Category Archive: Pittsburgh Tribune Review
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Boston example touted as form of urban utopia
By Elizabeth Barczak
TRIBUNE-REVIEW 02/04/2001
As the two-year tug-of-war over the future of Fifth and Forbes continues, champions of change are pointing north to Boston as an example of urban utopia.
Boston is being touted as a model for Pittsburgh to follow. Although Beantown’s population is nearly twice that of the Steel City, some local business leaders say Pittsburgh officials can learn from Boston’s recent revitalization.
Boston’s Main Streets program has been a topic of conversation at recent Plan C task force meetings.
The 15-member task force is charged with coming up with a recommendation to replace the mayor’s defeated Market Place plan.
“We need to look at Boston. There are lessons to be learned there that can be brought back to Pittsburgh,” said director of operations at the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation.
In the past six years, Boston’s Main Streets program has restored or renovated 120 storefronts. The program helped to create more than 300 new businesses and almost 2,500 jobs.
Boston officials have defined 19 local business districts.
“We know what works,” McCollom said. “We need a sense of district, destination, cleanliness and marketing. … We need a sense of place realized by the retention of historic buildings.”
McCollom said she would welcome large retailers Downtown if they agreed to move into existing buildings.
The concept is one that could be an easier sell to local business owners who balked at Mayor Tom Murphy’s $522 million plan to raze 62 buildings. The plan would have displaced 125 businesses to make way for national retailers.
Murphy’s proposal died in November after upscale retailer Nordstrom Inc. pulled out as the anchor of the project.
The Plan C task force is expected to make its recommendation to Murphy by the end of the month.
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review. © Tribune Review
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Commandments plaque historically important
01/11/2001-
Timothy Engleman letter to the editor
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a Christian. As the result of an enlightening class at Shadyside Presbyterian Church, I recognize that the first four of the Ten Commandments tie them inextricably to the Judeo-Christian belief system. However, I oppose their removal from the Allegheny County Courthouse on neither religious nor political grounds.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am a member of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation. I argue that the Ten Commandments plaque should stay in place to preserve the fabric and integrity of the architecture. I know the plaque was not affixed at the building’s erection. I know nearly a century in place does give it historical significance.
Ancient Rome’s Vitruvius stated architecture’s three tenets: Commodity (function), Firmness (sound construction) and Delight (esthetic appeal). Architectural esthetics means not only form, color and texture, but also the expression of ideas. In a public building, commonly held ideals are often expressed quite literally. At the turn of the 20th century, posting of the Ten Commandments would have met with wide approval, and sensitivity to minority views was not an important issue. Removal of the plaque, now, amounts to historical revisionism.
Above the Grant Street entrance to the Courthouse is carved, “A.D. MDCCCLXXXIV,” or Anno Domini (Year of Our Lord) 1884. Presumably, this reference to Jesus Christ is potentially offensive or intimidating to an even wider population than the Ten Commandments. Shall we chisel away the stone and deface the architecture by substituting the “Common Era” as our temporal benchmark?
Why not just place another plaque below the Ten Commandments? Its text: “The above artifact is historical in nature, and does not necessarily reflect the precepts of Allegheny County Government.”
Timothy C. Engleman
Saxonburg
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Plan C task force has initial meeting-Members still debating if public can attend
By Gregor McGavin
TRIBUNE-REVIEW 01/05/2001
The first order of business Thursday for a task force formed to forge a compromise between competing visions for Downtown was to open the doors to the public – sort of.
The 11 members of the Plan C task force appointed by Pittsburgh Mayor Tom Murphy met for the first time yesterday at the Oakland offices of Bally Design, the company hired to organize the meetings.
The panel includes Downtown merchants and property owners who were vocal critics of the mayor’s failed Market Place at Fifth & Forbes plan, which they said suffered from a lack of openness and public input.
The task force is permitting the media to attend the meetings, said Frank Garrity, president of Bally.
“I wouldn’t go if (the meeting) was closed,” said Arthur Ziegler, a task force member and executive director of the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation.
What they did not work out was whether to allow members of the public to attend, said Wendy Dodd, task force member and marketing director for the Downtown Pittsburgh Partnership.
That came as a surprise to task force member Patty Maloney, who owns a Forbes Avenue gift shop and heads the Golden Triangle Community Development Corp., one of the groups that opposed Murphy’s plan.
Maloney said she had understood the first meeting would focus on organization and general operation of the panel and would be closed to the public and the media. The task force plans to schedule separate public hearings, Dodd said.
“There seems to be some kind of confusion, with me being part of the confused,” Maloney said. “The decision was the meetings are going to be open to the press … I would assume it would be the same thing with the public.”
More importantly, Dodd said, panelists decided that Bally should conduct interviews with Downtown stakeholders, including property owners and arts organizations, to be sure any plan accurately reflects the will of people living and working in the area.
The group also scheduled meetings every Thursday morning through mid-February. The next meeting also will be at Bally Design, 424 N. Craig St., Oakland. The locations of the other meetings haven’t been determined.
Task force members hope to synthesize previous plans from the Downtown Planning Collaborative, the Golden Triangle CDC and other groups into a single plan that pleases all concerned, Dodd said.
“There’s still quite a bit of work that this group will have to do, and it’s only just begun,” she said.
– Gregor McGavin can be reached at gmcgavin@tribweb.com or (412) 320-7844.
This article appeared in the Pittsburgh Tribune Review. © Tribune Review
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Parking woes plagues downtown – Survey finds shoppers attracted to area malls because of free parking
By Dave Copeland
TRIBUNE-REVIEW 01/01/2001
Had it been approved, the failed $522.4 million Market Place at Fifth & Forbes redevelopment plan for downtown Pittsburgh would have done little to draw shoppers to the city, a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review poll shows.
“I would just never think of going down there,” said Joe Kuhner of Wilkins Township as he shopped at the Monroeville Mall recently. “I have no reason to go down there. It’s just easier to stay out here and go to the mall.”
Only 10 percent of the respondents to a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review Poll said they would be “very likely” to shop Downtown if the Fifth-Forbes retail corridor was redeveloped. Forty-two percent said they would not shop Downtown even if the corridor was redeveloped.
Pittsburgh Mayor Tom Murphy had wanted to create the Market Place at Fifth & Forbes by demolishing 62 buildings along Fifth and Forbes avenues. Urban Retail Properties Co., the project’s lead developer that bowed out when Nordstrom Inc. declined an offer to anchor the development, had promised an upscale retail district that they believed would have drawn shoppers from throughout southwestern Pennsylvania.
The main reason respondents gave for not shopping Downtown is the often hectic hunt for a parking spot.
Forty-three percent of the respondents said cheaper parking would make them more likely to shop Downtown, and another 18 percent said they might consider Downtown shopping more often if there was better public transportation to get them there.
“We can park for free here,” Kuhner said of the Monroeville Mall.
In November, Pittsburgh City Council voted against diverting money from the Market Place at Fifth & Forbes project to pay for free parking during the holiday season, upgrades to Grant Street and facade improvements for Downtown businesses.
The proposal had been pushed by Councilman Jim Ferlo, but Urban Redevelopment Authority Executive Director Mulugetta Birru said it would be illegal for the city to use the tax-increment financing money for anything other than what it was designated.
Murphy’s thinking for redeveloping Downtown wasn’t completely flawed, according to poll respondents. Seventeen percent said they would be more likely to shop Downtown if there were more department stores. Since being elected in 1994, Murphy has given tax subsidies to build a Lazarus and a Lord & Taylor department store to join the existing Kaufmann’s and Saks Fifth Avenue stores, making Pittsburgh one of the few major cities with four Downtown department stores.
“I don’t go down there now. If it was different than a regular mall, I might go down,” said Shannon Mahoney of Murrysville, Westmoreland County. “The only reason I probably would go down was for shopping, or maybe a concert.”
While 59 percent of the poll respondents said they never shop Downtown, only 4 percent said they shop there on a weekly basis. Those people are more than likely people who work Downtown or live in the city, said Patty Maloney, owner of the Card Center on Wood Street.
“That’s why there are different places to shop – so people can choose where they shop,” Maloney said. “All you have to do is look at our transactions and you can see that people do shop here. If they didn’t, I wouldn’t be in business.”
Another criticism of Murphy’s plan was the lack of residential development that could have provided a customer base for the envisioned “24-hour Market Place.”
Shadyside resident Karen McClellan said she prefers to shop at the stores on Walnut Street, within walking distance from her apartment.
“It’s so much easier to walk down the street. That’s where I do most of my shopping,” McClellan said. “I haven’t been to a mall since I moved here, and I’ve never shopped Downtown.”
With Murphy’s plan in shambles, he is looking to his former opponents to help develop a new Downtown revitalization program based partly on the National Trust For Historic Preservation’s Main Street program.
Murphy has tapped the Golden Triangle Community Development Corp. and the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation – two key critics of his original proposal – to work on “Plan C, for compromise.”
Main Street has been used throughout the country to revitalize business districts while preserving historic buildings. In addition to revitalizing buildings and fostering existing businesses, Main Street relies heavily on promoting the district as a destination for shoppers and tourists. Pittsburgh’s South Side was one of the first urban areas to adopt a Main Street program.
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Dave Copeland can be reached at dcopeland@tribweb.com or (412) 320-7922.
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Urban writer scoffs at corridor plan
By Jeff Stacklin
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
October 6, 1998By redeveloping the Fifth and Forbes corridor with national retailers and restaurants, city planners will blow an opportunity to “do something interesting and innovative that won’t bankrupt the city,” an urban critic said Wednesday.
Instead of investing in a national developer, city leaders should assist local businesses by helping them market their wares and by government-funded programs to improve roads and buildings, said Roberta Brandes Gratz, a journalist, author and critic from New York City.
Gratz, author of “Cities Back from the Edge, New Life for Downtown,” spoke as part of the Making Cities Work lecture series. The lecture was sponsored by the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation and the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, Pittsburgh Branch.
With slides, Gratz showed redevelopment projects that have worked in other U.S. cities and some that have not. She made a distinction between the reborn and rebuilt city – and favors the reborn city.
A rebuilt city is one where buildings are razed and replaced with new structures. A reborn city utilizes what’s already in place.
She scoffed at the proposed overhaul of Fifth and Forbes avenues as a rebuilding project that won’t work and will cost too much.
The plan, which has not been finalized, tentatively calls for the city to buy the properties lining the corridor, and then sell them to Urban Retail Properties, a Chicago-based firm.
The firm, which did not return phone calls yesterday, promises to attract an All-Star Cafe, a Planet Hollywood with a 24-screen movie theater and several national retailers.
The project is also expected to get plenty of tax dollars. Already, Gov. Tom Ridge has pledged $10 million in state grants. Mayor Tom Murphy has said he wants to provide $7 million in taxes reaped from a new Mellon Bank operations center. The project, which Urban Retail Properties brochures have called the Market Place at Fifth and Forbes, has been estimated to cost $170 million.
The developer and the city have yet to disclose how much of that cost will be underwritten by private sources.
Although many people can relate to the national chains, Gratz said her studies of other cities show they won’t attract more people Downtown.
“Why would someone come Downtown to a store they can find in a mall in the suburbs?” she asked.
The Fifth and Forbes corridor already is loaded with unique stores that offer a distinct flavor. It’s an area that can be reborn, Gratz said.
She suggested the city catalog existing businesses and what they sell. With that information, the city should launch an advertising campaign to market the area. She’s betting that within a year more people will come Downtown to patronize the stores.
“I don’t think people know how many local businesses will be displaced” by the redevelopment, Gratz said. “Local businesses should be treasured, not replaced.”
After her lecture, Gratz toured the Fifth and Forbes corridor, and stumbled upon The Headgear hat shop on Fifth Avenue. From cowboys hats to baseball caps, the store sells all styles and fashions of hats. It’s in a building that will be razed if the city’s plan is carried out.
“This goes?” she asked, shaking her head in dismay. The plan “makes less sense seeing it on the street than it did when I just heard about it.”
City Councilman Sala Udin is confident that the unique stores, such as the hat shop, will be relocated into the new development – although he could not guarantee that every wig shop and manicurist along the corridor would survive.
“Efforts are being made by the mayor’s office and the Urban Redevelopment Authority to find local businesses that contribute a progressive urban character and keep them in business and keep them in the mix,” Udin said.
Margaret McCormick Barron, the mayor’s spokeswoman, said that some businesses might be temporarily relocated while construction is taking place. She said “it’s premature” to say what businesses, if any, would be forced out of their buildings because of the development.
Udin said he appreciated many conclusions drawn by Gratz. However, the final plan for the Fifth and Forbes corridor has not been completed.
“The jury is still out on it,” Udin said. “What the final configuration of the Downtown ownership will look like is still to be determined.”
Barron said that the city’s new Downtown Plan includes market research that supports the Fifth and Forbes plan, and concludes that the national retailers and restaurants will draw customers.
“We stand by the plan,” she said. Gratz’s remarks suggested that “she seems to think we’re building a mall.” That’s not the case, Barron said.
Meanwhile, the mayor’s office said last night that Murphy planned an important economic development announcement this afternoon at Mellon Square, Downtown.
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Preservation grants aid 20 churches
By The Tribune-Review
October 1, 1998The Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation has awarded nearly $50,000 to 20 area churches.
“No community is any kind of community without church in it,” said Howard B. Slaughter Jr., director of preservation services at the foundation. Slaughter said the grants announced Monday help the churches to remain “alive, vibrant, and healthy.”
Many of the grants were given for repair of stained-glass windows.
Twenty-seven churches applied for funding.
The grants, ranging from $1,000 to $3,000, will be used for restoration of the historic buildings. Each church is required to match the grants and many of the churches double or triple the investment made by the foundation.
The recipients are:
Bellefield Presbyterian Church, Oakland, $2,000; Brown Chapel AME Church, North Side, $3,000; Calvary Episcopal Church, Shadyside/East Liberty, $3,000; Calvary United Methodist Church, North Side, $2,100; Covenant Church of Pittsburgh, Wilkinsburg, $3,000; Epiphany Roman Catholic Church, Hill District, $3,000; Episcopal Church of the Nativity, Crafton, $3,000.
Also, First Presbyterian Church, Downtown, $1,500; First United Methodist Church, Shadyside, $3,000; Glenshaw Valley Presbyterian Church, $2,500; Missionary Temple Church of God in Christ, East Liberty, $2,500; Old St. Luke Church, Carnegie, $3,000; The Presbyterian Church of Sewickley, $3,000; St. Andrew Lutheran Church, Oakland, $2,215.
And, St. Benedict the Moor Church, Hill District, $3,000; St. Mary of the Mount Church, Mt. Washington, $1,500; St. Nicholas Croation Church, Millvale, $2,850; St. Paul Baptist Church, Point Breeze, $3,000; Second Baptist Church, Penn Hills, $1,000; West End AME Zion Church, $3,000.
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FIGHTING FOR OUR OLDER SCHOOLS – AND COMMUNITY SOUL
By Neal R. Peirce
America’s maladies of giantism and mindless standardization aren’t just matters of the craze for bigger highways that paved the way for Wal-Mart and McDonalds and their imitators, erasing the distinctiveness of our communities.
Our public schools are being impacted just as gravely. Grand old structures continue to be mindlessly demolished, replaced by nondescript, low-slung buildings in seas of parking lots on the outskirts of towns.
And not always by accident. Just as there’s a highway lobby — the asphalt and concrete gang, engineers and state highway departments — there’s a powerful lobby for tearing down old schools and building anew. It includes school construction consultants, architects, builders, and their rule-writing allies in state departments of education.
Take the school construction saga of Brentwood, a working class old trolley suburb about 5 miles south of Pittsburgh. In 1995, the local school board was talking of closing the two elementary schools and attaching them to the existing middle- and senior high school in a single giant K-12 education complex.
Ronald Yochum, a professional working with the Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, thought that was a terrible idea. So did several others who ran with him for the school board, promising to save Brentwood’s neighborhood schools. They unseated the incumbents with a 70 percent vote.
Once elected, they faced a mountain of Pennsylvania Department of Education space minimums and code requirements. A school building consultant was hired, who reported the two old schools were substandard, that they should be demolished and replaced with new structures costing $11.2 million.
The consultant was asked– What about comprehensive renovations instead of demolition? His reluctant answer: Maybe you could do it. But you’d have to put a stucco shell on that old building to get satisfactory energy efficiency. The job would cost, he estimated, $8.6 million.
Yochum and his board allies wanted nothing of a plan that would destroy the building’s historic aesthetics. So they located a local architect who wasn’t wired into the Pennsylvania school-building game. With him, they devised a plan to renovate the two old schools in a way that preserved the aesthetics of the facade and interior, insulated the walls and roofs, rewired the rooms for Internet technology, and met every state building requirement. The final cost: $5.9 million, just over half the consultant’s first figure.
Even then, the price was $850,000 more than it had to be to satisfy a state regulation mandating steel and concrete wherever the old structures had wood load-bearing walls and wood floors. The state regulators wouldn’t budge on their rule, even though the revamped buildings would have full fire sprinkling. The rule, says Yochum, makes it difficult to rehabilitate any school building more than 30 or 40 years old.
Similar stories, says Constance Beaumont of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, are being echoed across America, in one state after another. In her book, “Smart States, Better Communities,” she identifies typical “guidelines” — from the Council of Educational Facility Planning, for example — which escalate from at least 10 acres of land for every elementary school to 50 acres for community colleges, plus extra acres (based on total enrollment) for playing fields and lots of parking spaces.
Another guideline recommends against renovating any school if the cost is more than 50 percent of total replacement. States don’t need to adopt these guidelines — but they frequently do. Communities that want state school aid are forced to abandon still-serviceable historic buildings.
The result: “school sprawl” that makes towns less attractive and marketable, feeds exurban growth, forces many students from their bikes onto buses, removes students from the lively daily flow of town life, and indeed simply feeds the isolation many of today’s teenagers feel.
J. Myrick Howard of Preservation North Carolina charges that his state’s Department of Public Instruction not only promulgates “ridiculous” acreage and size standards for new schools but has adopted regulations which actually limit preventive maintenance of fine old school buildings. It’s “poor stewardship of public resources,” says Howard.
Maryland appears to be the grand exception. Recently backed up by Gov. Parris Glendening’s campaign to restrain sprawl, a set of counter-guidelines — for preservation — are being enforced by Yale Stenzler, director of the state’s public school construction program.
And with clear results: From 1991 to 1997, the percentage of Maryland’s school construction funds supporting renovations and additions to existing schools — rather than new structures — soared from 34 percent to 82 percent.
“Older school buildings can be renovated and revitalized to provide for the most up-to-date educational programs and services.” says Stenzler. Remade schools in existing neighborhoods “will encourage families to stay, … to use the existing roads, parks, libraries, public facilities.”
Will other states start shifting course? Maybe, with progressive (and smarter) governors. But more guerilla action at the school district level, like Brentwood’s, may be vital to convince the public of how much is really at stake.
©1997, Washington Post Writers Group.