Greene County was awarded $946,083 in grant funding from Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission for sidewalk and pedestrian safety improvements as part of phase 2 of the Waynesburg Commons Multimodal Improvement Project.

The roughly $1.5 million project, which aims to make the area safer for students and community residents, includes construction of four new sidewalks in and around the Waynesburg Commons Park. It also will include the installation of five new pedestrian warning signs on the pedestrian routes that cross state Route 19 and on Washington Street, and the installation of new light poles along the new and repaired sidewalks.

A potential Amtrak line that would connect Pittsburgh with St. Louis, Oklahoma City and Dallas/Fort Worth for the first time in more than a generation generated positive interest in the past few days since it was unveiled.

The Federal Railroad Administration said this week that it was in the early stages of studying a handful of possible future Amtrak routes that would need both capital and operating money to become a reality. One would connect Detroit with New Orleans; the other would connect Dallas/Fort Worth with New York and include Pittsburgh along with other cities along the route.

County commissioners from Fayette and Greene counties were elected to the board of the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission.

Fayette County Commissioner Vince Vicites will serve as the board’s vice chairman, while Greene County COmmissioner Betsy McClure will serve as the secretary-treasurer.

Both terms are for two years.

County commissioners from Fayette and Greene counties were elected to the board of the Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission.

Fayette County Commissioner Vince Vicites will serve as the board’s vice chairman, while Greene County Commissioner Betsy McClure will serve as the secretary-treasurer.

Both terms are for two years.

The Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission (SPC) is awarding Kittanning Borough $500,000 in grant funding to support pedestrian and accessibility improvements for its streetscape project, according to a recently issued press release.

“Kittanning’s streetscape project is an ongoing initiative that has been a borough-driven initiative that the county fully supports,” said John Strate, chairman of Armstrong County’s board of commissioners. “The borough played significant role in our region’s history, and making these kinds of efforts to beautify and revitalize the downtown area for our residents and small business owners is another step in helping to grow the local economy.”

The Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission is sharing plans to lessen traffic at the Squirrel Hill Tunnel inbound.

The project is part of the “Eastern Pittsburgh Multimodal Corridor.”

It will allow public transit buses to bypass the Squirrel Hill Tunnel, by creating a bus lane on the shoulder of the Parkway East (Interstate 376) from Churchill to Edgewood, connecting the parkway to the busway.

[…]

Pat Fabian – The Southwestern Pennsylvania Commission – the economic development organization in the greater Allegheny region – has new leadership for the next couple of years. Pat Fabian, a Democratic Armstrong County Commissioner since 2016, was voted as chair of the panel, a promotion from the vice-chair position he most recently held. Fayette County Commissioner Vince Vicites, now vice-chair of that board, and Greene County Commissioner Betsy McClure, who was chosen as secretary-treasurer, were also approved for positions on the panel.

[…]

View the full article at cityandstatepa.com.

Gus Faucher, keynote speaker at the annual State of the Pittsburgh Economy conference, apologized “for saying last year that a recession was on the way.” Following his tongue-in-cheek acknowledgment, Faucher, PNC chief economist, said he believes the nation will avert a downturn in 2024 as well.

No one assembled at the James Rohr Auditorium at PNC’s corporate headquarters in downtown Pittsburgh Wednesday morning was disappointed.