[UC] Re: Pittsburgh

[Anthony West]

Neil wrote: >  That is, Shadyside ( from the descriptions provided) is a neighborhood > with many private resources, few negatively-impacting outer forces (such as > massive absentee-ownership and encroachment by an expanding university), a > strong community base of home-owners, an ability to attract merchants and > chain stores, a stable population of long-term resident home-owners, > relatively few undergrad students (the "student ghetto" is NOT located > here), well-maintained houses that (from what I can gather) have largely > maintained their historical integrity and have not been plastered with > aluminum siding, etc..  The neighborhood is not a struggling needy one, on > the downswing, or lacking in stability.  Rather, it is doing quite well on > its own, thank-you-very-much, and is a "trendy" area. > > Does this sound like Spruce Hill?  I think not. Shadyside West is smack next to the large and expanding CMU and Pitt campuses. Plenty of students rent there and its "gentry" homeowners are increasingly affiliated to that academic/medical/research complex, the largest in the state outside University City. There is considerable admixture of "post-historical" construction in that area -- more so than Spruce Hill, I'd say. Spruce Hill, for its part, is hardly a "struggling needy one, on the downswing, and lacking in stability." Its housing market is popping -- current single-family prices are well above current Philadelphia averages -- and folks from other neighborhoods often tell me I live in a "trendy" neighborhood. I am a stable, long-term resident home-owner who walks all over this neighborhood, and I see precious little aluminum siding. Most of the changes I see are people striving to work in harmony with the character of their architecture. > From the descriptions provided, it seems like South Oakland (the "student > ghetto" area) is more comparable to us (though worse-off in many ways). > Largely rental and university-owned, dilapidated (partly because of > foundation problems in the houses), covered with aluminum - siding, a > sprinkling of home-owners.  It sounds like a nightmare vision of what > Spruce Hill could become. Oakland has little High Victoriana that I noticed when I lived there. It was designed for a lower socioeconomic class than either Spruce Hill or Shadyside West. On a continuum, I'd say Spruce Hill falls in between the two Pittsburgh neighborhoods cited. One thing that we share with both Pittsburgh neighborhoods is the inevitability of a large student and auxiliary staff population. Education is the growth industry of our age and it is the engine that now drives these communities. All our residents can't be chiefs; there've got to be Indians too. There are only four possible walking-distance residential neighborhoods available for non-affluent Penn/Drexel/USP/Science Ctr proles: Spruce Hill, Powelton Village, Cedar Park, and Rittenhouse Square. If these communities get into a "zoning war" to see who can weed out low-rent academics, Rittenhouse will always win. That leaves UC fated to provide them with affordable housing. That's tomorrow's history, whether we will it or no. -- Tony West