Mt Washington Condos

[blueblackcat]

Mount Washington residents, developer remain at odds over 2 condo projects

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07211/805460-53.stm

A pastor I know who just moved here from Las Vegas 10 months ago said it perfectly: "In Pittsburgh, change is a 4 letter word."

This article makes me seething mad at the old-folk who just want to ruin everything for everyone else. All we need is a couple would-be developers to read this article and decide that they won't even bother trying to build up the city.

I had respect for the MWCDC until now. My little message for president Paul Tellers: you cannot just filibuster someone's investment if you don't like it. You can't set a time limit to kill a project that's being held up by some crazy people who want to appeal the fact that it was approved and conforms to current zoning laws. You cannot just change a zoning law to retro-actively kill a project after people already invested 40 million dollars in it. Sorry, but some basic principles of law and order come into play here. And as you can read from the rest of the article, this is not a failure of the developer to get financing for his properties, this is a legal matter of a bunch of crazy old coots suing him and even buying adjacent property just to sue him. You can't set a time limit on the condos if you're not willing to set a time limit for how long people can appeal and sue and lose and sue again and lose again. That's ridiculous.

[blueblackcat]

There's another thing that makes me mad... as the article mentions, that land is prime real estate. And people are pushing the developer to both do something with it or not do something with it or just to go away. But none of those people on those streets seem to be investing in their own properties. How come so many of the homes on those streets still have run down old siding from the 1950's, no air conditioning, nothing at all that shows signs of upkeep? How come no one is bothering the landlords who are renting out houses for ungodly prices that haven't been updated in 50 years?

[TheGerbil]

This type of thing drives me crazy. Mt. Washington is one of our greatest assets, but the actual neighborhood up there is not exactly worthy of showing off. People holding back new development are a big part of the problem. If they don't want to deal with this, they shouldn't live in one of the biggest tourist areas in town.

[Evergrey]

With the exception of the view from Grandview.. Mt. Washington is one of the city's most generic and craptastic neighborhoods... and apparently its irritable residents want to keep it like that. Mt. Washington should be one of the city's magnets for investment... but instead it's a huge missed opportunity... and an embarrassment. There's all sorts of shoddy low-density housing along Grandview... take a look at the section between the new Washington/Guyasuta statue and the western end of Grandview... just a few crappy suburban ranch houses on huge weedy lots with the best urban vista in America.... any other city in America would've capitalized on this years ago.... take a trip to Cincinnati and see how they build on their hilltops which offer views 1/3 as good as Mt. Washington