Orientation

Visitor Information

The Independence Visitor Center, 6th and Market streets, Philadelphia, PA 19106 (tel. 800/537-7676 or 215/965-7676; www.independencevisitorcenter.com), is extremely convenient, with underground parking just off I-95 (enter at 5th St. or 6th St. between Market and Arch sts.), and it has rejuvenated Independence Mall 1 block north of the Liberty Bell. The $38-million facility has a great offering of customer services through volunteers and automated kiosks, five exhibition nooks, a film theater, a cafe, and a gift shop and bookstore. The second-floor balconies are great for photo ops of Independence National Historical Park highlights.

The center parcels out free tickets to the major landmarks of Independence National Historical Park such as Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell Pavilion. This service is vital since security concerns have clamped down on who gets in and when. They sell other tickets such as the SEPTA (an extensive network of trolleys, buses, and subways) DayPass ($5.50). Plus, you can make any kind of reservations -- hotel, restaurant, event -- here. Many bus tours, trolley rides, and walking tours conveniently begin at the visitor center.

The center is open daily from 8:30am to 5pm, and until 7pm during the summer. If you're planning in advance, call tel. 800/537-7676 to get material on all the special seasonal promotions, and tel. 800/967-2283 from 10am to 10pm (or visit www.reservations.nps.gov) to preorder timed tickets to sites such as Independence Hall.

City Layout

Main Arteries & Streets -- If you're driving, you'll likely enter town from one of the major highways: I-95 or I-76 (the Schuylkill Expwy.), which are connected by I-676. From any of those three, it's easy to access Center City, which Pennsylvania founder William Penn smartly laid out on a grid. Numbered streets run north-south. Named streets (many which sport trees names such as Walnut, Locust, Spruce, and Pine) run east-west. Most streets are one-way, a fact that bears repeating. For the overview, look to Penn himself, standing atop the city's ornate axis of City Hall, at the intersection of Broad (really 14th) and Market streets. Broad Street runs 4 miles south, where the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers flow together, and 8 miles north -- all perfectly straight. Just to confuse you further, Broad has been renamed Avenue of the Arts for 8 blocks just south of City Hall, to highlight the concentration of performance halls. Front Street (which would be 1st St.), near the Delaware's edge off to the right, and neighboring 2nd Street were the major thoroughfares in Colonial times. Smaller streets between the numbered streets bear names, not numbers. The major east-west streets in Philadelphia's Center City run from Spring Garden Street in the north down to South Street. You'll spend much of your time between Arch and Pine streets, especially south of Chestnut Street, both for the historical attractions and for the current restaurant and nightlife vibrancy.

The Colonial city, now Independence National Historical Park, with its reconstructed row houses, grew up along the Delaware River north and south of Market Street, extending west to 6th Street by 1776. The 19th century saw the development of the western quadrants of the city (including most museums and cultural centers) and the growth of the suburbs in every direction. The city blocks planned by William Penn included five parks spaced between the two rivers. Four parks have been named for local notables (including George Washington, who headed the federal government here in the 1790s). The fifth supports City Hall. The broad northwest boulevard of Benjamin Franklin Parkway divides the grid, ending in the majestic neoclassical portico of the Philadelphia Museum of Art in the west. The area west of City Hall has been the site of intensive development and redevelopment of hotels, office buildings, and apartment houses.

To the west of this, the winding Schuylkill River separates Philadelphia from West Philadelphia -- if you're looking for an address between 24th Street and about 30th Street in this area, ask which side it's on. Fairmount Park lines both sides of the Schuylkill for miles north of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Helpful directional signs stand at every Center City corner, displaying the name and a color-coded ID of the district you're in as well as listings of nearby destinations.

Finding an Address -- Addresses on these streets add 100 for every block away from the axis of Market Street (north-south) or Front Street (east-west): 610 S. 5th St. is between 6 and 7 blocks south of Market, and 1534 Chestnut St. is between 15th and 16th streets.

Street Maps -- The Independence Visitor Center, 6th and Market streets (tel. 800/537-7676 or 215/965-7676), has a very good street map in its "Official Visitors Guide." You can pick it up at the center and at all hotels.