the future of this space. This last month, lots of rumblings and rumors started to swirl based on the fact that the Forum Theater and Les Gals (both in buildings that were owned by the Benns) closed on Nov. 30. According to an Inquirer article published a couple of weeks ago, STB Investments and their financial backer Richard Basciano are starting to talk development again for this location. The problem is: this lot is going to get worse before it gets better. Now that Les Gals is gone, the idea of demolishing it and the building next door for surface parking is back on the table.
Therefore, it's very likely that this lot will be growing even larger. STB won't be able to develop anything here until they get ownership of a few more properties on the block and get that firehouse moved (which Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Alan Greenberger has already stated will probably never happen). Therefore, look forward to a larger and more long-term surface lot for this block. Fuck.
Hopefully, I'm wrong about that. Maybe the larger surface lot will be temporary and modern construction will hit this block for the first time in 50-plus years (when the fire station was replaced with a modern facility). Development of this block will bring the city one step closer to bridging the gap between 30th Street Station and the West Market Central Business District, something that should have happened 80 fucking years ago.
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