Aug 15, 2025 4 min read

Hit: Just in time for the start of football season, the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum in Chartiers Township unveiled its latest restoration project, The Terrible Trolley, so-named for the yellow Terrible Towel that Pittsburgh Steelers fans wave at games and rallies. Painted black and gold and bearing the Steelers logo, the restored trolley traveled down the city’s streets from 1980 to 1986. It was rebuilt in 1989, then retired in 1998. Early on, the Terrible Trolley went by the name Streetcar 1713, built in 1949 by the St. Louis Car Company, and originally ran on Pittsburgh Railways’ Charleroi and Washington interurban lines. The two-year restoration project was carried out in a partnership with the Washington County Tourism Promotion Agency. At this week’s unveiling, Tom Rooney, a member of the family that owns the Pittsburgh Steelers, called the restoration “an immaculate resurrection,” while museum director Jeanine DeBor noted the “beautifully restored and nostalgic streetcar” is a tangible symbol of the Pittsburgh region’s pride in the Steelers.

Hit: Last week’s “wire-cutting” ceremony marking Lighthouse Electric’s official opening at the former Brockway Glass plant in Canton Township was indeed cause for celebration. The new industrial park off the Chestnut Street exit of Interstate 70 will bring close to 100 jobs to the location and eliminate the eyesore for motorists traveling on Interstate 70. Hundreds gathered outside the Hickory Street plant Aug. 5 for the event at the 100,000-square-foot plant, which specializes in manufacturing prefabricated electrical components that are shipped to construction sites across the country. The plant has been operational for about a month while work is underway to construct a second building there. The ceremony provided acknowledgement of the work of the Redevelopment Authority of the County of Washington and developer Crossgates Management Inc. to transform the former “brownfield” and find a new use for the former glass plant site. Speakers also acknowledged repurposing the former Ross Mould property on South Main Street in Washington for Lighthouse’s corporate headquarters, currently at Southpointe. Plans are to eventually turn the nine-acre property into another manufacturing plant, creating as many as 300 new jobs. Ryan Bandel, Lighthouse president and CEO, said it’s fitting that their new plant is on the former site of Brockway Glass, which made glass jars and other items more than a century ago. “We’re sitting on sacred ground. The sacred ground of makers,” Bandel said before turning his attention to Lighthouse’s work to help power new data centers. “That’s the sacred moment, to power those buildings on.”

Miss: They are tasked with caring for our most precious commodity, yet child care teachers earn just a little bit more than $15 an hour, comparable to – or less than, in some cases – the pay offered at retail outlets and fast-food eateries. And since the profit margins are slim, raising wages would end up costing more in tuition for already-strapped parents who rely on them to care for their children while they work. “Child care runs on impossible math,” Stephanie McAdoo, director of the Indi Kids program in Indiana County, told state lawmakers during an Aug. 6 press conference called to lobby for including $55 million in the state budget for child care teacher recruitment and retention. They argued that the lack of teachers – and, in some places, a paucity of providers – ripples out through the commonwealth’s economy. Ron Aldom, president and CEO of the Somerset County Chamber of Commerce, said more than $6 billion in earnings and productivity is lost in Pennsylvania’s economy every year due to child care issues. “This crisis is holding back our workforce, our businesses and our entire economy,” he said. Gov. Josh Shapiro has proposed the money be placed in a new and recurring budget line item that would be used for child care recruitment and retention. If approved, that amount would boost the pay of child care teachers by about $1,000 per year.