Nutter also said he would ask PennPraxis—the nonprofit planninggroup which outlined a 10-point, 10-year program for the waterfronton Thursday—to conduct a 30-day to 60-day study of whether the twocasinos planned for the area would compromise the program's goals.Specifically, the study will look at whether casino traffic wouldinterfere with plans to make a stretch of Delaware Avenue andColumbus Boulevard more pedestrian-friendly.

"We must answer the essential question: Can the casino plans attheir proposed locations work or not? An honest, legitimate,third-party analysis must be conducted," said Nutter in preparedremarks at the Independence Seaport Museum on Penn's Landing.Harris Steinberg, executive director of PennPraxis, tellsGlobeSt.com that his organization will analyze the casino plans'current transportation models as well as developing "whatsustainable development models for this type of use would be."PennPraxis is an operation of the University of Pennsylvania'sSchool of Design.

Legislation was recently introduced in Harrisburg that wouldrequire the two planned riverfront casinos—SugarHouse and FoxwoodsPhiladelphia—to relocate to sites near Philadelphia InternationalAirport. A SugarHouse source tells GlobeSt.com, "Our plan ofdevelopment was approved by the City Planning Commission in May2007. We intend to build our casino as designed and as approved bythe planning commission." The source adds that the Pennsylvania SupremeCourt ruling in favor of the casinos last December "orderedthat our site be zoned as a commercial entertainment district andthat the city accept and process our building permits."