Turn back the clock a hundred years, and North Broad Street was one of the ritziest areas in Philadelphia, home to some of the fanciest mansions you’ve never seen. We say that of course, because many of those amazing buildings were demolished over the subsequent decades, as the shine came off gilded North Broad Street. The architecture in the surrounding neighborhoods generally paled in comparison to the homes on Broad Street, but across many sections of North Philadelphia, baseline design standards were still a cut above. Take, for example, the three buildings at 1512, 1514, and 1516 W. Girard Ave., which would fit in comfortably on a block near Rittenhouse Square. If the buildings were in Rittenhouse, however, they’d probably be in better shape.

1516 W. Girard Ave., the western building, has been used by the Guardian Civic League for a number of years, and is in the best condition of the bunch. 1514 W. Girard Ave. went the sheriff’s sale a couple years back, flipping to developers soon after. Those developers listed the property for sale for $850K earlier this year, but didn’t find interest at that price. There are active permits on the property for renovation as a seven-unit building, so figure that could move forward in earnest in the near future.

Renovations are already moving forward at 1512 W. Girard Ave., which developers bought for $400K back in 2015. When work is done, this will be a six-unit building which will surely target Temple students. When the building next door gets redone eventually, we assume the same target tenant population. Even if students don’t line up around the block for these units, three newish apartment buildings at the western end of the block would suggest that the owners won’t have to work too hard to get tenants.

In looking at these properties from the east, we couldn’t help but notice the sizable and barely used parking lot at the corner of 15th & Girard. The property is zoned CMX-3 and covers just under 10K sqft, so it absolutely qualifies as a very interesting development opportunity. Looking at public record, we see it’s owned by Core States Group LLC, not to be confused with the Philadelphia-based bank that was absorbed by First Union back in the day. Oddly, public record suggests that this group bought the property for a mere $40K, just last year, which does not sound right at all. After doing some considerable digging, we realized that this ownership was recorded in error by OPA, and actually relates to a property in North Philly. Whoopsie.

It appears that the parcel is actually owned by the Temple of Divine Love Church, located just down the block. We imagine the church uses this property for parking on Sundays, while collecting a little extra income from the billboards on the lot. We also don’t expect the church will be selling their parking lot any time soon, since parking isn’t exactly getting any easier in this part of town. So figure on this parking lot remaining exactly where it is for the foreseeable future, as suboptimal as that is from an urbanist standpoint.