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'Curveball': It's Back To The Drawing Board For Market East As 76ers Pivot Away From Center City Arena

Sports fans and local officials were left in shock after the Philadelphia 76ers suddenly nixed plans over the weekend for a $1.3B Center City arena in favor of a new facility at the South Philadelphia Sports Complex.

Now, lawmakers and business leaders are scrambling to put together a Plan B to reignite commerce in the troubled district.

“This is a curveball that none of us saw coming,” Mayor Cherelle Parker, a major booster of the Center City arena proposal, said at a Monday press conference aimed at providing more context about the quick pivot.

Parker added that the city will need to “start from scratch” with its revitalization plans for Market East, which had been centered on the stadium.

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The Philadelphia 76ers play at Wells Fargo Center.

For more than two years, the 76ers organization worked to change hearts and minds about the wisdom of building the facility known as 76 Place, which would have replaced part of the Fashion District mall on 10th and Filbert streets. The project drew ire from some neighborhood leaders, including those in nearby Chinatown, culminating in a series of contentious public hearings late last year.

The Philadelphia City Council ultimately passed a series of measures that cleared the way for the arena in December.

Instead, the Sixers and Comcast Spectacor will now work on a new South Philly venue to replace the Wells Fargo Center, where the media conglomerate’s Philadelphia Flyers also play. It is expected to be completed by 2031. 

The deal, blessed by NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, created a 50-50 joint venture for the project. It handed Sixers parent company Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment equity in the Wells Fargo Center and Comcast Spectacor a small stake in the NBA team. The two companies will also submit a joint bid to bring a WNBA team to Philly.

Comcast and HBSE had been locked in a long public relations battle over the Center City arena plans, but the two reconciled just weeks after the project got the thumbs-up from Philadelphia City Council last month, 76ers officials said.

“When we began meeting with Comcast in earnest over the last two weeks, we both saw the opportunity to do something even bigger than what we planned,” Sixers owner Josh Harris said.

The 76ers and Comcast said their new partnership would include a 50-50 venture to invest in the revitalization of Market East in Center City.

“Nothing that we did is going to be in vain,” Parker said. “This wasn’t just about building an arena. This was about access to economic opportunity for Philadelphians.”

The legislation the council passed last month will be the framework for the city’s future negotiations with the Sixers and Comcast, she said. The mayor said City Hall will work “methodically” on the new proposal and that she is in no rush to approve it.

“We didn’t really change our mind,” Harris said when asked about the sudden pivot. “Deals don’t come together exactly the way you want them to.”

Council Member Mark Squilla, who represents the Center City district the arena was formerly slated for, wasn’t notified about the Sixers’ change in plans until this weekend, he said in a statement to Bisnow.

Even so, Squilla said his goal had always been the revitalization of the neighborhood, adding that “we need private partners to share our vision for a new and improved Market East.”

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Council President Kenyatta Johnson and Mayor Cherelle Parker at Monday's press conference.

Council President Kenyatta Johnson was another supporter of the arena project and became a focal point for protestors. Just before the council passed the Sixers legislation last month, a group of protesters locked arms in front of his desk to hinder the proceedings. Police ultimately pulled them out of the council chambers in handcuffs.

“Thank you for actually showing up today,” Johnson said at the beginning of his remarks Monday, a quip that may have been directed at Harris or HBSE co-founder David Blitzer, who didn't personally appear at any of city council’s public hearings about the arena.

“I wish we could have gotten the deal done before we actually started the process,” the council president added.

Still, Johnson said he was on board with the new proposal, which is slated for the South Philly district he represents.

“Plan B is better than Plan A,” Johnson said. “This is a process of addition, not subtraction. Now we have two economic development projects.”

After Macy’s announced that it would close its Wanamaker Building location just a few days ago, officials were quick to pin their optimism about the neighborhood's future on the arena. The Market East corridor has struggled with high vacancy for years as the office and retail sectors that traditionally anchored the neighborhood suffered in the wake of the pandemic.

The city is drafting a completely new master plan in the wake of the Sixers’ pivot, but it isn't yet clear what that redevelopment will entail. 

An early version of the Sixers’ proposal included a large apartment tower, but activists panned the skyscraper as a “middle finger” to Chinatown. Multifamily owners are also working through a glut of apartments that came on the market as a tax abatement program expired in 2021.

Comcast countered HBSE’s Center City arena plans with a biomedical campus proposal last year, but there is already 1.5M of vacant lab space in Philly and more set to come online this year.

“I would love to see another Comcast tower. I would love to see a brand-new hospital,” Johnson told Bisnow of Market East after the meeting. “We also want to bring retail and residential.”

Activists celebrated the pivot during a press conference organized by the No Arena Coalition below the Chinatown arch on Monday, but some opponents don’t feel like their battle with the Sixers is over.

“This is a time to celebrate for us, but we also have a cautious eye,” said Harry Leong, director of the Chinese Christian Church and Center on Vine Street. “Two and a half years of this battle against the billionaires, even against our own politicians, is really discouraging.”

Leong expressed concern about the fate of the Market East properties the Sixers already purchased for the defunct arena plan.

“We will continue to face that battle,” he said.

Opponents of the project also took city leaders to task for playing “in the viper pit with billionaires” by approving the Center City project.

“City Hall toyed with the snakes, and they got bit,” the Save Chinatown Coalition said in a statement Monday.