Before you pitch a story or read a neighborhood guide, it helps to know what we count as a fact, what we leave out, and who decides. These are the working definitions behind every piece on Boom Pittsburgh.
We use the city's official neighborhood boundaries, not realtor maps or delivery-app zones. When a guide says Lawrenceville, it means the blocks between the river and Penn Avenue, and we name the street where one neighborhood ends and the next begins.
Quotes are trimmed for length and clarity, never for tone. If a barista or librarian asks to see the draft before it runs, we send it. If they ask us to cut something, we cut it or we drop the piece.
Every listing carries the date we last confirmed it. Coffee shops change weekend hours, church halls move their pierogi Fridays. If you find something out of date, tell us and we will correct it in the next roundup.
Businesses cannot buy a spot in the coffee map or the mailbag. We do not accept sponsored posts, and we say so plainly when a contributor has a personal connection to a place they wrote about.
Readers can pitch a story through the submissions page; we reply either way, usually within two weeks. The section written for South African readers planning a move, or already living abroad, follows the same rules as everything else.
When we get something wrong, we fix it in the original piece and note the change at the bottom. Old guides stay online as they were written, so you can see what a block looked like a few seasons back.
Every piece on Boom Pittsburgh follows the same rough sequence. It is not a fast process, and that is deliberate: neighborhood reporting needs time for the second visit, the returned phone call and the correction that arrives three days after publication.
Week one
Pitch and assignment
Submissions arrive through the pitch page or by mail. We read for a specific place, a named person and a reason the story matters now. Vague ideas get a reply asking for the address and the interview contact before anything is assigned.
Week two
Reporting on foot
Contributors go in person at least twice, usually on different days, so the piece reflects a Tuesday afternoon and a Saturday morning rather than one lucky hour. Transit notes, opening hours and seasonal details get written down on site, not reconstructed later.
Week three
Editing and fact check
An editor reads for structure, then a second pass checks every proper noun against the reporter's notes. If a shop changed its weekend hours or a hall moved its meeting night, the line gets fixed or cut. Nothing runs on a guess.
Week four
Photography and layout
Photographers shoot the block, not just the subject, and the map accent is drawn by hand so readers can trace the walk. Captions carry the cross street and the time of day.
After publication
Corrections and follow-ups
Readers correct us, argue with us and add what we missed. Corrections are printed in the next roundup, and a strong reply sometimes becomes its own piece. The archive keeps growing because the neighborhood keeps talking back.