Plans in works for region’s first ground-up film production studio
Dawn Keezer can roll a different kind of credits when it comes to the potential funding and other kinds of backing she expects for the new film production studio dream coalescing into a committed plan at the Carrie Furnace site in Braddock.
“It’s my first ground breaking,” said Keezer, director of the Pittsburgh Film Office at a damp and occasionally muddy groundbreaking event at the Carrie Furnace site in Braddock late last week. “I’ve been to them but I’ve never been part of one.”
Keezer and her plans were in the middle of an event that included local, county, state and federal politicians along with leadership of the Regional Industrial Development Corporation of Southwestern Pennsylvania to celebrate what’s expected to be the first vertical construction at the 168-acre Carrie Furnace site since it was bought to be redeveloped by Allegheny County about 20 years ago now.
A new movie studio served as a headliner of sorts for the festivities, for which RIDC has an agreement in place with Allegheny County to buy a 55-acre portion of the larger redeveloped brownfield, with committed plans in place to build new roads and then two tech flex industrial buildings of about 60,000 square feet each, with no tenants yet confirmed for them.
While there’s yet no confirmed agreements in place for a studio plan, both Keezer and RIDC President Don Smith acknowledged an ongoing working relationship moving toward a formal agreement.
Final financing is also coming together for the plan, added Keezer.
“We’re very close,” she said. “We’re in the process of finalizing the financing with industry partners.”
Read more at Pittsburgh Business Times.
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