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PA Court: Vacant Lot Valueless Without Zoning Variance

BY Alan Nochumson
September 01, 2024

In In re Appeal of Council Member Cindy Bass, 2024 Pa. Commw. LEXIS 172 (July 19, 2024), the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court affirmed, in part, a decision by the city of Philadelphia's Zoning Board of Adjustment (ZBA), finding that a real estate developer's evidence established an unnecessary hardship because it proved that the property, a vacant lot that needed costly environmental remediation, was practically valueless without the granting of a variance under the Philadelphia Zoning Code.

In In re Appeal of Bass, a long-vacant lot on Chew Avenue in the East Mount Airy section was slated for transformation into a four-story apartment building following a contentious approval process that saw local residents clash with the real estate developer of the property, the opinion said.

The property, consisting of approximately 14,000 square feet, once an auto repair shop, was located in a CA-1 zoning district where multi-family residential use was specifically prohibited, the opinion said.

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