A lot of the homes are single family, or row homes. This results in swaths of a residential feel in a city. Even the hot Fishtown felt very rural to me after my stint in New York. Although I appreciate the quite. Looking at the history Philadelphia started with the idea of brownstones/row homes instead of apartment buildings. To give people more space. But this does result in sparseness of shops. A lot of the multi tenant buildings are either new constructions or converted warehouses.
The two subways is always a point of contention. But I don't find it that big of a deal. Living near either Broad or MFL, I can get around very easily. The city is also extremely walk able, a majority of the people I knew just walk. It's under two miles river to river. If not that there are a number of buses. http://skookul.com/ <| For real time public transit.
I can't speak regional rail. But when I left ~15, commuting from Delaware was a shit show.
In the city bike lanes I don't think is the best. But the river trail along the west side is well used. I know a number of people up in outer Manayunk bike in. https://schuylkillrivertrail.com/
Having just taken a history walking tour. How the city feels makes alot of sense. It's meant to feel like a number of connected neighborhoods. I still think it deserves a second look for tech companies. With all the universities and good start to transit. It's ripe for an investment outside of Comcast.
* Very few miles of protected bike lanes, although at least things are looking up there for the future: https://bicyclecoalition.org/our-campaigns/30-miles-of-prote... (although the fact that 30 miles is celebrated as some big achievement is itself telling)
* Two subway lines is better than most US cities, but still not very many for a metro of this size. Munich has a comparable metro population and has 8 subway lines, for example, not to mention several separated-grade commuter/rapid transit lines that go way out into the burbs. Looks like high quality, rapid transit is still close by for only a small percentage of Philadelphians. It also sounds like the regional rail system is in disrepair.
* Looking at the zoning map, it looks like implementation of mixed use zoning is much better than most US cities, but still very limited in many neighborhoods, which limits walkability: https://openmaps.phila.gov/
* Also from the zoning map, many areas are still zoned just for single-family homes, which limits walkability/bikeability (and also encourages economic segregation, to boot).
Philly's level of urbanism should really be like the bare minimum for US cities, but in reality it's close to the top, I think.