I probably prepared for three weeks back in 1994 or 95 for the arrival of Tom Lussenhop. I was the staff planner manning an "Office of Community Planning," a
project of Ira Harkavy's Center for Community Partnerships at Penn. Tom was the real deal, hired by Penn Executive Vice President John Fry to implement some of
the strategies we'd been crafting -- a Penn-assisted public school, a housing program, the upgrade of 40th Street, the University City District.
Tom was coming to Philadelphia by way of Newark, where he was instrumental in building the Regional Performing Arts Center; he was young, but slightly older than
I, caffeinated, and willing to work like the devil to implement strategies that would be a national model. He simply overpowered the reigning bureaucracy by force
of charm and a keen analytic sense. A midwesterner, Tom fell a little in love with Philadelphia and years later I would see him around town on his bicycle or
walking through Rittenhouse Square. He has proven his mettle in Philadelphia, building the first new construction residential building in University City (condos
at 43rd and Osage) since the 1970s and now, all things circling back to their origins, he's well on the way to building a hotel at 40th and Pine.
I like this project, a Hilton Homewood Suite designed by Sam Olshin of Atkin Olshin Schade with 120 units and a separate restaurant/bar, for a handful of important
reasons. First, as Tom mentioned to me, the
hotel is perfect transit-oriented development; its prime amenity is the 40th Street trolley portal a block away, where Septa runs 800-1,000 trolleys a day, a 12
minute ride to City Hall. It anchors that end of a critical retail district by adding density; it renovates a historic Italianate mansion, which has been in
disrepair for decades, while adding interesting height -- a slender 11 story tower. Importantly, it helps diversify the area's uses; nothing is more important for
the health of a city neighborhood. Finally, it's a hotel in just the place there ought to be one where there never is in Philadelphia; perhaps the small amount of
early opposition to this is a knee-jerk reaction against hotels in neighborhoods. (Ed. note: Unrelatedly, Bart Blatstein's Tower Investments has a boutique
hotel eyed for the dilapidated corner of 2nd & Poplar, catty-corner to Standard Tap.)
Well, the most interesting cities have a diverse lot of hotels in all different kind of places.
–Nathaniel Popkin
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