We at this blog are fans of all things Rust Belt. The WSJ had a great human interest story on the stairs of Pittsburgh.
Like most Midwestern cities, Pittsburgh's industrial days have left behind an expensive infrastructure. In this case, many stairs were constructed to accommodate immigrant working-class housing. The city can barely chart all these staircases, let alone maintain them.
It would be a shame for the city to just destruct these. How about privatizing them? Like the article says, many of these stairs lead to residences that cannot easily be found from the street. Private companies would do a much better job cataloging their own property.
In a city that is leading the Rust Belt's recovery, this urban, pedestrian-friendly feature of the city should be capitalized on. Privatization of the city's stairs would be a great way to explode the myth that infrastructure can only be maintained by the government.
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