(This article originally was published in LVEDC's Q2 2024 Commercial Real Estate Report).
Along Allentown’s riverfront stretches six acres that formerly served as a little used freight yard for Lehigh Structural Steel, once known worldwide for making large trusses and steel girders found in airport hangars and bridges. 
That property, which eventually became a right of-way for a major road project, still sits idle in the booming Lehigh Valley, an industrial powerhouse ranked as the nation’s No. 1 mid-sized market for economic development.
In May, Gov. Josh Shapiro held up that seemingly unremarkable site off American Parkway as an example of the economic potential Pennsylvania can unlock with the right investment.
The property is the first in the state to receive money from the new PA SITES program, which invests in getting sites “shovel ready” with infrastructure investment.
The state is investing $1.1 million to extend utilities to the property, priming the site for a more than $6 million, 50,000-square-foot manufacturing facility constructed by Allentown Economic Development Corporation (AEDC). The nonprofit specializes in property rehabilitation, business incubation, and strengthening urban manufacturing. The project is expected to lead to up to 50 jobs.
“They’re turning this pile of dirt into jobs,” Shapiro said May 8 at the site. “This is a big win for Allentown. This is a big win for the Lehigh Valley. And it is a big win for the Commonwealth, because we’re betting heavy on this region to drive economic growth in the future.”
PA SITES has since been awarded $400 million under the 2024-25 budget in a bipartisan effort to make Pennsylvania more competitive with bordering states.
“The PA SITES program will help create an environment that promotes the well-being of our residents by creating an opportunity for them to get ahead,” said Allentown Mayor Matt Tuerk, who is a member of the Board of Directors of Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation (LVEDC).
“By accelerating the development project, we’ll help create those good-paying jobs sooner,” said R. Scott Unger, Executive Director of the Allentown Economic Development Corporation and a member of the Board of Directors of LVEDC.
PA SITES is part of a larger focus Shapiro has put on economic development since he took office two years ago. Earlier this year, he visited the Lehigh Valley to unveil the state’s first economic development strategy in decades, noting that Lehigh Valley’s partnership-based approach to economic development is a model for the state.
Kristin Cahayla-Hoffman, Vice President of Business Development and Attraction at LVEDC, said PA SITES will help make the state more competitive.
“When companies have decided to expand, they are looking to move quickly. Shovel-ready sites are a high priority for site selectors,” Cahayla-Hoffman said. “The Lehigh Valley has a rich, mature industrial market where land is getting harder to find. Giving these hard-to-do projects an incentive is very appealing.”
The Lehigh Valley has a history of tackling hard-to-do projects as the region redeveloped its industrial properties and evolved into a diversified, $50.2 billion economy.
Another key redevelopment project sits within another part of the former Lehigh Structural Steel property. A 125,000-square-foot office building was completed in 2023 as the first building in The Waterfront, a $425 million development. Among the key incentives for that project was a one-of-a-kind taxing district that allows developers to use certain state taxes to pay off construction loans.
The so-called Neighborhood Improvement Zone also drove the transformation of downtown Allentown with the PPL Center arena and trendy apartment and sleek office buildings.
Among the region’s largest challenges was what to do with the former Bethlehem Steel’s hometown plant. Through public-private partnerships, infrastructure was invested into the 1,800-acre property that was redeveloped into industrial parks; apartments; a casino, shops, and entertainment; and a cultural campus dubbed SteelStacks.
Yet, 23 years after the Steel declared bankruptcy, there is more left at the old plant to redevelop, including the 13-story Steel General Offices, once Bethlehem Steel’s world headquarters.
Peron Development has already begun remediation on the adjacent East Annex portion of the complex, which is poised to become offices for up to 600 employees, but the SGO building continues to sit idle.
In July, Shapiro chose that location for the ceremonial signing of the bill that funded PA SITES.
John Callahan, Peron’s Director of Business Development, said programs like PA SITES have the potential to help challenging projects like the SGO building.
Jay Garner, an Atlanta-based site selection consultant who had offered Shapiro’s administration feedback on Pennsylvania’s competitive position last year, lauded the PA SITES program.
“What impressed me was the Governor and his team listened. They acted, and now they are implementing,” said Garner, who wrote the book “Economic Development is [Still] Not for Amateurs.” “We look at locations all over the globe, and I happen to think that the Lehigh Valley is the shining star for economic development in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.”