Neighborhood of the week: Chateau (Pittsburgh, Butler: real estate, apartments, houseboats)

[eschaton]

Chateau is one of Pittsburgh's "fake neighborhoods." It was calved off of Manchester during the mid 20th century, when in a fit of urban renewal, the City decided to turn Beaver Avenue (which was a commercial street similar to East Carson or Butler) into an effective highway via the construction of Route 65, the demolishing essentially all of the historic housing stock and turning it into an industrial zone with virtually no residents.

As of 2010, Chateau had only 11 residents, making it the smallest neighborhood in population by far. As far as I have been able to determine, there are only two houses in Chateau which can be seen here and here. Both are in the small section of Chateau on the "near" side of 65, and so commonly considered to be in Manchester or Allegheny West rather than Chateau. Indeed, a few years back City Paper interviewed the guy who lived in the house by the Taco Bell, and he was surprised to hear he lived in Chateau. The bulk of the population (such as it is) lives on houseboats at the small marina further down the Ohio (Peggy's Harbor, IIRC).

Of course, Chateau is mostly an industrial zone. There still are factories up that way, but many of the industrial uses have switched over to transportation and logistics, including a school bus terminal, a taxi lot, a Port Authority facility, and a major UPS facility. But there are other interesting "destination businesses" in the neighborhood now, including Bicycle Heaven, Chateau Cakery, and the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild. In addition, the area around Allegheny Station is actually in Chateau, meaning Rivers Casino and the Carnegie Science Center are part of the neighborhood.

The neighborhood is currently in many ways a blank canvas which is on prime riverfront territory. Unsurprisingly plans have begun to be developed to turn Chateau into a more mixed-use area. The ambitious Chateau Landing project is now in planning, which could bring as many as 800 units of housing to the neighborhood, along with further office space, and (from what I have heard) potentially even a Ferris wheel right along the riverfront. Unfortunately it doesn't look like 65 is going anywhere any time soon, which will mean connections to Manchester will remain few and far between, but the city is at least looking at turning Beaver Avenue into a two-way street again, meaning the local road pattern will not be so horribly confusing. I suppose it remains to be seen how many blocks upriver from Rivers Casino the new development will ultimately spread.

[RogersParkTransplant]

We love the Chateau Cakery. The lunch options are surprisingly good.

It's always bizarre to me that there isn't more going on in Chateau. Great location and some interesting old buildings here and there. It would be so nice to see people actually living there, so fingers crossed.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by RogersParkTransplant

We love the Chateau Cakery. The lunch options are surprisingly good.

It's always bizarre to me that there isn't more going on in Chateau. Great location and some interesting old buildings here and there. It would be so nice to see people actually living there, so fingers crossed.

Chateau is really hard to get to honestly. You cannot drive there from the North Shore, as the westbound side of Reedsdale Street just curves onto a tiny spur road behind Rivers Casino. There's basically three, and only three ways to get into Chateau:

1. Eckert Street at the base of Woods Run
2. The Beaver Avenue exit off of 65
3. heading northbound on Chateau Street, you can pass under 65 right by Juniata Street. Note there is no sidewalk here.

This lack of road connectivity made perfect sense considering the city was trying to turn this section of Manchester into a suburban-style industrial park. Thus it was built to allow easy access on and off of 65. It was not built to be the sort of place you could casually stumble upon if driving up from Downtown/the North Shore.

As an aside about Chateau, I've always loved this old Wonder Bread factory - it's probably the only historic manufacturing structure of note left in Chateau. I hope it gets adaptive reuse eventually.

[ferraris]

If more destinations/residential become common in Chateau, the city could potentially change some of the one-way streets in order to lead into Chateau from the North Shore.

If you count bike/pedestrian connections you also have the North Shore Trail and the switchback ramp at Marshall.

[szug-bot]

Why not put energy into it as an industrial job magnet, rather than a residential zone? With the already good access in and around the properties there, it would make more sense to encourage larger scale (in size of individual structures, I mean) development or redevelopment/reuse rather than re-invent Chateau: industry, some production operations, etc.

Manchester, for this argument, has arguably been "up and coming" for like 25 years, if not more. Let that continue, without creating another laboratory.

I like Chateau because of its expansiveness. It makes getting from the denser part of the city to Brighton Heights on bike a bit easier, since there is quite a break of the hemmed in surroundings.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by ferraris

If more destinations/residential become common in Chateau, the city could potentially change some of the one-way streets in order to lead into Chateau from the North Shore.

Yeah, as I noted, the developers considering the Chateau Landing project are lobbying pretty hard for Beaver Street to be converted into a two-way road, which would allow one to drive back and forth from the North Shore to Chateau pretty easily. It wouldn't solve the elephant in the room that is 65, but we're probably stuck with that for another 20 years from what I have heard.

It also bears mentioning that if the T is ever extended past Allegheny Station, it will most likely be as part of some comprehensive redesign of 65/Beaver Avenue/Chateau Street. Not that that corridor has much transit demand (now) but it's a big wide right of way which under the right circumstances would provide plenty of space for two rail tracks.

Originally Posted by szug-bot

Why not put energy into it as an industrial job magnet, rather than a residential zone? With the already good access in and around the properties there, it would make more sense to encourage larger scale (in size of individual structures, I mean) development or redevelopment/reuse rather than re-invent Chateau: industry, some production operations, etc.

I don't think the idea is to turn Chateau into a strictly residential zone, but that it can become what the Strip District is becoming in another 20 years - a mixture of mid-rise apartments and mid-rise offices, with some retail and recreational uses mixed in. Putting industry along our waterfronts now isn't the highest and best use of our real estate.

Regardless - and I say this as someone heavily involved in the labor movement, who works for a union which traditionally had a manufacturing focus - blue collar employment is dying, and what's left of it sadly doesn't have much of a role in core urban area. This is even true if you use "blue collar" in a wider sense to be inclusive of jobs like repair, distribution, logistics, and transportation. The density of "jobs per acre" on industrial sites is just pitifully low due to the continued advances in automation (along with single-story manufacturing structures being the norm since the mid 20th century). If you want to pack in a large number of "jobs per acre" you really need to have white collar workers in office buildings. Chateau actually has a couple of these already (see here and here). Adding a few more structures like that to the mix would be a big step forward for the neighborhood, providing more tax dollars to the city, and more people walking around during daylight hours who might create some commercial demand.