Submitted by PublicCommenter t3_11x56x9 in pittsburgh
igloojoe11 t1_jd2s09m wrote
Reply to comment by Bolmac in Let's pour one out for the developers of Pittsburgh by PublicCommenter
Eh, if the prices they point out are remotely accurate, it's a pretty ridiculous raise. Inflation alone doesn't take something from 15k to 255k.
ktxhopem3276 t1_jd3081f wrote
The new rate is 0.3% of development cost.
How much they raised it by is irrelevant.
Throwing around random dollar amounts is annoying at best and being deceptive at worst. These buildings will stand for 50-100 years and should be reviewed thoroughly by the city.
Nimbys and astroturfing shills should be the focus of our outrage at reasonable developments being stymied
YIMBYYay t1_jd36g8u wrote
>These buildings will stand for 50-100 years and should be reviewed thoroughly by the city.
Absolutely, which is what PLI does for building permits. Building permit fees can easily be in the tens of thousands to hundreds of thousand because they are technical reviews for health and safety.
The zoning review process should be fairly straightforward and efficient. Unfortunately, the zoning code is so complicated and the review process so capricious that it takes the city many more months to complete than the building permit process.
So, of course, buildings should be reviewed, but the way Pittsburgh does it and the requirements within those reviews have serious negative impacts on housing affordability.
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd37uq5 wrote
A more agile and visionary administration would be shoulder deep in reforming the zoning and review process by now. Gainey, however, would rather concern himself with speed bumps.
RepeatedFailure t1_jd3odvc wrote
The speed bumps slow traffic and make the city more livable. They are a ban-aid on decades of car centric design baked into the fabric of the city.
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd3pz44 wrote
An ugly, sticky, itchy, obstructive, annoying, wasteful, and noisy band aid. Compared to alternative solutions, the speed bumps needlessly create more fossil fuel and other emissions, increase road noise, and don't increase safety more than other traffic calming measures.
They also increase wear on vehicles, obstruct emergency vehicles, and make suburbanites less likely to patronize city businesses.
Probably the worst "solution" possible IMO. Lane narrowing and chicanes does the same thing, but that is harder to implement. Gainey took the easy but shitty road here.
dfiler t1_jd3rvvl wrote
We shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good. Speed humps have been extremely beneficial in some parts of the city. Sure, a restructuring of our built environment would be a preferable solution. But that's extremely complicated and rarely succeeds. So while we continue pursuit of a better city structure, I am in favor of using speed humps.
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd3y3yk wrote
Gainey isn't pursuing a better city structure though. He's simply taking the path of least resistance. Taking a bare minimum approach that gives no thought to the long term concerns shouldn't be good enough IMO.
Speed bumps are the very worst method of traffic calming. Literally anything else would be better.
S4ltyInt3ractions t1_jd9gyvg wrote
Social protest and just beep your horn over every bump they will be removed quickly
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jda0n4x wrote
Lol. Tempting, along with hard 0-60 pulls followed by slamming on the brakes in between the bumps.
/s
burritoace t1_jd63oam wrote
We could marginally slow traffic on a single stretch of road with chicanes or we could marginally slow traffic on many stretches of road with speed bumps. I know which I'd pick! This overheated stuff about their alleged harms does you no favors.
E: I'm no fan of Gainey but this program started under Peduto. Just a very weird thing to get on Gainey's case about.
dlppgh t1_jd3ym4x wrote
...it doesn't work that way. For one, Zoning Administrators should and do have a fair amount of autonomy/distance from the Administration. Also - mayors have come into office with all sorts of promises about changing zoning law and reforming the process. What exactly have any of them achieved? Namely, what did Peduto achieve, after promising all sorts of stuff? At the end of the day, it was all about "tweet at Dan Gilman if you need something"...a Kushner-esque process that was similarly ineffective
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd40kuy wrote
Zoning administrators are tasked with enforcing a Byzantine shithouse maize of restrictions contained within an enigma of a process. Gainey didn't promise much of anything before he was elected - his biggest asset in the primary was not being Peduto. It's no surprise he isn't delivering much when he never promised much in the first place.
Peduto was able to generate positive national attention for Pgh, and attract outside business interest and investment. So far, Gainey has done neither.
dlppgh t1_jd92v34 wrote
Like it or not, PGH had positive national press prior to Peduto's administration. Even while Ravenstahl's stature crumpled, the good press kept on going. I think it's fair to point out that this press cycle isn't tied directly to individual mayors in reality. Ravenstahl didn't come in and turn PGH around by himself, nor did Peduto...but both made contributions in that regard.
YIMBYYay t1_jd80qa1 wrote
Agree, but counterpoint. Peduto focused far too much on national and international issues, where he had zero impact, at the expense of effective governance in Pittsburgh. Almost all of the anti-development policies in the city were implemented under his watch and zoning staff and planning commission were all Peduto appointees.
Gainey inherited a mess and has let it get worse.
JustHereForTheSaul t1_jd3vb5e wrote
This is akin to saying "my mom needs to focus on getting rid of her cancer, but instead she makes herself lunch every day! Misplaced priorities!" The two things have nothing to do with each other, and the slow pace on the monumental task does not in any way affect the more manageable task.
It feels like "speed bumps" are becoming the new "bike lanes" ........ some random shit bitter yinzers bring up as a non sequitur whenever they're upset about something.
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd3zlwl wrote
More like "My mom needs to focus on getting rid of her cancer, but she's concentrating on eating healthier instead of taking the chemo her doctor recommended." Misplaced priorities indeed. Gainey threw yinz a political bone with the speed bumps, and yinz chomped down on it without question. It does nothing to improve transit or decrease car dependancy.
I'm pro bike lane for the record, at least it makes it easier to not use a full size vehicle. The speed bumps make driving worse and actually slow public transit down instead of improving it.
JustHereForTheSaul t1_jd40d83 wrote
I highly doubt Gainey believes speed bumps help alleviate the zoning review issue. Again, they are obviously completely separate issues.
Gnarlsaurus_Sketch t1_jd412r6 wrote
Gainey is in over his head. He is looking for anything quick and easy that might give him political points. For him, political points are the issue. The speed bump binge is the quickest and easiest way he has found to score political points, which gives him breathing room on harder issues, such as zoning.
It's basic local politics.
JustHereForTheSaul t1_jd41qir wrote
So it sounds like you recognize that these are separate issues, which is why it's mystifying that you brought up speed bumps in the first place. [shrug]
JustHereForTheSaul t1_jd3v26g wrote
Yes, but the "article" is ridiculously thin on details, so we don't know if inflation has anything to do with it. I don't know anything about the process, but just looking at the way things have gone in other areas of the city (a major example being the water and sewage system), I'd put a little bit of money down saying that the zoning review office has kept its rates the same for decades because the old people ... dare I say, boomers ... who apply for reviews came to expect cheap zoning reviews as a birthright.
Now we look around and realize that the city is way behind where it should be on those fees, and we have to make a huge jump. Just like we looked around after the flood on Washington Blvd and said "oh crap, we're not charging anywhere NEAR enough to do necessary maintenance and we haven't been for decades, better raise rates 300% overnight." The mismanagement of the past is making today's administrators look bad in the case of PWSA. Again, I would bet something similar is happening with zoning reviews.
69FunnyNumberGuy420 t1_jd2sdbf wrote
> Eh, if the prices they point out are remotely accurate,
This is basically an opinion piece and I don't believe the numbers that get thrown around on this shit any more than I believe the guy on WTAE a few months back who claimed that he saved $3000 dollars by driving to Ohio to fill his truck with thirty cent cheaper gas.
People lie, all the time, and journalists in this country abdicated their responsibility to do journalism a long time ago.
[deleted] t1_jd2xfg9 wrote
The city has the zoning fee calculator online if you’d care to look.
69FunnyNumberGuy420 t1_jd2y0n7 wrote
The existing calculator won't show us what the fees used to be, and a $15K to $255K jump is an insane claim.
[deleted] t1_jd30wa6 wrote
[deleted]
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