The Coolest Shipyard in America

Twenty-one years later, the 1,200-acre Navy Yard is booming. At the
base of Pier 6, a thousand workers are assembling 50,000-ton tankers at a
state-of-the-art $400 million, Norwegian-owned commercial shipyard.
Thousands more work in swank new office and laboratory buildings a
quarter-mile to the west that house T-cell cancer therapy researchers,
investment advisors and a large chunk of drug giant GlaxoSmithKline’s
North American operations. There’s a brand new 4.5-acre park designed by
renowned landscape architect James Corner (of New York City High Line
fame), with a running track, ping pong tables and hammocks among the
benches and Adirondack chairs; a trendy Marc Vetri restaurant in one of
the base’s former gatehouses; and, across a canal, the teeming
340,000-square foot Tastykake bakery, an iconic Philadelphia institution
transplanted to in 2010 from its 88-year old North Philadelphia factory.