Posts Tagged ‘Pittsburgh’
Pennsy Rotunda
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A beautiful bit of architecture, there’s a rotunda dome found at the entrance to what was once ‘Union (or Penn) Station’ here in Pittsburgh. This was once the home base station for the Pennsylvania Rail Road company, and they clearly wanted to make an impression – back in the day.
Completed in 1904, the station was designed by architect David Daniel Burnham, who was (amongst MANY other things) director of works for Chicago’s ‘White City’ World’s Colombian Exhibition in the 1890’s. He was also the designer of NYC’s Flatiron Building.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Converted to residential usage in the 1980’s – and I’m just going to colloquially use ‘Penn Station’ from this point out – the Penn Station terracotta dome, and rotunda entranceway to the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973. It is a grandiose space, I’ll tell you.
Someday, I’ll have to connive a way to get into the building itself. Magnificent space outside, can only imagine what it’s like within – especially the lobby.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As you’ve probably guessed by now, I’m really digging the use of a wide angle 16mm lens, which was acquired at the beginning of the year. It’s just a little bit wider than human vision, and offers an almost panoramic point of view.
Back tomorrow with more 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.
Hullabaloo, too
Wednesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It was a ‘get some exercise day’ once again, and a humble narrator executed his now familiar trope of walking to the T light rail station and then heading towards the center of things here in Pittsburgh. There’s a fair amount of maintenance work being performed on the service and the transit people are rerouting the T’s through a largely shuttered facility downtown called ‘Penn Station,’ pictured above.
The drill is to debark the light rail unit you arrived in, cross a street, and then board a shuttle bus. Said bus carries you to two stops away, where you then debark the bus and head down into another light rail station to catch a T, which then travels to the terminal stop on the other side of the Allegheny River nearby the Sportsball stadiums.
The shuttle bus and the T make all the usual station stops along the way, as you’d imagine.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Penn Station sits alongside one of Pittsburgh’s ‘Busways,’ which are roadways whose occupancy is singularly restricted to mass transit, municipal, and emergency vehicles. Across the street is what used to be the actual ‘Penn, or Union, Station’ – as in the Pittsburgh HQ station of the Pennsylvania Rail Road company. This beautiful structure, clad in terracotta, has been converted over to luxury residential usage, unfortunately. There’s an Amtrak station alongside of it which now carries the passenger rail slack, but in the past I’ve described the station as looking like a Soviet orthodontist’s office and I’m sticking with that.
After my last long walk went down in flames due to dehydration and a sudden pall of infirmity, as detailed a couple of weeks ago, a humble narrator was determined to push the envelope a little bit on this one to explore the ideation that either it was a temporary thing or that there’s something wrong with me.
As it turned out, that episode seems to have been a one time thing. Yay.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Funnily enough, I felt absolutely top notch for the entirety of this walk, despite the fact that it was about three miles longer than the one which ended with me in bed at 9:30 p.m. feeling sick and old.
The weather was definitely on my side this time around – middle 70’s, with a fairly low dew point, and a steady breeze. The light was absolutely glorious on this particular afternoon, and instead of getting on that shuttle bus, one randomly decided to leave transit behind and get with the scuttling.
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.
Open Streets PGH, too
Tuesday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Pittsburgh’s Armstrong Tunnel, opened for inclusion in the ‘Open Streets PGH’ event, is pictured above. A 1927 vintage inclusion to Pittsburgh’s street grid, it’s named for a director of Public Works who would later serve his community as Pittsburgh’s Mayor, and then as Commissioner of Allegheny County at the start of the 20th century.
Who knew?
Our Lady of the Pentacle and myself retracted our umbrella’s canopies back into the ‘ready’ position and entered the underground. This open streets dealie is something organized by the local chapter of ‘the Bicycle People.’ I’m on record calling out the ‘bicycle people’ as being generally caustic and acting like total dicks, but I’m scarred from interaction with a particularly toxic group of them back in NYC’s Queens.
There was a cool vibe in the air, here in Pittsburgh, although the many Cops observed along the route didn’t look too happy. Saying that, do Cops ever look happy when they’re in uniform?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Marching through the tunnel was uneventful, except for when I stopped to grab a shot and some kid who wasn’t paying attention to his surroundings walked right into me, but that wasn’t a big deal at all as he was a tiny fellow.
There’s meant to be two more of these Open Streets events in 2024, and I’m hoping that I’ll be able to make it to them. Anytime you can walk in the street and not get squished by a car – I’m down.
The Armstrong Tunnel deposits visitors on a normally busy quite and somewhat high speed roadway, at an intersection leading to the South Tenth Street Bridge that connects to the South Side Flats neighborhood on the other side of the Monongahela River. The Downtown section we had just walked through is part of the peninsular ‘Golden Triangle’ section which sits between ‘The Mon,’ Ohio, and Allegheny Rivers.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the South Tenth street bridge, pictured above, which we proceeded upon. A quick couple’s scuttle soon found us enjoying a pint of beer at a local brewery, whereupon we indulged in a bit of laziness and summoned a cab to carry us back to HQ rather than using the light rail. It was pouring rain by this point in the day.
As a note – Breweries are a ‘thing’ here in Pittsburgh. There’s also a significant number of establishments which specialize in locally brewed Mead. Not my cup of tea, that – too sweet.
Upon our return, Moe the Dog rejoiced.
“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.
Open Streets PGH
Monday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A nonprofit outfit here in Pittsburgh, dubbed ‘Open Streets PGH,’ offers an event a few times a year wherein the normal ebb and flow of vehicular traffic through the city is halted, and a route is offered to the public for bike and pedestrian usage.
Our Lady of the Pentacle and myself decided to check out and participate in the event, which occurred on a particularly dreary and rain choked weekend day.
The particular route for this outing involved us getting to ‘Downtown,’ whereupon it snaked through the business district and over to the normally vehicle focused Armstrong Tunnel. This led us to a crossing of the Monongahela River over the South Tenth Street Bridge, which would put us in the South Side Flats ‘zone.’
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I’m still learning ‘what’s what,’ and ‘where’s where,’ but pictured above is Pittsburgh’s ‘Bridge of Sighs.’ One side of the street is the court house, whereas the other used to be a jail, and prisoners would be marched to their court dates along the corridor housed within that bridge over the street, hence the colloquial cognomen.
As you’ve likely noticed, one opted for use of a wide angle 16mm lens on this excursion. I was traveling light, partially because it was raining, and had my ‘bag of primes’ with me rather than any of the zoom lenses.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the Armstrong Tunnel, dug into a landform called ‘The Bluff,’ which Duquesne University sits atop. The tunnel leads to the northern shoreline of the Monongahela River, and it’s been undergoing rehabilitation related construction for pretty much the entire interval that I’ve been living in Pittsburgh.
Tomorrow, what it looks like within the tunnel, and on the other side.
“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.
Up, over, & pffffft
Thursday
– photo by Mitch Waxman
That’s the 31st street bridge pictured above, which I walked across the Allegheny River upon. As mentioned several times this week, this walk was a bit of a challenge for me, due to a long period of inactivity. As to why I was inactive for so long, that’s not a terribly interesting story to tell but let’s just say that I had things which needed tending to at home. The situation I was thereby dealing with involved a stiffened set of muscles and tendons in both the roadway interface and my lower back. It was also the first really warm day that I’d been out and about, and it was quite humid so I was sweating profusely. Put all that together and ‘no bueno.’
Saying all that, I’m quite used to having to double down on a walk and ease myself back into a groove after ‘hitting a wall,’ but my physical reserves to continue on were drying up with each step forward. Didn’t help that I was absolutely cooking in direct sunlight. Yeah, it was cloudy, but those were clouds of literal humidity hanging in the air.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
At the right side of the shot above, looking southwesterly along the Allegheny River, right at the horizon level – that’s Acrisure Stadium, which the Steelers operate out of, and that’s where I started this walk. Just under six miles is how far I got, basically.
Right after capturing this shot, I crashed out. ‘Ran out of gas’ as it were. Saying that, I was at the middle of a bridge, so I had to stagger on to the other side. My original plan involved walking all the way back downtown and crossing another bridge over the Monongahela River to get back to the light rail, but that all had to be scrapped.
A significant part of ‘adulthood,’ as I define it, is to know when you’re licked. The only thing on my mind at this particular moment was to find a shady spot where I could sit down and rehydrate.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The bridge was finally crossed and upon regaining the street grid, I summoned a Lyft rideshare to carry me to a destination which my intentions of a ten to twelve mile walk were meant to incorporate as a reward for the effort. ‘Man, oh man, I’m getting old’ is what I was thinking.
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.
The Newtown Pentacle 