One of the grand ideas Pittsburgh’s leaders have as they attempt to help revive its struggling Downtown business and entertainment district is to, this month, and over three weekends, debut a new annual celebration.
We use the term “grand” wholly tongue in cheek.
It’s called “The Thaw,” to celebrate the arrival of spring. One part of the event will be the burning of a snowman in effigy in Market Square. That is, if the city’s Department of Public Safety signs off on the torching.
This is what passes for “transformational” public policy these days.
Word of the new celebration — to be staged in the soon-to-be redone Market Square — came out of last month’s annual Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership meeting, that included a panel of operatives from New York City, Baltimore and Oakland, Calif.
They spoke to what it takes to reclaim and/or remake their downtowns.
But why anyone would want to emulate the messes of those three cities is a question beyond reasonable and rational thought.
We are told that for the third straight time, the Pittsburgh Steelers haven’t fared very well the NFL Players’ Association “team report card.”
Wah!
As the Post-Gazette reported it, “the Steelers rank near the bottom regarding facilities, amenities and other associated working conditions.”
Wah!
Among the complaints are that while there’s now game-day daycare at Acrisure Stadium, there’s still no “dedicated family room” where player families can watch the game “safely and respectfully.”
Wah!
There are also plaints that the new strength and conditioning staff doesn’t pass muster when it comes to “providing individualized training plans and contributing to the players’ success.”
Wah!
Excuse us, but if player families can’t watch the games “safely and respectfully” among the apparently threatening and disrespectful commoners that populate the stadium on game day, what’s that say about the general climate in Acrisure?
Well?
And these highly paid and pampered professional athletes don’t have the discipline to craft their own individualized training plans in order to contribute to their own success?
Come now.
Colin McNickle is communications and marketing director at the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy (cmcnickle@alleghenyinstitute.org).
