Sixers will limit game-day closures of 10th and 11th Streets at proposed downtown arena

The Sixers have scaled back their plans to close 10th and 11th Streets on game days at their proposed Center City arena, now limiting the closures to one lane on each road.

The duration of the closures also was reduced to when fans are leaving the venue after games, instead of both before and after. The lane shutdowns would last for an hour.

An updated Sixers submission that was posted Tuesday on the city Planning Commission website shows the team has designated ride-share pickup and drop-off areas on 12th, Chestnut, and Filbert Streets.

The Sixers enlarged an outdoor plaza at the arena’s southeast corner on Market Street East, which they said creates more room for fans. And they added more retail spots to the ground-floor public area of the venue, which they say is key to making the arena an active part of struggling Market Street East on days when no event is taking place.

“We have listened intently throughout the community engagement process,” Sixers co-owner and lead arena developer David Adelman said in a statement, “and while we have already made many updates in response to community feedback, we are grateful for more opportunities to hear from Philadelphians about how to further strengthen this project.”

The second meeting on this part of the project is scheduled for April 2 and can be viewed live online here.

The $1.55 billion, 18,500-seat arena would stand on the edge of Chinatown, covering the footprint between 10th and 11th and Market and Filbert Streets. The Sixers expect to hold about 150 events a year, including 41 home games.

“Not a single person spoke favorably of this project in the last six-hour meeting,” said Vivian Chang, executive director of Asian Americans United, which opposes the arena, “and developers still fail to address the most persistent public feedback on 76 Place: It’s in the wrong location.”

The new submission “raises more questions than it answers,” she said, given “developers’ baseless assumptions about fans’ change in travel, significant street closures, and refusal to answer who will pay for needed changes to infrastructure and SEPTA.”

The potential for crushing traffic and crowds has been a major point of contention, and people concerned about the location have questioned how ambulances, police, and rescue vehicles would be able to reach people in trouble.

The House of Dragons, the famous city Fire Department station, sits just north of the arena site at 10th and Cherry Streets.

Both southbound 10th and northbound 11th are routes to Jefferson Hospital, a Level 1 regional trauma center located south of the site. Those types of centers stand ready to treat severely injured patients with teams of neurosurgeons, orthopedic surgeons, and cardiac surgeons.

Asked if they have determined the potential impact of an arena on hospital operations and how they intend to address that, Jefferson officials did not directly answer the question.

In a statement, they said it was key “that any redevelopment effort prioritize public safety, address concerns of local residents, and mitigate traffic considerations to ensure uncompromised access to health care facilities.”

The Sixers say their plan provides for ample parking and flows of cars and pedestrians.

The information submitted Tuesday shows that one lane each on 10th and 11th would always be open. The temporarily closed lane would be the one closest to the arena on its east and west sides, the additional space allowing for an overflow of fans after events, the team said.

The plan to enlarge the sidewalks on the arena sides of 10th and 11th Streets remains in place.

The Sixers’ initial intention to close 10th and 11th Streets between Market and Filbert on game days was contained in a traffic study conducted by one of the team’s consultants. The report became public in June when it was released under a right-to-know request.

The new information appears in the revised arena plans presented to a city-appointed panel of architecture and planning experts, called Civic Design Review. Initial plans were submitted in December at a special CDR meeting, convened at the request of Councilmember Mark Squilla, whose 1st District includes the arena site.

Philadelphia’s tradition of councilmanic prerogative gives Council members wide latitude over land-use bills in their districts, meaning Squilla holds an unusual amount of influence over legislation to allow the arena to be built. He and other decision-makers await the release of city-sponsored studies on the economic- and community-impact of an arena, now months overdue.

The CDR process is intended to allow developers to hear perspectives from design and land-use experts and from the public and to offer builders a chance to make improvements to their plans. The committee is advisory, and developers are not required to make any changes.

In December, the first official review of the Sixers’ proposal generated hours of questioning at a daylong, virtual meeting during which 30 members of the public shared uniformly critical opinions.

CDR committee members voted at the end of the day to invite the development team to return — the board’s only power — and respond to critiques.

People at the December meeting said that street closures would disrupt heavily used SEPTA bus routes such as the 23 and 45 on 11th Street. And that, generally, the plan did not offer sufficient details about how the team would handle the surge of traffic around the arena, especially when large crowds moved at the end of games and concerts.

“This plan doesn’t … show me that we can fit that queue,” said committee member Ashley DiCaro. “What does it mean to shut down these streets and to have these thousands of people here at a given time?”