Category: Good Government On The March, History, Politics || By

The late Andrew "Greeky" Jakomas still gets a lot of abuse --- not all of it undeserved --- for things he did and shouldn't have done, or for things he should have done, and didn't.

But anyone who loves the city should be grateful to Jakomas, a two-term mayor and longtime councilman, and other leaders of the 1950s and '60s for not building this monstrosity on Fifth Avenue at Huey Street.

I stumbled across this undated architect's rendering while looking for something entirely unrelated in the archives of McKeesport Heritage Center. No date was attached, but I'd suspect it's from roughly 1957.

According to the accompanying caption from the Daily News, this $800,000, five-story structure was proposed by the McKeesport Planning Commission. It would have included a 184-car parking garage with a new city hall on the top floor and storefronts on the lower level, along with "a modern supper club," and "a sun deck and recreation area."

The location --- presently a vacant lot across Fifth Avenue from the back of the Sunoco station, and ironically near the current City Hall --- was then a slum area slated for clearance.

As you can see, this building combines all of the charm of the Lysle Boulevard parking garage with the architecture of an East German prison.

Someday soon, I'll write a defense of the city hall that was built in 1959, which currently houses the police and fire departments. I'm one of the few people I know who likes it.

No, it's not a great building, but it has some handsome lines and it genuinely makes me smile when I see it, especially when the lobby is lit up at night.

But whatever you think of the 1959 city hall, you have to admit it's a Greek temple compared to this rotten building. How would you like to work on the top floor, breathing carbon monoxide fumes all day long? And what would the lower floors looked like when the concrete became stained with salt and soot, or when the parking deck began to leak into the stores on the first floor?

By the late 1950s, the handwriting was on the wall for Downtown, and McKeesport planners were desperately trying to compete with suburban shopping malls. The short-lived pedestrian mall on Fifth Avenue was one attempt. Midtown Plaza was another.

In all likelihood, this white elephant would have fared no better than they did. If there's such a thing as "addition by subtraction," then the failure to build this city hall/parking garage/shopping center was a huge civic improvement.

. . .

Meanwhile, Back in The Present: If I'm not writing at the Almanac, then I'm probably pitching in over at Pittsburgh Radio & TV Online, operated by my friend and cow-orker Eric O'Brien for almost 10 years now.

Right now you can read about a format change at a station in Erie or digital TV or even see Karl Rove with hair. Out of all of the websites covering radio and television in Pittsburgh, it's definitely one of them.

Also, Tube City Online has a new look, with help from local photographer and railroad journalist and historian Rich Borkowski Jr.

. . .

In Other Business: As predicted by the Almanac back in April, subscribers of the Daily News started getting the Sunday Tribune-Review this weekend. (Admittedly, it didn't take the prognostication skills of Kreskin to predict this. The Trib wants to boost its Sunday circulation in Allegheny County, because higher circulation means it can charge higher advertising rates.)

The News, which has never had a Sunday edition, is a six-day-per-week paper, and the Trib is being delivered to its subscribers at no extra cost ... whether they want it or not.

Traditionally, a lot of News carriers have also delivered the Sunday Post-Gazette and before that, the Press, so I'm going to guess that a few subscribers aren't thrilled about getting two Sunday papers ... especially if they don't like the Trib.

I wonder how much a Daily News subscriber has to pay to not get the Tribune-Review? (Rimshot.)

I'm ambivalent, because I don't get the Sunday P-G, but I don't think the Sunday Trib is any prize, either. (The normal caveats apply to my opinions and/or credibility.)

At least Sunday's Trib included a nice profile of McKeesport Mayor Jim Brewster by Jennifer Vertullo of the News. Vertullo has also demonstrated a pretty keen eye for taking good photos, too, which is not a skill that many writers master.