Moving days for the Parking Authority
The city parking agency is moving its headquarters from the old Evening Bulletin building to the old Lit Brothers building at 7th and Market streets.
The offices of the Philadelphia Parking Authority will be closed six days, from Wednesday through next Monday, while the agency moves from the old Evening Bulletin building at 3101 Market St. to new headquarters at 701 Market Street, the former Lit Brothers department store. There will be no respite for drivers: the PPA's infamously-efficient parking enforcement officers will continue to roam the streets.
Deputy Executive Director Richard D. Dickson said the authority's soon-to-be-former landlord, Drexel University, intends to raze the 3101 Market structure to build a new bio-medical research facility. Drexel was willing to sign a five-year lease at $1.4 million a year, but Brickstone Realty is providing 80,000 square feet in the new location for about $1.2 million, Dickson said.
After supervising the move, Dickson will take over as the Parking Authority's top public spokesman, replacing Linda J. Miller, who held those duties for close to 30 years before retiring in March. Miller most frequently drew the unenviable role of defending the authority's hyper-zealous enforcement of city parking restrictions. But she'll be remembered by reporters of a certain age for refusing her boss's instructions to lie when the media asked about medical benefits for the executive director's son, a part-time worker at the stadium parking lots. The executive director got fired, and Miller stayed on for another 20-odd years.
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