Philadelphia’s Navy Yard booms

Companies take root where warships were once built

Vehicles pass the main gate at Philadelphia’s Navy Yard last week. The former military property is now home to 130 companies and 10,000 employees.
Vehicles pass the main gate at Philadelphia’s Navy Yard last week. The former military property is now home to 130 companies and 10,000 employees.

— The city’s Navy Yard, a huge military powerhouse where battleships were built until the Cold War ended, is celebrating a milestone that seemed a stretch when the Navy shipped out 17 years ago.

Once the nation’s first shipyard - its origins date from 1776 - the sprawling property is now home to 130 companies and 10,000 employees in industries as varied as fashion, pharmaceuticals, colleges and cupcakes.

“There was a lot of uncertainty early on,” said John Grady, the president of the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corp. “People weren’t sure what we were going to do to replace this engine of activity that was there.”

Last week, the Navy Yard marked its 10,000-employee milestone and unveiled an update to its 2004 master plan that is forecasting 1,000 apartments, more parks and open space, more new construction and continued adaptive reuse of Navy-era industrial buildings.

About $130 million in publicly funded infrastructure improvements at the Navy Yard has spurred more than $700 million in private investment. About $30 million in city wage taxes and $47 million in state income and sales taxes were generated last year.

Companies calling the Navy Yard home include Urban Outfitters and Tasty Baking Co., and several universities offer classes, and other schools collaborate with private companies on “green”- energy research.

About one-third of the 130 businesses get some form of tax break, but they are required to make a certain amount of capital investment or increase employment.

The 2013 master plan update estimates that more than 30,000 people will work at the Navy Yard at its peak, possibly in 15 to 20 years, with private investments of $3 billion.

Robert A.M. Stern Architects, creators of the original and revised strategic plans, envision new and rehabilitated commercial, industrial and residential buildings eventually extending to the waterfront with a complement of surrounding parks and canals.

“Any good master plan has to change as circumstances change,” Stern said, “and in this case, it’s wonderful to work with a plan that is in many ways a victim of its own success.”

The end of the Cold War spelled the end of the shipyard, and by 1996 the Navy had packed its bags. Roughly 7,000 civilian jobs were lost.

After the Navy transferred ownership of about 1,100 acres to the Philadelphia Industrial Development Corp., the public-private partnership began floating ideas for the site’s future. Four years later, a road map was unveiled to guide growth of what essentially is a city within a city at the southern end of Broad Street.

The Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, the property’s military title, was renamed the Navy Yard for its new life as the urban antidote to the cloistered office parks in the suburbs.

“We started at a time when the suburban business park was kind of the model,” Grady said, “but, of course, what we’ve seen is a shift back to cities.”

Like a college campus, the layout is conducive to workers venturing out of their offices. Shared, parklike green spaces are hallmarks of the site, as are commissaries and cafeterias that are open to everyone, not just employees of the building where they’re located.

The model has proved particularly appealing to businesses from outside the city: Nearly two-thirds of the 130 businesses at the Navy Yard are new to Philadelphia, Mayor Michael Nutter said.

“The momentum ... only has accelerated throughout the recent recession,” he said. The area has added 60 companies and 2,500 employees since 2008.

Adding to the urban environment in the next several years will be 1,000 apartment units in a cluster of existing and new buildings, along with grocery shopping and other neighborhood necessities. A 170-room hotel is under construction and development is expanding up to the Delaware River.

The newest tenant is pharmaceutical giant Glaxo Smith-Kline. About 1,300 employees will be relocating from a downtown office tower to an $80 million, 208,000-squarefoot building by the end of this month.

The move allowed the company to custom-build an energy-efficient building with an open floor plan, and the location is much closer to the airport, said Glaxo project manager Ray Milora.

“Everyone really is excited to be down here,” he said. “We were in a very traditional, standard, beige, American office space. ... It’s amazing how everything changes by taking down walls and being able to see people.”

Business, Pages 23 on 02/12/2013

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