In Pittsburgh there are at least 4 major projects currently going on:
- Nine Mile Run in the east end - formerly Duquesne Slag – an old slag dump on which were stored byproducts of steel-making operations - a complex system of land, water and historic socio-political inequities. Here there were multi-million yards of slag and a stream of municipal wastewater directed to it since the turn of the century.
Now called Summerset at Frick Park, it is currently undergoing extensive grading and infrastructure work in preparation for the construction of 500 units of upscale housing. 100 acres of open space is to become the Frick Park Extension. Such a project has little chance of becoming an eventual NIMBY.
- The ex-Hays Army ammunition plant – now the GalTech Metal Procession Company
- Washington's Landing – a mixed-use project
- The ex-LTV steel site – today the Southeast Works Project
The Southeast Works Project (SSW), managed by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) of Pittsburgh is typical of a complicated multi-discipline project. The site was once home to the LTV Coke Facility and Steam Plants. In 1988 LTV ceased operations and began demolishing its facilities. Since then the lot lay empty, an unfriendly neighbor to its vicinity. The URA having completed a phase one assessment performed by Civil and Environmental Consultants (CEC) of Pittsburgh, bought the lot in late 1993 for $9.3 million (a figure arrived at by Hospitality Suites, a firm which had had a prior deal with LTV and had wanted to develop a casino on the site – an idea that fell through).
“There is great support to redevelop these areas in Pittsburgh,” says Gerald Williams, project manager of the Southeast Works Project, a 110-acre site being developed as a 2.8 Msf mixed use project with over a mile of waterfront access and frontage on the Monogahela River. The total development costs are estimated at $400 million, with $100 million for public and $300 million for private development.
Replying to a question about responsibility, should any traces of contamination be discovered in any phase of development, Williams said, “We are responsible for the costs. The entrepreneurs perform any work and submit invoices. CEC is involved in watching things.”
When completed, this major SSW site will have 450 multi-family and 50 townhouse residential units, 400,000 sf entertainment and retail space, 135,000 sf of offices, a hotel of 130 rooms on an area of 70,000 sf, a cinema/restaurant covering 100,000 sf, a research and development and corporate office of 1,470,000 sf and 5 acres of a new waterfront park. Some 6,850 parking places are envisioned to be constructed on the site. The URA has also focused on infrastructure enhancements and on accelerating traffic and access improvements on the site to increase development interest in the property. Thus, Moncon Bridge, a former railroad bridge, was converted to a two-lane vehicular bridge connecting the site to downtown. Planned, also, is the widening of East Carson Street from 2 lanes to 5, at an estimated cost of $9 million, which, together with other internal infrastructure enhancements, will be borne by proposed development.
Already completed projects include, in the public sector, the Hot Metal Bridge; the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC); the Life Sciences Center exterior, with fundraising under way to complete the interior (here will be the McGowan Center for the development of artificial organs), and the $18 million regional headquarters of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW). Under construction is a $20 million facility to house the regional offices of the FBI, with its opening planned for the fall of this year, and the $14.5 million Soffer office building.
A UPMC 16-acre Sports Performance Center at an estimated cost of $30 million, will have four outdoor fields, a 125,00 sf training center for the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Pittsburgh Panthers, and a jointly shared 90,000 sf indoor field and track. The complex had to be filled and raised above the 100-year floodzone; simultaneously, a new 3,500 lineal feet public roadway was built to serve the project.
