Liberty Avenue is a major thoroughfare starting in downtown

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, United States, just outside

Point State Park Point State Park (locally known as The Point) is a Pennsylvania state park on in Downtown Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, USA, at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, forming the Ohio River. Built on land acqu ...

. Liberty Ave. runs through Downtown

, the Strip District, Bloomfield, and ends in the neighborhood of Shadyside at its intersection with Centre Avenue and Aiken Avenue. Liberty Avenue is about 4.3 miles (6.9 km) long. A survey of Pittsburgh in 1784 already shows a ''Liberty Street'' in its present location. It is also called Liberty Street in a map from 1860.

Downtown

Beginning in the 19th century, the thoroughfare became a place of middle- and upper-class commerce. A history of Pittsburgh notes that a Market House was established in 1832 along Liberty Street between Sixth Street and Cecil Alley. Liberty also hosted food suppliers, brewers, and small manufacturers. In 1894, the Joseph Horne department store was built there. In the early 20th century, the Clark Building (named for the

Clark Clark is an English language surname, ultimately derived from the Latin with historical links to England, Scotland, and Ireland ''clericus'' meaning "scribe", "secretary" or a scholar within a religious order, referring to someone who was educate ...

candy company) and the Second National Bank were built. At length, it became a home for theater and movies, with the Stanley Theatre, the Lowe's Penn and the Harris Theatre. However, much of this activity was checked, first by the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

, and then by the St. Patrick's Day Flood of 1936. Some businesses were closed, and others moved elsewhere. A section of Liberty Avenue in

Downtown Pittsburgh Downtown Pittsburgh, colloquially referred to as the Golden Triangle, and officially the Central Business District, is the urban downtown center of Pittsburgh. It is located at the confluence of the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River whose ...

became a

red-light district A red-light district or pleasure district is a part of an urban area where a concentration of prostitution and sex-oriented businesses, such as sex shops, strip clubs, and adult theaters, are found. In most cases, red-light districts are particu ...

in the 1970s and 1980s, hosting the city's

sex industry The sex industry (also called the sex trade) consists of businesses that either directly or indirectly provide Sex worker, sex-related products and services or adult entertainment. The industry includes activities involving direct provision of s ...

, including burlesque houses, strip bars, and

peep show A peep show or peepshow is a presentation of a live sex show or pornographic film which is viewed through a viewing slot. Several historical media provided voyeuristic entertainment through hidden erotic imagery. Before the development of the ci ...

s, and attracting

vice A vice is a practice, behaviour, or habit generally considered immoral, sinful, criminal, rude, taboo, depraved, degrading, deviant or perverted in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a negative character tra ...

and crime. The

Pittsburgh Cultural Trust The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust (PCT) is a nonprofit arts organization formed in 1984 to promote economic and cultural development in Downtown Pittsburgh. The "Trust" has focused its work on a 14-square block section called the Cultural District, wh ...

, formed in 1984, worked over the next 25 years to transform the area into the Cultural District, a center for the arts, eventually bringing the

August Wilson Center for African American Culture The August Wilson African American Cultural Center is a U.S. nonprofit arts organization based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that presents performing and visual arts programs that celebrate the contributions of African Americans not only in Wester ...

Bricolage Production Company Bricolage Production Company is a professional theatre company based in downtown Pittsburgh. Established in 2001 by Jeffrey Carpenter, it is located aCommunity Forge an inclusive community center in Wilkinsburg, PA. The company's mission is to use ...

, Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company, the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust Arts Education Center, and a museum of cartoon art, The ToonSeum, to Liberty Avenue. Liberty Avenue in the downtown area underwent an years-long extensive $3.6 million redesign and repavement that was completed by 1991.

Strip District

Liberty Ave. is a main road through the Strip District. It is the home to many businesses, mostly offices and business-to-business service and product providers. The factory to manufacture

George Westinghouse George Westinghouse Jr. (October 6, 1846 – March 12, 1914) was an American entrepreneur and engineer based in Pennsylvania who created the railway air brake and was a pioneer of the electrical industry, receiving his first patent at the age of ...

's air brakes was located at 2425 Liberty. This has now become the home of the

Pittsburgh Opera Pittsburgh Opera is an American opera company based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Pittsburgh Opera gives performances in several venues, primarily at the Benedum Center, with other performances at the Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts Sch ...

. There are few retail establishments on Liberty Ave. in the Strip District.

Bloomfield

Liberty Ave. is the site of the main business district in Bloomfield. Liberty Ave. is also home to West Penn Hospital as well as many small store fronts.

Popular culture

A semi-fictionalized version of Liberty Avenue is featured prominently in the American version of the television program '' Queer as Folk''.

References

{{coord, 40.45537, -79.97617, type:landmark_globe:earth_region:US-PA, display=title Streets in Pittsburgh Historical red-light districts in the United States