Brandywine picks Georgia dorm builder for 36-story Philly site: sources
Can Campus Crest Communities handle a Philly high-rise?
Brandywine picks Georgia dorm builder for 36-story Philly site: sources
Joseph N. DiStefano
Brandywine Realty Trust, a Radnor company that is one of Center City's dominant landlords, has asked Campus Crest Communities, a Georgia-based company mostly known for building student housing at suburban and small-town colleges in the South and West, to put up student housing on a site permitted for a 36-story high-rise tower at 2930 Chestnut St. in University City, according to two real estate industry sources familiar with the deal.
Despite Crest's apparent lack of experience on big-city high-rise work, digging started last weekend for foundations for the project, which is part of the Cira 2 complex that Brandywine hoped to build on the block between Chestnut and Walnut streets, 29th and 30th streets, adjoining the Penn campus to the south and Drexel to the north.
Brandywine had proposed two towers for the block, and state and city leaders had offered tax breaks in an attempt to lure office employers, hotels, apartments and ohter tenants. But the proposals were put on hold during the economic downturn that started in 2008.
The student project, if successful, would divert Penn students from popular West Philly and Center City neighborhoods. Penn spokeswoman Julie McWilliams referred queries to Brandywine, whose investor relations manager, Marge Boccuti, won't comment on details of the plan. Brandywine boss Jerry Sweeney didn't disclose project details in his quarterly earnings statement this week. Crest hasn't returned calls seeking comment.
I don't get this secrecy - where are the renderings for this project? Is this tower going to have that amazing Cesar Pelli design that was part of the Cira South Plan? Or will it be some garbage student housing design that looks like a PHA relic from the 1960's? At 600 foot and 36 stories, with no high rises in the immediate vicinity, this tower will be extremely prominent on the skyline.
How about offering up a clue as to what it will look like?— Russell Conwell- "Crest's lack of experience!" Wow, i'm scared...— eMMster
- Lack of experience means they missed something on the bid and came in real low. Brandywine will hold them to the bid they submitted. Hiring a southern GC to build highrise in the Northeast with no experience doing so? Maybe Crest partner's with a local GC to help them through.— chham57
- Is this Campus Crest, the Charlotte, NC based, publicly traded REIT? They have a tough time delivering standard student housing on time (a Google search will show all kinds of development issues, I believe at Maine most recently). Should be interesting...— atd
- -Russel Here you can read all about the progress: http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=137163&page=30— Flyers2001
