Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl gave the Steelers the political equivalent of a tie game yesterday in their demands for a more comprehensive traffic study involving the North Shore casino.

In an interview, Mr. Ravenstahl said he supports a study of the casino's impact on game day traffic at Heinz Field but not on the same expedited timetable the Steelers are demanding.

Like city planners, the mayor said he does not believe there is enough time to complete such a study before the city planning commission votes on the casino master plan May 29.

But he added he would like to see a study of game day traffic completed before the casino opens in summer 2008. City planners want to wait until after it opens to du such a study of the casino, to be built near Carnegie Science Center and Heinz Field.

"I understand the concerns the Steelers would have with waiting until after the casino is open," Mr. Ravenstahl said. "I think it should be studied. Obviously you won't have as good of a feel for the impact until the actual traffic is there. But nevertheless, I think it is important to have a study completed prior to the facility opening."

Steelers President Art Rooney II said in an interview Thursday with the Post-Gazette that the team would consider a lawsuit if planning commission members approve the casino master plan without first studying the impact on events at Heinz Field.

To place the casino among sports venues and other attractions on the North Shore without studying event-day impacts is a "totally illogical approach," he said in a statement yesterday.

The Steelers not only want a study done but also specific measures identified and agreed to by PITG Gaming LLC, the casino operator, and the public sector to mitigate impacts before the master plan is approved.

Mr. Ravenstahl said a lawsuit would be a "concern," given the delays the city already has experienced in getting slot machine gambling up and running in Pittsburgh. A portion of that revenue, as much $17.7 million a year by 2009, will come back to city coffers.

He said the city would "do everything in our power to avoid" litigation, adding he still hopes to find a "happy medium" between the need to get the construction going and addressing the concerns of the Steelers, the Pirates, the Carnegie Science Center and others.

"At the end of the day, nobody's going to be 100 percent satisfied, but we're going to make sure that we balance the need for the construction as quickly as we can with the need for the proper design and issues the community is concerned with," he said.

City Transportation Planner Sidney Kaikai has said there isn't enough time at this point to do a comprehensive study of game day traffic if the casino is to stay on track for a summer 2008 opening.

The original casino traffic study contained some information relating to game days, and a revised study submitted recently had more. Mr. Kaikai said Wilbur Smith Associates, the city's traffic consultant, is comfortable with the data.

To address concerns, city planners hope to find ways, perhaps through signs and other measures, to separate casino traffic from Steelers traffic on game days and to better accommodate pedestrians, one of the concerns raised by the science center.

Such a plan likely will be a condition of the master plan approval. Mr. Kaikai said the peak times for casino traffic are Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights when the Steelers usually aren't playing. He added casino traffic also is more spaced out.

"It's a 24-hour operation. It's not as if you have 65,000 people going to the casino at the same time as you do on Steeler days," he said.

Mr. Ravenstahl said the city is relying on the expertise of its traffic consultant in navigating the traffic issues.

While there should be a "comfort level" with game day traffic prior to master plan approval, "to have an entire analysis done before planning commission approval may not be something that is feasible," he said.

PITG Gaming has pointed out that the Steelers and the Pirates got project development approvals from the planning commission for Heinz Field and PNC Park before traffic management plans were finished.

The mayor's call to have a game day study completed before the casino opens appears to be in the same vein.

"We have been saying that we simply want the same consideration the Steelers and the Pirates got with regard to traffic management plans related to their stadiums. We certainly would welcome a proposal that would be consistent with the spirit of that intention," PITG Gaming spokesman Bob Oltmanns said.