Shipping Containers for Sale in Pittsburgh, PA

Container Delivery Specialists for The Pittsburgh metro area

Pittsburgh is Pennsylvania's second largest city and the hub of a seven county metro area of roughly two and a third million people spread across the hills and river valleys of southwestern Pennsylvania Deliveries reach Allegheny, Westmoreland, Butler, Beaver, Washington, Armstrong, Fayette, Lawrence, Indiana, Greene, Mercer, Somerset counties, and the practical questions change from one part of the area to the next. Downtown, the Golden Triangle, Strip District, Lawrenceville, Bloomfield, Polish Hill, Shadyside, Squirrel Hill, Oakland, East Liberty, Highland Park, Point Breeze, Regent Square, Greenfield, Hazelwood, South Side Flats, South Side Slopes, Mount Washington, Beechview, Brookline, Carrick, Troy Hill, Manchester each bring their own access, placement, and ground-preparation considerations.

Pittsburgh runs its own Zoning Code, Title Nine of the Pittsburgh Code, with accessory uses and structures handled in Chapter 912. Zoning review sits with the Department of City Planning's Zoning and Development Review division and permits are issued by the Department of Permits, Licenses and Inspections. Allegheny County does not zone on behalf of its municipalities. Each of the county's 130 municipalities writes and enforces its own ordinance, so the jurisdiction that has your address is the only one whose answer counts.

We have delivered containers throughout the Pittsburgh metro area and we know the local ground: Four corner castings carrying the entire load onto ground that changes five times across the state, and two of those grounds are problems most states do not have at all. Start with why it matters more for a container than for a house: a house spreads its weight along a continuous footing, a container puts all of it through four points. Karst is the first Pennsylvania problem. Large parts of the southeast and the south-central valleys sit on carbonate bedrock, and the Bureau of Geological Survey describes a sinkhole as a subsidence feature caused by surficial material moving down into a pre-existing void. The Lehigh Valley, Lancaster County and the Cumberland and Lebanon valleys are the classic karst country, and concentrating four point loads and then routing roof runoff to one spot is exactly the combination karst does not forgive. Mine subsidence is the second. The Department of Environmental Protection states that millions of Pennsylvania structures sit over old abandoned underground coal and clay mines, and it runs a state mine subsidence insurance program because standard homeowner policies usually do not cover that damage. The rest of the state reads more normally: glacial till, boulders and perched water in the north, steep slopes and shallow rock through the ridges, red shale and clay soils in the Piedmont that hold water and soften, and Pittsburgh hillsides where the city maintains landslide-prone and steep-slope overlays. Over all of it runs freeze and thaw, which lifts a gravel lane every March and sets it back down somewhere slightly different., along with the access and clearance realities of the streets here. Tell us your address and your situation, and you get an honest assessment and an accurate delivery quote.

Pittsburgh Delivery Considerations

A few things shape how a delivery goes in this area:

• Grade is the first question in Pittsburgh, not the last. A loaded truck needs somewhere it can stop and hold, and a tilt bed needs room to work. Walk the route from the street to the drop spot and tell us honestly how steep it gets, because that conversation before the truck is dispatched saves a wasted trip.
• Overhead clearance matters as much here as anywhere, and hillside streets make it worse. The bed has to rise to set the box, so the clear path above the drop spot has to be well above the container itself. Service drops and mature trees over narrow streets are the usual constraint.
• Surface behaves differently on old Pittsburgh lots than it looks. Slag and red dog drives, common on older properties, carry weight better than they appear to. Turf and fill on a hillside do not. Either way the container goes on blocks or timbers under the four corner castings so it sits level and the doors keep swinging true.
• Access is often a rear alley rather than a driveway. Narrow hillside streets, retaining walls, tight turns and parking pads cut under houses all decide whether the box goes where you want it or somewhere close to it. Measure the pinch point, not the widest part.
• The route through the city is set by tunnels and bridges. The Fort Pitt and Squirrel Hill tunnels and the Parkway decide the delivery window far more often than the drive from Cleveland does, and some local bridges carry posted limits. Ask for the window when you book rather than assuming a morning slot.
• Ground history is worth a conversation before a permanent set. Parts of the region sit over old mine workings, and some hillsides are landslide-prone after a wet spring. Freeze and thaw moves fill through the winter. None of this stops a delivery, and all of it is easier to talk about a week early than on the day.

For permit questions on a specific address, contact City of Pittsburgh Department of Permits, Licenses and Inspections, 200 Ross Street, Suite 320, Pittsburgh, PA 15219. Phone (412) 255-2175. Zoning questions go to the Department of City Planning, Zoning and Development Review, at zoning@pittsburghpa.gov. Confirm the counter address before you travel, because older departmental memoranda still carry a 100 Ross Street, Second Floor letterhead and both sit in the same downtown complex. If your address is outside the city line, the borough or township that has your parcel is the office to call instead..

Container Types Available in Pittsburgh

• 20ft Standard, Most popular size, fits most residential driveways
• 40ft Standard, Contractors, farms, businesses and larger properties
• 40ft High Cube, Conversions, tall equipment, maximum interior volume
• Modified, Job site offices, custom builds
• Refrigerated, Food service, cold storage