August 5, 2010
Dear Downtown Business Owner:
As president and CEO of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership (PDP) representing the interests of more than 350 property owners, 4,500 businesses and 8,000 residents, I wanted to share with you information about a looming crisis facing Downtown. Please read through this letter to learn how you/your business may be impacted and what you can do to make your voice heard.
Despite the deepest recession since the Great Depression, Downtown Pittsburgh serves as a role model for other cities both nationally and internationally as it continues to evolve into a 21st century city. Today, Downtown makes up 21% of Pittsburgh’s total property tax base and is critical to the health and well-being of our city and entire region. Anything that negatively impacts the Central Business District would have a ripple effect on the whole city of Pittsburgh.
We now face a funding crisis that will likely endanger this positive growth – and may even reverse it. With a $50 million budget deficit, the Port Authority must increase fares and decrease service by 30% in January 2011 unless funding is found. This service cut, plus the 2007 15% reduction in service, means almost 50% of the Port Authority’s service will be lost in a three-year period.
What does this mean for you?
More than 54% of the people who work in Downtown take public transit at least once a week. Thirty-six% use ONLY public transit to get to work. Once bus service is reduced, those 42,000 folks who use ONLY public transit will have to find another way to get to work. Most will drive their car into Downtown. This service cut then translates into about 1,000 fewer buses in Downtown, but more than 40,000 more cars looking daily for a parking space.
The result will be office employees and employers who can’t get to work. It will be service workers who can’t get to their jobs. It will be customers and clients who go elsewhere rather than fight for parking spaces. And so on, and so on.
Over the last four years, the Port Authority has undergone more radical improvement than any big-city transit agency in the country, bringing its expenses and its operations in line with reality.
Every part of the community has contributed something to that painful, yet necessary process.
Governor Rendell has asked legislators to return to Harrisburg August 23rd for a special session to deal with the state’s transportation funding crisis. Indications so far are that legislators intend to ignore his call for this special session and leave the transportation funding gap unresolved.
What can you do?
I encourage you to call, write, or email your state legislators, urging them to return to Harrisburg for this very important special session. Click here for a list of legislators. Election year “business as usual” is no longer good enough. The Legislature must return to Harrisburg before the election to do the hard work of identifying funding sources to meet the needs of our entire state transportation system. We have too much to lose to let this issue drift until after the November elections.
Sincerely,
Michael Edwards
President and CEO
Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership
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