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.)

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 one of few cities where hotel industry has been growing

In another story about Pittsburgh defying nationwide downtrends, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that the local hotel industry is growing rapidly while the industry in other markets is receding.

The Post-Gazette reports that in addition to an explosion in new hotel properties being built locally, demand for hotel rooms in Pittsburgh is rising as well. The PG quoted Smith Travel Research as saying that of the 100 largest cities in the country, only 11 saw their hotel occupancy rates rise. Pittsburgh was one of those. Pittsburgh had the ninth highest increase in occupancy rates at 1.3 percent.

This coincides with previous reports documenting the increase in tourism to Pittsburgh and the good reviews it gets from national travel writers (read my two recent posts about good travel reviews from The New York Times and USA Today).

Pittsburgh: Who knew? USA Today Loves the 'Burgh

On the heels of a positive review in the New York Times travel section a couple weeks ago, Pittsburgh has scored again with another great review in the USA Today travel section. Here is the link: http://www.usatoday.com/travel/destinations/2008-07-17-pittsburgh_N.htm

Enjoy!