Will the Aerotropolis/airport trend pass up PIT? (Philadelphia, Pittsburgh: real estate, condos)

[MathmanMathman]

Heard an interesting video of a lecture at Georgia State University.

Speaker Series Live Stream: Dr. John Kasarda - Strategic Plan

The lecture is 1 hour 15 minutes so you'll have to find a block of time to view it.

The idea is that the waves of development progression are
Seaports (18 century and earlier)
Riverports/Canals (18th and 19th century)
Railroads (19th century)
Highways (20th century)
Airports (21st century)

The idea being that urban development will form around airports as it did at seaports, rivers/canals, railroads, and highways. Pittsburgh being built during the "second wave", rivers. Atlanta was third and fouth waves i.e railroads and highways. And Atlanta being the busiest airport is supposedly poised for the fifth wave being the Aerotropolis. I'm not sure I buy it but the lecture is above for what it's worth.

But if the Aerotropolis is the future, it looks as if it might pass Pittsburgh by as PIT is not a major "router" point as Dr Kasarda likes to use the internet metaphor. The Aerotropolis will be a new form of central business district for cities. And Pittsburgh's airport doesn't have good regional connectivity to highways and rail and to what extent can the area around the airport support development at least on the scale Dr Kasarda envisions. In other words, Kasarda sees the airport as a multimodal hub of air and land transportation with development clustering around it as companies want quick access to customers as they come into the airport.

I guess he might be right so long as air travel remains common and relatively cheap. But as of now it is highly dependent on the abundance of fossil fuels. Cars and trains can go electric. Even ships can go nuclear if necessary. Or we can conserve the fossil fuels for the airplanes? Doubt we'd be that smart.

Unfortunately he hints at but doesn't mention the Aerotropolis failures. I suppose Schiphol airport is the best available model?

[pman]

the idea of an aerotropolis is decidedly 20th century. the term dates to 1939, later (in the 50's) modernist planner Ed Bacon believed them to be the future international city. air travel is undoubtedly important but the idea that goods and services will be delivered that way is dubious at this point. air travel remains an extremely expensive way to deliver goods and without a major change in jet technology, that may remain. it seems to me that a successful city will incorporate seaports (provided they're on or near the ocean), maybe a riverport (canals really are obsolete), railroads, highways, and airports.
we may have already seen the peak of far flung supply chains which are proving to be problematic. boeing's woes with it's dreamliner are related to its inability to control its supply chain. when cars were made in detroit your supplier was across town, today they're all over the world and it's become a logistical nightmares. building houses requires advance planning since there are few producers left, therefore projects take longer. now people talk about "insourcing."

[globalburgh]

I hope the trend does pass up Pittsburgh. Reads like another real estate boondoggle.

[PITairport]

"Aerotropolis" may be a newly popular industry catchphrase, but if the idea is to integrate logistics, intermodal, corporate headquarters, and other industry in the immediate area surrounding airports... well that's been going on for decades. Just look at DFW, ATL, and many others. But there is one thing those cities have in common - they are large, established high growth business centers.

Trying to make an aerotropolis out of nothing on the other hand is a harder sell. This is a very interesting read:

Airfields of Dreams by Steven Malanga, City Journal Autumn 2012

Will the Aerotropolis Fly?
From St. Louis to Detroit to Memphis to Denver, the idea of the “aerotropolis” has become increasingly fashionable. As John Kasarda, a professor at the University of North Carolina’s business school, defines it, the futuristic term describes a city that has grown around an airport, providing residents and businesses with super-quick access to global networks of commerce and travel.Moderator cut: quote shortened, please read the tos

As far as PIT, one could argue it already is part of an aerotropolis, considering some of the office parks in the immediate area which house major corporate facilities for FedEx Ground, Dick's Sporting Goods, Bayer and others. But there is a definite lack of passenger, cargo, and other logistics activity at PIT to make it a complete aerotropolis.

MathmanMathman mentioned PIT doesn't have good connectivity to highways. I agree that Pittsburgh in general has awful highways, but they are actually pretty good around PIT. In fact, PIT has it's own beltway surrounding airport land, something that is pretty unique (other than the light at University Blvd, which will eventually be taken out).

The subject was studied for PIT, here is the report:
http://www.cmu.edu/rci/images/projec...n_11092011.pdf

[SteelCityRising]

Perhaps I'm just paranoid, but the idea of densely populating areas in a radius immediately adjacent to airports just sounds like a very bad idea from a safety standpoint. Pilots will have a more limited margin for error when trying to land, and if a plane overshoots a runway it will slam into office buildings and condos instead of just an empty field. I know flying is only continuing to become progressively safer on an annual basis, but the thought of being incinerated in my sleep if a plane suffered a malfunction while tring to take off and instead stayed level and hit my residential neighborhood isn't a pleasant one.

[SammyKhalifa]

Originally Posted by MathmanMathman

Heard an interesting video of a lecture at Georgia State University.

Speaker Series Live Stream: Dr. John Kasarda - Strategic Plan

The lecture is 1 hour 15 minutes so you'll have to find a block of time to view it.

The idea is that the waves of development progression are
Seaports (18 century and earlier)
Riverports/Canals (18th and 19th century)
Railroads (19th century)
Highways (20th century)
Airports (21st century)

The idea being that urban development will form around airports as it did at seaports, rivers/canals, railroads, and highways. Pittsburgh being built during the "second wave", rivers. Atlanta was third and fouth waves i.e railroads and highways. And Atlanta being the busiest airport is supposedly poised for the fifth wave being the Aerotropolis. I'm not sure I buy it but the lecture is above for what it's worth.

But if the Aerotropolis is the future, it looks as if it might pass Pittsburgh by as PIT is not a major "router" point as Dr Kasarda likes to use the internet metaphor. The Aerotropolis will be a new form of central business district for cities. And Pittsburgh's airport doesn't have good regional connectivity to highways and rail and to what extent can the area around the airport support development at least on the scale Dr Kasarda envisions. In other words, Kasarda sees the airport as a multimodal hub of air and land transportation with development clustering around it as companies want quick access to customers as they come into the airport.

I guess he might be right so long as air travel remains common and relatively cheap. But as of now it is highly dependent on the abundance of fossil fuels. Cars and trains can go electric. Even ships can go nuclear if necessary. Or we can conserve the fossil fuels for the airplanes? Doubt we'd be that smart.

Unfortunately he hints at but doesn't mention the Aerotropolis failures. I suppose Schiphol airport is the best available model?

I don't know. You can just plop an airport down wherever you want, and that would typically be where there was already a seaport/river city/etc.

[Johnland]

Originally Posted by SteelCityRising

Perhaps I'm just paranoid, but the idea of densely populating areas in a radius immediately adjacent to airports just sounds like a very bad idea from a safety standpoint. Pilots will have a more limited margin for error when trying to land, and if a plane overshoots a runway it will slam into office buildings and condos instead of just an empty field. I know flying is only continuing to become progressively safer on an annual basis, but the thought of being incinerated in my sleep if a plane suffered a malfunction while tring to take off and instead stayed level and hit my residential neighborhood isn't a pleasant one.

The Tampa airport is located in the Westshore business district, which is actually larger than downtown. I personally love the convenient, close-in location. I can get there in about 10 minutes from South Tampa. The location has been a boon to Tampa.

[pman]

Originally Posted by Johnland

The Tampa airport is located in the Westshore business district, which is actually larger than downtown. I personally love the convenient, close-in location. I can get there in about 10 minutes from South Tampa. The location has been a boon to Tampa.

So did you move to tampa because of its airport?

[mattejb]

I think Pittsburgh would be better off getting high speed rail to Philadelphia and Chicago, also focus its energy on a better public transit system.

[escilade18]

Originally Posted by mattejb

I think Pittsburgh would be better off getting high speed rail to Philadelphia and Chicago, also focus its energy on a better public transit system.

I agree, I am thinking that HSR is going to become more relevant in the future as air travel becomes more costly and as regulations become more and more invasive (at the rate things are going, I am waiting to be asked to provide a blood sample to the TSA). Air travel will become more prominent for international travel for obvious reasons and possibly for cross country travel, but someone traveling for business from NYC or Chicago to Pittsburgh will increasingly have incentive to use HSR if it were to become available.