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Meeting Addresses Possible Transit Strike Worries

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Aug 6, 2008 1:51 pm US/Eastern

Meeting Addresses Possible Transit Strike Worries

Reporting
Alison Morris
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ― A possible Port Authority strike was the hot topic at the Omni William Penn Hotel this morning.

The Allegheny Conference on Community Development and the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership held a joint meeting with downtown businesses to discuss what to do in the event of a transit shutdown.

The Port Authority and its workers union are currently in the midst of a 60-day fact finding period that runs through mid-September, after which the workers' union could possibly go on strike.

At this morning's meeting, Ken Zapinski, of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development, introduced a new website: KeepPittsburghMoving.com, which was designed to help downtown businesses and employees figure out how to keep their companies up and running.

"In downtown Pittsburgh somewhere between 40 and 50 thousand workers a day take some sort of transit into downtown," Zapinksi explained. "And there quite simply isn't enough street space and parking space to accommodate those people if the transit and the buses stopped running and all those people had to drive cars to work."

The new website offers a checklist to help businesses figure out just how severely they will be impacted and what they can best do to get their employees to work.

One great suggestion: Bring out the bikes.

"I would suggest that anyone who can, bike to work. That's what my business partner and I do," said Megan Lindsey, owner of the Franktuary Hot Dog Shop downtown. "We've got about three employees right now and we're encouraging them to bike. Most of them, I believe take the bus currently, but we love it."

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