 In 1958, Eastwick was declared the largest urban renewal project in the country, with the Korman Company making plans to replace the allegedly "poorly maintained and blighted homes" with newer, suburban-style construction in the 1960s and 70s.As Guian A. McKee writes in his study of Eastwick, the new development came at the expense of the existing community.It thus produced a "tragic irony," seeing as its realization required "the destruction of the area's unique existing community," which was one of the few integrated neighborhoods in Philadelphia at the time.