This weekend will see the annual return of the 32nd Fall for the Arts Festival. The Avenue-long block party and arts and craft exhibition has become a real hallmark for Chestnut Hill. It’s as much a part of the neighborhood identity as the Belgian blocks.

The festival is a real feat of organization by the staff of the Chestnut Hill Business Association, Business Improvement District and Parking Foundation, particularly as that staff has taken on more and more events in an effort to make Germantown Avenue a destination that always has something going on.

This week we included a special section devoted in part to the festival, but also to all of the remarkable artistic offerings Chestnut Hill has to offer not only this weekend but for the remainder of the year.

From ongoing exhibitions and lectures at Woodmere Art Museum to the consistently stellar productions of The Stagecrafters, Chestnut Hill is a one of the best places in the city to experience the arts year-round.

Be sure to read the section and find out what the best bets are this fall (and early winter) for art, film, music and theater. Chestnut Hill has it all.

Season of change for newsstand

If any theme has developed over the last year in Chestnut Hill it is that of the rising danger of neighborhood landmarks threatened by change.

Added to that list this week was the Chestnut Hill Newsstand at Germantown Avenue and Bethlehem Pike. Operator Dan Fromm spoke to the Local this week, saying that the newsstand was not generating enough revenue to remain open.

In many ways, the newsstand is as much a victim of its time as the news business itself: Printed newspapers no longer sell. Not long ago, you could buy the International Herald Tribune at the newsstand. Now, it’s no longer published, having been rolled into the international edition of the New York Times.

Although the newsstand closing is no real imminent threat to the historic structure, which likely dates back to at least the 1918 renovation of Chestnut Hill West when it converted to an electric line, a shuttered and permanently closed newsstand would be a real loss to the neighborhood.

That no one is buying the news at point of sale locations anymore is not something lost on Fromm. He’s aware that perhaps the future of the newsstand is a separation from its past and a move from the news business to something more profitable. It could be coffee or it could be ice cream or perhaps something else altogether. Something that can withstand the ever-changing economic winds of the always-connected Internet.

Whatever the answer is, a vital and viable newsstand is an important gateway for people arriving at the top of Chestnut Hill’s business corridor, by car and by train. A populated and well used newsstand is important for everyone in the neighborhood, whether you still buy your news or not.

-- Pete Mazzaccaro