page 56

Contents : Previous : Next

street, though somewhat costly, is not in the least impracticable. It might be best to construct it with a minimum of cutting by the use of a side-hill viaduct of reinforced concrete.

With the modifications above suggested the plan proposed by the residents of the South Hills, for a bridge and tunnel to the South Hills District, is eminently desirable. It is, therefore, urgently recommended as the best method of securing an adequate main thoroughfare artery to this region.

OUTLYING THOROUGHFARE IMPROVEMENTS

The following recommendations are in no sense the result of an exhaustive study of the main thoroughfare system of the Pittsburgh District. They comprise only the most desirable improvements noted during a general study of the outlying branches and connections of those thoroughfares which concentrate upon the down town district. The fact that a study undertaken with such a point of view has led so far afield that it has compelled the investigation of existing and probable connections so remote as some of those noted below, is, in itself, evidence of the complexity of the highway problem, and of the fact that it cannot be dealt with locally, in a piecemeal manner, without great sacrifice of opportunity.

The improvements are designated in the following text by numbers which correspond with those on the accompanying folded map of the Pittsburgh District.*

1. Sixteenth Street Bridge. -- The first thoroughfare branch of the Penn Avenue artery is the Sixteenth Street bridge. Because of its physical unfitness, and because it is, at present, an unreasonable interference to navigation, it must soon be rebuilt.**

At the time of reconstruction, the railroad grade crossing on each approach should be eliminated, probably by carrying the street over the tracks. At the southern end, the grades make such a change very simple. At the northern end, the separation of grades will be facilitated if the tracks of the Pittsburgh and Western Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad can be lowered a few feet. No physical objection to such a change of track grade is apparent.

* Map at the end of Part II.

** See Part V, Special Report on the Allegheny River Bridges.

Contents : Previous : Next

Last modified on 22-Dec 1999
Design format: copyright 1997-1999 Bruce S. Cridlebaugh
Original document: Frederick Law Olmsted, 1910