[eschaton]

Thanks to BrianTH and bmust71 for sharing these. It makes both projects much more comprehensible.

The Shakespeare Street redevelopment looks fine. I'd honestly want a bit more there, but I do realize with the Village of Shadyside NIMBYs right next door, it will be a battle getting anything through. At least the garage will be hidden from virtually all angles, and the layout seems to leave open the possibility for future upgrades if it becomes more politically palatable.

The Lower Hill presentation answers a question about why the unit count seemed rather low. The 7-acre superblock the development is going in on is actually being split into two different blocks for the purposes of development, with only the part closer to downtown being built out for now (the "back tier" of buildings in the shot we saw earlier was just theoretical). 288 units on 3.5 acres is a reasonable density, though the tower still seems to have an strangely low unit count to me, though it seems like that building has more 1/2 bedrooms and less studios/micros (probably few of the affordable apartments as well I'm guessing).

It's hard to tell exactly what's going on with the entertainment complex/garage (the two renderings don't seem to have anything to do with it), but it appears the parking is almost entirely subterranean, with the above-ground building largely a multi-story open space for concerts, along with some retail and commercial space. A cinema lobby is shown, though there's no other information about this.