7North Lifestyle Center

"The original design and development of Bryn Mawr was an early form of TOD (Transit-Oriented Development), as were other Main Line communities that developed along the Main Line of the Pennsylvania Railroad. By re-enforcing the TOD concept in Bryn Mawr, we are reconnecting the community with its origins. By promoting transit-oriented development, there is potential to increase the number of rail riders and to realize a better return on public investment in infrastructure and services."

-Sasaki, 2009

"We tried to unite public purpose and private profit, and if you can successfully do that, in anything, you've got a winner."

-Roye Lowry, 2009 from "Arlington's Smart Growth Journey"

"The commercial success of Tokyo Station is the result of Japanese railway companies’ continuing exploration for profitable business to utilize the annex commercial facilities around station buildings. This shows the importance of managing profitable business in addition to the conventional railway business in achieving a successful TOD."

-(Tokyo, Japan) International Affairs Office, City Bureau, Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT), Japan's TOD Guidebook, pg. 13, 2021

The following is a feasibility study around existing infrastructure and design ideas for the proposed 7 North Lifestyle Center, including a hotel, retail, street-style marketplace, fitness facilities, and more green space than currently, to occupy the parking lot at 7 North Bryn Mawr Avenue in Bryn Mawr, PA, incorporating modern interior design with traditional local architecture.
Since no two areas are alike, the main idea for the feasibility study is to find stations that are most similar to Bryn Mawr based on: 1) given distance from highways, hospitals, universities, and large employers and 2) population density and per capita income within the same or similar radius, and to analyze their success with lodging alternatives.

To-Do:

• College attendance ✅
• Rail Traffic ✅
• Bus Traffic ✅
• Pedestrian Traffic - inference by *personal observation ✅
• Car Traffic - traffic along Lancaster Ave. and Bryn Mawr Ave. ✅
• Employee counts, local businesses within walking shed - inference
• PHL airport distance and ridership ✅
• Priorities
• Finalizing metrics

College attendance is taken from datausa.io.

*Rail traffic and bus traffic were furnished by request directly from SEPTA.

*Pedestrian traffic was inferred using hourly observations on various days during the spring and early summer of 2025. The temperatures were characteristic of spring from 45F to 75F, and weather conditions included sunny, cloudy, and rainy. Observations are noted on both sides of street from parking lot on four connected streets (Lancaster Avenue, Morris Avenue, N Bryn Mawr Ave West and N Bryn Mawr Ave East). To count as an inside crossing, an individual must cross between the frontage of Lot 7 (in three places a black wrought iron fence and along N Bryn Mawr Ave East the bottom of the hill) and the middle point of the road being observed, in most places denoted by a line. To count as an outside crossing, an individual must cross between the frontage of the business (Ludington Library, Post Office, 7-11, Santander Bank, etc.) and the middle point of the road. Usually this relates to sidewalk traffic. All eight crossing points have sidewalks except N Bryn Mawr Ave East. See attached spreadsheet and map showing the crossing points. Some individuals are counted twice considering they are in-and-out customers of a local business (WSFS, Post Office, 7-11, etc.) I did not intentionally count them more than twice, and in the case someone is straddling the line talking in a group, waiting for a bus in the case that the line falls along the bus stop, working (construction workers were repainting and rewelding the wrought-iron fence for several days) or is making multiple trips within a short time to a business (such as the dry cleaners), they are counted only twice. It should be anecdotally noted that pedestrian traffic noticably increases one block west of this area (near the Bryn Mawr Film Institute) and in the case of a business at Lot 7, could certainly be expected to organically increase given the proximity of a noticably larger pedestrian base. For purposes of pedestrian counts, the focus is on anyone who could stop and make an impulse buy without parking a vehicle or locking up a bike or similar, so every person who is not in a vehicle or riding a bicycle or scooter is counted as one. For example, a person pushing a stroller with a baby would count as two, a person riding a skateboard would count as one (although I didn't see any), a person walking a dog would count as one, and a group of five jogging would count as five. As an area with mixed suburban and urban characteristics, it is reasonable to infer that many people walking arrived in the area via some sort of vehicle, and there is no differentiation in the study for pure pedestrian traffic vs. street and Lot 7 park and walk. See attached spreadsheet.

*Car traffic is taken from https://gis.penndot.pa.gov/BPR_PDF_FILES/MAPS/Traffic/Traffic_Volume/Statewide/Statewide_2022_tv.pdf

*Employee counts use Walking Shed Assumption (from Northern corner at New Gulph Road and N Roberts Road) - New Gulph Road southeast to Pennswood Road, Pennswood Road / Penn Street southwest to Railroad Avenue, Railroad Avenue northwest to five points corner of S Bryn Mawr Avenue and County Line Road, County Line Road northwest past Bryn Mawr Hospital and Bryn Mawr Light Rail Station to S Roberts Road, S Roberts Road northeast to Lancaster Avenue, Lancaster Avenue southeast to N Roberts Road, N Roberts Road to Northern corner at New Gulph Road. To estimate this, all frontage-facing businesses along both sides of the roads mentioned are included (notably Love and Honey and Kelly's Tavern which are the only case of the zone being split within a building) , as well as businesses on opposite corners of an extreme corner (notably Dunkin' Donuts and Wawa), and any other businesses inside the boundaries (anything within the area along but not limited to Lancaster, Bryn Mawr, and Montgomery Avenues).

We can expect that emloyee throughput is underestimated given the existence of remote workers in cafes/coffee shops, delivery drivers, rideshare drivers, construction workers on local projects, and municipal workers providing essential and emergency services.

--I first took all businesses within this walking shed area and, wherever possible, found the values on propertychecker.com , and if not available, estimated the values from Google Maps by square foot, and dropped them into buckets according to their NAICS code, then used the value of each NAICS bucket to infer an employee count. As with other metrics in this study, it does not differentiate between higher or lower paid work, part-time or full-time work, nor owners or hourly employees. Further study could differentiate the employees, but it is important to note that this is a very diverse area with not only retail employees, but medical, legal, education, and FIRE workers included in the calculation. I do not expect many doubles, or individuals that work part-time in two different locations within the walking shed, as it likely represents less than a percent of the total employee count. --

--Due to some inaccuracies in separating floors in the rental space, I may switch to using average employee count for each business type via NAICS code.

Note that the walking shed is not entirely in Lower Merion Township, Montgomery County, as the bottom right corner, comprising of Acme, Amkor Karate, and surrounding local businesses are in Haverford Township, Delaware County.

*Philadelphia Airport traffic was taken from https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.gov/files/2024-10/cy23-commercial-service-enplanements.pdf

Micro benefits:

• Existing traffic, hospital, theater, colleges, businesses and seasonal markets provide a natural market for the project
• Resort-qualities bring in medium- to high-net worth clientele for a relatively affordable resort experience
• Is both enhanced by local tourism and enhances regional/national tourism

Macro benefits:

• Re-establishes town as a center of commerce, education, and tourism given surroundings
• Encourages increased usage of Paoli-Thorndale line
• Social image of a town must include lodging alternatives

Priorities:

• Pedestrian safety and connectivity
• Convenience
• Anti-Fragility
• Aesthetics

Challenges

• Public pushback - NIMBY effect
• Amtrak lien
• Cost of underground parking
• 200 spaces temporarily lost during construction (see forcing points below)
• SEPTA funding issues and PAO threats
• Common ground needed between Lower Merion Township, PennDot, Amtrak, SEPTA, and possibly other parties

Study Challenges (Development of Proof of Concept)

• Comparing data across metro services, boarding vs. total vs. unique - Boarding seems to be most readily available and should give a number close to unique trips.
• Exact comparisons difficult - Note this in final draft including steps for best practices.
• Comparing solely by town can be confusing and misleading - Use radius out from local train station to determine proximity of features.
• Simple existance of a hotel does not necessarily indicate profitability.
• Ticket prices can greatly affect daily traffic to local stops, but may be unlikely to affect the propensity of one to actual hotel visits given an upscale hotel.

Forcing Points - Forcing points should be considered as time contraints rather than actual threats. Most of them represent economic growth in the long-run, and will thereby benefit feasibility and profit for proposed project. In the short-run, however, they represent constraints that could possibly hinder development in the near future. So acting on this project before action is taken on other projects will be greatly beneficial to all interested parties. Some have large implications, some have much smaller, if any, implications. The point of this section is to consider all forcing points, regardless of size or impact.

• Substitute parking situation should be implemented, utilized, and completed before construction of possible 2/6/10 S. Bryn Mawr Avenue Project. The underground parking lot meant to replace Lot 7 should be operational before the mixed use project on the opposite corner begins, since that is the last remaining large source of parking overflow for existing Lot 7 Users.
• Ardmore Hotel possibility - competition during the critical first years of operation
• College closure situation (e.g. Cabrini and other metro-area schools such as Art Institute of Philadelphia). Rosemont College has announced closure. While Valley Forge College remains open, Valley Forge Academy has announced closure.
• Possibility of adverse height restrictions, similar to recent restrictions implemented in Ardmore
• Inevitable building downturn could cause funding to dry up, at least for a long business cycle
• Alternative development on Municipal Lot 7
• Increase or decrease of Harcum attendence - While a decrease could result in possible closure (see above), an increase could mean less parking spaces available for overflow during construction and Lot 7 closure
• Norristown Speed Line (also known as Route 100 or M Line) reopens County Line stop after improvement, opening possibility of more public transit access to Villanova from competing hotel - REOPENED 2025
• Wyndam House in Bryn Mawr College reopens, providing increased competition, although small, for the local lodging market
• Amtrak substation improvement slightly decreases local parking - BEGAN NOV. 2024
• Continued unimpeded growth in Valley Forge/King of Prussia area, in particular, a glut of new hotel and conference space
• Growing amounts of lodging space in Radnor Township, City Line Avenue, and King of Prussia.

Further research:

• 30th Street Station Improvements

• Possible Philadelphia 76ers Market East project (Jefferson Station) - CANCELLED PERMANENTLY

• Line extension to Coatesville

• New Norristown speed line spur to KOP mall - on hold indefinitely due to FTA concerns

• County Line Station improvements and reopening

• Growth near Radnor Station

• Urban 3 Consulting and similar

• Urbanism movement and 10 principles of intelligent urbanism

• Virginia's Bull's Eye concept around stations, in particular the Silver and Orange lines

• 2004 TOD handbook: https://trb.org/publications/tcrp/tcrp_rpt_102.pdf

• Center for Transit-Oriented Development https://toddata.cnt.org/

• Japan's TOD: https://www.mlit.go.jp/common/001398605.pdf

• Delaware Valley TOD https://www.dvrpc.org/tod/

• Charles Marohn and the Strong Towns Initiative https://www.strongtowns.org/

• Jarrett Walker and the Human Transit Blog https://humantransit.org/

• Michael Sutherland and Hatch Urban Solutions https://www.hatch.com/About-Us/

• Nassim Taleb's concept of anti-fragility https://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/

• Peter Calthorpe and TOD https://www.hdrinc.com/markets/urban-community-development?trafficsource=calthorpe

Possible Partnerships - representing large organizations that may be interested in employee or executive packages for corporate retreats or employee lodging during travel

Step 1: Read and interpret studies of a similar nature, preferably for hotels inside of town centers, if not available, do similar projects ( 1 week ) Step 2: Decide on a good group of test results similar to Lower Merion Township from Step 1. Based on this, some similar areas are Westfield, NJ, Princeton, NJ, Arlington, VA, Tysons, VA, Evanston, IL, Bethesda, MD, and Chapel Hill, NC. Focus is on train stops/village centers and the radius around them, not necessarily the town or city designation of the addresses. All raw data extracted for Lower Merion Township should be extracted from test markets in as comparable form as possible. Conduct as synchonous as possible duplicate studies for the test markets. ( 1 week ). New approach: inputs: college students, hospital beds, local businesses, car traffic, train station traffic output: stations most similar to Bryn Mawr analysis: hotel rooms in output towns Step 3: Examining test results and all possible metrics with closest possible comparisons.

Primary Priorities, in order:

1. SAFETY - Projects in this age should leave the surrounding cityscape safer upon completion than before construction. Concerns about past projects in Lower Merion have cited safety as a primary concern. As a busy Northeastern town, Bryn Mawr already balances vehicles, trains, pedestrians (including joggers and parents with children in strollers), and other modes of transporation, including bicycles and scooters. Safety should be the primary concern in any new development, and any project should leave the existing environment safer than it was before. Some examples of this include expanded sidewalks with barriers against oncoming traffic, particularly along Lancaster Avenue, a sidewalk along North Bryn Mawr Avenue East to complete the interior sidewalk system around the property, the pedestrian tunnel from the train station (sheltered walk from traincar to hotel room, free of elements or vehicle traffic - "direct access"), and possible crosswalks at the Northwest tip of North Bryn Mawr Avenue (near Santander Bank and Parvin's Pharmacy). ADA compliance at the SEPTA stations would include elevators to get riders between the outbound and inbound sides of the platform, and provide raised platforms such as what is being constructed at the new Ardmore station currently. With the combination of elevators from the underground parking lot replacing Lot 7, a wheelchair bound rider will be able to conveniently get from any 7 North business, including their hotel room, to a traincar smoothly, without the awkward, inconvienient and dangerous ride to the front of the sidewalk/car entrance near the intersection of Morris and Lancaster Avenue. The completion of the sidewalk system on North Bryn Mawr Avenue East will make this possible in two places. The blind and awkward intersection between North Bryn Mawr Avenue, Morris Avenue, and the downhill parking lot coming from Pullman's restaurant and Bryn Mawr Center, is equally dangerous for drivers, pedestrians, and bicyclists given the lack of visibility for all parties. A scramble-style intersection should be implemented at Lancaster and Morris identical to the one at Lanaster and Bryn Mawr, and both intersections should contain white crossing lines in a diagonal to remind pedestrians that both walk lights are simultaneous (and differentiating them from ones that do not).

2. CONVENIENCE - Given the current lack of any hotel space (excluding VRBO, AirBNB, and some guesthouse-style lodging) along Route 30 from City Avenue to 476, and given the abundance of educational, cultural, entertainment, retail, corporate, and health organizations within this corridor, Bryn Mawr and surrounding areas are due for hotel space, especially from a mixed-use perspective. Lot 7 is a central location easily accessible by car from I-476 (Blue Route), US-30 (Lancaster Ave.), Montgomery Ave., Haverford Rd. and Bryn Mawr Ave. It is accessible by rail, being connected to the Paoli-Thorndale Bryn Mawr Station, within walking distance of the M Route Bryn Mawr South Station (Norristown Speed Line), a short distance from the Ardmore Amtrak Station, and adjacent to a new high-power substation that will increase regular and punctual train schedules and further enable a possible coast-to-coast high speed rail line in the future. It fronts two bus stops for two different bus lines (Route 105 and Route 106). It stands adjacent to a proposed improved bike route along Morris Avenue. And it sees regular foot traffic in all directions throughout the day. Public underground parking, while initially expensive, will provide steady revenue and should reduce the need for unsightly above-ground parking in adjacent areas as density in the immediate area increases.

3. ANTI-FRAGILITY - Properties must evolve. Transportation preferences change over time, and while a transit-oriented design is in focus, any surplus area should be available for quick conversion to alternative means. For example, parking spaces can expand or contract given market contraction or expansion. This highlights the importance of the Marketplace. This future-proofing of the valuable underground "flex" space will support both increases and decreases in driving habits, as well as provide shared parking to other nearby facilities, including downtown retail and Bryn Mawr train station.

4. AESTHETICS - By preserving a traditional but unique Main Line exterior and developing a modern minimalist interior we will be able to attract and retain local, national, and international clientele.

-While these are prioritized in order, it is fair to assume that all are equally necessary from a purely going-concern basis.

Economic Measures of Success:

1. Financial Profitability - Does this project create wealth for stakeholders?
2. Municipal Profitability - Does this project create wealth (and thereby higher tax receipts) from neighboring businesses?
3. Line Profitability - Does this contribute to making SEPTA financially profitable?
4. Long-term Growth - Does the financial outlay repay itself in growth of the neighborhood over the coming years?

As a municipal project on municipal land I do not feel like all of these factors have to be successful from the start. As one example, one particular aspect of the project (the underground parking garage) will be considered expensive by profit-first advocates and will be considered impure by transit-oriented development purists. But it is my belief that providing the underground parking to replace the current Lot 7 will begin to set a trend to move Bryn Mawr, and many other (if not most) Paoli-Thorndale station stops, away from what they are now, which are seas of flat parking lots (often half-empty) with vibrant pedestrian-oriented villages only on the outskirts of the walking shed. It is no mystery that the station stops serve as valuable park-and-ride stations for suburban commuters who use the train as the second leg of a commute to another part of the region, usually Center City Philadelphia, and that anchor should only grow over time when these stops offer essential services and in even closer proximitely to parking (in the form of a multi-story garage to hold all local capacity). Parking spaces do NOT have to be eliminated in this scenario, in fact they can be increased, and in much closer proximity to the train platform. But the acres of parking lots go away, freeing them up for additional retail, housing, office space, green space. or other uses that will improve the quality of life for residents, increase profits for local businesses, increase tax receipts for the local government, and ultimately, turn the Paoli-Thorndale stations to destinations, not just parking nodes on the way to and from jobs or events taking place in Philadelphia. Keep the cars, but keep them stacked so that the unsightly and underutilized parking lots can be developed, beautified, monetized, and enhanced for further generations. It should also be noted that any surplus parking can and will be designed to occupy other uses, such as equipment storage, marketplace expansion, and eventually centralized parking for businesses and services growing in the 1-2 block radius, of which at least one large mixed use project is proposed and approved.

Definitely: "old and the new"- outside (old) existing architectural styles of historic Main Line structures, inside (new) -modern, Asian-influenced, feng shui, modern Tokyo, Bangkok, Seoul structures, minimalist, luxurious, practical terrace idea elevator top floor year-round marketplace to embrace and improve (and in no way impede) Bryn Mawr Farmer's Market and Clover Market

Maybe: conical or octagon roof at beveled corners Atrium for Pool 2 area, retractable? if permanently outdoor, provide alternative winter use for covered pool area, not just plastic cover

Maybe not: arched fiberglass walks

Rendering Ideas, research capabilities and cost:

1. Archicad
2. AutoCad
3. Revit
4. SketchUp

-systems thinking approach