Since the Philadelphia 76ers announced their intentions to build a new arena on Market Street in Center City last year, many have expressed their feelings for and against the proposal, writes Etta Washburn for Teen Vogue.  

While local government has been largely for it, with the proposed arena being built just four blocks away from Chinatown, nearby business owners and community members have expressed their displeasure. 

Three university students — Kaia Chau of Bryn Mawr College, and Kenny Chiu and Taryn Flaherty of the University of Pennsylvania — who are worried about the potential negative impacts the new arena could have, decided to launch Students for the Preservation of Chinatown (SPOC).

“This is where people have spent their whole lives, building their businesses,” said Chiu. “We think that the Sixers — if they want to build this new arena — can build it anywhere else except next to one of the United States’s top-10 most endangered places.”

Through rallies, teach-ins, marches, meetings, and collaborations, college-aged students have started to seize the power they have in advocating for the future of the city. 

“Chinatown is serving a community that is so much more than this small minority,” said Flaherty.

Learn more about how young people are leading the charge against building a new Sixers arena near Chinatown at Teen Vogue.

_____

Protestors across Philadelphia rally against proposed 76ers arena in Chinatown.