I've been keeping an eye on "Cleveland's equivalent of Allegheny City" for some time now. I was in the Ohio City neighborhood just yesterday and on each trip it seems to improve significantly. Ohio City is like Allegheny City in terms of having been a seperate city, in that both areas have a collection of historic homes and both have, or in the case of Ohio City had a struggling commercial district.

Today I found I could buy a Cuban Sandwich, artifacts from Thailand, furniture (at real prices, not the kind you rent) and the widest possible array of meats and vegetables. The meats and vegetables category was available before, as Ohio City is home to Cleveland's market house. (It also appears a Target store is opening as an employment center has set up in a storefront on the main street).

The housing stock in Ohio City has nothing on Allegheny City, however. What they do have has been nicely restored and a variety of infill housing that actually seems to represent a higher-density building model than the existing housing is cropping up. There's even a variety of stores mixed in with the housing on the back streets, including a Sushi restaurant.

Ohio City, like Allegheny City is in close proximity to downtown and residents of both locals can walk there. Unlike Allegheny City, Ohio City has a rapid transit station that allows convenient access when its not nice enough to walk, or if you can't walk. Allegheny City will have this in a few years as well, but it won't come close to residential parts of the area, unfortunately.

Ohio City also has a large, modern grocery store called Dave's if one was needed in addition to the wonderful market house.

If you've never been to Ohio City, make a point to visit. Here's a short slide show of some Ohio City and Cleveland photos...

In response to reader comments on the Pittsburgh art scene, the scene here is alive and well. The affordability factor of Pittsburgh enables creative types to be able to live as working artists here, sometimes starving, but just as often thriving. Pittsburgh is home to many well-respected and internationally-known working artists. Pittsburgh is home to the Warhol Museum, but perhaps more importantly the Mattress Factory, a world famous destination for installation art. Andy Warhol left Pittsburgh for New York, but if he were alive today he may not be so quick to split. Pittsburgh is also a city of asylum for artists unable to work in their home countries. There's no shortage of things happening for artists and art afficianados either. From the Garfield Glass Works to galleries on the South Side and on Penn Avenue--its just amazing what you can find and the calibur of art you find. On many Fridays I walk downtown to the symphony and take in the art walk activities in the Cultural District. I also understand space for shows and work space are both very affordable, especially the former. Need I mention Pittsburgh is also home to the Carnegie Museum of Art and a short drive from most of the great Art Museums in the U.S. including the National Gallery, Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Met and more. The Cleveland Museum of Art is very close and comes close to surpassing anything available on the West Coast.

It looks like condo sales to boomers in New Jersey have been slower than expected? Why? Because they can't sell their single-family homes. In what looks more and more like the reverse of the suburban movement in the 1950s, the urban lifestyle continues to increase in its popularity. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal even has McMansion builder Toll Brothers following the affluent from suburbia to city. You might also recall the recent Brookings Institution report that finds just as many poor live in the suburbs as in the city at this point in time.

That's great for cities of course, but what's to become of all the suburban houses? Robert Toll is quoted in the WSJ article as saying he doesn't foresee the shift amounting to more than ten or fifteen percent. That's predictably less than the urban to suburban movement of earlier years, enough to lessen or eliminate the onslaught of articles about suburban sprawl.

More Toll didn't think the trend would spread from Manhattan to downtown Detroit anytime soon and he didn't think it was happening because folks were tiring of long commutes. Perhaps a busier lifestyle, an increase in single or two person households and a sense of being disconnected are driving the trend. City life is more attainable where there is the vibrant city to be in. Building vibrancy from scratch is much more difficult than adding some condos to the mix.

More, increasing numbers of immigrants who don't fancy suburban life is helping. Here in Pittsburgh sales of downtown condos have been robust and more developments including a number of rental units are planned or underway.

So, I still didn't answer the question, what's to become of the suburban houses even if we're only talking about ten or fifteen percent? The answer is unclear. One possible answer is "the same thing that happened to the urban houses when the more affluent moved to the suburbs--the price will drop and they will become more affordable to those displaced by the move of the more affluent to the city." This of course reverses the transportation problem for lower-wage workers who might now live in the city and travel to a mall or airport for employment. Still at the same time it could increase the quality of housing available to lower-wage workers.

That's not likely to be the entire picture we see however. The population today is rising at a faster rate than in the 1950s, creating more demand for housing in general. Theoretically, a fifteen percent increase in population could offset a fifteen percent population loss in the suburbs (unless the increase in urban residents exceed that). Also working against the suburbs, the city is a mixed-use environment by its nature. Unlike the suburbs, its easy to build rental units near for-sale condos in the city, rental units that are more affordable and attractive to lower-wage workers. If the city boom continues, there will be more of a push to develop a wider circle around downtowns, creating and improving other urban housing. It may also bring about the conversion of other city housing from multi-units to single-family units as those who enjoy the single-family home lifestyle look for it closer to the city.

This may to some degree bring about the conversion of suburban homes into multi-family units, but that is likely restricted by municipal ordinances. Failure of suburban homes to sell could result in pressure to change these ordinances to allow owners to receive rental income if they can't sell their homes. This could result in a more dramatic suburban value loss. Trends are in no way clear enough to make any such prediction, however. Today even while we see an urban boom, suburbs remain extremely popular with certain population segments. How far the branch grows from the tree remains to be seen.

A lively discussion emerged on a local email group this week on whether the Northside, particularly the Central Northside, was becoming gentrified. After-all, we do have a handful of coffee houses now and in some places houses are selling for a pretty good clip. Still, as I follow my flash light through yet another $5,000 house, I remained with my doubts. Besides, there's still no Starbucks.

There are a good many that live around here who don’t want what they think of as “gentrification.” It may result in lessened diversity certainly in economic if not racial terms. People who like cities in general often like them because there are lots of different people around and when you walk around, which a city is generally well suited for, you can meet them. To accomplish this you need a variety of housing stock.

I went onto dictionary.com to try and find out just what gentrification might mean, although I suspect its connotations carry much more weight than any definition. “Gentrification,” in a literal sense means “Very or excessively refined or elegant,” or “improved.” Well, you can call the Northside a lot of things, but Allegheny West house tours not withstanding, as a whole excessively elegant may not always be one of them. From the discussion I imagine depending on the listener, “improved” could just as easily be termed “destroyed.”

The discussion started when I posted a response to a recent City Paper article on the pending Federal Street Townhomes project scheduled for groundbreaking just before the publication of December’s Chronicle.

The article had a nice graphic showing a home on Jacksonia Street labeled the “Jacksonia” for $60,000 and a rendering of a new home labeled the “Jacksonian” for $120,000. I responded to the writer with several additional points and a correction.

First, I pointed out that houses that sell for $60K or less in the War Streets are not always in livable condition (at least there’s some work to be done). I also pointed out that these low-priced homes to represent great opportunities for those willing to put sweat equity into them to benefit. Not a fair comparison really.

The article contended that many of the neighborhoods residents may not be able to afford the new homes. I pointed out that there aren’t many new houses out there to be had for $130,000 especially ones being that close to downtown. Rebecca Davidson-Wagner, Community Development Specialist for the Central Northside Neighborhood Council wrote in saying she had spoken to the author about the article. Davidson-Wagner said the article failed to mention the project also has 39-42 low income rental units, along with single story "affordable flats" that will be priced lower than the most affordable unit. More, with the URA deferred mortgage of up to $50,000 the new houses will be around $80,000 for a 3 bedroom 1 and 1/2 bath with off street parking. That’s a new house for a few thousand more than one that could need lots of work.

In fact there are a wide range of prices in the Central Northside with or without the planned construction. Looking at sales between January 1, 2005 and October 31, 2006, sales ranged from $7,000 to $301,000. By my calculation the average home price in the year from Jan 1, 2005 to Oct 31, 2006 was about $127,000 making the lowest price new homes more affordable than the average. The median is actually higher, around $170,000.

That may sound like big money to some long-term Northsiders, but remember that is the area popularly known as the Mexican War Streets, which while being “discovered” now, has been in the eye of preservationists since the 1970s. Many of the comments to the board seemed to lament that after all these years of waiting (the Federal Street project has been on the board for more than a decade) to make progress an article comes along and takes a big swipe with the nasty word “gentrification.” One resident replied with “we should be so lucky.”

To those who do worry about the affordability of houses, feel fortunate you live in Pittsburgh where a population decline has left far more houses than people to fill them. More, a recent ranking in Smart Money magazine said Pittsburgh remained “undervalued.” Housing here, the magazine figures, is almost twenty percent less than it should be. While getting a house exactly where you want it for the price we want to pay (hey, we’d all buy that $20,000 house in Shadyside if it existed), there is no shortage of affordable houses in nearby neighborhoods and our houses have a lower median price than other comparably sized cities including Cleveland, Cincinnati and Chattanooga.

Plus, for those with lots of energy and time, yes there is even an occasional $5,000 house.

If you’d like to participate in these online email group discussions, I’d recommend the East Allegheny Group where recently the topic has been does Pittsburgh have enough culture (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/eastallegheny ) and also the Chat Northside group where the discussion on gentrification took place at ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/chatnorthside ). It’s a great way to meet neighbors and know more about what’s going on.