Concourse

Center City's underground concourse should be developed with shops and restaurants below the intersection of Broad and Chestnut Streets and maintained by an independent authority, according to a consultant's study released yesterday by the City Planning Commission. The study concluded that the concourse - a vast expanse for pedestrians from Eighth to 17th Streets under Market Street and John F. Kennedy Boulevard and from Race to Spruce Streets under Broad Street - "is potentially the finest in the country," connecting transit lines below ground with streets above.

As a relatively new resident of Philadelphia, I may have fresh impressions to offer on an area of weakness that ought to be an area of strength. The underground concourse in Center City could be practical, lively and attractive. Instead it is awkward to use, dreary and ugly. My suggestions: The concourse needs maps to guide visitors and natives to the Gallery, South Broad, etc. The only map I have seen is on one of the subway platforms. The concourse should have more visible security.

For a week, ominous rumors swirled among advocates for the homeless: The city would hire a private security force to drive the homeless from Center City subway concourses, sweeping them not into shelters, but into the cold night. It turned out differently. The city's clearing of the subway encampment late Saturday night was accomplished virtually without confrontation, as practically all the homeless left voluntarily. "They did it in a nice way," said a man who identified himself as "Uptown," one of a handful of homeless still in the concourse at 11 p.m. Saturday.

Police and city workers yesterday dismantled the cardboard shanties and makeshift beds set up in recent weeks by the homeless in the Broad Street Subway concourse near Spruce Street. The operation began at 8:30 a.m. when police knocked on the front of Terry Ryan's box and told him and an estimated three dozen others to leave. Within two hours, crews had removed the boxes, cleared the area and were hosing down the concrete floor with water. "We left when we were asked," said Ryan, 19. "We didn't come down here to start a riot.

About 30 youths attacked and robbed a man in the subway concourse at 15th and Market Streets yesterday afternoon and then were chased out by police officers, who made six arrests, authorities said. Nathan Butcher, 19, of the city's West Oak Lane section, was walking through the concourse about 12:30 p.m. when he saw the youths, ranging in age from about 13 to about 18, running toward him and shouting, according to police Detective Joseph Sweeney. One youth ripped two gold chains from Butcher's neck.

An argument between two homeless men erupted into gunfire in a Center City subway concourse last night, leaving one critically wounded, authorities said. An estimated 30 homeless people were settling down for the night about 9 p.m. in their encampment on the eastbound side of the station at 13th and Market Streets when a shot rang out. A man identified by police and witnesses as Wendell "Chuckie" Ellerbe, 31, clutched his stomach. "First he stood there like he couldn't believe what happened," said another homeless man, Leo Fennello, 61. "Then he kind of grabbed his stomach and said, 'Somebody help me!

The three high-school students charged with murdering a Starbucks manager on a subway concourse were attempting to "prove their manhood through violence," Assistant District Attorney Jacqueline Juliano Coelho told the jury during her closing argument yesterday. "They proved that they weren't scared to hit somebody," she added, speaking in a courtroom packed with spectators. "Now it's time for justice. " Although the attorney for Ameer Best, 18, argued that Coelho had not proven her case beyond a reasonable doubt, those representing Nashir Fisher, 17, and Kinta Stanton, 17, each closed by attacking the credibility of Coelho's star witness, Rasheem Bell, 17. During two days of testimony last week, Bell said that he and Arthur Alston, 18, and the three defendants randomly selected Sean Patrick Conroy to beat as he walked along the Market-Frankford El concourse on March 26, 2008.

Can you get there from here? Some of the red, white and blue cardboard signs that have sprouted along the underground SEPTA concourse around City Hall directing riders to the "Pa. Convention Center" seem to be pointing in the wrong direction. Take a sign in the concourse near Locust Street pointing south. The Convention Center is actually north and east of there. SEPTA has an explanation: "The signs are designed specifically with out-of-towners in mind," SEPTA spokesman Richard Maloney said.

A 36-year-old man was beaten to death by a group of teenagers in attack in Center City subway concourse this afternoon, police said. One person was taken into custody and police said they were still looking for at least three others who fled the scene. The incident happened at 13th and Market Streets in the concourse of a busy Septa stop about 2:45 p.m., said Officer Jillian Russell of the Public Affairs Unit. Septa spokeswoman Sylvana Hoyos said a Septa police sergeant initially responded and administered CPR to the victim until medics arrived.

A Philadelphia man charged with killing a rival crack cocaine dealer catering to the homeless people who stay overnight in the Suburban Station concourse was found guilty of first-degree murder yesterday. The Common Pleas Court jury deliberated about four hours before returning the verdict against Bryant "Heavy" Brown. Brown, 30, said nothing as Judge Shelley Robins New immediately sentenced him to life in prison without parole - the sentence required by Pennsylvania law for first-degree murder where the death penalty is not possible.

MARCH YOUR Penguins back home, Pittsburgh, and from your series loss to Philadelphia, take this lesson: Flightless birds shouldn't puck with the Flyers. From Claude Giroux's first goal just 32 seconds into the game to Brayden Schenn's final tally just seconds from the end, the orange and black clicked like clockwork on Sunday, even if the old ultraviolence seen earlier in the series was lacking. Flyers fans at the Wells Fargo Center worked like a well-oiled machine, too - pulsing in unison, chanting as one and blowing their lids when the team finally secured the opening round of the Eastern Conference in Game 6. "I am awesome!"

Casa de Mi Padre A goofball Spanish-language parody of the cheesily overdramatic telenovela form, with Will Ferrell as the dim-witted son of a Mexican rancher, caught up in romance, sibling rivalry, drug-dealing, and some mystical communion with a talking white lion. R Jiro Dreams of Sushi Wonderful doc about an octogenarian who serves octopus (and other raw fish) in an impeccable hole-in-the-wall on a Tokyo subway concourse. Accorded the top 3-star ranking from the Michelin guide, Jiro Ono's Sukiyabashi Jiro is no ordinary eatery, and its humble, bespectacled proprietor no ordinary man. A study of a life devoted to work, to simplicity, to purity, and to the quest for perfection.

The $50 million makeover of Dilworth Plaza will create an inviting gateway to subway stations that will remain considerably less inviting. Unable to pay for a planned $100 million renovation of City Hall subway stations, SEPTA will usher riders from the brighter, airier plaza and concourse to platform areas that will be as they are today: decrepit, dingy, and dim. SEPTA has been trying for years to get money to modernize the nearly century-old City...

As outbound trains whisked commuters home at the end of a workday last week, dozens of others around the waiting area and hallways of Suburban Station had no plans to leave. An elderly Ukrainian man who spoke only broken English fished through a trash can, found a half-filled McDonald's cup, and took a sip. Another man who said he was from Cuba shuffled from one end of the station to the other, clutching a dirty blanket. A young man shouting with slurred speech sat at the top of the steps leading to a platform.

2 men wounded in subway concourse * Broad and Locust streets Two men were shot early yesterday in an underground concourse of the SEPTA Broad Street Line subway in Center City, police said. Officers responding to a report of a shooting at the Walnut-Locust station about 12:40 a.m. found the two victims outside on Broad Street. A 19-year-old man with two gunshot wounds to the back, and stab wounds to the head and back, was found lying against a wall outside the Doubletree Hotel.

Two men were shot early this morning in an underground concourse of the SEPTA Broad Street Line subway in Center City, police said. Officers responding to a report of a shooting at the Walnut-Locust station about 12:40 a.m. found the two victims outside on Broad Street. A 19-year-old man with two gunshot wounds to the back, and stab wounds to the head and back, was found lying against a wall outside the Doubletree hotel. Other officers found an 18-year-old man with a gunshot wound to his foot, lying against a wall on Broad near Walnut.

NEW YORK - Flights partially resumed out of Lambert-St. Louis International Airport yesterday after the area's most powerful tornado in decades ripped off part of the roof and shattered hundreds of windows at the main terminal. The airport expects all 256 daily departures to be back on schedule by the middle of the week. About 60 percent of the daily departures were scheduled to take off yesterday, as area residents were still sorting through the debris and rubble. Airlines said the impact on other hubs was minimal due to the limited number of flights out of Lambert.

After tearing an anterior cruciate ligament for the third time since her senior year at Germantown Academy, Caroline Doty has not been able to play for the Connecticut Huskies this season. All that free time has given the Doylestown product ample opportunity to develop another skill: the trick shot. About two months ago, at the urging of Connecticut's manager, Greg Mihailides, Doty starred in a video called "Rise & Fire," which as of last week had received more than 160,000 hits on YouTube.

On any given night, throngs of homeless people gather within the winding halls and open spaces of the underground concourse beneath City Hall. As temperatures dropped into the 20s Wednesday evening, many were there just trying to stay warm. "You do anything you have to, to keep yourself alive," said Derrick, 41, one of about 20 people planning to spend the night in the underground concourse at JFK Boulevard and 15th Street. "We all keep blankets. " Fifteen years ago, Derrick's mother went into a coma, and he couldn't keep up with the rent.

Just an hour after a man was repeatedly stabbed yesterday in the bathroom of an underground Center City complex, a pianist just a short distance from the crime scene resumed his duties, providing an eerie soundtrack for the janitors who cleaned up the blood left behind. Police said that shortly before 11 a.m., the victim, identified by those who know him as Ben Davis, 64, entered the public restroom under the Mellon Independence Center, at 7th and Market streets, when a 25-year-old man, whom police did not identify, demanded money from him. It's unclear whether the assailant took anything from Davis, but he did stab him six times in the chest, neck and back, police said.