philadelphia building permits Tag

Philadelphia Zoning has been guiding clients and projects through the Special Inspections Program required as per the Building Code.  Sometimes there is pushback, confusion, and questions regarding this program and how it affects a project, or wy and when it is needed.   What is the Philadelphia Special Inspections Program?   The special Inspections Program is a program designed to promote quality assurance in construction projects. It is designed...

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The Official Word   “You need to get a Certificate of Occupancy if you’re planning to change the designated use or occupancy of a space.” -City of Philadelphia   As you may or may not know the Use of a space is regulated through Zoning. However, a Certificate of Occupancy is a form of Building Permit. Typically, when you change the Use of a space you are also renovating it...

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An additional information request is sent by Licenses and Inspections whenever one of their plans examiners wants to know more about your project.  Getting this letter is not an indication of failure, it is actually considered a standard response as requirements for permits can be as unpredictable as the weather. However, in the off chance you do not receive a request for additional information, you deserve...

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add-info-zoning-permit

Previously in this blog, we’ve mentioned the City of Philadelphia’s requests for additional information.  Since we see a lot of these, we are going to create a catalogue of the requests as a reference guide.  We hope that this will help our clients, design partners, and contractors better understand what information is most commonly missing from an application.  (If you haven’t seen it before, it’s...

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Reference Guide

Happy holidays from Philadelphia Zoning!   We've had quite a year here, thanks to our clients, legal partners, and design partners.  To thank everyone, we're offering this present:  A handy reference guide for our most common permitting projects.  Enjoy!     General Zoning and Permitting Information   The source:  The Philadelphia Zoning Code The Philadelphia Code can be found here.  Title 14 (what those of us not in the legal profession would simply...

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We here at Philadelphia Zoning like to poke some fun at our City's bureaucracy.  Licenses and Inspections can be a mystery to homeowners and developers: documents go in; only sometimes do they come out.  When they do come out, it's often because they are rejected for arcane reasons.  It can be pretty frustrating and eat your time (and it's why Philadelphia Zoning exists: to save...

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Wait, I have to get approval from what?   Ah, prerequisite approvals!  Who doesn't love that giddy sensation?  You know the one:  You walk up to the desk at Licenses and Inspections, submit your carefully prepared application, and are told in a dead monotone, "This needs approval from Streets before we'll look at it."   There's no way around it: Prerequisite approvals are rough.  In this story, you need...

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Zoning in Philadelphia is a strange enterprise.  The ideas behind it are simple, and the people working the desks downtown are generally helpful.  But in practice, it can be quite confusing.  This little overview probably won’t make the strange details of zoning any less confusing, but it may give you a clearer picture of the overall structure of zoning complaints, requests, and applications in Philadelphia.   How...

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The City of Philadelphia recently combined its review boards into the new Department of Planning and Development.   The Department now houses the Art Commission, Historical Commission, City Planning Commission, and — of particular note to us at Philadelphia Zoning — the Zoning Board of Adjustment.   This seems like a smart reorganization on paper, and there are other departments and personnel involved beyond those boards our company usually...

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