When we recently checked out a new apartment building on the 1100 block of E Berks St., we predicted more development would soon be coming down the pike in this pocket. We mentioned the warehouse next door being for sale, so we figured that it would be the next victim, as it were. This was close but no cigar, as developers will soon present plans to the ZBA to redevelop the wedge shaped vacant lot just on the other side of Wildey St., next to I-95.
The project consists of five homes on the eastern half of 1032-34 E Berks St., with a surface parking lot and an existing billboard on the rest of the site. With four bedrooms, the homes will be a bit bigger than typical rowhomes, but they’ll have no basements. The houses will also each have private roof decks which should be tall enough to have some nice views of the city and the river, as long as residents don’t focus their attention too much to the dozen or so lanes of traffic to the immediate east.
While homes would be allowed by-right across the street and on the adjacent lots along Wildey Street that are currently used as garages, this parcel is zoned for industrial & commercial mixed-use. This means the developers will need approval from the ZBA to proceed with their residential project. The project will also require a few variances for insufficient landscaping and buffering between the infill development, the surrounding properties, and the Delaware Expressway.
New houses would be a return to how this corner was used in the past, before this block was sliced in half by the construction of the elevated highway. It seems like the heavier industrial zoning is a historic artifice from the use of the land by the Atlas Iron and Steel Company in the mid-20th century. Other than popping up in some newspaper coverage of bid-rigging down at the Philadelphia Navy Yard during WWII, the former factory’s legacy is otherwise pretty limited, which seems appropriate enough for a site that’s literally been covered over.
We’re betting zoning board members might have some questions about the desirability of new housing so close to the roar of all the cars and trucks speeding by only a few yards away, but considering this site has been unused for decades, we’d imagine the board will be sympathetic to this infill redevelopment proposal. Taking into account the odd dimensions of the site it seems unlikely a new industrial building would ever make sense here, which sounds like a hardship to us. With PennDOT pursuing their plan to widen I-95 in South Philly it’s at least a little bit of solace to see vacant land near the highway can eventually get redeveloped, even if it takes a couple generations.