Urban Warrior | Warming trend around Tribune offices?
SPRING begins this week, and the thaw between the Philadelphia Tribune and its Center City neighbors is under way. The newspaper has long angered residents near its headquarters by claiming almost every parking space on the 500 block of South 16th Street.
SPRING begins this week, and the thaw between the
Philadelphia Tribune
and its Center City neighbors is under way.
The newspaper has long angered residents near its headquarters by claiming almost every parking space on the 500 block of South 16th Street.
Those spots are marked with "Press Only" signs, meaning only the paper's staff can park there from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday.
In the densely packed neighborhood, parking is at a premium.
Mayor Street's staff has refused to get involved in the issue, despite pleas and petitions from the neighbors. But Street's press office inadvertently broke the ice by meeting my request for a roster of press parking spaces in the city.
That roster shows that the Tribune has 17 press spaces, second-highest in the city. Only the media trio of CBS3 (KYW-TV, Channel 3), KYW (1060-AM) and WYSP (94.1-FM) has more, with 19.
The Philadelphia Gay News and Philadelphia Weekly each have three press spaces, the City Paper has six, and the Philadelphia Business Journal has two. Neither the Daily News nor the Inquirer has any designated press spaces.
The Tribune started rethinking its parking after I gave the paper a copy of the roster.
Dick Carroll, the paper's attorney, spent some time on the street last week and measured 13 press parking spaces. That was enough to prompt him to call the attorney for the Center City Residents Association to set up a meeting to discuss the issue.
Tribune CEO Robert Bogle, it turns out, didn't even know the press spaces were reserved on Saturdays, when, neighbors complain, they go mostly unused.
That may be the first area where the paper gives ground.
"That, at least, is an indication that
we're starting to bend somewhat," Carroll told me last week.
Marcia Wilkof, a Democratic committeewoman and Tribune neighbor who has been active in the parking issue, was stunned to hear about the thaw on Friday.
"We'd be delighted to talk with them and come to some arrangement that works for the neighbors and the paper," Wilkof said.
An end to hostilities has been a long time coming.
The newspaper recently asked the Zoning Board of Adjustment for a variance to allow part of a rowhouse it owns on South 16th Street to be converted to offices.
The neighbors responded with the classic ZBA triple threat.
First they circulated a petition, signed by 56 people living around the newspaper, opposing the request for the variance.
Then they got the backing of the Center City Residents Association, which opposed it, too.
Finally, they got a letter of support from City Council President Anna Verna. The Tribune is in Verna's Council district.
The zoning board heard it all on Jan. 30, and less then a month later gave the Tribune its variance.
Board chairman David Auspitz, well-known for urging zoning applicants to cooperate with community forces, said the board had "total respect" for what the neighbors were saying, but had to decide the case on its merits.
"We were not delving into the parking situation," he said. "We were delving into the land use of that building and the impact on the surrounding neighbors."
History supports Auspitz when he says the board can't influence the Tribune parking issue.
In 1995, the neighbors agreed to another Tribune request for a zoning variance with a proviso that they be able to share some of the 16th Street parking.
David L. Cohen, chief of staff to then-Mayor Ed Rendell, nixed that deal, saying the neighbors "improperly tried to leverage" the variance to get parking and that the zoning board had no power to enforce the deal, according to a letter Cohen sent to Verna then.
With Street's staff now unwilling to take up the issue, it's an excellent sign that the neighbors and the Tribune will try to settle their problems together. *
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