Category Archive: Neighborhood Development
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Preservationists hope UPMC respects history in Baum corridor expansion
By Christopher Snowbeck,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Wednesday, April 26, 2006The medical giant last month spent $10 million to buy a 91-year-old building at the corner of Baum and Morewood Avenue that was built as a combination assembly plant and showroom for the Ford Motor Co. Preservationists say they’re working with UPMC in hopes that the health system will be mindful of the structure’s historic character in any renovation.
For now, the health system isn’t talking much about its plans for the building, saying only that it “will eventually house programs and personnel from UPMC Shadyside or the Hillman Cancer Center,” said Eric Cartwright, vice president of construction and corporate real estate for UPMC. “If the ultimate use for the building allows it, we will preserve as much as possible.”
UPMC has been active lately in its quest for research space near its hospital in Shadyside.
In January, it spent $1.3 million for property at 5200 Baum Blvd. that is the home to a Boston Market restaurant. Spokeswoman Jane Duffield said there are no immediate plans for the property because the restaurant has a long-term lease.
Last month, Ms. Duffield also said UPMC wanted a 350,000 square-foot- building in the area to “provide for continued rapid growth” of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute’s cancer research program and related biomedical research programs at Pitt and UPMC. Ms. Duffield declined to say whether that building would incorporate the old Ford assembly plant or involve new construction elsewhere on the Baum corridor.
Transforming the area into a center for biomedical research would represent a far cry from its historical roots.
The Ford Motor building was located within blocks of the world’s first company-owned gas service station, operated by Gulf Oil. Nearby, at 4709 Baum, also was a dealership for the old Packard Motor Car — one of many dealers, manufacturers and repair shops that cropped up along the corridor during the early 20th century.
Indeed, the affluence of Pittsburgh’s East End in 1907 could be measured by the approximately 3,000 cars being driven by city residents, said Donald Doherty, the founder of a neuroscience company in Shadyside. He has studied the history of the area and developed a presentation designed to help preserve the Ford building. Many of those automobiles were purchased or tended to along Baum and most of the owners were quite wealthy, he said.
Henry Ford’s plan with the assembly plant he built here was to offer his Model T cars at a reasonable price. The factory on Baum was one of about 28 around the country that would provide the ultimate one-stop car shopping experience — vehicles would be assembled, sold and subsequently serviced all in one building.
Three hundred workers used a vertical feed hand-assembly method to build about 40 Model Ts per day at the Pittsburgh plant, Mr. Doherty said. Assembly operations continued until 1932, and the building remained a Ford sales and parts branch until at least the early 1940s. It was subsequently used as a manufacturing plant for clothier Reidbord Bros. Co. until 1995, and currently houses a PaperMart store.
Annie O’Neill, Post-Gazette
The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s plan to make Baum Boulevard in Shadyside a corridor for cancer care and research is running up against the strip’s historical legacy as “automobile row.”All of the Ford buildings were designed by architect John Graham in red brick with large windows and cream terra cotta tile accents. The renovation of a similar building by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for biotechnology labs and companies could serve as an example of what UPMC might do, Mr. Doherty said.
“When you look at the materials used, the details in the design — this is a fabulous building,” he said.
The building “clearly” could qualify for the National Register of Historic Places, said Rob Pfaffman, president of Preservation Pittsburgh. But community groups have refrained from seeking that designation, he said, so that they can work cooperatively with UPMC.
City Councilman Bill Peduto said UPMC initially intended to demolish the building, but he and other community representatives opposed the plan.
“UPMC hasn’t reported back to me on what their goal is for that building,” Mr. Peduto said.
(Christopher Snowbeck can be reached at csnowbeck@post-gazette.com or 412 263-2625.
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. © Pittsburgh Post Gazette
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Dormont must address leaking, locker room repairs at pool
By Al Lowe
Pittsburgh Post Gazette
Thursday, March 23, 2006Dormont officials are reluctant to say it, but it seems unlikely their landmark swimming pool will open on Memorial Day.
It might not open at all.
“I won’t say that yet,” Interim Manager Russell McKibben said after a special council meeting called last week to hear reports on the leaking pool and structural problems in the locker rooms at the complex at McFarland Road and Dwight Avenue.
Making the presentation were engineers from Gateway Engineers, a Green Tree firm hired to assess the situation.
“The work [to stop the pool’s leaking and to repair the recreation center] needs to be done or you shouldn’t open the pool,” borough engineer Ruthann Omer said.
Council members told the audience of more than 30 people that it planned to work with the community to try to resolve the problem.
Gateway reported to council that it would cost about $2 million to replace concrete and make piping repairs to stop the leaking. The pool loses 3 to 4 inches of water a day during operation; it should lose a half- inch a day to evaporation.
Another problem, structural deficiencies at the recreation center/locker room which would cost $635,000 to repair, caused Councilman John Sparvero to wonder if the second floor of the center could be rented to groups this summer, as council had planned.
Wayne Jacobs, of Gateway Engineers, said he had to study the problem more closely before making a recommendation on that.
Improvements that have to be made to the building include replacing planks supporting the floor of the men’s and women’s locker rooms, repairing or replacing beams in the filter room and installing a temporary support system while the building support columns are structurally analyzed and a repair method is planned.
Mr. McKibben said the borough could not float a bond to cover the cost of all the repairs. “Our indebtedness prevents us from borrowing that kind of money,” he said.
He had asked the engineers to evaluate the building and determine any structural deficiencies because few improvements have been made over the years. “If you want to shoot the messenger, go ahead,” he told the audience.
An option being considered is using a paint to act as a sealing agent to stop the leaking at what is expected to cost much less than $2 million; although that cost is not known. Gateway has asked Aqua Pool, a swimming pool contractor, to determine whether this is feasible.
The 60,000-square-foot pool holds 1.4 million gallons and is among the largest pools in the state. It received landmark designation from the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation in 2002.
But officials were forced to fill the pool with 8.1 million gallons last year. The cost was $42,000, twice as much as normal for the summer, Mr. McKibben said.
“We’re losing a phenomenal amount of money,” Mr. Sparvero said.
As usual, the pool, which is normally open from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day, was a money-losing proposition, as pools are for other South communities. The borough received $37,610 in pool pass sales and $92,252 in daily receipts. Utilities cost $85,000.
Other costs included general maintenance and repairs, including replacing pumps, at a cost of $25,000, using chemicals costing $33,000 and salaries of $71,000.
“You can see the whole situation is pretty upside down,” Councilwoman Ann Conlin said.
She chairs the recreation committee, which is scheduled to discuss the problems further at at a 7 p.m. Tuesday meeting at the municipal building.
The pool began as a wading pool in 1923 by damming a stream, according to records kept by the Dormont Historical Society.
It was developed to look like a tropical lake before a decision was made to hire contractor Scheiffer and Rait, of Dormont, to build a pool. The project was finished in 1928.
The pool and a wooden pool house were dedicated in 1929. Fine sand was added at that time to make the area resemble a beach.
The all-time attendance record was set in 1949 when a crowd of 5,000 came to the pool July 4.
During audience comments at the meeting March 14 Sarann Fisher, of Dormont, implored council, “The pool is the reason people pay taxes in Dormont. There has got to be a way to fix it.”
(Al Lowe is a freelance writer.)
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. © Pittsburgh Post Gazette
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Preserving landmarks in the Hill
By Andrew Johnson
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Friday, January 13, 2006To longtime Hill District residents, it looks as though bombs destroyed some of the buildings in their neighborhood.
“It’s like a war-torn country,” said Bedford Avenue resident Irene Herndon, now in her 70s.Where once the Roosevelt Theatre stood on Centre Avenue, now there is a parking lot. A smallish Subway restaurant and Cheap Tobacco & More have replaced the entertainment mecca.
One thing still standing in the Hill, left completely untouched, is August Wilson’s childhood home.
The Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, who died in October, grew up at 1727 Bedford Ave.
Although Wilson prospered in New York, Seattle and St. Paul, Minn., his Pittsburgh roots remained strong. Of his 10 plays about 20th-century life for blacks in America, nine were based in Pittsburgh.
Wilson’s legacy has gotten more respect than his Pittsburgh landmark.
“I think it’s significant enough to be part of any planned tour of Pittsburgh,” said Wilson’s nephew, Paul A. Ellis Jr.
Early last year, Ellis bought the Bedford Avenue home for $25,300.
Ellis, 36, wonders how much interest exists in preserving his uncle’s neglected home.
The house sold for $3,000 in 1997.
Outside of the home is a sign: “No loafing please.” The street is typically empty. There is a phone booth but no phone, an empty grocer on the first floor and a vacant watch-repair store next door. “RIP Bug, Scrobb, Diggs, MiMi and Booky,” reads writing on the home’s door.
Any restoration is likely to be expensive.
Ellis said it cost him more than $70,000 to renovate his grandmother’s two-story Bedford Avenue home a couple blocks down.
Before Wilson’s death, there were discussions about preserving the house. So far, nothing has happened.
Young Preservationists Association of Pittsburgh chairman Dan Holland said the house is worth saving.
“We’re losing a lot of what makes our city unique,” Holland said.
The association, which sent Ellis a packet of information about preservation, gives advice but no money.
Laurence Glasco, who teaches a course about the city’s black history at the University of Pittsburgh, said he would like to see Wilson’s house saved. He said the building and watch store represent the scope of racial diversity in the old neighborhood.
Glasco said Italian immigrants ran the repair store, a Jewish family operated the grocery, and the Wilsons, a black family, lived upstairs.
“The house kind of symbolizes that racial diversity,” Glasco said.
Glasco said the Hill was the first residential area in the city, home to 19th-century immigrants who walked from the Hill to jobs Downtown.
Today, residents said they can’t find much of anything that properly reflects their history.
The Hill District has 11 recognized landmarks, said Frank Stroker, assistant archivist for the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation.
Even when some Hill sites have been honored in the past, it has not changed their decayed state.
The Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission placed a plaque outside the Crawford Grill, a famed jazz club, in 2001.
Today, there is a torn-up carpet in front of the closed club.
There are some homemade tributes to Wilson outside Centre Avenue’s New Granada Theatre.
“August, your work has ensured that we will never be forgotten,” reads one of the white signs posted on the building.
The New Granada itself sits abandoned, decades after it closed.
Snapshots from the Hill
Much of the Hill District’s rich history already has been lost, said Dan Holland, chairman of the Young Preservationists Association of Pittsburgh.
George Moses, 61, who lives on Centre Avenue, has a map of old churches, bars and other places he has pieced together. But that map hasn’t helped him find his childhood home.
Moses said he was born in the Lower Hill, but now, “I don’t even know what street I was on.” That’s how much the Hill changed when the Civic Arena — later renamed Mellon Arena — opened in 1961, he said. The arena replaced much of the Lower Hill when it was built.
Angelique Bamberg, historic-preservation planner for the city, said of the 75 “historic structures” in the city, only four are in the Hill District.
“There is not enough proportionally,” said Laurence Glasco, a University of Pittsburgh professor, who teaches about the city’s black history.
A City Historic Designation can be given to districts or individual buildings within the Pittsburgh city limits that are significant for architectural or historical reasons.
The designation helps protect old buildings from wrecking balls, provided they remain structurally sound, Bamberg said.
Public money does not help pay to maintain these buildings, she said.
To nominate a building, civic groups or individuals can submit a nomination to the Historic Review Commission. The HRC and the City Planning Commission review the nomination and make recommendations to City Council. Public hearings by the HRC and City Council are part of the process of reviewing nominations. City Council makes the final decision.
Frank Stroker, assistant archivist for the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, said the Hill District also has 11 historic landmarks.
To be considered a historic landmark in Allegheny County, a structure must be at least 50 years old and deemed architecturally significant. The Historic Plaque Designation Committee meets once a year to review nominations and recommend awards.
A historic-landmark designation provides no safeguard against demolition, Stroker said.
Preserving the Hill
The city has designated these Hill District buildings historic structures:
New Granada Theatre
John Wesley A.M.E. Zion Church
Centre Avenue YMCA
Madison Elementary School
The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation has designated these sites as historic landmarks:William H. McKelvy Gifted Center
Weil Technology Institute
Herron Hill Park
St. Michael’s Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church
Hill House Kaufmann Auditorium
Connelly Technical Institute
Church of the Epiphany
Church of St. Benedict the Moor
Letsche Education Center
Madison Elementary School
Miller African Centered Academy
Andrew Johnson can be reached at ajohnson@tribweb.com or 412-380-5632.
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Neighbors protest Walgreens sprawl
By Violet Law
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, December 11, 2005More than 20 people rallied at the proposed site of a new Walgreens Saturday afternoon to protest the pharmacy’s plan to raze three homes to make way for a driveway.
The protesters said although they welcome the convenience of having the store nearby, they object to the company’s plan to push beyond the existing commercial lot into a quiet residential area.Most of the protesters live in Park Place, a sliver of a neighborhood between Point Breeze and Regent Square. The Walgreens that is being planned at the southeast corner of Penn and South Braddock avenues is within a few blocks of their homes.
“Once you start moving the commercial line into residential property, that is a green light for more developers to come,” said Marisa Osorio, 38, who lives on South Braddock Avenue. “We want to avoid the commercial sprawl.”
Waving handmade cardboard signs and standing in ankle-deep snow that had piled up at the busy street corner yesterday, the residents maintained that they are not opposed to neighborhood development. They would be happy to live with a Walgreens that stays within the confines of what is now an Exxon gas station, they said.
The residents plan to take their objections to the city’s Zoning Board of Adjustment when the proposal comes before the board Thursday.
Violet Law can be reached at vlaw@tribweb.com or (412) 320-7884.
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Can Braddock find a future in its rich historic and natural resources?
By Patricia Lowry,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, December 02, 2004From the lofty corner of Spring and Anderson streets, Braddock looks much as it did more than 60 years ago, when Thomas Bell imagined steelworker Dobie Dobrejcak living nearby, in the last house on what he called Summer Street.
From his front porch, Dobie had “as fine a view as one could want: Braddock and North Braddock spread out before one, the river, the hills, and on summer evenings the lights of Kennywood Park winking through the smoke above the blast furnaces” of the Edgar Thomson Works, Bell wrote in his 1941 book, “Out of This Furnace.”
On Braddock Avenue today, it is clear that the town Dobie, his father and grandfather knew is no more. While the mill is still there, transforming molten steel into slabs, it employs only about one-fifth of the 5,000 people who worked there during World War II.
There isn’t much left of the once-bustling main street it looms over, and by the end of the year there will be even less of it. Fifteen buildings on Braddock Avenue and nearby streets are slated for demolition, and eight more will be taken down as funding allows. More than 230 buildings in Braddock have been demolished since 1995, creating both loss and opportunity.
So many demolitions caused the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission’s Bureau for Historic Preservation to determine earlier this year that Braddock is no longer eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. The decision and its ramifications for Braddock and beyond are worth examining, as Braddock looks to the future and as historic buildings across the state continue to age and crumble.
While Braddock officials woo real estate developers and consider building a strip mall, grocery store and industrial park on Braddock Avenue, others envision a future built in part on the community’s historical and natural resources.
The county’s most recent strategy for Braddock and the rest of the Mon Valley will be rolled out tomorrow morning at a summit in McKeesport. The Mon Valley Economic Development Strategy, in the works for almost two years, will recommend focusing development around five hubs determined to have the highest potential, in Hazelwood, McKeesport, Duquesne, Clairton-Elizabeth and the Carrie Furnace site.
Braddock should be developed at the same time as the Carrie Furnace site, Dennis Davin, director of economic development, said yesterday. New businesses, streetscape improvements and a Main Street program on Braddock Avenue are the goals, along with mixed-income housing built around the hospital and other sites.
A storied past
While Braddock is no longer officially historic, the landscape holds international significance for the role it played in the French and Indian War. On July 9, 1755, on a hillside overlooking the Monongahela River, British Gen. Edward Braddock and about 1,400 men were defeated by almost 900 French and Indians sent out from Fort Duquesne. Braddock refused to let his men break rank and take cover, and for more than three hours they were easy targets for opponents who shot from behind trees.
Braddock’s reinforcements retreated to Philadelphia, leaving the frontier to be defended for the next three years by young George Washington, who took four bullets through his coat and had two horses shot out from under him at the Battle of Monongahela, but escaped–miraculously, some thought–without injury.
Almost 40 years later, on Aug. 1, 1794, about 6,000 Whiskey Rebels from the rural Western Pennsylvania townships rallied at Braddock’s Field with the intent of plundering Pittsburgh, symbol of the hated whiskey tax and the urban culture it represented. To escape the rebels’ wrath, Pittsburgh agreed to banish men that the rebels regarded as the worst offenders, then further won over the invaders by distributing casks of whiskey among them. Pittsburgh was spared.
“The rebels rallied at Braddock’s Field because everyone knew where it was,” said Robert Messner, an attorney who has raised more than $1 million toward construction of a Braddock’s Field museum at the corner of Sixth and Baldridge streets in North Braddock, where the battle is thought to have been joined. Messner, who believes history can be used to leverage economic development in the community, has acquired three acres of land and two commercial buildings, one of which will be the location next summer for programs commemorating the 250th anniversary of the battle.
Braddock’s eligibility for the National Register, however, owed not to its antique past but to the buildings associated with its rise as a steel town. It originated with the Allegheny County survey that Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation produced from 1979 to 1984, in preparation for its 1985 book, “Landmark Architecture: Pittsburgh and Allegheny County.”
Even in 1981, as the buildings were surveyed, many of the businesses were boarded up, abandoned and decaying, and there already were many vacant lots. Nevertheless, the borough requested historic status for part of Braddock Avenue in 1989, hoping the designation would help turn things around.
Four sections of Braddock were determined to be eligible for the National Register in 1991: a five-block stretch of Braddock Avenue; the Talbot Avenue residential district; the Maple and Wood streets residential pocket; and an institutional area comprising the library, post office and nearby residential streets.
But borough officials never commissioned the paperwork that would officially put it on the register and make it eligible for the 20 percent federal tax credit for rehabilitation. Instead, more and more buildings were abandoned by their owners and allowed to deteriorate.
Braddock borough administrator Ella Jones said she doesn’t know why the borough never pursued listing on the register, only that by the time she arrived four years ago, many buildings were too far gone for anything but demolition.
In 2003, the borough and the county economic development office hired preservation architect Charles Uhl to document the current condition of the buildings. Of the 75 buildings on Braddock Avenue that could be considered contributing to a historic district, Uhl found 23 to be “economically and structurally unsalvageable.” That leaves two-thirds of the remaining historic buildings standing — 52 buildings over a five-block area, an average of 10 buildings per block.
Uhl found the Talbot Avenue area “not an appealing residential district,” with most houses covered with artificial materials. Three large commercial buildings on Talbot have failed roofs and are condemned. In the Maple and Wood streets area, the 35 houses are mostly wood-frame, and all of those are covered with artificial siding. In the library-post office area, Uhl reports both of those structures are either individually listed on or eligible for the National Register, and the nearby housing artificially sided and/or interrupted by vacant lots.
The borough didn’t need the Bureau for Historic Preservation’s permission to demolish the buildings, but it wanted to use federal funds in the form of Community Development Block Grant money to do so, and that would have triggered a lengthy review process involving documentation through measurement and photography.
Uhl’s report and a site visit convinced the bureau to reverse itself. It has done so only once before, in 2002, reversing the 1992 eligibility ruling for Renovo, Clinton County, incorporated in 1866. Like Braddock’s historic district, Renovo’s had suffered a loss of integrity through demolitions.
“Although the history of Braddock and its contribution to the history of the steel industry in America is significant, the district no longer can reflect this significance due to a loss of integrity,” preservation bureau director Jean Cutler wrote to the county economic development office in January.
Demolition by neglect
“We understand the state and Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission have to follow standards and have criteria,” said Cathy McCollum, director of operations and marketing at Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation. “Our concern is not that they declared it ineligible, but that it got to that point. It’s demolition by neglect.”
To Dan Holland, chair of the Young Preservationists Association of Pittsburgh, the reversal “sets a dangerous precedent for historic districts and structures across the Commonwealth,” as he wrote in a letter of protest in February to PHMC director Barbara Franco. The letter also stated that the “unilateral decision to undo the designation of the Braddock Historic District without public input or comment reduces Braddock’s chances for revitalization.”
Municipalities should not be rewarded for allowing demolition by neglect and not enforcing codes, said Susan Shearer, president of the nonprofit advocacy group Preservation Pennsylvania, based in Lancaster. The message the reversal sends to other communities, she added, is that if they allow buildings to deteriorate to the point of no return, the eligibility can be lifted.
Jones acknowledged that over the years, building codes in Braddock were not always enforced “to the fullest degree.” But, she added, if property owners now don’t maintain their buildings, they’re taken to the magistrate. If they fail to comply, they face fines and the possibility of jail.
Preservationists agree that even when there is no immediate use for historic buildings, they should be stabilized and mothballed until new investors are found. But where will the money to do so come from?
“If the state was interested in keeping those buildings intact, I think the state had some responsibility in providing some funds so that those buildings could be maintained,” said Jones. “We would have preferred to restore, absolutely. Those buildings hold a lot of history.”
Braddock may be the most egregious example of demolition by neglect, but it’s far from the only one.
“You see it in every single county,” said Janet Milkman, president of 10,000 Friends of Pennsylvania, a statewide land use and conservation alliance. “Developers always say it’s so much easier to build out [of the city] or new than build in older communities, and in a lot of ways that’s true.
“The state policy has to be: Remove barriers and provide incentives” for rehabilitation.
The greening of Braddock
The Braddock historic district’s ineligibility for the National Register will have minimal impact on the Mon-Fayette Expressway project, because the Section 106 review triggered by the eligibility already has been performed. The Turnpike Commission will still provide photographic documentation of the buildings to be demolished and work with a citizens advisory committee to help integrate the highway and the community.
Designed to avoid Braddock Avenue, the highway would parallel it and be built mostly within a former railroad corridor. But it would remove 73 buildings — the same buildings the preservation bureau signed off on when they were considered to be contributing to the historic district.
To show the expressway’s impact on Braddock and to stimulate community dialogue, Lawrenceville architects Jonathan Kline and Christine Brill built a scale model of Braddock and North Braddock. The land and buildings taken for the highway, which would be elevated on a 25-foot-high berm, are expressed as a removable overlay.
“The berm is cheaper than [supporting it on concrete] piers,” Kline said. “But it will take up more land and be more of a barrier.”
Last June, the Lawrenceville couple and their scale model spent a month in Braddock as part of a team of artists commissioned by Carnegie Mellon University to look at ecological approaches to land-use planning and public space development in Braddock and North Braddock.
With many vacant lots returning to nature — usually through neglect and often in unsafe places — Kline and Brill suggest that when redevelopment does come to Braddock, some of those green spaces could be retained and incorporated in the plans. Parts of Tassey Hollow, a ravine separating North Braddock from Swissvale, could be made accessible, and the Sixth Street stream could be restored to a more natural condition to show proper storm water management.
Some of the vacant lots on Braddock Avenue could be used to interpret the borough’s history as a sort of outdoor museum, Brill said. Their ideas, still evolving, will be exhibited next year.
Jones said she would like to see “some greenery on Braddock Avenue, and well-designed street lights and a time clock in the center of town. I want it to have a sense of place, so people in this town will be proud to say they live in Braddock.”
Will it also, one wonders, be a place Dobie Dobrejcak would recognize?
(Patricia Lowry can be reached at plowry@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1590.)
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Wilkinsburg housing project gains approval
By Sam Spatter
FOR THE TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, September 29, 2005Another project to improve the housing inventory in Wilkinsburg has been approved by the Allegheny County Redevelopment Authority.
The authority on Wednesday authorized the county’s Economic Development Department to move ahead on the Peebles (Street) Square project, which involves the rehabilitation or construction of 12 to 14 houses in that area.
In July, Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation joined with Wilkinsburg Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, in a separate project to revitalize housing in a six-block area near St. James Church, known as Hamnett Place neighborhood.
For the Peebles project, the authority will seek $1 million in acquisition funds from the state and apply to the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency for about $2 million to assist the developer, Action-Housing, in the project.
“About four of the houses are occupied, two by owners, but the rest are either vacant or boarded-up, or the site vacant,” said Dennis Davin, the Economic Development Department’s executive director.
The overall cost of the program is about $5.6 million, with new houses selling for about $75,000 and rehabilitated houses, $65,000. The authority plans to provide a second mortgage of about $20,000, which is paid only upon resale of the house, he said.
The Hamnett Place neighborhood project includes rehabilitation of six abandoned buildings along Jeanette Street to create opportunities for new single-family housing.
Allegheny County is providing $500,000 for the project, and the History & Landmarks Foundation, and the state, will provide matching funds.
Cathy McCollom, the foundation’s chief programs officer, estimates the cost to redo the initial six properties could range between $90,000 and $130,000 per unit.
Sam Spatter can be reached at sspatter@tribweb.com.
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review © Pittsburgh Tribune Review
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Wilkinsburg housing project gains approval
By Sam Spatter
FOR THE TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, September 29, 2005Another project to improve the housing inventory in Wilkinsburg has been approved by the Allegheny County Redevelopment Authority.
The authority on Wednesday authorized the county’s Economic Development Department to move ahead on the Peebles (Street) Square project, which involves the rehabilitation or construction of 12 to 14 houses in that area.
In July, Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation joined with Wilkinsburg Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, in a separate project to revitalize housing in a six-block area near St. James Church, known as Hamnett Place neighborhood.
For the Peebles project, the authority will seek $1 million in acquisition funds from the state and apply to the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency for about $2 million to assist the developer, Action-Housing, in the project.
“About four of the houses are occupied, two by owners, but the rest are either vacant or boarded-up, or the site vacant,” said Dennis Davin, the Economic Development Department’s executive director.
The overall cost of the program is about $5.6 million, with new houses selling for about $75,000 and rehabilitated houses, $65,000. The authority plans to provide a second mortgage of about $20,000, which is paid only upon resale of the house, he said.
The Hamnett Place neighborhood project includes rehabilitation of six abandoned buildings along Jeanette Street to create opportunities for new single-family housing.
Allegheny County is providing $500,000 for the project, and the History & Landmarks Foundation, and the state, will provide matching funds.
Cathy McCollom, the foundation’s chief programs officer, estimates the cost to redo the initial six properties could range between $90,000 and $130,000 per unit.
Sam Spatter can be reached at sspatter@tribweb.com.
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review © Pittsburgh Tribune Review
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South Side enlivens historic district with lighting
Pilot project illuminates buildings’ facades on East Carson Street
Sunday, September 04, 2005
By Mark Belko, Pittsburgh Post-GazetteFor the South Side, Light-Up Night will come Thursday.
That’s when the facade of Maul Building, a prominent East Carson Street structure, will be illuminated for the first time under a pilot project to highlight significant architecture and to add to the vibrancy of the historic district.
It is one of two East Carson Street buildings to receive facade lighting as part of the project, spearheaded by the South Side Local Development Co. The other is The Bridge, a restaurant at 2302 East Carson St. named for its proximity to the Birmingham Bridge.
“To us, it was a way to brighten the district by night. To us, it was a way to take the South Side architectural features recognized by day and to extend that to all hours, really,” said Amy Camp, manager of marketing and communications for the South Side Local Development Co.
Lighting for the two buildings totaled about $18,000. Costs were shared by Peter Gordon, an owner of the Maul Building, Seth Carpien, owner of The Bridge restaurant, the city Urban Redevelopment Authority and Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation.
The facade of The Bridge, a Victorian Italianate building erected in the 1800s, has been illuminated since July. Camp said the intersection at the Birmingham Bridge is considered a gateway to the South Side, making the building a good choice.
Carpien, who has owned the restaurant for about a year, said he invested in the project as a way to get involved in the South Side and to help generate business.
“I love it,” he said of the up lighting effect, designed to highlight building features. “It’s kind of neat when I come across the Birmingham Bridge at night. It really looks beautiful. It really shows the architecture, accentuates the Victorian architecture.”
Carpien said his business has increased over the last year, but he wasn’t sure it was the lighting that has attracted the customers, noting that the SouthSide Works commercial complex is close by.
“But I would assume [the building] would get a lot more notice coming across the bridge,” he said.
Erected during the reign of Queen Victoria of England, the building is patterned after Italian Renaissance villas. Window shapes vary floor to floor and are capped with decorative stone hoods.
The Maul Building, at 1700 East Carson Street, is considered a South Side landmark. Built in 1910, the building is done in American Renaissance style and is clad in terra cotta. There also are three-dimensional carvings of faces of women and Native Americans on the building.
The architect, William G. Wilkins Co., also was responsible for the North Side building that is home to the Andy Warhol Museum.
“It’s like no other building on the South Side,” Camp said. “It’s just so ornate that we’re really happy that [the lighting] worked out.”
Gordon said he was happy to assist in the effort.
“It’s a particularly attractive facade. I believe in the South Side and I think the South Side Local Development Co. does good work,” he said.
“I’m really glad they picked one of mine as one of the very first to be up lighted. Hopefully, in the future, there will be many more.”
Camp said her agency is looking into the possibility of extending the program to other buildings on East Carson Street.
“It would be ideal to be able to see some of the architecturally significant buildings lighted, however that happens. It’s not quite there yet. It would be wonderful to see,” she said. “There’s definitely interest on the part of the business district and individual property owners.”
Cathy McCollom, Pittsburgh History & Landmarks chief programs officer, said the lighting of the two buildings and others “could serve as a visual draw from one end of Carson to the other.”
McCollom had suggested the lighting of facades along East Carson to the South Side Local Development Co. after seeing the way in which light was used to illuminate buildings in a number of other cities, including Chicago. Station Square’s Landmarks Building, where McCollom’s organization has its offices, also is lighted.
The Maul Building and The Bridge will be illuminated from dusk to 2 a.m. each day. Chas DeLisio, of Makato Architecture and Design, was the lighting consultant for the project.
Thursday’s ceremony and celebration will start at 8 p.m. with the lighting of the Maul Building. A reception will follow at The Bridge. There also will be performances by the Zany Umbrella Circus, which does fire juggling and other routines using light.
The South Side is the second area of the city in the last year to organize a project to illuminate building fronts. Last December, 17 buildings on Penn Avenue, Downtown got the same treatment through a program put together by the Downtown Living Initiative and Duquesne Light Co.
(Mark Belko can be reached at mbelko@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1262.)
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette. © Pittsburgh Post Gazette