Category Archives: News about PGH

The Mysteries of ‘Mysteries’

For those of you following the filming of The Mysteries of Pittsburgh (for better or for worse), yesterday’s Post-Gazette has a new interview with director Rawson Marshall Thurber, who expounds on his love for Chabon’s 1988 novel as well as his admiration for the city itself:

“I was blown away by how beautiful [Pittsburgh] is. I didn’t realize it’s as hilly as it is, as green as it is, and in the film, I’ve been hoping or trying to go for this Edward Hopper vibe, both from a compositional standpoint and a color palette standpoint, and Pittsburgh just lends itself to that,” with its brick buildings and many bridges.

For more of Thurber’s thoughts on Pittsburgh, Sienna scandals, and movie-making in general, you can read the entire interview here. The P-G reports that filming will wrap this Friday, October 20.

Take the bus … to Beaver County

Speaking of public transit, were you aware that Beaver County was chosen as the ‘American Idol’ of public transit? For the second time in its history, the Beaver County Transit Authority won the Outstanding Achievement Award from the Washington, D.C.-based American Public Transportation Association. This award is considered a once-in-a-lifetime honor.

bcta

According to the op-ed article from the PG:

“Ridership that soared 22.4 percent for the past three years is on track to grow another 9 percent in this fiscal year … far more than any other small or large state transit system …

“BCTA is the first recipient of a state Transit Revitalization Investment District grant, with ‘Elm Street’ residential and ‘Main Street; business components in Rochester, the hub of Beaver County. The epicenter of the development extending to a scenic bluff overlooking the Ohio River is its ‘Grand Central Station,’ a modern transportation center with a park-n-ride, up-to-the-minute electronic message board displaying bus arrival and departure times and convenient connections every half hour for paratransit and bus riders.”

A quick perusal of the BCTA website reveals that they even have a Steelers Express route. Good neighbors make for a good neighborhood. Go SWPA!

Here’s the full article:

Getting around: Beaver County chosen ‘American Idol’ of public transit
Sunday, June 11, 2006
by Joe Grata, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
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Googling The Bus

Yet another reason to get on the bus in Pittsburgh: today’s Post-Gazette reports that Burghers can now search for Port Authority bus routes and schedules via Google Transit, a new service being offered in only six cities.

Port Authority has offered a trip planner on their website for some time, but Google’s service combines scheduling with a map of your route, and in the future could include information such as money saved versus driving and parking, as well as total cost of fare for your trip.

The service is in its beginning stages, and Google is asking for feedback from users to help improve results. Play around with it and let them know what you’d like to see.

Article in The Economist about the ‘Burgh

Up alongside new elections in Thailand and the peace process in Burundi, the UK-based Economist magazine features a nice article about Pittsburgh. This is some nice ammunition to use when you meet some city naysayers …

“Among Pittsburghers 25-34 years old … 41.9% have graduated from university, placing the city among America’s top ten. More than 17% of those young people have also earned an additional graduate or professional degree: the fourth-highest share in the country, behind only Washington, DC (think lawyers), Boston and San Francisco.”

Thanks to Kevin for the tip. If you click on the link you have to watch an ad to see the full article … but shh, it’s also located below. Only the Economist could make the phrase “brutal arithmeticâ€Â? sound like a good thing:

economist

Pittsburgh
How now brown town?
Sep 14th 2006 | PITTSBURGH
From The Economist print edition

A former steel city is now proclaiming its cleaner land and clever minds

A FEW years ago, the Pittsburgh region was so desperate to hang on to its brightest young people that its boosters thought about running television ads featuring “Border Guard Bob, a patrolman who would have stopped youngsters on their way out of town and urged them to stay. Wisely, the boosters scrapped that idea. And increasingly it seems as though the worries were misplaced anyway. Many of the graduates from Pittsburgh’s 34 universities led by Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh do stick around, and some of them are finding work in cutting-edge scientific fields. A couple of decades after the collapse of the local steel industry prompted many Pittsburghers to flee, the city has a rosier future.
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