The past few weeks, we’ve been presenting you with lots of development action in the Spring Garden and West Poplar neighborhoods. For example, the new Spring Arts condos, the church that recently went under contract, and new homes on Mt. Vernon St. And we’re not done yet.

Four new single family homes are currently being worked on at 11th and Wallace Sts., with two new homes at 1102 and 1104 Wallace St. and two more at 1103 and 1105 Lemon St.

The four homes

Lemon St.

Wallace St. homes. There's the church we mentioned last week in the background!

The lots are owned by ADJ Property Investment LLC, according to the City’s Office of Property Adjustments (OPA) and were purchased for around $70,000 each last spring. A search for ADJ comes up bare, though in the OPA archive, it’s registered at two different addresses, 546 N 10th St., and a second in Bryn Mawr.

While the architectural elements of this project are definitely nothing to inspire the eye, unless brick row homes with garages and unimpressive cornices get your ornamental affinity wheeling, the construction is indicative of the rebuilding of a neighborhood.

In fact, in the past thirty-two months, in the area between 13th St., Spring Garden St., Broad St. and Percy St., there have been more than 49 lots transfers, according to local real estate agent and developer Lawrence Rust. Rust has been a principle or broker for 32 of those transfers. He defines those transfers as any transaction of a title even if the same lot has been bought, subdivided and resold.

That is just the case at 1102 and 1104 Wallace, which Rust acquired with his fellow members of Green Lots, LLC in October, 2010. The properties were subdivided to create 1103 and 1105 Lemon Street and later sold to ADJ.

“I live here,” said Rust. “I work here. I focus on this neighborhood. To me, [raising a neighborhood] is like farming. You plant the seeds, water it and pick the fruit when it grows.”

Rust credits much of the recent development and the rising neighborhood of what he referred to as “Chinatown north” to it being embraced by the residents and businesses in Chinatown. He also thinks that there is enough development in the area to make the area worthy of becoming a popular city neighborhood destination. Time will tell.

And if the city sells off all its vacant land in the area, it would certainly help.

–Lou Mancinelli