Fill This Front: Convention Center Parking Facility

1324 Arch Street

YELLOW!!!!!!!!!111eleven

                      This'll be another quick Fill This Front considering that this storefront has only existed for a little over a year, so there's no history to talk about. Nonetheless, there's little reason that this nice, brand new, gigantic storefront space has sat empty for this fucking long. Let's get something in there!
                    This space is located in the butt-fugly $27 million parking facility recently built by Berwyn-based Realen Properties in anticipation of a hotel conversion of 101 North Broad that'll probably never happen. Sure, its a little out of the way from both Broad Street and the entrance to the Convention Center (which is always the corner of 12th/Arch even though it has like 5 million doors) and there's a bunch of homeless services/mental health stuff/halfway houses/methadone clinics nearby... but when there's a convention going, there's tons of people passing through this block! Also, the Courtyard Marriott and Home2Suites (which was able to fill 2/3rds of its fronts instantly) are nearby.
                  On top of that, get this: there's very little the way of NIMBYs here. The closest residential homeowners are over at the other side of 13th Street... across the street is the Great Wall of Pennsylvania and directly next to it are a women's shelter, a church, and the back of the Masonic Temple. Therefore, if you can get the right kind of license, you could put the kind of shit here that would normally get railed against by Heroes of NIMBYdom. Since conventional retail/food stuff obviously isn't interested in the spaces, try something else out... A nightclub. A small concert venue (its bigger and has a higher ceiling than the Unitarian Church basement). A 24-hour drunkfood restaurant (an entire American city's restaurant scene depends on this and Philly used to have them in droves). The whole thing is 16,256 square feet, but I'm sure that's splittable considering there's a three doors on the front.

The floor plan from Loopnet

                    There's a lot of possibilities. The space is managed by CBRE Fameco... here's the listing. The rent is "negotiable" so after this long you can offer like 6 farthlings and you'll be just fine.FILL THIS FRONT!!

Rendering by Erdy McHenry of what the retail would look like if it was filled and if your named you store "Retail". I wish the real garage looked as good as this.

             ....and while we're on the subject of storefronts, check out the Community Design Collaborative's Storefront Challenge 2014!