Not NIMBYs

The somnolent mutterers of Spruce Hill welcome responsible development.

by Magali Sarfatti Larson

The hero of Giuseppe di Lampedusa's novel, The Leopard, invoked by Nathaniel Popkin [Slant, "Strait Talk," Feb. 28, 2008], was speaking in the 1870s, much before abusive building had choked the Greek temples near his Agrigento. Sicily today is an exemplar of how out-of-control development can spoil natural beauty and artistic treasures in a country (my native Italy) that has plenty of both, but not much clout to enforce any planning. So, indeed, Sicily is close to Philadelphia: We do not have effective planning, either, and our antiquated zoning code is adjusted and violated case by case, depending on developers' power and the depth of their pockets.

For years we hoped that the University of Pennsylvania would do something with the property it bought in March 2003, instead of wishfully thinking that neglect would take care of the dilapidated mansion. Nothing was ever discussed with the community (who knows, those NIMBYs might have had something worthwhile to say!) and nothing was proposed, for the rule is top-down. Preoccupied with its expansion east, Penn was not going to invest much in the west. The unexploited property was left to a coalition of developers, and they have been trying to cram their Hilton Homewood Suites down the neighbors' throats since October 2007.

The project had emerged as a five-story building, on the premise that the mansion could surely be razed. But the city Historical Commission, disregarding the advice of its own architectural committee, traded the house's preservation for an 11-story slab, shoehorned in a most unsuitable parcel, eliminating all side, back and front yards. The property sits in the midst of two registered historic districts where the maximum height is 35 feet, while Tom Lussenhop's Hilton hotel requires 114. Developers, after all, must make the maximum amount of money. That is progress, Sicilian style.

In University City, Penn has built two high-rises and a large complex of expensive apartments on commercial corridors, and new campus buildings have redesigned our streets. We have not objected to the plethora of new buildings. We object to Lussenhop's out-of-scale block. Parking is not our "ersatz barricade," but the legitimate concern of people who live here; the developers shrug it away with evasive "best scenario" answers.

Popkin ignores our neighborhood's scale, the architectural monuments it contains, and the qualities we want to save. His idea of informing the public is repeating Lussenhop's self-serving point of view and then heaping contempt on "some neighbors" (more than 400 at this count) who are protesting a devastating intrusion. Popkin does the same for Tunisia, embracing the image promoted by her ambassador, whose job is to court foreign investors. He should get to know Sicily and Tunisia objectively, or at least take the trolley to West Philadelphia; we would be delighted to give him a tour of the somnolent community we are fighting for. It is not easy to fight David and Goliath battles, but we still call it democracy.

Magali Sarfatti Larson is a Berkeley-trained sociologist. Before accepting a chair at the University of Urbino in Italy, she taught for 20 years at Temple University. Now retired, she is active with the Open Borders Project in North Philadelphia. She was born in Italy and lived many years in South America and France.