Quote:
Originally Posted by BrianTH
Yeah, I am not necessarily promoting 5637 Forbes as a model of good urban land-use policy, just noting the implications of projects like that for the density of the relevant neighborhoods and the City in general.
But to address that issue a second--I agree the issues identified with this project are serious ones. On the other hand, a number of people have started pointing out that various barriers to density-increasing projects in well-established, well-located, walkable urban neighborhoods with good public transit are creating a range of problems, basically because people who would otherwise like to live in those neighborhoods are being crowded out by high prices, which in turn has a host of ill effects.
Now in Pittsburgh, at least, there is no fundamental reason as yet why we should have to tear down structures like those SFHs along Forbes to address this problem, because we do indeed have a lot of centrally-located land available for non-destructive residential infill (elimination of surface parking lots, of course, not counting as destruction). On the other hand, we're not in full local control of all the relevant policy areas--for example, providing adequate locational substitutes for Forbes Avenue in Squirrel Hill would require providing reasonably good public transit service (the Forbes Avenue buses have issues, but that is still a lot of service overall). And, unfortunately, rather than facilitating such smart expansions of the local public transit network, the state is instead in the process of trying to dismantle large portions of the existing local transit network.
So in an ideal world--or at least a better world--we'd either gain more local control over these related policy areas, or more rational folks would gain the upper-hand at higher levels of government. But if that doesn't happen, we're going to be forced into some very tough choices about land use (choices which, in the better world, we wouldn't have to make).
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Right, I understood your position -- just took your mentioning of the Forbes development as an opportunity to bring the issue up.
The good points you make display to me how frustrating a project like this Terradime one on Forbes is. It only seems that this developer wanted to put high-end condos with a highly-questionable "green" designation in a "North of Forbes" Squirrel Hill location (that designation is laughable anyway, but that's another issue) to justify the asking prices.
And the city gives the developer carte blanche because they'll take any construction they can get, even though proper planning for the neighborhood (to say nothing of historical preservation of a significant chunk of one of the original blocks of Squirrel Hill) would say "wait a minute, let's take a look at what we're approving here... this guy wants to knock down original homes that are in very good structural shape to build a 5-story luxury condominium wedged in between single-family homes... and there's a surface lot directly across the street... and we've been trying for years now to revitalize Murray Ave but have failed miserably in every attempt we've made to attract a solid developer... neighborhood grass-roots efforts have been pushing for Murray Ave redevelopment especially lower Murray where there is direct access to the Parkway... bus service along Murray is the same as on Forbes -- very good... we have vacant and decaying properties and an empty lot on Murray... hmm, maybe we should take a look at how a project like this could be incorporated somewhere else?"
But luxury condos on Forbes won out... and now it seems that they are going to be rentals anyway? Utter failure.