South side of Pier 3 (2007).
Piers 3 & 5 North (The Girard Group), 1923
3 & 7 North Columbus Boulevard (formerly Delaware Avenue), Philadelphia PA 19106
© Helene Schenck & Michael
Parrington, Workshop of the World (Oliver Evans Press,
1990).
The piers were built in 1923
as part of a longrange port improvement scheme initiated
in 1907, a scheme which also included the dredging of the
Delaware River to a depth of 35 feet from the sea to
Allegheny Avenue in Philadelphia, and the building of the
Benjamin Franklin Bridge. The present location of the
piers is on the approximate site of wharves owned in the
early nineteenth century by the French shipping magnate,
and later banker and financier, Stephen Girard. The pier
complex was intended to serve foreign, intercoastal,
coastal, and river trade; when new, the piers were
stateoftheart in cargo handling transfer technology. They
were said to have transformed Delaware Avenue into the
"greatest shipping thoroughfare in the country."
1
The principal features of the Girard Group were the two
architecturally embellished reinforced concrete and steel
sheds which housed double berth piers. Between the piers
as well as to the north of Pier 5, along the Delaware
Avenue bulkhead, was a range of sheds and offices, with a
continuous streetside loading dock. The north and south
walls of each shed were comprised of 21 two story bays;
at the apron level of each bay, huge overhead metal doors
provided access to and from the first floor interiors of
the sheds. Continuous cargo masts with shackles of a
capacity of five tons each were strung along the tops of
the north and south walls, providing accommodation at
each pier for four ships with lengths of up to 500 feet.
The shed interiors were equipped to handle both
horizontal and vertical transfer to trucks and trains,
with freight car entrances occupying a principal bay at
each pier front on Delaware Avenue. The open shed
superstructure overall relied on a two story steel frame,
set up in four bays and roofed in a Warren truss.
The piers have been rehabbed as apartments.
1 Alice Kent Schooler,
John Milner Associates, "Nomination
of Piers 3 and 5 to the National Register of Historic
Places," 1983.
Update May
2007 (by
Torben Jenk):
Survives as commercial and
residential condominiums with parking and a central
atrium, bracketing a marina. The residences are
double-stacked along the waterside perimeter, each having
two floors (creating four levels where there were two). A
restaurant and offices are along the Delaware Avenue
side. Boat slips in the marina are usually rented by the
season but a few hardy souls live year-round on their
boats, weathering the season enroute to the
bathroom.