Wilkinsburg is working hard to establish itself as an ecologically friendly community. Several factors contribute to its favorable position with regards to minimizing impact on the environment.
Wilkinsburg offers affordable housing options—more commonly associated with suburban neighborhoods—at a fraction of the commute time and costs. Simply put, our location close to city amenities and easy access to public transportation mean less fuel consumption for you, and less impact on the environment. Wilkinsburg is within a fifteen-minute drive of Oakland, Squirrel Hill, Edgewood, South Side, the Waterfront, Monroeville, and Downtown Pittsburgh. Furthermore, our access to the busway can get you downtown within 20 minutes. Frequent buses on neighborhood routes also provide transportation to Oakland, Squirrel Hill, Shadyside, East Liberty, and many other city neighborhoods.
Wilkinsburg has a robust recycling program, including curbside pickup and three mobile collection points. In cooperation with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, the Borough obtained three recycling trailers to facilitate recycling at convenient drop off sites. Our goal is to increase recycling tonnage and decrease landfill expenses. In 2008, we have expanded the number of items residents and commercial businesses can recycle. All cans, bottles and plastics (#1–5) are now accepted at curbside and at the drop off locations. In addition to newspapers, we now can recycle magazines, catalogs, paperboard, junk mail, mixed paper, phonebooks and office paper (all colors).
The Wilkinsburg government is also working with an outside firm to ensure that public waste receptacles have separate bins for recyclables and non-recyclables. These containers that will be paid for and maintained by an advertising firm at no cost to residents.
Wilkinsburg leaders are paying attention to environmental issues. Environmental stewardship is a high priority among our elected officials and Borough management. The Borough recognizes that environmentally friendly ideas often have the benefit of reducing costs, allowing the Borough to provide better service to the residents. For example, the Borough is exploring replacing all the bulbs in its traffic signals with LED bulbs, which are far more efficient. Additionally, the Borough has obtained $470,000 in grant money to perform much needed repairs to the Borough building. The work includes replacing windows and the boiler to make the building more efficient and less expensive to heat.
Our government believes in the need to preserve and improve Wilkinsburg’s many green spaces; to care for Nine Mile Run, which runs beneath our city streets; to support urban farming initiatives and community gardens; to support legislation that promotes local action on global warming and other environmental threats (like the Cool Cities Climate Protection Agreement); to preserve and maintain the shade trees that line many of our neighborhood drives; and to support much-needed beautification and litter prevention initiatives involving concerned citizens.