Monday, September 24, 2007

Delaware River Waterfront Trail?

A video presentation by Center City District CEO Paul Levy envisions a short term temporary waterfront trail along the Delaware River Waterfront from the Ben Franklin Bridge to Pier 70 (Wal Mart).

The plan conceived by the Center City District and the William Penn Foundation would use existing pavement and paint, traffic cones and jersey barriers. If agreements with landowners can be reached the planphilly.org website suggests it could be open before the summer of 2008.

A higher quality path that would take out an existing lane of Columbus Blvd was rejected by PENNDOT.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Wow, that would be fantastic. What kind of concessions to the land owners are we talking about? I make that distance at about 2 miles, but looking at the aerial photos south of Pier 70, it looks like it would be impossible to extend it further south along the waterfront. I wonder if PennDot would be willing to give up some road south of Pier 70.

Anonymous said...

I fail to see how this will bring revenue to the city, just good for bikers and hikers. How do you get tourists etc to go to the waterfront when there is nothing on Penns Landing to see except a poor seaport museum and a few old ships. No central activity on Penns Landing even the festivals are poorly attended.

Anonymous said...

Wah Wah. This is why nothing ever changes in Philadelphia because people like the above don't see any benefits to something that they likely won't use. It's always about how it affects them personally. Get over yourself. There are thousands of walkers, hikers, and bikers in this city but you apparently can't see beyond your own self interests. This is a start in the right direction to reclaiming a decrepit waterfront that politicians and private interest developers have let decline for decades.

Anonymous said...

I agree that something is better than nothing, and I also think Rome was NOT built in a day. Build this current bike path, but also be aware that more needs to be done in the future. After you build it, then pressure people to make sure that tourists downtown do get good links and digns pointing to the waterfront.