The base map shows streets (including the names of major streets), bridges, surface rail lines, highways, Cobbs Creek on the west and the Schuylkill River on the east, the original WPLP project boundaries, and the boundary of the Mill Creek watershed. This map is literally the "base" for all the others; other information in the database is "overlaid" on top of this map.

Map Source: Philadelphia City Planning Commission (date and title of map and scale)

The pattern of major streets in West Philadelphia reveals a place with no hub or central location. In fact, the major streets are routes from somewhere outside the community--Lancaster, Haverford, Baltimore--to somewhere else--Center City. The commercial and institutional band formed by Market, Chestnut, and Walnut Streets is a corridor traveled by thousands of people every day, passing to and from work and school. The rail routes--both Amtrak's eastern corridor and the commuter rail lines to the suburbs of the Main Line and Delaware County--reinforce this sense of being enroute; the tracks skirt the edge of West Philadelphia and create strong boundaries to the north, east, and south. With the exception of the northwestern corner, one enters West Philadelphia by crossing a bridge over a river or railroad.

First ferries and then bridges determined the course of major streets. Lancaster Avenue, Market Street, and Baltimore Avenue all converge toward the Market Street Bridge (once a ferry and then the only bridge across the Schuylkill River for some miles). Haverford Avenue crosses Lancaster and continues toward Spring Garden Bridge (also once the site of a ferry). Within this framework of major streets is a grid of north-south and east-west streets that structure the residential neighborhoods of West Philadelphia.

West Philadelphia is a community of many smaller neighborhoods, each with its own history and distinctive character. The story of each is told by the original lay of the land, the scale and pattern of its streets, the forms of its houses, the nature of its businesses and institutions, the location of parks and vacant land, and the overall condition of these today.