Archive for the ‘Pittsburgh’ Category
finding perspective
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Getting high is kind of a thing when you’re behind the camera. I don’t mean “smokin a doobie,” I’m talking about altitude. Finding somebody who will let me into an office building or up on a rooftop somewhere for a less common point of view is going to take me a while, I reckon.
At the start of the week, I was at West End Overlook park, and later on Polish Hill – both overlook the surrounding area. I’m trying to get a sense of where things are, how the light and weather travel through Pittsburgh, and develop a general geospatial awareness. I’ve mentioned a few times this week that even in Downtown Pittsburgh, it’s fairly easy to park at a metered spot and even simpler to put the car into one of the many multi story municipal lots. By a New Yorker’s standard, the price of parking in Pittsburgh is outlandishly cheap. The lot that I was on the roof of in this and the next few shots cost $6 for an hour, and it would have been $3 an hour afterwards.
Last time I was looking for a spot in Manhattan, a garage in Chelsea was charging $39 per hour. What? Yeah, I drove into the City. Why? Go ‘eff yourself, and mind your own business. Pfah!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This one is looking more or less south, towards the PPG building, which is the mirrored job with the castellations. Wish I could tell you in one of my typically granular manners what it is you’re looking at, but I don’t know myself. Yet.
I have done no specific work regarding railroads yet. They’re everywhere here, and it’s pretty normal to spot a freight train going this way or that. So far, I’ve only seen Norfolk & Southern or CSX units. I did learn what the “Pittsburgh Subdivision” is, though.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
An observation I’ve made is that there’s a whole big bunch of stuff which the Pittsburgh natives grew up with and consider as being “normal,” and they thereby expect everybody to automatically know these things, and if they don’t they’re “jag offs.” The Pittsburgh Left is one of these things, for instance. It’s all learned cultural expectation, like the way that New Yorkers stand in the street while waiting for the light to change so you can make it across the road quicker when the traffic flow abides. I’ve been a New Yorker, living amongst 8 million other super predators, my whole life. Don’t believe you’re a super predator? Next time you’re on vacation, just try not to start a crime family or a revolution. We’re ready to kill if the kid at the bagel shop is working too slow, if somebody blows their horn too long, or if somebody is wearing too much cologne on the subway.
Also, everybody seems super nice here, which makes me nervous. It’s been impossible for me to not “last thing” check the various locks adorning the house New York style by pulling on the handle, to go outside and check if anybody is messing around near my car… that sort of thing, due to having always lived amongst this group of super predators.
Also, nobody’s this nice, they have to be hiding something… Additionally, Pickup Trucks are just called trucks here. There’s also “pierogi pizza,” which is surprisingly good.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shot directly above this one and the one directly above with the “crown building” that looks like a super villain’s lair in it were shot from a second parking lot a few blocks from the first. Both gave me six stories worth of elevation, and together cost me $11. There’s another downtown lot I’m going to hit soon, one which will theoretically give me a point of view over a set of railroad tracks leading off a bridge over a river.
I spent the rest of this particular day driving around Pittsburgh and checking out the various neighborhoods and how they fit together.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s one of the famous “Steps of Pittsburgh” pictured above, in an area called Greenfield. There’s hundreds of these municipal staircases scattered about the City, an accommodation to the terrain. As a note, it’s not a field nor is it overly green.
One of the things I’ve learned is that you don’t necessarily want to live on a street which has the word “run” in its name. That’s “run” as in river run, and during the spring thaw or even just a heavy bout of rain, these low lying valley areas can easily flood out. It’s a “thing” here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One of the things I’m just fascinated by are these extreme changes in elevation – says the kid from a part of Brooklyn called Flatlands. The roads interchange pictured above is part of the reason that the neighborhoods here are so distinct from each other. You’re separated from the next “massing” of people by topography and water, possibly by an interstate and or a rail line too.
What an interesting place Pittsburgh is. Can’t wait to learn more.
Back next week, at this – your Newtown Pentacle.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
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“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
a church on Polish Hill
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the 28th of December, one had an errand to run. It’s seems that the ubiquitous ATM machines of a certain NYC based bank which my accounts are with are not so commonly found here in Pittsburgh. That meant that in order to avoid paying a fee when withdrawing some cash, I needed to drive for a bit in order to do so. I will crawl through broken glass to avoid paying ATM fees, as a note. That’s how I ended up in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh, nearby the campus of the University of Pittsburgh or “PITT.”
That’s the literal crowning glory of their campus, called the “Cathedral of Learning.” I know very little about it, but the Wikipedia link attached to the name can explain it all to you, lords and ladies.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Since I was sort of in the neighborhood, I satisfied my curiosity regarding an impressive religious building that I had spotted from the flatlands of the Strip District on prior outings to this area.
That’s the Immaculate Heart of Mary Church, a 1905 structure that hosts a presumptively Polish Roman Catholic congregation. The prominence it is set onto is called Polish Hill.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One thing I can report, after my very limited experience here in the Pittsburgh area, is that the neighbors are quite friendly. Several times have I been approached while taking pictures of this or that, expecting the old refrain of “what are you doing, or you can’t do that, or are you in Al Qaeda” that I’ve often encountered. Instead, there’s a real pride in the neighborhood bubbling out of the locals, as in the case of an older gentleman who walked over to me while I was cracking out a few exposures. Before ten minutes rolled by, he told me his whole life’s story before he had to skedaddle off to meet a girlfriend. Dude had to be 80. You go, son, you go!
Most of the chats have been the usual ones – they have a camera that they don’t know how to use and do I know what it’s worth – that sort of thing. The second I open my mouth to speak, and they hear the accent, they’ll ask “where are you from.” When I tell them I just moved to Pittsburgh from New York, they look at me all puzzled and say “Why?”
This has happened several times.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One circled around the church in the automobile, easily finding spots to park in when an interesting point of view appeared. This one is looking north towards the Allegheny River from up on Polish Hill.
A lot of my time at the moment is being spent trying to a) finish the moving process and get established here, and b) learn the jigsaw puzzle of the neighborhoods and roads which form Allegheny County.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s an abandoned looking parochial school just up the hill from Immaculate Heart of Mary, which is one of the very few places I’ve seen graffiti. I don’t know if it’s municipal will or civic pride, but I find it striking how little of that sort of thing I’m seeing. Maybe it’s just how over the top NYC is with graffiti. I’m not talking about the nice “street art” murals kind of graffiti, mind you, I’m talking about “punks” “tagging” stuff.
It’s been very interesting living in a place where the government doesn’t seek to “monetize” you quite as much as the NYC one does. Robot cameras aren’t sitting on the traffic lights, there’s abundant free or fairly cheap parking for motor vehicles, especially so nearby mass transit centers, and when you need to go somewhere only a few miles away you can do so without passing through a crucible of purposely induced traffic jams. You can also go from one section of the metroplex to another without having to shell out an hour’s wages in tolls.
Again, it ain’t necessarily sunshine and handjobs out here, but it’s nice not having an army of professional assholes thinking up new ways to get the buckaroos out of your pocket so they can fund some numbnut’s political ambitions.
Say… how’s d’at fer da most Brooklynz t’ing I’s said inna last few weekz?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I really, really want to get inside this building. I’m positive that I’ll figure out a way to do so, and my desire to photograph whatever glories it contains should be obvious to longtime readers. I like photographing Catholic Churches (Greek ones too!). This is, of course, something I’m going to figure out a way to social engineer some official permission for. I’ve never been one of those guys who walks into a church and just starts shooting without asking. That’s rude.
I mean, I’ve done it, but it was rude. Like I said, this part of the country has manners, and is polite. They also don’t curse as much, if you can ‘effin believe that.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
a day in the neighborhood
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
First off, when you’re driving through Pittsburgh and you want to stop and get out of your car, you can find a metered parking spot pretty easily. As in, you drive somewhere and there one is. They use an electronic system here, one where you go to a nearby kiosk, enter your license plate information, and then pay your due. They also use coin meters here and there, but there you go. It’s mostly the kiosk version downtown, by my very limited observation. As a former New Yorker, this is a startling innovation to me.
When you leave an abusive relationship, normal courteousness seems revelatory to you.
Coming back from the Allegheny Observatory, I stopped off at the river it’s named for, and set up the tripod to take advantage of the late afternoon lighting. That’s downtown Pittsburgh pictured above.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I found myself a slightly elevated location to shoot from where I wouldn’t have to worry too much about watching my back. This allowed me to concentrate on what I was doing. The entire time I was shooting, I was hearing the words and songs of Fred Rogers, as in Mr. Rogers. “I like you just the way you are,” “everybody is special,” and so on. I wasn’t going crazy, instead I was at the Mr. Rogers memorial!
I should mention that I love Fred Rogers, and if you’re Generation X as I am, you probably do as well. That guy…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In the American culture, we venerate warriors and businessmen and killers and sports heroes, generally. It’s not often that someone rises to the top of the heap for being kind to children. Rogers was a Pittsburgh native, and his show was produced at the local PBS station – WQED. A friend of mine who’s lived here for a few decades described seeing Mr. Rogers regularly at a local supermarket in the Squirrel Hill section where they both lived, and often overheard him talking to kids – “you seem very smart… I bet you know how to spell Broccoli, don’t you?” was the gist of how he described those encounters to me.
The monument to Mr. Rogers is wired for sound, and plays a repeating reel of him singing, and his various sayings. Fantastic!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I had set myself up for “landscape” mode with the camera, shooting “low and slow” as I describe it. This is when I feel “creative” while shooting, rather than just being a shutter monkey. The problem you encounter with this setup – which involves a filter and a series of settings designed to reduce the amount of light moving through the lens – is when something is entering the frame and suddenly you want to capture it, without it going all motion blurry.
That’s the Fort Pitt Bridge and the entrance to the Fort Pitt tunnel which pierces Mount Washington pictured above.
Luckily, I’ve learned to be prepared for this change of circumstance when the camera is in landscape mode by the University of Newtown Creek, and I can be shooting “fast” images within about 20 seconds of rapid dial twisting and settings adjustments and without having to remove the filter or otherwise alter the operation.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I saw both the freight train and the tugboat coming together from opposite sides of the frame, and managed to pop off this shot.
It was time to head back home to Dormont. I packed up the gear, hopped back in the wheels, and made a decision that I was going to rely solely on my own sense of direction to get back to HQ rather than use any sort of navigation software. I’m going to come back to this spot at dawn sometime soon.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On my way, I hit a small patch of rush hour traffic wherein the vehicle and I were only traveling at about 20 mph through downtown Pittsburgh. Heh. Traffic… what was that I was saying about abusive relationships?
I got stuck at a few traffic lights during this interval, but I popped open the moon roof on the car and took advantage of that on the way.
More next week, from the Paris of Appalachia, at this – your Newtown Pentacle,
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
allegheny observatory
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
According to every authority I could find, the highest point in Pittsburgh is 1,223 feet above sea level and it’s at the Allegheny Observatory, on Pittsburgh’s north side. Saying that, there’s supposedly another spot up here that’s higher – 1,370 feet at Brashear Reservoir, but I didn’t know that when I came to the observatory. Next time, I guess.
Having accomplished all of my have-to’s during the prior day, I set off in the car to experience this prominence. It was about a twenty minute drive from our new HQ location in Dormont to get there.
One of the nice things about Pittsburgh is that if something is only 15 miles away, you don’t have to prepare for three to five hours of travel time due to the chronic bullshit of MTA, nor to compensate for the average traffic speed in NYC of 4.1 mph.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Operated and owned by the University of Pittsburgh, this 1912 building is the second observatory to stand here, with the first one having been erected in 1859. The institution supported itself historically by supplying telegraph transmitted chronology information to the Pennsylvania Rail Road and other national level carriers, a service which became known as “Allegheny Time” which the far flung network of rail would use to synchronize their clocks three times a day.
Additionally, the first descriptions of sunspots were accomplished here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There are three telescopic domes in this building, and it’s still a working observatory. For a full description of the building’s history and the technical specifications of its equipment, click this link.
The neighborhood which hosts the observatory is called Perry North, and the actual building is housed within Riverview Park. Perry North has a terrific number of late 19th and early 20th century homes, many of which look like mansions – to the eyes of this bloke from Brooklyn.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Complaining about how phone based navigational software works is going to be an entirely new topic to bitch about here, and despite there being a properly graded secondary arterial road which goes directly to Riverview Park from one of the primary interstate routes that run through Pittsburgh, the “Waze” people instead set me upon a path that involved driving through residential local streets which were set against the terrain at 20+ degree angles, ones which also demanded switch back turns where the car would need to negotiate 90-120 degree turns in alarmingly short distances and at speed.
This is truly annoying. I don’t mind a challenging drive every now and then, but it can’t be “the more efficient route“ if you’re making a 120 degree left turn while the car is sitting at a 25 degree angle with its nose up in the air. Grrr. I fear that Waze will drive me off a cliff.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There were deer running around up here at the Observatory. There’s also a dog park, and I chatted with a guy who was setting up a long skateboard getting ready to slalom the mile and half back down to the relatively flat land at the bottom of the prominence.
The views of the city from up there were all fairly occluded by trees, which was a bit disappointing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
My day was just getting started, I would mention. I hadn’t discovered much time to wave the camera about quite yet, what with the unpacking of a few essentials in the boxes we drove out personally, and setting up the house with furniture and such. These shots are from the 5th of December. I’d be heading back to NYC on the 8th to deal with some “ending” business and deal with the movers, so the 5th was all I’d be getting this particular interval as far as exploring.
On my way home to the new HQ in Dormont, however, I had to stop and get a few shots from a certain place. It was, after all, a wonderful day in the neighborhood.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
wandering pittsburgh
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The sun sets rather quickly in Pittsburgh, due to its inherent geology, and especially so due to a prominence called Mount Washington. When the burning thermonuclear eye of God itself descends behind it, Mount Washington begins casting a deep shadow across the combined valley of the three rivers. Couple that in with the famously cloudy skies of the place, and you’ve got maybe twenty to forty minutes when there’s color in the sky. Big difference from the oceanic skies I’ve known my entire life.
I slowly navigated my way towards the location where Our Lady of the Pentacle was enjoying her afternoon at the Convention Center, making random rights and lefts and building a mental map of the golden triangle. That’s what they call the peninsular center of the City where the skyscrapers are found.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Rail infrastructure is everywhere here, and you regularly see freight trains hauling minerals and chemicals about. Notice that there aren’t abundances of illegally dumped crap, or graffiti. This is something which keeps on jumping out at me in Pittsburgh.
The other thing which is absolutely foreign to me is the fact that I can just walk into any old shop or restaurant and ask to use the bathroom – whereupon they look at me like I’m crazy and say “it’s right over there.” I’ve also encountered – get this – Porta Potties that are installed nearby public transportation. It’s nuts… they actually acknowledge human biology here. Wow. You don’t have to piss in the street like a dog.
A humble narrator kept on truckin, and rolled about on Pittsburgh’s Allegheny coastline just as the sky got pretty.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’ve walked over that bridge, during one of several prior trips I took out here in 2022. Future exploration of this area, with its crazy terrain, might just involve me purchasing some sort of electric bike or something which I can keep in the back of the car. A shuttle craft, if you would, which I can break out of the main “ship” when I want a better point of view. I’ve felt hampered by being tied to the car, when out with the camera.
Whereas the car is a genuine boon, and allows me to cover enormous areas quickly, I definitely miss the granularity of being on the street with the camera. It’s a “photowalk” not a “photodrive” which makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something on any given day. The problem is that you have to get back to where you parked, and the solution just might be a shuttle craft.
Yeah, everything comes back to Star Trek with me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The hour was growing late, and my assignation with Our Lady grew near. I was still early, so I kept on shooting.
The area I was in clearly used to be steel production related, but many of these enormous industrial structures in this area have been repurposed towards other usage including theatrical production. Pittsburgh has, apparently, a fairly thriving TV and Movie industry.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Closer to the center of the City, and I was shooting through a fence hole over the demolished remains of a cold storage warehouse towards the Allegheny River and the Sixteenth Street Bridge. I had to wait a few minutes for a large crowd of either Amish or Mennonite Steelers fans to vacate the sidewalk, as a note.
That is a whole side of Western Pennsylvania that I am eager to find out more about, incidentally. You see a lot of people roaming around with home made hats in this part of the American universe.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The low lying building on the left is the Pittsburgh Medical Examiners Office and City Morgue, and on the next block is one where I’m told is the “lowest point” in the area as it’s the HQ of the local sewer people, and the City’s “ultimate” drain is located somewhere deep below their facility.
Finally, the appointed time arrived and I picked up Our Lady. Back to Dormont we went, and another day in this new place had ended.
More tomorrow.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
Buy a book!
“In the Shadows at Newtown Creek,” an 88 page softcover 8.5×11 magazine format photo book by Mitch Waxman, is now on sale at blurb.com for $30.
The Newtown Pentacle 