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Friday, November 22, 2002

By Tom Barnes and Bill Schackner, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Dippy and the other dinosaurs should have been celebrating yesterday at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Oakland.

Yesterday was also a good day for Jane Werner of the Pittsburgh Children's Museum, Andrew Masich of the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center and Stephen Leeper, a city-county official overseeing construction of the new convention center.

Gov. Mark Schweiker showered them and other local organizations with $63 million for six projects.

"It's like the day I got married -- I was hugging and kissing everybody," Werner said. "It's a great day."

The state's outgoing chief executive came to town as part of a five-day tour to hand out money to arts, cultural, educational and historical facilities.

Schweiker, who leaves office in January, also delivered $1.7 million to Westminster College in New Wilmington yesterday.

It will help the college finance a Western Pennsylvania Cultural Arts Center.

The school says it has raised an equal amount from private donors to complete the project.

State capital budget funds earmarked for facilities in Pittsburgh include:

$15 million to expand and renovate Dinosaur Hall at the natural history museum in Oakland. A three-story atrium will be added to provide needed room for the dinosaur exhibits, along with new interactive displays and state-of-the-art areas for educational programs.

$25 million for the new David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown, including $8 million for a riverfront park along the Allegheny River, money for a watercourse that will snake its way down a walkway on 10th Street, motorized shades on windows to darken the interior when needed, a fabric ceiling to improve the building's acoustics, and environmental features, like a method to reclaim water and improve natural lighting and ventilation.

$8 million for expansion of the Children's Museum on the North Side. A new illuminated structure of translucent glass will be built to physically connect the existing museum (a former post office) with the old Buhl Science Center next door, which has been empty since 1991. The new accordion-like structure in the middle will also serve as the new entrance to the museum.

$9 million to put a five-story addition on the Heinz history center in the Strip District. It will include space for a "traveling exhibit gallery" from the Smithsonian Institution, a sports hall of fame for Western Pennsylvania, a gallery for collections and a new education center.

$5.1 million to expand Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens in Oakland, including space for themed displays, a new front pavilion, state-of-the-art greenhouses and new administrative offices. Phipps hopes to break ground on the project in mid-2003.

$1.5 million for Point Park College, Downtown, to acquire two buildings that can be converted into four dance studios and a performance space.

The college would not identify the buildings. Spokeswoman Ginny Frizzi said Point Park is in negotiations with the properties' owner and thus is not commenting on their location.

Point Park already has made it clear it wants to eventually move programs out of the Playhouse in Oakland to Downtown. Frizzi said the acquisition is not related to those plans but added that having a performance space "means more dance could be presented Downtown."

As for Westminster College, the state money will be used to renovate 1,700-seat Orr Auditorium to enhance cultural and civic offerings for area residents.

The college said it also has developed a multipurpose room seating 300 in the adjacent Campus Center. That will accommodate public lectures, dinners, lifelong learning programs and teacher workshops.

The college hopes to finish the work and open the Campus Center by September 2003.

"This project will improve what is already a major public venue for the performing arts in this area," Schweiker said in prepared remarks.

Werner had hoped to start construction at the Children's Museum in June but hasn't raised all the money she needs. Because of the delay, construction costs have risen to $27 million from the previous $18.5 million estimated.

With the state money, she has $25.2 million on hand, so "we're 90 percent there."

Asbestos is now being removed from the old Buhl building and Werner hopes to break ground in January and have the new glass building completed within 18 months.

The natural history museum is planning to add "a dramatic atrium, which will become the physical core" of the museum. The expanded building will have nearly three times the space of the current Dinosaur Hall.

The $15 million from the state is nearly half the total expansion cost of $37 million.

The Sports & Exhibition Authority, a city-county agency that owns the new $354 million convention center, has tried for months to acquire state funding for a new riverfront park running from Ninth Street eastward to the Strip.

Once that is built, Leeper said, people will have a continuous riverfront hiking/biking trail from Point State Park through the Downtown Cultural District, past the convention center and into the Strip District.

The convention center work has included separating northbound and southbound lanes of 10th Street and raising them higher than a walkway in the middle.

The walkway will include a water feature, with water coursing from Penn Avenue to the river.

The authority also sought state funds to pay for a system to darken the interior of the building, which has much natural light because of its large window-walls.

Exhibitors said they need a way to make the interior dark so they can show movies, videos and slide presentations.