As Pittsburghers, we’ve all been there.

You’re in your car at the bottom of a steep hill covered in slick ice and snow. You shift into gear, start moving upward, and you think you just might make it.

Then you feel the tires spin out. You gun the gas, you try to maneuver, but eventually you face it: you’re just not getting up this hill. You have to find another way.

Thankfully, in Pittsburgh, with its winding roads and seemingly endless alternate routes, there’s always another way.

Pittsburgh City Paper has found itself facing that steep climb. Like many newspapers — especially the free alt-weekies across the nation — for a while now, we’ve been battling hard times. And it’s not because we lack the drive. We’re facing rising costs and less revenue, but also, misinformation, hostility towards media, a rough economy, and loss of talent to more stable industries.

But we’ve kept on. For 34 years, to be exact. And I’m here to say, despite the challenges, we’re going to keep on keeping on.

Let me make this absolutely crystal-polished-with-Windex clear: Pittsburgh City Paper isn’t going anywhere. Every single day, we’re going to keep bringing you the alternative take on news and under-the-radar culture you’ve enjoyed from this “woke Commie rag” for decades.

But the package it comes in is going to look a little different, at least for a time. In order to rebuild to a more solid place, we’ve made the difficult decision to drastically reduce the rate at which we print. For now. It breaks my heart a little, but today’s issue is the last weekly version of the print paper you’re going to see for a while.

But print isn’t dead, and neither are we.

Instead of a weekly digest, City Paper will now bring you four super-issues per year, starting this December. In those editions, which will function as your “Bible” for the season, you’ll find an essential collection of event listings, in-depth news coverage, and off-the-wall arts and entertainment stories you’re used to seeing from us year-round. Plus, contained within will be your favorite greatest hits, including our People of the Year feature, election guide, and of course, the pièce de City Paper resistance: our annual Best of PGH issue. And you’d better believe we still intend to throw our famous Best of PGH party along with it.

In the meantime, check out pghcitypaper.com and follow our Instagram, Facebook, and Bluesky to see new content every day: of-the-moment news, under-the-radar arts and culture, photo essays, your favorite columns, and plenty more.

All we ask, dear readers, is this: please bear with us. We are setting the stage to rebuild, and we have every intention to come back bigger, better, and stronger … but just as delightfully weird and wacky as we’ve always been.

Hopefully it’s all downhill from here.

With love,

Ali Trachta, Executive Editor, Pittsburgh City Paper

This article appears in Oct. 15-21, 2025.

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