Our Retail Plan For Downtown Pittsburgh
By John Valentine
The following is an outline of a plan by the Downtown Neighbors Alliance (DNA) to revitalize Downtown Pittsburgh post COVID-19.
The vision is to create a unique, urban village with independent boutiques, cafes, and other retail that you will not see in malls. This will include music, outdoor and diverse ethnic dining, cafes and shopping with a focus on independent minority boutiques.
A primary component of the plan is to create jobs and increase wealth in the minority community. A goal we will achieve is to have fifty percent of the new retail businesses we recruit downtown be minority owned. It is of the utmost importance that people from all walks of life are included in creating our vision of a diverse Downtown.
A commercial real estate agent will be hired to recruit independent businesses to fill the empty storefronts. This real estate agent will bring new businesses and hopefully more attraction to the streets of Downtown.
This real estate agent will not only recruit Pittsburgh entrepreneurs but will travel to other cities looking for diamonds in the rough, unique retail, that will add a flavor to Downtown Pittsburgh that has not been seen here before. We will start with visits to Columbus, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Philadelphia. The staff at the DNA has put a database together of fifty empty storefronts that dot the landscape of Downtown Pittsburgh. Our goal is to change that landscape to have every storefront occupied in three years.
Along with the plan for storefront retail recruitment, a second-floor economy program has been created with a database of second-floor retail availability. The DNA feels that we can fill the upstairs spaces with attractions that will go into the second-floor units (IE: salons, dance studios, martial arts, yoga studios etc.).
As an incentive to entice businesses to relocate here we want to create a grant of $50,000.00 for tenant improvements for minority owned retailers. This money will only be used for tenant improvement with other loans facilitated between the tenant and the DNA.
Importantly, Smithfield Street will have a total remodel. By adding more boutiques and cafes to this corridor we will create an identity for Smithfield Street (Fashion Row?) that will transform the street to become a shopping district.
Alongside those efforts, affordable housing within Downtown is a must in creating a diverse Downtown and have workforce housing for the service industry. Housing will be created in order to provide businesses in Downtown with residential units that people can live in affordably.
Seeing multiple beat officers, which has already been implemented in Market Square, will create a community relationship with business owners and residents is of the utmost importance.
The Downtown Neighbors Alliance impact will be job creation (we estimate over 250 new jobs), minority wealth, a brighter, more vibrant downtown and national recognition as Downtown Pittsburgh is by far the most visited neighborhood by tourists and businesspeople.
We also believe a vibrant, unique village will create a community where more potential residents will want to reside and a domino effect will take place as more businesses, office and retail, will look to locate here.
