Risky Business

I don't get to Allentown too often... somehow it just worked out I happened to get there twice in the same month. Camden takes about the same amount of time for me to get to and is a much worse place, yet I wind up there much more often. Lucky you gets to see both of them in today's post.

Arco/Sunoco, Coopersburg, PA

This former Arco was sold to Sunoco in the 80's, but closed as a corporate-owned location in the 2000's. It reopened as a franchise in 2008, but without the service center. Interestingly, they didn't bother trying to expand the convenience store into the space, and it still sits empty.

Wawa/El Tipico, Allentown, PA

I was super excited about this find, an almost perfectly preserved 60's Wawa! It even still has the lantern-shaped roadside sign, which as far as I'm aware is the only one left in existence. I'm not sure of the exact history of this location, but seeing how there's an early 2000's Wawa nearby there's a couple ways it could have played out. The first option, which I think is most likely, is that they relocated to a new store at some point in between, and replaced it a second time with the current store. Another option is this could have been closed without replacement, then Wawa returned to the area later. The third option, which I think is extremely unlikely, is that they stayed here making zero updates to the building until the current one opened.

Yocco's, Emmaus, PA

The Emmaus Yocco's opened its doors in 1983 as the chain's third location. They are supposedly the best hotdogs in the state, and so far I have to agree as I have yet to find one better. The interior hasn't been updated since they opened, but that's a good thing in this case.

Wawa, Gilbertsville, PA

Sorry for the terrible picture. This Wawa opened in 2015 as part of a large development on former farmland, but so far has been the only part built.

Inside, it's got the earlier version of their current look.

Fields/Kmart/Target, Devon, PA

I stopped by here once again now that the asbestos removal barriers were gone. It looks like ripping out the back wall and floor tile was the extent of the interior work. Kmart must have replaced the ceiling tiles at some point with a non-asbestos variety.

I was kinda surprised to see how intact it was. Even the security sensors are still standing by the doors!

The front awning was another story. They ripped out all the ceiling and wallboard, but left the structure for the time being. Once work really got underway, this entire thing came down.

Cherry Street, Logan Square
This area's one of my favorite parts of Center City. It has a pretty intact and well-maintained collection of 1870's rowhomes, but is surrounded on three sides by the tallest buildings in the city.

Hampton Inn, Chinatown

The area surrounding the Convention Center is stuffed to the gills with hotels. This is one of the newer ones, having been opened in 1999. Most in the area opened earlier in the decade alongside the center.

Travelodge/Days Inn, Chinatown

Conversely, this is one of the older ones. It was built sometime around 1900. I don't have a good history on its uses over the years, like whether or not it was always a hotel, but by the 90's it was home to a Travelodge. It rebranded to Days Inn in 2013. They made some improvements to de-uglify the building, but that only went so far.

Chinatown Garage, Chinatown

As you could probably guess from its appearance, this began life in the 1920's as an industrial building. Sometime around 1980, it was gutted out and turned into a parking garage. Despite having been used this way for so long, if you look closely you can still see adhesive left over from the old ceiling tiles inside. Center City's lost a number of parking garages in recent years to new development, but I have a feeling this will be different. Since it was formerly an occupiable building and loft apartments are in vogue now, if the parking garage ever goes away I could see it being kept and turned into apartments.

Chinatown

While for the most part Chinatown was built prior to the arrival of the first Chinese immigrants, a few of the buildings have been renovated by them to a more ethnic look. The more ornate buildings here both originally would have looked like the rowhome in between them.

Here's another instance of that. It really is an interesting blend of styles. The building partially seen on the left is newer, and took a more postmodernist interpretation of the Chinese style. Unfortunately that one has since been knocked down for a new building and I don't think I have any pictures of it in its entirety.

Joy Tsin Lau was yet another example of it in addition to being one of Chinatown's most iconic restaurants. Unfortunately, a bad night in 2019 resulted in several patrons being hospitalized with severe food poisoning (Temple University's law school happened to be having a group dinner there). Over 100 people fell ill. It permanently closed not long after that. 

On the complete opposite end of the spectrum is this midcentury modern law office in the neighborhood. It's surrounded by parking lot, so something tells me a developer is waiting for the chance to snatch it up.

Ben Franklin Bridge

I had recently learned about the walkway on here and wanted to give it a try. There's some good views from up here!

There were tunnels under either end of the bridge. Philly's side still gets use as a roadway, while Camden's has been blocked off. That's understandable considering Camden is the country's #1 city in terms of violent crime per capita. We're only looking at the nice part of town today, but why don't you take a moment appreciate the risks I take for you anyway. (That's sarcasm by the way. I'd still be doing stupid stuff like this even if I weren't taking pictures.)

Rutgers University, Camden, NJ

Camden is home to a satellite campus of Rutgers, New Jersey's Sate College. They've contributed a number of new buildings, such as this one. This went up in 2012 on a mostly vacant lot and is one of the nicer buildings in town.

Rutgers has also fixed up a number of once-abandoned historic buildings along Cooper Street. I really like the one on the right here, which was saved in 2009.

Across the street, they had another work in progress. It had been abandoned well over a decade by the time Rutgers began restoring it in 2018. It appears to be student apartments now.

Victor/RCA Building, Camden, NJ

This complex was first developed by the Victor Talking Machine Company in 1915 as their headquarters and manufacturing plant. RCA bought them in 1929, and kept this in operation until 1984. The complex sat abandoned for several years, until finally everything except the five buildings protected by the historic register were torn down. Plans were to convert the two high-rise factory buildings to condos during the early 2000's redevelopment push. One of them opened in 2003, the other began work in 2009 but was stopped for the recession and never completed. As for the other three buildings, the office tower was the Camden School District's offices until recently. It's being converted to something else currently. There were also two warehouses which were marketed as loft offices. One is still for lease, while the other was finally allowed to be demolished as part of the office tower restoration project.

Another Old TV!

The last sidewalk find TV I posted here seemed to go over well, so here's another! This one looks a bit older than the last one. I'd guess 70's but if you know better please tell me in the comments!

And how about an old Volkswagen too? These cars are collector's items at this point, but seeing where it is and the shape it's in I have to wonder if it's just somebody's old rustbucket. Neither would surprise me in this part of town.

Warner/Rite Aid, Camden, NJ

Rite Aid bought this store from Warner in 1973 and likely redid the exterior of it not long after. It was replaced by a new store a few blocks down in the mid-90's, and became offices for some sort of charitable organization. They haven't done much to it, the Rite Aid interior is still structurally intact and the labelscar is still visible on the front 25 years after they moved out.

White Tower, Camden, NJ

I thought this place was a KFC at first, but as it turns out it was actually one of fast food pioneer White Tower's last store designs. This one opened in the early 70's, shortly before the company imploded. I'm assuming Camden Seafood and Deli took the reins by the end of the decade. 

City Hall, Camden, NJ

The present Camden City Hall was built in 1929 and caps out at a height of 371 feet. It's the tallest building in the Philly region outside the city limits. Camden is not a particularly large city, but the reason this building is so massive is that it also holds the county's offices too. The need for city government space has shrunk over the years as Camden has shed nearly half its peak population, but more offices were consolidated into here in 2011 when another city office was torn down.

Campbell's Field, Camden, NJ

The centerpiece of Camden's early 2000's waterfront redevelopment was a baseball stadium named for the most famous brand to call the city home, Campbell's Soups. The Riversharks, a minor league team, called this one home until the franchise folded in 2015. After much deliberation, the decision was finally made to demolish the stadium. It came down in late 2018.

The Castings, Old City

To be totally honest, this building's present use is a mystery to me. A Google search for The Castings brings up a condo building next door, but obviously this circa-1900 foundry isn't a condo. It looks nice, whatever it is. It fronts a very narrow street, so its easy to miss.

Elfreth's Alley, Old City

This tiny street is credited as being the oldest intact block in the city. The houses currently standing here date from between 1703 and 1836, though the majority fall towards the earlier end of that range.

While two of the units are open as museums now, the rest are still privately owned and occupied houses.

Crab Lamp

These lights fronted DiNardo's Crab House in Old City, which was one of the city's most famous seafood restaurants. Sadly, they closed in mid-2018 after 42 years in business. The space is currently vacant. They took the Crab lamps with them, too.

The Roundhouse, Old City
Some love it, some hate it. It's the Police Administration Building, which opened in 1963. The PPD has outgrown its need for the space, and is currently working on renovating the old Inquirer Building closer to City Hall into their new digs. There isn't any set plan for this building, but chances are the city's going to try selling it off. The neighborhood's very divided opinions of it make it hard to guess what will happen to it. Personally, I like it but I can see where its critics come from. It seems to have support of the historic preservation community, who can probably successfully fight off any demolition proposals.

Hahnemann University Hospital, Logan Square

Hahnemann first opened its doors as a teaching hospital in 1885, and has been at this location since the 1920's. It was bought up as part of the Allegheny Health System in the 90's, which quickly fell apart after going into bankruptcy. Drexel University bought the medical school, and Tenet Health bought most of Allegheny's Philly-area hospitals. Tenet had closed or sold all but Hahnemann and St. Christopher's Hospital by 2018. They were both sold in 2018 to a new owner, who went bankrupt under a year later thanks to Hahnemann losing over a million dollars a week. They ultimately sold St. Chris to Drexel, and shut down Hahnemann. This was met with a ton of resistance, as they primarily served lower-income patients (and Gerald Ford after his 2000 RNC stroke). Bernie Sanders held a rally to save it, even. It shut down by the end of Summer 2019 nevertheless. Currently Drexel still uses the classroom portion, though that too will vacate once they complete their new medical schools on the main campus and in Reading. Chances are this will come down for new development eventually.

Rex Pizza, Logan Square

Is it just me, or do old Pizzeria's seem to have a fondness for brick arches like that? They've also always got really good pizza too. This one's been on my list for a while.

 Since we were in Jersey today, let's go with one of their best musicians. I recently found out he did this one first, not Dave Edmunds (who also has a fantastic version). I stand by my belief that originals are always better than covers.