Penn Center is the heart of

Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...

central business district A central business district (CBD) is the Commerce, commercial and business center of a city. It contains commercial space and offices, and in larger cities will often be described as a financial district. Geographically, it often coincides wit ...

. It takes its name from the nearly five million square foot office and retail complex it contains. It lies between 15th and 19th Streets, and between John F. Kennedy Boulevard and Market Street. It is credited with bringing Philadelphia into the era of modern office buildings.

History

In 1881, the

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad ( reporting mark PRR), legal name as the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, also known as the "Pennsy," was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. At its ...

brought passenger service into the center of the city, and constructed the first Broad Street Station just west of

City Hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...

. The sea of iron pillars holding up the PRR's elevated trackbed was replaced in the 1890s by a 10-block stone

viaduct A viaduct is a specific type of bridge that consists of a series of arches, piers or columns supporting a long elevated railway or road. Typically a viaduct connects two points of roughly equal elevation, allowing direct overpass across a wide ...

to the

Schuylkill River The Schuylkill River ( , ) is a river in eastern Pennsylvania. It flows for U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map(). accessed April 1, 2011. from Pottsville, Pennsylvania, Pottsville ...

. This created a block-wide barrier known as ''The Chinese Wall'', cutting the western portion of the city in half and discouraging development there. At the time, most commercial activity in Center City was east of Broad Street, which is why the

SEPTA SEPTA, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, is a regional public transportation authority that operates bus, rapid transit, commuter rail, light rail, and electric trolleybus services for nearly four million people througho ...

Market-Frankford Line The L, formerly known as the Market–Frankford Line, is a rapid transit line in the SEPTA Metro network in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The L runs from the 69th Street Transit Center in Upper Darby, just outside of West Philad ...

has no stops between

30th Street Station 30th Street Station, officially William H. Gray III 30th Street Station, is a major intermodal passenger transport, intermodal transit station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The station opened in 1933 as Pennsylvania Station– ...

and

15th Street 15th Street may refer to: * 15th Street station (SEPTA), an American rapid transit station in Philadelphia * 15th Street – Prospect Park (IND Culver Line), a local station on the IND Culver Line of the New York City Subway * Fifteenth Street, a ...

. The stations at 19th Street and 22nd Street are served by SEPTA Subway-Surface Trolley Lines. In 1925, the Pennsylvania Railroad announced its intention to leave Broad Street Station, freeing the land for redevelopment. The railroad, which had both outgrown the station and was operationally burdened by its stub-end nature, would move its operations to the newly constructed

and

Suburban Station Suburban Station is an Art Deco office building and underground commuter rail station in Penn Center in Philadelphia. Its official SEPTA address is 16th Street and JFK Boulevard. The station is owned and operated by SEPTA and is one of the t ...

. Those stations were completed and in operation by 1933, but a number of factors, including the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

which stalled the planned redevelopment, forced the railroad to continue utilizing Broad Street Station for certain types of trains (such as the Philadelphia-New York " Clockers", and steam-powered trains of the

Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines The Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines was a railroad that operated in South Jersey in the 20th century. It was created in 1933 as a joint consolidation venture between two competing railroads in the region: the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Rea ...

) for nearly two more decades. Broad Street Station was not completely vacated until 1952, during the term of Mayor Joseph S. Clark. Plans for the demolition of the Chinese Wall and accompanying train station were finalized and both were razed in 1953. Ed Bacon, executive director of the Philadelphia City Planning Commission, came up with a master plan for a four-block area to be cleared. Bacon named the new site Penn Center with the hopes that it would become a business center and model for future development. His plan for the redevelopment of the site included three large office towers, a pedestrian mall, and an underground concourse where retail and business was to be located. He picked architect Vincent Kling to design most of the buildings over

Louis Kahn Louis Isadore Kahn (born Itze-Leib Schmuilowsky; – March 17, 1974) was an Estonian-born American architect based in Philadelphia. After working in various capacities for several firms in Philadelphia, he founded his own atelier in 1935. Whil ...

, another possible contender. The Pennsylvania Railroad wanted to sell the land off in smaller lots for piecemeal development, but Mayor Clark used his political clout to see that Bacon's plan was realized. The plan was implemented with public support, but it would come into criticism later from urban planners, and notable journalist

Jane Jacobs Jane Isabel Jacobs (''née'' Butzner; 4 May 1916 – 25 April 2006) was an American-Canadian journalist, author, theorist, and activist who influenced urban studies, sociology, and economics. Her book ''The Death and Life of Great American Ci ...

for placing vibrant urban activity underground leaving no use for the above ground promenade, and failing to account for actual human usage of the space. Throughout the mid-to-late 20th century, the city's office sector began to move west into the Penn Center area, thanks to planning efforts. As the office-working population became more

suburb A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

anized, convenient access to

began to take precedence to city planners over local city transit access. Today, the Penn Center name is officially attached to 11 mid- and highrise office buildings. Most of the buildings of the complex are connected to the Suburban Station retail concourse (renovated in 2007) and by extension the Center City Concourse. The buildings share a loading and delivery entrance on Commerce Street which connects to all the buildings underground. Although not part of Penn Center, the

Comcast Center Comcast Center, also known as the Comcast Tower, is a skyscraper at 1701 John F. Kennedy Boulevard in Center City, Philadelphia, Center City Philadelphia. The 58-story, tower is the List of tallest buildings in Philadelphia, second-tallest bui ...

connects to the concourse; such an option was also examined for the canceled American Commerce Center.

Buildings

The numbers of the Penn Center buildings generally radiate clockwise around One Penn Center, the oldest building. John F. Kennedy Boulevard, on which many Penn Center buildings front, was known as Pennsylvania Boulevard until 1964, after the

assassination of John F. Kennedy John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, was assassinated while riding in a presidential motorcade through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas, on November 22, 1963. Kennedy was in the vehicle with his wife Jacqueline Kennedy Onas ...

References

Geographic location

External links

'Developmentally Disabled'
a Philadelphia Weekly article that discusses the history of planning in Philadelphia and specifically addresses Penn Center

a history of LOVE park that discusses Penn Center

a history of the development of Penn Center containing many historical photographs {{Philadelphia Neighborhoods in Philadelphia Center City, Philadelphia Logan Square, Philadelphia Market Street (Philadelphia)