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Philadelphia Real Estate
Philadelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania and the sixth largest city in the United States. In 2008, the city proper was estimated to be more than 1.54 million while the Greater Philadelphia metropolitan area’s population of 5.8 million made it the country’s fifth largest city.
- Philadelphia is the county seat of Philadelphia County.
- Popular nicknames include Philly and the City of Brotherly Love.
- Philadelphia was the second largest city in the British Empire (London was the largest) and the social and geographical center of the original thirteen colonies.
- Philadelphia served as the temporary capital of the United States in 1790 until 1800 while the Federal City was under construction in the District of Columbia.
After a population decline, revitalization and gentrification of neighborhoods began in the 1960s and continues today, with much of the development in the Center City and University City areas of the city. After many of the old manufacturers and businesses left Philadelphia or closed, the city started attracting service businesses and began to more aggressively market itself as a tourist destination. Historic areas such as Independence National Historical Park and Society Hill are now among the most desirable living areas of Center City
Philadelphia is home to many national historical sites that relate to the founding of the United States. Independence National Historical Park is the center of these historical landmarks. Independence Hall, where the Declaration of Independence was signed, and the Liberty Bell are the city's most famous attractions.
The Philadelphia region is considered Mid-Atlantic which is located in the Northeastern United States. Pennsylvania is considered a Northeastern state, but shares the rural character of many Southern states. Parts of Maryland, Delaware and New Jersey are Philadelphia suburbs.
The city contains many art museums, such as the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and the Rodin Museum, which holds the largest collection of work by Auguste Rodin outside of France. The city’s major art museum, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, is one of the largest art museums in the United States. Its long flight of steps to the main entrance became famous after the film Rocky.
The city is also well known for its food - hoagies, scrapple, soft pretzels, water ice, Tastykake, and is home to the famous Philly cheesesteak.
Philadelphia's largest park, Fairmount Park, encompasses more than 9k acres and includes 63 neighborhood and regional parks. The largest tract of Fairmount Park is on the west side of the city along the Schuylkill River and includes the Philadelphia Zoo.
Philadelphia's professional sports teams date at least back to1860 with the founding of baseball's Athletics. The city is one of 13 U.S. cities to have all four major sports: the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League, the Philadelphia Flyers of the National Hockey League, the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League of Major League Baseball, and the Philadelphia 76ers in the National Basketball Association.
Philadelphia is home to professional, semi-professional and elite amateur teams in cricket, rugby league (Philadelphia Fight), rugby union and other sports. Major sporting events in the city include the Penn Relays, Stotesbury Cup, Philadelphia Marathon, Broad Street Run, Philadelphia International Championship bicycle race, and the Dad Vail Regatta. Also, Philadelphia is home to the Philadelphia Big 5, a group of five Division I college basketball programs. The Big 5 are Saint Joseph's University, University of Pennsylvania, La Salle University, Temple University, and Villanova University. The sixth NCAA Division I school in Philadelphia is Drexel University.
Philadelphia's economic sectors include manufacturing, oil refining, food processing, health care and biotechnology, tourism and financial services
The city is home to the Philadelphia Stock Exchange and several Fortune 500 companies, including cable television and internet provider Comcast, insurance companies Colonial Penn, CIGNA and Lincoln Financial Group, energy company Sunoco, food services company Aramark and Crown Holdings Incorporated, chemical makers Rohm and Haas Company and FMC Corporation, pharmaceutical companies Wyeth and GlaxoSmithKline, Boeing Rotorcraft Systems, and automotive parts retailer Pep Boys.
The federal government has several facilities in Philadelphia. The East Coast operations of the United States Mint are based near the historic district, and the Federal Reserve Bank's Philadelphia division is based there as well.
The city is a national center of law because of the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Drexel University Earle Mack School of Law, Temple University Beasley School of Law, Rutgers University School of Law - Camden, Villanova University School of Law, and Widener University School of Law. Headquarters of the American Law Institute is located in Philadelphia.
An important center for medicine, a distinction that it has held since the colonial period, Philadelphia is home to the first hospital in the British North American colonies, Pennsylvania Hospital, and the first medical school in what is now the United States, at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn). Penn, the city's largest private employer, also runs a large teaching hospital and extensive medical system. There are also major hospitals affiliated with Temple University School of Medicine, Drexel University College of Medicine, Thomas Jefferson University, and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. Philadelphia also has three distinguished children's hospitals: Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, the nation's first pediatric hospital (located adjacent to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania), St. Christopher's Hospital, and the Shriners' Hospital. In the city's northern section are Albert Einstein Medical Center, and in the northeast section, Fox Chase Cancer Center. Together, health care is the largest sector of employment in the city.
With Philadelphia's importance as a medical research center, the region supports the pharmaceutical industry. GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, Wyeth, Merck, GE Healthcare, Johnson and Johnson and Siemens Medical Solutions are just some of the large pharmaceutical companies with operations in the region. The city is also home to the nation's first school of pharmacy, the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, now called the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia.
The Delaware Valley is a term used to refer to the metropolitan area centered on the city of Philadelphia. The Delaware Valley is composed of several counties in southeastern Pennsylvania and southern New Jersey, one county in northern Delaware and one county in northeastern Maryland. The area has a population of almost 6 million (as of the 2009 Census Bureau estimate). Philadelphia, being the region's major commercial, cultural, and industrial center, maintains a rather large sphere of influence that affects the counties that immediately surround it. The majority of the region's populace resides in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Philadelphia's suburbs contain a high concentration of malls, including the King of Prussia Mall, the largest on the East Coast, and the Cherry Hill Mall in Cherry Hill Township, New Jersey, the first enclosed mall on the East Coast. Malls, office complexes, strip shopping plazas, expressways, and tract housing are common sights, and more and more continue to replace rolling countryside, farms, woods, and wetlands. However, due to strong opposition by residents and political officials, many acres of land have been preserved throughout the Delaware Valley. Sprawling forests and farms can still be found throughout the region, providing a haven for pristine nature seekers. Older small towns and large boroughs such as Norristown, Jenkintown, Upper Darby and West Chester retain distinct community identities while engulfed in suburbia. The fastest-growing counties are Chester, Montgomery, Bucks, and Gloucester. Upper Darby in Delaware County is the largest township in the United States. .
The region also has a large and growing ethnic population, thanks to job growth and proximity to major cities other than Philadelphia, such as New York City (90 miles) and Washington D.C (140 miles).
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