While other cities' leaders are using one r-word -- recession -- to explain canceled projects and construction slowdowns, Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl dares to use another one to describe what he sees: renaissance.

He invoked that hallowed term at a Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership meeting last month, and didn't hesitate to expound upon it last week, even as observers and political rivals voiced doubts.

"I firmly believe that despite the economic conditions in surrounding areas and cities, the numbers and the facts are that Pittsburgh is growing in a lot of areas, we are rebuilding the city, and we are on the brink of a third renaissance," he said.

The mayor -- who faces Democratic primary challengers -- argues that Pittsburgh is riding a gentle wave amid otherwise stormy seas, and the coming federal stimulus package "is going to mean that we are going to be able to sustain it."

Outside experts said Pittsburgh has fared better than many other cities, but warned that the future is hard to predict.

"The problems in residential mortgages have definitely started to spread into commercial mortgages," said James Haughey, chief economist with Reed Construction Data, which sells information to construction firms and analyzed comparable cities' performance for the Post-Gazette. "There's not enough money to go around."

The credit crunch is evident on many skylines.

David Feehan, president of the International Downtown Association, said Las Vegas and Miami "have 20- and 30-story major towers Downtown that have never opened" because no one can get mortgages for the condos. He cited a developer in Columbia, S.C., who sold 25 percent of the condos in a complex only to have the bank pull the plug.

"I think Pittsburgh's relatively conservative pace has served it well now, and it's perhaps well positioned," he said.

A few local projects have stalled. A proposed $230 million hotel-retail-condo project that developer DOC-Economou proposed for the Don Allen Auto City site in Bloomfield, for instance, appears to be comatose, its diagnosis and prognosis disputed.

"Hotel financing nationally started to change pretty considerably," explained Rob Stephany, executive director of the Urban Redevelopment Authority. The site will be developed eventually, he said, but it "just will not be the [project] that everybody was working on for 18 months."

"The project is not dead. It was put on hold, due to a lack of consensus in the community," said Paul O'Rourke, a spokesman for DOC-Economou. "They're still in business, and still interested in developing in this market."

For every quiet site, Mr. Ravenstahl can point to several buzzing ones, from the Rivers Casino to the Consol Energy Center to housing, retail and office projects in East Liberty, the South Side and Downtown.

The construction unions are at "between 95 and probably 110 percent employment," said Rich Stanizzo, business manager of the Building Trades Council. "They're bringing in guys from throughout the Tri-State area" and as far away as Michigan.

The city logged nearly $991 million in building permits last year, which is double the 2006 level. That number was inflated by the casino work, which will end this year.

Still, the city's growth drove the metro area's relatively strong construction market. While the Baltimore, Cincinnati and Cleveland metro areas saw construction drop steadily from 2006 to 2008, the Pittsburgh region saw a jump in 2007, followed by just a modest pull-back, according to Reed Construction Data.

"In general, across the whole country, construction activity has dipped back," said Mr. Haughey. "Activity in Pittsburgh seems to have steadily grown."

Philadelphia developer Jack Benoff, of Solara Ventures, said he's now "100 percent focused on Pittsburgh." His condo tower at 941 Penn Ave. is fully sold and paid off, and he's pre-sold 40 percent of the coming 56 condos at the Otto Milk Building in the Strip District.

Mr. Ravenstahl's 10-year tax abatement on new housing Downtown and in 26 distressed neighborhoods "is huge," said Kathy Wallace, Solara's vice president of development. It shaves as much as $6,100 a year from a condo's tax bill. Enough buyers have put down hand money that construction is set to start April 1.

Still, Solara hasn't yet lined up all of the financing needed to finish the Otto Milk Building, Mr. Benoff said.

"I am worried that there is a credit crunch in Pittsburgh, because Pittsburgh banks are very, very, very conservative," he said. "I had a lot of trouble getting anybody to lend to me on 941 [Penn]," and had to "scurry" to borrow from Johnstown-based AmeriServ Financial when a local bank yanked a loan.

The URA views the region's banks -- notably Dollar Bank, PNC Financial Services and Citizens Bank -- as big reasons for the construction market's stability.

"We are a city of financial industry that understands the underlying value of the asset, that understands the creditworthiness of the borrower," said Mr. Stephany.

Deals that rely on outside money, though, are in trouble, he said. "Anything being underwritten out of town, I would say, probably doesn't end well."

The pullback is pronounced for what Mr, Stephany called "quirky investments," like hotels, condos and anything involving tax credits.

The value of a tax credit, which a developer gets from the state or federal government and then sells, has plunged by one-third in the past year, experts agreed.

PNC is continuing to buy tax credits that back diverse deals like the 60-apartment Century Building, Downtown, and the Garfield Heights public housing development. Nationally, though, it's having a tough time marketing tax credits to other investors, said Peter Kaplan, vice president of acquisitions for PNC MultiFamily Capital.

That "makes deals less feasible," he said, but PNC plans to keep doing them when they make "an attractive return" and boost communities.

What's to keep the pullback from worsening, and erasing a drawing board of projects that range from a Target store in East Liberty to housing in Ridgemont to a retirement facility at the old South Hills High School? The administration hopes the stimulus package will see to that.

The $787 billion federal package should give Pittsburgh a $6 million to $10 million boost in funding for low-income community development, plus money for lots of roadwork.

"I see $70, $80 million in Pittsburgh alone on road, tunnel and enhancement projects enabled by the one, first pot of money from the recovery package," said city Chief of Staff Yarone Zober.

Mr. Haughey, the Reed Construction Data economist, said the stimulus won't immediately affect commercial construction, but added that Pittsburgh appears to have more "shovel-ready" improvements than similar cities because its project pipeline has flowed consistently.

It's unclear when or how any renaissance will affect the city's tax revenue and population.

The city expects less than 1 percent annual growth in its property tax receipts, in part because county assessment policy keeps it from fully cashing in on rising values. And the city's population continues to dip, from 334,563 in 2000 to 311,218 last year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's most recent estimates.

"A renaissance in my mind means that there is more vibrant business activity than previously, and that population is increasing," said city Councilman Patrick Dowd, a Democratic mayoral challenger.

He called Mr. Ravenstahl's development strategy "decentralized, scattered, and a lot of it is driven by developers. ... They take what comes along rather than trying to create."

Mr. Dowd said he would revamp the City Planning Department and craft a citywide development plan.

"It shouldn't be just lofts in the Strip District and where the Penguins are building," said Carmen Robinson, a Hill District attorney who also is running for mayor. She said any renaissance hasn't hit Lincoln-Lemington, Homewood, Brookline or Carrick, and vowed to back community benefits agreements guaranteeing jobs and investments to neighborhoods in which subsidized developments sit.

Mr. Ravenstahl argues that he is working strategically, using data to determine whether new homes, green space, business district investments or public safety efforts would help a given neighborhood most. The administration is also about to seek a consultant to help five as-yet-unpicked, troubled communities to find paths to stability.

Last year he asked consultants for concepts for stimulating development along the Allegheny River, and was surprised to get 24 responses. The URA will choose one soon.

A decade ago, Mayor Tom Murphy and Allegheny County commissioners Mike Dawida and Bob Cranmer declared a third renaissance, driven by the then-emerging stadiums and David L. Lawrence Convention Center. Mr. Ravenstahl's people aren't counting that one, instead measuring their work against the 1950s clearance of the Point State Park area and the Downtown building boom that started in the late 1970s.