if nothing else, it’s FANTASTIC PR.
heaven forbid you’re mildly inconvenienced for a week for the chance at hosting a huge political conference with head dignitaries and having the international spotlight shined on our beautiful city for an entire week.
I hear what you’re saying about the PR, but do you think it will actually have any impact after the event? Will anyone say, “Wow, the G-20 was in Pittsburgh. Let’s go their for our vacation.” I guess it could increase the chances of hosting symposiums or meetings, although those things are usually centered around the locations of the businesses dealing with the topics of discussion, or for commercial business, someplace that is a nice vacation spot.
mildly? half the city has to work from home!!! i wouldnt call that mild. yeah so the city will be clean for a week and it will go back to being a dump. i want long term fixes for pittsburgh not short term band aids. i think we have the same goal but two completely different ways to get there… i not about summits and casinos, i’m for better public safety/public works and manufacturing
Not because of the fact that the G-20 is here…but they might say “wow, I always thought Pittsburgh was a post-apocalyptic smokey former steel producing wasteland with no economy, but it looks clean and beautiful and their economy is thriving”. Then they hear the newscasters talking about how it was ranked the country’s most liveable city, get to hear about how nice everything is, and then people think “maybe I should move there” or “maybe I should relocate our corporate headquarters there” or “maybe we should open up a plant there”…
i can agree with this…
part of the problem of the steel mills is… they took a lot of the land and made it into shopping districts. the waterfront is nice but those are the types of business and jobs that make a huge impact on a city. We should be luring as much out of places like detroit as we can.
Wow. Not having to drive into work and fight traffic, not having to find a babysitter… that all sounds terribly inconvenient.
And if you think Pittsburgh is a dump, then you obviously have no been to many other major cities. Go scope out Philly, Baltimore, Indianapolis, NYC, Louisville, St. Louis… etc.
Pittsburgh is a sparkling gem compared to most other major cities. very low crime, low poverty level, hardly any homeless… yeah there’s construction going on, yeah there’s some grafitti, yeah the roads aren’t perfect… but Pittsburgh is an OLD city, not designed for the 21st century. All in all we’re leaps and bounds above almost any other city out there.
Better Public Safety/Public Works and Manufacturing are definitely goals to strive for, but those things are a BYPRODUCT of what I’m trying to say. When you have the “summits and casinos”, then you will lure in more businesses and people. More of that = more tax dollars. More tax dollars = better public safety/public works. When people want to move here, live here, retire here, start families here, raise their kids here, build their businesses here, etc… thats when you will see new manufacturing jobs and such start to spring up. The fact that we’re making the significant improvements that we are, despite this global recession really speaks volumes. Mark my words… Pittsburgh will be the new hotness in 3-5 years. Maybe 5-10.
You say that like it’s a bad thing. The best thing that could have ever happened was those old mills being turned into mixed use complexes. The city of the 21st century doesn’t want industry downtown… and it shouldn’t. The city should be like it is now… where you go to see a game, go to school, work a white collar job, shop, see a play/musical, museums, aviaries, conservatories, cultural districts, etc.
We can have our industry, but it should be in the smaller towns outside of the city. The Monessens, Neville Island’s, etc. Keeps the traffic, eyesores, filth, etc out of the direct city. The blue collar workers can live in the cheaper housing in the small town where their job is. Don’t have to fight traffic/waste time and money commuting.
We are going to be so fucking tits when the economy turns around in 6-12 months.
i dont want to compare pittsburgh to other citys… its needs to be compared to itself. it can be so much better if we stop putting the same old politics in office year after year. we finanlly had a guy that was really passionate in bob O but we ended up stuck with the the smart aleck kid that you wanted to kick the shit out of in high school. We dont need a “rockstar” mayor like he seems to thrive on. See luke is someone who will do just enough to keep getting elected and be mayor forever… i want someone who will do great things for pittsburgh so it will allow them to move to better things. You can run the city into the shitter and try and run for governer…you better have good things to back u up.
So you’re saying that you want me to run for Mayor? I’ll give it some thought. But since you’re so passionate abut this, perhaps you would care to join me in volunteering some of your time to actually make the city nicer?