PITTSBURGH | Development Rundown II

[pghusa]

Originally Posted by PITairport

Looks like the software designers at SimCity don't regard Pittsburgh too highly...



http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/ar...iew-with-the-games-lead-designer/275724/

Wow, just wow, I just lost all respect for SimCity.

Really do these guys have 8-tracks and listen to AM radio, have they ever heard of Wikipedia, or even a Google news search. It's not anger its just pity that a room full of computer programmers can be that out of touch with their potential customers in a city that leads the world in LEED certified categories, is home to a university with the LARGEST patent infringement trial award last year, not to mention three other world class universities and the only Gates Computing Center (now Gates-Hillman).

Yeah in that article he not only mentions Pittsburgh as dirty once but twice and mentions to the effect that we have no education.

It's not only that they are stuck in the 1970s, but Pittsburgh has ALWAYS outpaced Berkeley in education, heck they copied the University of California from metropolitan Pittsburgh:

University of California (PA) 1852
University of California Berkeley 1868

Next time I want to buy software from someone that a 2 year old can out think I'll look into SimCity, how much more offensively ignorant can they be?

[pghusa]

Originally Posted by Urbana

A while ago, a forumer made a map of all proposed and under constriction Pittsburgh projects with the promise that they would update it regularly. Seeing as that forumer has sort of fell off the face of the earth, leaving their map woefully outdated, I decided to make one of my own. I will keep it up to date with the latest news regularly.

Here is a link:

http://quikmaps.com/show/239956

Let me know if I missed any projects, I chose to only include developments that we have heard news about in the past year.

I will also add the link to my signature.

very nice, liked the first one, like this one even better!

[Evergrey]

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/pr...phy-years-visionary-vexing.html?page=all

May 10, 2013, 6:00am EDT

Tom Murphy's mayoral years visionary, vexing

Build-or-bust blueprint sowed seeds of growth



More than seven years after he left office as mayor of Pittsburgh, Tom Murphy may not have the itch to return to the City-County Building, but he still has plenty of ideas about where the city should be going.

“In many ways, I should be mayor now,” he says with a smile.

...

“He changed the conversation on riverfront development and real estate. He changed the conversation on growth,” Dowd says.

Murphy’s public partnership led to the creation of more than 25 miles of riverfront trails and urban green space and the transformation of abandoned industrial sites into viable commercial and residential properties. Those include the 238-acre Summerset at Frick Park, once a slag heap above the Monongahela River but now a highly successful New Urbanist community of about 700 homes that ranks as the city’s biggest residential development in generations; the SouthSide Works, once the site of steel mills where Murphy’s father worked but today a mix of residential and retail and the headquarters of American Eagle Outfitters, the first public company in recent memory to leave the suburbs for the city; and East Liberty, where Murphy convinced a then-skeptical The Home Depot to take over a closed Sears store in what was a struggling neighborhood and now is thriving with other national stores such as Whole Foods, Target and Trader Joe’s.

But arguably his most prominent achievement — one in which the headwinds of public opposition were especially blustery — is his part in securing $1 billion in funding for the development of Heinz Field, PNC Park and a new David L. Lawrence Convention Center.

“I think that Tom Murphy gets a lot of credit for not only getting these projects started but getting them in the pipeline,” Dowd says. “There’s been some really great leaders in the city and the county. Tom Murphy is certainly one of them.”

...

[deja vu]

Originally Posted by PITairport

Looks like the software designers at SimCity don't regard Pittsburgh too highly...



http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/ar...iew-with-the-games-lead-designer/275724/

I'd wager he's never been to Pittsburgh and has creeped around more cities on google earth than he's ever been to in real life. My only question is, now that they decided to call this version SimCity, , what will the next version (technically version 6) be called?

[themaguffin]

I remember Murphy didn't seem to get much respect. Maybe it was his demeanor or personality etc. I don't know. And no, not all of his ideas were great, but I always liked that he truly seemed to be interested in improving the city and had ideas. Pittsburgh was lucky that its fortunes were changing despite the idiot in office now and honestly, O'Connor never seemed to be a visionary... probably more competent than the frat boy, but I remember earlier bids to be mayor where he made really generic comments and had no vision.

I hope Pgh's next mayor has vision to coincide with the city's changing fortune and growth.

[pghusa]

Originally Posted by themaguffin

I remember Murphy didn't seem to get much respect. Maybe it was his demeanor or personality etc. I don't know. And no, not all of his ideas were great, but I always liked that he truly seemed to be interested in improving the city and had ideas. Pittsburgh was lucky that its fortunes were changing despite the idiot in office now and honestly, O'Connor never seemed to be a visionary... probably more competent than the frat boy, but I remember earlier bids to be mayor where he made really generic comments and had no vision.

I hope Pgh's next mayor has vision to coincide with the city's changing fortune and growth.

O'Connor was a good man but your correct, much of his support wasn't his doing it was where do you run if you disagree with Murphy's grand vision that did include great things but also very polarizing things. Its the oldest rule of politics, the visionary is gonna change the status quo and there are some very powerful interests that like it just the way it is so the opponent despite not having vision or even statesmanship gets the support of those interests.

Murphy was great the first term and a half or so, shook things up, but like any 2 or 3 term politician the electorate and press get "the grass is greener" syndrome. I.e. despite being remembered fondly today leaders as opposite as Reagan and Clinton were rubbing even their own supporters the wrong way in their 7th and 8th years in office. Voters and the power structure just get tired of people, same thing is happening with Lukey and Obama now, doesn't mean they never did anything great but the last years of any mayor or other leaders administration always leaves a fatigue among voters.

[BrianTH]

Murphy was obviously very passionate and energetic with respect to improving the City, but didn't have a firm grasp on what actually makes cities attractive places to live and work.

Ironically, the current Mayor is sort of the opposite side of that coin--he is often faulted for a lack of personal initiative, but I think his policy instincts have generally been pretty good.

[Topher51]

Originally Posted by pghusa

Wow, just wow, I just lost all respect for SimCity.

Really do these guys have 8-tracks and listen to AM radio, have they ever heard of Wikipedia, or even a Google news search. It's not anger its just pity that a room full of computer programmers can be that out of touch with their potential customers in a city that leads the world in LEED certified categories, is home to a university with the LARGEST patent infringement trial award last year, not to mention three other world class universities and the only Gates Computing Center (now Gates-Hillman).

Yeah in that article he not only mentions Pittsburgh as dirty once but twice and mentions to the effect that we have no education.

It's not only that they are stuck in the 1970s, but Pittsburgh has ALWAYS outpaced Berkeley in education, heck they copied the University of California from metropolitan Pittsburgh:

University of California (PA) 1852
University of California Berkeley 1868

Next time I want to buy software from someone that a 2 year old can out think I'll look into SimCity, how much more offensively ignorant can they be?

I was intially outraged when I saw the first post about this, but after reading the article, I don't beliebe he is calling modern day Pittsburgh a dirty city. He is talking about the extreme cases a SimCity player could take and used Pittsburgh as the example of a player who exploits everything and everyone to make a buck, ala a Pittsburgh industrial tycoon from the Guilded Age. I don't think this is a big deal.

BTW, I haven't played a SimCity game since SimCity 2000, but man, the latest game looks bad ass. If only I had time for video games. Oh well, when I retire in 40 years I imagine the games will be even better!

[Evergrey]

Originally Posted by Topher51

I was intially outraged when I saw the first post about this, but after reading the article, I don't beliebe he is calling modern day Pittsburgh a dirty city. He is talking about the extreme cases a SimCity player could take and used Pittsburgh as the example of a player who exploits everything and everyone to make a buck, ala a Pittsburgh industrial tycoon from the Guilded Age. I don't think this is a big deal.

BTW, I haven't played a SimCity game since SimCity 2000, but man, the latest game looks bad ass. If only I had time for video games. Oh well, when I retire in 40 years I imagine the games will be even better!

Exactly. He is referring to Pittsburgh circa 1900. Nothing to get defensive about... Pittsburgh truly was the epitome of a city built on exploitation of resources and labor.

[pghusa]

"you're not educating them; you're just using them as slave labor to make money for your city."

Don't take him out of context he never said 1900, and really the description given is more 1860-1880s Pgh. Pitt, Duquesne & Chatham were all around in 1900 and Carnegie Mellon (as CT) was coming online, not to mention the Carnegie Libraries and yet somehow Pittsburghers had less access to education than Berkeley? What building was "clean" LEED certified in 1900 Berkeley? I wouldn't care as much if he said 1900 or even 1940, but somehow I think theres a whole room of programmers out there that don't do a simple google search and if they don't then theres too much ignorance on what Pittsburgh is in the last 50 years. It's why I appreciate this boards posters for getting the truth out, but sadly too many myopic people on the coasts using us as the poster child for all the wrong things.

Its gonna be interesting if this guy does the right thing in the coming days, interesting to read the comments on the Atlantic.

[Wiz Khalifa]

Originally Posted by Urbana

A while ago, a forumer made a map of all proposed and under constriction Pittsburgh projects with the promise that they would update it regularly. Seeing as that forumer has sort of fell off the face of the earth, leaving their map woefully outdated, I decided to make one of my own. I will keep it up to date with the latest news regularly.

Here is a link:

http://quikmaps.com/show/239956

Let me know if I missed any projects, I chose to only include developments that we have heard news about in the past year.

I will also add the link to my signature.

Good idea! Here a few others off the top of my head:

-Columbus Square in Manchester
-Chevron HQ at Moon Township Kmart
-942 Penn ave 3 story restaurant
-Fifth ave high school lofts
-Coffee shop/café garage rehab at Sarah st and S. 27th
-Millers Ale House next to Hofbrahaus in SSW
-3 story office bldg on North shore next to Stage AE

-Soffer Apt complex at Sidney and S. 26th
- Hotel at Bates st and Second ave Oakland
-Residential development at 5800 Penn in East Liberty
Link: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/busi...another-try-for-hotel-in-oakland-675065/

-First ave apartments downtown: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/busi...st-avenue-in-downtown-pittsburgh-682004/

[Found5dollar]

Originally Posted by Urbana

A while ago, a forumer made a map of all proposed and under constriction Pittsburgh projects with the promise that they would update it regularly. Seeing as that forumer has sort of fell off the face of the earth, leaving their map woefully outdated, I decided to make one of my own. I will keep it up to date with the latest news regularly.

Here is a link:

http://quikmaps.com/show/239956

Let me know if I missed any projects, I chose to only include developments that we have heard news about in the past year.

I will also add the link to my signature.

Bovie House at Ellsworth and Summerlea
http://www.boviehouse.com/Bovie_House/Bovie_House.html

Also, it would be great to add links to projects websites in the bubble that comes up when you click on a project.

Great work!

[Evergrey]

Originally Posted by Wiz Khalifa

Good idea! Here a few others off the top of my head:

-Columbus Square in Manchester
-Chevron HQ at Moon Township Kmart
-942 Penn ave 3 story restaurant
-Fifth ave high school lofts
-Coffee shop/café garage rehab at Sarah st and S. 27th
-Millers Ale House next to Hofbrahaus in SSW
-3 story office bldg on North shore next to Stage AE

-Soffer Apt complex at Sidney and S. 26th
- Hotel at Bates st and Second ave Oakland
-Residential development at 5800 Penn in East Liberty
Link: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/busi...another-try-for-hotel-in-oakland-675065/

-First ave apartments downtown: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/busi...st-avenue-in-downtown-pittsburgh-682004/

http://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/bl.../from-funeral-home-to-restaurant-in.html

May 9, 2013, 12:08pm EDT

From funeral home to restaurant in Lawrenceville

The incoming wave of restaurants into Lawrenceville can count another big newcomer coming to a former funeral home.

A group named Abbatia Holdings LLC plans to convert three properties at 4619, 4637 and 4635 Butler Street in the Ninth Ward near the Allegheny Cemetery.

Abbatia was scheduled Thursday morning to appear before the Pittsburgh Zoning Board of Adjustment, seeking two special exceptions and three variances.

Matt Galluzzo, executive director of the Lawrenceville Corporation, said the operation is expected to be called The Abbey of Lawrenceville. During the daytime, it will primarily be a coffee shop selling pastries and serving lunch. In the evening, it will become a restaurant and bar.

Led by owner Eric Kukura, who also owns a club in Shadyside called Spin, the Abbey is expected to have a capacity for more than 100 guests, offer outdoor patio seating and use an open lot for parking that’s part of the property next door, Galluzzo said.

The Lawrenceville Corporation supports the project, since the ownership agreed to a conditional license agreement with the community group as part of the Responsible Hospitality program.

“We want to see that site reused,” Galluzzo said.

Patrick Dowd, a city councilman whose district includes Lawrenceville, said the Abbey is an interesting business model for the neighborhood.

“It’s a very exciting idea, and it’s another great concept for Lawrenceville,” Dowd said. “There’s a lot of innovative entertainment venues emerging in the neighborhood.”

[Brentsters]

http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/life...-beer-bar-opening-on-north-shore-686842/

Steve Sloan, formerly of the Church Brew Works, reports that he's getting closer to opening -- perhaps next month -- his Roundabout Brewery at 4901 Butler St. in Lawrenceville.

"Equipment is in place and we have federal and state approval so hope to be brewing soon," he said in an email update, noting that he still has some issues to work out with the city, and that his wife, Dyana, has been working on the website: roundaboutbeer.com.


Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/life...ing-on-north-shore-686842/#ixzz2SvI8sJfn

[Urbana]

Thank you for the contribution everyone, the map is updated with the the ones I missed. To address a couple of suggestions, the markers will not, for whatever reason, support hyperlinks. Also, I endeavored to keep the projects on the list exclusively ones that are still under construction or proposed, so I deliberately excluded sites such as the 5th avenue school as they are complete or nearly complete.

Thanks for the kind words!

[pghusa]

Nice mention in the Boston Globe by a postdoctoral Harvard fellow no less, seems unlike SimCity we may be the poster child for people getting their facts straight.

Or, imagine you are considering relocating to another city. Not recognizing the slow change in the economic fortunes of various metropolitan areas, you immediately dismiss certain cities. For example, Pittsburgh, a city in the core of the historic Rust Belt of the United States, was for a long time considered to be something of a city to avoid. But recently, its economic fortunes have changed, swapping steel mills for technology, with its job growth ranked sixth in the entire United States.

[Minivan Werner]

Speaking of cities that feature Pittsburgh prominently.. the first few minutes of Jack Reacher could be re-used for a commercial promoting Pittsburgh tourism.

[daviderik]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

Murphy was obviously very passionate and energetic with respect to improving the City, but didn't have a firm grasp on what actually makes cities attractive places to live and work.

Ironically, the current Mayor is sort of the opposite side of that coin--he is often faulted for a lack of personal initiative, but I think his policy instincts have generally been pretty good.

Agreed. He tried to force development before the market could support it. Plus he was of old thinking on growth. But I still remember him in Harrisburg inside the capital building with tears streaming down his face asking for money for the new stadiums. He loves his city. And all Pittsburghers have a soft heart for that.

[glowrock]

Originally Posted by Minivan Werner

Speaking of cities that feature Pittsburgh prominently.. the first few minutes of Jack Reacher could be re-used for a commercial promoting Pittsburgh tourism.

Most of that movie could be re-used for a commercial promoting Pittsburgh!

Aaron (Glowrock)

[Evergrey]

http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/loca...oom-shows-no-signs-of-letting-up-687244/

Downtown Pittsburgh building boom shows no signs of letting up

May 12, 2013 12:07 am



...

The report also disclosed that developer McKnight Realty Partners plans to anchor the Henry W. Oliver Building on Smithfield Street with an Embassy Suites Hotel. The hotel, with about 230 rooms, would occupy the upper 12 floors of the 25-story structure. Work is expected to start this year, according to the report.

...