Changing Skyline | City planning still bush-league

There are two kinds of people counting the days until Mayor-elect Michael Nutter fires David Auspitz, the blustering, bullying chairman of Philadelphia's Zoning Board of Adjustment. The first can't wait for him to go because they're hoping Nutter will usher in a more thoughtful approach to planning. The other bunch just want to get their variances locked in before Auspitz's erratic, deal-oriented reign finally sputters to an end.

Since Nutter's inauguration is Monday, that makes today their last chance for pushing through skyline-defining projects, including a massive mixed-use development on the former Schmidt's Brewery site in Northern Liberties. In his usual high-handed fashion, Auspitz peremptorily informed neighborhood representatives at a Dec. 20 hearing that he intended to green-light the scheme at a follow-up meeting today - like it or not.

It was a vintage Auspitz threat. In his 41/2 years as chairman, he has come to epitomize the Street administration's indifference to serious planning. Nutter has publicly compared Auspitz's often clownish stewardship of the zoning board to TV's Judge Judy show. Changing the board's lineup, the future mayor says, is a top priority.

Yet, if all Nutter does is send in a few fresh faces, he'll simply be replacing the actors in the same bad play. Auspitz isn't the real problem. The system is the problem.

The structure for handling planning and zoning matters in Philadelphia is broken beyond repair. This big-league city treats critical land-use questions with the amateurism of a small town. Actually, many small towns do it better. While development projects have grown bigger and more intricate in the last few decades, the city's leadership still operates on the belief that proposals of any size can be evaluated in a 90-minute-long adversarial hearing, and adjudicated by people who may have never visited the site, and who lack fixed standards to guide their decision-making.

Take Bart Blatstein's scheme for Schmidt's Brewery. The project would fill in an 8.5-acre tract along Second Street, between Germantown and Girard Avenues, with a vaguely designed 27-story apartment tower, a block-size shopping center, a major supermarket, and parking for 846 cars. The development, which requires a slew of variances and approvals, would substantially alter the character of the artsy, low-rise neighborhood.