PITTSBURGH | Development Rundown II

[BrianTH]

Pittsburgh Gateways has officially swapped in for Rubino as McCaffery's partner on the Produce Terminal:

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/ne...r-picked-for-redevelopment-of-strip.html

Random aside--the fact the Buncher project is one, long, continuous building does kinda please me, insofar as that makes it a nice match with the Produce Terminal.

[JVC]

Originally Posted by guyFROMtheBURGH

You might want to check your scales on that image overlay.

good catch - it still fits like a glove

[BrianTH]

Courtesy of ETRT, a preview of the Hotel Indigo:

http://www.nextpittsburgh.com/neighborho...liberty-opening-soon-heres-a-sneak-peek/

The interior decor is actually kinda cool:









The historic preservation component is very cool:







And the new portion is incredibly bland and does none of that any justice:



Cool and bland in one photo:

[Austinlee]

Ehh, the new addition is minimal but urban. I like it.

And this portion looks gorgeous, IMO.

[Austinlee]

Originally Posted by Urbana

HUGE planing presentation was just uploaded.

http://apps.pittsburghpa.gov/dcp/schedule65/presentation-65-703.pdf

Highlights (in my mind):

Buncher has unveiled their ENORMOUS proposal for the Strip. The design leaves much to be desired, but the scale, urbanity, and riverfront integration is beyond anything I expected of them. Check out the full planning presentation for a lot more detail and renderings.









Oxford's apartment building on Centre with more than 170 units.





A couple new angles of the first stage of the Tepper Quad.







An interesting over view of CMU's long term plan for their north campus.

These projects all seem really promising.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

Ehh, the new addition is minimal but urban. I like it.

Fair point. We complaint a lot about crappy details, so maybe we should take this for what it is.

And this portion looks gorgeous, IMO.

No kidding! Droooool.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

These projects all seem really promising.

Big picture, you are looking at densities of land use consistent with a thriving, walkable, urban center. If Pittsburgh keeps in-filling with projects like that, it is going to continue to progress as a city.

That doesn't mean there are not details that could be better. I also share concerns about large institutional campuses in urban areas. Historic preservation continues to be an uphill battle, at least when large non-profits or the biggest local corporations are on the other side. NIMBYs are still stalling or downgrading some projects. Lots of parts of the City are still in decline, and some may not get out of that dynamic for the conceivable future. We're not investing enough in things like transit to prepare for future growth. And so on.

But when you step back farther and take the proverbial 30,000 foot view, things are moving along nicely.

[JVC]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

Ehh, the new addition is minimal but urban. I like it.

And this portion looks gorgeous, IMO.

no question they did a great job restoring that old hotel building

now parkinson needs to turn his attention to the vacancy-loitering headquarters across the street which in its current state is undermining the investment he made in the indigo

https://goo.gl/maps/3A5ds

[Austinlee]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Fair point. We complaint a lot about crappy details, so maybe we should take this for what it is.

No kidding! Droooool.

It actually reminds me of the Rand building in Oakland a little bit.





Of course the Rand building was much much better from a design stand point; If I recall if won some award for excellent interaction with street and discrete parking, etc. It is really Washington DC quality construction which is interesting because that part of Oakland always reminds me of downtown DC.

As an interesting aside, a few years ago I had an IT friend who worked at Rand not long after it opened in Pittsburgh (Aaron PGH knows who i'm talking about) who would post some of the choice, most random crazy emails Rand receives on a regular basis. Basically schizophrenic people accusing the US of every conspiracy theory you can imagine and then some. It was pretty entertaining.

[Austinlee]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Big picture, you are looking at densities of land use consistent with a thriving, walkable, urban center. If Pittsburgh keeps in-filling with projects like that, it is going to continue to progress as a city.


But when you step back farther and take the proverbial 30,000 foot view, things are moving along nicely.

Yes, and that IS what I was getting at. I actually dislike the quality of at LEAST 50% of all new Pittsburgh apartment and hotel developments but as far as infill and creating vibrancy, that is MUCH more important IMO for the future vibe of the city which is how I describe that intangible something that draws people to want to live there and stay there.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

It actually reminds me of the Rand building in Oakland a little bit.

Hmm, interesting--if I imagine the modern part of the Hotel Indigo is an office building, I like it better. Not sure why.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

Yes, and that IS what I was getting at. I actually dislike the quality of at LEAST 50% of all new Pittsburgh apartment and hotel developments but as far as infill and creating vibrancy, that is MUCH more important IMO for the future vibe of the city which is how I describe that intangible something that draws people to want to live there and stay there.

Totally agree.

[DKNewYork]

Originally Posted by Austinlee

Yes, and that IS what I was getting at. I actually dislike the quality of at LEAST 50% of all new Pittsburgh apartment and hotel developments but as far as infill and creating vibrancy, that is MUCH more important IMO for the future vibe of the city which is how I describe that intangible something that draws people to want to live there and stay there.

Take heart. It is the same everywhere, particularly here in New York. I think disliking only 50% of new projects would be an improvement for me. But I calm myself by embracing the same approach you describe: The individual projects might not be to my liking but the effect of the project---completing the street, populating the neighborhood, increasing foot traffic, adding density and residents, etc.---can make it worthwhile.

[BrianTH]

I also take heart from the belief that cheap, ugly, undersized projects are more likely to get replaced down the road with something better.

Well, at least if the land is owned by a for-profit entity and taxed as such.

[Nomad Bryce]

They are putting in the bridge at Bakery Square today!

Also props to the forum for being nice to each other for a full week

[GeneW]

Originally Posted by Nomad Bryce

They are putting in the bridge at Bakery Square today!

Also props to the forum for being nice to each other for a full week

Your image link doesn't work. Weirdly I can't seem to find a picture of the bridge construction anywhere on the web and none of the news sites seem to have anything on it.

[On Edit] Fixed now, thanks. It looks pretty cool.

[Evergrey]

Can't wait to see photoLith's furry photos.

[guyFROMtheBURGH]

Originally Posted by JVC

good catch - it still fits like a glove

Originally Posted by BrianTH

As I believe we discussed before, an urban-format Walmart in a mixed-use building could be fine:

Trusting these folks to do that sort of project is a different matter.

^JVC: I meant no harm Just fact-checking as i lurk in this forum. But I completely agree that there is more than sufficient space for an urban Wal-Mart in that location.

^BrianTH: Great references and I would hope that the partners in Pittsburgh can put a good project team together to make such a form-fitting urban building that actually makes Wal-Mart look good and be accepted into a neighborhood.

(As an aside, my firm conducted land use approval work on all of the Wal-Marts in DC and wish the best for one in PGH!)

[eschaton]

Ended up randomly at a child's birthday party with one of the long-term staff people from ELDI this weekend. Confirmed two things.

1. They managed to get Ricky Burgess to sit down with LG Realty Advisors and get across the message that the Penn Plaza apartments are zoned residential, and there was no way the complex could get razed and replaced with a strip mall or office without major variances, which would not be granted. They are hoping they can convince the owners to sell to ELDI, who would then partially rehab/partially reconstruct the site. I didn't realize until he told me that an almost identical building was reskinned on the north side of Penn as part of New Pennley Place.

2. I also inquired about the Mellon's Orchard project on Negley (as opposed to the Penn Circle one). He confirmed that all of the buildings, even the cool early 20th century walkups, are going to be demolished if the funding for the project cleared. He said the demolition of those buildings was unfortunate, but there was no way they could work the financing of the project correctly with rehabs and the smaller site footprint taken up by the ugly mid-20th century apartments.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by guyFROMtheBURGH

^BrianTH: Great references and I would hope that the partners in Pittsburgh can put a good project team together to make such a form-fitting urban building that actually makes Wal-Mart look good and be accepted into a neighborhood.

Indeed. And my understanding is that Target was pretty easy to work with when it came to the design of their store. I'd be a little more ambitious with the WalMart, but I think these sorts of companies in general are very accustomed at this point to working with cities to get something reasonable done. There is a lot of money on the line for them, and as you suggest, it makes sense for them to want a smooth, positive move into these areas.