September 22: PPA looks the other way | Hyatt Centric replacing Little Pete’s | Transportation demand management

Vince Fenerty, Jr., director of the Philadelphia Parking Authority, sexually harassed a female senior employee for two years. Mike Newall found that despite a damning investigation, the PPA board allowed Fenerty to keep his job but reduced his role to “a manager who can’t manage.”

The Hyatt Centric hotel proposal planned at the site of Little Pete’s on 17th Street will go before Civic Design Review in October. Jacob Adelman and Michael Klein report that the 13-story hotel project has changed since it was first proposed: no rooftop restaurant. Pete Koutroubas​ of Little Pete’s says he will look for another location nearby but worries there won’t be an affordable space.

San Francisco is trying to flip the script on car-centric development that leads to traffic congestion and higher rents, CityLab reports. That city is the latest to try a “transportation demand management” system which assigns new developments a number of points to achieve and a 26-item menu with ways to earn those points by including features designed to reduce vehicular congestion, from on-site child care to a fleet of bicycles. The program applies to all buildings with more than 10 residential units or 10,000 square feet and is awaiting approval by San Francisco’s board of supervisors.

The city neglected several of its lots along the El near Front and Girard for so long that a neighbor who says he’s been using the vacant land for parties, parking, storage, and his kids for so long, he’s been able to file an adverse possession claim as owner of the land. The Spirit has the story of adverse possession and Frank Galdo.

Philly Free Streets is this weekend and administration officials will be leading groups out to enjoy the 10-mile route. Mayor Jim Kenney will lead walkers from 2nd and South at 9am, Managing Director Mike DiBerardinis will lead a bike ride from the same spot at 8am.

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