PITTSBURGH | Development Rundown II

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Found5dollar

Without being on the city's "historic buildings" list there is no way you can get those credits. Even if you were able to convince the Historic Review Commission to revisit their original decision and they ok'd it, then you wouldn't be able to cut the portals in the building because it would be protected from any sort of demolition.

I don't think either of those things is true as you put them.

The 20% tax credit is based on the building being a "certified historic structure" by the federal Department of the Interior. That in turn is true if the building is either individually on the National Register, or it is a contributing building to a registered Historic District. See pages 4-5 here:

http://www.nps.gov/tps/tax-incentive...tives-2012.pdf

It was for just this purpose that this portion of the Strip District was successfully registered as a Historic District--buildings like the Produce Terminal will now qualify for the 20% credit:

http://www.post-gazette.com/local/ci...s/201405290272

To my knowledge local designations have nothing to do with any of this. Rather, now Department of Interior guidelines will apply to whether a project qualifies for the credits, but those are pretty generous in the sense they are intended to give lots of leeway to creative re-use projects.

Even if the Produce Terminal does get local designation, that doesn't mean the portal plan would be impossible. The HRC would have to review such plans, but they have the authority to grant approval to significant exterior changes on a sort of balancing test.

If the main reason the produce terminal is important is because of it's length, I still don't understand how splitting it into 3 shorter buildings as opposed to reducing its overall length is any better. You preserve a longer building in Bunchers plan. You get three non-descript short buildings with the other 3 plans.

I don't think that is a fair characterization of what we saw in the Pfaffmann plan, and I suspect the other plans. With a smart approach to the portals, I think you can preserve the overall integrity of the building, and the result certainly does not have to be "non-descript".

[AaronPGH]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

That's why I like the proposals which have some of those elements--a big market at one end, and maybe retail around the portals--without dedicating all the intermediary square footage to that same use. That way, from a walking around perspective, it will still feel like a hub of activity and such, because all the most prominent contact points with the outside will be dedicated to such uses. But you won't be risking having way too much of it.

That said, if you can persuade me it is not in fact too big, then I could go for the single use plan.

I guess I'm most attracted to having all the retail pushed into one section so it can feed off itself rather than breaking it into small pieces and scattering it along the length. I think a compromise could be grouping it all in the center, at the main portal (18th street I think?), with residential (if we must) on the ends. At least then all of the pedestrian 'buzz' would be in a big giant clump, and you could develop some sort of grand plaza out front of it. I guess what I'm talking about would be what the Public Market was doing in that pspot, but on steroids and with a bigger budget.

[daviderik]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

I will add Dick's Last Resort to my list of reasons why I rarely set foot on the North Shore -- hate that name by the way... no such thing as a "shore" on the Allegheny. Not an estuary and nowhere near wide enough of a river to have a shore. I would like North Bank better... much more accurate and sounds chic, like gay Paris.

Good Point. Why do they have to make everything to please the masses? BTW I do all financial transactions at North Bank.

[AaronPGH]

Something with the polish and size of Grand Central Market in LA would be ideal, I think.

[DKNewYork]

Originally Posted by Found5dollar

Woah woah woah.

There is no way any of those strip produce terminal plans are happening. one has a 2 million dollar gap in financing, one will give the city no property tax revenue, and another is betting on 20% of its financing coming from historic tax credits. The building did not make it through the historic review process. Without being on the city's "historic buildings" list there is no way you can get those credits. Even if you were able to convince the Historic Review Commission to revisit their original decision and they ok'd it, then you wouldn't be able to cut the portals in the building because it would be protected from any sort of demolition.

There are only 2 outcomes for the produce terminal. Buncher gets it and knocks down the newer section of the building, or one of the other 3 developers gets it, is not able to get the financing, sits on the building for 5-10 years trying to figure out what to do, then sells it to Buncher who knocks the newer 1/3 of the building down and builds his original plan.

If the main reason the produce terminal is important is because of it's length, I still don't understand how splitting it into 3 shorter buildings as opposed to reducing its overall length is any better. You preserve a longer building in Bunchers plan. You get three non-descript short buildings with the other 3 plans.

As much as we want to think preservation is going to win in this one, it is going to come down to who can figure out how to finance the building. The only person with a solid plan is Buncher.

Given the mayor's opposition, I don't see how the Buncher proposal is anything but dead. And given that there are three credible (okay, two credible and one less-credible) alternatives on the table, I hope Buncher is out of the mix. Unless all this discussion makes Buncher see the light and rework its proposal...

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by AaronPGH

I guess I'm most attracted to having all the retail pushed into one section so it can feed off itself rather than breaking it into small pieces and scattering it along the length. I think a compromise could be grouping it all in the center, at the main portal (18th street I think?), with residential (if we must) on the ends. At least then all of the pedestrian 'buzz' would be in a big giant clump, and you could develop some sort of grand plaza out front of it. I guess what I'm talking about would be what the Public Market was doing in that pspot, but on steroids and with a bigger budget.

I'm definitely flexible on approach, but I am thinking we do both. One whole section is a dedicated retail/market thingy tied into an adjacent plaza, but then you also have "corner retail" at the remaining portal corners and end corners.

Again, I'm not insistent either way, but I do think adding the "corner retail" component would create an overall impression of the building more consistent with its historic use.

Incidentally, if it was me, the entire area around the Produce Terminal would be treated as one grand rectangular plaza:

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

hate that name by the way... no such thing as a "shore" on the Allegheny. Not an estuary and nowhere near wide enough of a river to have a shore. I would like North Bank better... much more accurate and sounds chic, like gay Paris.

As I understand it, the story is basically:

Allegheny City is annexed by the City, and in traditional imperialist fashion, it is renamed the North Side.

Decades later, the highways carve up the North Side. The portion on the river side of the highways, which had been pretty junky for a while, gets even junkier. The North Shore name for this area gradually emerges, and people in the rest of the North Side like it because they want to distinguish their area from the junkier North Shore.

In this context, it probably wasn't called "North Bank" because it was a wider section than really just the bank, and also because it in no particular way resembled Paris. "Side" was already taken, so through some combination of laziness and confusion over proper topographic terminology, they settle on "Shore".

Anyway, Three Rivers comes along, but it is still pretty junky otherwise. Now, though, lots more is happening, and in fact for all its unfulfilled potential, it is probably got more going on now than at any prior point in its history. So, it is worthy of a better name, except we are stuck with North Shore, a name for a junky, disconnected area that no one much liked at the time.

[eschaton]

I've never heard before that the western third of the Terminal was a newer addition. I can't see any "seams" in the building, nor is there any change in the (rather modest) detailing. I'd be curious to hear more about this history...

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by AaronPGH

Something with the polish and size of Grand Central Market in LA would be ideal, I think.

So it looks like that market is about 27,000 sqft:

http://brighamyen.com/2013/06/13/dow...-more-to-come/

Just because this is handy--it looks like what Pfaffmann called his East Market Hall would be right on target at about 33,000 sqft:

http://produceterminalmarketplace.fi...pt_page_03.jpg

Of course there are lots of other places you could carve out a market that size, although I do like it better on the eastern end just because I think an adjacent exterior market area in front of the church, where Smallman is widest, would be cool.

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by eschaton

I've never heard before that the western third of the Terminal was a newer addition. I can't see any "seams" in the building, nor is there any change in the (rather modest) detailing. I'd be curious to hear more about this history...

So take this with a grain of salt, but my understanding is there was in fact an extension added to the western end after it was first built in 1926. However, it was only a few years later, and my impression is more that the railroad was building out its terminal complex in phases, and this was just the last planned phase for the Produce Terminal. So, that would explain the lack of any discernable changes as you move from the first phase to the final phase.

Anyway, this image is apparently from 1928, which would potentially put it after the first construction but before the extension. And to my eye it does look a bit shorter, and specifically it appears to end a little farther from the bridge:

http://www.clpgh.org/exhibit/neighbo...strip_n73.html


The associated text also describes it as 1200 feet long, which would be about 300 feet short of its current length. Just eyeballing it, that seems about right given the apparent gap between the end as of 1928 and the bridge.

However, I might note the Buncher plan would have taken something like 530 feet off its length. So wherever the extension might have started, I think that plan was taking way more off than that.

Edit: By the way, I do have a guess about where the extension (approximately) starts. It might be here, right next to where the Public Market sign used to be:

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.4500...4LBSRpir3w!2e0

That's more or less right at 300 feet from the end, and that is the one section along the entire length lacking the full row of transom windows.

[DKNewYork]

The PG just added this PDF to its Terminal article. It's from the URA and has nice summaries of the pros and cons of the four proposals.

http://www.documentcloud.org/documen...l#document/p18

[Urbana]

Originally Posted by AaronPGH

Something with the polish and size of Grand Central Market in LA would be ideal, I think.

I find it really hard to believe that Pittsburgh could support a market of that size. It is simply a numbers game. Pittsburgh Public Market has been struggling for years - and what has been proposed so far for the terminal has nearly the exact same concept. I see no reason to believe that then outcome will be much different.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

So take this with a grain of salt, but my understanding is there was in fact an extension added to the western end after it was first built in 1926. However, it was only a few years later, and my impression is more that the railroad was building out its terminal complex in phases, and this was just the last planned phase for the Produce Terminal. So, that would explain the lack of any discernable changes as you move from the first phase to the final phase.

Anyway, this image is apparently from 1928, which would potentially put it after the first construction but before the extension. And to my eye it does look a bit shorter, and specifically it appears to end a little farther from the bridge:

http://www.clpgh.org/exhibit/neighbo...strip_n73.html


The associated text also describes it as 1200 feet long, which would be about 300 feet short of its current length. Just eyeballing it, that seems about right given the apparent gap between the end as of 1928 and the bridge.

However, I might note the Buncher plan would have taken something like 530 feet off its length. So wherever the extension might have started, I think that plan was taking way more off than that.

Edit: By the way, I do have a guess about where the extension (approximately) starts. It might be here, right next to where the Public Market sign used to be:

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.4500...4LBSRpir3w!2e0

That's more or less right at 300 feet from the end, and that is the one section along the entire length lacking the full row of transom windows.

That was pretty much the only place I thought I could discern a change as well, but I dismissed it because it was in the middle of a block, and I presumed (from what the earlier poster said) that the natural break should have aligned with 17th Street.

[AaronPGH]

Originally Posted by Urbana

I find it really hard to believe that Pittsburgh could support a market of that size. It is simply a numbers game. Pittsburgh Public Market has been struggling for years - and what has been proposed so far for the terminal has nearly the exact same concept. I see no reason to believe that then outcome will be much different.

That picture I used isn't the greatest representation of the LA version because it's just showing produce. The reality of the LA market is that every other stall is a mini-restaurant or something else – not necessarily just a food market. Tacos, Delis, Breakfast counters with bar stools, etc. They mix it up very well. The scale felt right for PGH when I went through it. I'm not talking about 30k square feet of 'grocery store'.

[Gilamonster]

I can see the hot topic of discussion on here recently is the produce terminal and the Strip and I am not trying to change the subject but now that the new PNC tower is essentially topped out, I was curious to solicit some opinions on what people think the chances are of Pittsburgh someday fairly soon getting a new all-residential building of 30+ stories. I tend to doubt it, but maybe someone here can convince me otherwise because I would love to see it happen. A big factor to consider is this: Is Pittsburgh's population gain linear or or exponential? Lots of conversions and small sized new construction keep happening and getting filled and for sure there is a finite amount of space upon which to build on, but I think that is still a large amount of space. With the residential plans for the Strip and the old Civic Arena site, there will be plenty of units to buy/lease in the next 3 to 5 years. The Strip plans don't include much height at all and while I think many of us agree that the old arena site would be a great place for some taller residential, I really don't see the Penguins building anything over 5 stories there, commercial or residential. They have a ton of space that they have to use and because they have to keep building yearly per their agreement with the city, I think they will make sure that what is built has sufficient demand so that they can recoup their building costs.

[acenturi]

Originally Posted by AaronPGH

That picture I used isn't the greatest representation of the LA version because it's just showing produce. The reality of the LA market is that every other stall is a mini-restaurant or something else – not necessarily just a food market. Tacos, Delis, Breakfast counters with bar stools, etc. They mix it up very well. The scale felt right for PGH when I went through it. I'm not talking about 30k square feet of 'grocery store'.

Here's a better representation of that concept:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reading...nter_court.jpg

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by BrianTH

I think I may see steel piling up on the Gardens site

Yep!



Exciting!

[George Woods]

Finally

[Private Dick]

Originally Posted by Evergrey

You're not interested in contrived irreverence accompanied by large portions of 'basic American fare'?

No, I'm definitely not interested in that! But I guess I should reconsider... because I do love smart-assed servers and silly hats.

[Brentsters]

New Oxford tower website. New plan.

http://www.3505thpittsburgh.com/

I don't like losing that building and solid intersection for 20 stories.