pretty darn cool...went to college in Philly and lived in Center City for 2 years...a few things
1. the condo building shown at Penn's Landing - I worked there as the Head Lifeguard...woo hoo!
2. The building across from 30th St. Station (in one of the shots) is the Old Post Office...now turned over to UPenn
3. The park pictures actually appear to be from Rittenhouse Square, not Washington Square...both are equally nice
4. Much of the wayfinding signage was implemented by the Center City District, an outcrop of the Central Phila. Development Corporation...this is one of the projects I worked on as an intern...way back in 1993
5. Schuylkill River Trail....this picture is of an area that was a pretty seedy city park (lots of weird night time activities) even through the 1990s
6. The CVS Pharmacy shown in one of the pics used to be a movie theater....Philly had several in-town theaters even in the early 1990s....I saw a local pre-screening of the movie Philadelphia there
7. Many of the streets shown with bike lanes used to be 2 lane one-way streets w/ parking
8. The shot with the streetcar tracks in the street....back in the early 1990s, SEPTA stopped operating most of these streetcar lines (put buses on the routes instead)....and then sold the PCC cars to places like San Fran....a few of the streetcars have now been brought back...most noticeably the 12th St line, which goes under/through the Convention Center.
One final thought that has meaning for Jax....I always found Center City Philly to be a great place to live, work, and hangout...but, up through the early 1990s there was a large homeless population, dirty streets, and rising crime....the turn around began in 1994 when the City opened the new Convention Center downtown and started to actively promote Philly as a tourist destination.