A first take on Pittsburgh

OK, so I spent roughly 28 hours in Pittsburgh earlier this week, including the last two driving to the airport and waiting for my outbound flight to Portland. Is it possible to render anything but a superficial impression of a place, knowing you've seen just a tiny sliver of it? Of course not.

But, what the heck. Here goes:

-- It's greener than I expected. Simone and I drove in around noon Sunday and headed toward the downtown business district. We took a wrong bridge south but quickly righted ourselves and made our way to east Pittsburgh. As we drove along Forbes Avenue, past the concentration of universities (Duquesne, Pitt, Carnegie Mellon), we passed huge parks with lush lawns, well-maintained shrubbery and impressive stands of trees -- enough to rival Portland's urban canopy.

-- It's more compact than I imagined. Well, the east side, anyway. After a quick visit to Carnegie Mellon, we spent a couple hours driving around randomly just to get a glimpse of different areas. We got an eyeful -- everything from gorgeous homes on a hill to transitional neighborhoods to boarded-up rowhouses along sinister streets. You've got to expect to see the gritty along with the glamorous in any city. I was just mildly surprised that we so saw so much variety in such a relatively small space.

-- It's both more and less diverse than Portland. One in four Pittsburgh residents is African American, whereas blacks, Latinos and Asians account for about 7 percent each of Portland's population. Pittsburgh has large numbers of people with German, Irish, Italian and Polish ancestry and, in fact, has a Polish Hill neighborhood. Portland, meanwhile, has lots of Chinese and Vietnamese and growing numbers of Russian and African immigrants.

-- It's got a similar vibe to Portland. We saw plenty of bicyclists and runners the first day and, thanks to our hosts, Leigh and J.J. (more on them in a separate post), we ate dinner Sunday at a hip restaurant in the up-and-coming Lawrenceville neighborhood. Think of Portland's Mississippi and Alberta districts and you can picture what I'm talking about. Tattoos and microbrews. Lots of young people moving into refurbished homes and putting their creative talents into new businesses and art galleries. After dinner, we headed up to Schenley Park with some blankets and joined other 'Burghers for Cinema in the Park. (What a coincidence that they'd be showing "Coraline," the animated feature film done by Portland's Laika studio.)

-- It's got a thriving Jewish district. The Squirrel Hill neighborhood, home to Fred Rogers (yes, TV's Mister Rogers), is an appealing mix of residential and small retail shops, including Smallman's, an old-school deli/coffee shop reminiscent of Canter's in L.A.'s Fairfax District. We had sinfully delicious Reuben (with sauerkraut) and Rachel (with cole slaw) sandwiches for lunch Sunday. The next day, I had to chuckle as I walked past the neighborhood theatre. True to stereotype, it was showing the new Joan Rivers movie.

As I said goodbye to Simone at the airport, I left with a good feeling. I got the sense that people appreciate their parks and public transit as much as we do. And, based on a pre-dinner walk through the Park Place and Regent Square neighborhoods at the end of Forbes Avenue, I got a glimpse of middle-class homes, mostly two-story and made of brick, that suggested comfort, safety and community.

Photograph: View of downtown from Schenley Park.