east liberty station: realizing the potential - City of Pittsburgh

The market demand had only recently
picked up.
6
store on Penn Avenue which recently
opened in the summer of 2011.
Redevelopment of the former Nabisco
bakery on Penn Avenue into the mixeduse
Bakery Square continued this
momentum. New higher quality mixedincome
rental and affordable housing
projects commenced alongside the
commercial revitalization led by the
efforts of ELDI, the URS and The
Community Builders. In a little over a
decade, 1,400 public housing units
within three high rise structures –
Liberty Park, East Mall Tower and Penn
Major TOD development opportunities in relation to the redesigned station
Circle Apartments – have been
replaced with 450 new mixed-income
units. While many affordable housing
units were created by 2010, much of
this new development only included
small amounts of market rate/affordable
market rate rentals. Especially limited
are new single family detached units.
Within each core residential area of
each neighborhood, over 30% of the
housing stock was built before 1940.
The focus on rental housing in East
Liberty has somewhat detracted from
the development of for-sale units where
In an attempt to continue the
momentum of significant renewal
efforts within the study area, the
latest planning strategy focuses on
TOD as the preferred alternative to
reverse decades of auto dependent
development. TOD is a method for
organizing relatively compact, high
density mixed-use development
around transit as a means of
encouraging transit use and creating
more efficient and sustainable land
use patterns. More than simply a
project next to a train station, it
represents the creation of a
walkable, active and beautiful place
centered-around transit access at a
human scale. The approach aims to
create healthy, connected
neighborhoods with integration
between the station and the
surrounding community.
TOD provided a synergy between
economic, land use, transportation,
environmental, housing and social
equity goals. By facilitating public
transit use, this development type
can reduce dependence on fossil
fuels, lower residents’ transportation
costs, ease congestion, improve
safety, promote walking/health and