11 Shurs LnUnder construction

A 42-unit mixed-use building is under construction at 11 Shurs Lane in Manayunk, stretching across a 15,000-square-foot lot that's been held by the same owner since 1967. The four-story structure will include ground-floor commercial shell space—tenants will need separate fit-out permits before occupancy—with residential stacked above. The developer is using a hybrid construction approach: Type IA on the first floor and Type VA for the upper three stories, separated horizontally to meet code. Recent tweaks to the plans added bollards and chain-link fencing around the electrical room and adjusted the ground-floor layout.

The site sits in an ICMX zone, which allows this kind of mixed-use density by right, and the project cleared its final hurdles in mid-April. Smith Boyding, the owner of record, is bringing meaningful scale to a neighborhood corner that's seen minimal change in decades. The building will be fully sprinklered and include standpipes, with fire watch protocols in place during construction.

This project lands in the middle of a modest but steady wave of multifamily development in the area. Within a half-mile, roughly 65 new units are either planned or delivered, including a 15-unit building on Pechin Street and a 50-unit project on Ridge Avenue. Manayunk's ICMX corridors have proven quietly attractive to smaller developers working with older assemblages, and 11 Shurs Lane is a textbook example of an aging parcel finally penciling out.

The mixed-use format here—commercial below, residential above—mirrors what's becoming standard along walkable neighborhood spines where retail demand remains speculative but housing absorption is reliable. As long-held sites like this one shift hands or get developed by legacy owners, expect similar four-story, mid-density infill to test other underbuilt lots along the neighborhood's commercial strips.