Posts Tagged ‘Pittsburgh’
Operation Ochtendgloren
Friday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
So… that’s where I was heading… Dawn Avenue’s intersection with Route 19 / West Liberty Avenue at the Liberty Tunnel interchange.
This has to be one of the least pedestrian friendly spots in Pittsburgh. Traffic is literally coming at you from every direction of the compass. It’s the ‘last stop’ for commuters towards the downtown section of Pittsburgh, and high speed road connections to points north and east of the city itself, from the South Hills.
Drivers get quite salty when they get caught at red lights in this zone.
One found an intersection with a painted crosswalk, and hit the little arrow button on the signal pole. Soon, the device was telling me it was safe to cross and one burst across the intersection as fast as his fat little feet could carry him.
It’s been more than a year now, and I basically still cannot run due to the orthopedic incident. Working on it.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Traffic insanity is everywhere. Pittsburgh drivers will maliciously slow down to make you catch a light. Pittsburgh drivers will intentionally keep you away from highway exits by lurking in your blind spot, and commonly tailgate other vehicles – at speed – on the highways. They’ll ‘fake’ a left turn and then go right… they suck.
Why? Lulz. The Yinzers think it’s funny.
After wiggling my butt across the intersection, I realized that the lighting had changed again and things had gotten quite photogenic all of a sudden.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Up that flight of steps, that’s where I’d need to get in order to go back to HQ.
I enjoyed a quick chat with a fellow named Brian who owns that auto shop whose signage is seen in the bottom left of the shot above. He gave me some time of day ‘intel’ on when Wheeling & Lake Erie RR commonly transits through this area, and he then informed that me he’s retiring and that the business is up for sale ‘if I know anyone interested.’
After a quick hand shake and my admonition that I wasn’t interested in purchasing an auto repair and used car sales business, I was off on my way. Hope he finds a reliable buyer. Nice guy.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Looking back at West Liberty Avenue from Dawn Avenue’s paver covered roadway. Pavers (cobblestones colloquially, or more accurately ‘Belgian Blocks) are used on roads all over Pittsburgh, and particularly so on these steep streets. They suck to drive on, as your car is bouncing all over the place, but the pavers do enhance the ‘grip’ of your tires and allow for a bit more control in terms of speed and braking on a slope.
This was a fairly barren spot, by the way. Didn’t see any evidence of homeless encampments, or any sort of morbid habitations, here.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Those are the steps leading up to the Southern Busway, which is partially ‘tracked’ to serve the T light rail. Nearby is the yard used by a towing company which seems to enjoy a municipal contract. If you parked illegally, and they scooped up your auto, odds are that you’re coming out here to get it back.
Reminds me of the old days in NYC when the NYPD used an area under the Kosciuszcko Bridge, in Queens, as a tow yard. At least in Pittsburgh, the tow yard is sited somewhat near mass transit. NYPD used to tow cars out to a remote spot which you needed a car to get to, which I always thought of as being a kind of perverse joke.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
People live up here, and there’s a small neighborhood present in these foothills. This is, as I often call such places, a ‘pregnant location.’ Lots of photo opportunities. I’ll be coming back, and specifically so in pursuit of some rail shots from this spot.
Back next week with more – 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.
Operation Shōnin
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Continuing with photos from a recent scuttle down Pittsburgh’s West Liberty Avenue/ U.S. Route 19 Truck.
This is just a short section of 19, incidentally, as it continues both north and south, towards and into other municipalities and even counties where it’s labeled with different local street names. Just a couple of miles away in Mount Lebanon, for instance, it’s ‘Washington Road,’ and in the northerly direction it’s called ‘McKnight Road.’ The latter is a pesky traffic snare surrounded by shopping malls, and the locals refer to it as ‘McKnightmare Road.’
Supposedly the best spot in Pittsburgh for a good public cry is an Arby’s on McKnight, according to a Reddit poll. But, I digress.
With my car in the shop for its maintenance and inspection, the pathway back home after this walk concluded would involve connecting with the T light rail. There’s a particular station, nearby the Liberty Tunnel and found at the end of this section of Route 19, which has been catching my eye while riding on the service. That’s where I was headed.
There were other T stops along my path, of course, but I’d have to climb the steep hills of the Beechview section to get up there.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The shot above looks up and into the Beechview section, specifically Brookside Avenue (right about here on Google Maps), and gives you an idea about why the thought of climbing those hills on foot fills one with dread. The light began to improve, and your humble narrator got busy by getting the camera’s clicking and whirring.
As is usually the case, I was the singular pedestrian.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Amazingly, there are private homes set along the slopes. The one above had a set of steps descending to West Liberty Avenue, and another that led to what looked like a driveway or alley. Wow. This is a very busy road to live along, by Pittsburgh standard.
The PA. Dept. of Transportation calls itself ‘PennDOT.’ West Liberty is ‘theirs’ to administer. According to the agency, via Google’s AI:
‘PennDOT data shows West Liberty Avenue (SR 3069) in Pittsburgh carries over 20,000 vehicles daily, with specific counts available through PennDOT OneMap (using the Allegheny County Traffic Volume Map for general figures) or by accessing their GIS portal for detailed data points on this principal arterial, a key route connecting Dormont and Pittsburgh with significant commercial activity.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Finally, arriving at the ‘business end’ of West Liberty Avenue, where a sharp left turn orients motorists towards the Liberty Tunnel interchange.
The ramp leading off the roadway on the left is the entrance to the Southern Busway. More on that one in a later posting.
The landform in the background is ‘the ass side’ of Mount Washington.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There’s a startling amount of infrastructure present in these shots. The green steel causeway is another section of the busway structure, and just below that is a rail trestle used by the Wheeling & Lake Erie RR outfit. Below that, the two primary arterial roadways of ‘51’ and ‘19’ interchange with the tunnel and a series of local streets, leading to secondary arterials.
Honestly, given that I’m usually motoring through here at 30mph or so, this is the first time that I’ve actually been able to stand, study, and stare at the scene. For all of you New Yorkers, an analogy would be to go to Queens Plaza and just stand there watching it all work.
Fascinating, says me.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the aforementioned 1924 vintage Liberty Tunnel, pictured above. It connects, on the Monongahela River side, to the Liberty Bridge.
Me? I had to get across this crazy street. This should answer a riddle, since – ultimately – I needed to get to the other side. That’s why this chicken crossed the street, so parable solved.
Back 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.
Operation Ispettore
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It was a Monday in January, and the start of a warming trend, climatologically speaking. An interval of winter weather had held Pittsburgh in its grip for a couple of weeks at the start of the new year.
The mission for the day revolved around the Mobile Oppression Platform, a Toyota. An annual State of PA. mandated car inspection, and changeover of the stickers indicating my compliance with the law (found on my windshield) needed to happen, and there also was a bit of scheduled work – revolving around a recall which the ‘stealership’ was obliged to handle. The recall is due to a class action lawsuit regarding a flawed bit of insulation on a cable found under the hood. The MOP hasn’t displayed any symptoms indicating it’s experiencing ‘cablegate,’ but there we are.
Long story short, had to drop the car off at 8:30 a.m. and didn’t expect it back until ‘end of day.’ One decided to take the opportunity to do something fairly unpleasant, which is always my favorite choice.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
West Liberty Avenue (a section of the larger U.S. Route 19 Truck) is a primary arterial street which your humble narrator finds himself driving down almost every single day. An analogy from back in Queens, for West Liberty, would be the eastern sections of Queens Boulevard or the section of Northern Boulevard in Woodside/Astoria/LIC which I used to call ‘the Carridor.’ It’s the ‘last mile’ that automobile commuters experience when driving into ‘the city’ from ‘the suburbs.’
I’ve driven it hundreds of times, but had never walked this section, so off I scuttled in the direction of the Liberty Tunnel after dropping off the car.
Nearby, the 1924 vintage Liberty Tunnel is 1.795 miles long, allowing vehicles on the Monongahela River shoreline to travel under Mount Washington. There’s two ‘tubes’ which offer double lane travel lanes.
Liberty Tunnel connects the peninsular section of downtown to and from the South Hills section of Pittsburgh, offering motorists egress to several primary and secondary arterial roads (‘stroads,’ as transportation geeks would name them) like Route 51 ‘Saw Mill Run,’ or this one – Route 19 ‘West Liberty Avenue.’. These arterials run out to the various boroughs of the larger metro, its extant towns, and other municipalities which populate Allegheny County in the ‘South Hills’ section. If you follow either path long enough, you’ll soon find yourself in Maryland or West Virginia.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Officially, this is a pedestrianized street.
Personally speaking, it was the second most terrifying pedestrian experience I’ve had here in Pittsburgh, and it’s overall in my top ten lifetime. Most of the businesses along this route are involved in the car business – fixing them, renting them, selling them. The sidewalks along West Liberty were barely treated for ice and snow, with a casual desire path formed by people’s feet that was loosely shoveled here and there. There’s quite a few commercial properties along this path which are ‘available’ and those locations receive zero attention regarding sidewalks.
The curb along West Liberty is seldom higher than an inch or two, and there’s heavy traffic blowing past you at double the posted speed limits.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
At one point, the sidewalk just ends. It continued on the other side of the street, so I crossed the five lanes of traffic at a red light. It was warming up in Pittsburgh, and luckily this was the first day in a couple of weeks that began with an air temperature above freezing. It was nice to be out and swinging my legs around. I was happy, or something like it.
As you can see from the shot above, I maintain a fairly low bar for my happiness threshold.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the more or less south east side of West Liberty is Beechview, famous for its steep hills. Opposite side is Brookline, which is also famous for its steep hills and sharply graded streets. West Liberty seems to run in what looks like an altered hydrological valley between the two.
The always excellent brooklineconnection.com offers this great page describing the construction of West Liberty Avenue at the start of the 20th century. Plummers Run Creek is the answer which I was looking for, regarding what body of water used to flow through what’s obviously a shallow valley carved by water.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
One continued on his merry path, while observing everything. I used to say it all the time: you can’t actually ‘see’ anything when driving, or even riding a bike, as you’re moving too fast. Scuttling along at normal walking speed (and yeah, I’m back at normal speed again, post orthopedic incident) you can read the whole storybook of any city if you know what to look for.
Back 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.
Operation Achpamsin
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Yeah, it was kind of a mistake going out on a day like this one. Middle to low 20’s in temperature, kind of wet, and quite windy. Days and days of accumulation of ice and snow were everywhere. No bueno.
Thinking to myself that Moe the Dog was probably wondering where I was right now, your humble narrator decided to cut off half of what he planned to do this day and begin the journey back to HQ in Dormont.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
First step was getting to the Monongahela River, and then crossing it.
Easy peasy, that. Just a matter of carefully crossing a few high volume streets, but soon I found myself at the Smithfield Street Bridge.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
After walking over the river, and resigning myself to the fact that it was Sunday and that means that I’d be waiting a very long time for a CSX train to pass through on the tracks found beneath the bridge, I headed over to the light rail station and boarded a train set heading back towards HQ.
All told, this abortive effort ended up being about five miles worth of walking. Worth doing from an exercise POV, of course, but one yearned to wander aimlessly and ‘see some stuff.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The T dropped me off in Dormont. I had cooked a big meal the night before and had lots of leftovers sitting in the fridge, so no worries on the evening repast.
The various camera straps were adjusted into a comfortable situation and then I headed down the hill.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A bit of signage was observed, blocking the sidewalk while cautioning against something happening soon in a cryptic manner. Me? I was vouchsafing my gamey ankle while walking through all that ice where this thing was blocking the sidewalk. Sheesh.
So far, so good.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
This is the block in Dormont which HQ is found on the far corner of.
The hill doesn’t look as challenging or steep as it actually is in this shot, but there’s about five to six building stories worth of differential in just a thousand or so feet from one corner to the next. Usually when walking up the hill, midway, I take a minute to let my heart rate slow down.
Back tomorrow with something different – 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.
Operation Tahalna
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A brief aperture, in a seemingly constant barrage of winter weather that had been battering Pittsburgh occurred, and your humble narrator soon found himself at the local ‘T’ light rail station awaiting his ride. The weather window would be closing within a few hours, so it would be a short scuttle for me on this particular day. Stretching the legs, as it were.
Traveling light with a minimum photo ‘kit’ in the bag, one was nevertheless swaddled in insulating clothes to combat the atmospheric temperatures. I’ve described the minimum kit bag in the past, but – two prime lenses and a few ‘odds and bobs’ of essential gear.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The T was ridden to Pittsburgh’s north shore, where I discovered that the legions were beginning to assemble for a football game that night.
Realization that I had wandered into exactly the sort of setting I don’t want to be in – where the human infestation would soon be swarming – my plans for the afternoon began to alter.
Also, a considerable amount of ice and snow was present on the pavements, even in those areas which receive dedicated maintenance. Did not want to find out what things looked like in spots where nobody is taking care of the sidewalks.
Orthopedic incident… it still occupies a big part of my brain, a fevered tenancy wherein no rent is paid.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s Acrisure Stadium, where the action would be happening later on.
I understand that the Steelers won that night, but I didn’t see anyone sacrificing a bull or anything – this time. My amended plan for the day, thereby, would be to loop around the stadium and get back on the T light rail, which I’d ride over to a different section of the City which would hopefully be a bit less populated.
In the ‘inner ring’ of Pittsburgh, the light rail runs in a ‘free zone.’ Hop on, hop off, it’s cool.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Allegheny River has been pushing out ice flows for a few weeks now.
The river’s source is far to the north, nearby PA.’s border with New York State. Kinzua, I’m told.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Made it back to the T’s terminal stop, and boarded a train set heading towards the South. Chatted with some Canadian guy from Quebec who was a tourist, and he was in town for the football game. Recommended a place to eat and grab a drink to him, near his hotel, and then one debarked at the ‘Steel Plaza Station,’ under the U.S. Steel Building, in the downtown section.
Back on the streets, where I belong.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I noticed that the sculptures in this park were sporting some sort of plastic or vinyl protective covers. Interesting, that. It was getting colder with every step, I should mention, and the thermometer had been at 24 degrees when I left HQ.
Regardless, I’ve got to keep moving or I’ll stop moving.
Back tomorrow with more.
“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 