Changing Skyline: Let the master planners decide how to get to the Delaware waterfront

In the entire seven-mile study area, Festival Pier is the only site that retains the remnants of a once-dense urban streetscape. It's just one block from the Market-Frankford El, the underrated transit treasure that spirits commuters in minutes to the city's two great employment nodes, Center City and the university area.

If you squinted a bit, you might think you were on Broad Street instead of on the river. Just imagine if a project like the Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties had been built there. A development that had Schmidts' generous public space, shop-lined ground floor, and dense residential component would be a game-changer for the waterfront.

To think, all these years the city has assumed that its inaccessible Penn's Landing site at the foot of Market Street was the front door to the waterfront. The entrance was at Spring Garden Street the whole time.

There's no highway canyon to cross there. Spring Garden may even be the perfect spot to link a riverfront trolley into the SEPTA network. But that's something for the master planner to decide.

Contact architecture critic Inga Saffron at 215-854-2213 or isaffron@phillynews.com.