Architect renderings of the project (PZS Architects) on the 4700 block of Spruce Street.
UPDATE (6/19/25): The Department of Licenses and Inspections has ordered work at the site to stop until the developer obtains a building permit. The developer has until July 10 to obtain the permit, according to an “Order to Correct” issued June 6.
6/9/25: Demolition work has begun to make way for a 13-story apartment building with ground floor retail space on the 4700 block of Spruce Street, across from the Henry Lea School. The building will include 170 mostly studio and one-bedroom apartments and 28 underground parking spaces.
Zoned CMX-3, which allows residential and commercial uses without zoning variances, the project drew criticism during a May 2022 community meeting but developers were not required to implement design changes because of the zoning designation. The project has been on hold while an addition was being completed to the adjacent Garden Court Plaza complex.
The project went through the Civic Design Review process in August 2022. That process allows city planning staff and community members to make non-binding recommendations. See the hearing here (beginning at 6:10).
Crews began clearing out the one-story units along the 4700 block of Spruce Street.
Crews are currently preparing to demolish the row of one-story commercial buildings and the former auto repair shop along the south side of Spruce Street to make way for the project. The building will be adjacent to the community garden and tennis courts along Spruce.
A demolition permit was issued in May 2022 but expired in November of that year. A new permit has not yet been issued.
The building will include a lobby and commercial space on the first two floors.
Project developers chose to pay about $1.8 million into the city’s Housing Trust Fund rather than include affordable housing units in the building.
June 9th, 2025 at 8:11 pm
What did you learn about rents? Will there be affordable options or is this a luxury building?
June 9th, 2025 at 8:24 pm
This abandoned commercial strip, at the intersection of two bus routes, has long been underdeveloped. 170 new apartments would improve the vitality of the struggling neighborhood business community around 48th & Spruce.
The challenge, of course, will be to fill those units with actual tenants. There is a glut of new multi-unit construction in this part of West Philly, sparked by the education and science industries of University City, which have been popping in recent years and drawing new workers and residents. How well will they hold up in 2025 going forward, though? We will see.
June 9th, 2025 at 10:24 pm
Demolition started with no permits. There is serious threat to the tennis courts & community garden. The strip was never abandoned until developers purchased the buildings – then they became “abandoned” due to having no future. The neighborhood needs more diverse commercial. No studio & 1 Bedroom apartments with market luxury rents are needed.
June 12th, 2025 at 9:24 am
Community concern about the methods, prospects and impacts of any developer is always wise and often well founded. But for several years before the 4700 block commercial strip was vacated, its businesses were marginal. Empty and underused retail spaces mark the other side of 48th St. as well. Across West Philly, streetfront vacancies have climbed.
Neighborhood businesses cannot flourish without neighborhood residents. This is increasingly true as online shopping grows. The recent fire at 48th & Locust points out that large lots in Walnut Hill have lost residential occupants in recent years. Fewer shoppers = fewer stores.
Two-thirds of all Philadelphia households are either single persons or couples, so 1-bedroom homes are needed somewhere. Whether they are “luxury” or “affordable” is a complicated question that the nation is struggling with right now. But not building anything makes housing costlier at all levels.
June 12th, 2025 at 11:33 am
Folks should really think about how this news site doesn’t really get any engagement in the comments unless it is about housing. Why is it that the possibility of new neighbors that gets folks so animated?
June 13th, 2025 at 4:42 pm
These huge buildings are changing the character of University City/West Philly for the worse. They have no set back, no green space. This along changes the character. Leads in the neighborhood for fight for more greenspace/setbacks from the street, and smaller buildings. I was a resident of the neighborhood for 30 years.
June 13th, 2025 at 4:45 pm
Sorry for the typos in last post:
These huge buildings are changing the character of University City/West Philly for the worse. They have no set back, no green space. This, alone, changes the character. Current leaders in the neighborhood should fight for more greenspace/setbacks from the street, and smaller buildings. I was a resident of the neighborhood for 30 years. The worst example of this problem are the 4200 and 4100 blocks of Chestnut St.
June 14th, 2025 at 6:08 pm
Including affordable units in new construction apartment buildings should not be optional. Our city already has a severe shortage of affordable housing.
June 15th, 2025 at 8:35 am
This strip was purchased by the developers EIGHT YEARS AGO, and they are the ones who have been underdeveloping it, ignoring city code, creating ugly blight and health hazards. They did the same with the city parking lot at 49th and Spruce, filled it full of crap, rotting furniture and abandoned vehicles, were cited by the city for it, then portrayed themselves as “saving” the lot. The developers at 43rd and Baltimore also pushed this story. This intersection at 48th Spruce is not struggling, there are plenty of successful businesses there, which you would know if you actually went there and used them.
June 15th, 2025 at 8:38 am
Also – the developers are not *preparing* to demolish these buildings, they are actively demolishing them, without a permit, without securing the site (maybe a “homeless person” will will start living there and accidently set a fire?) etc.
June 18th, 2025 at 12:20 pm
Update: The demolition is illegal, and has been halted.
https://eclipse.phila.gov/phillylmsprod/pub/lms/download.aspx?PosseObjectId=882114107&hash=93FCE11D7C0ECACE835790C93215EF4F393C200695824B706B95D5A4A26A415F
There is a month for appeal, and presumably to get a demo permit.
July 21st, 2025 at 12:52 pm
Hi Susan, I’m glad you and your NIMBY views have left the neighborhood. People like you prevent Philly from becoming a better place to live.
July 24th, 2025 at 3:31 pm
Hi Susie Q, I’m glad you and your NKOTB views have left thee neighborhood. People like you prevent Philly from becoming a bolder place to live.
August 4th, 2025 at 12:45 pm
Why are so many crotchety old folks so adamant about preserving this “Community Character.” Literally every single time old heads complain, its a vacant or burned down lot that was abandoned over covid, or as is usually the case, it’s crumbling ruins that have sat vacant since the 80s. A perfect example of this is the complex being built over The King Arena lot on 45th and market. Do we all really enjoy empty concrete lots THAT much that we will sit a watch blocks crumble for 50 years and say “Now THIS is a community!”
What should go here instead? Build nothing and let’s all wait for lightning to strike unit on the block like on Locust! The Empty Lot and Barbequed Rubble enjoyers will love to see ANOTHER trash pit next door! There is no community without PEOPLE and there’s no people without HOMES and BUSINESSES!
Gripe about Penn all you want, but they tore down the civic arena and built chop over it, and now its one of the largest employers in the city. Build places to work, sleep, and eat. Enough with defending urban decay.
August 20th, 2025 at 5:29 pm
Now if they can do something about Big George at 52nd and Spruce that would be great.
August 23rd, 2025 at 6:50 am
Kanafa King – It’s actually the owners/developers caused the urban decay in the first place, after they bought these properties, moved businesses out, then let them fall apart, get covered in graffiti, trees growing out of them, left the old forecourt to become filled with trash, before they started demolishing them without a permit.
August 26th, 2025 at 8:27 am
Mick
the businesses that were there were in pretty bad shape already, dont blame the developers. And just look what goes on around that corner. Precisely at the 48th and Spruce corner, the fish place has been closed for over a year and the store vacant. On 48th, at both sides of Brewer Outlet, there are two stores vacant (one was used as for parties/events for a short while) . Across the street, in the Culinary Enterprises building the Honeysuckle store closed a while ago (they moved to N. Broad as I understand) and the place remains vacant. The other two restaurants on that building are open, but I dont see many people on them.