HomeDiagramsDatabaseMapsForum About
     

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Global Projects & Construction > City Compilations


Reply

 
Thread Tools Display Modes
     
     
  #5441  
Old Posted Aug 5, 2022, 2:54 PM
dfiler dfiler is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 335
Quote:
Originally Posted by AaronPGH View Post
I'm almost positive there's now a connection to the trail system and Hot Metal Bridge.
It's technically possible to go through the PTC property to get to the trail but it is not well built and very few people go that way.

There's a sidewalk between Bridgeside Point 1 and the hotmetal bridge which would be perfect except it goes underneath the building next to ground-level office windows and feels like trespassing. It also has a stair step every 8 feet so it isn't bikable.

There's also a narrow afterthought of a sidewalk that goes around the parking lot and to the door of Bridgeside Point. From there you can continue circling around the building through a variety of surfaces including concrete, pavers and dirt. The dirt part is lined with extremely sharp corten steel landscaping edging sticking out of the ground 6 inches. The route is non-obvious with narrow pavers used as a sidewalk between planters. There are also accute turns because the route wasn't intended. It feels like you're going through a company's private courtyard because that's what it is. Ironically, there is never anyone in that courtyard.

Because of all of this, pretty much everyone crosses the road using the pedestrian signal at the end of the hot metal bridge. That is dangerous with the speed and number of cars turning off or onto the bridge.

If the PTC was willing to be a good member of the community, that dangerous intersection would be eliminated. Hazelwood trail users would connect to the hot metal bridge without ever crossing a road.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5442  
Old Posted Aug 7, 2022, 3:26 PM
highlander206 highlander206 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 215
Simply infuriating....

Zoning board nixes Shadyside apartment building on S. Aiken Avenue

https://www.post-gazette.com/busines...s/202208050124
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5443  
Old Posted Aug 7, 2022, 7:31 PM
WillyC WillyC is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 99
Quote:
Originally Posted by highlander206 View Post
Simply infuriating....

Zoning board nixes Shadyside apartment building on S. Aiken Avenue

https://www.post-gazette.com/busines...s/202208050124
Don't let those "No Hate All Are Welcome Here" signs fool you about that part of town. You are only welcome if you have enough zeroes on your net worth. Heaven forbid we build more apartments to deal with the shortage in the area.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5444  
Old Posted Aug 7, 2022, 10:46 PM
themaguffin themaguffin is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 2,282
I'll say this again, city developers need to submit plans for double of what they really want, so the fucking NIMBYs can feel vindicated that they "only" a 12 story building happens instead of a 20+ one.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5445  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 11:45 AM
GeneW GeneW is offline
Northsider
 
Join Date: May 2007
Posts: 649
I'm totally baffled at the rationale used by the zoning board here. I mean the new building would be right next to an apartment building of similar size which is across Aiken from another one.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5446  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 12:04 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 5,182
Quote:
Originally Posted by highlander206 View Post
Simply infuriating....

Zoning board nixes Shadyside apartment building on S. Aiken Avenue

https://www.post-gazette.com/busines...s/202208050124
As much as the Planning Commission gets flack here, from watching the hearings online, the ZBA is much, much worse. The Planning Commission does eventually approve most projects, albeit after nitpicking them and making them jump through hoops. The woman who runs the ZBA (Alice Mitinger - the board nominally has three people, but I only ever see her) basically acts as if zoning code ties her hands, and if there's any community complaint regarding any variances at all, there's absolutely nothing she can do. Around half of large projects that have to go before the ZBA die, in my experience.

Last edited by eschaton; Aug 8, 2022 at 12:29 PM.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5447  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 12:21 PM
BobLoblaw BobLoblaw is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Posts: 46
Quote:
Originally Posted by highlander206 View Post
Simply infuriating....

Zoning board nixes Shadyside apartment building on S. Aiken Avenue

https://www.post-gazette.com/busines...s/202208050124
There are a lot of things I love about living in Pittsburgh, but seeing the elimination/reduction of projects that seemingly would have been small steps toward helping the city reach its potential makes it feel like a pretty backwards place at times. There's certainly no "the sky is the limit" sort of feeling here. Let's keep that ceiling low and comfortable.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5448  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 2:42 PM
Don't Be That Guy Don't Be That Guy is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 299
Quote:
Originally Posted by BobLoblaw View Post
There are a lot of things I love about living in Pittsburgh, but seeing the elimination/reduction of projects that seemingly would have been small steps toward helping the city reach its potential makes it feel like a pretty backwards place at times. There's certainly no "the sky is the limit" sort of feeling here. Let's keep that ceiling low and comfortable.
Honestly, that is my least favorite thing about Pittsburgh. This town and region have an amazing amount of potential, but the local attitude and policies from leadership are about as anti-aspirational as you can get. Local government just doesn't have the appetite for big ideas and the development that goes with them.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5449  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 3:14 PM
Austinlee's Avatar
Austinlee Austinlee is offline
Chillin' in The Burgh
 
Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Spring Hill, Pittsburgh
Posts: 13,094
Quote:
Originally Posted by BobLoblaw View Post
There are a lot of things I love about living in Pittsburgh, but seeing the elimination/reduction of projects that seemingly would have been small steps toward helping the city reach its potential makes it feel like a pretty backwards place at times. There's certainly no "the sky is the limit" sort of feeling here. Let's keep that ceiling low and comfortable.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Don't Be That Guy View Post
Honestly, that is my least favorite thing about Pittsburgh. This town and region have an amazing amount of potential, but the local attitude and policies from leadership are about as anti-aspirational as you can get. Local government just doesn't have the appetite for big ideas and the development that goes with them.
I feel the frustration along with you guys but is it really a problem unique to Pittsburgh? I see similar complaints and discussions across many other cities development threads as well. It seems that in this country as long as there are at least a couple vocal neighborhood residents giving pushback projects can be stalled, downsized or killed pretty easily. I believe it has to do with single use zoning in the US?

Having been on these message boards for 18 years now I am thinking that the biggest change that's needed is comprehensive zoning law reform in most cities and areas.
The housing affordability crisis that is affecting most major metropolitan areas and leading to unprecedented homeless populations and increase in crime is the logical end result of all of this.
I think the younger millenial & gen Z generations are going to need a zoning law revolution to undue the mounting catastrophe. The path we are on is not sustainable for housing demand.
__________________
Check out the latest developments in Pittsburgh:
Pittsburgh Rundown III
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5450  
Old Posted Aug 8, 2022, 5:19 PM
BrianTH BrianTH is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,070
Yeah, anti-density NIMBYs are everywhere, and empowered by a localized political system in which future/potential residents have no direct say in relevant development decisions.

The only viable way to address this fundamentally structural issue is for the cohorts facing crushing housing shortages to band together at higher levels of government (county or state, say). We'll see if that be organized, but unfortunately there is also a lot of misinformation about housing market dynamics (like that keeping developers from building a lot of new market rate units in a desirable location will help keep that location affordable, which is the exact opposite of how supply, demand, and pricing work).

So, these cohorts have to have some clarity on what actually needs to happen in order to keep well-located housing affordable in major metros.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5451  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 1:12 PM
highlander206 highlander206 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 215
Quote:
Originally Posted by GeneW View Post
I'm totally baffled at the rationale used by the zoning board here. I mean the new building would be right next to an apartment building of similar size which is across Aiken from another one.
Yeah, I don't understand it at all. A lot of large projects have been approved in recent years as well like Oakland Crossings, so I'm baffled as well why there could be any issues with this development. Hell, it's the same height as a building next door and across the street, as others have said too.

Quote:
Don't let those "No Hate All Are Welcome Here" signs fool you about that part of town. You are only welcome if you have enough zeroes on your net worth. Heaven forbid we build more apartments to deal with the shortage in the area.
Right? That's limousine liberals for you though.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5452  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 1:18 PM
highlander206 highlander206 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 215
Quote:
Originally Posted by Austinlee View Post
I feel the frustration along with you guys but is it really a problem unique to Pittsburgh? I see similar complaints and discussions across many other cities development threads as well. It seems that in this country as long as there are at least a couple vocal neighborhood residents giving pushback projects can be stalled, downsized or killed pretty easily. I believe it has to do with single use zoning in the US?

Having been on these message boards for 18 years now I am thinking that the biggest change that's needed is comprehensive zoning law reform in most cities and areas.
The housing affordability crisis that is affecting most major metropolitan areas and leading to unprecedented homeless populations and increase in crime is the logical end result of all of this.
I think the younger millenial & gen Z generations are going to need a zoning law revolution to undue the mounting catastrophe. The path we are on is not sustainable for housing demand.
It's definitely not. A city with big NIMBY issues as well is Boston, and that has definitely not stopped it from becoming what it is over the course of the century. Someone ironically though, I feel like Pittsburgh is where Boston was 20 to 25 years ago in many ways.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5453  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 1:33 PM
BobLoblaw BobLoblaw is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Posts: 46
Oh, there are selfish, change-averse, self-preservation-focused people everywhere, without question.

It does seem to me that there are a relatively small number of >5 story proposals in Pittsburgh, and the number of those that make it through the various approvals without substantial changes feels disproportionately low. Then again, if there were demand for more big proposals, the scuttled projects would be less evident, I suppose. Seeing 5 big buildings built and 5 scaled back/cancelled is different than seeing 50 built and 50 scaled back/cancelled, so being a small to mid size city might make it feel more restrictive in terms of net output.

But, perhaps it just seems that way because this is the city I live in and see day-to-day.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5454  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 3:42 PM
BrianTH BrianTH is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Posts: 6,070
As I recall, big picture, the 1960s was when a lot of zoning laws starting to be tweaked to be a lot more anti-density, but the immediate impact on housing affordability was somewhat blunted by reduced demand for "urban" residential neighborhoods over the next few decades. What then happened next depended on the city, and specifically when its urban renaissance began in earnest. But starting in the 1990s in some cities, and only more recently in others (with Pittsburgh being on the way back end of this effect), rents started increasing in a way consistent with artificially restricted supply.

Of course cities like New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, and so on are still building a lot more tall residential buildings than most other US cities. But the empirical evidence suggests even they are not doing so fast enough to keep up with potential demand.

Anyway, here is a really interesting article from a while ago about how a lot of NYC's buildings violate their current zoning laws by being some combination of too tall, too many units, not enough set backs, too much mixed use, and so on:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/...ilt-today.html
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5455  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 4:00 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 5,182
Quote:
Originally Posted by highlander206 View Post
Yeah, I don't understand it at all. A lot of large projects have been approved in recent years as well like Oakland Crossings, so I'm baffled as well why there could be any issues with this development. Hell, it's the same height as a building next door and across the street, as others have said too.
Again, the difference I think is because of the area. Oakland Crossings was in a part of the city which is under the jurisdiction of the Planning Commission. The site in question here was just subject to approval by the ZBA, and my experience has been the ZBA defaults to reject anything if neighbors complain.

The city didn't help things during the Peduto administration, when the decision was made that basically every substantial project in a neighborhood needs to be explicitly approved by the relevant neighborhood community/constituency groups. Effectively the city operates like 90 different municipalities with loose coordination when it comes to zoning.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5456  
Old Posted Aug 9, 2022, 4:47 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 5,182
Looks like the sale of the former Riverbend Foods factory on the North Shore has been finalized. Reading through the details, it seems for the most part the new developer wants to keep the site commercial/light industrial, rebranding it into a technology park, and mostly rehabbing the existing buildings. There are eventual plans to include approximately 200,000 square feet of residential however, which will also have a small retail component. They say this will be close to the Heinz Lofts development, and I believe it will be in this building, which most people likely believe is part of Heinz Lofts already.

In other news, Mozart plans to resubmit their apartment proposal. They include no details other than they will still have 10% of the apartments affordable.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5457  
Old Posted Aug 11, 2022, 3:10 AM
highlander206 highlander206 is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Apr 2016
Posts: 215
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton View Post
Again, the difference I think is because of the area. Oakland Crossings was in a part of the city which is under the jurisdiction of the Planning Commission. The site in question here was just subject to approval by the ZBA, and my experience has been the ZBA defaults to reject anything if neighbors complain.

The city didn't help things during the Peduto administration, when the decision was made that basically every substantial project in a neighborhood needs to be explicitly approved by the relevant neighborhood community/constituency groups. Effectively the city operates like 90 different municipalities with loose coordination when it comes to zoning.
Ah that explains a lot then. Hopefully their second attempt is more successful.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5458  
Old Posted Aug 12, 2022, 3:57 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 5,182
Quote:
Originally Posted by highlander206 View Post
Ah that explains a lot then. Hopefully their second attempt is more successful.
Yeah, the basic attitude of the one member of the zoning board who is on all the online meetings is "zoning code says what it does, and you'll only get variances if you can show hardship, not just because you'd like them."

She's a real hardass, but I don't know if this says much about her own personal views. Unlike the Planning Commission a judge can easily overrule a ZBA positive ruling, meaning her role in the matter really is mostly to interpret what's already on the books.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5459  
Old Posted Aug 19, 2022, 2:37 PM
eschaton eschaton is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Dec 2013
Posts: 5,182
August is always the slow month for planning in Pittsburgh, since the Planning Commission goes on holiday. ZBA agendas have been pretty boring as well. However, September ZBA agendas are now trickling online, and there's some more interesting things than over the recent period.

First, for September 8:

1. Three infill houses in Central Northside. This is the location. Not a fan of these, at all, but at least they're way up the hill where no one will stumble upon them. Also disappointed they have front-loading garages. The developer seems to have been unable to buy the rear lots for two of the buildings, but the skinnier one could have parking in the rear.

2. An infill house in an alley in Lower Lawrenceville. Location is here. I honestly really like the rendering - it's "simple" in a way you generally don't see in the infill townhouses. I also like that it includes no parking whatsoever. The overall footprint is tiny too - 330 feet per floor, meaning 990 feet in total. I wish we were seeing more "tiny-ish" houses like this in Pittsburgh.

3. This one is just a mystery to me - a new four-story mixed use building in the Hill District. This is the location. I think this is one of the small infill projects that the URA has greenlit for Centre Avenue.

Turning to September 15:


1. A new 8-unit residential building in Larimer. This seems to be adding to the existing veteran's housing project by putting an additional building here. There was a set of historic (albeit abandoned) rowhouses here as recently as 2019. Looks like rather than face Washington Boulevard the new building will have an entrance internal to the complex, which is probably for the best given the quasi-highway status of Washington Boulevard around there.

2. Four infill homes in Deutschtown. They would be located here - right around the black from Spring Hill Elementary. Design is bland and uninspired, but at least they are building a new road between them which will allow for rear parking pads, meaning no front-facing garages.

3. The residential conversion of 642 Fort Duquesne is going before the ZBA. Not a new project of course, but there's some new renderings of the planned rooftop lounge (or maybe penthouse unit) I hadn't seen before. Still not sure why they plan to keep the existing steel sign structure - it will just obstruct rooftop views.
Reply With Quote
     
     
  #5460  
Old Posted Aug 19, 2022, 6:27 PM
Don't Be That Guy Don't Be That Guy is offline
Registered User
 
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 299
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton View Post
Yeah, the basic attitude of the one member of the zoning board who is on all the online meetings is "zoning code says what it does, and you'll only get variances if you can show hardship, not just because you'd like them."

She's a real hardass, but I don't know if this says much about her own personal views. Unlike the Planning Commission a judge can easily overrule a ZBA positive ruling, meaning her role in the matter really is mostly to interpret what's already on the books.
I get the impression that both the ZBA and the Planning Commission have gotten significantly more hardass since going to virtual meetings. Something about not having to face an applicant has made the negative questions and opposition more apparent.
Reply With Quote
     
     
This discussion thread continues

Use the page links to the lower-right to go to the next page for additional posts
 
 
Reply

Go Back   SkyscraperPage Forum > Global Projects & Construction > City Compilations
Forum Jump


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 3:17 PM.

     
SkyscraperPage.com - Archive - Privacy Statement - Top

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.