PITTSBURGH | Development Rundown II

[BrianTH]

30% of 1200 units is 360 units. 360 units is 20% of 1800 units.

So, problem solved--increase the unit count to 1800, and now you can get all those additional affordable units while at the same time keeping the ratio of market-to-affordable units where the Penguins want it to be. And the overall intensity of use of the site has gone up. That's a win-win-win situation.

[Private D]

Originally Posted by Evergrey

30% affordable units is a ridiculous demand and will depress the potential of the site. This site should be conceptualized as an extension of Downtown rather than another low-slung "mixed-income" project. Unfortunately, retaining "mixed-income" specialist McCormack Baron Salazar for this development does not inspire confidence.

Yup. This has the potential to not only depress, but doom, the success of the site overall. The "affordable" housing component has been done already in the immediate area (and done poorly from an urbanist perspective) with Crawford Square, and the other suburban-styled streets in the vicinity (Arthur, Roberts). Including more in any incarnation on this parcel does nothing but depress values and limit long-term value of the land as an extension of downtown.

A point that needs to be made: This site has not been a neighborhood for over 50 years. It has not been part of the Hill District for over 50 years. It has been an arena and parking lots for likely almost every Hill District resident's life. That is the big difference in attempting to compare this site to the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood in Cincinnati. There is absolutely ZERO reason to have to include any "low-income" housing in this development, much less a ludicrous amount like 30%, and there should be zero reactive motivation to do so... especially when there is so much available land within the Hill District for affordable housing development. If demand exists for more low-income housing in the Hill, then there is plenty of land for it.

[GeneW]

Do we want Downtown/The Lower Hill to turn into a little Manhatten that's only affordable by the 5%? I think that it's important to retain some affordable housing to keep some economic diversity and not chase everyone who makes less than six figures out to the suburbs.

[Private D]

Originally Posted by GeneW

Do we want Downtown/The Lower Hill to turn into a little Manhatten that's only affordable by the 5%? I think that it's important to retain some affordable housing to keep some economic diversity and not chase everyone who makes less than six figures out to the suburbs.

That's a wholly unrealistic scenario for Pittsburgh.

[BrianTH]

Just to provide some background to keep in mind:

The Lower Hill site was previously publicly-owned land. As part of the massive public handout to the Penguins surrounding Consol, offered as a bribe to keep them from moving to another city, they got exclusive development rights to the land as long as they met certain conditions. Ultimately, there was a Community Benefits Agreement signed which required the Penguins to consider the goals in the Hill District's Master Plan, although it didn't quite bind them to do whatever the Master Plan ended up saying. It is that Master Plan that includes a goal of 30% affordable housing for the site.

Personally, I don't agree that there should be NO affordable housing element at all. There really are not that many sites left in this sort of proximity to Downtown where affordable housing in large multi-units could go, and fears of affordable housing ruining the marketability of the other units are typically overimagined. On the other hand, I also think that people shouldn't use the excuse of wanting affordable housing to actually try to limit the number of market-rate units, rather than provide more affordable units, in order to shape the future demographics of the neighborhood in an exclusionary way. And there is definitely some of that going on too.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

That's a wholly unrealistic scenario for Pittsburgh.

I don't think so. Note that Pittsburgh as a region is on trend to change an awful lot in the next 20-30 years, and such broad regional changes can have very dramatic effects at the neighborhood level.

In this specific case, it is pretty easy to imagine 1200 new units being absorbed entirely by higher-income households. I don't know where the 5% cutoff might be, but certainly it could all go to households way above the median income.

Of course maybe you were referring to the idea the whole City will head that way. Obviously it won't become completely exclusive any time soon. However, what could happen is that higher-income households absorb almost all of the new construction, and also convert over more and more of existing homes, such that the units available in the City for lower-income households are going down sharply even as the City's population is going up.

[dfiler]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

Yup. This has the potential to not only depress, but doom, the success of the site overall. The "affordable" housing component has been done already in the immediate area (and done poorly from an urbanist perspective) with Crawford Square, and the other suburban-styled streets in the vicinity (Arthur, Roberts). Including more in any incarnation on this parcel does nothing but depress values and limit long-term value of the land as an extension of downtown.

A point that needs to be made: This site has not been a neighborhood for over 50 years. It has not been part of the Hill District for over 50 years. It has been an arena and parking lots for likely almost every Hill District resident's life. That is the big difference in attempting to compare this site to the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood in Cincinnati. There is absolutely ZERO reason to have to include any "low-income" housing in this development, much less a ludicrous amount like 30%, and there should be zero reactive motivation to do so... especially when there is so much available land within the Hill District for affordable housing development. If demand exists for more low-income housing in the Hill, then there is plenty of land for it.

This is based upon a number of assumptions that I don't agree with. Primarily, I don't agree that mixed income neighborhoods are bad or undesirable. Nor do I agree that urban planning should be entirely market based. Here are my thoughts on a topic I consider to be important but widely misunderstood...

Indeed, cities comprised of mostly mixed income neighborhoods are preferable for a variety of reasons. They have benefits that are not generally realized by developers. When developers are allowed to build without any regulation, we end up with projects that don't fit well into neighborhoods, societal problems, dangerous construction techniques, unsafe structures etc. Profit is maximized for the developer but all other aspects suffer.

So why do we want mixed income neighborhoods?

Less traffic. Segregating hourly workers to another area of town means that they have to commute longer to get to work. Ideally a cashier shouldn't need to drive to work. It isn't a specialized skill that merits commuting great distance.

Less crime. When poor people are concentrated in isolated neighborhoods, there is a snowball effect. Nobody walks the street at night because the streets are deserted. Mixed neighborhoods don't go past that point of no return.

Better property upkeep. This is similar to the effect on crime. When nobody in your neighborhood bothers to paint their house, you don't either. Mixed-income neighborhoods tend to have enough well-maintained properties that there is the tendency for people to maintain their own to a higher degree than would be done if it were in a monolithically poor neighborhood. To see an obvious example of this, drive through homewood or wilkinsburg and observe how many sidewalks are shoveled.

Healthier society. When income groups are forced to into segregation by neighborhoods with housing units all falling into a single income bracket, people tend to dehumanize and demonize eachother. It triggers socio-economic strife because people of a different income bracket become a faceless "them". And because economics and race are linked, in the end this is tends to be expressed as racism. When people walk past each other on a daily basis, that kind of class warfare is reduced.

Stronger communities with longer-term residents. In mixed income neighborhoods, getting a promotion, starting a family, or retiring doesn't mean you have to move someplace entirely different. You can stay in the same neighborhood and upsize, downsize, cut-back, or upgrade in quality... all without moving too far.

My personal opinion is that mixed-income neighborhoods benefit everyone, including the middle and upper classes. Yet if left to their own devices, developers will build only middle class or upper class units in middle or upper class neighborhoods. It maximizes their short-term profit. For this reason, I think there should be ordinances ensuring new development is mixed. In many parts of the world ordinances ensure exactly that and people can't imagine it any other way.

Prior to modern transportation this effect was slightly less pronounced. With everyone now traveling further to get to their jobs, the effects are more obvious than ever before. When the poor are ghettoized and isolated we end up with third-world conditions and neighborhoods slip past the point of no return. There are a few neighborhoods in Pittsburgh that are now so far gone that many consider them to be unfixable. If we hadn't allowed it to get that bad, many in those neighborhoods would be productive members of society. Now they're stuck and we're stuck with them. They may live a few more blocks away, but it is that division which has amplified the problem.

In other words, ghettos (and all their associated problems) are precisely the result of income segregated housing.

[BrianTH]

In addition to co-signing dfiler's list, I'd note there are a bunch of other public policies reasons to think it is a good idea to make room for lower-income households specifically in areas near important jobs and services centers (like Downtown and Oakland): that is conducive to physical health, a cleaner environment, lower energy usage, and so on.

Of course most of that sort of public policy argument depends on the idea that making room for lower-income households wouldn't involve crowding out higher-income households. And so that is part of why I advocate resolving this issue by adding more units.

[GeneW]

Thanks Brian and dfiler for articulating the what I what I wanted to say but didn't have words for.

[dfiler]

lol, and I consider my post to be long but not terribly well supported or organized.

The effects of mixed vs segregated income neighborhoods has long been a popular topic for economists, sociologists, doctors, and public policy experts. My impression is that the scientific community and even politicians agree that income groups are more segregated than optimal. In the abstract, the majority is in favor of mixed income neighborhoods. However, when it comes to a specific choice on a specific development, those directly involved will prefer the immediate profits of segregated housing.

[Private D]

dflier: For the most part, I agree with your outlook... albeit a somewhat utopic one in some assertions.

But you suggest that I am espousing the view that "mixed income neighborhoods are bad or undesirable" and "that urban planning should be entirely market based." No where in my post did I say that. I have no issue with "mixed-income" neighborhoods or attempts to create them. I do have issue with building more low-income housing in an area replete with it.

Fact is, the adjacent Hill neighborhood is already low to borderline-middle income as it is. Adding market-rate and upper scale housing to the mix works to create that very "mixed-income" neighborhood you are a proponent of. Adding additional subsidized units at a significant percentage only adds more of what is already there.

This is an opportunity to expand downtown (which should be needed if Pittsburgh is to become the booming resurgent city it's being made out to be, no?)... and it should be considered as such. And absolutely not seen as an opportunity to rebuild a long-gone ethnic neighborhood that has not existed for over half a century. Because if anything is going to bring the old Lower Hill back, it certainly is not a Section 8 housing developer from St. Louis.

[Private D]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

I don't think so. Note that Pittsburgh as a region is on trend to change an awful lot in the next 20-30 years, and such broad regional changes can have very dramatic effects at the neighborhood level.

In this specific case, it is pretty easy to imagine 1200 new units being absorbed entirely by higher-income households. I don't know where the 5% cutoff might be, but certainly it could all go to households way above the median income.

It's a wholly unrealistic scenario for downtown Pittsburgh and the Lower Hill to become a "little Manhatten" (sic) that is only affordable to the upper 5% of society.

And if this somehow were to become the case in the distant future, then it would say something pretty damn impressive for the city of Pittsburgh as a whole. I'd love to see the Golden Triangle become the chic address for uber-wealthy yinzers of all stripes.

[Private D]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Just to provide some background to keep in mind:
Ultimately, there was a Community Benefits Agreement signed which required the Penguins to consider the goals in the Hill District's Master Plan, although it didn't quite bind them to do whatever the Master Plan ended up saying. It is that Master Plan that includes a goal of 30% affordable housing for the site.

On the other hand, I also think that people shouldn't use the excuse of wanting affordable housing to actually try to limit the number of market-rate units, rather than provide more affordable units, in order to shape the future demographics of the neighborhood in an exclusionary way. And there is definitely some of that going on too.

And that is what I have a problem with... the Civic Arena site has not been part of the Hill District for over 50 years... it should not be included in the Hill District's master plan. It is not part of the Hill District, and it's never going to be again. We may call it the lower Hill again in the future, but it will be in name only. The rest of the Hill requires serious attention by a master plan far more than this DOWNTOWN site does.

I fully agree with your thoughts in the second paragraph... and I'm warming to your idea of increasing the number of units overall to achieve a 20% "affordable" number.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

Fact is, the adjacent Hill neighborhood is already low to borderline-middle income as it is. Adding market-rate and upper scale housing to the mix works to create that very "mixed-income" neighborhood you are a proponent of. Adding additional subsidized units at a significant percentage only adds more of what is already there.

I think if the Lower Hill was all top-of-the-market new units, it likely wouldn't function as part of the same neighborhood as the rest of the Hill--certainly it is not at all unusual for Pittsburgh to have such abrupt changes in neighborhood.

Of course that will probably be true in any event (that the Lower Hill won't really be seen as the same neighborhood as the rest of the Hill--which itself probably isn't one big neighborhood anyway). To that extent I agree the Hill should not be treated as a single unit with a right to completely control the development of the Lower Hill site (as distinct from having a meaningful opportunity to contribute to the discussion about its development, which I think it should have). But conversely, I don't think you will be able to count other parts of the Hill when it comes to determining whether or not this ends up as a mixed-income neighborhood.

This is an opportunity to expand downtown (which should be needed if Pittsburgh is to become the booming resurgent city it's being made out to be, no?)... and it should be considered as such. And absolutely not seen as an opportunity to rebuild a long-gone ethnic neighborhood that has not existed for over half a century.

I think it is actually something in-between--quite literally. Closest to Downtown I could see this functioning as an office-heavy extension of Downtown that "leaps" Crosstown, but I also see a real need for a new Downtown-adjacent residential area that would be a bit different from the Grant Street portion of Downtown (maybe not so different from the Cultural District, however, at least given where that is headed). I also think it makes sense to see this as an opportunity for creating a new walkable commercial/entertainment district for common use by residents of the Hill, Uptown, Downtown, Oakland, and maybe even the Strip (if they can do something like restore an incline).

In short, Pittsburgh is a city of a gazillion neighborhoods, so there is no need to choose either of Downtown or the adjacent parts of the Hill as the model for this new neighborhood-in-the-making. Instead it can be its own thing, serving a variety of different purposes.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

It's a wholly unrealistic scenario for downtown Pittsburgh and the Lower Hill to become a "little Manhatten" (sic) that is only affordable to the upper 5% of society.

New market-rate 1BRs in or around Downtown are often priced at or above $1500/month these days, and could easily be headed higher. To afford an apartment priced like that, you need a household income of at least around $60,000 a year. But the median household income in the City is only around $42,000 a year.

So only the top 5% might be a bit of a stretch. But something well above the median is not a stretch at all.

And if this somehow were to become the case in the distant future, then it would say something pretty damn impressive for the city of Pittsburgh as a whole. I'd love to see the Golden Triangle become the chic address for uber-wealthy yinzers of all stripes.

Again, Greater Downtown (including Downtown itself and immediately surrounding areas like the Lower Hill) can be both, meaning both a chic address, and also a place some of the less-chic can afford.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

And that is what I have a problem with... the Civic Arena site has not been part of the Hill District for over 50 years... it should not be included in the Hill District's master plan.

So as I was just suggesting, I don't entirely disagree with this notion.

I do think the existing Hill neighborhoods are notable stakeholders in this site since it is adjacent to where they live (and without a cliff in the way, as is true on most sides of the Hill). As such, I think residents of those neighborhoods should be invited to participate in the planning process, but not actually have control over its outcome. And to the extent plans for this site and plans for the rest of the Hill can be mutually supportive (not necessarily fully integrated in a single plan, but thoughtfully considered in conjunction with each other), that would probably be a good thing.

My point, however, was more that this started out as public land, and accordingly it is not inappropriate to think about serving the public's interests in terms of how it gets developed. For good or ill, part of how the public's interests were recognized in the development deal with the Penguins was through the CBA. But even if you hold all that aside, the City retains planning approval over the site through its Specially Planned District zoning.

Therefore, you don't actually have to reference the CBA to note the City has the moral and legal authority to impose development requirements on the Penguins. I wouldn't be abusive about it, but requiring a certain number (not percentage, I would hope) of affordable units would not in my view count as abuse.

I fully agree with your thoughts in the second paragraph... and I'm warming to your idea of increasing the number of units overall to achieve a 20% "affordable" number.

For what it is worth, I think it is a pretty good litmus test in terms of determining whether a given critic of the plan is serious about providing more affordable housing in the City (in which case the actual number is more important than the percentage), or rather is trying to shape the future demographics (or perhaps politics) of the neighborhood by excluding what they would view as an excessive number of higher-income households (in which case the percentage is more important than the actual number). But I wouldn't apply this test to a given individual until you have given them a fair opportunity to think it through.

[BrianTH]

A few additional details on the PAT real-time tracking story here:

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/news/2014/02/10/port-authority-to-use-new-real-time.html

[BrianTH]

The state AG doesn't seem to like the idea of the PPS acquiring the AWC:

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/ne...eneral-raises-concerns-over.html?ana=twt

And in fact it may be a bad idea, but the premise of his criticisms seemed to be the PPS would also take on its liabilities. I would hope not! It would be one thing if they were top bidder in a liquidation, in which case the creditors would get whatever proceeds were available. But PPS definitely should not just agree to pay the creditors in full.

[dfiler]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

dflier: For the most part, I agree with your outlook... albeit a somewhat utopic one in some assertions.

But you suggest that I am espousing the view that "mixed income neighborhoods are bad or undesirable" and "that urban planning should be entirely market based." No where in my post did I say that. I have no issue with "mixed-income" neighborhoods or attempts to create them. I do have issue with building more low-income housing in an area replete with it.

Fact is, the adjacent Hill neighborhood is already low to borderline-middle income as it is. Adding market-rate and upper scale housing to the mix works to create that very "mixed-income" neighborhood you are a proponent of. Adding additional subsidized units at a significant percentage only adds more of what is already there.

This is an opportunity to expand downtown (which should be needed if Pittsburgh is to become the booming resurgent city it's being made out to be, no?)... and it should be considered as such. And absolutely not seen as an opportunity to rebuild a long-gone ethnic neighborhood that has not existed for over half a century. Because if anything is going to bring the old Lower Hill back, it certainly is not a Section 8 housing developer from St. Louis.

My apologies for misrepresenting your points.

As pittsburgh recovers economically, it is likely that much of the hill will be redeveloped. While it currently has low income housing, that doesn't translate into a mixed income neighborhood unless new development contains that mix. Much of the existing housing is not low income due to location or quality of architecture. As that existing stock is renovated or redeveloped, the existing residents will be priced out of the neighborhood unless there is a mix of housing.

As you point out though "section 8 housing" is a problem, or at least not a solution. That is evident in some of the hill district's newer "projects". Yet I would say failed low income housing projects are precisely the reason why we need mixed-income neighborhoods. The creation of a segregated middle or upper class neighborhood dictates that elsewhere there is a concentration of low income residents.

While some proponents of low income housing in the lower hill cite ethnic heritage and a sense of historical fairness, I think it is a mistake to focus on those as the justification for a mixed income neighborhood. From an emotional perspective, those arguments can be appealing to some people and also the media. However, from a purely rational point of view, mixed income neighborhoods are desirable regardless of who lived there previously and what race they were.

This isn't to say that all neighborhoods need to be mixed. Instead, a less radical stance is intended. And that is that some of Pittsburgh's worst problems right now are a result of currently being too segregated. By lumping all the rich in one area and poor in another, we have created ghettos with third world conditions. Those ghettos breed many problems that also spill out and infect better off neighborhoods. Thus, it is my stance that we swing the pendulum back toward a healthier balance of mixed and segregated neighborhoods.

[BrianTH]

Blast from the past--West Elm is coming to Bakery Square after all:

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/city/2...re-in-Bakery-Square/stories/201402100123