On Sunday I had the pleasure of touring several of Pittsburgh’s urban chicken coops.
The self-guided tour was the first of its kind in the city. Read more about the tour and its organizers here.
Check out these chicks…

This was from a backyard farm in the Highland Park neighborhood.
And

The city’s zoning code allows for three chickens per 2,000 square feet, plus one additional chicken for each additional 1,000 square feet, according to event organizers. Roosters are not permitted. Chicken farmers must also apply for a zoning ordinance.
Here’s some of the bounty, from …

Editor’s note: This guest editorial come from Brett Wiewiora, Founder and CEO of Onlyinpgh (http://onlyinpgh.com), a tech startup creating an online system to visualize an area’s sense of place and connect people to local happenings.
Take a second to think about the favorite places in your city. What types of places are they?  Do they tend to be places unique to your town? Are they places that the locals know but are otherwise off the beaten path? I know that’s the case with me.
My favorite part of Pittsburgh is an area …

This multimedia project by student journalist Estelle Tran highlights two former church sites in Pittsburgh that have now been converted into other uses – one a brew pub and the other a concert venue and recording studio.
Places like this are what I love about Pittsburgh!
Any other good converted churches in your community?
-KG
 
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More than 50 US cities are competing to win a $1 million prize if they increase their number of college-educated residents.
The Talent Dividend Prize will be awarded by CEOs for Cities to the metropolitan area that exhibits the greatest increase in the number of post-secondary degrees granted per capita over a three-year period, the organization announced recently.
Competing cities include: Akron, Baltimore, Buffalo, Chicago; Cleveland, Dayton, Detroit, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Pittsburgh, Rochester, St. Louis and Youngstown.
Read the complete list of competing cities and more details here. Is your city on the …

This is seriously the coolest thing I’ve seen in a long time.

The Bridge is a video about a movement started by DeKorda Jackson and his efforts for the push of getting a public skate-park built in the city of Youngstown, Ohio.

The video was produced by Stuck in Ohio, a Northeast Ohio creative studio.

Skateparks are a great way for cities to demonstrate their youth friendliness and also boost their hip factor. Plus it’s better to get kids off the street where they could get killed by a car. This is what you call a win, win. A no brainer. I hope this effort is successful.

Video after the jump …

The Buffalo News reports The Travel Channel will feature Buffalo this summer in an hour-long show that has yet to be named.
The show’s host told the paper:
“It kind of awes me that much of the country, like myself, is in the dark as far as what Buffalo means in the evolution of the United States. Buffalo was such a profound part of this nation. If I can do a television show that has any part in teaching that, that’s terrific.”
The series features places that are off-limits …

The Scene: A maze of decaying streets intermingled with dirt-tinged smokestacks and neglected church steeples.

The Action: A small knot of cyclists set off en masse from a Carnegie-built library in a formerly robust steel town.

Background: Cycling is still a fringe activity in this Rust Belt metropolis, wedged as it is between the trendier East and West coasts. But a small yet committed group of riders shrug off the incredulous stares. Some even commute to work, though few of their employers provide showers and lockers, much less secure bike parking. At least the local transit authority finally has installed bike racks.

Welcome to Pittsburgh circa 2003, when the Post-Gazette published the story “Can Pittsburgh Learn to Love Bikes?”

I know this isn’t strictly Rust Belt-related, but I’m sure many readers of this site are fans of The Wire as much as I am.
So here’s a link to an excerpt of an interview creator David Simon did with The Progressive magazine. The entire piece is not available online, only in the print version of the magazine.
I think my favorite part is when Simon says:
“This show, if we do it right, is an argument for the city. For the idea of American urbanity, for the melting pot, for the idea …

Andrew Basile, writer of the infamous Detroit sprawl letter, shared this video he has been working on with us. It outlines how car culture destroyed Detroit and how the Woodward Corridor presents an opportunity for revitalization.

What an inspiring guy. Kudos to Mr. Basile for fighting the good fight and not “silently surrendering,” like so many other businesses.
Detroit’s Woodward Avenue:
Before:                                                                                    After:

-AS
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