Have you seen our new “Welcome to Passyunk Square” signs? We have installed 30 “Welcome to Passyunk Square” aluminum signs on key blocks throughout the neighborhood. Many thanks to board member Karin Morris for all her hard work on this project!

PSCA initiated the project based on the results of a neighborhood survey that found support for signage that provides an overall image for the neighborhood.

The signs will also serve to let residents know about the local civic association and its website: www.passyunksquare.org as well as mark the edges and entry points into the neighborhood.

We’re giving you a summer vacation from General Meetings for July and August, so we’ll see you in September with updates from our committees who have been busy working straight through these hot months to make Passyunk Square even better!  Speaking of committees, our 2012 Board of Directors and Committees have been announced:

BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Pam Zenzola, President
Angel D’Ippolito, Vice-President Outreach
Sarah Anton, Treasurer and Beautification Committee Co-Chair
Karin Morris, Secretary and Planning Committee Chair
Christine Knapp, Immediate Past President
Andrew Emma, Beautification Committee Co-Chair
Chris DiCapua, Parks Liaison
Ilene Wilder, Fundraising and Events Committee Chair
Carmela Fioretti, Trash and Recycling Committee
Cassie Knox, Communications Committee Chair

COMMITTEES
Beautification Clean-ups, plantings, banners, block efforts
co-chairs: Andrew Emma and Sarah Anton
Communications Public relations, external communication
chair: Cassie Knox
Zoning Monitoring zoning change requests
chair: John Digiulio
Outreach Giving every resident of the neighborhood a chance to become involved
chair: Angel D’Ippolito
Safety / Passyunk Square Town Watch
chair: Kim Davis
Trash & Recycling
chair: Carmela Fioretti
Planning Convening stakeholders to help choose what we want the area to look like in the future
chair: Karin Morris
Fund Raising/Sapling Program For association activities
chair: Ilene Wilder
Education Supporting schools in the neighborhood
chair: Open

A mix of stormwater trenches, sidewalk planters and rain gardens will be installed on various blocks in Passyunk Square, after a collaboration with the Philadelphia Water Department identified community members that were eager to see greening projects on their block.  The projects will help green and beautify the blocks, but will also help manage stormwater which can cause flooding and degrade our waterways.

The projects will be located on:
PASSYUNK AVE from REED ST to DICKINSON ST
10TH ST from REED ST to DICKINSON ST
12TH ST from DICKINSON ST to TASKER ST
12TH ST from REED ST to WHARTON ST
REED ST from 12TH ST to 13TH ST S
WASHINGTON AVE from 18TH ST to 19TH ST
19TH ST from WASHINGTON AVE to ELLSWORTH ST
ELLSWORTH ST from 18TH ST to 19TH ST
18TH ST from WASHINGTON AVE to ELLSWORTH ST
LINN ST from TASKER ST to 12TH ST S

PSCA is also participating in PWD’s RainCheck program, which will allow residents to split costs with PWD for green infrastructure improvements to their property that will help manage stormwater.

If you have ideas for other areas where a green stormwater management project could be conducted, fill out the Community Input form here www.phillywatersheds.org/CIF and also let us know by emailing contact@passyunk.org

We love it when other websites and blogs take notice of some of the great stuff happening in our neighborhood. The blog Naked Philly recently featured the renovation of 1131-1137 Wharton Street – the headquarters of the Passyunk Avenue Revitalization Corporation. PARC, who visited our civic association’s zoning committee last summer to get approval for this project, has moved their offices downstairs and activated the Titan Street side of the building, turning a gi-normous, blank, stucco wall into something kinda cool. On the second floor and in lofts above are now five luxury apartments.

Check out some other cool features mentioned in the Naked Philly post:

each of which will have an individual solar power array. On the first floor, each apartment will have its own parking space, as well as an electric car charging station, powered by each apartment’s solar unit.

Naked Philly includes some great before-and-after shots as well as the renderings for the eventual finished product. Give it a look.

As discussed at our May General Membership meeting, the full results of our Parking Issues survey have been compiled and available now for your reading pleasure. Click on the links below to open PDF files that summarize the statistical portion of the survey and compile the answers from the open-ended questions portion of the survey.

We are ALWAYS looking for feedback about problem parking areas in the neighborhood or other car/bike/pedestrian issues that need to be addressed. If you notice repeat offenses of parking in crosswalks, parking on sidewalks, blocking fire hydrants, blocking handicap ramps; if you know of any handicap parking spaces that are no longer being used by the person who originally requested them; or if you have any suggestions for how we can take care of some of our most persistent problems, please email parking (at) passyunk.org. All emails will be kept strictly confidential. We will use the information you give us to add to the list of problem areas that we will discuss with the police and for which we will request targeted enforcement.

Click here for graphs showing the results of the statistical portion of the survey.

Click here for a document that summarizes the open-ended questions about problem parking areas, obsolete handicap spaces and suggestions for improvements.

The new owners of the lot at 921-931 Ellsworth St. will close on the property within the next two weeks and construction will begin at the site during the first week of March.

At that time a fence will be erected around the site and parking will no longer be permitted at the lot.

Email contact@passyunk.org with any questions. For a quick reminder of what is planned for that site, click here to read some news about this project and get a link to the result of the Zoning Committee meeting at which this project was discussed.

Next meeting of Safe Streets, Healthy Neighborhoods will be at the Guerin Recreation Center at 1600 Jackson Street on Wednesday, February 1, 2012 from 6 PM to 8 PM.

At this meeting the Community Design Collaborative Design Team will be presenting preliminary designs for bike priority streets. These designs will include both short and long range plans for a typical residential block in South Philadelphia based on input they received from you in previous meetings. This is your last opportunity to provide input to guide the final plans.

Join members of the Combined South Philadelphia Civic Association Alliance in the auditorium of Saints John Neumann – Maria Goretti High School tonight at 6:30PM for a meeting and Q&A session with SEPTA senior management.

SEPTA Constituent Relations Coordinator Wendy Green-Harvey and Assistant Director of Transportation Michael Lyles will address issues relevant to schedules and ALL South Philadelphia routes. Mr. Lyles, along with many of his staff members, will field questions especially regarding pilot projects such as the 47 bus lines limited pick-ups.

The question was posed at the January General Membership meeting: What is the Passyunk Square Civic Association doing about vacant lots and abandoned properties in the neighborhood? Thankfully our area doesn’t have as much trouble with this issue as other neighborhoods. That doesn’t mean we’re completely free of them.

In order to even begin planning what we might do about this issue, we first need to get an idea of the scope of the problem. To do this we want to continue to get an inventory all the boarded up/vacant houses in the neighborhood. This is where you come in!
Continue Reading »