Allentown, Pittsburgh

Last updated
Allentown
East Warrington Avenue Pittsburgh.jpg
East Warrington Avenue in the Allentown neighborhood of Pittsburgh
Pgh locator allentown.svg
Coordinates: 40°25′16″N79°59′38″W / 40.421°N 79.994°W / 40.421; -79.994
Country United States
State Pennsylvania
County Allegheny County
City Pittsburgh
Area
  Total0.295 sq mi (0.76 km2)
Population
 (2010) [2]
  Total2,500
  Density8,500/sq mi (3,300/km2)
ZIP Code
15203, 15210

Allentown is a neighborhood located in the southern portion of the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The ZIP code used by residents is 15210, and has representation on the Pittsburgh City Council by the council member for District 3 (Central South Neighborhoods).

Contents

History

Beltzhoover Avenue is a north-south thoroughfare that separates Allentown and Knoxville (to the east) from Beltzhoover and Mt. Washington (to the west). The city of Pittsburgh expanded and absorbed these areas lying southward of the original city of Pittsburgh.

Allentown was carved out of St. Clair Township, which was one of the original townships of Allegheny County. On April 26, 1827, Joseph Allen, an Englishman, purchased the land that would eventually be known as Allentown from Jeremiah Warder. Incorporated on March 2, 1870, and annexed by the City of Pittsburgh on April 2, 1872, Allentown was settled by many skilled German immigrants who established businesses. Welsh, Irish, and English settlers made up the second largest immigrant population.

Allentown developed quickly due to its convenient location to downtown Pittsburgh as well as due to the available transportation. Two main roads south from Pittsburgh merged on the hilltop in Allentown: Washington Road (today’s Warrington Avenue) and Brownsville Turnpike Road (today’s Arlington Avenue). The neighborhoods were connected at first by horse-drawn streetcars and later by the electric streetcar. In 1888 Allentown became the first site west of the Allegheny Mountains to operate an electric streetcar. Ever since then the trolley, or ‘T’, has run up Warrington Avenue, Allentown's main thoroughfare, keeping hilltop residents connected to downtown Pittsburgh. Today, though, the T does not make any stops in the neighborhood, and the line (most recently known as the Port Authority's Brown Line) is used as an emergency route when the South Hills Transit Tunnel is closed. In the past, there were also five inclines that served Allentown, the most famous of which was the curved Knoxville Incline with a station at the intersection of Warrington and Arlington Avenues. Several bus routes, and many more roads connect the neighborhood with the downtown, South Side, and beyond.

Historical population
CensusPop.Note
1940 8,227
1950 7,487−9.0%
1960 6,416−14.3%
1970 5,361−16.4%
1980 4,292−19.9%
1990 3,600−16.1%
2000 3,220−10.6%
2010 2,500−22.4%
[3] [2] [ better source needed ]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Downtown Pittsburgh</span> Neighborhood in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States

Downtown Pittsburgh, colloquially referred to as the Golden Triangle, and officially the Central Business District, is the urban downtown center of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located at the confluence of the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River whose joining forms the Ohio River. The triangle is bounded by the two rivers.

A streetcar suburb is a residential community whose growth and development was strongly shaped by the use of streetcar lines as a primary means of transportation. Such suburbs developed in the United States in the years before the automobile, when the introduction of the electric trolley or streetcar allowed the nation’s burgeoning middle class to move beyond the central city’s borders. Early suburbs were served by horsecars, but by the late 19th century cable cars and electric streetcars, or trams, were used, allowing residences to be built farther away from the urban core of a city. Streetcar suburbs, usually called additions or extensions at the time, were the forerunner of today's suburbs in the United States and Canada. San Francisco's Western Addition is one of the best examples of streetcar suburbs before westward and southward expansion occurred.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Highland Park (Pittsburgh neighborhood)</span> Neighborhood of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States

Highland Park is a neighborhood in the northeastern part of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Highland Park, the neighborhood, fully encompasses the park with the same name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Allegheny County belt system</span> Road design in Pennsylvania, US

The Allegheny County Belt System color codes various county roads to form a unique system of routes in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, and around the city of Pittsburgh.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bon Air (Pittsburgh)</span> Neighborhood of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States

Bon Air is a neighborhood in the south portion of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Its two zip codes are 15226 and 15210, and it is represented in the Pittsburgh City Council by the council member for District 4.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beltzhoover (Pittsburgh)</span> Place in Pennsylvania, United States

Beltzhoover is a neighborhood in southern Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in an area known as the South Hills.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fineview</span> Neighborhood on Pittsburghs North Side.

Fineview — known to older generations as Nunnery Hill — is a neighborhood on Pittsburgh's North Side with expansive views of downtown Pittsburgh. The most famous of these views is from the Fineview Overlook at the corner of Catoma Street and Meadville Street.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Knoxville (Pittsburgh)</span> Neighborhood of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States

Knoxville is a neighborhood in southern Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. It is part of zip code 15210, and has representation on Pittsburgh City Council by the council member for District 3.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Perry South</span> Neighborhood of Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States

Perry South—also known as Perry Hilltop—is a neighborhood on Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's North Side. It developed as a streetcar suburb around the turn of the 20th century, so it consists almost exclusively of residential housing, with a small business district at the intersection of Perrysville Avenue and Charles Avenue. The hill on which the neighborhood is built provides natural borders to the west, to the east and to the south.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Transportation in Pittsburgh</span> Transportation in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States

A large metropolitan area that is surrounded by rivers and hills, Pittsburgh has an infrastructure system that has been built out over the years to include roads, tunnels, bridges, railroads, inclines, bike paths, and stairways; however, the hills and rivers still form many barriers to transportation within the city.

Columbus, the state capital and Ohio's largest city, has numerous neighborhoods within its city limits. Neighborhood names and boundaries are not officially defined. They may vary or change from time to time due to demographic and economic variables.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Knoxville Incline</span> Former railway in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States

The Knoxville Incline was a broad gauge inclined railway that ran between Pittsburgh's South Side and Allentown neighborhoods. The incline was built in 1890 and had a track gauge of 9 feet (2,700 mm).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Castle Shannon Incline No. 2</span> Cable railway in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, US

Castle Shannon Incline Number 2 was an inclined cable railway in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was originally designed by Samuel Diescher, and opened in 1892 as part of the Pittsburgh and Castle Shannon Railroad as a means of transporting passenger traffic over Mt. Washington in concert with the Castle Shannon Incline. From the top station at Bailey Street, adjacent to the Castle Shannon Incline top station, No. 2 ran down hill west of Haberman Avenue, ending at Warrington Avenue.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South Busway</span> Busway in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

The South Busway is a two-lane bus rapid transit highway serving southern portions of the city of Pittsburgh. The busway runs for 4.3 miles (6.9 km) from the Mt. Washington Transit Tunnel across the Monongahela River from Downtown Pittsburgh to the Overbrook neighborhood of the city, bypassing the crowded Pennsylvania Route 51. It is owned and maintained by Pittsburgh Regional Transit, the public transit provider for Allegheny County and the Pittsburgh region.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brown Line (Pittsburgh)</span> Former light rail line in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

The Brown Line was a branch of the Pittsburgh Light Rail system that ran from South Hills Junction over Mount Washington and across the Monongahela River to downtown Pittsburgh, terminating at Wood Street. It included the steepest grade of any section of the Pittsburgh light rail system, of approximately 10 percent.

Pittsburgh, Knoxville & St. Clair Electric Railroad was one of the earliest electric street railways. A licensee of the Daft System, the line struggled with difficult terrain, required expensive bridges, and failed financially within just 3 years of opening.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blue Line (Pittsburgh)</span> Light rail line in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

The Blue Line is a Pittsburgh Light Rail line that runs between Downtown Pittsburgh via the Overbrook neighborhood to South Hills Village.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mount Washington, Pittsburgh (mountain)</span> Hill in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

Mount Washington is a hill in Pittsburgh, on the southern banks of the Monongahela River and Ohio River.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Silver Line (Pittsburgh)</span> Light rail line in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

The Silver Line is a line on the Pittsburgh Light Rail system that runs between Downtown Pittsburgh through the Overbrook neighborhood to Library. It is the renamed service for the former Blue Line –Library branch.

References

  1. "Census: Pittsburgh". Pittsburgh Department of City Planning. April 2013. Retrieved 2013-04-26.
  2. 1 2 "Census: Pittsburgh" (PDF). Pittsburgh Department of City Planning. January 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 10, 2007. Retrieved 2007-07-19.
  3. "PGHSNAP - Neighborhoods: All Raw Data".

Further reading