Metropolis

City Life

Philly’s Top Cop Talks Plummeting Homicides, Horrible Drivers, and ICE Raids

He started as a beat cop in 1986 after dropping out of Temple. Nearly 40 years later, he’s at the helm of the force at […]

City Life

Meet the Man Who Beat SEPTA and Saved the Columbus and Rizzo Statues

He came from quite literally nothing to become one of Philadelphia’s wealthiest lawyers and most prominent local Donald Trump supporters. And before jetting off to […]

City Life

Meet the Philly-Born Director Changing the Predator Universe

Dan Trachtenberg believed he’d made his very own Star Wars. It was 1984, and the three-year-old auteur had recruited his mother to hold the family […]

City Life

How Questlove Became the Defining Drummer of His Generation

The following is an excerpt from the book Backbeats: A History of Rock and Roll in Fifteen Drummers, released on November 11th. The 41st Grammy […]

City Life

Henri David Sets the Record Straight on Frank Rizzo and Gender Pronouns

He’s created jewelry for the stars at his Pine Street shop, Halloween. He’s run the same Halloween ball since LBJ was in the Oval. Here, […]

City Life

How One Store Became Ground Zero for West Philly’s Gentrification War

The song of the summer on Baltimore Avenue this year was a lament, a Greek chorus that started as a whisper and just kept getting […]

City Life

When Did Everything Become So … Disneyfied?

Listen to the audio edition here: This past year, as part of my long, self-imposed quest to check off as many boxes on the list […]

City Life

Can Mussels Save Philadelphia’s Waterways?

“Feeding time,” says Shannon Boyle, pushing back her chair and pulling her attention away from the microscope she’s been bent over for the better part […]

City Life

The High Cost of Underfunding Philly’s Parks

It’s high noon on a 98-degree day in early summer, but Justin DiBerardinis doesn’t seem to know it. Wearing dark blue jeans and layered T-shirts […]

City Life

The Head of Philly Schools Talks Safety, Staffing Shortages and Cell Phone Bans

School bus driver. School custodian. First-generation college grad. History teacher. School administrator. Tony Watlington held all of these roles before moving north to become the […]