Retail Strip at 45th & Walnut will help move commercial activity westward

University City Review: Retail Strip at 45th & Walnut will help move commercial activity westward

For the last six months, University City residents have offered conjectures over what will become of the site currently under construction at 45th and Walnut Streets.

Perhaps it will contain a nail salon? Another coffee shop? Or what about a dry- cleaner?

While what particular stores will fill the strip still remains in the hand of its future tenants, the project’s owner, Coldwell Banker Real Estate Agent, Jamshidi Faraidoon, explained that it will contain five single floor retail stores when completed over a telephone interview. The strip’s completion date, Faraidoon continued, “is weather dependent.”

“It may open in January,” said Faraidoon, though its construction may take until April to complete.

For some business owners and residents along 45th Street, the strip’s addition, even though its entrances will face Walnut and not 45th, is nonetheless a welcome addition to a burgeoning commercial corridor.

After all, 45th Street bustles with activity as pedestrians walk from the Halal shop to the 2nd Mile Thrift Store, to the UC Review and Weekly Press headquarters, to the Ethiopian Restaurant Abyssinia on 45th and Locust to even the Green Mile 2 across the Street. There’s even a rumor that the former bank building on the Southeast Corner of 45th and Walnut may be converted to a restaurant/bakery.

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