Riverfront Program and Funding Development
Riverlife
Riverlife is dedicated to reimagining Pittsburgh’s riverfronts as a continuous system of parks and open space referred to as “the Loop.” Formerly vacant, industrial, inaccessible land, is being redesigned to connect neighborhoods to riverfronts in a way that is accessible to all.
Riverlife recently released its Completing the Loop strategic plan that articulates investments along “”the Loop””, 15 miles of trails, parks, and natural landscape that span Pittsburgh’s three rivers. Fourth Economy worked on a companion piece to this plan, creating a model for estimating costs for Care and Maintenance along the trail. In addition, Fourth Economy made recommendations for a financial vehicle to fund care and maintenance. In 2023, Riverlife re-engaged Fourth Economy to work on a regional data hub along the 15-mile loop of riverfront space in Pittsburgh, PA. This dashboard will provide a comprehensive overview of riverfront activity and its impacts and will include data from Placer.ai along with various other sources. This project builds on Fourth Economy’s experience within the outdoor economy and trail impact work portfolio. We have been re-engaged to conduct an Economic Impact Study of Riverlife’s operations, programs, and related events.
Our Approach
Previous work had articulated costs at a macro scale and at an individual parcel scale. This effort updated the cost model from previous phases to reconcile area and cost estimates with new geographies created by Riverlife staff for Trail Frontage, Natural Landscape, and Public Space. In addition, Fourth Economy provided ongoing on-call support to Riverlife.
The Results
Working in partnership with Riverlife, Fourth Economy developed a plan with alternatives for implementation, including: creating an endowment funded by local foundations; establishing comprehensive care and maintenance agreements between the largest property owners along “the Loop”; providing private and public landowners along the trail with good faith estimates of care and maintenance costs; and modeling different tasks, frequencies, and levels of maintenance for different trail segments to establish service agreements with the Department of Public Works and the City of Pittsburgh. Riverlife has secured an initial $5,000,000 investment from a local foundation in the Fall of 2024 that is being matched with an additional $1,000,000 (to date) from a second foundation in early 2025.
Location
Pittsburgh, PA