Special Reports

City’s Mon-Oakland Plan Bulldozes Its Own “Mobility Goals & Objectives”

Posted on October 19, 2020 by Special Reports 0
Ranking criteria for Mon-Oakland Connector from 2019 budget application

On October 21, 2020, Pittsburgh’s Department of Mobility and Infrastructure (DOMI) will hold what they say is the final public meeting on “phase 1” of their Mon-Oakland Connector (MOC) plan. The project is so controversial, DOMI renamed it the Mon-Oakland Mobility Project—its third name in five years.

In slide 5 of their presentation for this virtual meeting, DOMI lists “Citywide Mobility Goals & Objectives.” When you consider these goals next to the MOC, which calls for building a road through Schenley Park to run 6- to 9-passenger shuttles at 15 mph between the Hazelwood Green development and Oakland university campuses, the controversy becomes clear.

No one dies or is seriously injured traveling on city streets

The Junction Hollow and Eliza Furnace trails together offer pedestrians and cyclists the only car-free route between Oakland, Downtown, and the South Side. The MOC eliminates this safe connection by putting motorized shuttles on Junction Hollow Trail—steps away from a playing field used by youth sports groups and others from around the city. On September 17, 2020, a UPMC shuttle ran over and killed a female pedestrian who was crossing an Oakland street.

Every household can access fresh fruits and vegetables within 20 minutes travel of home, without needing a private automobile

MOC’s planned shuttles run between Hazelwood and Oakland, neither of which has a grocery store. Both neighborhoods do have small, family-run shops that sell produce—Dylamato’s in Hazelwood and Groceria Merante in Oakland. But neither of those is on the shuttle route.

No household must spend more than 45% of income on basic housing + essential transportation

Major problems here. There is no guarantee that the cost of riding the privately-operated MOC shuttles will be affordable to low-income residents in the long term. The cost of running the shuttle service, which is designed for fewer than 1,000 daily riders, is extremely high. Yet successful development of Hazelwood Green will outgrow the MOC almost as soon as the road is built. Hazelwood Green expects 20,413 daily trips to their development by 2028. Most distressing of all, no plan is in place to protect renters in Hazelwood and Greenfield from the increased housing costs that such large-scale development projects always bring.

Walking, rolling, or biking is the most enjoyable choice for short distance trips

We rely more than ever on our public parks for health and recreation, but it seems even these crucial green spaces are not safe from developers. Cyclists who use the existing trail consider the MOC a degradation of the trail because they will be forced to share that space with shuttles. Building a new road that is primarily for shuttles through Schenley Park certainly does not improve safety or enjoyment for the cyclists the city says it wants to encourage.

Streets and public rights of way reflect the values of our City and community

If you’ve read this far, you can decide for yourself how the MOC stacks up against this “mobility goal.” Does the MOC reflect your values? City officials want to spend $23 million of our taxes on this project whether we like it or not. And—since the MOC is the single biggest transportation corridor investment the City of Pittsburgh is contributing to—they are making a statement that it’s our biggest transportation priority.

Residents of affected communities created an alternative plan called Our Money, Our Solutions (OMOS) that does a much better job of connecting more people to more jobs, grocery stores, healthcare, and amenities—all for significantly less money. The community-driven plan has led to weekend service on the 93 bus line and forced DOMI to claim that key components of OMOS were always part of the MOC plan. But MOC’s aim has not changed: Build a road through Schenley Park to accommodate shuttles that serve the universities and Hazelwood Green development.

The MOC reflects someone’s values, and those values are attached to dollar signs for a few at the expense of many. Our public representatives are lifting the goals of private universities, foundations, and developers above our needs.

Who Is Bending PWSA Backward to Accommodate the Mon-Oakland Connector?

Posted on September 20, 2020 by Special Reports 0

The answer may not surprise you

Per usual, a number of disturbing revelations floated to the surface at PWSA’s September 15 public meeting about the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project. Highlights include:

  • The plan calls for removing 900 trees from the Junction Hollow/Panther Hollow section of Schenley Park, according to Tim Nuttle of Civil & Environmental Consultants (CEC). Most of the trees slated for removal, Mr. Nuttle said, are located at the north end of Schenley Park in the Panther Hollow neighborhood. Presumably, this total does not include trees that would be cut down by the controversial Mon-Oakland Connector (MOC) road through Schenley Park.
  • Part of the project attempts to address the large amounts of runoff from the Parkway East overpass that cuts through The Run, but despite talks between PWSA and PennDOT there is currently no plan for PennDOT to share any of the costs.
  • The MOC and the foot path have both been moved since the previous PWSA meeting on June 18 of this year. PWSA representatives said they heard that people didn’t want the walking trail right next to the MOC, which is designed to accommodate motorized shuttles between Hazelwood Green and the university campuses in Oakland. The foot path, in the latest PWSA presentation, has been moved to the other side of the soccer field. The MOC has also changed course, but in the presentation a photo covered a critical turn in its path. Before reaching the southern entrance to Schenley Park, where they diverge at the soccer field, the two paths are still side by side. Twitter user @Bram_R recalled, “When [residents] asked about the safety of that, were told there’d be ‘a piece of wood or something’ separating [the MOC and foot path].”
  • PWSA has spent months telling concerned residents that no model of the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project exists that excludes the MOC. But during this most recent meeting, PWSA representatives divulged that such a model does exist. According to this new narrative, the MOC was added to the stormwater models after initial public meetings where residents expressed concerns about how a new asphalt road (and associated removal of trees) would affect the project’s ability to address the flooding issue in The Run.

    MOC opponents contend that the MOC—a development project designed to lure corporations to Hazelwood Green—should not take precedence over the stormwater project. The core project in Schenley Park has long been considered “technically challenging” even without incorporating a new road.

    PWSA continues to withhold the MOC-free model from residents, and did not use it in their chart where they showed a net benefit in flood control. The presentation implied that this positive result is because of MOC, rather than despite MOC. Without an MOC-free model, the road’s true impact on flood control cannot be measured.
  • Discussion of “BMPs” (best management practices) revealed that the BMPs in question were “swales,” or ditches, to hold runoff from the MOC road. These deep ditches are placed directly next to the youth soccer field.
  • After the June PWSA board meeting, PWSA executive director Will Pickering responded to resident concerns over undue influence over PWSA by Mayor William Peduto and the private interests that define his administration’s agenda. A resident had stated that all except one board member were nominated directly by Mayor Peduto. Mr. Pickering clarified via email, “Ms. [Margaret] Lanier’s initial term on the PWSA Board was prior to Mayor Peduto’s term(s) as Mayor, but all appointments to the PWSA board are nominated by the Mayor and approved by Council. Ms. Lanier’s most recent nomination was indeed put forward by Mayor Peduto.”

    At the September stormwater project meeting, PWSA Chief of Program Management Alex Sciulli elaborated that a committee formed by Mayor Peduto chose the latest round of PWSA board nominations. According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the committee is “chaired by Mark Nordenberg, University of Pittsburgh chancellor emeritus and chair of the Institute of Politics. The other members…include Community College of Allegheny County President Quintin Bullock, former Regional Asset District Executive Director David Donahoe, Women for a Healthy Environment Executive Director Michelle Naccarati-Chapkis and Heinz Endowments President Grant Oliphant.”

    The Heinz Endowments is one of three foundations that comprise Almono Limited Partnership, which owns the vast majority of the Hazelwood Green site—the development of which MOC is intended to bolster.

    Mayor Peduto, a longtime proponent of MOC, faces an estimated $100 million budget shortfall this year because of COVID-19. The City’s capital budget includes $23 million for MOC over the next few years—$9 million for 2021 alone. Approximately $2 million has already been spent on “community outreach”—marketing efforts to convince residents of affected communities they should abandon efforts to stop the road from being built.

    Mayor Peduto’s chief of staff, Dan Gilman, tweeted on September 15: “Today, City Council approved the Mayor’s 3 appointees to the @pgh2o board. These three women – BJ Leber, Rosamaria Cristello, and Dr. Audrey Murrell are going to be tremendous leaders in helping PWSA continue to modernize and provide a safe and reliable water system.”

    When @Bram_R commented that “it’s going around that these 3 new board members came off a list given to the Mayor by Pitt & CMU, and that they’re ‘their’ appointees. W Almono nearby as well, [residents] have a lot of concerns that their neighborhood is being slated for gentrification,” Mr. Gilman responded, “This is completely untrue. The names came from suggestions by the PWSA Board Nominating Committee that was publicly announced and part of the recommendations from the Blue Ribbon Panel.”

    The panel Mr. Gilman mentioned includes Jared Cohon, former president of Carnegie Mellon University (CMU).

    Twitter user @BarbWarwick2 replied to Mr. Gilman with background on the three new board members: “Looks like Ms. Cristello works at CMU and Dr. Murrell at Pitt. Ms. Leber is CEO at adagio health, which is associated with UPMC. All very accomplished women indeed, but the ‘eds and meds’ comment is not wrong. PWSA board could use at least one or two resident advocates, no?”

Asked why the PWSA’s June presentation accounted for only $14 million of the $40 million project budget, PWSA acting senior manager of public affairs Rebecca Zito responded in an email, “The remaining funding can go towards future projects in the upper portions of the watershed, provide opportunities to collaborate with the universities and other community organizations on future stormwater projects, or revisit some of the original green infrastructure projects planned for Panther Hollow Stream and Phipps Run.” (emphasis added)

After decades of steadily worsening floods in The Run and avowals from city officials that they lacked funds to fix it, residents have every right to demand that the $40 million secured for the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project addresses their dire public safety need rather than accommodating a project to benefit The Heinz Endowments, the University of Pittsburgh, CMU, and a handful of other private entities. Yet these very entities have been tasked with overseeing the PWSA and its execution of the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project.

You can view the PWSA’s June 18 presentation on their website, and PWSA has promised to post a recording of the September 15 meeting and accompanying presentation soon.

PWSA Delays Stormwater Project, Declines Request to Model Improvements Without Shuttle Roadway

Posted on June 22, 2020 by Special Reports 0

On June 18, the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority (PWSA) held a Zoom meeting to discuss the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project and its revised schedule. A May 18 email from the PWSA stated in part, “Additional modeling and design effort have caused a delay to the overall project construction schedule. We originally anticipated starting construction this fall, but it is now anticipated to begin in 2021.”

Chief of Program Management Alex Scuilli began the meeting by acknowledging that “people are waiting for stormwater relief.” He assured attendees, “We think we have the solution [and can provide] a level of storm protection that will be very good for residents.”

However, further discussion of the updated model revealed an apparent scaling back of protection: According to slide 17 of PWSA’s June 2020 presentation, “Designing for a 10-year event was determined to be a cost-effective solution for reduced flood risk.” Notes from a February 22, 2019, meeting at the mayor’s office (obtained via Right-to-Know request) recorded Pittsburgh mayor Bill Peduto’s chief of staff Dan Gilman “wonder[ing] if instead of a 25-year storm, which is what current development designs for, should we be designing for a larger storm event.”

PWSA’s presentation calls out two previous floods in The Run: one 25-year event in 2011 and one 75-year event in 2009. It does not mention other events, such as a 2019 flood that included higher elevations in the neighborhood and a 2016 flood that trapped a resident and his son on the roof of their car.

Run residents have asked the PWSA Board to create a model for the Four Mile Run Stormwater Improvement project that excludes the controversial Mon-Oakland Connector (MOC) road through Schenley Park. MOC opponents contend that the MOC—a development project designed to lure corporations to Hazelwood Green—should not take precedence over the stormwater project. The core project in Schenley Park has long been considered “technically challenging” even without incorporating a new road.

Department of Mobility and Infrastructure (DOMI) director Karina Ricks commented, “We firmly support [PWSA’s] decision to take the time needed to ensure the massive stormwater investment we are making is the right one to best address the stormwater impacts that have affected The Run for so many years. The Mon-Oakland project will proceed concurrent with the PWSA green infrastructure project, thus our timeline is adjusted accordingly as well.”

Asked whether the PWSA has created a model without MOC or intends to do so, PWSA acting senior manager of public affairs Rebecca Zito responded, “The mobility project is a planned project and our model has taken into consideration that it would be constructed. Not including it would set false expectations and provide an unrealistic assessment for advancing the stormwater project. We appreciate that residents from the Run took the time to address the Board in March about this project. The Board heard your request to commission a model for the stormwater project without the mobility corridor project, unfortunately, we were not directed to do so.”

Five of PWSA’s six current board members were nominated by Mayor Peduto, a longtime proponent of MOC who faces an estimated $150+ million budget shortfall this year because of COVID-19. In contrast to PWSA’s stormwater project, which addresses a clear public safety issue and will be financed by the PWSA itself, the City-funded MOC project demonstrably fails to benefit residents in the neighborhoods it affects. By all appearances, Mr. Peduto’s priorities are the only reason the PWSA would view cancelation of the MOC as “an unrealistic assessment.” 

Contact the PWSA

412-255-2423
www.pgh2o.com/report-an-issue

Run Residents to PWSA Board: Create Model for Stormwater Plan Without MOC

Posted on April 28, 2020 by Special Reports 0

On March 27, 2020, the Board of the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority (PWSA) convened its monthly board meeting via telephone conference line. The Board received comments from several residents of The Run, the neighborhood most directly affected by the PWSA’s 4-Mile Run Stormwater Improvement Plan. They asked the Board to create a model for the project that excludes the controversial Mon-Oakland Connector (MOC) road through Schenley Park.

PWSA Chief of Program Management Alex Scuilli has stated on the record that no such models currently exist. MOC opponents have long contended that the MOC—a development project designed to lure corporations to Hazelwood Green—should not take precedence over the stormwater project, which addresses severe flooding in The Run as well as an EPA mandate to separate stormwater from sewage.

Despite its importance to public safety, the stormwater project is not expected to fix the flooding but only lessen it. Right-to-Know documents show Pittsburgh mayor Bill Peduto’s chief of staff Dan Gilman admonishing the PWSA to “improve the messaging on this issue” to adjust residents’ expectations. The vast majority of runoff that floods The Run comes from Greenfield—not Schenley Park, where funding for the stormwater project has been directed. Yet the project was originally pitched to residents as a way to address the flooding issue. The “messaging” changed in early 2019—well into the engineering process. The core project in Schenley Park has long been considered “technically challenging” even without incorporating a new road.

It seems likely the $41 million stormwater project could be more effective if it weren’t required to accommodate the MOC. Multiple experts have told residents of affected neighborhoods that the MOC could hinder flood control. Recently, Pittsburghers for Public Transit worked with analysts to complete a cost-benefit study of expanded public transit versus MOC shuttles in affected neighborhoods—but some costs of the MOC fall outside the scope of that study, including harm to the stormwater project’s effectiveness and to Schenley Park itself. These costs must be examined at least as carefully as the costs of inefficient shuttle service.

There is a clear public need for the PWSA’s stormwater project, and a clear lack of need for the MOC. The MOC benefits developers, not residents, and exemplifies the “non-essential construction” Governor Wolf has halted during the COVID-19 crisis. It is more prudent than ever to develop alternative plans.

Contact the PWSA

412-255-2423
www.pgh2o.com/report-an-issue

Right-to-Know Request Documents Provide Answers

Posted on February 10, 2020 by Special Reports 0
bad governance and good governance

And Some Answers Raise More Questions

Since 2018, residents of Four Mile Run (The Run) have filed several Right To Know requests with the City of Pittsburgh regarding the proposed Mon-Oakland Connector (MOC) project. City government eventually gave residents documents that were inadequate in fulfilling the RTK requests. Missing information includes up-to-date engineering documents and large portions of City departments’ correspondence with all private partners in the project. In the city’s response to the requests, they stated that they are not required to share any information, but would do so selectively. Furthermore, they added, “We are prohibited from forwarding records that reflect the attorney-client privilege or the attorney work product privilege.”

But a section of the PA office of Open Records Right–to-Know Law states:

Section 708 of the RTKL places the burden of proof on the public body to demonstrate that a record is exempt. In pertinent part, Section 708(a) states: “The burden of proving that a record of a Commonwealth agency or local agency is exempt from public access shall be on the Commonwealth agency or local agency receiving a request by a preponderance of the evidence.” Preponderance of the evidence has been defined as “such proof as leads the fact-finder … to find that the existence of a contested fact is more probable than its nonexistence.”

The City’s position raises the question: Who is the attorney and who is the client in this case? This is the very same claim that city government made while conducting its infamous secret Amazon deal. The details of that plan, now available after Amazon turned down the bid, reveal the reasons for the secrecy. Pittsburgh promised the world’s richest man one of the most generous corporate welfare giveaways of land and taxpayer money of any city in the U.S. Those promises included the MOC.

At the suggestion of the City of Pittsburgh, residents also filed RTK requests with the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority (PWSA), the agency tasked with constructing the Four Mile Run Watershed Plan. The scope of this crucial and technically challenging project was to include fixing The Run’s worsening chronic flooding. But the City is forcing the merger of the MOC with PWSA’s plan. PWSA failed to respond to a resident appeal and the Office of Open Records in Harrisburg ordered PWSA to hand over all documents requested. Those documents contained crucial information including:

A portion of Mayor’s office meeting document listing who attended and Mayor Chief of Staff Dan Gillman’s remarks about the MOC project.

There is more evidence of non-transparency and duplicity by city government regarding the MOC project. Throughout the process, residents have demanded they be informed of what DOMI was planning and when DOMI would be filing grant proposals or other requests for funding. DOMI has refused to do so. They applied for a 1 million dollar grant for the MOC through the Southwestern PA Commission in 2018—while DOMI was holding a series of public meetings about the project. The money was approved, but DOMI failed to notify residents beforehand and afterward. Only dogged research and policing of the project by opponents flushed out the information.

Residents more recently received another document: a 2018 request from DOMI to the City Budget office for funding. That document is mostly blank, but DOMI was nonetheless given 9 million dollars of taxpayer money. One section of the document DOMI did fill out was the section reading: Please identify the source of external funding and how the project adheres to the funding source’s rules and regulations. “Demonstrated support of the public” was a question within that section. DOMI’s response: Depends on which community!

 A section of the City Budget form shows DOMI’s response to whether the project has community support. 

What else are city officials hiding and why? Why are they so determined to bulldoze through two vibrant neighborhoods and Schenley Park when they admit their proposed shuttle road is not a transportation solution and does not serve the affected communities? University expansion through a slow-motion land grab could be the answer.

Opponents of the MOC recognize this issue as much bigger than any individual neighborhood. Our growing coalition of residents, park protectors, neighborhood organizations and other concerned citizens is committed to protecting Pittsburgh’s communities from erasure.

(This article was previously published on February 1, 2020 in the Hazelwood Homepage)

DOMI Memo Leaked to Junction Coalition

Posted on January 16, 2020 by Special Reports 0
X-Files Deep Throat and Mulder

This January 7 memorandum from Department of Mobility and Infrastructure (DOMI) director Karina Ricks to Pittsburgh City Council shows a sea change in the battle for (as the memo puts it) “COMMUNITY GENERATED TRANSPORTATION SOLUTIONS.”

For the first time, DOMI has named specific components of the Mon-Oakland Connector project and attached dollar amounts to some of those components. Whether or not the information proves trustworthy, Pittsburghers can count its emergence as a win for accountability. Previously, DOMI refused to provide these details even in public meetings. Such details existed in a nebulous “magic bag” that constantly morphed, defying scrutiny.

The memo shows DOMI responding to our call for public infrastructure improvements listed in the Our Money, Our Solutions plan. Reluctantly—and perhaps dishonestly—but directly, and point by point. Thanks, DOMI!

Stay tuned as the fact-checkers get to work. If you want to contribute data or effort, please leave a comment on this post or email us.

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