The A-space and Books Through Bars

The office/apartment building of 4722 holds two apartments: the A-Space and Books Through Bars. The building is part of the Life Center Association (LCA), a land trust. According to the website of A-Space, the LCA “cooperatively owns and holds in trust safe, stable at-cost housing for the long-term use of low to moderate-income peoples in order to co-create a just, sustainable community” with the purpose to “cultivate local, non-hierarchical leadership, direct democracy, social justice organizing and housing justice rooted in the history of the Movement for a New Society.”

As stated in phillyaspace.com, the A-Space Anarchist Social Center is “a storefront space that facilitates anti-authoritarian resistance as well as provides space for cultural and social justice events. It is a place for face-to-face interactions to take place beyond and against the systems that keep us separated, whether through art, organizing, food, or discussion.” 

Books Through Bars, BTB, is a nonprofit organization, sharing free books to prisoners and supporting their education. According to booksthroughbars.org, BTB “believes systemic social, educational, and economic inequality leads to relentless cycles of crime and mass incarceration” and aims to “reverse the devastating effects that injustice and incarceration has on individuals, families, and communities.” 

Keep walking to the east. You will see a few immigrant restaurants between the A-Space and 47th Street, including Dahlak at 4708 and Lee’s Deli at 4700. Immigrant businesses played and still play a large role in the area’s revitalization and gentrification, though the 1980s residents live elsewhere now. The 1962 land use map shows that Baltimore Avenue has been a commercial corridor for decades. 

Figure 4. 1962 land use map. The hatches of dots indicate commercial land use. © Works Progress Administration & Free Library of Philadelphia https://www.philageohistory.org/tiles/viewer/

Source: 

https://phillyaspace.com/questions-guidelines/

http://booksthroughbars.org/about/