Parkway

I LOVE newspapers, but they can annoy me to no end. Two people on a bike get injured, all hell breaks loose, and we get these exaggerated assertions about changing the Parkway and the river drives. Back when then-West River Drive was one-way during morning and afternoon rush hours, one confused person went the wrong way and was killed. For one incident, they permanently changed the drive to two-way. Thirty-plus years later, we're about to go through the same stupidity. When cars crash into trees on the drive and a driver is injured or killed, do we do anything then?

The sidewalks of Logan Square were filled with science fans visiting white experiment-filled tents Saturday for the Science Carnival on the Parkway, an event of the 10-day Philadelphia Science Festival. Mayor Nutter joined Dow president and CEO Jerome Peribere as he announced the company would not only contribute $100,000 for next year's festival, but would double the donation if other sponsors matched it. "All the improvements which are going on right now are thanks to science," said Peribere.

The Benjamin Franklin Parkway is an urban gesture of tremendous physical and symbolic strength, though Philadelphians have never been too sure about what it ought to be. It was, at first, designed as a grand boulevard lined with civic institutions clad in imperial garb. Later, when it became clear that only a capital city could produce enough such buildings, the focus of the design was shifted to a few key buildings - such as the Art Museum and the Free Library - with landscaping unifying this rather patchy development.

MY 1908-15 city tax map is back from the framers. Several times over the past week or so, I've shown the map to neighbors - and everyone loves to see what their surrounding blocks were like 100 years ago. The map shows, in exquisite cursive handwriting, the owner and physical dimensions of every building, street and sidewalk west of Logan Square, then part of the 10th Ward. The image is color-coded to show whether buildings were made of brick, stone or wood (the hand-painted shading is detailed enough to convey that a house had brick walls, a stone facade and a wooden kitchen in back)

Hundreds came to the Parkway yesterday to enjoy Unity Day, a celebration of African-American Unity in which every aspect of African-American art and education was represented in a pavilion. Crowds took in the fun, and it's grand finale was a concert with Philadelphia's own Patti LaBelle.

One of these decades, the Public League will sail through a controversy- free basketball season. Not this year, though. Today, which brings the final bracket of regular-season action, one result already is known: Parkway has forfeited to Germantown. The action was taken by Tom Jacoby, the school district's curriculum support coordinator for athletics, in the aftermath of what he termed "a screw-up" on the part of Parkway's adminstration. Parkway has signed a contract to visit Central Pennsylvania power Williamsport Saturday night.

Wasul Crawford has attended the past five Public League basketball championship games at Temple's McGonigle Hall. When this season's championship game rolls around, Crawford would like to be there wearing a uniform. "I live around 16th and Diamond streets, so McGonigle Hall is right nearby," Crawford said. "Every time they've played the championship there, my pop has taken me over to watch. I remember seeing Mastbaum-Franklin (1982), Overbrook-West (1983) - all the way up. "I'd always sit there and think, 'I hope I can do this someday.

They call Super Sunday on the Parkway the world's largest block party. Given that the Parkway is one of the widest streets in the world, and given that hundreds of thousands of people fill five blocks of it, you may never hear anyone contradicting that claim. This 27th running of Super Sunday will have everything - entertainment, health and fitness activities, crafts to do and buy, and food. A mascot parade at noon, led by Mayor Rendell, will feature characters, marching bands and drill teams.

This game will long haunt Parkway. A 12-point lead in the third quarter. A full press that was causing havoc. And the Hoyas looking at their first playoff upset in years after posting just four league wins all season. It all came apart in the fourth quarter, as host Washington rallied for a 72-62 victory in the Public League's Division E boys' basketball tournament. The Eagles (12-4) will likely play University City or Franklin Learning Center on Thursday when the Public League round-of-16 playoffs begin.

Calling all party animals. Philadelphia is throwing a little bash Oct. 14, and you're invited. The occasion is the annual Super Sunday spectacular on the Parkway. A Mummers parade will open this year's event, which will include displays from area organizations and a wide array of entertainment. New this year: a Battle of the Bands contest and a Family Fun Stage with Michael Weilbacher of WHYY-FM's Earth Talk Saturday performing in "Rollickin' Dinosaur Revue" and hosting other events.

I take history and authenticity seriously. I have never disguised my defense of originals over copies, or my distaste for the Disneyfication of reality or the more genteel "authentic reproduction," an oxymoron that devalues the creative act by glossing the knockoff with a false veneer of respectability, because a faux is a fake is a phony. ... So how does it feel to have one's core beliefs turned upside down? The "new" Barnes that contains the "old" Barnes shouldn't work, but it does.

When Judge Stanley R. Ott ruled in 2004 that the Barnes Foundation's collection of paintings and sculpture, worth billions, could be extracted from its Merion home and remounted in a new building downtown, the Barnes set out to replicate the original galleries, in scale and configuration, exactly. This much now is an accomplished fact. And yet, as the new Barnes Foundation opens this weekend, everything is different. Gone forever, of course, is any claim to authenticity.

With Mayor Nutter as his opening act, hip-hop mogul and rapper Jay-Z stood atop the Philadelphia Museum of Art steps. His theme: Made in America, the music festival - announced Monday morning - that will take over the Benjamin Franklin Parkway on Labor Day weekend. Jay-Z, whose given name is Shawn Carter, was saying he embarks on a venture only if it has potential to be great. Just then, a fan shouted, "You're the best, Hov!", a shortening of "Jayhova," one of the MC's noms de rap. Without missing a beat, Jay-Z answered back: "I agree.

Concert promoters and the city are still a long way from working out logistics for the Labor Day weekend Made in America music festival unveiled Monday, the first Parkway event ever to require paid admission. But with audiences limited to 50,000 people each day, the festival will be just one-tenth of the estimated size of past Parkway mega-events, like the Live 8 concert to help African nations and Elton John's July Fourth appearance for AIDS relief, both in 2005. "If you compare this to Wawa Welcome America, we have hundreds of thousands there for that event, so we have a bit of a track record there to guide all of the agencies - the police, L&I, the managing director's office, Public Property, and others - that would be participating in something like this," said Mayor Nutter's press secretary, Mark McDonald.

How is a two-day concert on the Parkway gonna charge for tickets and keep people from just standing around watching free? We're still waiting for the city and concert promoter Live Nation to answer this one. But Monday morning, Jay-Z joined Mayor Nutter atop the Art Museum steps to announce what we reported Saturday at PhillyGossip.com and had in print Monday, that the Budweiser Made in America festival will take place Sept. 1 and 2. Tickets are $99 for a two-day pass and are on sale May 23 at LiveNation.com and Ticketmaster.com.

In the tight Brewerytown kitchen of Rachel Hosan, a cloud of steam rose from a five-gallon pot on the stove. Into the cauldron of boiling water, she emptied bags and bags of rigatoni. Beside her, Rachel Koppenhaver, her roommate, sliced chicken, onions, spinach, and asparagus. For almost an hour, the women were in constant motion, draining pasta, tossing it with pesto, adding parmesan, before dividing heaps of food into the pot and two large roasting pans. With the help of another friend, Matt Allison, they lugged everything out to a car, including a plastic crate filled with paper plates, cups, napkins, and plastic utensils.

The Roots will help celebrate our nation's roots on the Fourth of July as the house band for the Philly 4th of July Jam at Eakins Oval on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Mayor Nutter announced on Thursday. "The largest free concert in the United States," as Nutter called the event, is the brainchild of Welcome America! musical director Ahmir "?uestlove" Thompson, who has invited an array of headliners, including Pottstown native Daryl Hall and superstahs Queen Latifah, Common, and Joe Jonas.

New Jersey State Police are investigating allegations that two state troopers ushered a high-speed parade of luxury sports cars - including one reportedly driven by former New York Giants running back Brandon Jacobs - as they recklessly tore down the Garden State Parkway to Atlantic City in March. Early the afternoon of March 30, witnesses reportedly saw two patrol cars, lights on, speeding down the Parkway with a pack of more than two dozen cars including Lamborghinis, Ferraris and Porsches, the Newark Star-Ledger reported Sunday.

The sidewalks of Logan Square were filled with science fans visiting white experiment-filled tents Saturday for the Science Carnival on the Parkway, an event of the 10-day Philadelphia Science Festival. Mayor Nutter joined Dow president and CEO Jerome Peribere as he announced the company would not only contribute $100,000 for next year's festival, but would double the donation if other sponsors matched it. "All the improvements which are going on right now are thanks to science," said Peribere.

Back in 1872, a diverse group of industrialists, financiers, artists, and just plain folks decided that Philadelphia, the industrial hub of America, was veering too far from its roots as the artistic and cultural center of the country. They formed the Fairmount Park Art Association, and set about commissioning and placing sculptures wherever they could around the city, but particularly in Fairmount Park, which was increasing in popularity with the coming of the 1876 Centennial Exhibition.