Pittsburgh: Best City in the World

I'm late to the party on this one, so you may have heard about this already. Local internet marketing firm eyeflow is making an effort to have the City of Pittsburgh website rank #1 in Google's search results pages for the term "best city in the world". They have a video that shows how you can help achieve this.

Link to: Best City in the World
Link to: Post-Gazette article
Link to: KQV Radio article

Obama chooses Pittsburgh to host G-20 Summit

As I'm sure you've heard already- unless you've been living under a rock for the last 8 hours- President Obama has chosen our fair city to host a major, prestigious economic summit. The G-20 Summit, which features leaders from 20 countries who represent 85 percent of the global economy, who will gather to discuss ways of recovering from the global economic and financial crisis.

Obviously, this is a great honor and a rare opportunity for us to show off our city and its progress over the years. Let's make sure we take full advantage of it.

This is, of course, all over the news in many different national and international sources, but I think the Associated Press article did a nice job summing it up- everything from Obama's reason for choosing Pittsburgh to the history of Pittsburgh in a nutshell.

But let's let out a big fat BOO! to the USA Today article, which completely missed the point of why Obama chose Pittsburgh. USA Today said the reason was because Pittsburgh has economic problems, which is not true. We were chosen because we recovered from severe economic problems and Obama wants to hold up Pittsburgh as an example of what can happen with a recovery.

(Note: Before any negative person points out that we still have problems, let me cut you off at the pass and say "Yes, we understand Pittsburgh is not perfect. We understand we are not completely where we want to be yet." But we are in much better shape than the rest of the country- read any of my previous posts- and we are headed in the right direction.)

Pittsburgh area adds two Fortune 500 companies in 2009!

Congratulations Pittsburgh!

The new 2009 Fortune 500 list was released to today and two Western Pennsylvania headquartered companies joined the Fortune 500 while another joined the Fortune 1000. The Pittsburgh area now boasts 8 Fortune 500 headquarters and 13 Fortune 1000 headquarters up from 6 and 12 respectively in 2008.

The newcomers are Mylan Pharmaceuticals at 462 (736 last year), Consol Energy at 497 (577 last year), and Atlas America at 864 (not ranked last year). Mainstays US Steel (up 41 spots to to 105), PPG (up 56 spots to 161), PNC (down 14 spots to 278), Heinz (up 26 spots to 267), Wesco (up two spots to 406) and Allegheny Technologies (down seven spots to 448) all retained their Fortune 500 status as well.

Here is the complete list of Fortune 1000 headquarters in Pennsylvania.

Here is a list of the Pittsburgh area ones:

1. US Steel, Pittsburgh, 105
2. PPG Industries, Pittsburgh, 161
3. Heinz, Pittsburgh, 267
4. PNC, Pittsburgh, 278
5. Wesco, Pittsburgh, 406
6. Allegheny Technologies, Pittsburgh, 448
7. Mylan, Canonsburg, 462
8. Consol Energy, Canonsburg, 497
9. Dick's Sporting Goods, Pittsburgh, 562
10. Allegheny Energy, Greensburg, 630
11. American Eagle, Pittsburgh, 690
12. Kennametal, Latrobe, 732
13. Atlas America, Moon Township, 864

No wonder we're weathering the economy better than most regions. In addition to these 13 "official" Fortune 1000, we have several more that basically are at the same level. We have BNY Mellon and Alcoa, both of which are "on paper" HQ'd in NYC, but really are still HQ'd here. Plus we have Giant Eagle and Highmark, both of which would be a Fortune 500s if they were public and EDMC which would be a Fortune 1000 if it was public.

Exciting stuff. Pass this on!

Pittsburgh Zoo named Top 5 in the U.S. for kids

Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium was just named by Parents Magazine the #4 zoo in the country for kids. Here is a link to the P-G article and the actual write-up by Parents Magazine.


http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09101/962131-53.stm

http://www.parents.com/family-life/travel/vacation-planning/kid-friendly-zoos/?page=4

USA Today: Pittsburgh in Top 10 Best Skylines in the world

The USA Today Travel section recently named Mt. Washington one of the top 10 places in the WORLD to see a skyline.

http://www.usatoday.com/travel/destinations/10great/2009-02-26-best-skylines_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip

Pittsburgh weathers recession well

As has been pointed out many times, Pittsburgh is in very good shape compared to the rest of the country.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_612126.html

Pittsburgh home prices buck national downturn again

Old news at this point. You can see several other posts on this blog talking about the same subject. But I always like to reinforce the points.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/business/s_613270.html

CNN: Can Pittsburgh save Detroit?

Perhaps you saw this piece of positive press about Pittsburgh from Anderson Cooper on CNN.com. Essentially, it says what I have been saying for a long time- Detroit is in the same situation now that Pittsburgh was in 20-30 years ago. And Pittsburgh recovered. This article basically suggests that Detroit should model is recovery on Pittsburgh's. I agree.

Most interesting are the comments both pro and con. While we would all agree that Pittsburgh is not perfect, the point is that we are on the right track and lots of positive tings are happening.

Here is the link:

http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2009/03/18/can-pittsburgh-save-detroit/

Good News Pittsburgh on Twitter!

Johnny Positive and Good News Pittsburgh can now be followed on Twitter at:

http://twitter.com/newspittsburgh

Pittsburgh Commercial Real Estate Market #1 in the U.S.

Makes sense. With a strong economy (relative to the rest of the country), it make sense that office and retail properties would be doing better in Pittsburgh than elsewhere.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/breaking/s_608350.html

Pittsburgh Home Prices up in 2008, Foreclosures down

Defying the national housing crisis, average and media home prices in Pittsburgh increased in 2008. Not only that, foreclosures went down as well. Absolutely amazing. That's a pretty good claim to fame.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/business/s_608405.html

2008 biggest year yet for Pittsburgh Film Office

Anytime movies are filmed in Pittsburgh, that's pretty cool. Not sure I'm sold on the huge economic impact they have, but I think the PR value for the city is great.


http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/s_608437.html

NY Times: Pittsburgh Thrives After Casting Steel Aside

Great NYT article about the resilient Pittsburgh economy and about how it can be a model for what Detroit is going through right now. Great that Pittsburgh is finally starting to get national recognition for performing better than the rest of the country in this downturn.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/08/business/economy/08collapse.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2

Pittsburgh's Fifth & Forbes Renaissance Nearing Completion

This talks about all of the construction projects near completion Downtown and their expected benefits and impact.

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09004/939503-53.stm