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At Tuesday’s Historical Commission hearing in City Hall for hardship status on the property known as the Royal Theater, 1524 South St., a representative from Dranoff Properties, 755 S. Broad St., explained the many ways in which the property, as is, can’t function without a massive structural overhaul. The hardship is needed because the theater’s protected as a historical property, particularly the northern, South Street-facing façade — there’s even a restriction on the deed in place by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission (PHMC) that protects the architecture of the space.
“No construction, alteration, rehabilitation, remodeling, demolition, site development, ground disturbance, or other action shall be undertaken or permitted to said property without prior written permission from the Commission,” it states.
It’s one of the many hurdles Carl Dranoff’s development idea for the theater will have to clear, but it seems like it’s on the right track. The lifetime Philadelphian’s looking to expand on the impact of his South Star Lofts at the northeast corner of Broad and South streets.
“This project will be dramatic and will restore one of the historic and prominent sites on this corridor,” the Center City resident, who was born at Mount Sinai hospital, said. “In its present form, it could not be redeveloped, that was the purpose of the hardship application, to illustrate and analyze potential options, all of which have come to a dead-end for the past 45 years. To transform it, we can transform the property and retain the historical prominence and create a new jewel along South Street that will be very compatible and additive to the vibrancy of South Street that we’ve seen over the last several years.”
The proposal, assuming the Historical Commission approves the hardship (and it seems members will on July 10), would mostly just keep the façade and build a mixed retail and residential property larger than the existing theater.
“Instead of it being a vacant blight, it will become a large new anchor that will beautify the street and provide a steady stream of business for residents and retail uses on the ground level,” Dranoff said.
The proposal calls for 45 apartments with 20 underground parking spaces and 7,100 square feet of retail with 140 feet of frontage, four stories at its highest, and a mix between one- and two-bedroom apartments.
In its current state, it’s nearly 8,500 square footage with 30-foot ceilings, it’s not on a corner, and it’s larger than most retailers want. The historically African-American theater was a treasure to the largely black community decades ago, and Dranoff’s team laid out analyses of number-crunching efforts that sought to return the Royal Theater to its original usage. But the numbers don’t make sense – there’s no way to profit from that model in 2015.
Dranoff says he’s tight with Kenny Gamble who, along with CFO Shahied Dawan, runs Universal Companies, which has owned the Royal since ’00. They’re working together on this project, though it doesn’t downplay the changes that have occurred on and near South Street in the past couple decades.
“We really looked at it from the very beginning as a mainstay in the community, and it’s totally reflective of so many entertainers in the African American community in South Philly,” Universal Vice President Eve Lewis said.
She said the neighborhood used to be “70 percent African American to 30 percent Caucasian. It’s reversed – the neighborhood’s changed. A lot of people that still remain here are living in the units that we constructed, and that’s on both sides of Broad Street.”
At Tuesday’s hearing, Dranoff’s representative from Econsult Solutions laid out the potentials they ran the numbers for: retail only, a movie theater with one (400 seats) or two (175 seats each) screens, a live performance venue, only residential, and mixed use retail/residential or retail/commercial. None resulted in a profit. They even analyzed profit per screen from local movie theaters – the average theater has 7.8 screens in Philadelphia (at its lowest end, the Ritz has a screen revenue of $160,000 a year). As for a theater, they pointed to the unsure futures of the Prince Theater, the Suzanne Roberts Theatre, Society Hill Playhouse, 507 S. Eighth St., and Plays & Players. It was mentioned that House of Blues passed on the space and settled on the 125-year-old Ajax Metal Company building in Fishtown.
There are a few protestors to this particular Dranoff vision, the most viable in the more than 40 years developers have tried and failed to move the project forward. Mostly, they’re near neighbors who want the property to be townhomes.
“The latest proposal to demolish everything except for the front façade has been the most realistic proposal,” Jim Campbell, an architect with a practice on the 1500 block of South and a residence on the 1600 block, said. “There are people in the neighborhood who wanted million-dollar townhouses – they didn’t like the idea of 20 cars parking, which is miniscule, they didn’t like the idea of renters.”
But Campbell says the history of the theater hasn’t been ignored.
“There’s a big sentiment in the neighborhood to preserve some of the history of the Royal Theater, about who built it and what population did it serve,” he noted. “It’s an important piece.”
South of South Neighborhood Association (SOSNA), which was deferred to by the Center City Residents Association, is all for Dranoff’s vision. Lauren Vidas, SOSNA’s chair, said she has neighbors who’ve been in the neighborhood since the 1960s and ’70s who lived through the potential for a crosstown expressway but since they’ve stuck around, their main corridor’s experiencing a renaissance.
“It’s like the phoenix of corridors, it’s coming back strong and vibrant and businesses who have been here for ages are getting a second or third wind,” said Vidas. “What this venue meant to the city and the African American neighborhood that surrounded it – how do we respect and honor it?”
She concluded that the near neighbors surely “recognize that the future of the corridor is different from its history.”
Matt Levinson, the owner of 2012-born Quick Fixx, 1511 South St., and resident of the 1500 block of South Street for about five years, also sits on the South Street Business Owners Association.
“Since I opened, there have been about eight places open on the two blocks of 1500 and 1600,” he said.
As for the Royal, he says he and his fellow business owners are “cautiously optimistic. I know there are a few hurdles to get through with the Historical Commission, but we’re excited and optimistic that it’s finally going to happen.”
He’s less gentle about the opposition.
“They have really fought this thing tooth and nail,” but rather than $1 million townhomes upping property value, he argues, so could vibrancy on South Street. “A strong commercial corridor a half-block from your house will appreciate your value, too.”
Staff Writer Bill Chenevert at bchenevert@southphillyreview.com or ext. 117.
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