A new­ly cre­at­ed his­toric preser­va­tion dis­trict in Philadel­phia is draw­ing back­lash from local res­i­dents, reports Aval­on Hinch­man in 34th Street. “While many oppo­nents agree that his­toric preser­va­tion is impor­tant, they con­sid­er the Wash­ing­ton Square West His­toric Dis­trict a case of seri­ous over­reach, with lit­tle regard for the good of the com­mu­ni­ty.”

Accord­ing to Hinch­man, res­i­dents wor­ry the des­ig­na­tion will make it more dif­fi­cult to make alter­ations to their prop­er­ties and could raise hous­ing val­ues, push­ing low­er-income peo­ple and renters out of the area. 

“In a let­ter of oppo­si­tion, Wash­ing­ton Square West res­i­dents expressed their sup­port for indi­vid­ual des­ig­na­tion” of eight iden­ti­fied his­toric prop­er­ties, but they argue that it “hard­ly jus­ti­fies cre­at­ing a his­toric dis­trict cov­er­ing 1,441 [prop­er­ties].” After all, in a city as his­toric as Philadel­phia, it could be argued that the entire city is a his­toric land­mark. 

Some res­i­dents believe the des­ig­na­tion is an effort to stop new devel­op­ment. Oth­er oppo­nents argue that his­toric des­ig­na­tion will impede upgrades to build­ings that improve qual­i­ty of life, such as adding win­dows to homes that often lack good nat­ur­al light­ing or mak­ing build­ings ADA com­pli­ant, and make it more oner­ous and expen­sive for home­own­ers to make changes. 

The city could opt to cre­ate sev­er­al small­er his­toric dis­tricts or let indi­vid­ual prop­er­ty own­ers par­tic­i­pate in preser­va­tion pro­grams on their own. “The PHC has des­ig­nat­ed his­toric dis­tricts in the past with lit­tle to no protest, but if the Wash­ing­ton Square West back­lash is any indi­ca­tion, the his­toric preser­va­tion sys­tem in Philly can’t keep oper­at­ing inde­pen­dent of the com­mu­ni­ty.”