Single-family home at 4606 Spruce St.
A four-story single-family old Victorian house on the 4600 block of Spruce Street has new owners, who are proposing to convert it to a multi-unit property. The Garden Court Community Association’s zoning committee is hosting a community meeting on Thursday, May 26, at the property in question – 4606 Spruce Street.
The owners have proposed to convert the building to include: a professional office on the first-floor front; single-family apartment in the first-floor rear; and three units on the second through fourth floors. The 3,360-square-foot 6-bedroom house was built in 1909.
Many community organizations in the area have been reluctant to support proposals to convert single-family homes into multi-family buildings.
The meeting will begin at 7 p.m., and attendees are asked to bring folding chairs, as seating will be limited.
May 25th, 2016 at 6:38 pm
NOOOOOOOO!!! This house is spectacular and has been lovingly maintained with it’s historical charm as the driving force. If they wanted multi-units, they should have bought a multi-unit building. Don’t destroy this beautiful work of art!
May 25th, 2016 at 6:39 pm
*its – sorry grammar geeks
May 25th, 2016 at 7:25 pm
I wish they would reconsider. I hate to see another beautiful historic home striped. I wish more folks would restore versus commercially renovate. Unfortunately there’s not enough money in that…..
May 25th, 2016 at 10:46 pm
So the idea is to go from a single family building to a four family plus a commercial use building. Why is this even being considered? Why even have a meeting? Who are these new owners and why did they buy a single family home if what they really want is an apartment house.
Just say no. Otherwise we might as well just knock everything down and bring in the multi story trailers.
May 25th, 2016 at 11:58 pm
Where is the meeting? Sorry, I didn’t see the location of the meeting, just the house in question.
May 26th, 2016 at 9:51 am
I don’t see anywhere that they say they want to knock it down. I’ve lived (apartments) and worked in several large west philly homes that have undergone interior modifications. You couldn’t tell by the exterior that they were any different from any of the neighboring homes.
May 26th, 2016 at 10:10 am
Sorry, Corey, that kind of rational thinking isn’t going to fly with the hysterical homeowners who comment on this site. Converting a single-family to a multifamily is tantamount to tearing it down in their hysterical minds. As homeowners, they already have a place they can afford, so the need for affordable rental housing isn’t a concern of theirs.
May 26th, 2016 at 12:42 pm
@Blockcaptain – The article says that the meeting is at the property in question – 4606 Spruce Street.
May 26th, 2016 at 12:44 pm
As per the listing, the house was being used as an office already…so the new owners apparently plan to keep that commercial side PLUS add a few apartments…
“The house was slightly modified 25 years ago for its current use as a public relations office…”
https://www.coldwellbankerhomes.com/pa/philadelphia/4606-spruce-st/pid_3156287/
May 26th, 2016 at 12:49 pm
Interesting… I live on the block and it seemed to have been used as an commercial office a couple of years ago. There are similar houses on the block with office space for non-profits.
May 26th, 2016 at 6:34 pm
Hello———-Many of us “hysterical” homeowners have probably lived in our homes for as long as you’ve been alive, meaning we’ve/I’ve seen what it was like to have what seemed to be every other house basically be a rooming house and it wasn’t good.
I like the mix that the UC neighborhoods presently have, although I will always encourage turning multi family buildings back into 1 and 2 family dwellings, when the owner wants to do that. I will always take a owner who lives in her home over a investment property owned by who knows who. (read the reports about the house on 42th. St, the one where the chimney fell over)
What do you think affordability is and where does it come from? From what I hear a nice 1 bedroom goes for well over $1K a month, that doesn’t sound affordable to me.
There is a very long practice of someone buying in a less expensive area, fixing up their home and sooner or later hopefully getting a ‘reward’ for their work (but no guarantees). If enough people do that the whole neighborhood gets ‘better’. Better has usually meant more home owners, less renters. Why, because homeowners have more invested in the neighborhood. (yes, I know its not a 100% rule, just a general principal)
Some people still come into UC, buy a $400K house and think its still a risky neighborhood, so they should be allowed to do what ever they need to minimize the risk. Weird, and wrong. This has been an established nice area for many, many years and personal I don’t appreciate the latest wave of newbie’s coming in and saying that we should do this or that just because they think it would be good for their own self interest.
If you think a big old house should be chopped up into small apartments, go west or where ever that’s still happening and work hard to make that neighborhood better. I’m of the mind that adding that sortof density to this area would be a big step backwards.
May 26th, 2016 at 11:29 pm
Hi, streetcar, and thanks for your response. You raise a lot of points that I’ll try to respond to.
First, I’m 35 years old. I don’t know whether you’ve owned your house longer than I’ve been alive, but I’m also not sure why that’s important. I’ve lived in this neighborhood (renting) for 5+ years and feel very much a part of it. In that time, I’ve been involved in several neighborhood association groups, but would like to think that, even if I hadn’t been, I would be seen as much a member of this community as you, even if I can’t currently afford to buy a home in the neighborhood, which I hope to be able to do someday.
Your reaction to the idea of turning a single-family into a multi-family was hysterical (“we might as well just knock everything down and bring in the multi story trailers”; not sur what multi family trailers you’re talking about?).
What do I think affordability is and where does it come from? I’m not an economist, but I think affordablity has to do with supply and demand. I think that there is currently a shortage of affordable rental housing in the neighborhood because there is more demand than there is supply. One solution to alleviate that would be to increase supply, for example, by converting single-families into multi-families.
I don’t have a response to the rest of your comment, because I literally don’t understand what you’re saying, other than homeowners good, renters bad. Regardless of your desire for me to go west, though (presumably west of 50th 😉 ), I’m going to stay in spite of NIMBYs like you.
May 29th, 2016 at 6:20 pm
Hello———do you think there should be any limits, such as zoning, on what a owner should be allowed to do to their property? Just in theory, for you, for a half way decent one bedroom apt. what do you think counts as affordability? Above you seem to be saying you don’t know what it is, but you do know what it isn’t. That doesn’t help me understand what you’re saying.
Mutli-stories trailers is a reference to the prefabs put it on 46th. north of Walnut? And yes, there were transported here on trailers.
Time spent anywhere gives one a chance to experience history. I can honestly say in some small way I know what this neighborhood was like 45 years ago, I have a sense of the changes that have taken place, good and bad and neutral, over those years and what it took to make those changes.I have an opinion on how to preserve the good changes and what it might take to continue that direction. In this context this is what time spent living around here has given me. (of course I could be wrong)
Yet I don’t think my (aged) voice should count any more then yours. But I will continue to say in my hysterical way, that I think its crazy and reckless to allow whats being asked for on 4600 Spruce. I think its nuts that people buy houses that cost big huge piles of money and then decide that they want to make major changes to the use of the house and if anyone disagrees with them, then there’s anyways a label we can thrown at them (NIMBYs). Labels are always a helpful and educated method for moving the discussion forward, thanks for bring them up.
Frankly I don’t care who lives where, including you. But, and you knew that was coming, I will say that in my experience of living in UC for 45+ years, that owner occupants seem to be better for the improvement of any of the neighborhoods that I’ve lived in(Spruce Hill, Powelton, Cedar Park). That doesn’t mean all landlords are bad, it doesn’t mean all renters are bad, it doesn’t mean most renters are bad, it doesn’t mean all home owners are good. Pretty simple, no?
So,if you want to take an existing house and re-zone it into basically what I think of as a boarding house, I will try to stop you and encourage you to go else where, maybe west would suit you, and you know the west covers alot of ground.
So I encourage owner occupied houses to stay that way, I encourage multi family houses that were built as single family buildings to be converted back when ever possible. I encourage and work against people who want to add density by adding more units to existing 1 and 2 family homes.
I think this is a viewpoint that many people around here live by, but their liberalism gets in the way of saying very much out of fear of offending someone. As I said above I like the mix of peoples in UC and it is becoming a lesser place as more people just buy their way into the neighborhood and are less involved in the community.
There are many apartment buildings that were built as multi-family buildings, and I’m fine with those staying that way. And in certain locations, especially where it doesn’t involve tearing down good buildings, I’m ok with good apartments being built (good meaning not directed at undergrad students).
Yes, homeowners are good, but no your logic is wrong if you think that it also means that everything else is bad. And by the way, first time I’ve been called a NIMBY. If that means I care about the neighborhood and try to do what I think is best for it, then send me the T-shirt; I take a large!
May 30th, 2016 at 2:07 pm
Streetcar, a well reasoned and articulated response.
It seems like U.C. is reaching a crisis point. Don’t know if it applies to the house in question but developers from New York and elsewhere seem to be descending like vultures to rip up the neighborhood, replace longstanding buildings with prefab crap, and extract the highest possible return so they can continue to afford their townhouses.
I regret that about 10 years ago I opposed the proposal to make U.C. an “historic district”; I now believe this may be the only way to prevent the onslaught of big capital. Hopefully the historic designation which saved an entire block in Powelton from plunder will withstand the onslaught of money being thrown around by the developers to corporate lawyers (and who knows to whom else)to offset the will of the people.
May 30th, 2016 at 2:26 pm
Also in response to the following:
“I think that there is currently a shortage of affordable rental housing in the neighborhood because there is more demand than there is supply. One solution to alleviate that would be to increase supply, for example, by converting single-families into multi-families.” — “Hello!”
Another solution would be to recognize that there are only so many people who can reasonably inhabit any space without it becoming unsafe, unhealthy and undesirable. Should our goal be to accommodate this potentially limitless “demand” or simply set some limits in terms of the desired population density (highly correlated with the density of traffic and carbon monoxide pollution)?
May 31st, 2016 at 1:40 pm
Many years ago I lived in Minneapolis and the city implemented a program offering homebuyers a financial incentive to convert multi-family homes back to single-family. This along with the ‘historic district’ designation might help combat the desecration of our beautiful neighborhood. There has always been a healthy mix of homeowners and renters in the area and we need to keep that balance. Somewhere around 60% single family and 40% multi-unit homes might be a good starting point. (Anyone have the current figures?)
May 31st, 2016 at 4:33 pm
Streetcar: that is way too much to respond to, so I am going to pick and choose here.
Yes, you and others like you are NIMBYs and your attitude is more destructive than I think you realize. Take San Francisco, for example. Longtime residents have been being priced out of San Francisco for years because homeowners were able to successfully block building projects that would have increased density and created more affordable housing.
Yes, it’s easy when you own a home in the neighborhood not to care about whether or not people who lived in this community for 5, 10, or 20 years can continue to afford it, but if nothing changes, rental prices will continue to climb and longtime residents will be pushed out.
It is absurd (and hysterical) to claim that a multi-family property is essentially a boarding house.
June 2nd, 2016 at 8:48 am
“Anon”, “streetcar” “watchcat”, “strongforu”. You all spend too much time commenting on articles this page puts up… Instead of typing on a keyboard, get out and make a change. Stop hiding behind your screen making passive-aggressive comments to people you don’t have the nerve to expose yourself to. Because we all know you don’t want anyone you’re talking to know who you are or what you look like. That might make it difficult to get your coffee at Green Line without risking running into somebody who might take what you’re saying a little more serious than you.