Jewish community

See also: History of the Jews in Pittsburgh

The origins of Squirrel Hill's Jewish community dates from the 1920s when Eastern European Jews began to move to the neighborhood in large numbers from Oakland and the Hill District. Many of them took up residence in rows of brick houses on the cross streets of Murray Avenue south of Forbes, such as Darlington Road, Bartlett Street, and Beacon Street. The neighborhood became the center of Jewish culture in the city, with kosher butcher shops, delicatessens, Jewish restaurants, bookstores, and designer boutiques. Several hundred Russian Jewish immigrants moved to the neighborhood in the 1990s.[4]

A 2017 study of the Greater Pittsburgh Jewish community, conducted by researchers at Brandeis University and commissioned by the local Jewish Federation, found that 26% of Pittsburgh-area Jews live in Squirrel Hill, 20% live in the South Hills, 9% live in the North Hills, 31% live in other areas of Pittsburgh, and 14% live in other areas of the region. Although Squirrel Hill remains the traditional center of Jewish life in the region, the study found a shift to more suburban areas. The study also found an increase in the population of Jews who identify as Orthodox or secular, and a decrease in the number of Jews who identify with Conservative and Reform denominations.[25] This feature of Squirrel Hill and surrounding Jewish communities, sustained locations of Jewish life across time and denominations, makes the area unusual compared to Jewish life in other cities. Elsewhere, Jews tended to migrate in waves to suburban areas during the twentieth century, and more geographic separation exists between denominations compared to Pittsburgh.[26]

All of Squirrel Hill, as well as much of the adjoining neighborhoods of Greenfield and Regent Square, is within an eruv, a symbolic enclosure that allows Orthodox Jews to carry items or push a stroller on Shabbat (the Jewish sabbath), during which certain activities are not permitted.[27] Moving items from private domain to a public domain is not permitted on Shabbat, so an eruv creates a single, private shared space, and carrying within it is permitted.[27] The irregular boundaries of the eruv are such that, as one writer noted, "an Orthodox Jew could carry something within the eruv's boundaries all the way from the north end of the Hot Metal Bridge to the intersection of Wilkins and South Dallas in Point Breeze."[28]

Squirrel Hill contains three Jewish day schools: two are affiliated with the Chabad and Modern Orthodox movements, respectively,[29][30] while Community Day School is a co-ed, independent Jewish day school in the neighborhood that attracts families across the wide spectrum of Jewish belief and practice.[31]

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Demographics

As of the 2010 Census,[3] Squirrel Hill North has a population of 11,363, having grown 9% since 2000. Squirrel Hill North's population is 75% White, 17% Asian, 4% Hispanic, and 3% Black. Of the 3,892 housing units in Squirrel Hill North, 93% are occupied.

Squirrel Hill South has a population of 15,110, up 4% since 2000, of whom 82% are White, 11% are Asian, 3% are Hispanic, and 3% are Black. There are 7,514 housing units which have a 95% occupancy rate.

In 2010, about 40% of Squirrel Hill's residents were Jewish.[4] According to a 2002 study by the United Jewish Federation, 33% of the Jewish population of Greater Pittsburgh lives in Squirrel Hill, and another 14% lives in the surrounding neighborhoods.[5] The report states that: "The stability of Squirrel Hill, a geographic hub of the Jewish community located within the city limits, is unique in North America."

Asian/Chinese community

Per the October 17, 2019 issue of Pittsburgh Magazine, the area is also becoming Pittsburgh's new Chinatown with an influx of mainland Chinese students from Carnegie Mellon University.[6] The area celebrates Chinese New Year annually with a parade.[7] The area as of 2017 was about 17% Asian.[8]

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5885561&forum_id=2,#50020340)