Slideshow: Fall From the Bacon Walkways

You could argue that no one is more important to the look of Philadelphia than Edmund Bacon, who was executive director of the city’s planning commission in the mid 1900s. Part of his re–imagining of Society Hill and Old City included the creation of Bacon’s greenways, a series of paths that cut through the area and end at the back of the Second Bank of the United States. These blink–and–you’ll–miss–them walkways nimbly cut through the middle of blocks, past playgrounds and almost through the backyards of homes. It’s a study in brickwork, where the stark modernist creations of I.M. Pei mix with bright red colonial reproductions and the centuries–old weathered facades of the real thing. It’s also one of the best walks to see autumn in the city, with the red and yellow complementing the homes and churches. So brave the coming cold and take a trip downtown to see it.
­Photos by Will Baskin-Gerwitz