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What’s the best way to revive Market East?
A 20-year tax abatement? Narrowing Market Street?
Maybe a Las Vegas-style Sphere covered with screens?
Business and political leaders held a lively discussion this week of some of those options and revealed a few actual improvements that will come to the struggling shopping district over the next few weeks and months.
A city advisory group led by Brandywine Realty Trust CEO Jerry Sweeney has been holding meetings to come up with a redevelopment strategy and policy recommendations for city officials, and is expected to issue a report by the end of the year.
In the meantime, as Mayor Cherelle Parker briefly mentioned in her budget address Thursday, the city and other entities are moving ahead with some short-term initiatives: retail pop-ups in eight vacant spaces on the 900 block of Market Street, outdoor murals at the Fashion District mall and other buildings, refurbished bus shelters and 42 new trees.
The projects are meant to “shift some momentum” on the corridor and “get things in order” before a surge of visitors hits the city for this year’s FIFA World Cup, celebrations of the nation’s 250th anniversary, the MLB All-Star game and other events, said Prema Gupta, CEO of the Center City District organization, which is helping organize the work.
“There is a high degree of retail vacancy on the corridor, and we think one of the ways that we can make an immediate impact — using the summer, frankly, as an excuse to kind of galvanize action — is incubating some local diverse businesses in those spaces,” she said at a CCD meeting Wednesday.
CCD said the retail spaces are in buildings owned by the Fashion District, Comcast, and Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment, owner of the 76ers, which had previously planned to build a new basketball arena on Market Street.
Comcast and HBSE have also put off controversial plans to demolish buildings on the 1000 block of Market, including the architecturally significant Robinson’s Building, the Philadelphia Business Journal reported. The companies had previously proposed using the resulting empty lot for a beer garden and other temporary attractions this summer.
Filling gaps on the street
HBSE’s development plan for the arena area had envisioned the company working with Macerich, owner of the Fashion District, to eventually demolish the low-rise strip of shops on the 900 block and build a large new development with retail spaces and hundreds of residential units.
In January 2025, the Sixers abandoned the arena project in favor of building a new South Philly arena with Comcast, while promising to continue supporting a Market East revival. The two companies subsequently spent $56 million to buy four sets of properties on Market between 9th and 11th streets.
Other than the proposal to demolish some of the properties, which drew criticism over fears of creating another long-term gap on a corridor already studded with parking lots, their intentions for the stretch have remained unclear.
A new vision for those blocks could be part of the report produced by Sweeney’s group, whose members include HBSE’s David Adelman and Comcast and Macerich executives. Redeveloping Market East will likely take years, however, and CCD and the city want to enliven and spruce up the dead zone at its heart in time for this summer’s big tourism season.
An installation by Cuban-Salvadoran artist Manuela Gillen will go up on the Fashion District’s exterior in the coming weeks, Gupta said. An abstract mural wall will be installed over the frontage on the Robinson’s building and a former Reebok store, according to a rendering in the CCD’s presentation Wednesday. Art will be added to the windows of the shuttered Giant Heirloom Market that occupied the former Strawbridge & Clothier building at 8th and Market.
Overall, works by eight local artists will cover about 5,500 square feet of frontage in at least 10 locations.
“We all know that Market East over-indexes on retail vacancy, and I think this will clean things up a little bit in advance of the summer and also show off some of our local creative talent,” Gupta said.
She also showed photos of retail spaces on the 900 block that HBSE, Comcast and Macerich have been renovating and whose use they will donate to local creatives and entrepreneurs. The names of the businesses have not been announced, but the photos showed stores selling art, clothing, and handmade pottery.
“Our purpose here really is filling gaps. We’re not necessarily trying to plant our flag in the ground. Candidly, the best-case scenario, some of these retail vacancies are leased up by a more permanent retailer,” Gupta said. “But while there is vacancy and while there are these opportunities, we’re trying to fill some of those gaps.”
The popups will open in May. Through a $1.85 million city grant, CCD has additionally been replacing and planting 42 new street trees, refurbishing four transit head houses and 21 bus shelters, and painting light and banner poles.
How to create an inviting strip
The CCD meeting included a panel discussion with Parker’s chief of staff Tiffany Thurman, City Councilmember Mark Squilla, Parkway Corp. CEO Robert Zuritsky and developer Josh Rosenbloom of Morningside Heights, which owns the Steele Building at 11th and Ludlow streets.
It was not clear from the conversation whether the closed-door meetings Sweeney’s group has been holding have yielded any concrete strategies yet. Squilla, who would have a key role in any legislation related to Market East, repeatedly mentioned the idea of a 20-year tax abatement, as well as two state programs — Tax Increment Financing and Keystone Innovation Zone tax credits — that can be used to spur development in targeted locations.
“All those conversations are being had now. It’s kind of hard to see what could work, what wouldn’t work. Is the 20-year abatement better than having a KIZ? We’re not sure yet,” he said.
He also noted that Fashion District owner Macerich has “a lot” of empty space they could sell off or convert into an entertainment, restaurant, or other use.
Thurman and the other panelists pointed to the ongoing success of the Christmas show in the former Macy’s building, at Market East’s western end near City Hall, and mused about the possibility of creating another attraction.
Zuritsky joked that the Goldenberg Group, owners of the notorious “Disney hole” site at 8th Street, were now planning to build a version of the Las Vegas Sphere there. “Something that is exciting, that draws people in the evenings and the weekends, would be an amazing thing for that corridor,” he said.
Rosenbloom praised a project in Old City, now nearing completion, that is narrowing the east end of Market to expand space for pedestrians and cyclists. He suggested that something similar could be done for the rest of the corridor, perhaps initially by blocking off one lane of the road to make room for cafe seating or vendor stalls.
“What do we do for East Market as a whole, right now? Move as quickly as possible to get something done,” he said. “Then you let the creativity of people in the private sector, the development world, the arts world, let all those people unleash their creativity on the canvas of the city.”
Thurman said she and other administration officials have been visiting and checking out downtown revival efforts in other cities, including Denver, where $100 million is being spent on a series of housing and redevelopment projects. Such projects aim to make city centers more inviting for residents and workers, not just a destination for restaurantgoers and visitors, she said.
Denver is “really one of our proof of concepts,” Thurman said. “It is people spending their money and dwelling there, even beyond those dining experiences.”