The deadline to apply for the Neighborhood Slow Zone Program has been extended to February 15. The program, run by the Philadelphia Office of Transportation, Infrastructure, and Sustainability (OTIS), invites neighbors to apply for traffic calming in an entire zone of residential streets. The City will work with successful applicants to bring traffic calming to an entire “Slow Zone,” which will include:

• Developing a plan for traffic calming that responds to critical safety issues;

• Lowering speed limits to 20MPH;

• Installing traffic calming tools, like speed cushions, and more. Continue Reading

An artist’s rendering of the planned six-story office building with a ground-floor McDonald’s at 40th and Walnut.

A six-story mixed-use building is planned for the northeast corner of 40th and Walnut Streets, where a neighborhood fixture, McDonald’s, is currently located, according to an announcement by Penn’s Office of Facilities and Real Estate Services. The new, 50,000-square-foot facility will include a fully-modernized McDonald’s on the first floor of the building. Continue Reading

The Streets Department’s 2023 Christmas Tree Recycling Program, which helps residents dispose of their trees in an environmentally friendly way, kicks off Tuesday, Jan. 3 and will run through Jan. 14.

UPDATE: As part of this program, UC Green, in collaboration with TreeKen, is hosting its annual Tree-Cycle event at two West Philly parks on Saturday, Jan. 7:

• Clark Park (43rd and Chester): 10 a.m.-12 p.m.

• Malcolm X Park (51st and Pine): 1-3 p.m.

$5-$20 donation per tree is requested. Hot drinks and donuts will be offered at the event. Recycled trees will be mulched and then used to aid established park trees. Continue Reading

Bob Christian/Facebook photo

Robert (Bob) Christian, a longtime publisher and editor of the community newspaper University City Review, passed away on Saturday after a prolonged illness, according to reports. Originally from New York City, Bob and his wife Claudia started the weekly newspaper in 1988. The couple also published the Philadelphia Free Press, which covered the news east of the Schuylkill River.

In the past two years, Bob was recovering from COVID-19 complications. A fundraiser to support him and his family was launched in January 2022.

A service for Bob Christian will be held at 11 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 30 at All Saints’ Episcopal Church, 1325 Montgomery Ave., Wynnewood, PA. The burial will follow at 2 p.m. at The Woodlands Cemetery, 40th St. and Woodland Ave, Philadelphia. At Bob’s request, a New Orleans Jazz Band will perform at his funeral.

To read more about Bob and Claudia and their long-term service to the community, read this post from the UCD Blog.

In an effort to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and other respiratory illnesses in school, reduce absenteeism and prioritize in-person learning after the winter break, the School District of Philadelphia will reinstate mandatory masking for students and employees for 10 days following the winter break – from January 3 through January 13, 2023.

This implementation is part of the District’s general COVID-19 protocol for the 2022-2023 school year that was shared in August.

District employees, students and families can pick up free at-home COVID-19 test kits at five school-based testing locations while supplies last. SDP testing locations will be closed on December 26 and January 2 in observance of the federal holidays.

Testing locations, the most updated COVID-19 data and more information can be found on the District’s COVID-19 Information Hub.

Lee’s Deli after the crash (Photo from GoFundMe).

Lee’s Deli, a neighborhood corner store operating on Baltimore Avenue for nearly 30 years, has been closed for more than a week after a U-Haul van crashed into it at full speed last Sunday. While no one was injured in the crash (it happened around 4 a.m.), the deli sustained significant structural damage. The van hit the main support beam of the store located at 47th and Baltimore, which caused a brief evacuation of the apartments on the 2nd and 3rd floor. And inside the deli, the van “destroyed nearly everything,” according to owner Scott Lee.

After the initial assessment of the damage and some clean-up, the Lee’s Deli team planned to reopen their business after Thanksgiving, but now they realize that is is no longer impossible due to the level of damage. Encouraged by “friends, neighbors, and strangers” who had approached them asking how they can help, the team decided to set up a GoFundMe page for the business. The goal is to raise enough money to reopen as quickly as possible and to support the employees while the business remains closed. Continue Reading