As Point Breeze has experienced a significant wave of redevelopment over the last number of years, countless blocks have experienced major changes, generally swapping vacant land or blighted buildings for new construction. Among all these blocks, we’d nominate the 2000 block of Wharton Street as the one that’s experienced the most significant transformation in the neighborhood. You may recall, the block was once dominated by a pair of warehouses on its southern side. Both of those buildings were torn down a few years ago, with sizable residential developments tabbed to replace them. As you might expect, both projects are well down the road at this juncture.

The eastern project, located at 2010 Wharton St., started sooner and is therefore much farther down the pike. That project, designed by JKRP Architects, includes two rows of homes, with 11 homes on 20th Street and 11 homes on Woodstock Street. All of the 20th Street homes are finished and sold, and construction is now wrapping up on the Woodstock Street homes. In that second row, a few of the homes are already sold, with a couple more under contract. Look for construction to wrap up in the next couple months, and in case you’re interested in looking at one of the homes in the development, the current asking price is $635K.

Next door, at 2012 Wharton St., construction only got started within the last year. This project, also from JKRP, will eventually mean 46 new homes on the property, which stretches all the way down to Reed Street. While the homes are all the same at 2010 Wharton, this project offers some different floor plans, including a few 20′-wide homes with 2-car parking. Price points for these homes range from $605K for the sixteen footers, up to $740K for the jumbo homes. At this point, the first seven homes have been framed out, but look for additional homes to appear as the developers sell through the first phase.

68 new homes is no joke, and would represent a dramatic change for any block in Philadelphia. We can’t overstate the impact for this particular block though, as it transitions from industrial buildings to residential. For over a century, the buildings on these properties were bulwarks, separating the neighborhood from the Point Breeze Avenue commercial corridor. With the warehouses replaced by town homes, the 2000 block of Wharton has become much more walkable, making the trip to PB Ave. much more pleasant than in the past. Of course, the logical dovetail with this change would be the remapping of the commercial corridor, which we’re still hoping will happen sometime in the future. For now though, we’ll simply appreciate the new homes on this long industrial block.

Disclosure: 2010 Wharton is being developed by a subsidiary of OCF Realty, and 2012 Wharton is being developed by developers affiliated with OCF Realty. OCF is the parent company of Naked Philly, in case ya didn’t know.