Category Archive: Downtown Development
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Baltimore-style revitalization eyed for Pittsburgh
By Sam Spatter
FOR THE TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, August 4, 2005Pittsburgh leaders should look to the southeast for a guide on redeveloping Fifth and Forbes avenues Downtown, the president of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation said Wednesday.
The Murphy administration’s plan to enlist one developer hasn’t worked, said landmarks President Arthur P. Ziegler Jr., so the city should consider copying Baltimore’s continuing effort that has revitalized part of its downtown.
“If that single developer steps forward, that would be fine,” Ziegler told members of the Pittsburgh Rotary Club. “But so far, it has been an elusive goal. We believe the Baltimore plan that worked there very well should be examined again.”
Ziegler referred to Baltimore’s $800 million project driven mainly by private investment and fueled by historic preservation tax credits that has renewed a 26-block area over the past several years.
The city packaged buildings, determined specified uses and quality levels, and offered the packages on the open market, he said.
If Pittsburgh officials adopted a similar plan, national and local developers might be persuaded to take a look at redeveloping pieces of Fifth and Forbes, Ziegler said.
Three developers have considered becoming the master developer for Fifth-Forbes, only to walk away. Dranoff Properties of Philadelphia is the most recent.
Ziegler said he’s been approached by at least two local developers interested in Downtown redevelopment, but not the entire Fifth-Forbes corridor.
“If a major developer can’t be located, then obviously other options would have to be considered,” said Herb Burger, who is leading a private effort to revitalize the corridor. “But I believe a major developer will participate in Downtown renewal.”
The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, founded in 1964, is a nonprofit organization dedicated to preservation.
One of its major successes is Station Square on the Monongahela River on the South Side. The entertainment and office complex was developed in a former Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad warehouse site.
The redevelopment, which began in 1975, owes much of that success to nearly $12 million in private money provided through the Allegheny Foundation, Ziegler said. Richard M. Scaife, owner of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, chairs the Allegheny Foundation.
Ziegler said that many of the Downtown developments subsidized by taxpayer money — such as the Lazarus-Macy’s department store and the conversion of the former Mellon Bank headquarters into a Lord & Taylor store — have failed.
He said tax credits have helped finance the Heinz Lofts on the North Side and the Cork Factory redevelopment in the Strip District. Tax credits also could help transform the former Nabisco plant into housing in East Liberty.
Staff writer Ron DaParma contributed to this report.
Sam Spatter can be reached at sspatter@tribweb.com or .
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review © Pittsburgh Tribune Review
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Time running out to meet under Kaufmann’s clock
By Tony LaRussa
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, July 29, 2005For many of Kaufmann’s most devoted customers — especially those who frequent the Downtown store on Smithfield Street — the change to a Macy’s moniker likely won’t change shopping habits that, for some, have been decades in the making.
Some business experts believe customer loyalty and a new association with a retailer that has a strong history of its own could ease the transition.
“Certainly, some people will see the change in names as the loss of something that is a major part of Pittsburgh’s history,” said Marc Jampole, of Jampole Communications, a marketing company Downtown. “But the fact that Macy’s is a well-known and respected name in retailing is a plus that should make the transition a little easier.”
Federated Department Stores Inc. announced Thursday that Kaufmann’s and many other regional department names will disappear next year, after it completes its deal for May Department Stores Co. The landmark Downtown Kaufmann’s and several suburban stores will become Macy’s.
Cathy McCollom of the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation believes that because the Downtown store will remain open, it could play an important role in Pittsburghers’ acceptance of the name change.
“The memories that are triggered when people talk about Kaufmann’s — meeting friends under the Kaufmann’s clock or going to see the window displays during the holidays — are very much attached to the building itself,” McCollom said.
“Sure, the name is a big part of it because it’s been around so long,” she said. “But in a sense, the building is the source for many of those fond memories. The fact that people still will be able to see it, and still be able to shop there, is very important in minimizing whatever sense of loss they may be feeling.”
People who view the Downtown Kaufmann’s as their primary shopping destination said they will continue to patronize the store when it becomes a Macy’s.
“I’ve been coming here to shop since I moved to Pittsburgh in 1971,” said Catherine Thomas, 87, of Shadyside. “There’s still something special about coming Downtown to shop, and the store has a nice selection and the service is good.”
Maryann Finotti, of Emsworth, said she began shopping at Kaufmann’s when she was a child and still thinks it’s one of the region’s better retailers.
“Oh, I have wonderful memories of when I was a little girl, and my mother and aunt and I would dress up to come shopping Downtown,” said Finotti, 62, who worked at the store while she attended Duquesne University in the mid-1960s. “I still come down to shop here every Saturday and sometimes during the week. I’ll keep coming as long as they don’t change things too much.”
Jampole believes maintaining or improving the quality, service and selection of merchandise will be critical to easing the transition to the Macy’s name.
“It’s always a risky business when you change a name, especially when there are so many years invested in a brand,” he said. “The Kaufmann’s name is so much a part of Pittsburgh, and it has long been associated with a certain level of quality. Any changes will have to be focused on providing the same, or better, experience for the customer.”
Jackie Snell, professor of marketing at San Jose University in San Jose, Calif., predicts that Pittsburghers will grow nostalgic about the Kaufmann’s name, but will “get over it.”
“It’s difficult to predict what will happen when there is a collective loss of something that has been associated with a community for so long,” Snell said. “But Macy’s has a pretty solid reputation as a retailer, so I think there is a great chance that the name change will not have a deep negative effect.”
Tony LaRussa can be reached at tlarussa@tribweb.com
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review © Pittsburgh Tribune Review
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For Fifth and Forbes, a place to start small and think big
By Patricia Lowry,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Tuesday, June 28, 2005Preservation Pittsburgh wants to convert the first floor of the former Regal Shoe Co. building at Fifth and Market into a transit cafe, with office space above. It’s the work of Alden & Harlow, one of the city’s most prominent architectural firms in the early 20th century.
In a cartoon in the current New Yorker, a big man sitting at a big desk in a big city hands a folder to a smaller, weary man sitting across from him. The folder is labeled “Plan Z.”
“Of course,” the big man says, “if this one flops we’re done.”
Somebody ought to warn the little guy: Beware of a big man with a big plan.
Three years and three months from the day Mayor Tom Murphy announced Plan C, his revised Fifth and Forbes renewal project, we’ve got zip. In fact we’ve got a lot less zip than we had when the massive, demolition-oriented Plan A was hatched in October 1999. Back then, there were one or two empty storefronts; now there are many more as property and business owners wait for the city’s Urban Redevelopment Authority, which owns several properties in the district, to make a move.
When Carl Dranoff, the most recent potential developer, pulled out a few weeks ago, there was no rush to announce Plan D. Come January, the mayor and his men will move on. The empty storefronts will be hanging around for some time.
There’s still a frightening amount of alphabet left in Fifth and Forbes, but with a new administration next year, there are new opportunities for fresh ideas.
Here’s one: Preservation Pittsburgh wants to put a “transit cafe” in a great old building at the corner of Fifth and Market. It doesn’t look like much now, but in its day it was quite the place, an elegant little shoe showroom designed by Alden & Harlow for the Regal Shoe Co., one of a chain of Boston-based stores.
Of human scale and quaint antecedent, Regal Shoe was one of two buildings inspired by the English Arts and Crafts movement that the firm designed Downtown in the first decade of the 20th century. The other, the former White Dog Cafe, was among the nine structures sacrificed for the new Lazarus store in 1996. The cafe had been remodeled, but ah, what it once was and could have been again.
We have a second chance with the Regal Shoe building, which has had a happier fate. Over time its canopy was removed and some of its windows were covered over, but its integrity has not been greatly compromised.
Downtowns need low-rise buildings like this, buildings with a social and architectural history to anchor the modern office towers, and Fifth and Forbes provide them. Plan A disregarded them, calling for the removal of 62 buildings and acquiring them by eminent domain if necessary.
But massive demolition wasn’t the only troubling aspect of Plan A. Just as wrong-headed was its intent to wrestle ownership from dozens of local and often longtime entrepreneurs and concentrate ownership in the hands of a single developer, sending all of the profits out town. Fine for a suburban mall, but this is not the way cities work. Urban retail lasts longest when it is steady and incremental, supported by government policies that understand its organic, symbiotic nature.
If you’ve ever waited for a bus or been panhandled at the bustling corner of Fifth and Market, you don’t need me to tell you how good a transit cafe sounds. A place to come in out of the cold and heat and rain, pick up a coffee and a newspaper, “maybe even a bouquet of flowers on the way home,” said architect Rob Pfaffmann, president of Preservation Pittsburgh, the nonprofit advocacy group launched in 1991 after the demolition of the Syria Mosque.
Bringing flowers back to the vacant building would be a sort of homecoming, as Lubin & Smalley operated a florist’s shop there for about 70 years after Regal Shoe moved out.
A transit cafe is just one idea; the important thing is to get a retail establishment up and running again at that gateway location. Located at one of the entrances to the Fifth and Forbes district, the building has an importance beyond it size, just 15 feet deep and 80 feet wide.
Restoring and renovating the building would show that preservation is a viable and desirable component of the revitalization as it moves forward, Pfaffmann said. Office space on the second floor could be used to house community meetings during the Fifth/Forbes planning process.
Pfaffmann thinks he knows how to keep the costs down, to about $500,000 for the building’s shell. Preservation Pittsburgh has asked Belmont Technical College in St. Clairsville, Ohio, to consider making it a class project next year.
Each year, Belmont students in the Building Preservation Technology Program put their newly acquired skills into play on a summer field project. Students have worked at Fallingwater, Grey Towers (the Richard Morris Hunt-designed, faux-French medieval castle in Milford, Pike County) and the Octagon House in Washington, D.C. Pfaffmann thinks Belmont students could, for example, rebuild the mullioned windows of the Regal Shoe building.
Closer to home, Carnegie Mellon University students could participate in transforming the building into a green, sustainable design, which should be a component of the revival.
Preservation Pittsburgh also hopes to team with Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation in making the project a case study at the National Trust for Historic Preservation conference, which comes to Pittsburgh in October 2006.
Partnerships will be a key to making this project work, as will a positive reception from the city and the Fifth/Forbes task force, not to mention interest from a shopkeeper. Task force chairman Herb Burger declined comment yesterday, saying it was the city’s decision. URA director Jerome Dettore has said that he is willing to wait for the right developer.
Pfaffmann didn’t say so, but the subliminal message of the project is critical and clear: Stop waiting for a big man with big money and big plans. Start somewhere, and start small. Just start.
(Architecture critic Patricia Lowry can be reached at plowry@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1590.)
Copyright ©1997-2005 PG Publishing Co., Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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South Side church becomes restaurant
By Johnna A. Pro,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, April 14, 2005The historic Cleaves Temple on the South Side had been left to deteriorate in recent years, its stained glass windows covered in grime, its majestic columns and dome towers marred by the hands of vandals and Mother Nature.It was little more than a crumbling eyesore on Carson Street between 10th and 11th streets, a fate hardly befitting a building that served as a place of Christian worship for nearly 100 years.
Since January, though, contractors and artisans working for developer and restaurateur Clint Pohl have worked painstakingly to recapture the building’s past while readying it for a future as a restaurant, the Halo Cafe, much to the delight of the city’s historical preservationists.
“It’s going to be fabulous,” said Maria Burgwin of the city’s Historic Preservation office, which approved the renovation plans in the fall. “We hate to see vacant buildings in historic districts.”
The project is the second one undertaken by Pohl, who spearheaded the renovation of the St. Elizabeth Catholic Church in the Strip District, turning it into Sanctuary, a nightclub.
While records about Cleaves Temple are sometimes sketchy, the building was constructed in 1913 by J.O. Keller at the behest of a congregation of Ukrainian Presbyterians formed several years earlier. At the time, the two existing churches that served the large Ukrainian population living on the South Side were Byzantine Catholic churches.
The newly formed congregation found a patron in a wealthy woman named Mrs. William McKelvey of East Liberty Presbyterian Church. She donated the money to construct the church, a building with an exterior reminiscent of an ornate Eastern European church and an interior reflecting a classic Calvanist tradition. On the outside, the red-brick facade featured an entrance reminiscent of a Greek Temple with a wide staircase leading from the sidewalks and four massive columns supporting a triangular gable. On either side of the building were twin hexagonal towers capped at some point by Byzantine onion domes, each topped with a traditional Orthodox three-bar cross. Stained glass windows adorn the building.
Inside, rich woodwork, clean lines and simple frescoes were the church’s hallmarks.
The church was initially called the First Ruthenian Church. In 1949, that congregation merged with South Side Presbyterian, which today remains one of the most vibrant churches in the neighborhood.
Some historians have written that the building’s onion domes were added in its early history and it was used as a Greek Catholic Church, although none of the experts cite a specific reason for that conclusion.
What is certain is that by the 1950s, members of the South Side Christian Methodist Episcopal Conference owned the building and had renamed it Cleaves Temple CME Church. It would remain an active congregation through the turn of the century until the building was put on the market.
Enter Pohl — owner of Andora restaurant in Ohio Township — who was looking to do a project on the South Side. While much development in the neighborhood is occurring on the far end of Carson Street at the South Side Works, Pohl was drawn to blocks near the 10th Street Bridge, where an eclectic array of businesses are.
While he wasn’t looking for a church in particular, Cleaves Temple caught his eye.
“I was looking for a real estate investment and it happened to be a church. It’s good architecture and it’s inexpensive,” said Pohl, who paid $135,000 for the property, but will invest 10 times as much on the renovations. He also will provide parking at a lot less than a block away.
“I see this as the entrance to the South Side,” Pohl said.
He enlisted the design help of architect Felix G. Fukui of Fukui Architects, who also helped to create Sanctuary.
“Structurally, it’s great,” Fukui said. “The challenge is to marry the new and the old. To tie the rhythm and the form of the church together with the modern design.”
In this case, that means restoring stained glass, bringing the woodwork back to it original luster, using the former balcony space for seating and designing lighting so that it fits with the interior space.
Because the building sits back from the street, Fukui has redesigned the entrance so that a center staircase will lead from street level down to a lower level lounge. Two other staircases will sweep from street level up either side to the portico and the restaurant’s main entrance.
The restaurant, expected to open in early June, will feature intimate booths and table seating surrounding a main bar. The separate spaces are meant to provide patrons privacy while allowing them to be part of the activity. Additional dining space will be in the former balcony.
Jeff and Laura Mae Greene of Greene Glass in Sharon have overseen the restoration of the two dozen stained glass windows.
“I just loved the building from the first time I saw it,” Jeff Greene said. “I just was fascinated with the idea of fixing a building like that up.”
The stained glass was less damaged than it appeared, Greene said.
“In the scale of what we have seen over the years, it was in pretty good shape. To the untrained eye, it can often look pretty bad. It was not in disastrous condition. The painting is beautiful, well done, and the colors are fantastic. The bulk of the effort was just cleaning them.”
Louise Sturgess of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation said that one of the reasons the South Side remains a vibrant neighborhood is because so many of its former churches have found new uses.
Cleaves Temple, while not one of the largest, has always attracted attention because of its charm.
“It’s been scaled to fit right in that block of workers rowhouses,” Burgess said. “It should be grander but humbly fits in there with the streetscape. When you think about the scale of things it takes you by surprise to see this ethnic church.
“I think it’s great that it’s being reused. We’re all for imaginative reuses as long as the historical integrity is retained. It’s wonderful how generally on the South Side, historic churches have been treasured, given a new life and a new use. They create a quality of life that wouldn’t exist without them. They help people feel connected to the story of a neighborhood’s history.”
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Point Park restoring buildings
y Ron DaParma
TRIBUNE-REVIEW REAL ESTATE WRITER
Wednesday, March 9, 2005The ability to combine new facilities with historic buildings is becoming a specialty at Point Park University.
Evidence includes a recently completed $2.8 million television studio and production project at the Downtown school’s historic University Center and the soon-to-begin $1 million first-phase restoration of Lawrence Hall, a building housing dormitories, classrooms, offices and dance studios.“We’re really combining historic preservation and renovation with contemporary student needs,” said Point Park President Katherine Henderson on Tuesday. “These projects also enhance Downtown, both historically and aesthetically.”
Point Park’s efforts have support from the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, Mellon Financial Corp. and the Allegheny Foundation, chaired by Richard M. Scaife, owner of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Those organizations all provided funding support for the upcoming Lawrence Hall project.
“We are very pleased with Point Park’s attention to the historic nature of its campus buildings,” said Arthur P. Ziegler Jr., president of Landmarks Foundation, which provided a $12,000 grant to help develop a restoration plan and budget.
Allegheny Foundation added a lead grant of $100,000 to initiate a restoration campaign, and then Mellon Financial kicked another $150,000 to the funding mix, with Point Park funds supporting the rest.
The building, which is located across Wood Street and connected via an enclosed walkway from Point Park’s Academic Hall, originally was built in 1928 as the Keystone Athletic Club, and later converted into the Sherwyn Hotel. It was acquired by Point Park in 1967 and renamed in honor of former Pennsylvania governor and Pittsburgh Mayor David L. Lawrence.
Designed by Janssen and Cocken, a well-known Pittsburgh-based architectural firm that also fashioned such Pittsburgh landmarks as the Mellon Institute and the Pittsburgh Athletic Association, the building is notable not only for its Gothic architecture style, but also its distinctive Art Deco third floor ballroom, Ziegler said.
Expected to begin in May, the first phase will reclaim the historic appearance of the first-floor lobby and the exterior facade. Plans include replacement of a series of arched windows on Wood Street and Third Avenue, cleaning of the limestone exterior and relocation of the Wood Street entrance to align with the interior grand staircase.
The project, designed by Landmarks Design Associates of Pittsburgh, will bring in more natural light, and add amenities like an expanded bookstore and additional first-floor student lounge space. The work will improve the atmosphere for the school’s 3,200 students and more than 300 staff and faculty members.
The work also will include addition of a second entrance on Wood Street and restoration of the outside sidewalk. Later phases over the next several years will include more expensive infrastructure and mechanical systems improvements, Henderson said.
The university’s new television studio and production facilities have been available for use by students and faculty in Point Park’s broadcasting program since January.
The studios, which Point Park officials say rival professional facilities, are tucked in a corner of the school’s University Center, a Wood Street complex that in the early 1900s housed five adjacent bank buildings and later, an urban shopping mall known as the Bank Center.
From 1997 until 2004, the complex housed the joint library collections of Point Park and the Downtown & Business Branch of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh. That was after a restoration that preserved the building’s historic and architectural details, which include marble staircases, an elaborate bronze clock and restored walk-in bank vaults.
The university developed new plans for the facility once the Carnegie last year decided to relocate its collection to another Downtown location on Smithfield Street.
“It is important that faculty members are able to teach students in an environment in which they will be working professionally one day,” said Jan Getz, broadcaster-in residence in Point Park’s Department of Journalism and Mass Communication.
Ron DaParma can be reached at rdaparma@tribweb.com or 412-320-7907.
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Mellon cutting ties with historic building
By Patricia Sabatini,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, March 03, 2005Mellon Financial Corp. has decided not to renew its lease at Two Mellon Center, Downtown, ending its ties with a building that harks back to Mellon’s roots as financier to the nation’s corporate chieftains.
Mellon, which declined to say how much space it occupies or how many employees work at the ornate, Gothic-style structure also known as the Union Trust Building, said the move was an effort to cut costs.
Employees will be relocated in phases to the company’s three other Downtown buildings before the lease expires in May 2006, Mellon spokesman Ken Herz said.
Those buildings include Mellon’s headquarters on Grant, known as One Mellon Center; the adjacent Client Services Center; and 525 William Penn Place, also known as Three Mellon Center. Mellon has about 6,300 employees Downtown, Herz said.
In January, Mellon extended the lease at its headquarters building through 2028. The company owns the client services building and 525 William Penn Place, where it in turn leases space to Citizens Bank of Pennsylvania for its local headquarters. Citizens purchased Mellon’s banking operations in 2001.
The Union Trust Building, owned by the DeBartolo family since 1984, opened in 1923 as the headquarters for the Union Trust Co., founded by the Mellon and Frick families. The Mellon family’s banking operations merged with the Union Trust Co. in 1946 to form Mellon National Bank and Trust Co.
Herz said Mellon still planned to hold its annual meeting in the auditorium at Two Mellon this May.
(Patricia Sabatini can be reached at psabatini@post-gazette.com or 412-263-3066.)
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. © Pittsburgh Post Gazette
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Downtown switching from business to residential
By Tony LaRussa
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, February 27, 2005Pittsburgh’s business leaders think they finally have hit on a way to revitalize Downtown: Rather than focusing solely on making it the place to work and shop, position it as a place to live.
“The era of having totally commercial districts is over in Pittsburgh and other cities,” said Herb Burger, who helped launch the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership more than a decade ago and is among those spearheading the latest effort to revitalize the Fifth and Forbes corridor.“All indications point to the need to have residential development Downtown to stabilize the area and create a community of people who not only work there, but live and shop there as well,” Burger said.
Patty Burk, program director of Pittsburgh’s Downtown Living Initiative, believes efforts to increase the amount of residential development Downtown are part of a national trend.
“We’re seeing a growing number of people in Pittsburgh who view urban living as something cool, something they want to be part of,” Burk said.
“I think it’s a combination of people growing bored with the suburbs — whether it’s spending an hour or more a day commuting or something else — and realizing the city offers some great buildings within walking distance of their jobs as well as lots of cultural activities.”
Business leaders believe increasing the size of Downtown’s population will lay the groundwork for improving the retail climate.
“More people living Downtown adds vibrancy to the city, which should lead to a healthier retail environment,” said Nancy Hart, interim executive director of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership. She said a goal of doubling the Downtown population — currently fewer than 4,000 people — is a realistic one.
Developer Ralph Falbo, who has teamed with the Zambrano Corp. and Equa Landmark Communities on a proposed 84-unit luxury condominium complex on Fort Pitt Boulevard near Stanwix Street called First Side, is banking on greater interest in Downtown living.
“I walked past that site all my life and noticed the beautiful view of the river,” Falbo said. “And I’ve long felt that the lack of upscale condos available for people who want to live Downtown really was a missing link in the fabric of the city.”
Falbo, who is hoping to break ground on the 18-story building in the spring, estimates the project will cost about $28 million. Work is expected to take about 18 months.
Downtown residential projects that are under construction or being planned include:
An 18-story, 151-unit luxury apartment building at Seventh Street and Fort Duquesne Boulevard in the Cultural District. The project is being done by Lincoln Property Co.
Conversion of the upper six floors of the Fidelity Building on Fourth Avenue into 24 apartments by developer Dean McHolme, who also has plans to convert a seven-story office building at 111 Wood St. into apartments.
Conversion of the Union National Bank Building at Fourth and Wood streets into 60 condominiums.
Construction of 20 luxury apartment units at 930 Penn Ave., near the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.
While developers are optimistic about the future of residential development Downtown, those who jumped in early have had their difficulties.“I certainly believe the city is ripe for the national trend of people looking for a different lifestyle, a more urban experience, than was sought 20 or 30 years ago,” said Eve Picker of No Wall Productions, one of the city’s “loft living” pioneers. “But Pittsburgh tends to lag behind the rest of the country a bit, so Downtown has been a bit of a tough sell.”
Over the past several years, Picker has developed 21 upscale residential properties on First Avenue and along Penn Avenue, Downtown. However, a downturn in the city’s real estate market has meant several units remain vacant.
Burger said his group is concentrating on developing the lower portion of Fifth Avenue, from the closed Lazarus department store building down to Liberty Avenue.
While he cautions that plans for the Fifth and Forbes corridor are in the very early stages of development, the initial vision is to preserve the best of the older buildings and add a number of new structures.
Previous Fifth and Forbes plans promoted by Mayor Tom Murphy were sharply criticized by officials of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation because they included demolition of many older structures.
Burger said his group is working with Philadelphia residential developer Carl Dranoff on the latest Fifth and Forbes plan, which initially calls for between 600 and 800 residential units on the second and third floors of various buildings, and retail space at ground level.
Another change that will likely occur is a shift in who is spearheading the development effort, Burger said.
While the city will certainly be a major player in any effort to develop Downtown — the Urban Redevelopment Authority owns a significant number of buildings in the Fifth and Forbes corridor — success ultimately will have to rely on private initiatives.
“I think there is a greater sense that the political atmosphere is not the place to get things done,” Burger said. “It’s going to take people in the private sector saying we have to do something Downtown. Of course, the developers will be looking to the city to assist them.”
Tony LaRussa can be reached at tlarussa@tribweb.com or (412) 320-7987.
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Newest Fifth-Forbes plan built on housing – Retail still present but scaled down
By Mark Belko,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, January 20, 2005The latest attempt to inject life into the downtrodden Fifth and Forbes shopping corridor Downtown will include lots of housing and some street-level retail, but not nearly as much as in previous proposals, Pittsburgh Mayor Tom Murphy said yesterday.
During a Rotary Club of Pittsburgh speech at the Omni William Penn Hotel, Murphy said he expects the newest plan aimed at reinvigorating the faltering retail district to be formalized within the next few weeks.
It is one of two major Downtown development pieces that could get renewed focus in 2005, Murphy’s last year in office.
Murphy also said he expects, by the end of the month, an agreement in principle with Cleveland developer Forest City Enterprises on the construction of a $104 million, 500-room hotel adjacent to the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.
Murphy said the latest make-over of properties along Fifth and Forbes avenues will be quite different than the retail-laden plan he unveiled nearly eight years ago, one that collapsed amid objections from Downtown property owners and the loss of Nordstrom, the proposed department store anchor.
The mayor said the newest version will be heavy on residential — up to several thousand new units — with ground-level retail serving as a complement.
One reason for the de-emphasis of retail, Murphy said, is that many of the major retailers or restaurants that had been considering Downtown have since chosen other locations, such as the SouthSide Works or The Waterfront in Homestead. One he mentioned was The Cheesecake Factory, which ended up at the SouthSide Works complex.
“I think we’re feeling more optimistic than we’ve felt in awhile,” Murphy said of the Fifth and Forbes project. “I think we had a window to do retail and I think that’s gone now, I mean, [as] a significant dominant driver of the deal. There’s still going to be retail — I expect mostly all the first floors to be retail — but the focus will be more on housing.”
While Murphy’s original proposal involved extensive demolition of existing buildings, many of which Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation officials considered historic and worth saving, the mayor said there would be an effort to preserve some buildings under the new plan.
Herb Burger, the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership founder who is heading the ad hoc committee putting together the latest Fifth and Forbes initiative, said the intent is to preserve as many historic buildings as possible.
“Nobody’s interested in destroying beautiful buildings where they exist,” he said.
The committee’s work is being driven primarily by private interests, which banded together after Murphy’s first plan and a subsequent initiative collapsed.
Burger said most of the residential component would be concentrated in lower Fifth Avenue, from the vacant Lazarus-Macy’s department store to Liberty Avenue, and would involve a number of city Urban Redevelopment Authority properties acquired for development purposes. One of the buildings that is expected to house residential units is the old G.C. Murphy’s store near Market Square.
Burger’s committee is working “hand and glove” with Philadelphia residential developer Carl Dranoff on the latest plan.
Burger said the earliest phases of the project would feature 600 to 800 residential units, with expansion from there. The retail would be “complementary,” geared toward meeting the needs of Downtown residents, such as groceries and dry cleaning.
The Murphy administration wants to give Dranoff a chance to develop a comprehensive plan for the corridor before considering other approaches, including the possibility of selling off URA-owned properties.
Both Murphy and Burger believe that there’s a better chance of doing quality development if a developer has a large bank of properties to work with.
Federated Department Stores, the owner of the closed Lazarus-Macy’s, also has been open to a series of possible investors. But Burger said that to date he did not know of any sale or resolution of that property.
As for the convention center hotel, Murphy and Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato have set an end-of-January deadline for finalizing an agreement with Forest City on the hotel, which has been stuck in neutral for nearly two years.
Murphy said he is optimistic about getting an agreement, noting that Forest City and the city-county Sports & Exhibition Authority “are down to very few issues,” most of them involving design or minute contractual details.
“The broad parameters of the deal we all agree on,” he said.
If no agreement is reached, the city and county could end up rebidding the project, but Murphy said that is currently not under consideration.
“There would have to be substantial and irreconcilable differences for us to proceed to [rebid it] because we’ve come so far on the deal at this point. It’s been a lot of years of discussion,” he said.
The hotel project was stalled for a long time because of funding shortfalls. But that changed when the state Legislature earmarked $44 million for it from a $2 billion tourism and economic development fund to be financed through slot machine gambling revenues.
(Mark Belko can be reached at mbelko@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1262.)