Philly Creates 'Digital District'

To revitalize urban centers, cities and commercial property owners have tried all sorts of gimmicks to attract desirable tenants. A section of Philadelphia may have finally found a winning pitch, by offering to put tenants' names in lights.

A new ordinance will allow Philadelphia Media Network, which publishes The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Daily News, to help create a digital district in the Market East section of the city. Philadelphia Media Network recently signed a lease for 125,000 square feet at a building on Market Street that's part of an adjoining mall, The Gallery, at Market East. The ordinance allows developers, in exchange for an investment of at least $10 million, to put up and collect revenue from large digital signs and billboards on the outside of Market Street buildings between Seventh and 13th Streets.

Philadelphia Media Network will be the first business to take advantage of the ordinance, passed last summer, but will have to abide by its limits. For example, the ordinance allows digital signs to appear only on properties that have 100 feet or more of frontage on Market Street.