In South Philly, Vietnamese shopping plaza will become 44-unit housing development

More change is coming to the properties surrounding Washington Avenue—this time in the form of a new housing project that’s taking the place of a Vietnamese grocery store.

The project at 1600 Carpenter Street calls for 44 total homes, including 22 attached single-family structures, five two-family structures, and two six-family structures, according to plans for the project posted online ahead of the Civic Design Review (CDR) next week.

Led by local development group, Streamline, the project will take up 35,300 square feet of space at the corner of 16th and Carpenter. That lot stretches halfway down 16th toward Washington Avenue and is currently home to the Hoa Binh shopping plaza, which has been there for 30 years.

Haarman Deutsch, via CDR

In an article Tuesday, PlanPhilly spoke with a bakery owner whose shop is in the plaza, and who said property owners didn’t make him aware of the changes coming to the site.

But the project is already well underway. Next Tuesday, Streamline and architects Harman Deutsch will go in front of the CDR with their plans, which include 48-foot-high single- and multi-family buildings divided in rows that sit parallel to Carpenter Street.

The first two rows of buildings, which are separated by a drive aisle, will have three-bed, single-family townhouses. A small courtyard with outdoor seating separates the single family homes from from the third row of buildings, which features two-family structures, flanked on either side by six-family buildings.

Harman Deutsch, via CDR

Plans include 13,000 square feet of open area and 22 parking spots, available from the drive aisle off 16th Street.

The exteriors will mix fiber cement siding and metal with synthetic wood garage doors, according to the plans.

The project is the latest in several major developments along—or near—that stretch of Washington Avenue. One of the most notable is Lincoln Square, which wrapped up last year with multi-family housing, shops, and a Sprouts grocery store at a previously vacant lot on Broad and Washington.

But there are plenty of plans still in the works as well, like the redevelopment of the former Frankford Chocolate Factory into housing. Another project hopes to bring homes and retail to the 22nd block of Washington, and Dock Street Brewing even announced plans for a new brewery on 2118 Washington.