Sigh.

A judge in Harrisburg yesterday cleared the way for the state to demolish two historic buildings on North Broad Street that the Pennsylvania Convention Center Authority had formally pledged to save and weave into the center's prominent new facade.

The written opinion, issued late yesterday afternoon by Commonwealth Court Judge Keith B. Quigley, effectively lifted a stop-work order in place since Christmas Eve and allowed the state to start taking down the structures immediately.

"They could be gone by morning," said a dismayed John Gallery, who heads the Preservation Alliance of Greater Philadelphia, the nonprofit group that led the legal challenge against demolition. Last night, the group had not yet determined whether it would appeal Quigley's ruling to the state Supreme Court or seek a second injunction.

Gallery added that the decision could have serious implications for historic preservation in Pennsylvania. Quigley's ruling effectively reduces the state's top preservation agency, the Historical and Museum Commission, to a toothless advisory body.

Preservationists were under the impression that the Broad Street buildings had been saved in 2004 because the historical commission brokered a landmark agreement with the Convention Center Authority.

Preservationists cut a deal with the Convention Center Authority (who was the chair of that?), and now the the Convention Center is getting around it by saying that they did not have the authority to make the agreement in the first place. Uh huh. But, besides talking about who can actually cut the deal, the ruling is much worse than that...

I hope no one really liked statewide historic preservation, because without a change in law, it is just about dead:

Yesterday, Quigley gave the DGS full backing. Under Pennsylvania's history code, he wrote, the department was merely required to "consult" with the historical commission, which it did.

Terrrrrific.

I hope everyone can take a moment today to help save a pair of historically significant buildings that are under the threat of needless demolition.

Early in the morning on the Saturday before Christmas, the state's Department of General Services (DGS), sent a team of workers to demolish the Philadelphia Life Insurance Co. Building and Annex at 111-115 North Broad Street to make way for the expansion of the Philadelphia Convention Center. This was done despite the fact that in 2004, the head of the Convention Center Authority had signed an agreement with the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission to spare these two National Historic Registered buildings.