Heth’s Run Bridge: Redux

Posted on September 10, 2013 by Carolyn Ristau

Heth’s Run Bridge, the first bridge I posted about in my Pittsburgh bridges project, is scheduled to be replaced by the end of next year. The notice to proceed was expected to be issued last week with construction beginning on Sept. 24 with the installation of a temporary road around the bridge, through the zoo’s parking lot. According to the schedule that was passed out at a community meeting at the end of August, the bridge is expected to close with all car traffic being diverted to the temporary road on Nov. 1st. Due to the turning radius constraints with the temporary road, trucks will not be permitted and will instead be by way of the Highland Park Bridge, Route 28 and the 62nd Street Bridge. If all goes according to schedule the bridge should reopen to all traffic on October 1, 2014. Additional road work will continue through October. After final inspections, the project is expected to be officially completed by December 8, 2014.

This is a PennDOT project expected to cost over $18.5 million and is definitely needed. As I discuss in my Heth’s Run Bridge Part II and Highland Park Bridge posts, the sidewalks here are in desperate need of repair and the proportion of sidewalk to road across the bridge is at least 50 years out of date. All this is going to be addressed in the reconstruction. The new bridge is going to have two lanes in each direction to match the roadway on either end. Additional features of the new bridge will be decorative railing, period lighting, entrance pylons, and “architectural features on the abutments with form liners” (which I believe refers to new urns). At the community meeting, it was mentioned that the current urns will be saved and kept in a warehouse until a new home is found for them.

In addition to the bridge, about 870 feet of Butler Street are going to be reconstructed including sidewalks. My understanding is that this is the part of Butler from the Heth’s Run Bridge to the ramps of the Highland Park Bridge, which should take care of my complaints about the condition of the sidewalk for those of us trying to cross the Highland Park Bridge without a car. This should also clear up the confusion for the outbound traffic of whether this part of the road is one lane or two as the plans include removing the “kink” from the existing alignment.

New signals and ADA ramps will be installed at the intersections of Butler with One Wild Place and with Baker Streets.

Another major part of the project is the excavation under the bridge to an elevation of 762. According to GoogleEarth, the bridge is at an elevation of 800 ft. I’m not sure if this will restore the bridge to its exact historic height, but it will be close (see the photo of the previous bridge from 1912). This will also pave the way for connecting this area to the proposed Allegheny Riverfront Green Boulevard project.

This project will no doubt cause some inconveniences during the construction process, but the construction of the temporary road will significantly cut down on this even though it adds over a month to the process. Imagine instead, everyone having to go on the truck detour or all the Zoo traffic coming down Morningside Ave and Baker Street instead of One Wild Place and Butler Street. That would be a true nightmare. Thank you, PennDOT and the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium for the temporary road. Thank you, PennDOT and any other funders, Sen. Jim Ferlo, Rep. Dom Costa, and anyone else who had a hand in helping bring about this long overdue project.

I can’t wait to walk over the new bridge when it’s finished!

More information about the project including the design of the temporary road can be found here: http://morningside-pa.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/hethsrunbridge.pdf

Safety while Traipsing

Posted on August 8, 2013 by Carolyn Ristau

The Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation, a non-profit community development organization in Pittsburgh, is raising funds to buy back guns. The goal is to get unwanted guns out of the community where they may be stolen and used in a crime or found by a child and played with, causing injury and death.

In the process of raising funds and talking with different people, it’s become clear that not all guns are bad. Some guns are very useful such as soldering guns, caulking guns, staple guns, salad shooters, glue guns, nail guns, heat guns, cookie guns, water guns, and cameras (which shoot). Check out the links for each of these guns to see how they can improve communities (more links will be added over the next few weeks).

As an urban traisper, it is important to feel safe as I walk around exploring the city. I have chosen not to walk the bridges in certain neighborhoods of Pittsburgh, because of safety concerns. I was excited when I joined the staff of the BGC to hear that they were working on planning a gun buyback to reduce the chances of gun violence in their neighborhoods. Maybe our work will make a small difference and help lead to broader changes that will improve the safety of the currently troubled areas or those perceived as troubled.

For more about the Gun Buyback Initiative, check out our Razoo page. While you’re there, please consider giving a donation. We hope to reach at least $15,000 by August 31. Thank you!

Pedestrian Bridges: Chicago

Posted on April 20, 2013 by Carolyn Ristau

There are two pedestrian bridges connecting to Millennium Park in Chicago. The first I encountered was the BP Bridge. I admired the undulating silver sculpture above as I walked past and was thrilled to discover it was a pedestrian bridge. My excited was quickly crushed as the bridge was closed to traffic due to construction at the other end. I realized that I have become quite addicted to bridge-walking. I was on my way to see The Bean before renting a bike to ride along the lake, when seeing this bridge completely sidetracked me. I had a desperate urge to walk a bridge. Fortunately, there was another pedestrian bridge nearby and while it was not nearly as enticing, it had some interesting parts.

The Nichols Bridgeway connects Millennium Park with the Art Institute of Chicago. Both ends had space-age-like toughs, which I assumed were supposed to be a fancy drainage system. If their purpose is a drainage system, the upper end by the Institute has failed and been turned into a wishing well.

The part I liked best about this bridge was that while it looked like the surface was level, there were ridges or “speed-bumps” every few feet. I wondered if these were merely artistic or if they had a functional value like reducing the slipperiness of the bridge during icy conditions.

Manhattan Bridge: A Multimodal Link

Posted on April 7, 2013 by Carolyn Ristau

When I was planning my walk across the Brooklyn Bridge while in New York City last December, I noticed there was a bridge nearby called the Manhattan Bridge. I decided to cross to Brooklyn by the Manhattan Bridge and return to Manhattan by the Brooklyn Bridge. The Manhattan Bridge ended up being the more interesting of the two bridges.

I found my way from the subway stop to the Manhattan Bridge by following the way-finding signs for the bike lanes in the Lower East End. This brought me to the left side of the bridge, where I was temporarily upset to see that pedestrians were not permitted to use the sidewalk on that side of the bridge–it was dedicated to two-way bicycle traffic. I was concerned that I was not going to be able to walk across this bridge and instead would have to cross the Brooklyn Bridge twice (I try to avoid walking across a bridge just to walk back across it; doing so gives me a sense of pointlessness). Luckily, there are sidewalks on both sides of this bridge (from walking Pittsburgh bridges I know not to assume that bridges have sidewalks on two sides) and the sidewalk on the right side is dedicated to pedestrians.

I suggest that NYC puts up a sign on the bicycle side to direct pedestrians to the other side, which might help encourage pedestrians to follow the traffic directions set up on this bridge–I watched a pedestrian ignore the bicycle-only signs to cross the bridge on the bike lanes.

This bridge is the most multimodal bridge I have walked with the bike lanes on one side, pedestrian way on the other, and the subway and roadway in between. While I approve of this welcoming of alternative transportation methods, I am not sure about placing the pedestrians next to the subway tracks. This does give a barrier between the pedestrians and the noise of the cars, but instead, the pedestrians have to deal with the noise of the subway, which while it is less constant than the cars, it is a little more startling/disturbing.

The neighborhoods the Manhattan Bridge links had some similar physical elements, but are clearly used by different populations. The populations on both the Manhattan and Brooklyn sides use their rooftops, but for different purposes. On the Manhattan side, the rooftops were covered in graffiti, while the Brooklyn rooftops had new additions and places to sit. There were also parks on both sides of the East River. However, the Manhattan side only had a baseball diamond while the Brooklyn side had a carousel and a pirate-ship playground.

What intrigues me most about the Manhattan Bridge is that I had never seen or heard of it before and yet it is the bridge shown in the background (multiple times) in the Doctor Who episode “The Angels Take Manhattan.” Based on my walk on the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges, it looks like these shots were taken on the Brooklyn side of the river, in which case it seems like it possible to get the Brooklyn Bridge in the background instead as these two are close together on that side. To me the images of the Brooklyn Bridge say New York, while (at least before I walked it) images of the Manhattan Bridge just say a place with a bridge and hence water. I wonder if the Manhattan Bridge is better known in the UK than in my circle?

Isolated Waterfronts

Posted on November 11, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

In October 2012, I spent a few days in Erie, PA, to attend a conference. Before arriving, I had looked at the map to figure out how to get from the bus station to my accommodations to the convention center. On the map it looked pretty straight forward and simple. All the places I had to get were within a mile of each other—piece of cake. I often walk that far just to get to a bus in Pittsburgh. Shortly after arriving in Erie, I realized that purely considering distance does not capture the true picture. The seemingly short mile-long paths that I had to take included significant geographical and man-made barriers.

The main drag ran up through the town and straight out to the waterfront ending at the convention center hotel. From the town square (6^th Street), most of the buildings are flush with the sidewalk, except for the parking-lot-centric McDonald’s in the middle of these older buildings. At 3^rd Street, this changes. The next two blocks are dominated by the campus of a UPMC hospital. Then the barriers come.

First there is a small hill down toward the waterfront, then a wide parkway, followed by a barren strip of land on one side of the road and a marina on the other. Finally, there is the convention center hotel. Of course you have to pass the long parking garage, the lobby and rooms of the hotel, go up an elevator across a pedestrian bridge over the entrance to the marina, and down another elevator before you get to the convention center.

I was staying in a Bed and Breakfast near the town square, so several times a day I walked back and forth along this route to attend the conference events. Even though the walk was only about a mile long, it seemed to take forever because of the barriers of the hill, road, vacant land, and water. After going back and forth a few times, I realized that the set up was not much different from what I had seen in Cleveland this summer. That city also has a major roadway cutting off the town from the shores of Lake Erie. This road of course was much bigger than the one in Erie as the city is correspondingly bigger.

Despite the fact that there is a major freeway dividing the waterfront from downtown Cleveland, I still felt welcome to cross this barrier to reach the waterfront park or the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame. In Erie, I got a very clear impression that the downtown residents were not welcome to cross the barriers to get to the convention center/hotel or the little public jetty next to it and that the visitors at the hotel/conference center were not encouraged to explore into downtown Erie. This situation seems to defeat part of the purpose of convention centers to bring economic benefits to the surrounding area, by bringing in more people to use local services.

10th Street Bridge

Posted on September 18, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

The 10th Street Bridge (which a reader pointed out is nicknamed the Phillip Murray Bridge after the first president of the United Steelworkers of America) was the last of the bridges over the Monongahela River for me to walk. Or so I thought. It turns out that the Liberty Bridge also has a sidewalk despite the fact that it is a freeway bridge like the Veteran’s Bridge (see post). So I’ll have to come back to the Liberty Bridge at some point.

I delayed my walk of the 10th Street Bridge in part because it seemed like an awkward one to get to and from. One end is in the middle of the South Side, but the other connects to the Armstrong Tunnel, which would obviously not be pedestrian friendly. Last week, I finally went out and walked it and as I hoped, it turns out there is a pedestrian access over the hill to the high-bus-traffic corridor of Fifth and Forbes avenues in the form of a giant staircase that I will address in another post. This end of the 10th Street Bridge was more well-connected than I had anticipated. Not only do the stairs provide access to the top of the hill when Duquesne University sits, but there is also access to a parking lot down by the river which also connects to the Three Rivers Trail System. The best proof of this bridge’s connectivity is the number of other pedestrians I saw walking the bridge. While I did not keep a count, I noticed that there was a comparatively high level of pedestrian traffic. It certainly wasn’t as much as the Smithfield Street Bridge (see post), but it was comparable to or higher than that on the other downtown bridges.

My favorite part about this bridge was the dinosaurs painted at the top of the southern tower. I couldn’t tell if they were official or freelance graffiti, but it seemed appropriate given that Pittsburgh is famous for dinosaurs. Andrew Carnegie brought the first dinosaur skeletons on display anywhere in the world to his natural history museum. I found someone else wrote a post about the dinosaurs on the bridge, which the artist apparently calls geese, which suggests that the painting may not have been officially sanctioned.

The post mentioned above about the dinosaurs also comments on the “rusty” condition of the bridge. While I didn’t notice the rust much (it wasn’t nearly as bad as the 28th Street Bridge), I did notice the condition of the sidewalk. I thought my theory that the top of the sidewalk had worn away to expose the metal framework supporting the structure rather farfetched, as how could the entire sidewalk (on both sides as far as I could tell) wear out so evenly. Yet, I cannot think of any other sidewalk I’ve walked that looks like this and given the other bloggers comments on the poor physical condition of the bridge, perhaps my idea isn’t totally crazy?

Pedestrian Bridges: Bigelow Blvd

Posted on August 15, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

There is a pedestrian bridge across Bigelow Boulevard at the Bloomfield Bridge. I walked this bridge before I started this blog and didn’t think to take a picture of the bridge itself. Its appearance is similar to the Graham Street Pedestrian Bridge (see post) except that the fencing doesn’t connect overhead and does continue along the stairs.

The picture above is from the Bigelow pedestrian bridge looking out over Pittsburgh’s East End. The large brownish building on the left is West Penn Hospital in Bloomfield. In the middle of the frame are two white points standing above the other buildings. These are the steeple of East Liberty Presbyterian Church on the left and the Highland Building, also in East Liberty and designed by Daniel Burnham, on the right.

When I saw this symbol on the pedestrian bridge, I stopped to consider it. This was the first time I had ever seen this symbol. I thought whoever put it on this bridge had a very good point. The only way to access the Bloomfield Bridge from Oakland and the uphill side of Bigelow Boulevard is by the pedestrian bridge, which is only accessible by a set of stairs on either side. As such anyone with a mobility disability is barred from using the Bloomfield Bridge as a pedestrian. The way the intersection of the bridge and the boulevard is set up now, it would not be safe for any pedestrian to attempt to cross the streets, let alone one with a disability. This is a unequal and limiting situation. There is a grocery store across from the other end of the bridge and a drug store and restaurants within another block. Up the hill from this side of the bridge is a residential area. The other end of the Bloomfield Bridge is the residents closest area for essentials found at grocery and drug stores as well as entertainment found at restaurants and bars. It would be highly convenient for the residents on the hill to be able to walk to this area; however the current situation limits who is able to use this resource. (Not to mention the ugliness of the bridge and the intersection which probably discourages many people from even considering the short walk across the Bloomfield Bridge.)

The second time I saw this graffiti symbol was on the 16th Street Bridge (see post). I could not figure out what statement, if any, the 16th Street Bridge one was trying to communicate. As far as I could tell, that bridge is accessible to any pedestrian with or without mobility issues. At least there are no stairs to contend with at either end.

Pedestrian Bridges: Bates Street

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

The trail bridge over Bates Street, which opened in 2011, is the second newest bridge in Pittsburgh. The newest is the pedestrian bridge in East Liberty (see Taking the Long Way Round post). The East Liberty bridge was a completely new bridge, whereas there was a trail bridge over Bates Street before. This bridge carries the Eliza Furnace Trail. This trail is part of the larger Three Rivers Heritage Trail. I believe that this is the only bridge over a road along the Three Rivers Trail system. There is a converted railroad bridge that carries the trial over part of the Allegheny River (see July 15 post). The Hot Metal (Aug 9 post), Smithfield Street and Fort Duquesne (June 19 post) bridges are also considered part of the trail system according to the trail map.

As I mentioned in the Birmingham Bridge post, the part of the Three Rivers Trail system that travels on the northern side of the Monongahela is not a very pleasant stretch. This area around the Bates Street Bridge is one of the worst sections. The trail is caught between a freeway and the high traffic, through way of Second Avenue. There is no vegetation or anything else to act as barriers to the noise of the traffic on these two roads and to the sun on a hot day.

Further away from town (in the direction the picture above looks), the trail improves some as it comes to an elevation between that of the freeway and Second Avenue and there is more space between the trail and the roads. I’ve traveled on this trail toward town only once or twice, so I don’t remember specifics about it. I do remember that it does continue to lean toward being unpleasant. The times I traveled on it, I was biking. From that experience I know I would never choose to walk it. On a bike, you go fast enough to ignore much of the harshness of the trail, but walking you would be forced to take it all in.

Perhaps the biggest problem with this part of the trail system is that it doesn’t approach anywhere near the river. This is a significant flaw for a trail considered part of a river trail system. At the Bates Street Bridge, the trail is separated from the Monongahela River by Second Avenue and the office/technology park I reference in the Birmingham Bridge post.

One of my original fascinations with my walking bridge project was the different views of the city captured from the various bridges. The Bates Street Bridge adds to the views of downtown I’ve collected so far:

Hot Metal Bridge

Posted on August 9, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

After walking the Hot Metal Bridge, I realized that it is really three separate bridges. One of the bridges is the bike/pedestrian bridge pictured above that crosses over Second Avenue. The other two are in the background of the image above–one carries all vehicular traffic while the other carries all pedestrians and bicycles. The bridge pictured above is not structurally connected with either of the other bridges. The two bridges that span the Monongahela River were built at different times. While at this end (north) the bridges are at the same level, they are at two different elevations on the other side of the river.

The Hot Metal Bridge is one of the more locally famous and popular bridges in the city. In my experience of participating in and overhearing people’s conversations locally about Pittsburgh bridges, the Hot Metal and Smithfield Street bridges are the two that come up the most as fun to use and interesting. In the case of the Hot Metal Bridge, this is perhaps because it used to be a set of railroad bridges which have now been converted. They were built and used by the Jones & Laughlin Company to connect its sites on opposites of the river. The name of the bridge (Hot Metal) came from the fact that the trains were carrying molten metal from one factory to another. There are, or at least there were, placards along Water Street along the South Side Works that describe the history of the J&L steel company on this site and on the bridge. I don’t know if they are still up as there is currently construction going on in this area.

According to the description attached to the oldest image of the bridge on Historic Pittsburgh, the bridge was built in 1887. This image, as well as PGHbridges.com’s page for the bridge, identifies the names of the two structures as the Monongahela Connecting Railroad Bridge (now the vehicular bridge) and the Hot Metal Bridge (now the pedestrian bridge). The G.M. Hopkins maps tell a slightly different story. As early as 1882, the maps show a bridge at this location. That map and the 1889 map identify the bridge as the East End Bridge. All the maps from 1890 through 1923 of this site call it the Jones & Laughlins Bridge. Up until 1904, the bridge is depicted as carrying a single track, which I assume would be the bridge that is now the pedestrian bridge. Starting in 1910, the bridge is depicted with three railroad tracks, meaning the current vehicular bridge was added in that time.

It is amazing to me that as late as 1998 this part of the city was still dominated by steel mill buildings as illustrated by this photo. I suppose this means that I did not come to this part of the city then. As the South Side Works mall did not exist yet, I guess there was no reason for me to come over here. According to PGHbridges.com, the conversion of the bridges began in 1998, but the larger of the two bridges didn’t open until 2000 while the pedestrian bridge opened in 2007.

My final comment on this bridge is that there is a nice view of downtown from here, although the buildings don’t form any interesting patterns and clusters like they did in the views from the Allegheny River bridges (see 16th Street Bridge post for an example of this).

Pedestrian Bridges: Shadyside

Posted on August 8, 2012 by Carolyn Ristau

When the pedestrian bridge I discuss in “Taking the Long Way Round” was in the process of being built, I was thinking it was the first pedestrian bridge in Pittsburgh. When I started my project of walking the bridges in Pittsburgh, I realized what a ridiculous thought that was. Pittsburgh has many pedestrian bridges, but until the new one was built, I never heard anyone talk about any pedestrian bridge in the city. Many of these pedestrian bridges are not particularly attractive and are not in high traffic areas.

Shadyside has one of these hidden pedestrian bridges. The bridge connects Graham Street across the busway and railroad tracks. The only reason I know about this bridge is from riding buses on the busway. Walking down Graham from Centre Ave (a busy corridor lined with businesses, churches and a hospital and used by several major bus routes and lots of cars), I was impressed how quiet and peaceful the residential area between Centre and the busway was. That is until a train comes by.

As I walked across this bridge, I wondered why it was there. There is a vehicular bridge with sidewalks on both sides across the busway a block in either direction. There are eight other roads between this bridge and the Penn Ave Bridge that end at the busway and have neither a vehicular or pedestrian bridge connecting them to the other side of the busway. In my walk, I speculated that perhaps it was put in to connect the residents on the north side of the busway to places of work on the southern. This was based on the fact that there was a large building on the southern side that now houses the Shadyside Boys and Girls Club (photo below).

When I got home I went to PGHbridges.com, which I have used whenever I’ve had questions like this about the origin or design of Pittsburgh bridges. However, for some reason this website ignores many of the bridges over the busway. In looking up some of the bridges that PGHbridges.com misses, I found several other bridge websites that list and identify many of the bridges in the city, but none of them include the Graham Street Bridge, not even the National Bridge Inventory Database.

So I turned back to my favorite resource–the G.M. Hopkins maps. I also went to the image collection on Historic Pittsburgh, the parent site for the Hopkins maps. In the image collection I found one photo from 1908 of the bridge under construction. The 1904 and 1911 maps show the area immediately adjacent to the bridge as all residential. The building that is now the Boys and Girls Club does not exist. All I’m left with is speculation at this point. However, there is a school a few blocks from the southern end of the bridge and in between 1904 and 1911 another church was built a couple blocks north of the bridge. There already was a large church a block from the site of the newer, smaller one. Perhaps, the bridge was built to facilitate school students and church goers to get to their respective destinations.

Based on the way the bridge is depicted on the 1911 map and the 1939 map, I suspect the bridge may have been rebuilt since 1908. At the very least the stairs were replaced. The southern steps are drawn as coming straight out from the bridge to the road, but today the stairs are perpendicular to the line of the bridge and Graham Street. The northern steps are drawn perpendicular to the bridge and facing the same direction the southern steps face today. However, the steps I walked are switchback style, with the upper portion facing the opposite direction depicted on the 1939 map.

urbantraipsing

A site of urban exploration. Text and photos by Carolyn Ristau.

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