SIGN ON PENN AVENUE IN THE STRIP DISTRICT | PHOTO BY CASSANDRA HARRIS

[Updated Sept. 18, 2025: The Strip District Business Association has sued the Pittsburgh Department of Mobility and Infrastructure to try to stop this road construction.]

The Strip District Business Association has mobilized a ‘Preserve the Strip!’ campaign to protest traffic-calming construction planned by the City of Pittsburgh on nine blocks of Penn Avenue.

The City says the changes are needed to improve safety as motorists enter the dense business corridor of the Strip, but Strip businesses and others say it would hurt sales and alter the unique character of the neighborhood. The city is moving forward with the plan and has announced that construction will begin by the end of September 2025, according to a report in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

From East to West, Penn Avenue has two inbound, one-way lanes that travel between two lanes of parallel parking. One of these traffic lanes serves also as a bike lane. The Penn Avenue Rightsizing project calls for just one in-bound lane for cars, two parking lanes and the addition of a dedicated bike lane between 31st and 22nd streets.

Rightsizing projects, like this one are proven to reduce accidents by 19% to 45%, according to Pittsburgh’s Department of Mobility and Infrastructure or DOMI.

“Penn Avenue between 22nd and 31st Streets has almost half as much daily traffic as Smallman Street through the same extents, but nearly four times the amount [of] total crashes and six times the amount of injury crashes,” said Olga George, spokesperson for Mayor Ed Gainey’s office.

TOP: CURRENT CONFIGURATION OF TRAFFIC LANES BETWEEN 31ST AND 22ND STREETS. BOTTOM: CHANGES COMING TO THAT SECTION. | PITTSBURGH DEPARTMENT OF MOBILITY AND INFRASTRUCTURE

The project is a part of Gainey’s Vision Zero program to eliminate all traffic fatalities and severe injuries. Between 2018 and 2022, 115 accidents occurred on Penn Avenue in the Strip District, according to the Pennsylvania Crash Information tool.

The Pittsburgh History Landmarks Foundation, which also opposes the change, said the new traffic configuration will “disentangle” the nature of what makes the Strip District unique.

Nearly 8.6 million visits were logged in the Strip District in 2024, according to the latest numbers available in the 2025 State of the Strip Report.

Those leading the Strip District petition to stop construction say that they aren’t against safety. They’re against a change that is too drastic, and they have thousands of signatures to back that idea.

“If our goal is to try to calm traffic, there’s other ways,” says Robb Wilson, member at large of the business association. He’s in charge of developing and maintaining the association’s website, which promotes the petition. “There’s a lot of other ways to make this happen without causing inconvenience for people that are visiting

“The more you constrict people and make it hard for them, they’re just not gonna come anymore.”

He believes the change along Penn would lead to increased congestion, unworkable loading zones and would impede emergency vehicles.

Ralph Sicuro, president of Pittsburgh firefighters IAFF local #1, says that if an emergency occurs between 22nd and 31st streets, emergency vehicles would stack up. The vehicle re-routing won’t matter If there is an emergency on that strip, he says, and that firetrucks need 14 feet of operating room to extend their ladders.

He also said that when drivers hear emergency sirens, they panic and think that they’re moving out of the way, when in reality, on a one-way road, there would be no way for a big truck to get by.

PHOTO BY CASSANDRA HARRIS

Jim Coen, president of the business association and owner of Yinzers in the Burgh, says he was told about the project’s cost-effectiveness at its public meetings. Because of its affordability, he said there was never another option other than rightsizing.

According to the Institute for Local Government, a national consulting firm based in Sacramento, California, rightsizing projects, otherwise known as “road diets,” can cost little more than paint used to restripe roads.

Coen doesn’t understand, he says, why the city wants to implement the road diet before its long-term traffic signal improvement project that is scheduled to take place between 16th to 22nd streets on Penn two years from now.

To answer that, the city’s rightsizing engagement page says that it’s being completed before the $5.5 million Penn Avenue Traffic Signal Improvement project so that DOMI can use pre- and post-installation data to refine the design.

The Strip District Business Association sent a letter to the mayor’s office on May 31, 2024 to denounce the data as outdated that DOMI used between 2018 to 2022 to justify the project. During part of that time, many businesses were closed and people stayed home because of the pandemic that began in March 2020.

The association reviewed government crash data recorded between 2019 to 2023. During that period, 74 accidents occurred between 22nd and 31st streets with no fatalities or accidents involving cyclists. Additionally, nearly half of the accidents occurred at night and were concentrated at three corners: 25th, 27th and 30th streets.

Although there were two car accidents with serious injuries, both occurred on 27th street, the letter said. One hit a fixed object in the dark while the other involved a collision at an angle.

“Fifty percent of the accidents were at night,” Coen says. He believes installation of a street light there would prevent a lot of accidents.

In a release stating its opposition to the project, the History and Landmarks Foundation said that the Strip District works because it hasn’t been overly planned. Its beginning as a fresh produce and market hub and now as a singular place of retail, entertainment and housing is a part of an organic cycle of life in a place that already works.

George says that the city has received emails supporting the changes.

PHOTO BY CASSANDRA HARRIS

David Regan, former owner of Mullaney’s Harp & Fiddle, located at the corner of Penn Avenue and 24th Street, has mixed views about the changes. While he agrees it  would slow traffic, it would pose new challenges in loading areas and could cause more problems than good.

Regan, who had owned the building for 33 years until recently, says it’s been hit three times by cars. One came through the front door, while another damaged the corner of the building. The last time it happened was four years ago. Most of the cars were trying to turn left on Penn and were hit by oncoming cars, he said.

To fix this, DOMI proposed adding curb bump-outs to increase visibility on corners and further pedestrian safety. Additionally, new loading zones also will be established that would move loading activities out of the travel lanes.

To understand on-street loading needs, DOMI said that staff will engage stakeholders with storefronts in the project area.

At the time of this interview, Steve Russell, owner of R Wine Cellar, located between 25th and 26th streets, says that DOMI hadn’t contacted him yet about his business’s loading needs.

He takes loads out from the front of the store. On his side of the street, which would have the bike lane, he says that his deliveries need to get close to the curb. That’s because the truck typically pumps out raw materials that are needed to make wine.

“Nobody will come through here and leave with a case of wine on their saddlebags,” he said referring to the bike lane. He criticized Prestogeorge Coffee and Tea’s support of the project saying that bikers can more easily carry away coffee beans than alcohol.

Prestogeorge, located on Penn Avenue between 17th and 18th streets, is not a part of the affected section on Penn Avenue.

Sarah Twigg, manager of Prestogeorge Coffee and Tea, said that she’s in support of the road changes because each project she’s seen DOMI accomplish in the last six years has increased foot traffic. She’s worked there for the last 16 years.

“Maybe not car traffic,” she said. “But pedestrian foot traffic, I believe that is the point of it.”