As redevelopment reshapes Philadelphia’s Grays Ferry neighborhood, the Philadelphia City Planning Commission set out to build a community-driven vision for the 34th Street corridor connecting Grays Ferry and Forgotten Bottom to University City, the Schuylkill River Trail, and regional employment centers.
As redevelopment intensified along the corridor, the gap between existing conditions and the residents’ vision for a safe, welcoming street widened, and 34th Street and Grays Ferry Avenue ranked among the city’s most dangerous streets.
Foursquare ITP led a robust engagement process—a workshop, online survey, and stakeholder roundtable that together gathered more than 200 community perspectives—paired with travel, safety, and demographic analysis, to shape a shared corridor vision. We translated that vision into corridor-wide recommendations and conceptual intersection improvements, from a two-way cycletrack and traffic-calming treatments to a TDM toolkit for the corridor’s major institutions.
The plan gives Philadelphia a clear, community-backed roadmap for transforming 34th Street into a corridor that’s safe and welcoming for people walking, rolling, and biking alongside transit and vehicles. Recommendations range from near-term investments—like eliminating slip lanes and connecting to the Schuylkill River Trail—to longer-term studies such as a 34th Street bridge redesign, giving the city a phased path to implementation.
Solutions and Outcomes
- Engaged more than 200 residents and stakeholders.
- Developed a corridor-wide vision and conceptual intersection improvements.
- Recommended near-term and long-term investments.