Pittsburgh’s Hill District community in the early 20th century was a vibrant, diverse neighborhood, nicknamed the “Crossroads of the World” by Harlem Renaissance poet Claude McKay.
Jazz legend Duke Ellington performed at New Granada Theater. Black residents fleeing Jim Crow segregation in the South made their homes alongside a mix of European immigrants. Restaurants, service stations and beauty salons dotted the neighborhood alongside historic churches.
“Everything was right in your neighborhood,” said Richard Kail, 86, whose family lived on Wylie Avenue.
Then the bulldozers came.
In 1955, much of the predominantly Black neighborhood was leveled in the name of urban renewal. About 8,000 homes where people — mostly minorities and immigrants — had built their lives were demolished. Over 400 businesses were torn down to pave the way for the Civic Arena, which was razed in 2012.
Kail, now living in Washington County, recalled that many felt they weren’t given enough money to buy new homes after they were forced to relocate in the name of urban renewal.
“I remember that being the primary concern people seemed to have, that and being forced out,” he said.
Seventy years later, Hill District residents are still waiting for a promised redevelopment of the area known as the Lower Hill where it slopes toward Downtown.
Many have grown impatient, criticizing the Pittsburgh Penguins for squandering the nearly two decades they maintained exclusive rights to develop the land there by building on only a sliver of the neighborhood.
In October, the city’s Urban Redevelopment Authority and the Sports & Exhibition Authority took back control of the sprawling site. The task now falls to those authorities to build the affordable housing, businesses, art installations and other amenities many hope will revitalize the neighborhood.
“We need the Hill District renaissance,” said resident Sharnay Hearn, 37.
‘Short end of the stick’
City officials and Hill District leaders said redeveloping the neighborhood in a way that benefits the people living there is a necessary step to repair the harm that was done during the mass displacement.
“They definitely botched urban renewal,” Kimberly Ellis, executive director of the Historic Hill Institute, said of city leaders at the time. “There’s no question about it.”
Today, much of the 28-acre site that had been decimated when the Civic Arena was built is filled with parking lots. Residents for years have said they would like to see affordable housing to replace the homes that were torn down, minority-owned businesses, a grocery store and art that showcases the neighborhood’s cultural heritage.
Marimba Milliones, president of the Hill Community Development Corp., has a clear vision for a Hill District rebirth.
“I think the Lower Hill should be a mixed-use, higher-density, mixed-income site that celebrates the incredible African American history and cultural landmark that is the Hill District in its public art, in its open space and in its diversity,” Milliones said. “I think that there should be space reserved and conserved for small business participation, for economic development that benefits residents and corporations.
“There should be economic opportunity across the board.”
Milliones believes the Hill District — nestled between major hubs in Downtown and Oakland — ought to be a “premier destination in our region.”
Though she acknowledged there’s been some progress in uplifting the Hill District in recent years, Milliones is among the residents frustrated by redevelopment efforts many believe have been too slow.
“We could’ve realized this 10 years ago,” she said. “The Hill District has received the short end of the stick.”
Righting wrongs
When the Penguins lost development rights in October, more than 21 acres remained undeveloped.
The team had pledged to build a public safety facility and parking garage, which never came to fruition. Neither did plans to build affordable housing or a public art installation called Curtain Call, which was meant to showcase the neighborhood’s history.
Allowing the property to fall under the Penguins’ purview was an “awful mistake,” said City Council President R. Daniel Lavelle, D-Hill District, who sits on the Urban Redevelopment Authority’s board.
The Penguins declined an interview request.
In an October statement, the Penguins said the organization was “proud of the meaningful progress achieved in recent years with community leaders despite the challenging economic circumstances.”
Lavelle said the city and its partners have an obligation to bring housing and economic opportunities to a neighborhood that saw those things wiped out decades ago.
“Our city needs to support diversity. One of the problems Pittsburgh has is we have not had a sustainable middle-class Black community in a while,” Lavelle said. “When the city and the URA demolished the Lower Hill, they set that process in motion. We have an obligation to right that wrong.”
Tawanda Harper, 62, of the Hill District, noted the damage done decades ago that still lingers today.
“They displaced all the Blacks and Black-owned businesses,” Harper told TribLive as she waited to catch a bus in the Hill District this week. “They still ain’t put any housing in yet.”
Eric Howard, 38, another neighborhood resident, said his aunt’s home had been torn down when the Civic Arena was built.
“They tore all that down and never replaced it,” he said. “They dropped the ball.”
Howard said the Penguins and the city seemed to ignore what Hill District residents wanted to see for that site.
“I feel like they didn’t care,” he said.
Who benefits?
A 2007 agreement with the Urban Redevelopment Authority and Sports & Exhibition Authority gave Pittsburgh Arena Real Estate Development — an arm of the Pittsburgh Penguins — sole rights to develop the 28-acre site.
Since then, they built an office tower anchored by FNB and a Live Nation music venue, which is expected to open this fall.
Harper is unimpressed with those efforts. She questioned how the music venue, dubbed Citizens Live at the Wylie, will benefit Hill District residents.
“Who’s that generating business for?” Harper asked. “Not anybody in this community.”
Harper, who has spent more than four decades in the Hill District, said she doesn’t think that’s the kind of development the community needs. She would prefer to see housing and a grocery store.
Though some are quick to criticize the Penguins and their development team, the Historic Hill Institute’s Ellis defended their efforts. She served as director of community arts and culture for the Buccini Pollin Group, the developer working alongside the Penguins on the project.
“I’m still proud of the work that was done,” said Ellis, who’s a niece of the late August Wilson, the major American playwright whose primary body of work is set in the Hill District. “There were definitely some challenges, but I do think the positives outweigh the negatives.”
The development team, Ellis pointed out, awarded about $46 million in construction contracts to companies owned by minorities or women.
Ellis blamed “public delays” and “bureaucracy” for hamstringing efforts to develop. She declined to elaborate.
“Quite frankly, if the Lower Hill redevelopment had launched under this administration, because of the changes Mayor O’Connor had made, it would’ve been done,” she said, referencing Mayor Corey O’Connor’s efforts to streamline permitting processes and slash red tape for developers.
Art Morgan, 37, of the Hill District, also offered a positive take on the development that has happened so far. Morgan believes developers have moved “as quick as they can,” and he hopes the music venue will be a boon for the community.
“It’s bringing back the roots of the Hill District,” he said.
‘Correct the harm’
Some Hill District leaders pointed out that redeveloping the site isn’t just about putting up buildings but about repairing harm that had been done to a vulnerable community.
When homes were torn down, those who could afford to move to other desirable neighborhoods did, Ellis said, often gravitating to ethnic enclaves elsewhere in Pittsburgh. For example, many Italian Hill District residents ended up in Bloomfield and Jewish Hill District residents found their way to Squirrel Hill.
“If you were African American, you basically tried to move to Homewood or further up into the Hill District because there was nowhere else to go,” Ellis said. “All that did was aid in Pittsburgh’s segregation, the legacy of which we’re still dealing with today.”
Carol Hardeman, executive director of the Hill District Consensus Group, said the Hill District deserves reinvestment and redevelopment to begin remedying the harm that pushed many residents into public housing and destroyed any chance of creating generational wealth by passing homes on to their children.
“All the things that have been extracted from our community, I would like to see a big giveback,” Hardeman said. “Correct the harm.”
Hardeman was born built the year the Civic Arena was built. She recalls her mother’s generation boycotting the venue, refusing to attend hockey games and concerts as a stand against the destruction that preceded the arena.
She told TribLive that she hopes development in the Hill District moving forward will be more in line with the neighborhood’s wishes.
Leeretta Payne, a Hill District Consensus Group staffer, said she doesn’t feel Hill District residents — particularly people of color — have been a priority.
They weren’t the top concern when the neighborhood was cut off from Downtown in the 1950s ahead of the construction of Crosstown Boulevard, the short freeway leading to the Veterans Bridge, she said. And the same held true, she added, when their homes were torn down for the Civic Arena.
“Typically, people who have made decisions for the Hill District have not lived here,” Payne said.
Hardeman and Payne want to see developers work alongside the community, bringing amenities that people living there actually want.
“Don’t develop on top of us,” Hardeman said. “Develop with us.”
Government’s role
Hardeman was no fan of the Penguins’ efforts. But she’s wary, too, of the Urban Redevelopment Authority.
“I don’t particularly want it in the URA’s hands,” Hardeman said.
Hardeman raised concerns in 2024 after the URA placed for-sale signs on properties it owned throughout the Hill District, sounding alarms the authority may sell properties to developers without community engagement.
The authority removed the signs amid backlash.
In a statement responding to criticisms at the time, the URA said the signs were meant to more easily show which properties it owned and was offering for sale. The process for selling properties — which includes public votes from the authority’s board — remained unchanged.
Courtney Meadows, pastor of the Central Baptist Church in the Hill District, said he doesn’t believe government alone can reinvigorate the Hill District.
He wants to see neighbors, community groups, and private and public partners pitching in, not only to build new houses and commercial sites but also to provide educational opportunities, job training and other programs to set neighbors up for success.
“We must hold ourselves accountable to do our part and then and only then can we unite together and hold the government and other entities responsible to do its part,” he said.
Promises made, promises not kept
Officials at the two city authorities that control the Lower Hill’s destiny are pledging to prioritize community needs as they push forward with long-awaited development.
State Sen. Wayne Fontana, a Brookline Democrat, chairs the Sports & Exhibition Authority board. He said the authority is still in the early stages of mapping out what to do with the portion of the property under its control.
A parking garage and public safety facility — two things the Penguins had planned to build but did not — are still possibilities, he said.
Fontana said he hopes quick progress will signal to residents that officials are serious about revitalizing the neighborhood after years of delays.
“The promise here is that we’re going to get something done,” he said. “We’re going to make sure it’s good for the community, without a doubt. There (were) a lot of promises made, and we’re going to try to keep as many of them as we can.”
URA officials in a written response to TribLive questions acknowledged Hill District residents were frustrated by slow progress and “what some saw as a failure to prioritize racial justice and community needs.”
The URA has earmarked a portion of the site for affordable housing. The authority is selecting a developer to build housing, which could start as soon as next year, Lavelle said.
Lavelle said many residents had hoped the Penguins would have prioritized housing earlier.
“The housing itself won’t necessarily repair the harm,” Lavelle said. “It’ll certainly help.”
Lavelle also hopes that attracting more residents will provide a boost for existing businesses and entice more to open. He’s hoping a larger population would support a grocery store after the most recent one in the neighborhood, Salem’s Market, shuttered last year.
The mayor told TribLive that he is committed to seeing the Lower Hill redeveloped — and spreading that momentum throughout the rest of the Hill District.
It remains to be seen whether O’Connor can do what his 11 predecessors could not. One thing is certain: O’Connor is acutely aware of how decades of inaction have weighed on the once-vibrant neighborhood.
“It’s sat stagnant way too long,” he said.
