Heyl: Hazelwood Hangs Its Hopes On Landing Amazon Headquarters

PITTSBURGH, PA - Joe Reich has roots extending deeply into the Hazelwood community. He’s worked at the Elizabeth Pharmacy on Second Avenue for 44 years, owned it for the past six and just spent thousands of dollars renovating the building’s facade and interior.

He’s seen it all: He remembers when the neighborhood was bustling back when the old LTV coke works was thriving. He has lived through its steep decline since the plant closed 20 years ago. He was among those who recoiled in March when the nearby fire station had to be fitted with bulletproof glass after gunshots were fired outside it.

Reich has never felt more optimistic about Hazelwood’s future.

“If we land Amazon, it would be incredible,” he said. “It’d be a big boost to the economy for Pittsburgh in general and Hazelwood in particular.”

Surprising as it might seem, Hazelwood is the obvious location for Pittsburgh’s upcoming entry in a contest virtually every large city in America badly wants to win: to be chosen as the site of Amazon’s second headquarters.

The stakes couldn’t be higher. Amazon plans to invest $5 billion in the new campus and hire as many as 50,000 workers to fill it. The civic leaders who successfully lure this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity forever will be remembered in their city as heroes.

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Civic leaders locally such as Mayor Bill Peduto already have identified the former LTV works, a 178-acre property along the Monongahela River, as the preferred location by the team assembling Pittsburgh’s Amazon proposal. After a group of foundations purchased the site in 2002, the site was mostly cleared and a road system was built.

The Hazelwood location isn’t the only Pittsburgh one that will be offered to Amazon, but it’s undeniably the best. It meets virtually all of the company’s stated requirements for the new campus.

The site has space for an initial 1 million square feet in the project’s first phase and for an eventual expansion that could expand the development to 8 million square feet; it’s in a metro area of at least 1 million people; It’s within 45 minutes of an international airport; It’s within two miles of a major highway (I-376) and it has access to mass transit.

It’s also across the railroad tracks from Hazelwood’s Second Avenue business district, which has shown signs that it’s gradually emerging from a slumber worthy of Rip Van Winkle. In March, the upscale French bakery La Gourmandine opened at the site of what at the time was the neighborhood’s only grocery. Dimperio’s closed in 2008 with the owner publicly complaining that shoplifters drove him out of business.

Two small places to get prepared food and sundries have opened in the neighborhood since Dimperio’s went under. One of them is Fat Rai’s, named after a victim of gun violence in the neighborhood. Owner Kim Allen, who opened the place three years ago, said business was great her first two years but has tapered off.

“I’d love to see Amazon come here,” she said. “I could feed everyone from there during the day and then maybe I could get a part-time job with them at night.”

Allen is keeping her fingers crossed that Amazon chooses Hazelwood.

“We have a prime location for them,” she said. “And people around here need jobs.”

Hazelwood slowly is showing slow signs of reversing its fortunes. Amazon’s arrival certainly would accelerate the process.

Eric Heyl is Patch’s Pittsburgh field editor. Reach him at 412-334-4033 or Eric.Heyl@Patch.Com. Photos by Heyl.