We scored all 218 Philadelphia census tracts eligible under the OBBB recomputation, weighing three signals equally: transit access, access to regional jobs, and recent permit and business-license activity. We recommend 54 currently-designated tracts for redesignation and 28 high-signal newcomers — 82 tracts where transit, jobs access, and permit activity line up. We also recommend dropping 6 currently-designated tracts that score below the median newly-eligible tract, and flag 20 strategic swap candidates where TOD-corridor completion, capital project pipelines, or priority public sector initiatives argue for reconsideration.
Two-thirds of Philadelphia's recent regional job growth happened within three-quarters of a mile of a rail station. Designating Opportunity Zones in tracts with strong SEPTA access compounds federal capital with the city's existing infrastructure.
An OZ designation is most valuable in places workers can already reach. Tracts with strong access to regional employment by transit are where new housing and commercial development serves the broadest base of Philadelphians.
The places where developers can already underwrite projects are the places where OZ tax benefits will produce visible results in the near term. Recent permits and new business licenses are how we see that signal directly in the data.
Philadelphia has 82 Opportunity Zones today, and the next round arrives in 2027 under new federal rules. Where Philadelphia spends its share — and how forcefully it defends its allocation — will determine whether the next decade of OZ capital lands in Philly neighborhoods where these incentives will work to create new homes and businesses. New to the program? Read the brief →
We recommend Philadelphia put forward 82 tracts: 54 currently-designated tracts to keep, plus 28 newly-eligible tracts to add. We also recommend dropping six currently-designated tracts that score below the median newly-eligible tract, and flag twenty strategic swap candidates on TOD-corridor, capital-pipeline, or public-sector-priority grounds.
On displacement: more housing is the answer, not less. 59% of our 82 picks sit in the weakest tiers of The Reinvestment Fund's Market Value Analysis — we are not selecting Philadelphia's gentrifying frontier — and the city already has a robust pro-supply, pro-affordability toolkit for protecting existing residents. Full analysis in the memo →
Skim the summary, dig into the full memo, or download the 82-tract recommendation CSV.
Click or tap any tract to see its composite score, how it performs on each of the three signals, and the permits, business licenses, and soft-site counts behind the number.
The defaults are set so each signal counts equally, reflecting BPN's view that optimal OZ tracts should rank highly on all three. Drag the sliders to weight them your way and watch the rankings shift. The memo makes the case for our defaults.
Pennsylvania's Department of Community and Economic Development (DCED) released a draft map of the tracts it is considering for nomination. It names 208 tracts statewide and holds 10 slots open. Philadelphia gets 44 of them, 31 of which are on BPN's list of 82.
| BPN category | Tracts | On state draft |
|---|---|---|
| Redesignation candidate | 54 | 25 |
| High-signal candidate | 28 | 6 |
| Strategic swap candidate | 20 | 5 |
| Recommend replacing | 6 | 0 |
| Other eligible | 112 | 8 |
The lists agree on which current zones to drop: none of the six BPN recommends replacing is on the state's draft.
| BPN rank | Tract | Nearest station |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 137.02 | Girard Av & 28th St |
| 2 | 377 (current zone) | Temple University |
| 4 | 141 (current zone) Possible | Girard Av & 11th St |
| 5 | 2 (current zone) | Jefferson Station |
| 10 | 163 (current zone) | York-Dauphin |
| 12 | 177.01 (current zone) | Kensington-Allegheny |
| 13 | 85 (current zone) | 52nd St |
| 23 | 110 Possible | Girard Av & 41st St |
Ranks are out of 220 scored tracts.
Twelve tracts statewide have an empty status in the state's data, unlike the other non-nominated tracts. We believe, but have not confirmed with DCED, that these are the shortlist for the 10 open slots. Three are in Philadelphia: Tract 141 (Girard Ave. and 11th St., BPN's No. 4), Tract 110 (Girard Ave. and 41st St., No. 23) and Tract 25 (Ellsworth-Federal, a BPN strategic swap candidate). They are dashed on the map. BPN recommends filling the open slots with Tracts 141 and 110 first.
Statewide, the draft gives 18 tracts to Allegheny County (BPN recommended 62) and at least one to each of the 63 counties with an eligible tract. See the county-by-county comparison → · Download the Philadelphia comparison (CSV)
| Tract | Composite | Nearest station | Soft sites | State draft |
|---|
| Tract | Composite | Nearest station | Soft sites | State draft |
|---|
Full methodology + all 82 tracts in the memo → · Our 4 replacement recommendations →
How much of the tract sits within a quarter-mile walk of a SEPTA rail, Market-Frankford, or Broad Street Line station, plus how close the tract's center is to the nearest station.
How many jobs you can reach in a 30-minute transit ride from the tract's nearest station. Sourced from DVRPC's station-level data.
Housing permits, commercial permits, and new business licenses (restaurants, retail, services) issued in the tract over the last three years.
Each signal is ranked against the other 219 tracts in our scoring universe (the 218 IRS-eligible tracts plus 2 § 5.04 near-miss candidates), then averaged into a 0–100 composite score. Soft-site counts — vacant parcels, surface parking, and auto-oriented uses — are shown as context and don't affect the ranking.