City Cast Pittsburgh

What’s that in the Pittsburgh air? No, it’s not smog. It’s love. Next week brings two opportunities to celebrate our loved ones: Galentine’s Day and Valentine’s Day. If you need plans, the City Cast team is rounding up our favorite local treats, activities and gifts for both romantic partners and pals.

Our recommendations from the episode:

For Galentine’s/Palentine’s Day

When the city closed a tent camp along Stockton Avenue late last year, officials only gave the people living there a few days’ notice. Crews cleared anything left behind with front loaders, inadvertently scooping up a woman who was still inside her tent. Now two legal advocacy groups have stepped in to ask whether officials violated residents’ civil rights. Amelia Winger, a reporter with PublicSource, joins us to discuss the fight ...

It’s the Friday news roundup! The City Cast team is talking about how anxiety dominates the state’s medical cannabis industry, why a bridge rumored to be unsafe in 2018 is only now getting closed, and how one local artist is turning regional folklore into a tarot deck.

As always, our Friday shows are powered by great local journalism.

Every February 2, the lore of a mythical groundhog draws thousands of spectators from all over the world to a small town 80 miles north of Pittsburgh. Punxsutawney Phil sits on his stump and predicts the weather; if he doesn’t see his shadow, that means an early spring. But how accurate are his predictions — and why does PA ride so hard for a rodent? We're teaming up with City Cast Philly this Groundhog Day to learn whether Pun...

In Pennsylvania, there’s one cemetery that can offer a sustainable afterlife – and it’s just outside of Pittsburgh in Verona. City Cast host Morgan Moody and producer Mallory Falk are touring the grounds of Penn Forest Natural Burial Park, the state’s only certified green cemetery, to find out why more people are going out green.

And if you want to become a volunteer river ice spotter, check out the National Weather Service's vi...

Pittsburgh is packed with medical centers and doctors, but it can still be a challenge to get an appointment with a trained mental health professional. It was even trickier in the early days of COVID, until the pandemic gave rise to third-party psychiatric platforms.

Remote therapy and virtual prescriptions helped increase access to mental healthcare. But as freelance journalist Meg St-Esprit reports, some of the platforms are start...

Pittsburgh prides itself in our strong steel background, but before this city was the world leader in steel production, we were known for a much more delicate material: glass. Anne Madarasz, chief historian at the Heinz History Center, joins us to discuss Pittsburgh’s legacy as “Glass City U.S.A.”

You can learn more Pittsburgh glass history at the Heinz History Center exhibit Glass: Shattering Notions.

And if you’re a fan of Blown Aw...

It’s the Friday news roundup! The City Cast team is discussing one school’s attempt to keep cell phones out of classrooms, why more teens are gathering Downtown, and Mayor Gainey’s plan to review whether Pittsburgh non-profits should start paying property taxes.

As always, our Friday shows are powered by great local journalism.

If you’re planning to get something sweet for Valentine’s Day, need to load up the cookie table at your Pittsburgh wedding, or just want to know where to get the flakiest croissants in the city, the City Cast team has you covered. We're rounding up some of the best treats we've tried from local bakeries that cater to everyone.

Our recommendations in this episode:

Jean-Marc Chatellier's French Bakery in Millvale

Five Points...

This time of year, it can seem like Pittsburgh’s been stripped of every color except gray. But if you look closely enough, you might catch a pop of color from a ghost sign. They’re the faded, old-timey advertisements painted on the sides of brick buildings. To beat the winter blues, we’re revisiting our conversation with City Cast contributor (and self-proclaimed ghost sign hunter) Rossilynne Skena Culgan about how to find these re...

The Pennsylvania House is in disarray. Lawmakers haven’t been able to agree on basic rules and the House has recessed indefinitely. Now, Speaker Mark Rozzi is going on a listening tour to address the partisan gridlock — and his first stop is in Pittsburgh.

Spotlight PA’s Capitol Reporter, Stephen Caruso, joins us to explain how Allegheny County inadvertently set this chaos in motion and where we go from here.

You can read Stephen’s o...

As a college student, poet and archivist Silas Maxwell Switzer realized he knew almost nothing about Pittsburgh’s queer history — even though he’d grown up here. And when he set out to fix that, he realized there were gaps in the history. Silas’ forthcoming poetry collection, "Nine Parts Water, One Part Bleach," focuses on the AIDS crisis in Pittsburgh and its erasure. He joins City Cast Producer Elizabeth Kauma to talk abo...

It’s the Friday news roundup! City Cast host Morgan Moody and producer Mallory Falk are joined by Pittsburgh City Paper’s Jordana Rosenfeld to discuss her recent reporting on a new proposal to enforce Pittsburgh’s youth curfew, concerns about LGBTQ book censorship in Moon Township, and the Twitter storm around an Allegheny County Council race.

As always, our Friday shows are powered by great local journalism.

One of the city’s most popular vegan spots, Apteka, is shifting into burger mode. Crapteka is a three-weekend-long event where the nationally celebrated Bloomfield restaurant switches out its typical Eastern European fare, like pierogi and schnitzel, for burgers. The vegan patties are so popular, they've developed a cult following. 

Kate Lasky, co-owner and co-chef at Apteka, joins us to talk about how she and her partner built ...

Pittsburgh’s local healthcare giants — UPMC and Allegheny Health Network — are investing billions of dollars to expand throughout the city and surrounding counties with several new specialized and neighborhood hospitals. TribLIVE senior reporter Deb Erdley joins us to talk about how these elaborate construction costs could be added to your next hospital bill.

You can read Deb’s reporting on hospital expansions here.

Our newsletter is...

In the weeks since Damar Hamlin went into cardiac arrest after a hit during a Monday Night Football game, the McKees Rocks native has recovered enough to go home and the NFL has kept on playing. But what does the future look like for the young athlete, who was just starting his career? And can we continue to justify watching a sport that leaves so many players with life-changing injuries? Martenzie Johnson, senior writer for ESPN’s...

It’s the Friday news roundup! City Cast host Morgan Moody and producer Elizabeth Kauma are joined by Brian Conway of the Pittsburgh Independent to discuss his reporting on the fate of Pittsburgh’s iconic “orange-lemon flavored drink” and the historic bakery that owns the recipe. Plus, they talk about the latest updates on conditions at the Allegheny County Jail and the Gainey administration’s ambitious plan to put more money toward...

With big local startups like Argo AI and Fifth Season closing last year, remote work enabling people to do their jobs anywhere, and the possibility of a recession looming large, we started wondering whether the death knells are ringing for Pittsburgh’s tech and startup industries. We took the question to Becca Szkutak, a senior writer at TechCrunch+. She joins us to discuss our city’s future as a tech hub. 

Our newsletter is fre...

City Cast Pittsburgh launched one year ago today! To celebrate, the team is sharing some interesting things we’ve learned about the Steel City — with help from our very first guest, writer Damon Young.

In the newscast, we mention the new digital archive documenting the attack at Tree of Life synagogue. You can access the website here: https://october27archive.org

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