Why is Lincoln Place so cheap? (Pittsburgh, West Mifflin: waterpark, homes, school district)

[columbusmom]

Does anyone here live there? My husband and I are relocating to Pittsburgh with our 2 kids and the homes in Lincoln Place are so cheap! Nothing that I've read suggests that it's a bad area to live in, so I wonder what's up. Anyone know? Thanks!

[Pitt Chick]

Mainly because Lincoln Place is Pittsburgh City schools; the areas around Lincoln Place feed into Steel Valley or West Mifflin.

[Chichappens]

Maybe you should phycially take a trip with your husband during the day and nite and get a feel for the hood.

[Brookline_sylvia]

The city schools may be part of the reason, but they get a bad rep from suburbanites. LP has its own elementary school. I'm not sure where the middle school is - I used to live in Lincoln Place as a kid, and it was Gladstone at the time, but that's been closed. The HS is Taylor Allderdice in Squirrel Hill. I went to St. Agnes in West Mifflin for most of grade school, and then moved to WM for high school.

Lincoln Place has a suburban feel because many of the homes have driveways/garages, and decent sized yards. Most of the homes are also in good shape, although as in most parts of the city some are better maintained than others.

For someone like myself, who has no children and will have none, the school district isn't as important (except maybe for future property value). I wouldn't live in LP because the commute to where I work, downtown Pittsburgh, would take too long. I live in Brookline now and leave every morning at 7:30 and arrive by 7:50 every time. LP is so far away from downtown that anyone coming from there would probably be in the car at least twice as long. That's my guess anyway, based on the route that someone would have to take from there.

[raubre]

I used to live in Lincoln Place. It was a nice suburban setting in the city, but if you are looking for more of a city feel, then LP isn't really for you, which is one of the reasons why I don't live there anymore. The other reason being I had family there and they moved out of the county.

[Hopes]

I suspect property is cheaper because of the surrounding areas are less than appealing.

If that doesn't bother you, Lincoln Place is an affordable area that is safe and feeds into Taylor Allderdice High School, which is one of the better city high schools.

[columbusmom]

Thanks for the replies! We'll definitely be driving down to check it out. Hopes, which of the surrounding areas would be less than appealing, and for what reasons? The school system doesn't bother me so much because we'll be doing either magnet or private schools. And although it's far from downtown, it's not far from everything, right? I mean there should be shopping and restaurants and libraries nearby I would think. Thanks again for all the info!

[Mugatu]

Originally Posted by columbusmom

Thanks for the replies! We'll definitely be driving down to check it out. Hopes, which of the surrounding areas would be less than appealing, and for what reasons? The school system doesn't bother me so much because we'll be doing either magnet or private schools. And although it's far from downtown, it's not far from everything, right? I mean there should be shopping and restaurants and libraries nearby I would think. Thanks again for all the info!

Plenty of shopping and restaurants nearby in West Mifflin & Pleasant Hills, and you'd be near the Waterfront as well.

[Hopes]

Originally Posted by columbusmom

Hopes, which of the surrounding areas would be less than appealing, and for what reasons?

The surrounding areas are depressed due to the crash of the steel industry decades. For instance, The Waterfront (a large shopping area) and Sandcastle Waterpark is built on old steel mill sites. The Waterfront development should have helped revive the area, but IMO it was done wrong. They separated the Waterfront from the Homestead main street by not developing more father towards main street to tie it together. Instead, they built a barrier by dumping a mound of earth and planting trees---almost as if to hide the ugly eyesore of Homestead from Waterworks shoppers. If they had tied the Waterfront development to Homestead's main street, the cheap storefront property on Homestead's main street would have been snatched up by small business owners, and IMO the area could have revived and thrived. In a nutshell, the answer to your question is poverty.

Originally Posted by columbusmom

And although it's far from downtown, it's not far from everything, right? I mean there should be shopping and restaurants and libraries nearby I would think. Thanks again for all the info!

Trust me, downtown isn't were people go to shop in Pittsburgh! There's tons of shopping around. Aside from the areas already mentioned by Mugatu, it's very conventient to Squirell Hill and Southside, both approximately 15 minutes away.

[Mugatu]

And by "The Waterworks", Hopes actually means "The Waterfront".

The Waterworks shopping complex is north of the city. The Waterfront is in Homestead.