cityLIVE! 25
The Pittsburgh region has been a leader in the “green” building wave. With innovative thinkers in our ranks and technological advances happening in our midst, we are poised to remain in the lead. Will our progress come solely from within the region, or are there advances happening elsewhere that we can learn from? Will there be economic benefits? Is the biggest “green” bang for our buck only for new buildings, or can larger efficiencies be made in older buildings?
Our speakers will discuss the latest advances in the green building movement, what we can expect in the future and what we can learn from innovation elsewhere.
Anne Swager, Executive Director of AIA Pittsburgh will moderate. Speakers include former Ambassador Charles Ries, who is a Senior Fellow in the RAND, Washington, DC office, Maureen Guttman, Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Governor’s Green Government Council, and Francisco Escalante, VP of Development at Rugby Realty. Amb. Ries has written about energy performance of buildings and what can be learned from the UK and Austrialia. Ms. Guttman, who sits on the International Construction Code panel, will discuss the national movement to implement green construction codes and what that means for Pennsylvania and area businesses.
the winner!
Last night’s cityLIVE event, 10 people. 3 minutes, was a roaring success. 10 brilliant people with 10 brilliant ideas.
Our moderator, Chris Potter, conducted a survey to determine the “winner” by providing 5 pennies to each audience member, and a styrofoam cup for each panelist, bedecked with their photo. Late last night, Chris and his wife counted pennies. He remarked that as an alt-weekly journalist, a lot of his workdays end this way.
Top honors go to Jon Rubin of the renowned East Liberty Waffle Shop. Chris will make a donation in his name to Pittsburgh Promise. The amount is TBD but he promises it will be less than the $10 million donated by UPMC, but more than the 41 cents dropped into Jon’s cup.
Jon amazingly crammed three big ideas into three little minutes.
One:
We should kick all of PGH's universities off their campuses and out of their buildings, and relocate each and every university department—classrooms, teachers, students and all— throughout the entire city into storefronts, apartments, boats, abandoned car dealerships, even tree houses.
For over a century PGH’s universities, like universities in all major areas, have operated in relative isolation from the rest of the city, with students rarely straying very far from the campuses. Decentralizing the universities will turn the whole city into a campus, spreading the wealth and resources that colleges attract and flattening the social hierarchy between the schools and the city.
Also, by removing faculty and students from the Ivory Tower, we’ll develop a richer educational experience. Imagine: a writing department on a coal barge, a philosophy department at the casino, a physics program in row houses, a business school at city hall, and university lectures in backyards and street corners.
Additionally, the transportation issues created for the universities in terms of students getting to classes in different parts of the city, will become the Mother of Invention. I guarantee, if this is implemented, within 10 years we would have the most advanced and progressive light rail system in the world..
Two:
A lot of time has been spent trying to reinvigorate downtown PGH as destination spot for new residents and businesses. As someone who recently moved here from California, I think the solution goes way beyond new condos, graffiti removal, and streetscaping. It calls for radical measures.
I say we install super-gigantic sky fans around the perimeter of downtown PGH- blowing out. The effect of this would be to create a perpetual sunny zone over the downtown area.
This urban miracle would attract tourist and sunbathers, and more importantly reverse suburban flight -since not only would downtown seem more attractive, but the weather in the surrounding suburbs would actually become worse.
Now, a byproduct of this could be a weather war -where cities, states and even countrys fight to push bad weather onto each other. The upside of that is that every war creates a new industry and we would have gotten in on the ground floor.
Three:
Pittsburgh used to be known internationally because of its greatest export—steel. We have struggled since the collapse of the steel industry to reclaim our identity on the international stage. Ironically, what we are most recognized for now is being the home of a football team named the Steelers.
In order to regain our spot on the worldwide stage, we need to export our greatest resource again. To do this, I propose that next year— the Pittsburgh Steelers become an international traveling soccer team. Think of them as the Harlem Globetrotters of soccer, but instead of choreographed slapstick, the Steelers would delight the crowd with their naive rule-breaking hits and illegal use of hands.
Seriously, the last World Cup had a cumulative viewership of 30 billion people, just think how many Primantii brothers sandwiches we could sell. If we really want to call ourselves the city of champions I suggest we take the big leap and go with the short shorts.
If you missed out, shame on you. But we’ll do it again next year.
cityLIVE! 23
Back by popular demand! 10 more opinionated souls give us their most brilliant ideas for change. From the reasonable to the audacious.
Give us 30 minutes and we’ll change the way you see the city. Each person gets three minutes to offer up an idea without any restrictions. Forget feasibility, funding or anything as ridiculous as consensus-building. We asked for ‘thought-provoking’ and ‘outside the box’ concepts that examine change and how we approach it.
We have Susan Everingham, director of the RAND office in Pittsburgh; Scott Faber, a developmental pediatrician at the Children's Institute; Raymar Hampshire of sponsorchange (.org); Sean Jones of the Pittsburgh Jazz Orchestra; Alexi Morrissey, a poet; Priya Narasimhan from Carnegie Mellon's Mobility Center; LaVerne Baker Hotep from the Center for Victims of Violence and Crime; Hilary Robinson, dean at the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon; Jon Rubin, artist, and the man behind The Waffle Shop; and Janera Solomon, executive director of the Kelly Strayhorn Theater.
And back to moderate this year is Chris Potter, renowned editor of the City Paper.
Audience participation is a must. Show your love.
cityLIVE! 12
10 opinionated souls give us their most brilliant ideas for change. From the reasonable to the audacious. Give us 30 minutes and we'll change the way you see the city.
Chris Potter, editor of Pittsburgh City Paper will moderate this extravaganza. Our participants are Heather Arnet, Executive Director of the Women and Girls Foundation, Lalit Chordia, founder of Thar Technologies, John Norton, head of the Philosophy of Science department at University of Pittsburgh, Jonathan Greene, architect and designer, Bomani Howze, program officer at The Heinz Endowments, Erik Lingren, Executive Director of Venture Outdoors, Nathan Martin, CEO and President of deeplocal, Inc., City Councilman Bill Peduto, Joey Rahimi, co-founder of the College Prowler and Branding Brand, and Elisabeth Schroeder, Executive Director of Riverlife.
Cocktails and conversation to follow ... if you've managed to catch your breath. Show your love! Join us.
cityLIVE! 8
In a time where the ultimate resources are ideas, connections and innovation, how can we facilitate these very things? How can creativity be used to bolster the socio-cultural, knowledge and creative capital of a city? This session will look at the power of creativity to engender self-organizing, self-generating means of exchange among citizens.
A panel of international leaders working in various creative disciplines will talk about their own experiences and what they’ve learned that can be put to work in cities everywhere. Co-hosted by CEOs for Cities and cityLIVE!, and sponsored by Pop City, this event will be open to meeting attendees and the people of Pittsburgh.