Francisville has grown by leaps and bounds in the last half decade, but some blocks in the neighborhood have remained in sad shape. Even Ridge Avenue, which has seen numerous new buildings sprout up in recent years, still has its share of blight and vacancy. A couple years ago, we drew your gaze to the 1400 block of Ogden Street which was notable in that it was almost entirely vacant, and wondered when someone would start redeveloping this block. We saw signs of life about a year ago, when developers had framed out a five-story building with three apartments and ground-floor parking at the southeast corner of 15th & Ogden. While the building has progressed considerably since then, it surprisingly doesn't appear to be totally done just yet.
But wait! What's that we see next door to the building!?! Could that be… construction?
Holy smokes, that's exactly what it is. A developer picked up 1436 and 1440 Ogden St. back in 2012, but they took their sweet time with these properties. Now they're well on their way to building a pair of duplexes. Will the units be offered for sale? For rent? Who knows.
On the north side of the block, another building went up in the last year, from different developers. This building is also a duplex and has two condo units, both of which are already under agreement. The bottom unit was listed for $310K and the upper unit for $360K. Perhaps this will encourage the developer across the street to follow the condo example.
You can see, there's still plenty of room for development on this block, with a busted up warehouse on the south side and many vacant lots on both sides of the street. Permits have been pulled for a pair of triplexes on the block, but others remain ripe for redevelopment. If the new duplexes on the block don't spur redevelopment, perhaps the upcoming renovation of the Metropolitan Opera House will have that effect. We shall see.