Homewood Neighborhood Revitalization Plan

Housing Development Strategy The Community of Homewood

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Cities, like anything else, succeed only by making the most of their assets. If we understand the principles behind the behavior of cities, we can build on potential assets and strengths, instead of acting at cross-purposes to them. First we have to know the general results that we want., and the next step is to examine some of the workings of cities at another level: the economic workings that produce the neighborhoods that we want.

- Jane Jacobs The Death and Life of Great American Cities

Prepared for Homewood Brushton Comprehensive Community Organization

Prepared by Jaxon Development Company

Perkins Eastman Architects

J A X O N Development Company

23 Bedford Square Pittsburgh, PA 15203

412.431.5151 Fax: 412.431.6361

Homewood Brushton Comprehensive Community Organization

c/o: Mr. Jeffrey L. Richardson Comprehensive Plan Coordinator J. Richardson Consultants 7125 McPherson Boulevard Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15208

Re: Homewood Housing Development Strategy

Dear Mr. Richardson:

On behalf of Jaxon Development Company and Perkins Eastman Architects, P.C., we are pleased to present here the report of our evaluations and recommendations concerning a Housing Development Strategy for the community of Homewood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

As detailed within the report, Homewood is a seriously distressed neighborhood but it retains attributes that can form the basis for effective physical revitalization; and, if that revitalization is pursued strategically, it can help to beneficially reshape the community and the way that it fits into Pittsburghs future.

Against the background of a severely depressed current reality, our report addresses the basic issues and some of the strategic principles that apply to the process of re-building a distressed neighborhood; and, based on that framework, we have sought to identify core problems and priority opportunities as targets for a series of development interventions and key housing development projects that are designed to embody and set into motion a change process that can help to make Homewood a more sustainable neighborhood.

Our philosophy is that a neighborhood revitalization strategy should be realistically attainable but that it should also aim high in terms of the vision that it represents. Our experience is that compromise is inevitable no matter where the target is set. Our ideas are both big and small, some easily done and some much less easily done.

We hope that we tell a story here that conveys a sense of Homewoods potential and that it is sufficiently compelling to encourage a commitment to embrace and explore and, to the fullest extent possible, to resolve all of the challenges big and little, easy and hard that might need to be addressed in making Homewood the best place that it can be.

Sincerely yours,

Jaxon Development Company

John A. Johnston President

Housing Development Strategy The Community of Homewood April 15, 2002 Prepared By: Jaxon Development Company Perkins Eastman Architects, P.C. Prepared For: Homewood Brushton Comprehensive Community Organization (HBCCO) HBCCO Sponsoring Organizations: Community Empowerment Association

Homewood Brushton Revitalization & Development Corporation

Homewood Brushton Roundtable Operation Better Block Rosedale Block Club Stingers Development Corporation

The Office of State Representative Joseph Preston

HBCCO Community Plan Coordinator: Jeffrey L. Richardson, J. Richardson Consultants

i

Housing Development Strategy The Community of Homewood Executive Summary Since the 1950s, Homewood has been a community in decline and, after fifty years of persistent physical, economic, and social deterioration, it is severely impacted by the degree and kinds of distress that impoverish neighborhoods as places to live. Since 1950, the community has lost two-thirds of its population, almost half of its families, one-third of its households, and one-third of its housing. The strength of its historical diversity is gone. It has changed from a vibrant socially and economically mixed neighborhood to one that is almost exclusively African American and very predominantly very low income. The ramifications of a very low income population are readily apparent. Its business district has been eroded to practically nothing. Its physical character is very modest. Vacant lots are common. Boarded houses are not uncommon. Housing generally is deteriorated. The streets seem barren. With a low income population, rents are low. With low rents, the upkeep of rental properties is inadequate. With deteriorating rental properties, home values are compromised. Compromised home values are a disincentive to reinvestment. Many homes have been converted to rental use. Rental properties tend to deteriorate. The overall pattern is one of persistent, self-perpetuating, and progressive disinvestment. In physical terms, the cycle of disinvestment needs to be broken for effective revitalization of a distressed neighborhood. This involves more than building houses for the sake of building houses. New housing is the essential tool for physical renewal but, to be effective, the housing built needs to be strategically built.

Problem: self-sustained and progressive

neighborhood disinvestment associated with a high concentration of a low income population.

Symptoms: vacant land, boarded

houses, a deteriorated housing stock, low property values.

Solution: the introduction of strategic

physical changes through real estate development that positively influences market dynamics and competitively repositions the neighborhood in the citys housing market.

Objective: economic diversification of

the neighborhood housing market. Resources for renewal are limited --far less than the task requires. Interventions into the neighborhood in the form of new housing investment should be made in a way that is synergistic and catalytic. Developing new housing as a part of a community revitalization agenda involves more than providing housing as shelter: it should improve the housing condition of disadvantaged residents but it should also eliminate blight and encourage economic diversification of the local residential market.

Homewood Housing Development Strategy Executive Summary

ii

With limited resources in the face of extensive needs, the process is necessarily incremental and each piece of development should progressively build on the last piece and leverage the next piece to a higher potential. Where to start? Real estate is place-based and neighborhoods consist of many parts. In distressed neighborhoods, some parts are relatively good and some parts absolutely bad. A physical revitalization program that also aims to rebuild the neighborhood housing market through incremental action has to start with whats there, in particular the relative attributes that are there. Homewood has both relatively good and bad places throughout most of the neighborhood. The bad places need to be redeveloped by developing housing that borrows some contextual strength and thus marketability from the good places, enhances that value through the development that is done, and transfers that higher value back into the good places. Principles for strategic incremental development include some basic ideas: new physical improvements should eradicate

blight as a principal cause of neighborhood disinvestments physical changes should be made in a concentrated visible way from place to place throughout the neighborhood and each place should be re-built incrementally in order to add value progressively back into the neighborhood new development should start with whats there now, both in terms of physical and market context, and it should take value from the relative attributes in that context while reinforcing and enhancing those attributes and adding greater value to them new development should build from low to high in its market orientation and it must, to a significant degree, progressively test and prove out demand potentials in the higher end of the market diversification of development is essential in terms of place, type, market orientation, and resource requirements a structured complementary multiplicity of diversified development initiatives is most strategically effective in terms of impact.

The Homewood community exists as an assemblage of corridors and districts, each affected by different sets of circumstances and each deserving a different approach to new development. Each of the neighborhoods major areas has parts where distress is relatively concentrated and each has attributes that can serve as revitalization building blocks. Major Planning Areas The Frankstown and Hamilton corridors create three major neighborhood districts, each with stronger and weaker places within it and each with a character that is generally internally consistent but basically different from the others. In general, the front doors to the neighborhood and the principal corridors into and through it show signs of considerable distress and are accordingly targets for development interventions. In general, each of the neighborhoods residential districts has places in them where the basic structure of the neighborhood is weak and/or where distress is high; and they also have places where the architectural character and physical condition of the built environment is relatively good. Over time, most of the major streets in Homewood evolved as mixed-use corridors, sometimes with uses that were originally not complementary. The pull of the railroad and the concentration of industrial development in North Point Breeze, for instance, encouraged a scattered pattern of industrial development in the southern parts of Homewood that usually occurred along the major streets there within or at the edges of residential neighborhoods and that sometimes occurred off the major streets in the middle of those neighborhoods.


iii

Lang Avenue vacant lots, nonconforming uses Western Portal physical isolation Hamilton Avenue bad housing, ,vacant lots Business District vacant lots, deterioration Key Problem Areas Key problem areas are the focus for early action in an incremental revitalization process. They are the places that cant fit into the re-woven fabric of a strong neighborhood or the places where the existing fabric is most intensely distressed. More often the mix of uses along the corridors gradually became non-complementary or compromised as things changed. The strength of neighborhood industrial activities devolved and the utility of industrial properties declined. Neighborhood businesses lost their viability; the market for scattered storefronts disappeared; the storefronts fell into disrepair. As the car became more essential to life, the streets carried more and more traffic and the housing along the major streets, especially owner-occupied homes, became less and less desirable. Inside the neighborhoods traditional residential areas, the general economic decline of the neighborhood was given expression in the form of deterioration in the housing stock leading to concentrated distress in places where the original housing was of lower quality and where the basic physical structure of the neighborhood was weak.

mid-Frankstown Avenue vacant lots

Southeast Homewood bad housing, vacant lots, weak structure major non-conforming industrial uses

The pattern of physical distress in the neighborhood is the target for revitalization interventions. In rebuilding a neighborhood, the physical symptoms of the communitys problems are the opportunities that need to be addressed. The marketability of housing is influenced by all of the features that comprise its setting. As a part of a housing revitalization strategy, the parts of a neighborhood that are less well suited for residential development than for other development still need to be addressed if the neighborhoods housing potential is to be maximized. The bad places that shouldnt be housing need to be turned into better places that provide something of value to the community as a place to live and a housing development strategy has to deal with those needs and opportunities as a part of the process of creating a sustainable housing market.


iv

Non-Residential Development Initiatives Some parts of Homewood are fundamentally not suited or are at least less well suited than others to be treated as residential revitalization opportunities. Those areas are places where non-residential uses might be either expanded or introduced to better fit each place to its more natural market and, in doing so, to support the housing components of Homewoods revitalization plan.

Western Portal Retail Center

Mid-Frankstown Cutural Center and Marketplace

Business District Improvements

SouthCentral Commercial Development

Homewood Industrial Park

Plan Components Non-Residential

Western Portal Retail Center

z multi-tenant retail and office showroom facilities between west of the Conrail overpass

Business District Improvements

z public parking between Kelly and Bennett, east and west of Homewood Avenue

z in-fill commercial development z rental housing and/or offices south

of Hamilton z selective building rehabilitations

Mid-Frankstown Corridor Revitalization

z community cultural center z Homewood marketplace z selective building rehabilitations and

adaptive re-use for office purposes

SouthCentral Commercial Development z public elementary school on Tioga z public park at Hamilton z professional office development z multi-purpose sports/wellness center

Homewood Industrial Park

z office/showroom, distribution, and light manufacturing facilities in southeast Homewood at Braddock


v

Residential Development Initiatives The pattern of development in Homewood creates three major planning districts that are generally defined by the Frankstown Avenue and North Homewood Avenue corridors. Most of each district is residential in character but each district is different in terms of its housing pattern and condition so that different approaches to housing revitalization are appropriate in each case.

Lang Corridor North District Northwest District Sterrett-Collier

Bennett Street Lot Kelly / Murtland In-Fill

Hamilton, west mid-Hamilton Hamilton / Braddock Site Hamilton, east Brushton Corridor Cora Street Redevelopment Plan Components Residential 591 new housing units: 313 for-sale detached units 278 rental units in 65 apartment houses North Homewood Housing Initiative [85 for-sale units] concentrated new housing development in areas

of significant distress scattered site in-fill housing development in

areas of light and moderate distress selective showcase housing rehabilitations

throughout Southwest Homewood Housing Initiative [81 for-sale units; 26 rental units, 12 buildings] concentrated new housing development in areas



throughout

Southeast Homewood Housing Initiative [147 for-sale units; 144 rental units, 32 buildings] concentrated new housing development in areas



throughout

Other Frankstown, east and west [108 rental units, 21

buildings] in-fill housing development and selective

housing renovations


vi

By sequencing new development from place to place in the neighborhood, the physical conditions that compromise the neighborhoods market potential can be progressively eliminated. By pursuing development in moderately scaled increments, the market orientation of each increment of development can be broadened toward the top end of whats there now; and, by doing that successively from increment to increment and place to place throughout the neighborhood, the full scope of new development will introduce a substantive economic diversification of the market. Because the approach is incremental, the objective of a diversified, sustainable housing market can only be realized through the cumulative outcomes of the individual initiatives; and it is essential that the plan, as an expression of strategy, be viewed and pursued as an integrated whole.

Again though, the plan is not so much a matter of building individual houses in a pattern shown on a map as it is a matter of a process of making change that remediates the physical features in a neighborhood that compromise the way the neighborhood housing market works. Ultimately, physical changes can provide a setting for a more viable housing market and that setting can help to influence other aspects of community life; but it is nonetheless just one part of the overall process of improving and renewing a community and it must be balanced with the other parts of a comprehensive community planning commitment that addresses the full range of Homewoods social and economic issues and needs.

Housing Development Summary

for sale rental total units units buildings all units

market orientation low mid high all mixed North Homewood

Lang Corridor 8 14 0 22 0 0 22 Northwest District 10 10 0 20 0 0 20 Scattered Site In-Fill (north district) 8 15 20 43 0 0 43

total 26 39 20 85 0 0 85 Southwest Homewood

West Hamilton Corridor 15 6 0 21 0 0 21 Hamilton Corridor, mid-section 12 11 0 23 0 0 23 East Hamilton Corridor 0 8 3 11 4 1 15 Bennett Street Lot 3 0 0 3 6 3 9 Kelly / Murtland Site 0 4 0 4 16 8 20 Scattered Site In-Fill 8 8 3 19 0 0 19

total 38 37 6 81 26 11 107 Southeast Homewood

Sterrett Street / Sterrett-Collier 10 6 3 19 64 16 83 Hamilton / Braddock Site 0 0 0 0 80 16 80 Brushton Corridor 17 17 0 34 0 0 34 Cora Street Redevelopment 5 11 11 27 0 0 27 Scattered Site In-Fill 20 20 27 67 0 0 67

total 52 54 41 147 144 32 291 Frankstown Corridor

West 0 0 0 0 36 9 36 East 0 0 0 0 72 13 72

total 0 0 0 0 108 22 108 Total, All Areas 116 130 67 313 278 65 591


Housing Development Strategy The Community of Homewood Table of Contents Introduction Background 1 HBCCO Mission 1 HBCCO Planning Goals 1 HBCCO Planning Framework 1 Scope of Work 2 Part One: The Homewood Community Existing Conditions Historical Perspective 3 Neighborhood Setting 4 Physical Context 4 Housing Typology 7 Housing Condition 8 Problem Housing 9 Recent and New Developments 10 Neighborhood Demographics 12 The Housing Market 13 Rents and Values 15 Indicators of Distress 16 Neighborhood Balance Sheet 19 Part Two: Neighborhood Building Issues Basic Issues 21 The Role of Real Estate Development 22 The Change Process 22 Housing Market Dynamics 23 Housing Need / Demand Potential 24 Tenure Considerations 24 Housing Affordability 25 Part Three: Neighborhood Assessment Overview 29 Neighborhood Districts 30 Neighborhood District Evaluations 31 Patterns of Neighborhood Strength and Weakness 45 Part Four: Strategic Initiatives Non-Residential Development Initiatives 48 Residential Development Initiatives 53 Public Improvement Initiatives 63 Neighborhood Revitalization Concept Plan 64 Selected Master Plan Components 65

Part Five: Key Housing Development Projects: Overview 67 North Lang Avenue Corridor 68 Hamilton Avenue Corridor 69 Sterrett-Collier 70 Brushton Corridor 71 Cora Street Housing 72 Part Six: Strategy Implementation Introduction 73 Implementation Requirements 73 Vision 74 Resources 75 Sustained Effort 76 HBCCO Roles 76 Early Action Agenda 79 Development Planning 79 Priority of Initiatives 80 Miscellaneous Implementation Ideas 81 Note: Throughout this report, graphics are used for illustrative purposes only and related captions and comments do not refer to specific properties unless so noted within the text of the report.

Homewood Housing Development Strategy

1

Introduction Background From 1940 to 1990, the population of the Homewood Brushton community declined from more than 30,000 people to just a bit more than 9,000. Attendant changes affected almost every aspect of community life physical conditions deteriorated, the social fabric of the community was eroded, and its basic economic vitality became imperiled. By 2000, after some 60 years of gradual decline, many parts of Homewood (as it is more commonly known) had become severely distressed and a cycle of self-perpetuating and progressive disinvestment had set in that seriously compromised the lives of neighborhood residents and threatened the essential sustainability of the community as a whole. In 1999 the interests and the energies, as well as the frustrations, of many concerned Homewood citizens and community organizations coalesced in the form of the Homewood Brushton Comprehensive Community Development Plan Steering Committee which was assembled to sponsor and coordinate a new and newly unified community-based planning process aimed at setting a comprehensive agenda for revitalizing the neighborhood. The Steering Committee has now evolved into the Homewood Brushton Comprehensive Community Organization (HBCCO); and, with funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh and with the leadership of a core group of dedicated resident and organizational representatives, HBCCO has retained a wide range of professional support services to help it execute its planning process. The process is built around community-based, professionally-supported task forces that have been organized to address issues of environment, housing, commercial development, public safety, education, and youth development. The work reported here is in support of HBCCOs Housing Task Force.

HBCCO Mission HBCCO exists to coordinate, foster and plan the comprehensive revitalization of Homewood Brushton through improving the housing, economic, educational and social conditions that impact the community. HBCCO Planning Goals With respect to its housing agenda, HBCCOs planning process advances four stated goals: a balanced housing market that responds to the

diverse needs of all community residents; a housing market that provides opportunities that are

attractive to new buyers and renters; a working understanding of resident and landlord

responsibility in improving existing housing conditions;

neighborhood development and beautification

improvements that aesthetically enhance the desirable qualities and overall character of the community.

HBCCO Planning Framework At the heart of HBCCOs planning process is the idea of community-based empowerment which encourages people to assume responsibility for themselves and their community, to have aspirations, and to act on those aspirations by investing both in themselves and in their community. In this regard, the community plan seeks to facilitate empowerment based on education, opportunity, and action. As a facilitation mechanism, HBCCOs planning process builds on the concept of informed community involvement in making change. It embodies the practical concept of stepped actions that work together and build incrementally toward attainable objectives that promote the goals of the plan. And it also embraces the practical concept of partnering in order to link to opportunities and


2

needed resources that may not be readily available within the community. As related specifically to housing issues, HBCCOs planning framework recognizes the need to affect perceptions about the community as a means of securing sustainable change. It also recognizes the constraint of adverse economic realities and prevailing market dysfunctions on the ability to create needed new physical improvements as a means of evidencing change and building positive perceptions about the community. In this regard, it identifies subsidized new housing construction and existing housing rehabilitation as potentially effective ways of introducing physical change while also addressing the communitys housing needs within the context of its economic realities. Scope of Work The work reported here seeks to support HBCCOs planning process by focusing on the role of real estate development in distressed communities as a tool for restructuring neighborhood housing markets as a part of a comprehensive community-wide revitalization program. This report is intended to provide a framework and specific suggestions for a housing development strategy that will catalyze change. In this regard, this report will not paint a picture of all of the buildings and streets and trees that might ultimately shape a new community. It does not seek to depict a physical vision; and it is not meant to set out a program that will fix everything that is wrong. But it is meant to define strategic approaches and initiatives that will instigate basic changes changes that, when put into place, will help to create and sustain a viable neighborhood housing market. It should be understood from the beginning that the quality and desirability of neighborhood housing markets embodies all aspects of neighborhood life. Real estate development, even when it is extremely effective, has a limited role in changing people and the way they live their lives. At the same time, the ways in which people live their daily lives in their neighborhood tends to define the social dimension of the desirability of the neighborhood housing

market in a way that either is or isnt supportive to market viability. Real estate development is good at making physical changes but it is much less well suited to social engineering. As a result, the effectiveness of the suggestions that will be made here is critically dependent on the effectiveness of HBCCOs planning process in other areas of community concern. Finally, Homewoods decline occurred over some sixty years and it is unrealistic to expect it to be re-constituted in short order or without a very substantial investment of new public resources. Distress is not unique to Homewood and those resources are in great demand. They are also in limited supply and, because of this, revitalization interventions need to be competitive, selective, and strategic in terms of impact as well as the sustainability of that impact relative to cost. This report is not about building houses just for the sake of building houses. It is about building houses but its about doing that in a way that builds a market as a part of re-building a neighborhood. Reflecting these considerations, the work that is reported here has been pursued within the following framework: It seeks to define the circumstances of the

community in terms that treat it as a market setting for housing development.

It seeks to delineate a process of change where real

estate development influences market dynamics in a way that encourages self-sustaining market function as a contribution to a compre-hensive neighborhood revitalization strategy.

In terms of that change process, it seeks to delineate

general approaches to intervening in prevailing market forces based on real estate development activities that are appropriately and strategicially varied in the ways that they respond to the range of existing housing needs and opportunities in the community as well as to the inherent competitive market position and potential of the community.

In terms of those approaches, it seeks to delineate

selected key development initiatives that might serve as prime catalysts in the change process.


3

Part One: The Homewood Community, Existing Conditions Background Historical Perspective Until the mid-nineteenth century the Boroughs of Homewood and Brushton were agricultural areas lying just beyond the border of the City of Pittsburgh. Homewood was annexed by the City in 1867; Brushton, in 1894. Today, they exist as a single community, commonly called just Homewood. Based on its close proximity to the City, Homewood offered an attractive opportunity to accommodate Pittsburghs growing population. It was an early suburb. Spurred by the construction of a street grid and trolley routes that connected the community to the City, and by rail lines that brought with them industry and jobs, Homewoods population grew continuously through the latter part of the Nineteenth Century and well into the Twentieth Century, reaching almost 31,000 by 1940. At that time, Homewood was one of Pittsburghs largest neighborhoods, consisting of a population that was mostly ethnic, working class, and middle income.

The growth of Homewoods population, together with that of adjacent residential neighborhoods, encouraged a vital commercial district that, by the middle of the Twentieth Century, included five grocery stores, three banks, two movie theatres, and numerous other neighborhood-serving businesses. Today, just about 9,000 people live in Homewood and the business district is largely shuttered. Homewoods precipitous decline over the last fifty years represents a convergence of urban economic forces that have worked to imperil many communities in Pittsburgh as well as elsewhere throughout the nation. A massive post-war investment in the construction of a regional highway system opened the door to the development of outlying suburbs that were attractive to many city residents. Post-war housing finance programs made suburban development more affordable to many city residents. As the national economy evolved, Pittsburghs traditional economic advantages were weakened and, as employment patterns shifted away from manufacturing and away from Pittsburgh, working people followed. Suburban shopping centers and highways stole most of the remaining market for traditional neighborhood business districts and they gradually disappeared. In Homewood, the impact of these circumstances was intensified by demographic shifts within the City population and by the social ramifications of those shifts. Large-scale urban renewal elsewhere in the City, in places like the Lower Hill and East Liberty, required large-scale relocation of existing residents, typically low-income and non-white; and, with a population that had already began to decline as a result of more macro trends, Homewood provided an opportunity to accommodate displaced residents. Fueled by social and economic intolerance, the by-then established pattern of out-migration was exacerbated and turned into white-flight.


4

Now, what had been a vibrant and diverse urban neighborhood sixty years ago has become essentially a low-income minority neighborhood without sufficient economic vitality to resist the continually advancing deterioration of its increasingly older housing stock. Viewed as an economic phenomenon, the neighborhoods asset base has been significantly eroded and not replenished so that the utility of the community in the context of Pittsburghs larger housing market has been substantially lost. In this sense, the challenge to be addressed here is to rebuild the communitys asset base in a way that re-establishes a viable fit between what the community has to offer as a place to live and its market. Neighborhood Setting Homewood is situated along the northeast edge of the East End of the City of Pittsburgh. The community consists of some 700 acres or roughly 2% of the Citys land area. With a year 2000 population of about 9,300, it accounts for almost 3% of the Citys population. Homewood is for the most part bordered by City neighborhoods of generally modest character East Hills to the east, Lincoln-Lemington-Belmar to the north, Larimer to the west, and North Point Breeze to the south. It is adjacent to the Borough of Wilkinsburg along its southeast edge and to the Municipality of Penn Hills along its northeast edge. Lincoln Lemington Larimer Penn Hills East Hills North Point Breeze Wilkinsburg

With the exception of Penn Hills, all of its neighbors are communities that are distressed. It is generally well served by public transportation and offers reasonably convenient connections to and from major destinations elsewhere in the City and region. Pittsburghs central business district, the Golden Triangle, is about four miles to the west via the Penn Avenue corridor. Along the western side of the community, Washington Boulevard connects to the Route 28 Expressway on the northern side of the City. Braddock Avenue provides a direct link to the William Penn Expressway to the south. And Frankstown Avenue offers an immediate connection to Pittsburghs eastern suburbs. Route 28 CBD Parkway East Physical Context Homewood is very strongly defined by its street grid and its geography. Along its southwestern boundary, elevated railroad tracks are reinforced by Washington Boulevard, a major connector into the City from the northeast suburbs; and, taken together, these features mark the edge of the community and provide a major separation between it and the adjacent Larimer neighborhood. Along the northwest boundary, a steeply sloped hollow terminates the neighborhood street grid. Along its southern boundary, the edge of Homewood is marked and separated from North Point Breeze by a Conrail right-of-way and the Allegheny County Port Authoritys restricted access


5

busway east route. This boundary is reinforced by industrial development over most of its length on the North Point Breeze side as well as on the Homewood side to the east of Braddock Avenue. The northerly and easterly edges of the community are effectively defined by topography. The northern boundary between Homewood and Lincoln-Lemington-Belmar exists as the crest of a hill that slopes sharply down into Homewood and wraps around the northeast corner of the neighborhood to Frankstown Avenue. A second hillcrest rises just to the south of Frankstown and serves to separate Homewood from East Hills and Wilkinsburg. Strong Street Grid Weak Street Grid Washington Boulevard Lang Avenue Hamilton Avenue Homewood Avenue Braddock Avenue

In Homewood, the flats extend south from Hermitage Street to the Port Authority busway. To the north of Hermitage, the land slopes up sharply to the hillcrest that extends along the northerly border of the neighborhood. Within its boundaries, Homewood is divided into major parts that are formed by major streets and the overall pattern of the neighborhood street grid. In general, a strong and regular north-south / east-west grid predominates. The neighborhood is bisected east-west by Frankstown Avenue, which is the major street through Homewood. The Frankstown corridor is wide and long, running through the neighborhood over a distance of about twelve blocks. It has a major presence and it is highly disjointed, consisting of several segments where each segment shows a slightly different mix of residential and commercial land uses that are affected in each case by varying concentrations of underutilization, physical deterioration, and vacant land. The area to the north of Frankstown is very consistently residential in character and the housing stock there is largely intact but old and worn. The general quality of housing here is fairly good as compared to the rest of the neighborhood; and, while the physical condition of housing in this area Steep Slope Frankstown Avenue Busway / Railroad


6

is generally marginal, it is good in comparison with most of the neighborhood, with a relatively low incidence of vacant lots and severely deteriorated homes. To the south of Hamilton Avenue, the east-west street grid shifts in axis somewhat to generally parallel the Conrail and Busway East rights-of-way. The pattern of the streets here is much less regular, especially in the zone between Hamilton and Tioga Street and the pattern of development in this area is therefore more confusing. This is exacerbated by a fairly frequent incidence of non-conforming commercial and industrial land uses, especially along the railroad tracks at the southern border of the neighborhood and on the primary north-south streets Homewood, Braddock, and Brushton that either used to or still connect to the large predominantly industrial area to the south of the tracks in North Point Breeze. The disjointed street grid, the confusing pattern of existing development, and the intrusion of non-residential uses that generally appear to be marginally viable all contribute to a very weak residential context in this area. The level of physical deterioration here is generally more severe than elsewhere in the neighborhood, the incidence of vacant lots is generally much more common, and the basic quality of housing is generally less substantial. The central portion of Homewood, between Frankstown and Hamilton, evidences a marginal residential context. It is stronger than the area to the south of Hamilton but weaker than the area to the north of Frankstown. The street pattern here is very regular and it provides a uniform overall structure to the area. But the development pattern is generally weak because it is frequently interrupted by non-residential uses and by housing with a scale and/or density that is inconsistent with the context of the area. Commercial and/or industrial uses are found intermittently throughout the area and are concentrated in the vicinity of the business district along North Homewood Avenue and along Brushton Avenue. The old edges of the business

district are tattered with a high concentration of vacant land. More generally, vacant lots are scattered throughout the area in a pattern where they tend to be more concentrated in the vicinity of non-residential intrusions. As elsewhere, the housing stock here is generally old and worn. Here, though, it is much more varied in terms of its basic quality and condition with areas of relatively good housing in fair condition mixed with areas of very modest housing in bad condition. Overall, the physical context of Homewood has suffered immensely from the neighborhoods long economic decline. The commercial district has shrunken down essentially to its Homewood Avenue spine, leaving remnants behind in the form of vacant land and many buildings that are deteriorated and largely empty. Industrial properties are generally poorly maintained and give the appearance of marginal viability. Many businesses have left the area. The housing stock is badly worn with some concentrated instances of extreme deterioration.


7

Housing Typology

Pittsburgh Worker House

One bay wide, typically 17 to 22, on a 17 to 25 wide lot, often semi-attached. Two bays deep. Usually, frame; sometimes brick.

Pittsburgh Manager House A bay and a half wide with an entry vestibule in the half bay, typically 25 to 33, on a 35 to 50 wide lot, detached. Two bays deep. Either frame or brick.

Pittsburgh Four-Square Two bays wide, typically 35 to 45, on a 50 to 60 wide lot, detached. Two bays deep. Usually, brick; sometimes frame.

Worker Row

Row House

Apartment House

Apartment Building

Homewoods residential fabric has a highly varied character with a range of housing types that reflects the communitys economically diverse history. Large areas within the community are characterized by similar housing types in a pattern that represents a historic distribution of housing value that was tied to the incomes of early residents. In some areas, worker housing prevails typically modest frame houses in a relatively dense pattern of small lots. In most areas, though, more substantial manager housing prevails larger houses, more often brick, on larger lots with bigger yards. In Homewood, a high-end version of the manager house, the Pittsburgh four-square is infrequent..

In Homewood, worker housing is the prevalent type in the northwest, the south central, and the southeast parts of the neighborhood; manager houses prevail in North Homewood; Four-Squares and manager houses are generally mixed in the middle part of the neighborhood between Frankstown and Hamilton. Interspersed in these overall patterns are various kinds of attached and multi-family housing that help to add texture to the neighborhood fabric and provide a variety of housing accommodations for neighborhood residents.


8

Housing Quality Very little new housing has been built in Homewood and the housing stock is generally old. Given the age of the housing stock, it is not surprising that its condition is worn. In Homewood, the normal wear-and-tear that is attendant to age has been exacerbated by the economic decline of the community. To some degree, the general pattern of housing deterioration follows the general pattern of housing types. Worker housing bears wear less well and, with generally lower income ownership, deterioration tends to occur earlier and to advance more rapidly than with more substantial housing types. In worker housing areas, demolition is more frequent and vacant lots appear more commonly. The result is that areas where worker housing is most prevalent are the areas where physical distress tends to be most severe. Over time the distress in those areas encroaches on areas where the basic character of housing is more substantial and where the income profile of the property ownership is higher. As instances of distress occur, values tend to be eroded and the economic profile of ownership tends to decline in relative terms. Higher income areas and larger areas of more substantial housing tend to resist these dynamics but, eventually, the physical indications of economic distress work their way from the bottom to the top of the communitys housing market and permeate all parts of the community. That is essentially what has happened in Homewood. Physical distress is varied but very widespread so that a house that is in good condition is generally so only in relative terms as compared to the typically marginal condition of the communitys housing stock. Housing quality, however, consists of more than just the architectural character and physical condition of individual houses.

At least at a small scale, block by block, a strong and consistent pattern of housing type and scale contributes to a more legible sense of the place and, thus, in housing market terms, greater product identification. A place that has a consistent pattern of housing in poor condition has more market potential than a place that has housing in poor condition in a pattern that is a hodgepodge of type and scale. Similarly, a strong public domain in a residential area can help to make bad housing better. Good Streets and yards, appropriately sized, adequately planted, and well tended, can help to unify the image of a place and mask deteriorated housing conditions. Homewood generally has fairly poor quality streets and yards and the image of economic decline and physical deterioration is intensified rather than alleviated by the general character of the public domain there. The stark streets, however, expose a basic pattern of development that is fairly strong. Most of Homewood has a very regular and very strong street grid and this gives structure to a lot pattern that varies fairly consistently from place to place which, in turn, gives rise to a fairly consistently varied pattern of housing types.


9

The only places in Homewood where the basic pattern is weak is in a zone from Homewood Avenue to Braddock Avenue to the south of Hamilton and to the north of Tioga; and in a part of the southeast quadrant of the community between Braddock and Rosedale to the south of Hamilton. These are areas where the existing street grid is less accommodating of housing patterns that prevail in most of the community and where any redevelopment would have an opportunity to introduce new kinds of places that vary from the general context of the community.


10

Problem Housing Bad housing is scattered throughout Homewood in patterns that vary from place to place. The three locations shown below are particularly problematic. Each consists of a high density concentration of small and old rowhouses that were acquired by an investor group in the 1970s and modestly renovated as project-based Section 8 housing. All have been unsuccessful and have defaulted on HUD-insured mortgages. The largest, the Sterrett-Collier complex, gradually became extremely deteriorated and has now been

mostly abandoned, boarded, and foreclosed by HUD. The Susquehanna and Cora Street properties remain operational but are seriously deteriorated and represent a very high concentration of very low income residents. Each of these properties has had a detrimental impact on their immediate surroundings and that impact has in turn compromised the viability of each as public housing. Within the community, they are regarded as major blighting influences.

Sterrett-Collier Susquehanna Street

Cora Street


11

Recent and New Developments

2 1 9 9 5 9 8 4 7 6 10 3

1 YWCA 2 Silver Lake Commons 3 Rosedale Street Housing 4 Frankstown Court, Phase 1 2 5 The Coliseum 6 Homewood Avenue Housing 7 Lang Avenue Housing 8 Bennett Street Housing 9 Elderly High Rises 10 Homewood Brushton Elementary School (Helen Faison Academy)

Rosedale Housing Park Lane Houising YWCA Elderly High Rise


12

HOMEWOOD PHOTO GALLERY


13

Neighborhood Demographics Demographic analysis is constrained by the fact that, at the neighborhood level, the most recent available data is based on the U.S. Census for 1990. Where it is pertinent, that data is supplemented here with information provided by HBCCO based on data analysis and statistical projections prepared by Claritas, Inc. Over the last fifty years of the twentieth century, population losses were not uncommon among large cities but were especially severe among the more industrialized cities in the northeast and mid-west. In Pittsburgh, between 1940 and 2000, the population declined by just about half, falling from 672,000 in 1940 to 335,000 in 2000. Over a twenty-year period, from its high point in 1950 to 1970, the City lost 157,000 people, a decline of about 23%. Between 1970 and 1990, it lost 151,000 people, a loss of about 29% over twenty years. And over the ten years since 1990, the population has continued to decline (by about 35,000 people) but the rate of loss has moderated somewhat to slightly less than 10% Homewood Neighborhood Profile

Total Population Count, 1940-2000 Neighborhood Pittsburgh # % chng. #

1940 30,990 - 671,659 - 1950 30,235 -2.44% 676,806 0.77% 1960 26,971 -10.80% 604,332 -10.71% 1970 20,266 -24.86% 520,117 -13.94% 1980 15,158 -25.20% 423,938 -18.49% 1990 11,511 -24.06% 369,879 -12.75% 2000 9,283 -19.36% 334,563 -9.55%

Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census. The decline in Homewood has been significantly more precipitous than what has occurred in the City as a whole. From 1940 to 2000, Homewood lost roughly two-thirds of its population--a loss of some 20,000 people from almost 31,000 in 1940 to just a bit more than 9,000 in 2000. While the rate of decline moderated slightly between 1990 and 2000 (19%), it had averaged almost 25% for each ten-year period over the prior thirty years.

As Homewood has lost population, the composition of the remaining residents has changed greatly. In general there has been an appreciable aging of the neighborhood population. In Homewood, between 1970 and 1990, the percentage of the population accounted for by people over the age of 55 increased substantially from about 23% to almost 30%, while the percentage between the ages of 35 and 54 and under 20 both declined substantially from about 62% to about 40%. At the same time, the percentage of the neighborhood population accounted for by people between the ages of 20 and 34 increased from about 15% to about 20%.

Homewood Neighborhood Profile

Population By Age Group, 1970-1990

Neighborhood Pittsburgh 1970 1990 % chng. 1970 1990 % chng. (70 - 90) (70 - 90)

75 yrs. 717 927 29.29% 26,269 28,910 10.05%all 20,266 11,541 -43.05% 520,117 369,879 -28.89%

Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census.

This very generally suggests the possibility that the age group shifts may have been tied to a loss of families with children and a gain among younger as well as older adults. Household composition data generally bears out this possibility but with a few surprising twists. Homewood Neighborhood Profile Household Composition, 1970 1990

Neighborhood Pittsburgh 1970 1990 % chng. 1970 1990 % chng. 70 - 90 70 - 90

Total HH 6,690 4,609 -31.11% 178,016 153,483 -13.78%Family HH 4,931 2,885 -41.49% 127,248 87,455 -31.27% married couple 3,245 1,075 -66.87% 98,576 55,449 -43.75% w. children 1,456 412 -71.70% 47,243 21,931 -53.58% other, male head 259 212 -18.15% 5,649 5,541 -1.91% w. children 73 99 35.62% 1,037 1,992 92.09% other, female head 1,427 1,598 11.98% 23,023 26,465 14.95% w. children 906 1,067 17.77% 10,621 15,351 44.53%Non-Family HH 1,759 1,724 -1.99% 50,768 66,028 30.06% single 1,519 1,527 0.53% 45,201 55,582 22.97% other 240 197 -17.92% 5,567 10,446 87.64%Group Qrtrs. 51 9 -82.35% 17,685 20,838 17.83%Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census.


14

Between 1970 and 1990, the total number of households in Homewood declined by slightly more than 30% from 6,690 to 4,609. At the same time, though, family households declined by about 41% from 4,931 to 2,885. Surprisingly, though, non-family households (single individuals living alone or unrelated individuals living together) held steady, falling from 1,759 households in 1970 to 1,724 in 1990. The only significant gain in Homewood was among female-headed households with children. Because the number of households in Homewood has become progressively smaller, the changes over time are, in terms of absolute numbers, also small. A more telling story comes from an analysis of changes in percentage composition of households. In 1970, married-couple family households accounted for almost 49% of all of the neighborhoods households. By 1990, this ratio has fallen to 23%. Over the same period, family households headed by a single individual increased from 25% to 39% of the total (and single-headed households with children grew from 15% to 25% of the total); and non-family households increased from 26% to 37% of the total. Viewed in terms of traditional cultural values, these kinds of changes represent a significant destabilization of the neighborhoods social fabric. Interpreted less arguably, the suggested destabilization has very likely entailed a dimunition of the neighborhoods economic vitality since losses from the overall population and household base has been greatest among age groups and household types where earning capacity, motivation, and income tends to be highest. In 1979, the median household income for the City of Pittsburgh was $22,630 while the medians in Homewood were about $13,300 in the south and south central parts of the neighborhood, about $14,200 in the southwest and western parts of the neighborhood, and about $18,600 in the northerly parts of the neighborhood. By 1990, while the City median had fallen to about $20,750 the neighborhood medians generally fell even more in percentage terms ranging from place to place from about $8,000 to $12,500. Although changes in the definition of statistical areas make it hard to

measure changes in income over time, it appears that only the area that has been generally defined here as the north central district may have gained with a reported 1989 median of about $19,400. The precise dimensions and origins of change in incomes within Homewood are not of great bearing on the condition of the neighborhood. However it got that way and whatever population shifts may have been contributory, what does have great pertinence is the fact that, Homewood has lost economic vitality both in the absolute sense that household incomes have actually declined and in the relative sense that the disparity between income levels in Homewood and the City as a whole has increased; and, further, simply that Homewood has now become a very low income community. Homewood Neighborhood Profile

Household Income Distribution, 1989 Neighborhood Pittsburgh # % # %

< $10,000 1,988 43.92% 41,113 26.77% $10,000 - $14,999 655 14.47% 17,683 11.51% $15,000 - $24,999 791 17.48% 29,494 19.20% $25,000 - $34,999 484 10.69% 22,724 14.79% $35,000 - $49,999 346 7.64% 20,400 13.28% $50,000 - $99,999 220 4.86% 17,689 11.52%

> $100,000 42 0.93% 4,504 2.93% all 4,526 100.00% 153,607 100.00%

Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census. By 1990, almost 60% of the households in Homewood had annual incomes of less than $15,000 - indicating that the overall median in Homewood in 1989 was well under $15,000 and at least less than 75% of the citywide median. Another 28% had incomes between $15,000 and $35,000; and only about 13% had incomes above $35,000.


15

The Housing Market In 1990, Homewoods housing stock consisted of 5,225 units accommodating 4,609 households. The overall vacancy rate was about 12%, slightly higher than the 10% rate that characterized the City as a whole. Between 1940 and 1990 Homewood lost almost 38% of its housing stock. Most of the decrease, 30%, occurred between 1970 and 1990. This loss very closely parallels the 31% decline in the neighborhoods household base over the same period and this, in turn, suggests that a rough balance was maintained between housing supply and demand during that period.

Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census. In 1990, only 10% of the inventory was less than thirty years old. This suggests that new construction brought an average of about 17 units a year to the market between 1960 and 1990 at an annual rate equal to about 0.3% of the total supply. In 1970, the neighborhoods housing stock consisted of 7,531 units. Assuming that an average of 17 units per year were added to the inventory, roughly 340 new units were built between 1970 and 1990; and, with 5,225 units remaining in 1990, some 2,646 units were removed from the inventory over the period.

Homewood Neighborhood Profile Housing Stock Composition, 1970 1990

Neighborhood Pittsburgh 1970 1990 % chng. 1970 1990 % chng. (70 - 90) (70 - 90)

Total HU 7,531 5,225 -30.62% 189,840 170,159 -10.37% Vacant HU 841 616 -26.75% 11,824 16,676 41.04% Occupied HU 6,690 4,609 -31.11% 178,016 153,483 -13.78% owner occ. HU 2,881 2,178 -24.40% 89,626 80,199 -10.52% renter occ. HU 3,809 2,431 -36.18% 88,590 73,284 -17.28% Owner Vac. % 1.81 4 .10 126.5% 1.10 2.70 145.45% Rental Vac. % 14.78 7.36 -50.2% 7.70 9.80 27.27% Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census. The fact that 35% of the 1970 inventory was removed over a twenty year period and, for the most part, not replaced provides some sense of the impact of vacant properties on the physical context of the neighborhood. While overall vacancies in Homewood actually decreased slightly between 1970 and 1990, the owner vacancy rate increased dramatically indicating to some degree the decreasing desirability and competitive appeal of homeownership opportunities in the neighborhood. At the same time, a dramatic decrease in the rental vacancy rate suggests a possible undersupply of rental housing relative to demand even though renter occupancy declined appreciably between 1970 and 1990. This, in turn, indicates that the inventory removals were disproportionately from the neighborhoods rental stock. In 1990, of the 2,178 owner-occupied units in the neighborhood, 1,449 units or almost 67% were owned by households that were headed by an individual over the age of 55. This proportion is about 50% higher than for the City as a whole and, given the apparent need for rental housing in the neighborhood, it is possibly problematic in that it presents the prospect of a relatively high turnover on owner-occupied homes with the potential for subsequent conversion to rental tenure. In 1990, 2,224 units or almost 43% of the total inventory were single-family detached homes; almost 30% were attached homes (rowhouses, townhouses); and about 27% were multi-family

Homewood Neighborhood Profile Total Housing Unit Count, 1940-2000

Neighborhood Pittsburgh # % chng. # % chng.

1940 8,394 - 179,867 - 1950 8,751 4.25% 193,889 7.80% 1960 8,338 -4.72% 196,168 1.18% 1970 7,531 -9.68% 189,840 -3.23% 1980 6,092 -19.11% 179,191 -5.61% 1990 5,225 -14.23% 170,159 -5.04% 2000 n.a. - n.a. -


16

apartments. While the single-family detached component represented about the same proportion of the inventory in Homewood as it did for the City, Homewood contained a relatively high concentration of attached housing and a relatively low concentration of multi-family housing. Homewood Neighborhood Profile

1990 Housing Stock By Type Neighborhood Pittsburgh # % # %

detached 2,224 42.56% 70,673 41.53% attached 1,536 29.40% 26,632 15.65%

multi-family 1,417 27.12% 70,998 41.72% mobile / other 48 0.92% 1,856 1.09%

total 5,225 100.00% 170,159 100.00% Source: Pittsburgh Department of City Planning, U.S. Census. Based on housing types, this suggests a relatively high rate of homeownership but, in Homewood, the 1990 homeowner rate was only about 47% as compared to 52% for the City as a whole. This then indicates a relatively high incidence of rental tenure in single-family detached and attached housing.


17

Rents and Values 2001 fair market monthly rents in the Pittsburgh region were $389 for an efficiency, $476 for a one-bedroom unit, $574 for a two-bedroom unit, $719 for a three-bedroom unit, and $803 for a four-bedroom unit. Assuming the conventional affordability standard that not more than 30% of household income should be devoted to direct housing costs, a household should have an annual income of roughly $15,000 to afford just an efficiency apartment at the fair market rent value. On this basis, it would appear that well more than half of Homewoods households could not afford to rent a decent efficiency apartment. Because of this, rents in Homewood are low. In 1990, the median contract rent in Homewood was in range of $150 to $200 a month while the median for the City then was in the vicinity of $300. Homewoods prevailing rent levels, even adjusted to reflect escalation over the past ten years, are marginally economic at best. Non-economic rents, of course, translate into inattentive property management and maintenance and gradually progressive physical deterioration; and, given the relatively high proportion of rental housing in Homewood, this helps to explain the modest overall physical context of the neighborhood. This, in turn, presents a compromising influence on values in the homeownership market. From 1997 through 2001, a total of 474 owner-occupied homes were sold in Homewood. This represents an annual average turnover rate of about 4.2%. This is substantially less than the 7% rate for the City in 2000 and it likely reflects the greater stability (lower mobility) of the relatively older age profile of Homewood homeowners. Of the 474 units sold over the five year from 1997 through 2001, 86 were sold at Sheriffs Sales and 238 were sold for less than $10,000. Of the 150 remaining sales, the five-year mean sales price in Census Tracts of the neighborhood ranged from about $23,000 to $39,200.

During the 1997 2001 period, high end sales in the neighborhood ranged generally from around $40,000 to $80,000. $24,050 $39,200 $25,800 $29,020 $36,330 Five-Year Mean Home Sale Prices, 1997-2000. (For sales in excess of $10,000) $35.000-$45,000 $40,000 - $55,000 $40,000-$50,000 $45,000 - $80,000 $40,000 - $75,000 High Range Home Sale Prices, 1997-2000.


18

Indicators of Distress Property in public ownership that is not used for public purposes typically exists as vacant land or dilapidated buildings. Together with privately owned vacant property, they represent an under-utilization of a communitys most basic resource; and, very often, that under-utilization has a strong local blighting influence. In Homewood there is a widespread pattern of public ownership that contributes to an even more pervasive pattern of vacant land that adversely affects every part of the neighborhood. Property in Public Ownership While property in public ownership sometimes represents an important community asset, it also often exists as minimally maintained vacant lots that, in Homewood, are widespread and significant detriments to the quality of the neighborhood.

Property tax liens are reliable indicators of economic distress and they have a high correlation with existing or likely physical deterioration. Again, the pattern of tax liened property in Homewood is extensive and, based on its correlation with physical deterioration, it indicates an extreme level of distress that helps to explain the generally marginally condition of the neighborhoods housing stock. The combined patterns of public, vacant, tax liened and deteriorated properties in Homewood provide a strong indication of the extent of possible blighting influences within the neighborhood. Since elimination of blighting influences is one of the prime objectives of revitalization, this in turn indicates the scope of the challenge that the community faces.


19

Vacant Property High localized concentrations of vacant lots represent areas of significant physical distress. They also represent a high level of opportunity for development intervention since vacant property in distressed communities does not have a ready market and is generally available. Public ownership of buildable vacant property is a serious waste of a citys asset base, but it also provides an important and effective tool for strategic intervention.

Vacant lots, both public and private, are generally abandoned and, where that is the case, they affect the image and value of properties in almost every block in Homewood. As such, they are instances of blight that promote disinvestment throughout the neighborhood; and, because of that, they are primary targets for redevelopment.


20

Tax Liened Property There is an extremely high incidence of tax liened property in Homewood and the pattern of that is pervasive and almost uniform throughout the community. It indicates a very high level of economic distress and it suggests a strong likelihood that physical deterioration will be on-going in the absence of interventions that entail economic diversification of the neigh-borhood population while also building investment incentive for current residents and businesses.

Property tax liens indicate economic distress on the part of individual property owners. The limited ability of property owners with modest means to adequately maintain an increasingly older building stock translates into gradually progressive physical deterioration that erodes the willingness of property owners of less modest means to maintain the value of their investments in the neighborhood.


21

The Neighborhood Balance Sheet The current condition of a neighborhood is always transitory but in severely distressed communities the forces of disinvestment tend to feed on themselves and be mutually reinforcing. For this reason, in the absence of intervention or a fundamental shift in market dynamics, current conditions will worsen. To be effective in turning and re-building a housing market, interventions need to address basic neighborhood strengths and weaknesses in a way that begins and evidences a process of realizing the value potential that may be embedded in the neighborhoods asset base. The goal has to be to capture unrealized value by optimally re-fitting the neighborhoods actual market position to the market potential that is inherent in the fundamental character of its context. Every neighborhood has its balance sheet. Its assets and its liabilities each may be inherent or acquired, strong or weak, well or badly used, productive or unproductive. Its net worth may represent realized value or it may hide potential that could be obtained through strategic redeployment of resources and restructuring of liabilities. To carry the analogy just one step more, community development balance sheet analysis requires an investigation of the fundamentals that might be hidden by a report of transitory current conditions at any one point in time. The Homewood neighborhoods most basic

and enduring resources are the attributes of its location.

It is relatively central to the Pittsburgh region.

It enjoys relatively good accessibility with

fairly direct connections to the major regional highway system.

It is relatively close to Pittsburghs major

urban employment centers in Oakland and the central business district.

The Busway East and major street bus routes through the neighborhood offer generally convenient and good public transportation.

Having strong physically defined boundaries,

it is relatively self-contained, identifiable, and isolated from adjacent communities.

The Homewood neighborhoods greatest and most fundamental deficiency is the markets negative perception of the community as a place to live. While this perception reflects a very apparent distressed physical condition that, in turn, is closely related to the very modest economic profile of the resident population; those conditions are regarded more as liability issues that can be restructured to some meaningful degree through physical revitalization and economic diversification, but only if market perceptions can be changed. In re-establishing a more optimal fit for the neighborhood relative to its inherent asset potential, the neighborhood balance sheet presents a range of building blocks assets that should be reinforced and capitalized as well as a range of detrimental liabilities that should be negated or minimized. Selected Assets Selected Liabilities


22

Neighborhood Building Assets

Frankstown Avenue as a strong orienting spine and as a potential marketing tool it bisects the neighborhood from east to west and provides a basic structural foundation for the organization of the neighborhood. As a major through street, it also offers high visibility to traffic from within and outside the neighborhood.

The basic street grid it is largely intact and gives definition and legibility to the structure of the neighborhood, in turn offering in-place infrastructure and a strong existing context for neighborhood improvements. Legible breaks in the grid offer opportunities for the differentiation of places within the neighborhood.

The existing housing stock it includes a diverse range of housing types that are generally varied from place to place to create a pattern of different residential districts that, in turn, support potentially varied market orientations. While generally of modest condition, throughout the neighborhood the pattern includes sub-districts where a legible traditional residential character remains in the form of relatively good housing that has been relatively well maintained.

Vacant lots they are widely scattered throughout the neighborhood and, as the basic building block for making new neighborhood improvements, they provide a significant opportunity for revitalization.

Alleys in many parts of the neighborhood, they are an integral part of the existing street grid and they offer opportunities for parking and service that preserve the consistency of the streetface character on principal residential streets.

Good institutions Carnegie Library, Community College of Allegheny County, the YWCA, the YMCA, the Montessori Magnet School, a variety of other neighborhood schools, churches.

Long-time residents almost 70% of Homewoods residents have lived there for more than 5 years.

Neighborhood Building Liabilities Concentrated poverty it is estimated that 30% of Homewood households now have annual incomes of less than $10,000 and more than 50% have incomes under $25,000.

Poor front doors the principal points on entry to the community are weak. Taken together, the quality of the uses and the character of these front-doors create a poor image of the neighborhood and this perception effectively limits the neighborhoods development potential.

Frankstown Avenue as the major street into, through, and out of the neighborhood, it is disjointed and sterile: mixed uses are sometimes unrelated and incompatible; the streetscape is barren; the physical condition of existing development is extremely modest; vacant lots dominate the image of the street. Being both commercial and residential in character, the marginal character of each makes the street neither. It has no identity.

The business district it is economically depressed and physically blighted, offering little value to the neighborhood as an anchor or in terms of service or employment opportunities provided.

Deteriorated housing conditions while the structure of Homewoods residential districts is strong and some blocks of good housing are scattered throughout the community, the prevailing condition of the housing stock is deteriorated.

Problem Properties several clusters of highly concentrated, severely deteriorated housing constitute blighting influences that have impact well beyond their immediate settings.

Streetscape character there is little distinction between the public and private domain and, in general, the functional character of Homewoods streets, including most of its residential streets, is unalleviated by amenity either within the public right-of-way or in private front yards.

Vacant lots and alleys While vacant lots are an improvement as compared to a deteriorated, abandoned house, on a block-by-block basis they still are blighting influences that negatively affect perceptions, downgrade realizable property values, and remain as incentives to disinvestment. While alleys are advantageous ingredients in the structure of the neighborhood, they are usually neglected and their poorly maintained and poorly lit condition detracts from the quality and image of the neighborhood.

Distressed neighbors neighboring communities are generally distressed, in some cases as severely so as Homewood. They provide few assets that can be borrowed as building blocks for Homewood and, absent strong borders, their condition imperils revitalization efforts inside Homewood.


23

Part Two: Neighborhood Building Issues Basic Issues Neighborhood distress tends to be multi-faceted with parts that work together to impoverish the sense of community that makes neighborhoods good places to live. As much as houses collectively give value to the larger neighborhood where they are located, they also take their value from their neighborhood. Building housing just for the sake of building housing is different than building neighborhoods. A house is essentially a shelter device; but the qualities of a good neighborhood provide much more than just decent and affordable shelter. Distressed communities are, at best, imperiled neighborhoods. They have lost some of the essential qualities that make them habitable and their diminished attractiveness as places to live threatens their basic sustainability as neighborhoods. While the adequacy of the shelter provided by the housing stock in those neighborhoods may be severely compromised, incidental and non-strategic house building does not assure that the qualities of a good neighborhood will be put back into the community. If the quality of the neighborhood is not addressed, the objective of realizing value from the development of individual houses will be compromised. In the process of neighborhood building, the agenda for housing development has to extend beyond the provision of shelter. 1. The Physical Agenda: In many cases, the physical context of distressed neighborhoods has been blown out. While distressed neighborhoods may have inherent natural attributes and pockets of development where the physical character is still relatively good, they often suffer from widespread severe deterioration. Much of the housing stock has simply been lost in many areas, vacant lots and abandoned houses are more common than occupied

homes. Most of the remaining housing stock is compromised by inadequate maintenance and upkeep. In this setting, the sense of physical blight is overwhelming and, within the context of the neighborhood, the basic physical agenda for new housing development is to create not just new houses but rather new housing that makes new neighborhood places where, in the context of each place, there are the attributes of a good, habitable, and sustainable neighborhood that will encourage people to live there. 2. The Economic Agenda: Deteriorating neighborhoods are a fact of urban life. What gets built gets old. Where there is effective demand in a functional market, the life of a neighborhood can be extended based on continual reinvestment. In distressed neighborhoods, though, existing housing demand is generally ineffective and the housing market is largely dysfunctional. Where there is ineffective demand in a dysfunctional market, both the capacity and the motivation for reinvestment is diminished. In the absence of reinvestment, disinvestment occurs naturally as the housing stock ages and it is expressed in the form of physical deterioration that tends to spread gradually and to become increasingly discouraging to reinvestment. The result is that disinvestment tends to be both self-perpetuating and progressive in the absence of interventions that encourage and enable new investment in the form of new development that is not otherwise supported by prevailing market dynamics. The resources that are needed for effective interventions are limited and a basic economic agenda for new development is to optimize the relationship between the investment required and the catalytic impact of that investment in building back both the capacity and the motivation for self-sustaining private investment. 3. The Social Agenda: Neighborhoods that are decaying physically and economically impoverished are usually also socially distressed. Typically, distressed neighborhoods have lost the


24

market fit that once made them viable neighborhoods. However that may have occurred, their problems now revolve largely around a population with very limited incomes and the solution to those problems, the social agenda for new housing development, inevitably lies in diversifying the neighborhood financially either by raising the condition of its residents or by attracting new people to live there or, preferably, by doing both. The Role of Real Estate Development Real estate development is not very good at raising peoples incomes. In the long run, it can be a strategy for building the wealth of a neighborhood but, while it may be able to provide a few job opportunities, it can only really provide just a hopefully conducive context for encouraging people to improve themselves. What real estate development is all about, though, is the process of providing a competitively advantageous product to an appropriate market; and where this is done in a way, a strategic way, that is successful, it attracts demand to it, demand that may have been previously compromised or even latent because the suitable product wasnt available. By strategically responding to unaddressed or poorly served needs in the market, new housing development can attract demand to it even in a distressed market setting and, by doing that, it puts into place physical improvements that demonstrate change and positively influence market perceptions. Changed perceptions in turn set in motion fundamental forces that encourage reinvestment and affect the dynamics in the market in a way that progressively introduces elements of diversification contributing critically to a more vital and sustainable community. The Change Process Effective change is change that becomes embedded in the context where it occurs so that it is functional and form-giving rather than superficial. In a market context, demand is motivated by perceptions and it is important to recognize that, while perceptions are

in the realm of market psychology, they are nonetheless real, functional, and form-giving as a market force. Viewed as an economic development agenda, the essence of neighborhood building is investment and, in distressed neighborhoods, investor psychology is generally negative so that the process of re-building a neighborhood is a matter of influencing investor perceptions where the investor is most critically the population that lives or might live in the neighborhood. Neighborhood marketing, promotion, and re-merchandising can help to change perceptions, but the real building block for influencing market perceptions has to be physical improvements that represent a substantive physical change to what is most apparent as a cause of disinvestment. Clearly, as a starting point, new development has to attack and eradicate physical blight by addressing vacant lots, dilapidated property, and, where appropriate for the purposes of effective neighborhood building, instances of non-conforming or otherwise marginal use. Because blighting influences tend to be pervasive in severely distressed neighborhoods, the process of eliminating blight has to be pursued either comprehensively at a very large scale or selectively and strategically at a more limited scale so that change is apparent. Change that is not apparent has limited impact. Because comprehensive physical renewal typically requires a scale of investment that exceeds generally available resources, a uniformly new market setting usually cant be created throughout a neighborhood in a single step and the opportunity to attract new and more diverse demand to the neighborhood tends to be limited during the early stages of physical revitalization. As a result, as physical changes are made, the process of building a neighborhood has to work from step to step with the needs, interests, and potential of demand groups that can be realistically addressed within the context of a neighborhoods market setting. As physical changes are made from place to place within a neighborhood, each of those places has to


25

be reconstituted to provide new housing in a new setting that will be attractive to market segments that are reasonably accessible based on the competitive attributes of the housing that is created. Where change is effective, it becomes embedded in the context of the neighborhood and each reconstituted place then serves as a rung in a ladder that supports another step up. At each step, incremental investments create new places that add physical, economic, and social value to the neighborhood so as to reinforce and enlarge a sense of change that supports a progressive expansion and diversification of the market. Housing Market Dynamics Between 1970 and 2000, the City of Pittsburgh population declined from 520,117 to 334,563--a loss of just about 35%. Over the same period, the number of households in the City declined from 178,016 to 143,739--a loss of almost 20%. The Citys housing stock declined from 189,840 to 163,365 units--a loss of 14%. But, during the same time, the housing vacancy rate increased from about 6.3% to 12% and the absolute number of vacant housing units in the City increased from 11,824 to 19,627 units for a gain of slightly more than 65%. In a market with a declining household base, the demand for new housing is derived primarily from the need to replace substandard units in order to maintain a market-wide balance between quantitative demand and supply and, secondarily, from the need to create a better qualitative fit between the available housing stock and the ever-evolving needs and interests of housing consumers. In a fluid market setting, these demand forces are at least theoretically inter-related: construction of a new unit that satisfies market interests provides an inventory addition which, when occupied, frees another unit for a trade-up occupant. As the trade-up transactions trickle through the market from house to house or apartment to apartment, the process allows for the removal of the least desirable units from the bottom of the market so that, overall, the functional characteristic of the housing stock is enhanced and a quantitative

balance between market supply and demand is maintained. In Pittsburgh, as in many older cities, this process has broken down. In the absence on new housing supply that effectively addresses available demand so as to maintain a quantitatively balanced market while eliminating substandard housing from the stock, more longevity is demanded from the existing inventory even though a significant part of the inventory may have already outlived its useful, competitive life. When the demand base shrinks faster than non-competitive housing units are removed from the inventory, vacancies increase. As the number of demand units (i.e., households) in the Pittsburgh market has declined, the removal of obsolete housing has not kept pace thus precipitating gradually increasing levels of vacancy which, then, have given rise to disinvestment which, in turn, tends to advance the pace of physical and functional obsolescence and precipitate further market instability. The general result is an increasingly aged housing inventory with decreasing quality and functionality and increasing vacancy levels comprised of non-competitive housing that constitutes an ever-increasing proportion of the total housing inventory. New housing production in urban areas is generally constrained by the scarcity of available land at locations that are attractive to market segments where demand is effective that is, those segments where the rents and values that are required to support new construction are affordable to the existing or potential demand base. New construction in cities tends to be relegated now to non-prime locations where effective demand is least available and where available demand tends to be least effective. The result is that new development generally must involve a scale of change to the characteristics of a non-prime location sufficient to attract effective demand to it. Where that cant be done, it must address niche market opportunities where the housing product is seen as being sufficiently unique or otherwise competitively advantageous to counteract the deterrent of a non-prime location relative to the interests of a specific segment of effective demand.


26

Since there is relatively little opportunity for new urban development in prime locations, development in response to demand in the upper ranges of the market is limited by the scarcity of suitable land and does not encourage sufficient production to support a functional trickle-down process as a means of improving the quality of housing supply at the lower ranges of the market. Because of this, the need to maintain a housing supply that is both quantitatively and qualitatively balanced to reflect demand has to be addressed through revitalization of distressed neighborhoods where the opportunity for development, in the form of under-utilized property, is greatest. Because of conditions and market forces in those areas, it has to be addressed, at least initially, in terms of market demand that is financially ineffective relative to the cost of new housing construction. Housing Need / Demand Potential Distressed neighborhoods are non-prime locations. Where distress is severe and pervasive, realistic opportunities to address niche markets or to otherwise develop at a scale sufficient to attract effective demand are limited and the available demand base is therefore generally ineffective relative to the cost of new housing. But, even in the face of a shrinking demand base and an increasing incidence of ineffective demand, there is still a basic and critical need for new housing based on the progressively decreasing serviceability of the existing housing stock. This need is measured as replacement housing demand and that demand is greatest in the Citys distressed neighborhoods where housing conditions are most compromised. At the same time, that demand is also most acute with respect to the needs of the Citys lower income population since affordability considerations tend to relegate tho

Homewood Neighborhood Revitalization Plan

Documents

Transcript of Homewood Neighborhood Revitalization Plan