Uptown neighborhood tries to reassert identity
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Residents of the city's Uptown neighborhood have scrambled to action in recent months in reaction to a zoning threat that's a harbinger of things to come: The once isolated strip is now in the sights of Oakland and Downtown as both look for space to grow.
Lake Fong, Post-GazetteUptown resident Renee Aldrich, left and Jeanne McNutt, of Uptown Community Action, are among those working to strength the neighborhood.
Click photo for larger image.
Map: Pittsburgh's Uptown neighborhood
After successfully opposing landowner Sal Williams' effort last month to expand four lots into a park-n-ride for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, the reinvigorated Uptown Community Action Group is working to change the neighborhood's drive-thru reputation.
The neighborhood, also known as the Bluff, extends from the Birmingham Bridge to the Crosstown Expressway and from the Boulevard of the Allies to Fifth Avenue. Businesses, vacant properties and institutions dominate its public face. All but about 900 of its residents live at the Allegheny County Jail and Duquesne University, according to Chris Briem at the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Social and Urban Research. Of 137 households, all but 50 are childless.
Not waiting for the overreach of adjacent neighborhoods, Duquesne University is developing a blighted property at Forbes Avenue and Chatham Street into a 123,000-square-foot, mixed-use building for a Barnes and Noble bookstore and Starbucks coffee shop, with a recreation center and ballroom upstairs and a bridge connecting it to the top of the parking garage on the other side of Forbes, said Steve Schillo, vice president for management and business.
The university is also working with the Hill House Association to attract state status as an "innovation zone," which would bring tax incentives to technology-based enterprises that locate Uptown and in the Hill. He said the university also is considering creating a business incubator Uptown.
Meanwhile, Uptown Community Action, in three committees, is turning its attentions to building a stronger voice, developing housing and cleaning and greening the neighborhood.
Jeanne McNutt pulled the group out of dormancy after its former head, Tonya Payne, graduated to City Council in the last election. Still a resident of Oakland, Ms. McNutt and her husband, Dale, plan to move into the old Elks club they have renovated for their Soho Inventions design studio on Fifth Avenue as soon as their living space is completed.
Former city planner Maureen Hogan calls the resurgence of the Uptown Community Action part of "a huge, wonderful convergence going on right now. The neighborhood is getting really enthused about what it can do." The Uptown group hired Ms. Hogan and architect Karen Brean last year to help it formulate a community plan.
"It takes a long time for some neighborhoods to tip for the worst, and it's the same when you're revitalizing. Uptown is coming into a remarkable time, but you have to be full of heart for this work. I've told this group to start counting small successes and keep your eye on the big vision," Ms. Hogan said.
David Blenk, executive director of Oakland Planning and Development Corp., has brought his agency's experience to Uptown with joint housing plans.
"They're on the right track," he said, "but they need to prepare for the pressures that are acting on them right now." He cited a new Penguins arena, proposals for slots gambling, Downtown's potential to grow toward Oakland, and vice versa, and the growth of Duquesne University and Mercy Hospital along the Forbes Avenue corridor.
Mr. Williams, of Carnegie, owns at least 50 properties Uptown, many of them vacant lots and vacant buildings. He would entertain no questions about his plans, saying, "I have no comment about anything," but he is in a good position if investment works its way into Uptown. Most of his properties lie along Fifth Avenue, the main thoroughfare.
The neighborhood group opposed the parking and shuttle plan saying it would use the neighborhood without giving back to it, several members said. Benjamin Singer of the city zoning office said Mr. Williams withdrew all four applications before the zoning board even made a decision. "There were copious amounts of neighborhood opposition," Mr. Singer said.
Whatever happens next, said Ms. McNutt, "we hope he [Mr. Williams] wants to work with us. We want to work with him."
Renee Aldrich said it's a scary time, with developers scrutinizing opportunities where residents have felt powerless for so long. The turnout for the zoning hearing, she said, "speaks volumes to the process. A lot of people who have been here a long time have gone unnoticed."
A native of the part of Uptown known as Soho, she returned in 1989 after 17 years away and became discouraged. "But I thought, 'Are there some answers we could put our hands on? If I could be part of a collective, we could.' "
First Published February 2, 2006 12:00 am
