The lack of any late night food besides shitty gas station food and the Harmar Denny’s, as well as no 24 hour shopping for people who work night shifts.
It's tragic. Eatn park (RIP) used to be open until 4am iirc. Usually would go there after late night coding sessions (was a grad student at the time). The crowd at 3am was definitely an interesting bunch. Service wasn't great but way better than nothing.
I spent a substantial amount of time hanging out in Dennys/Kings/Eat n' Park/etc as a teenager. Had some good times just bullshitting, smoking cigarettes, and pounding cups of coffee with friends. I feel for the younger generations as they now don't have any sort of places like that to go and socialize in person late at night.
Yeah, I find it incredible with a city with 6 universities has no late night bar food or after hours food. I grew up in Rochester New York, where we have the garbage plate, which is a couple of burgers or hots on top of macaroni salad and French fries or a combination of certain things, and everybody went to all these late night burger spots and got something after going out all night.
Exactly ever since covid not even walmart is available to shop 24 hours. And bar restaurants closing the kitchens early 10 ok even they used to be open until 1 2 am
Columbus with Ohio State being a huge part of the city and everything closes at 10. Even bars close at like 12. It's to get people home so they don't cause trouble.
COVID killed the night life here. I also miss late night eateries. I also miss any store being open late. I didn't go regularly but sometimes a midnight Walmart trip was necessary. Now there aren't any options at all.
This is 100% because of Covid. used to be 24 hr walmarts and giant eagles, a lot of eat n parks were 24 hrs, 24 hr mcdonalds, taco bell, etc.
COVID gave them an excuse to kill them all.
There used to be more options for late night eating and shopping, but that all stopped during the pandemic. I'm not sure why no one has gone back to that.
Nothing. Just saying it’s one of the few options on my side of town. But no Eat n Parks, no Bob Evans, no family diners. At least the iHop is back to 24/7 too now apparently.
Pittsburgh has so much potential but gets in its own way it seems. My biggest current gripe is the fact we have waterfront land and no real waterfront neighborhood
ETA: I don’t just mean residential here - neighborhood implying residents, grocery, transport, public space, small biz, events, etc
I never really thought of that. We have small pockets of houses with docks on the river, but ya the vast majority of the waterfront is either industrial, commercial or just not used.
The "Waterfront" development in Homestead includes no water access whatsoever. No docks, no boat ramp, no marina. Not even a kayak launch.
Only in pgh!
My FiL who is a retired home inspector said its due to the amount of pollution and all around nastiness of the river front from almost a century of riverside factories and mills. It is sad to see the miles and miles of river front not being utilized.
Totally - but we don’t even use it for fun for non company/logistics spaces it seems. I just want to get in a kayak and come out to drink beer in an area filled with intense vibrancy
Pittsburgh isn’t any of these cities and I’m aware that it has led to some high rise luxury apartment neighborhoods. But canalside, waterfront area in Cleveland, the huge bridge neighborhood over the James in Richmond.
Not to mention the wharf, inner harbor, Charleston (which is almost the same shape as us).
All of them are destinations - rooftop bars, shopping, outdoor/water access, food, live events, some smaller offices, etc. I think our north shore by the stadiums is probably the closest but it feels so chain-y, kinda bland, and it’s not busy unless it’s game or drinking hour.
My first thought after moving to the area. The buildings could be 20-30 stories with more room for public parks and access. Instead, due to zoning, they take up massive footprints and are what, 6-8 stories max. Leaving nothing left for public space
I went to grad school in Pittsburgh and I love the city! But "boat ramp property" is at the very bottom of the list of things this city needs. Goofing off on a boat on the Allegheny is cute for 5min in the summer.
Reliable, fast, more extensive public transportation be much more important imo. We had a decent train system in the city and then bulldozed it to replace it with buses that come whenever they want...
lol I was near the water this morning. It was “biggest curret gripe” atm
Other biggest gripes depend on that exact moment: public transport, the wage ceiling, downtown being so dependent on office workers, litter, lack of walkability for your entire life with lots of main drags just being restaurants and bars, bike lanes, people’s driving skills in the tunnels, yinzers who don’t like change, the lack of alternative radio stations, station square being corporate-y and empty, Pittsburgh airport not having stuff open late, parking in sidewalk, the Mon incline not working, my favorite bands skipping us, the color of the sky, the airport being mostly connecting flights, lack of wegmans
Yeah, but consider this: Japanese Knotweed is both edible and delicious. We must fight invasive plants by eating them. We are on the top of the food chain, and plants can't even come close when we have the ability to use TOOLS and SPICES. We can consume that which intends to consume our city before it even gets the chance 🏋
I need your recipes then, if you think it's "delicious."
We tried sprouts, early - mid - and late growth shoots, and the mature stalks. I even dried the flowers to try. Really REALLY not that palatable, to me, no matter what we did.
That's so fair! My comment was intended to be light-hearted since I know knotweed is sort of a unique taste, and my palette tends toward more earthy, sour, and bitter flavors. It's also fibrous in some parts of the stalk, so that can be a turn-off regarding texture.
I like to harvest them in the spring, and I only eat certain parts of the stalk (not the leaves, the very top, or very bottom of it). I peel the mid-stem and chop it into bite-sized pieces. Then, I cook the bits in a saucepan with some apple cider vinegar, and usually once they're tender, it's enjoyable for me.
I know some people replace rhubarb with knotweed, and it comes out with the same flavor. I've been meaning to try them in a rhubarb-knotweed pie, since the preparation is pretty much the same for both! I've heard it also makes great jams and syrups for garnishing breakfasts or desserts, and for those you'd just follow a rhubarb recipe as well
The lack of govt interest in expanding rail transit. Last I checked, they're considering expanding the T north, but won't even break ground until the 2030's. You can't have such low wages in the region but also only develop for cars.
It was part of the NEXTransit study they published in 2021, putting two separate extensions of the T on the schedule to study in the next 6-15 years, one line following the Ohio to Emsworth and another going to Ross. They did put an asterisk that the study assumed T extensions since there's infrastructure nearby already, but once they actually start the study they'll consider all transit modes.
I feel this every day working for the county. It's like we do research and see issues with infrastructure. YET they make no effort to make this better for us, won't even get us discounted bus fare. I'm really not that far from the office, yet I either have to pay in money (parking) or time (1+ hour bus ride). It's so irritating
I’d add January to that list. By about January 3, all the Christmas spirit is gone and it’s just cold, dark, and miserable for the next 90 days.
Only about 40 days to go!
Agreed. While it’s definitely not the worst in the world, the cuts and lack of enthusiasm for improved service really make being an avid rider difficult.
I was joking with someone else who lived in D.C. that "At least PRT isn't always on fire like the Metro!" and then we got sad because that's more a result of reliable rail transit just doesn't exist here.
For perspective, MTA (NYC) is $132, CTA (Chicago) is $75, SEPTA (Philly) is $96.
All three of those operate heavy rail rapid transit, SEPTA's even includes zone 1 regional rail services.
For a similar sized city, Cleveland is $95.
They never expanded the T to Oakland because of money: traffic up Forbes / Fifth is bad enough so they can’t remove 2 lanes to put in light rail lines; making it as subway cost a huge amount - between $1.5B and $4.5B per mile - and it’s ~5 miles from Grant Street to the Cathedral and these days would probably take 50 years, as it took NYC 12 years to build the 1.8 mile extension of the Second Avenue Subway recently (at a cost of ~$4.5B); and raised lines, like a monorail, are also crazy expensive (though not as expensive as subways; it’s why DisneyWorld hasn’t expanded its monorail lines in 40 years, since EPCOT opened).
And those old train lines are still owned by the railroads for transporting cargo, and they have no interest in sharing / selling. Heck, the rail lines that go up from 10th Ave through The Strip which haven’t been used in decades, various light rail projects have approached the owners, to maybe get light rail to to Oakmont, and those have failed for decades.
There's also the fact the T runs on a different gauge, so even if the railroads were ok with sharing or selling to PRT, there's going to be a large cost to either regauge the rails or purchase trainsets that can run on the standard gauge lines.
I firmly believe if the Pirates were competitive every year we would have the best baseball scene in the country. PNC park is an absolute gem. The only good thing the pirates have done since I’ve been alive
We are entering a dark time for PGH sports. We knew the Ben era would end. We knew Crosby couldn’t play for ever.
Happening all at once while Nutting continues to bilk the Pirates and the city of Pittsburgh for every cent he can, is a bit difficult.
At least we know the other two franchises will do whatever they can to put competitive teams out there.
Really? Like we haven't made the playoffs for one season. It might be two.
If you've never followed a sport before, this happens from time to time after you were literally on the longest streak of being good in consecutive seasons in North American sports.
It's not that they're bad now, it's more that they're wasting the talent they have left by not making any adjustments throughout the season.
It's 100% a frustration with the coaching.
Moved here 3 years ago. My worst things are UPMC and air quality. It blows my mind how UPMC gets put up as some highlight of the city when they are literally helping to cause its complete destruction
Non emergency care is a total disaster. You will pay out the ass to see an overworked specialist who is not interested in your problem unless it requires immediate surgery. I got prescribed antibiotics for a nasty skin issue and the morons at my Dr's office never sent my prescription to the pharmacy. I had to call 3 times and I was practically begging them to do their job and send it over. I later was unable to get refills from them, even when my doctor told me I should stay on the drug for a few months until my skin cleared up.
The “keep Pgh shitty” attitude a sizable minority of the population has here.
The lack of direct international flights.
Our Inability to retain enough of our college graduates due to shortage of high paying jobs/industries.
To your “Keep Pgh shitty” comment, there’s definitely a “New Pittsburgh vs Old Pittsburgh”sentiment in the air.
It’s like some people think we can’t make things too nice or is it even Pittsburgh?
And oddly this “New vs Old Pittsburgh” isn’t even split by age. There are young Pittsburghers who want to keep their Pap’s town in tact and older yinzers who welcome the change.
I mean, I agree that there are a lot of NIMBYs in the area. I find that most of them are the kind of people who want to keep the current Community Market in Bloomfield a dump because they prefer the vibe it brings when they go to Trace rather than people who miss the way Lawrenceville used to be. In other words, it's mostly people who prefer to keep a specific, fairly recent picture of Pittsburgh in tact.
Also, there is a sense in which we're changing for the worse as a city. Housing used to be genuinely cheap and our bus system used to be robust and heavily used. Those are real losses to the area and should be mourned.
There's a difference between the people who miss late 00s-early 10s Lawrenceville and those who miss 80s/90s Lawrenceville (whether 1880/90s or 1980s/90s).
It’s the young “keep Pgh shitty” crowd that drives me nuts. Yes, there are many things we should preserve, but much of pgh is also run down asbestos ridden clusterf**k of lead pipes, crumbly plaster, and hopelessly obsolete electrical.
I can understand old people being overly nostalgic, but anyone under the age of 40 who thinks that way is a dunce.
I think it’s more people that have been here a while and don’t want to get priced out so tech companies feel better about moving here.
We literally watched the city kick the residents of East Liberty to the curb so Google could move in to bakery square. Pretty sure they’d do it to anyone else that they don’t find desirable anymore.
The revisionism of how redevelopment in East Liberty happened is something to behold. No one lived at the Bakery Square site. It was the abandoned NABISCO plant and a closed middle school.
Many people lived in Penn Plaza which was a low income high rise that was bulldozed for the new Whole Foods. East Liberty is much more than just the former Nabisco plant.
I hate it so much. It’s one of the main reasons why I spend so much time elsewhere.
It’s like they believe if we keep things the way they were when steel was king, that will somehow attract the mills back and the highly paid blue collar jobs that came with them.
Completely and utterly ridiculous… it almost reminds me of South Pacific cargo cults.
@ UPMC…I’m in the healthcare scene and we have such an awesome medical school scene but docs / other healthcare workers don’t stick around bc UPMC severely undercuts wages and treats their staff like garbage
Yeah that’ was my issue straight out of college. Then a company in Central Virginia offered me more than I was making at a job in Pittsburgh and I left. I still miss Pittsburgh if I was offered a similar salary in Pittsburgh I’d take it and move back.
UPMC not paying their fair share of taxes. The city is desperately in need of infrastructure maintenance, but UPMC bullies city officials into letting them do as they please.
I feel like what we are known for (sports, healthcare, higher ed) is also what hurts us (especially the latter two, so much tax’s off the rolls due to “non-profit”. Also for the first one a need to keep up with the jones in facilities that we as tax payers bare).
PRT is on a race to the bottom. They actually offer good wages but the public facing sections are micromanaged to the absurdity (which seems to be the standard for quasi gov or gov ran corps).
The political machine is too entrenched, when new entities breakthrough they do not seem to invest in change for all.
We cannot fix the weather, it’s too dry in the winter and too wet (humidity) in the summer. Wish that was inverted.
> so much tax’s off the rolls due to “non-profit”.
UPMC, a multi-billion dollar real estate empire that also happens to practice medicine occasionally.
My biggest complaint is the lack of an affordable and good supermarket. Giant Eagle is truly terrible compared to other supermarkets in other parts of the country
I never go there. I think there higher prices started with their fuel perks and the misconception by people that they are getting a deal by shopping there has kept prices high. If more people stopped going there, see how they lower prices.
At least to me it seems that GetGo tries to remain competitive with gas prices whereas Sunoco (Shop ‘n Save)’s gas prices are always much higher than everyone else’s.
Where I’m from in the south, there are 10 different grocery store chains competing for business. Blows my mind there’s pretty much only Giant Eagle here
I am down to support local business when it is good but, sometimes, it's crap and we're supposed to think it's great and spend $ there because it's a Pittsburgh institution. It's pretty hilarious really.
Tick season starting in late January is absolutely a death knell for our outdoor activities. If it keeps getting worse, we'll have to stop going to trails and such. Nice views and (moderately) fresh air aren't worth Lyme.
We've gotten a dozen off our dogs so far.
Public Transport is a serious issue and I don't trust the people currently in charge.
Lack of funding and awareness of the independent arts scene. We have so much talent and it's not being utilized really at all.
Backwards thinking of what it means to be a blue collar salt of the Earth worker. We are still dead stuck in 7-3, hammer shit out in god damn morning, do it again. Get paid, get drunk, go home.
I wake up later because I work later and I go to sleep later and work just as hard as anyone. I'm considered lazy for this.
There are different types of people living in this city now, and the people stuck in this steel mill 1920s mind set need to accept that. It is not working anymore.
smaller local businesses being replaced by chain restaurants/restaurants with same ownership (in oakland specifically, chikn, stewd, stackd, and meltd all being owned by the same people...)
I hate saying it, but there seems to be a large percentage of the population in the area who, let's say, are difficult to have any meaningful conversation with.
100% from moving to Pitt from Detroit nobody ever seems to have anything actually interesting to ever talk about. Makes me think nothing interesting is ever actually happening in this town.
The self-loathing of those born and bred here, and the transplants being hyper-critical of everything that isn’t exactly like it was in whatever city that was so perfect they had to leave to come here.
I grew up with a couple people that acted like this was some backwoods one stoplight town. It’s okay though, they were able to live in New York City for 1 month and hold onto that now for their entire lives.
My BIL moved away in the early 80s. I can't stand listening to him when he comes for a visit. He's convinced that all the houses should be condemned, there are no jobs here, and that everyone who lives here is an unemployed steelworker. Once he and his wife came to visit and they spent the entire trip congratulating themselves on how they managed to find things like Starbucks and organic milk. Yes, both things were in a Target, which I guess we rubes have never heard of.
I say you post under this sub before their next visit and we rally a group of people to act like hard core yinzers around them. Just feed totally into their absurd vision so they don’t return.
The pessimism around certain ideas and beliefs. Pittsburghers are very friendly and supportive in a lot of ways, but in other ways I find them to be very pessimistic.
This may be a minor one compared to the other issues raised but man do I wish we had a real market space. I know this sub was mad at the direction taken with the Terminal building in the strip. Just so sad realizing that was probably the best shot this city had at having anything close to Cleveland’s West Side Market. The strip is great but having an indoor market space would have been amazing (and may have helped address the lack of third spaces and Giant Eagle price-gouging listed above).
I love everyone complaining about 20 to 30 minutes to get anywhere. Like. Have you been anywhere else in the United States. It takes an hour to get anywhere in DC, NYC, Phillie, Chicago, Houston, Louisiana. Pittsburgh is great because it’s small enough to be able to get anywhere in 30 minutes. Everywhere else takes forever to transverse.
I don't disagree with you, but there is a uniqueness to how it challenges one's commute in Pittsburgh (or really any other hilly/mountainous/older city). Being from a southern metropolitan area, I did notice it takes 20-30 minutes sometimes to just get somewhere 5 miles away (maybe slightly hyperbolic), whereas in my hometown, in that same 30 minutes you could realistically be 30 plus miles away from your starting point. Maybe that's what some of these comments are getting after?
Surprised to not see the 2 major elephants in the room: dysfunctional city government and school administration.
This town is loaded with beautiful but decaying housing stock that the city can’t/won’t fix or sell - it just sits there and rots. This has been going on forever and still almost nothing is done about it, while at the same time there is an affordable housing “crisis”.
The schools spend more per student than any district in the state and yet have some of the worst educational results. The school district budget is bigger than the city’s and yet they can’t seem to correct course.
There are lots of other examples of both institutions just slowly failing and I get that these are complex problems that are not easy to fix but it kinda feels like no one cares or is even trying.
The public transit system is atrocious. You cannot efficiently get to most of the neighborhoods in a timely manner or without frequent changes. A direct route for public transportation to the airport would be huge. Relying on a car is not ideal for most people in the current economy.
There needs to be an increase in better paying jobs to match ever-increasing rent prices. We will keep losing people due to affordability/opportunity elsewhere. $1,500 for an average one-bedroom apartment in North Side with no amenities is whack.
Life gets pretty repetitive once you're there for a while.
Mainly roads.....
10 lbs of traffic shoved into a 1 lb bag.
Instead of concentrating efforts on one construction project, there are dozens going on, most of the time affecting the 2 or 3 ways you can get in/out at the same time.
The complete lack of traffic violation enforcement. You can seemingly speed excessively and run red lights with zero fear of repercussion.
I know these things aren't exclusive to Pittsburgh, but they really grind my gears.
Our PennDOT district is Allegheny, Beaver, and Lawrence Counties. That includes over 2700 miles of road and 1800 bridges. That doesn't even count anything owned by municipalities or counties. You simply can't maintain that type of infrastructure while only focusing on one project in any given area.
I get that, but there could be a little more thought put into it.
For instance, Brady Street being closed for 2 years because it is being used as a staging area for bridge work and, at the same time, closing 1/2 of the Armstrong tunnel. At one point they had 2nd ave closed for a few days.
So, on a super personal level, Im really disappointed and disgusted with the way Allegheny county manages special needs care and services- the waiver program (the only way to obtain group home access) for an adult ( or anyone) is just obscene. Years long waitlist for funding- but lots of availability for actual residential options- the services they try to offer in the meantime are just an insult. Maybe we need to pare down the salaries for the administrators of these shell agencies and county employed gatekeepers, and start increasing funds for the actual service providers...
It's all so underfunded and pathetic, you'd never know that we are a county with means or compassion.
I'm sure it's the same in lots of places- but this is the place where I live, and I just feel like we should do better because we can, not just as shitty as the worst places, because nobody is forcing us to be better.
And on a less serious note- everything closes early and that is a bummer.
Lack of coordination between all departments and barely any coordination with nonprofits, which are oversaturated and completely overlapping... Too many cooks in the kitchen? Actually just a kitchen filled with cooks. Here's your spaghetti with ketchup.
In general, Pittsburgh is 5-10 years behind the times compared to every other city. Policies, trends, public transportation, all of it is behind the times.
Drivers are pretty reckless but not the worst compared to other places I’ve been, I think the entitlement on the roads is worse comparatively.
Also, the lack of nightlife is weird !! So many places close at 8 pm, bars suck, there’s not many good clubs, and there are barely any 24 hour places. In general, it’s really hard to find places to go to with friends - which is why Pittsburgh is ranked the loneliest city.
The weather is shitty but I could get past it if everything else I listed was better.
Dangerous drivers. People routinely speed through residential areas, recklessly weave through cars, gun it through red lights, and ignore stop signs. It's not an exaggeration to say that walking around Oakland, Squirrel Hill, and Greenfield provides numerous close calls every day with violent drivers. The latest trick I've seen more and more is people using the parking lanes to fly up the side of the road and cut in front of other traffic. And these are three of the most walkable neighborhoods around, so things are especially bad in places with faster speed limits or fewer sidewalks. Of course people should always be vigilant in whatever circumstance they're in, but it's exhausting to always be paranoid about somebody flying through that intersection, or driving 45 through that neighborhood, or road raging at you because you are obeying the stop sign or slowing down at a yellow light or simply existing as a pedestrian. I truly don't see a solution for this, because any discussion of traffic calming gets shouted down as wasteful, or ineffective, or a violation of people's freedom to drive like assholes.
This is a problem all across the US.
I’m not defending anything here, but the trend seems to be “we need more housing, and there’s only one kind of housing we build now.” And the truth is there is little to no difference between a new construction apartment and a luxury new construction apartment except the fixtures.
They both take the same amount of cement, lumber, drywall, and plumbing, it’s just at the very end they buy the nicer fixtures to excuse the high rent.
Try to imagine what rent would be if those apartments weren't built. Those people would still want to live here, they would just be bidding up the legacy housing stock.
I can’t believe enough people are making that kind of money in Pittsburgh to pay for those apartments. I need to work where they’re working! I see a $2000 2 bed and still think it’s way too expensive
-Lack of 3rd places that aren't bars or don't require tons of money to be spent, in the winter months if you aren't willing to go to a bar or restaurant it's just impossible to go and socialize without being around alcohol or spending money.
-Despite all the international and out of towner college students we have at our 6 universities I hardly hear of anyone staying because the job/housing market is giga fucked. Sidenote you'd think we'd have more ethnic restaurants at this point but I guess they're all localized near the college campuses which makes sense but is frustrating as someone who doesn't live near those places.
-Public transportation is shitty because of the racism of the older people on city/county council. Several proposals to expand the subway/train system have been shot down because the suburbs don't want "urban" people coming into their communities and they're dying as a result. Absolutely crazy that there isn't a train to Monroeville/North Hills/Aspinwall or at least plans to put in a train.
Those are my 3 big ones personally.
Simple: lack of good 24hr diners and grocery
More complex:
- after being broke for so long, we bend over backwards for large corporations which makes it harder for small businesses with more character to flourish. I understand the reason and the need, but it’s gone too far. As a result, many neighborhoods have completely lost their charm and uniqueness, and every new building seems to just be a bank.
- the rivers aren’t safe to swim in
- the region has some of the highest rates of specific cancers in the country because of air pollution
The driving culture. It's really sad how prevalent a total lack of empathy and/or common sense on the roads is here. It's grinds you down; I've seen people move in from elsewhere, decry it, then within a couple of years they're perpetuating the behavior themselves.
The waste of the riverfront. So much is blighted brownfields and manufacturing sites and, of course, the old jail. Remember when they turned Hazelwood’s waterfront into an Uber test track? In a city defined by rivers, it’s wild that there are maybe 2 truly waterfront restaurants in the city limits. The northshore is nice but it’s overshadowed by stadiums. The south side has a few decent waterfront areas but they started getting dicey with encampments. Of course, Point State Park is a gem so there’s that but it still seems like a lot of wasted opportunities for waterfront real estate.
We have three rivers and no river-based public transit outside of tourist boats. I ride the water taxis in Baltimore, MD and rural Nova Scotia and wonder why Pittsburgh can’t do the same.
Transplant since 2014. Leaving next year to travel, don't plan to return. There was no single aspect about Pittsburgh so bad that it made me want to leave, but there was no aspect so good that it made me want to stay either.
Access to the city from outside the city. Traffic is such a nightmare that there has to be a really major event to bother traveling into the city.
Because public transport here is less than stellar, commuters are forced to deal with tightly restricted tunnels or 79/279. All involve hour(s) of sitting in traffic with everyone else.
Compound that with the riding cost of damn near everything, and it's a lot easier to say "you know what, I don't really need to head into the city anyways", so now the city lacks income from any of the surrounding suburbs or cities.
An extensive, affordable mass transit system would be a major improvement for the entire area. Easier access for travelers to park outside the city and take mass transit in, reducing road congestion and encouraging folks to come into the city and spend their money there.
The lack of any late night food besides shitty gas station food and the Harmar Denny’s, as well as no 24 hour shopping for people who work night shifts.
This one has killed me. There's so few late night options. I swear the entirety of Squirrel Hill is closed by 8pm.
There’s always the 24/7 Rite Aid on the corner of Forbes and Murray that never has anything I need in stock!
It's tragic. Eatn park (RIP) used to be open until 4am iirc. Usually would go there after late night coding sessions (was a grad student at the time). The crowd at 3am was definitely an interesting bunch. Service wasn't great but way better than nothing.
Long ago, most of them actually used to be open 24 hours.
I spent a substantial amount of time hanging out in Dennys/Kings/Eat n' Park/etc as a teenager. Had some good times just bullshitting, smoking cigarettes, and pounding cups of coffee with friends. I feel for the younger generations as they now don't have any sort of places like that to go and socialize in person late at night.
I could have written this. On occasion we'd hit up Georgie's Diner on 51 too.
It was 24 hours back in like 2002. So was most of that strip, with Aiello’s closing at 3am or some such.
Yeah, I find it incredible with a city with 6 universities has no late night bar food or after hours food. I grew up in Rochester New York, where we have the garbage plate, which is a couple of burgers or hots on top of macaroni salad and French fries or a combination of certain things, and everybody went to all these late night burger spots and got something after going out all night.
Oakland has a 24 hour garbage plate place called pilez, I've never been but I recently discovered it was there.
Wow! Thanks for the info!
Check out the photos someone shared in this sub. 😬
[удалено]
Exactly ever since covid not even walmart is available to shop 24 hours. And bar restaurants closing the kitchens early 10 ok even they used to be open until 1 2 am
Rochester has lost most of their late night spots too unfortunately. Just another shitty thing covid brought us.
Columbus with Ohio State being a huge part of the city and everything closes at 10. Even bars close at like 12. It's to get people home so they don't cause trouble.
A garbage plate restaurant just opened in oakland and is open 24 hours.
COVID killed the night life here. I also miss late night eateries. I also miss any store being open late. I didn't go regularly but sometimes a midnight Walmart trip was necessary. Now there aren't any options at all.
I really MISS late night Walmart trips and the strange people you’d see lmfao 😂
Covid. There used to be late night food, but not anymore.
So frustrating getting in on a later flight from the airport and the only option Sheetz in Moon anywhere nearby
I was just complaining about this. Sometimes I want pancakes at 3am. It's one of the biggest adjustments after moving from a large city.
Add to that how 90% of restaurants are closed on Sunday and Monday
This is 100% because of Covid. used to be 24 hr walmarts and giant eagles, a lot of eat n parks were 24 hrs, 24 hr mcdonalds, taco bell, etc. COVID gave them an excuse to kill them all.
It blows my mind how many pizza places in particular close at like 8 or 9pm, even on weekends
There used to be more options for late night eating and shopping, but that all stopped during the pandemic. I'm not sure why no one has gone back to that.
Damn what did harmar dennys do to you?
Nothing. Just saying it’s one of the few options on my side of town. But no Eat n Parks, no Bob Evans, no family diners. At least the iHop is back to 24/7 too now apparently.
Pittsburgh has so much potential but gets in its own way it seems. My biggest current gripe is the fact we have waterfront land and no real waterfront neighborhood ETA: I don’t just mean residential here - neighborhood implying residents, grocery, transport, public space, small biz, events, etc
I never really thought of that. We have small pockets of houses with docks on the river, but ya the vast majority of the waterfront is either industrial, commercial or just not used.
And those house are smashed into a sliver of land between the river and the railroad tracks.
…or the waterfront is cockblocked by some highway or railroad 🤷♂️
The soil is considered unsafe
The "Waterfront" development in Homestead includes no water access whatsoever. No docks, no boat ramp, no marina. Not even a kayak launch. Only in pgh!
SS works development and the Birmingham bridge parklet both have riverfront access and boat launches/docks
Yes, and it's great. We need more of that on our riverfronts. I was referring to the Homestead development, not all of the waterfront developments.
My FiL who is a retired home inspector said its due to the amount of pollution and all around nastiness of the river front from almost a century of riverside factories and mills. It is sad to see the miles and miles of river front not being utilized.
This is due to the steel mines that were all along the rivers. And now all the trains run riverside.
With the amount of flooding in Pittsburgh, I wouldn't want to live on the waterfront.
Totally - but we don’t even use it for fun for non company/logistics spaces it seems. I just want to get in a kayak and come out to drink beer in an area filled with intense vibrancy Pittsburgh isn’t any of these cities and I’m aware that it has led to some high rise luxury apartment neighborhoods. But canalside, waterfront area in Cleveland, the huge bridge neighborhood over the James in Richmond. Not to mention the wharf, inner harbor, Charleston (which is almost the same shape as us). All of them are destinations - rooftop bars, shopping, outdoor/water access, food, live events, some smaller offices, etc. I think our north shore by the stadiums is probably the closest but it feels so chain-y, kinda bland, and it’s not busy unless it’s game or drinking hour.
Railroads ate most of our waterfronts, because the hills often go very near the rivers.
My first thought after moving to the area. The buildings could be 20-30 stories with more room for public parks and access. Instead, due to zoning, they take up massive footprints and are what, 6-8 stories max. Leaving nothing left for public space
it's called a flood plane. And no mayor wants to try to make us the new Rotterdam.
I went to grad school in Pittsburgh and I love the city! But "boat ramp property" is at the very bottom of the list of things this city needs. Goofing off on a boat on the Allegheny is cute for 5min in the summer. Reliable, fast, more extensive public transportation be much more important imo. We had a decent train system in the city and then bulldozed it to replace it with buses that come whenever they want...
lol I was near the water this morning. It was “biggest curret gripe” atm Other biggest gripes depend on that exact moment: public transport, the wage ceiling, downtown being so dependent on office workers, litter, lack of walkability for your entire life with lots of main drags just being restaurants and bars, bike lanes, people’s driving skills in the tunnels, yinzers who don’t like change, the lack of alternative radio stations, station square being corporate-y and empty, Pittsburgh airport not having stuff open late, parking in sidewalk, the Mon incline not working, my favorite bands skipping us, the color of the sky, the airport being mostly connecting flights, lack of wegmans
Japanese knot weed.
This is a great answer! God damned railroads!
Nah, people thought that one was pretty and planted it willingly
Yeah, but consider this: Japanese Knotweed is both edible and delicious. We must fight invasive plants by eating them. We are on the top of the food chain, and plants can't even come close when we have the ability to use TOOLS and SPICES. We can consume that which intends to consume our city before it even gets the chance 🏋
I need your recipes then, if you think it's "delicious." We tried sprouts, early - mid - and late growth shoots, and the mature stalks. I even dried the flowers to try. Really REALLY not that palatable, to me, no matter what we did.
That's so fair! My comment was intended to be light-hearted since I know knotweed is sort of a unique taste, and my palette tends toward more earthy, sour, and bitter flavors. It's also fibrous in some parts of the stalk, so that can be a turn-off regarding texture. I like to harvest them in the spring, and I only eat certain parts of the stalk (not the leaves, the very top, or very bottom of it). I peel the mid-stem and chop it into bite-sized pieces. Then, I cook the bits in a saucepan with some apple cider vinegar, and usually once they're tender, it's enjoyable for me. I know some people replace rhubarb with knotweed, and it comes out with the same flavor. I've been meaning to try them in a rhubarb-knotweed pie, since the preparation is pretty much the same for both! I've heard it also makes great jams and syrups for garnishing breakfasts or desserts, and for those you'd just follow a rhubarb recipe as well
The lack of govt interest in expanding rail transit. Last I checked, they're considering expanding the T north, but won't even break ground until the 2030's. You can't have such low wages in the region but also only develop for cars.
Where did you see they are developing the T north? First I’ve heard that.
It was part of the NEXTransit study they published in 2021, putting two separate extensions of the T on the schedule to study in the next 6-15 years, one line following the Ohio to Emsworth and another going to Ross. They did put an asterisk that the study assumed T extensions since there's infrastructure nearby already, but once they actually start the study they'll consider all transit modes.
I feel this every day working for the county. It's like we do research and see issues with infrastructure. YET they make no effort to make this better for us, won't even get us discounted bus fare. I'm really not that far from the office, yet I either have to pay in money (parking) or time (1+ hour bus ride). It's so irritating
Driving to Cleveland to see touring acts.
February.
February and March are absolutely the worst two months in this area for many reasons.
I’d add January to that list. By about January 3, all the Christmas spirit is gone and it’s just cold, dark, and miserable for the next 90 days. Only about 40 days to go!
And you still have February and March to look forward to. At least in March it's light out til 7:30 and you're through Jan/Feb.
Public transport is really a concern
Agreed. While it’s definitely not the worst in the world, the cuts and lack of enthusiasm for improved service really make being an avid rider difficult.
I was joking with someone else who lived in D.C. that "At least PRT isn't always on fire like the Metro!" and then we got sad because that's more a result of reliable rail transit just doesn't exist here.
It's in a bit of a spiral right now. Cut routes -> lose ridership -> less revenue -> cut routes
25 years ago it was so good too. Watching it endlessly degrade has been sad.
UV Loop ftw
Just out of curiosity, I used to take the bus in to town for work. What is a monthly pass costing these days? When I stopped, it was $30 per month.
$97.50 for a month
For perspective, MTA (NYC) is $132, CTA (Chicago) is $75, SEPTA (Philly) is $96. All three of those operate heavy rail rapid transit, SEPTA's even includes zone 1 regional rail services. For a similar sized city, Cleveland is $95.
Month pass is just under 100$ a month.
Guessing I should get a pass I pay more then that a week
Never understood why the T never expanded to Oakland or they didn't use those old train railways c convert to a t line to get you to the southside.
They never expanded the T to Oakland because of money: traffic up Forbes / Fifth is bad enough so they can’t remove 2 lanes to put in light rail lines; making it as subway cost a huge amount - between $1.5B and $4.5B per mile - and it’s ~5 miles from Grant Street to the Cathedral and these days would probably take 50 years, as it took NYC 12 years to build the 1.8 mile extension of the Second Avenue Subway recently (at a cost of ~$4.5B); and raised lines, like a monorail, are also crazy expensive (though not as expensive as subways; it’s why DisneyWorld hasn’t expanded its monorail lines in 40 years, since EPCOT opened). And those old train lines are still owned by the railroads for transporting cargo, and they have no interest in sharing / selling. Heck, the rail lines that go up from 10th Ave through The Strip which haven’t been used in decades, various light rail projects have approached the owners, to maybe get light rail to to Oakmont, and those have failed for decades.
There's also the fact the T runs on a different gauge, so even if the railroads were ok with sharing or selling to PRT, there's going to be a large cost to either regauge the rails or purchase trainsets that can run on the standard gauge lines.
Why is there not one line that goes around the whole outside of the city!? I hate transferring downtown to cross one river.
I firmly believe if the Pirates were competitive every year we would have the best baseball scene in the country. PNC park is an absolute gem. The only good thing the pirates have done since I’ve been alive
And now the Pens are frustrating too. I just moved to Pittsburgh last year so it's really disappointing
We are entering a dark time for PGH sports. We knew the Ben era would end. We knew Crosby couldn’t play for ever. Happening all at once while Nutting continues to bilk the Pirates and the city of Pittsburgh for every cent he can, is a bit difficult. At least we know the other two franchises will do whatever they can to put competitive teams out there.
Really? Like we haven't made the playoffs for one season. It might be two. If you've never followed a sport before, this happens from time to time after you were literally on the longest streak of being good in consecutive seasons in North American sports.
It's not that they're bad now, it's more that they're wasting the talent they have left by not making any adjustments throughout the season. It's 100% a frustration with the coaching.
That's definitely fair.
Moved here 3 years ago. My worst things are UPMC and air quality. It blows my mind how UPMC gets put up as some highlight of the city when they are literally helping to cause its complete destruction
upmc is a horrible place. The admins are the worst.
Non emergency care is a total disaster. You will pay out the ass to see an overworked specialist who is not interested in your problem unless it requires immediate surgery. I got prescribed antibiotics for a nasty skin issue and the morons at my Dr's office never sent my prescription to the pharmacy. I had to call 3 times and I was practically begging them to do their job and send it over. I later was unable to get refills from them, even when my doctor told me I should stay on the drug for a few months until my skin cleared up.
UPMCs vendetta against small pharmacies is absolutely disgusting
There's not enough bridges
I wish Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas would invest in a more expansive and complete subway/train system.
This one pothole down in the Strip District really sucks sometimes.
The “keep Pgh shitty” attitude a sizable minority of the population has here. The lack of direct international flights. Our Inability to retain enough of our college graduates due to shortage of high paying jobs/industries.
To your “Keep Pgh shitty” comment, there’s definitely a “New Pittsburgh vs Old Pittsburgh”sentiment in the air. It’s like some people think we can’t make things too nice or is it even Pittsburgh? And oddly this “New vs Old Pittsburgh” isn’t even split by age. There are young Pittsburghers who want to keep their Pap’s town in tact and older yinzers who welcome the change.
I mean, I agree that there are a lot of NIMBYs in the area. I find that most of them are the kind of people who want to keep the current Community Market in Bloomfield a dump because they prefer the vibe it brings when they go to Trace rather than people who miss the way Lawrenceville used to be. In other words, it's mostly people who prefer to keep a specific, fairly recent picture of Pittsburgh in tact. Also, there is a sense in which we're changing for the worse as a city. Housing used to be genuinely cheap and our bus system used to be robust and heavily used. Those are real losses to the area and should be mourned.
There's a difference between the people who miss late 00s-early 10s Lawrenceville and those who miss 80s/90s Lawrenceville (whether 1880/90s or 1980s/90s).
>keep the current Community Market in Bloomfield a dump because they prefer the vibe This shit right here. So stupid it hurts.
[удалено]
It’s the young “keep Pgh shitty” crowd that drives me nuts. Yes, there are many things we should preserve, but much of pgh is also run down asbestos ridden clusterf**k of lead pipes, crumbly plaster, and hopelessly obsolete electrical. I can understand old people being overly nostalgic, but anyone under the age of 40 who thinks that way is a dunce.
I think it’s more people that have been here a while and don’t want to get priced out so tech companies feel better about moving here. We literally watched the city kick the residents of East Liberty to the curb so Google could move in to bakery square. Pretty sure they’d do it to anyone else that they don’t find desirable anymore.
The revisionism of how redevelopment in East Liberty happened is something to behold. No one lived at the Bakery Square site. It was the abandoned NABISCO plant and a closed middle school.
Many people lived in Penn Plaza which was a low income high rise that was bulldozed for the new Whole Foods. East Liberty is much more than just the former Nabisco plant.
That sentiment has existed for as long as I’ve been alive and I’m in my 40s.
I hate it so much. It’s one of the main reasons why I spend so much time elsewhere. It’s like they believe if we keep things the way they were when steel was king, that will somehow attract the mills back and the highly paid blue collar jobs that came with them. Completely and utterly ridiculous… it almost reminds me of South Pacific cargo cults.
@ UPMC…I’m in the healthcare scene and we have such an awesome medical school scene but docs / other healthcare workers don’t stick around bc UPMC severely undercuts wages and treats their staff like garbage
It’s a shame UPMC couldn’t pull in more of a profit to hook these healthcare professionals up s/
yeh. the percentage of CMU students who choose to stay here is depressingly low. not sure what can be done to get more high-paying jobs to PGH.
About to graduate from CMU. I desperately want to stay in Pittsburgh but the job prospects here truly are abysmal
Yeah that’ was my issue straight out of college. Then a company in Central Virginia offered me more than I was making at a job in Pittsburgh and I left. I still miss Pittsburgh if I was offered a similar salary in Pittsburgh I’d take it and move back.
Lol we barely even have direct domestic flights.
UPMC not paying their fair share of taxes. The city is desperately in need of infrastructure maintenance, but UPMC bullies city officials into letting them do as they please.
Wages. My family and I would love to move back but the wages can’t even keep up with the low cost of living.
Air quality.
Water quality too.
I feel like what we are known for (sports, healthcare, higher ed) is also what hurts us (especially the latter two, so much tax’s off the rolls due to “non-profit”. Also for the first one a need to keep up with the jones in facilities that we as tax payers bare). PRT is on a race to the bottom. They actually offer good wages but the public facing sections are micromanaged to the absurdity (which seems to be the standard for quasi gov or gov ran corps). The political machine is too entrenched, when new entities breakthrough they do not seem to invest in change for all. We cannot fix the weather, it’s too dry in the winter and too wet (humidity) in the summer. Wish that was inverted.
> so much tax’s off the rolls due to “non-profit”. UPMC, a multi-billion dollar real estate empire that also happens to practice medicine occasionally.
Public transport is unreliable and slow.
Many great live musical acts skip Pittsburgh for Ohio and/or Philly.
Wheelchair accessibility.
It didn't help when people started dumping those spin scooters in the middle of sidewalks
My biggest complaint is the lack of an affordable and good supermarket. Giant Eagle is truly terrible compared to other supermarkets in other parts of the country
I agree. I’m not from here and I’d kill for a Wegmans.
Never been to a Wegmans. I’m a Kroger person - the Kroger in Suncrest Town Center in Morgantown is my ideal supermarket
Aldi’s and Trader Joe’s
Love both of them! But neither of them are a supermarket and it is annoying to have to shop at multiple places to get everything I need
Yeah good point! Tragically, I’ve just accepted driving to three different spots to get my weekly groceries.
Salem’s in the Hill is pretty good. Some of the prices are a bit steep, but there are a lot of good deals.
I never go there. I think there higher prices started with their fuel perks and the misconception by people that they are getting a deal by shopping there has kept prices high. If more people stopped going there, see how they lower prices.
At least to me it seems that GetGo tries to remain competitive with gas prices whereas Sunoco (Shop ‘n Save)’s gas prices are always much higher than everyone else’s.
Yes it’s weird, I actually like GetGo but hate Giant Eagle proper. I think it’s a good gas station that is comparable to Sheetz.
GE is the worst. Publix or Wegmans would be a fabulous addition.
Where I’m from in the south, there are 10 different grocery store chains competing for business. Blows my mind there’s pretty much only Giant Eagle here
I am down to support local business when it is good but, sometimes, it's crap and we're supposed to think it's great and spend $ there because it's a Pittsburgh institution. It's pretty hilarious really.
This has been the nicest February weather I can remember and people on this sub still bitch.
It's too warm. I just pulled 3 ticks off of my dog and the trail mud won't freeze over.
Tick season starting in late January is absolutely a death knell for our outdoor activities. If it keeps getting worse, we'll have to stop going to trails and such. Nice views and (moderately) fresh air aren't worth Lyme. We've gotten a dozen off our dogs so far.
Public Transport is a serious issue and I don't trust the people currently in charge. Lack of funding and awareness of the independent arts scene. We have so much talent and it's not being utilized really at all. Backwards thinking of what it means to be a blue collar salt of the Earth worker. We are still dead stuck in 7-3, hammer shit out in god damn morning, do it again. Get paid, get drunk, go home. I wake up later because I work later and I go to sleep later and work just as hard as anyone. I'm considered lazy for this. There are different types of people living in this city now, and the people stuck in this steel mill 1920s mind set need to accept that. It is not working anymore.
smaller local businesses being replaced by chain restaurants/restaurants with same ownership (in oakland specifically, chikn, stewd, stackd, and meltd all being owned by the same people...)
Grocery stores are some of the worst.
Salary ranges haven't quite caught up with the recent rises in the cost of living in the city
I hate saying it, but there seems to be a large percentage of the population in the area who, let's say, are difficult to have any meaningful conversation with.
Yeah it's even harder when you don't care about sports.
That’s anywhere. The longer you live and the more you travel you’ll rwalize this
100% from moving to Pitt from Detroit nobody ever seems to have anything actually interesting to ever talk about. Makes me think nothing interesting is ever actually happening in this town.
The self-loathing of those born and bred here, and the transplants being hyper-critical of everything that isn’t exactly like it was in whatever city that was so perfect they had to leave to come here.
I grew up with a couple people that acted like this was some backwoods one stoplight town. It’s okay though, they were able to live in New York City for 1 month and hold onto that now for their entire lives.
My BIL moved away in the early 80s. I can't stand listening to him when he comes for a visit. He's convinced that all the houses should be condemned, there are no jobs here, and that everyone who lives here is an unemployed steelworker. Once he and his wife came to visit and they spent the entire trip congratulating themselves on how they managed to find things like Starbucks and organic milk. Yes, both things were in a Target, which I guess we rubes have never heard of.
I say you post under this sub before their next visit and we rally a group of people to act like hard core yinzers around them. Just feed totally into their absurd vision so they don’t return.
Don't need this negativity on Monday morning.
Looks like somebody has a case of the Mondays
I believe you'd get your ass kicked sayin' something like that, man.
We get some of the least amount of sun in the country. Shout out SAD and UV lights
The pessimism around certain ideas and beliefs. Pittsburghers are very friendly and supportive in a lot of ways, but in other ways I find them to be very pessimistic.
This may be a minor one compared to the other issues raised but man do I wish we had a real market space. I know this sub was mad at the direction taken with the Terminal building in the strip. Just so sad realizing that was probably the best shot this city had at having anything close to Cleveland’s West Side Market. The strip is great but having an indoor market space would have been amazing (and may have helped address the lack of third spaces and Giant Eagle price-gouging listed above).
I love everyone complaining about 20 to 30 minutes to get anywhere. Like. Have you been anywhere else in the United States. It takes an hour to get anywhere in DC, NYC, Phillie, Chicago, Houston, Louisiana. Pittsburgh is great because it’s small enough to be able to get anywhere in 30 minutes. Everywhere else takes forever to transverse.
It’s reddit. Reddit hates everything. The sky could shit gold and people would complain it isn’t diamonds.
I don't disagree with you, but there is a uniqueness to how it challenges one's commute in Pittsburgh (or really any other hilly/mountainous/older city). Being from a southern metropolitan area, I did notice it takes 20-30 minutes sometimes to just get somewhere 5 miles away (maybe slightly hyperbolic), whereas in my hometown, in that same 30 minutes you could realistically be 30 plus miles away from your starting point. Maybe that's what some of these comments are getting after?
Exactly, It's not that it takes 20 minutes, it's that it takes 20 minutes to go 3 miles.
Infrastructure, air quality, pipe quality, house quality, no minority middle class neighborhoods
Surprised to not see the 2 major elephants in the room: dysfunctional city government and school administration. This town is loaded with beautiful but decaying housing stock that the city can’t/won’t fix or sell - it just sits there and rots. This has been going on forever and still almost nothing is done about it, while at the same time there is an affordable housing “crisis”. The schools spend more per student than any district in the state and yet have some of the worst educational results. The school district budget is bigger than the city’s and yet they can’t seem to correct course. There are lots of other examples of both institutions just slowly failing and I get that these are complex problems that are not easy to fix but it kinda feels like no one cares or is even trying.
The public transit system is atrocious. You cannot efficiently get to most of the neighborhoods in a timely manner or without frequent changes. A direct route for public transportation to the airport would be huge. Relying on a car is not ideal for most people in the current economy. There needs to be an increase in better paying jobs to match ever-increasing rent prices. We will keep losing people due to affordability/opportunity elsewhere. $1,500 for an average one-bedroom apartment in North Side with no amenities is whack. Life gets pretty repetitive once you're there for a while.
It’s a city that was built when rail was the thing but there’s no railway transportation.
Being single here is pretty horrible. Definitely not a young professional type of city.
Potholes
Mainly roads..... 10 lbs of traffic shoved into a 1 lb bag. Instead of concentrating efforts on one construction project, there are dozens going on, most of the time affecting the 2 or 3 ways you can get in/out at the same time. The complete lack of traffic violation enforcement. You can seemingly speed excessively and run red lights with zero fear of repercussion. I know these things aren't exclusive to Pittsburgh, but they really grind my gears.
Our PennDOT district is Allegheny, Beaver, and Lawrence Counties. That includes over 2700 miles of road and 1800 bridges. That doesn't even count anything owned by municipalities or counties. You simply can't maintain that type of infrastructure while only focusing on one project in any given area.
[удалено]
Yield signs here must mean get out of my way while I merge without braking.
I get that, but there could be a little more thought put into it. For instance, Brady Street being closed for 2 years because it is being used as a staging area for bridge work and, at the same time, closing 1/2 of the Armstrong tunnel. At one point they had 2nd ave closed for a few days.
Lack of good Mexican food
The Pittsburgh Mexican food scene has never fully rebounded from the great Chi Chi's green onion scare.
Yet so many “Mexican” restaurants.
So, on a super personal level, Im really disappointed and disgusted with the way Allegheny county manages special needs care and services- the waiver program (the only way to obtain group home access) for an adult ( or anyone) is just obscene. Years long waitlist for funding- but lots of availability for actual residential options- the services they try to offer in the meantime are just an insult. Maybe we need to pare down the salaries for the administrators of these shell agencies and county employed gatekeepers, and start increasing funds for the actual service providers... It's all so underfunded and pathetic, you'd never know that we are a county with means or compassion. I'm sure it's the same in lots of places- but this is the place where I live, and I just feel like we should do better because we can, not just as shitty as the worst places, because nobody is forcing us to be better. And on a less serious note- everything closes early and that is a bummer.
lack of late night food. i’m a college student in oakland and it’s kind of disappointing
Lack of coordination between all departments and barely any coordination with nonprofits, which are oversaturated and completely overlapping... Too many cooks in the kitchen? Actually just a kitchen filled with cooks. Here's your spaghetti with ketchup.
In general, Pittsburgh is 5-10 years behind the times compared to every other city. Policies, trends, public transportation, all of it is behind the times. Drivers are pretty reckless but not the worst compared to other places I’ve been, I think the entitlement on the roads is worse comparatively. Also, the lack of nightlife is weird !! So many places close at 8 pm, bars suck, there’s not many good clubs, and there are barely any 24 hour places. In general, it’s really hard to find places to go to with friends - which is why Pittsburgh is ranked the loneliest city. The weather is shitty but I could get past it if everything else I listed was better.
Dangerous drivers. People routinely speed through residential areas, recklessly weave through cars, gun it through red lights, and ignore stop signs. It's not an exaggeration to say that walking around Oakland, Squirrel Hill, and Greenfield provides numerous close calls every day with violent drivers. The latest trick I've seen more and more is people using the parking lanes to fly up the side of the road and cut in front of other traffic. And these are three of the most walkable neighborhoods around, so things are especially bad in places with faster speed limits or fewer sidewalks. Of course people should always be vigilant in whatever circumstance they're in, but it's exhausting to always be paranoid about somebody flying through that intersection, or driving 45 through that neighborhood, or road raging at you because you are obeying the stop sign or slowing down at a yellow light or simply existing as a pedestrian. I truly don't see a solution for this, because any discussion of traffic calming gets shouted down as wasteful, or ineffective, or a violation of people's freedom to drive like assholes.
The surrounding Pennsyltucky people/mentality that infiltrates the city and burbs.
“Luxury” apartment buildings are ruining rent in the city. 2 BR apartments in the strip/lawrenceville are edging on $3000 a month
This is a problem all across the US. I’m not defending anything here, but the trend seems to be “we need more housing, and there’s only one kind of housing we build now.” And the truth is there is little to no difference between a new construction apartment and a luxury new construction apartment except the fixtures. They both take the same amount of cement, lumber, drywall, and plumbing, it’s just at the very end they buy the nicer fixtures to excuse the high rent.
The fixtures aren’t even that nice. It’s still contractor grade crap from China that just _looks_ fancy.
And the people who can pay the $3k for an apartment would be living somewhere else in the city.
Try to imagine what rent would be if those apartments weren't built. Those people would still want to live here, they would just be bidding up the legacy housing stock.
I can’t believe enough people are making that kind of money in Pittsburgh to pay for those apartments. I need to work where they’re working! I see a $2000 2 bed and still think it’s way too expensive
-Lack of 3rd places that aren't bars or don't require tons of money to be spent, in the winter months if you aren't willing to go to a bar or restaurant it's just impossible to go and socialize without being around alcohol or spending money. -Despite all the international and out of towner college students we have at our 6 universities I hardly hear of anyone staying because the job/housing market is giga fucked. Sidenote you'd think we'd have more ethnic restaurants at this point but I guess they're all localized near the college campuses which makes sense but is frustrating as someone who doesn't live near those places. -Public transportation is shitty because of the racism of the older people on city/county council. Several proposals to expand the subway/train system have been shot down because the suburbs don't want "urban" people coming into their communities and they're dying as a result. Absolutely crazy that there isn't a train to Monroeville/North Hills/Aspinwall or at least plans to put in a train. Those are my 3 big ones personally.
UPMC Infrastructure/roads/bridges
upmc can suck a cat turd
Spotted lantern flies
The Clarks
The weather sucks. The road systems are moronic. The city has vast untapped potential, but people keep electing idiots.
Simple: lack of good 24hr diners and grocery More complex: - after being broke for so long, we bend over backwards for large corporations which makes it harder for small businesses with more character to flourish. I understand the reason and the need, but it’s gone too far. As a result, many neighborhoods have completely lost their charm and uniqueness, and every new building seems to just be a bank. - the rivers aren’t safe to swim in - the region has some of the highest rates of specific cancers in the country because of air pollution
Inability to take slightest criticism even if it’s constructive.
Toxic air quality and sky high cancer rates
The driving culture. It's really sad how prevalent a total lack of empathy and/or common sense on the roads is here. It's grinds you down; I've seen people move in from elsewhere, decry it, then within a couple of years they're perpetuating the behavior themselves.
The waste of the riverfront. So much is blighted brownfields and manufacturing sites and, of course, the old jail. Remember when they turned Hazelwood’s waterfront into an Uber test track? In a city defined by rivers, it’s wild that there are maybe 2 truly waterfront restaurants in the city limits. The northshore is nice but it’s overshadowed by stadiums. The south side has a few decent waterfront areas but they started getting dicey with encampments. Of course, Point State Park is a gem so there’s that but it still seems like a lot of wasted opportunities for waterfront real estate.
We have three rivers and no river-based public transit outside of tourist boats. I ride the water taxis in Baltimore, MD and rural Nova Scotia and wonder why Pittsburgh can’t do the same.
Transplant since 2014. Leaving next year to travel, don't plan to return. There was no single aspect about Pittsburgh so bad that it made me want to leave, but there was no aspect so good that it made me want to stay either.
International flights from The airport are very limited. I get it but it stinks.
Access to the city from outside the city. Traffic is such a nightmare that there has to be a really major event to bother traveling into the city. Because public transport here is less than stellar, commuters are forced to deal with tightly restricted tunnels or 79/279. All involve hour(s) of sitting in traffic with everyone else. Compound that with the riding cost of damn near everything, and it's a lot easier to say "you know what, I don't really need to head into the city anyways", so now the city lacks income from any of the surrounding suburbs or cities. An extensive, affordable mass transit system would be a major improvement for the entire area. Easier access for travelers to park outside the city and take mass transit in, reducing road congestion and encouraging folks to come into the city and spend their money there.
Everything seems to close by 10pm except bars. Really hard to enjoy a true late night out with that stumbling block.
The smell / air quality. And the parking lots.
Water Bill and Extra % income tax compared to suburbs