A map submitted by Buccini/Pollin Group and others on the Penguins’ development team showing the course of a proposed pedestrian-only Wylie Avenue, presented to the City Planning Commission on April 20, 2021.
by Rich Lord
The future of Wylie Avenue emerged as the biggest speed bump in the Penguins’ drive to begin Lower Hill District redevelopment, as the hockey team’s chosen developers briefed the City Planning Commission for the first time.
The meeting marks an important step in the Penguins’ effort to remake the 28 acres formerly occupied by the Civic Arena and its parking lots into a $1 billion complex of offices, residences, stores and entertainment venues.
The Penguins’ chosen developers, Buccini/Pollin Group [BPG], want to start construction with a 26-story office tower and 1.35 acres of landscaped public space. The plot, totaling 2.07 acres, is near the Hill’s border with Downtown. It’s bounded by Washington Place, Bedford Avenue, Logan Street and what had been the western end of Wylie, before it was erased in the process leading up to the 1961 opening of the arena. First National Bank has signed on as the tower’s anchor tenant.
An artist’s rendering of the proposed First National Bank tower, with Downtown behind it, presented by developer Buccini/Pollin Group to the City Planning Commission on April 20, 2021.
First the commission has to certify that the developers’ intentions are consistent with a preliminary land development plan for the site, approved by the commission with neighborhood sign-off in 2014.
Commissioner Becky Mingo pointed out that the 2014 plan calls for fully restoring historic Wylie Avenue’s long-severed connection to Washington Place, the new proposal counts on a pedestrian-only connection. That idea might have “a lot of merit,” Mingo said, but voting for something that’s inconsistent with the established plan might set a bad precedent.
“Wylie Avenue no longer worked after the cross-town highway [Interstate 579] was built,” said Kimberly Ellis, a Hill-based historian and owner of Dr. Goddess Arts, which is working with BPG. Centre Avenue is now the neighborhood’s commercial core, and pedestrian Wylie can “honor the legacy and the history while we are building this new development.”
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