Pre-conference Events, Mobile Workshops and Regional Day require additional fees. Space is limited. Each conference participant is limited to 2 Mobile Workshops, first-come, first-served. Regional Day, on Wednesday afternoon, October 23, is open to non-conference participants.
AICP CM credit is available for Conference Plenaries, Sessions, Mobile Workshops and Regional Day. For details, see mpactmobility.org/schedule
Pre-conference Event 01 Eat Like a Local
Saturday Oct 19, 2024, 12:00 pm to 2:30 pm , $70
Curious about the iconic Philly foodways? This tour in the heart of the city offers the opportunity to taste and find out how some of these iconic foods came to be. Visit independently owned gems and the historic Reading Terminal Market. Experience where locals really eat and Philly’s low-key, unpretentious vibe. You won’t be transformed into a local but you will know first-hand the classic eats – from tomato pie to cheesesteak, fries “wit’ wiz” to pretzels – and sweet treats.
Pre-conference Event 02
The Origins of Philadelphia Street Art
Saturday Oct 19, 2024, 1:00 pm to 3:30 pm, $25
Tour the origins of modern street art in Center City Philadelphia. Sites will include closed-to-the-public sections of the Broad Street Concourse and Spring Garden Station. See original tags by artists including Cornbread, Espo, Agua, and others. Each of these artists comes with a story. Together they provide a window into a street art scene that is distinct from the Philadelphia Mural Arts organization, which arose out of reactions to street art and in the “anti-graffiti” movement.
Please note: This tour is not ADA accessible.
Photo: Kenny Starr
Pre-conference Event 03 City Center Mural Mile
Saturday Oct 19, 2024, 2:00 pm to 4:30 pm, $30
In 2023, USA Today voted Philadelphia the best city for street art in America. Mural Arts Philadelphia, the nation’s largest public art program, is a big reason. More than 4,000 murals created over 40 years make the city a giant outdoor art gallery. Tour Center City Philadelphia’s Mural Mile. Get to know a range of murals, contemporary and classic, and the stories they tell of the city, its leaders and citizens.
Photo: Steve Weinik
Pre-conference Event 04
The Black Journey in the 7th Ward
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 8:30 am to 11:30 am, $45
From the end of the 18th century until the 1960s, Philadelphia’s 7th Ward was a thriving Black and immigrant community, home to abolitionists, educators, athletes and activists as well as African American churches, schools and institutions. The 7th Ward was an important stop on the Underground Railroad and the Great Migration. This walking tour uses the past to talk about current issues, including the fight to desegregate Philadelphia trolleys 100 years before Rosa Parks and public transit today.
Please Note: At the end of the tour a different station will need to be used for ADA accessibility.
Photo: The Black Journey
Pre-conference Event 05
TOB: Transit-Oriented Breweries
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 2:00 pm to 5:30 pm, $45
Here’s your chance to ride SEPTA to suburban communities – and enjoy conversation at a brewery along the way. You’ll take the Norristown Line (one of 13 lines in the Regional Rail network), stopping in Norristown and Bridgeport along the Schuylkill River in Montgomery County. Return on the Norristown High Speed Rail. As you get to know some of the communities SEPTA serves, you’ll learn about transit and transitoriented development projects, past and present and future. You’ll also learn about how these rail lines are being renamed in the SEPTA Metro system. Please note: This tour is not ADA accessible.
Mobile Workshop 01 The Other Mainline
Multimodal Communities on the PATCO Speedline
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 9:00 am to 1:30 pm, $65
The PATCO Speedline train, running between Philadelphia and Camden County, NJ, follows the route of several historical mainline railroad lines dating from the 19th century. Ride the train to see how Haddon Township and Collingswood, two New Jersey communities with thriving downtowns adjacent to PATCO stops, are leveraging transit access to enhance pedestrian safety and promote bicycling for transportation and recreation.
Photo: Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission Transit, Walking
Mobile Workshop 02 A Journey to Chicken Hill:
Seeking ETOD in Pottstown
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 9:30 am to 3:00 pm, $85 includes lunch
Journey to Pottstown, PA, a historic borough 37 miles northwest of Philadelphia. In anticipation of proposed restoration of Amtrak rail service to Philadelphia along the Reading line, the Pottstown community is working collaboratively to apply ETOD (equitable transit-oriented development) principles to ensure that the return of passenger rail results in benefits for all residents.
Experience the people and places of Chicken Hill, the setting of James McBride’s award-winning novel, “The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store.”
Charter Bus, Walking
Photo: Andrew Svekla
Mobile Workshop 03 Reimagining Regional Rail
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 1:00 pm to 4:30 pm, $45
A century-ago, two railroads built electrified commuter rail networks in Philadelphia. In the 1980s, SEPTA tied them together with a center city tunnel. As a result, Philadelphia has the best regional rail infrastructure in the US. It makes thousands of peoples’ lives better every day. Yet, it also leaves people behind. Take a firsthand look at two station areas to see how the system is and is not working. Find out about outreach tools used to reach people who are not riding and learn about plans to make the system more useful and accessible to more people. NOTE: This workshop is not ADA accessible.
Photo: SEPTA
Transit, Walking
Mobile Workshop 04 Philadelphia 101
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 1:30 pm to 4:15 pm, $45
This is the quick skinny on Philly from the locals who know it. Explore several Philadelphia neighborhoods on foot –Chinatown, Independence Mall, Old City, Gayborhood and the area around City Hall – as you get an overview of the city’s DNA, from history and planning to infrastructure, art, culture, redevelopment, demographics and current trends. Listen and learn details about the city – from the Lenni Lenape who first lived here, to William Penn’s original plan for the street grid and squares, from the recent Rebuild Initiative and the Philadelphia2035 Comprehensive Plan, and more!
Photo: SEPTA Walking
Mobile Workshop 05
Sponsored by Bicycle Transit Systems
Complete Streets for Bike and Bus
Sunday Oct 20, 2024, 2:00 pm to 5:00 pm, $65
In Philadelphia, transit corridors and bicycle priority corridors overlap frequently. Making room for both requires creative solutions, particularly with curbside boarding for transit users and separated bike lane design. Creative solutions require collaboration. Hear how the City of Philadelphia and SEPTA work together on complete streets project design for buses and trolleys as well as expansion of High Quality Bike Network corridors – part of a goal of providing safe and comfortable bike routes within ¼ mile of every Philadelphian by 2040. Ride about 8.6 miles to see several projects.
Photo: City of Philadelphia
Trolley, Walking Mobile Workshop 06
Sponsored by Community Streetcar Coalition
South by Southwest
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 9:45 am to 12:45 pm, $45
Southwest Philadelphia, a rich, varied region of the city, showcases both local vibrancy and underinvestment. It’s home to neighborhoods like Kingsessing, unique business sectors, such as Little Africa along Chester and Woodland Avenues, and educational and municipal centers. Three of SEPTA’s 8 trolley lines travel through the area, making the Trolley Modernization initiative an opportunity to tackle persistent issues with access to jobs and food. Hear how local organizations are working to empower community members to benefit from neighborhood planning and development, without gentrification taking hold.
Photo: 2023 Studio1 Students at Stuart Weitzman School of Design
Mobile Workshop 07 William H. Gray 30th Street Station and Schuylkill Yards
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 10:00 am to 1:30 pm, $65 includes lunch
A world-class redevelopment is underway on the banks of the Schuylkill River in West Philadelphia. It’s been called one of the most exceptional transit-oriented developments in the nation and an opportunity for architects, engineers, planners and designers to lay the foundation for Philadelphia’s bright future. See the elements already built and hear directly from project partners about: the redevelopment of Amtrak’s William H. Gray 30th Street Station; the redevelopment of Schuylkill Yards; and the renovation of SEPTA’s Drexel Station.
Photo: Christina Arlt
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 08 100 Years in the Making:
The Vision for Roosevelt Boulevard
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 10:15 am to 2:00 pm, $65 includes authentic Chinese dim sum lunch
Roosevelt Boulevard, 12 lanes wide, runs through northeast Philadelphia, carrying 90,000 vehicles and 20,000 people via bus per day. It is one of the deadliest roads in the country, with a crash every 4.5 hours by some estimates. While immediate work focuses on improving traffic signals and adding curb extensions and other pedestrian safety features, there’s a bigger conversation about alternatives for transforming the boulevard for the long term. One of the options is to revive a 100-year-old plan for a subway under Roosevelt Boulevard.
Photo: Thom Carroll (top); Jay Arzu (bottom) Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 09 Suburban Riverfront TODs
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 12:30 pm to 5:15 pm, $45
New Date and Time
Explore transit-oriented developments (TODs) along the Schuylkill River northwest of the City of Philadelphia in the growing borough of Conshohocken and its adjacent development areas, Whitemarsh Township and Spring Mill.
Find out how Montgomery County’s Transit-Oriented Development Model Ordinance guides municipalities in adding appropriate building typologies and station-area features to their zoning codes for use around rail stations.
Photo: Montgomery County Planning Commission Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 10
Sponsored by Bicycle Transit Systems
Tacony:
An Evolving Industrial Waterfront Neighborhood
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 1:15 pm to 5:15 pm, $85
The story of the Tacony neighborhood in Northeast Philadelphia revolves around continuously changing industry along the Delaware River. Arrive by train and grab a bicycle for a 5-mile ride. Learn about this immigrant neighborhood’s development. Hear how transportation projects, including highway construction, have challenged the neighborhood. And see how a trail and parks along the waterfront reconnect the neighborhood to the Delaware River, long blocked by industry and the highway.
Note: This workshop is not ADA accessible.
Train, Bicycling
Mobile Workshop 11 SEPTA Metro:
Multiple Modes, Unified
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 1:30 pm to 5:00 pm, $45
Boost your familiarity with a variety of types of transit service – and find out how SEPTA is improving to meet the needs of today’s riders. The SEPTA system combines bus, trolley, subway/el and regional rail inherited from five different private companies. Experience city and suburban transit offerings and see busy hubs where these lines connect to local buses and each other. Learn how SEPTA Metro unifies these disparate rail lines into one connected system more intelligible and friendly to new and all-day riders. Note: This workshop is not ADA accessible.
Train, Trolley, Walking
Photo: Drexel University
Mobile Workshop 12 Blossom at Bartram:
Growing the Future in Southwest Philadelphia Trolley, Walking
Monday Oct 21, 2024, 1:45 pm to 5:15 pm, $45
Learn about the vision – and growing reality – for revitalizing Kingsessing, a neighborhood in Southwest Philadelphia that suffers from unsafe streets, obsolete public housing and lack of access to nearby amenities such as Bartram’s Garden (the nation’s first botanical garden, started in 1728!) and the Schuylkill River Trail. Hear from SEPTA about improvements that will transform a corridor on Philadelphia’s High Injury Network, by bringing accessible trolley stations, separated bike lanes, new sidewalks and a state-of-the-art maintenance facility.
Photo: Christina Arlt
Mobile Workshop 13 - CANCELLED
Train, Walking
Transit and Redevelopment in Camden, NJ
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 9:45 am to 12:45 pm, $45
THIS MOBILE WORKSHOP IS NO LONGER OFFERED. APOLOGIES!
Mobile Workshop 14 A Refuge in the City
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 10:00 am to 3:00 pm, $65 includes lunch
The borough of Prospect Park in Southwest Philadelphia is your launching pad for a 5-mile walking exploration of history, nature, neighborhoods and climate. Visit the Morton Homestead; John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum, the first urban wildlife refuge in the nation; and Eastwick, Philadelphia’s lowest-elevation neighborhood. Redlined in the 1930s, the close-knit neighborhood nonetheless thrived, but then lost homes to eminent domain and airport parking. Today, the City of Philadelphia is working with Eastwick residents to address flooding, environmental justice and quality of life.
Photo: John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 15 Center City’s Grand Public Spaces
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 10:00 am to 12:00 pm, $45
Explore two of William Penn’s original squares – Logan and Center – and the public spaces that tie them together. Along the way learn about 300 years of planning history and varying contemporary solutions to reinvigorating, accessing and managing public open spaces. Recent efforts to encourage more activity and enhance the surrounding architecture, businesses, and transit feature varying approaches to landscape design, public engagement, management structure, and funding. Learn from those who manage these places about efforts to make them more multi-modal and less auto-centric.
Photo: John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge at Tinicum
Mobile Workshop 16 Kensington:
A Misunderstood Neighborhood
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 10:15 am to 1:30 pm, $65 includes lunch
The Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia once was a center for textile manufacturing. Today Kensington is notorious for its open-air drug market and transient drug users along commercial corridors and transit stops of the raised Market-Frankford line. Yet the area has assets: its walkability, residents and businesses who care and strong neighborhood-based organizations. Hear from community members and leaders about their efforts to invest in affordable housing and resident health as well as efforts to resist displacement.
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 17 American Street:
The Road to Green and Complete Streets
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 10:30 am to 1:00 pm, $45
American Street in the heart of North Philadelphia tells a story of a corridor in transition, from an era of factories to a new generation of transit-supportive green and complete streets. Completed in 2021, the two-mile streetscape project now manages over 50 acres of storm water with green infrastructure, includes wider sidewalks and grade separated bike lanes and serves buses, freight and changing communities. Walk the corridor with practitioners involved to hear about coordinating complex elements of this right-sized corridor.
Train, Bus, Walking
Photo: City of Philadelphia Water Department
Mobile Workshop 18 Transit-Oriented Communities:
Urban and Suburban
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 1:00 pm to 5:00 pm, $45
Around the country, there’s demand for more housing near transit. SEPTA recently launched a Transit-Oriented Communities program to find solutions that fit suburban and urban locations. In small town Ambler, a TOD project on a parking lot offers the opportunity for a mixed-use, multimodal development. In the city, where space is tight, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia converted their property near a subway station for a new walkable development –part of the Yes in God’s Back Yard (YIGBY) movement.
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 19
Sponsored by Bicycle Transit Systems
Bicycling
Transforming Philadelphia’s Central Delaware Waterfront
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 1:15 pm to 4:15 pm, $65
Bicycle approximately 8.5 miles along the Delaware River and learn about the Master Plan for the Central Delaware River, which guides policy and investment strategies for 6 miles of riverfront. See some of the changes since the plan’s adoption in 2012: waterfront parks, connector streets, nearly three miles of the Delaware River Trail. and construction of the Park at Penn’s Landing, a cap over Interstate 95. These improvements have sparked $1.1 billion in adjacent private investment. Learn how the mixture of economic and community development makes the waterfront a treasured public amenity.
Mobile Workshop 20 Old City Vision Plan in Action
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 2:15 pm to 5:30 pm, $45
Philadelphia’s Old City neighborhood is home to the oldest continuously inhabited residential street in the nation. The neighborhood's Vision2026 plan sets goals for development and defines the elements of a high-quality public realm. Goals include fostering civic life through great places, reoccupying vacant buildings, protecting neighborhood-serving retail, better connecting to nearby neighborhoods, and encouraging car-free travel as peoples’ first choice. Implementation is already underway, via changes in zoning and parking policy as well as raised bike lanes on Market Street and new and reimagined parks.
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 21 New Connections to the Navy Yard
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 1:30 pm to 4:00 pm, $45
The U.S. Navy’s former Philadelphia shipyard is now one of Philadelphia’s fastest growing employment centers and a leading model for repurposing military and industrial assets for a diversified and inclusive modern economy. But it’s a mile from the end of SEPTA’S B Line (aka Broad Street Line) and separated from the rest of the city by I-95. With an additional 8.9 million square feet of commercial and residential development still to come, SEPTA and the Navy Yard worked together to develop a plan for regional transit connections, including piloting a new autonomous shuttle.
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 22 Sustainability Goals:
Inspiration and Action
Tuesday Oct 22, 2024, 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm, $45
Hear about two approaches to understanding and enacting sustainability goals. The Global Philadelphia Association works with local partners to fund and create murals focused on United Nations Sustainable Development goals. As you walk from mural to mural, also hear about SEPTA’s Sustainability Playbook, which defines and measures progress toward 13 goals. Expanding transit and transit-oriented communities is inherently sustainable, but there are ways to change specific practices, too. From the visionary to the specific, get the Philadelphia story and think about your own.
Walking
Photo: Global Philadelphia Association
Mobile Workshop 23
Sponsored by Bicycle Transit Systems
Philadelphia Center City Bikeways
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 8:15 am to 10:45 am, $65
Explore several different kinds of bicycle facilities in Center City Philadelphia and hear the stories of how they came to be, including collaboration with community groups, businesses, elected officials and other agencies. The approximately 8-mile route includes bike lanes, protected bike lanes, curb protected bike lanes, the Delaware River Trail, a road diet and the dramatic Schuylkill Banks Boardwalk – a 2,000 foot long, 15 feet wide multi-use structure running parallel to the eastern shore of the river.
See how the city is making safety improvements as it expands and connects the cycling network.
Photo: City of Philadelphia
Mobile Workshop 24 Infill TOD and Redevelopment in Fishtown
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 8:30 am to 11:00 am, $45
Fishtown, a neighborhood along the Delaware River just north of Center City, is one of Philadelphia’s hottest and most transformed rowhome neighborhoods. In Fishtown, parcels are small, measured in square feet, not acres, or found in the adaptive reuse of formerly industrial or institutional buildings. Learn how new infill and redevelopment projects are designed and funded for small footprints. Walk the neighborhood and hear from developers, funders and community members about design and finance as well as how working together helps new development reflect community character while being clearly modern.
Photo: City of Philadelphia
Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 25 Community Gardens as Community Assets
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 8:45 am to 11:15 am, $45
Scattered across Philadelphia, community gardens provide fresh food and flowers for residents of every background.
But not only that: often started by community members on vacant parcels, the gardens provide social, environmental and economic benefits. Tour gardens in South Philadelphia as you learn about the movement to preserve these spaces, from innovative legal processes to unique partnerships to the arrangements with community stewards. Land assembly for garden preservation can be complicated. Take home a greater understanding of the various paths toward a successful preservation story – and why it matters.
Photo: Natalie Kolb Commonwealth Media Services Train, Walking
Mobile Workshop 26 South Philly’s Iconic Commercial Corridors
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 9:00 am to 11:30 am, $45
South 9th Street and East Passyunk Avenue are iconic Philadelphia neighborhood commercial corridors. 9th is home to the Italian Market, one of America’s oldest and largest open-air markets, featuring businesses that have been in families for generations and new immigrant-owned shops. East Passyunk, which crosses 9th diagonally, is famed for its eclectic mix of small businesses, including more than 50 women-owned storefronts. What keeps these corridors vital? Take a walk down each and hear about strategies both conventional and innovative. Talk about an eclectic mix – get all the details!
Note: this workshop is not ADA accessible.
Photo: Visit Philadelphia Transit, Walking
Mobile Workshop 27 Two Tales, One Road:
Lessons from a Road Diet
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 9:15 am to 11:45 am, $45
There’s a road diet on the eastern half of Washington Avenue but not on the western half. Washington Avenue is a 5-lane arterial in South Philadelphia that touches Black, Vietnamese, Mexican and Italian communities along its route. It’s a quickly changing corridor with multiple large development projects. Hear how Philadelphia politics and gentrification fears greatly impacted a roadway safety project a decade in the making. Discuss lessons learned related to safety, multimodal access and local business activity.
Transit, Walking
Photo: Will Tung
Regional Day The Future of Regional Rail
Wednesday Oct 23, 2024, 2:00 pm to 5:00 pm, $20
Mpact Transit + Community’s Regional Day program focuses on the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reimagine regional rail for Greater Philadelphia and the Tri-State Area of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware. To seize the opportunities along these corridors, municipalities and counties need to plan, rezone and incentivize transitoriented development and multimodal infrastructure around their stations. In this afternoon workshop, get an overview of regional planning efforts and then dive deeper in breakout sessions. Note: You do not have to be registered for the conference to attend Regional Day.
Photo: SEPTA
Register for the Conference + Mobile Workshops + Pre-conference Events + Regional Day mpactmobility.org/registernow
Huge thanks to the Mpact Transit + Community 2024 Philadelphia Local Host Committee for telling the regional story by organizing Pre-Conference Events, Mobile Workshops and Regional Day. The full conference includes 3 Plenaries, 60+ Sessions and numerous Networking Events curated and organized by the Mpact National Steering Committee and Mpact Innovators.
Mpact Transit + Community 2024
Get the latest about building transit-oriented communities. Great Dialog. Actionable Ideas.
