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Me. I'm planning to for many of the reasons you state. I currently spend close to $30k a year on rent here in CA. Buying a home and spending half that or less on property taxes seems good to me.
I'd take another look, Julie. Coming from California, you should really know this:
As someone who recently moved from Louisville to Pittsburgh, I have to utterly disagree with your assessment of "beauty" and the relative attractiveness between the two cities. Louisville is plumb full of missing teeth. The CBD is all of six blocks, north to south, and about as many east to west. Ys, they do have a grid, I will give you that. But as far as maintaining older construction? It's not even close. Outside of two wealthy neighborhoods in Louisville, there are very few area that are maintained. While residents of the Pittsburgh MSA are moving and visiting in toward the city, there is tons of characterless sprawl and cookie cutter housing in Louisville. They continually look further out from the city to develop green fields as the inner city is neglected.
I won't contend your view of the river suburbs of Pittsburgh, but please don't kid yourself and call Louisville aesthetically more pleasing, there is little comparison, outside of two wealthy areas.
I won't contend your view of the river suburbs of Pittsburgh, but please don't kid yourself and call Louisville aesthetically more pleasing, there is little comparison, outside of two wealthy areas.
Please don't get mad or defensive. Louisville is well known for its beauty, and it's a growing metro area due in large part to its abundant attractiveness. Let's not make this a city vs. city thing. Pittsburgh is what it is regardless of what Louisville is doing.
I didn't see a single nice, impressive part of town. I visited Plum, Oakmont, Aspinwall, Sharpsburg, Penn Hills, Monroeville, West Mifflin, Washington, Trafford, Verona, Pitcairn, Turtle Creek, North Versailles, Irwin, McKeesport, White Oak, Wilkinsburg, Forest Hills, Duquesne, Universal, Oakland, Munhall, and many others, and I didn't see a single, neat, charming, cute-as-a-button immaculate neighborhood with manicured lawns and edged sidewalks. I drove on Carson St., which appeared to have some vitality but was in no way polished or attractive.
Well there's you're problem; you spent most of your time in or near the Monongahela River Valley. You never saw the northern or western suburbs, nor the East End neighborhoods in the city.
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Originally Posted by GregHenry
A Pittsburgh realtor I spoke with said this: "If you've been somewhere else, it's just not that pretty here."
Either you're lying out your ass, or that real estate agent deserves to be fired.
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Originally Posted by GregHenry
If the Pilgrims were coming to America in 2012, with America being a new and virgin land, the settlers would have no need of making steel in this area, and Pittsburgh would be passed over as a major settlement.
If.
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Originally Posted by GregHenry
If I could remake Pittsburgh, before I'd let anyone move in, I'd have every hill ground to flat earth, and I'd send the rock downriver to New Orleans to use as reclamation landfill.
A fool and his money are soon parted.
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Originally Posted by GregHenry
I'd then plat the area in neat grid streets, and I'd make a building code that all buildings be constructed with materials that wash squeaky clean and bright and shiny with a garden hose.
In other words, materials that don't exist.
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Originally Posted by GregHenry
I love other Ohio River towns. Cincinnati and Louisville are utterly lovely places, charming, open, sunny, and while they have hills, the hills don't bind the city in bleakness nor make driving too unpleasant. Madison and Owensburg are also quite nice. Evansville even has its moments.
That's because every single goddamn building in those cities and towns has a Teflon exterior that can be cleaned with a simple garden hose.
Well, you asked, so here's an honest answer from someone who has absolutely no axe to grind against the city.
Not to be a jerk, but here's what I noticed on a recent trip.
I didn't see a single nice, impressive part of town. I visited Plum, Oakmont, Aspinwall, Sharpsburg, Penn Hills, Monroeville, West Mifflin, Washington, Trafford, Verona, Pitcairn, Turtle Creek, North Versailles, Irwin, McKeesport, White Oak, Wilkinsburg, Forest Hills, Duquesne, Universal, Oakland, Munhall, and many others, and I didn't see a single, neat, charming, cute-as-a-button immaculate neighborhood with manicured lawns and edged sidewalks. I drove on Carson St., which appeared to have some vitality but was in no way polished or attractive.
Everything seems run-down and in need of a pressure-wash.
The houses often look moldy, mossy, and streaked. Often, the wood siding is sagging or pulling away from the houses.
The hills are horrible. Everything seems built into a valley, so you're losing at least four hours of sunlight, every day, down in those things. The hills make driving very unpleasant, and they give Pittsburgh an utterly unintuitive road system.
Intersection upon intersection and shopping center upon shopping center appears run-down and unkempt, as if there's no pride in the city. Frequently, these intersections and shopping centers are found abandoned, as people just moved away and gave up on them.
Often, the houses are built on or into the hills, worsening the trapped moisture and exacerbating the lack of sunlight.
I don't mean to be rude or insulting, but Pittsburgh has to be the least attractive large city I've visited, and this sample includes Cleveland. Being there even on bright sunny days made me sad.
A Pittsburgh realtor I spoke with said this: "If you've been somewhere else, it's just not that pretty here."
If the Pilgrims were coming to America in 2012, with America being a new and virgin land, the settlers would have no need of making steel in this area, and Pittsburgh would be passed over as a major settlement.
If I could remake Pittsburgh, before I'd let anyone move in, I'd have every hill ground to flat earth, and I'd send the rock downriver to New Orleans to use as reclamation landfill. I'd then plat the area in neat grid streets, and I'd make a building code that all buildings be constructed with materials that wash squeaky clean and bright and shiny with a garden hose.
Pittsburgh just seems sad, run-down, unkempt, dark, dingy, in no way sharp or meticulous, and I am not surprised to see people leaving it. In other towns, I love to see people rehabbing their old buildings, bungalows and houses. In driving around Pittsburgh, I concluded that the best thing for the town would be to bulldoze most of the houses, buildings, and stores and start over.
I love other Ohio River towns. Cincinnati and Louisville are utterly lovely places, charming, open, sunny, and while they have hills, the hills don't bind the city in bleakness nor make driving too unpleasant. Madison and Owensburg are also quite nice. Evansville even has its moments. I now know why Pittsburghers (?) emigrate to Florida in mass.
Again, I have no axe to grind against Pittsburgh; I was just so disappointed - and sad.
Not going to demean you for your perceptions / preferences but I had to laugh. Most of the things you listed are a part of the reasons I love the area. I have lived in pristine flat areas built on a grid and PGH is so much more interesting to me. I find the houses that have stood for years tucked into hills just fascinating. But I appreciate that it is not your thing....that's part of what makes the world interesting.
Not going to demean you for your perceptions / preferences but I had to laugh. Most of the things you listed are a part of the reasons I love the area. I have lived in pristine flat areas built on a grid and PGH is so much more interesting to me. I find the houses that have stood for years tucked into hills just fascinating. But I appreciate that it is not your thing....that's part of what makes the world interesting.
Lots of cities/regions would kill to have neighborhoods like Shadyside and Squirrel Hill (and probably others in Pittsburgh). Or, for that matter, like the Old Louisville and Cherokee Triangle/Bardstown Road areas of Louisville.
I agree with you 100% about the reaction to housing tucked away into hills. The first time I ever saw housing like that was driving through Wheeling, WV on a road trip from DC to Chicago in my early 20s. Immediately stopped me in my tracks at the time, just as some of the settings in Pittsburgh still do when visiting PA. I really think this is a visceral thing - either it grabs you or it doesn't.
Either you're lying out your ass, or that real estate agent deserves to be fired.
In this case, she owned the property in the listing, so...
And why should someone be fired for telling the truth?
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People in Indianapolis don't like you either.
Must you take everything so personally? This thread was opened to have an objective discussion about Pittsburgh's 50 years of decline. You're not helping.
unbelievable - 1/2 of their cost is the management!? thats incredible when you think conveyance is done for free by gravity.
thanks for the information. years ago i worked with SWM and was bored to tears. now, FINALLY there are interesting ways to cope with it rather than installing inlets every 50 feet. unfortunately im not a part of this revolution of sorts.
i applaud philadelphia. its amazing that 15 years ago any mention of an environmentally - sensitive would have been met with scorn. you were, lets see, a commie, a tree-hugger, a liberal, etc. finally, municipalities have seen the benefits.
and, i might add, tough cookies to the surface parking operators, car lots, etc. we have paid for decades to support a personal vehicle-dependent lifestyle, whether an individual opted for that or not.
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The city of Pittsburgh and upstream municipalities could have to pay as much as $277 million to meet federal and state requirements for controlling sewer overflows and storm flooding, Pittsburgh City Council learned at a special meeting today...The city and Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority's share could range from $111 million to $213 million, depending on how the municipalities decide to apportion costs and the types of upgrades officials decide to make...Allegheny County Sanitary Authority and dozens of municipalities face federal or state requirements for controlling sanitary and stormwater sewer runoff. ..Capital projects mainly would include construction or expansion of sewer lines to increase the city's carrying capacity to the Alcosan system. A final plan for meeting the mandates must be presented to regulators by next July, and improvements would be completed by about 2026.
City Councilman Bill Peduto said meeting the mandates will be the greatest public works project of the era. Councilman Patrick Dowd said funding the improvements will be a challenge
...
I live in the Sunset District of SF. It's cold and foggy most of the time. San Francisco is a city of microclimates and the one I live in is near the coast. Sept and October are nice, but the rest of the time it's pretty grey. I have to admit that I like the fog and cool weather. That's what I'll miss when I move. I don't live in a sunny part of California so I can't miss what I don't have.
"The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco" is attributed to Mark Twain, although I've been told that he never actually said it. I'm sure that whoever said it was in the Sunset District when they were quoted!
I live in the Sunset District of SF. It's cold and foggy most of the time. San Francisco is a city of microclimates and the one I live in is near the coast. Sept and October are nice, but the rest of the time it's pretty grey. I have to admit that I like the fog and cool weather. That's what I'll miss when I move. I don't live in a sunny part of California so I can't miss what I don't have.
"The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco" is attributed to Mark Twain, although I've been told that he never actually said it. I'm sure that whoever said it was in the Sunset District when they were quoted!
juliet,
I live in the central valley near Yosemite. Last week was in the 100's so I decided to spend the weekend in Santa Cruz. On Sunday it was 54 at 2:30 P.M. What a relief from the heat but it felt like winter. So I guess no place is always perfect.
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