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Originally Posted by eschaton
I was not aware there was any residential conversion planned for the Frank & Seder Building.
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What I vaguely recall is near the beginning of the year, Stark said it was changing its plans from mixed-use with some apartments on the top couple levels to almost all apartments. But then I think there were reports of Stark trying to sell the building, and then the sale falling through. So personally, I am not sure of the actual status of that project at all.
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I would also say though that comparing the Pittsburgh downtown residential market to other cities might be a bit of apples to oranges, considering many other cities lack a second CBD like Oakland, or a big, mostly gentrified, and highly desirable urban nexus like the East End.
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Totally agree. For topographic, historical, and other reasons, development patterns in Pittsburgh are not really directly comparable to most other cities, even cities of a relatively similar size in the United States.
This has had both good and bad implications. But in this case I'd say it is more good than bad, as Pittsburgh's Downtown actually better-survived the sorts of widespread post-industrial hollowing-out that plagued many other superficially similar cities. But it also ended up more weighted to office uses.
Nonetheless, I think the Pittsburgh-specific statistics involving how occupancy rates, rents, and so on have trended Downtown, particularly since COVID, support the idea that potential demand Downtown has shifted significantly between lower-class office space and residential.
But exactly where that ends up taking us in, say, the coming decade will be a Pittsburgh-specific story, and I agree what has happened or will happen in other CBDs is of very limited use.