Submitted by MaynardWaltrip t3_zste2a in pittsburgh
Sidewalk open to walkers too!
Comments
dockellis24 t1_j19w8cl wrote
It can go faster if you put all of the other projects on the back burner like they did for this one. Also, any of the steel bridges will take a lot longer due to the massive steel supply problems right now. That’s the whole reason they used the concrete beams rather than the steel ones that the local community wanted for some reason.
sopabe6197 t1_j1adl3g wrote
Being embarrassed in front of the world certainly helped.
Romanakis t1_j19zxbo wrote
I gotta say, compared to the old bridge, I prefer this bridge’s look. Neither are anything spectacular, but to me this one blends more into the scenery. I would welcome a little green paint on the top concrete beams though.
geoffh2016 t1_j1a1udp wrote
There will be some sort of public art installed over the next year, which should hide some of the concrete. Here's the latest version I could find.
Romanakis t1_j1a2sqa wrote
Nice.
CL-MotoTech t1_j1a6ef9 wrote
There is indeed a massive steel shortage. That applies to everything, but even rebar and stressing cables are insane. What is happening is that all the engineering specs are getting lowered to compensate. So instead of a #8 epoxy coated bar we will get you by with a #7 plain bar. It will be interesting to see where we are maintenance wise in like 20 years.
Ninja_69_420 t1_j1ajfkn wrote
Lol maintenance. Good one. That's rich.
We will be in the same place in 5 years, in 10 years, in 20, 50, 100, & beyond but they will have something new to blame it on so that's cool.
burritoace t1_j1cw5pq wrote
Seems like we'll always have conservatives who cannot bear to support public works to blame.
Ninja_69_420 t1_j1d5pyg wrote
Oh please. All politicians are the same. If they can't put their name on it or give their cousin the contracts, they have no interest in it. Maintenance doesn't win votes from the uneducated masses so it will never be a priority.
burritoace t1_j1d5yda wrote
Dumbass garbage
[deleted] t1_j1dwilr wrote
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tinacat933 t1_j1b2ft7 wrote
Well that’s comforting
lone_pinemall t1_j1cgbbm wrote
This is absolutely not how it works.
Bicycle-Seat t1_j1eem56 wrote
This is bull. They didn’t change design codes.
CL-MotoTech t1_j1efc6b wrote
That’s not how that works. But okay.
BurghPuppies t1_j1d14qg wrote
IDK, it sure seemed like there were a LOT of other projects going on
ParappaGotBars t1_j1bl2mp wrote
Well they subbed it out. That’s how they had so many hands on deck.
AirtimeAficionado t1_j1a4nsm wrote
Eh we lost a lot in this accelerated process, notably a serious discussion about how this road is being used and if we really need four lanes for car traffic. This design should have had a protected bike lane, at the least.
JustYourNeighbor t1_j1adnk8 wrote
Agreed, but (in this short amount of time) they can't have a protected bike lane for a few hundred feet only to open to unprotected. If they had more time to revamp Forbes up to Shady at least, maybe.
burritoace t1_j1cwbfu wrote
Putting a bike lane on either end would be trivially easy
BorisTheMansplainer t1_j1atjc5 wrote
You're absolutely right about the accelerated approval process, but I suspect a lot of the discretion applied for this project was based on the anticipated shitshow of the looming bridge replacement on the Parkway. After that project is complete I am hesitantly confident that they will revisit lane allocation on the Fern Hollow.
hubbyofhoarder t1_j1bsz4q wrote
No, they very much won't. During non-peak times, restricting car traffic on Fern Hollow to single lanes for bikes would be no big deal. During peak times, that would make an already very well-trafficked intersection more of a clusterfuck than necessary.
hubbyofhoarder t1_j1bs1n4 wrote
It's been a minute since I lived less than 2 blocks from that bridge (well okay, 10 years). I lived in that neighborhood for 15+ years.
Only someone who doesn't live in the vicinity of that bridge would ask "do we really need four lanes" for that bridge. That bridge has been a gigantic bottleneck for that area as long as I've been familiar with it. Bikes can easily share lanes with cars there, as traffic is slow. Further, even if Fern Hollow Bridge had dedicated bike lanes in and out bound, no one is going to mass demolish houses along single lane each way South Braddock Ave to fulfill your bike dreams.
I get the anti-bike lane, anti-bicycle sentiment that often manifests in this subreddit. I'm not part of that. I'm pro-bike, pro-bike lane where bike lanes make sense. Removing car lanes for bike lanes for Fern Hollow would have made things worse for everyone who actually lives there.
You're not doing bike culture any favors with dumb posts like this.
burritoace t1_j1cwgns wrote
This is needlessly aggressive and wrong. The bottleneck is the intersection with Braddock, not the bridge. During off-peak times traffic through there is extremely fast and unsafe for bikes. Three lanes for car traffic would be perfectly adequate there.
tension_tamed t1_j1cefoa wrote
I think this way of thinking is exactly why you need to consider reducing the number of lanes and increasing protected bike lines. If the mentality is always "next year" or "next project", then the work will never get done and progress will not occur or will occur extremely slowly. I attended several of the meetings discussing the bridge and bike lanes, and there was enormous support for protected bike lanes and for considering how this bridge and the surrounding area could be changed to enable better transit for drivers, buses, cyclists, and pedestrians.
It is possible to have a solution that benefits multiple parties - many other cities have been successful in this area. And trying to discount people's opinions and ideas by anonymously calling them dumb isn't doing anyone a favor either.
AirtimeAficionado t1_j1bwic2 wrote
Well given the fact that traffic has successfully diverted around the bridge for a year with really no huge increases in traffic, it would suggest that the lanes aren’t necessarily necessary.
And a traffic bottleneck isn’t necessarily being caused by the lanes of the bridge, it is the intersection just past it on the Point Breeze side that limits flow, and causes traffic to cue * queue * on the bridge. Added lanes don’t really help this scenario, and in some cases actually hurt it by encouraging people to merge late/increasing chaos at a choke point (like we see on the outbound entrance to the Squirrel Hill tunnel, adding a lane before the tunnel and keeping the tunnel unchanged would not help traffic).
As for bike lanes, they aren’t really there for peak, standstill traffic periods. They are there for off hours, when traffic treats the bridge like a highway, and put cyclists at risk. It is the fact that people speed dangerously on the bridge, but not Braddock Ave (because it is so narrow), which is why the bridge bike lanes are necessary. It’s increasing safety on a dangerous stretch.
hubbyofhoarder t1_j1c42rz wrote
> Well given the fact that traffic has successfully diverted around the bridge for a year with really no huge increases in traffic, it would suggest that the lanes aren’t necessarily necessary.
Kindly link to the statistically valid survey of residents of that area that leads you to that conclusion
> And a traffic bottleneck isn’t necessarily being caused by the lanes of the bridge, it is the intersection just past it on the Point Breeze side that limits flow, and causes traffic to cue on the bridge.
It's "Queue", not "cue". Cues are read from cards, people wait in queues.
Having lived in this area, added lanes definitely help as you're not forcing all vehicles into a single lane to wait their turn to either access S Braddock going either direction or go straight through. Your proposal would back traffic into Squirrel Hill.
As for that stretch of roadway being treated like a highway: you're either ignorant, obtuse, or you've never lived in that area. It's not Fernhollow Bridge that's taken at high speed, it's the long straight bit of road between South Dallas and South Braddock. Restricting the bridge lane traffic would do jack shit to help with that.
The traffic lights at South Braddock restrict the practically non-existent speeding on the bridge. If you weren't completely full of shit and actually cared about speeding and safety on that stretch of road you'd be talking about traffic control between South Dallas and South Braddock.
The bridge is not the issue, it's the long stretch of read with no traffic enforcement and no traffic control.
Again, why make it so easy? You're taking positions that anyone who has lived in that area will know to be bullshit. Bike lanes are good for cities overall. The Fernhollow/South Braddock intersection is a place where a bike lane would only fuck things up more.
AirtimeAficionado t1_j1c767l wrote
Thank you for the lesson on cue versus queue, I will remember to proofread all of my posts on this anonymous social media platform of little to no importance more carefully going forward.
As for the data, since you’re the expert, feel free to go through PennDOT’s GIS data to prove your case, you can access it here: https://data-pennshare.opendata.arcgis.com/datasets/a17c20bf71dd40fea24363bb9f0ae0e4
What I see are minimal changes in AADT for adjacent roadways over the closure period, with only a 14% increase from July 2019 to July 2022 on Penn Ave, for example.
Looking at the City of Pittsburgh’s data (which you can access here: https://data.wprdc.org/dataset/traffic-count-data-city-of-pittsburgh), I see that the average speed of travel for the October 2019 period of recording for Braddock Ave was 30 mph, with a 95th percentile speed of 38 mph. The city does not have data for the Fern Hollow Bridge, but given its speed limit of 35mph, it stands to reason the speeds of vehicles on that stretch is faster than the 30mph average observed for Braddock Avenue.
Given that the average risk of death for pedestrians involved in a car collision doubles from 25% to 50% with a 10 mph increase in speed from 32 to 42 mph (42 mph is likely very close to the Fern Hollow avg speed given the wide pattern of avg speed = limit + ~5-10mph), this difference is not insignificant by any means, and supports the general necessity of bike lanes on this stretch of roadway: cyclists are twice as likely to experience a fatal collision on this stretch versus those adjacent.
But, then again, I don’t live there, I live ten whole minutes away, so what do I, and these very absolute, quantitative data know anyway…
hubbyofhoarder t1_j1cufrh wrote
> it stands to reason the speeds of vehicles on that stretch is faster than the 30mph average observed for Braddock Avenue.
No, it doesn't. If you're inbound on Fern Hollow you're either coming from South Braddock, having made a turn or you've passed through, you know, a traffic control device that slows cars as part of its function due to merging traffic patterns. If you're outbound, you're again passing through a traffic light from a wider road to a single-lane road that has cars parked along its length nearly all of its length most of the time.
South Braddock is long and straight with relatively few traffic devices along its length. Fern Hollow either starts or ends with a traffic light, depending on direction. Not the same, your assumptions are shit.
>free to go through PennDOT’s GIS
You did, and what you got is a bullshit comparison of two non-comparable stretches of road.
Monkey-see, monkey-do is not part of my schtick.
astrosail t1_j1d99hf wrote
You’re not doing any cyclists a favor by posting “dumb posts like this” to use a phrase out of your own book. I’ve biked across the old bridge so many times and feared for my life. It doesn’t matter if there are cars around or not—cyclists feel unsafe and unprotected while biking over it.
Also, they ARE adding bike lanes to the new fern hollow bridge in the spring paving season. See you there… oh wait, you don’t live here anymore.
astrosail t1_j1d8w8m wrote
It’s going to already. Follow Bike PGH. Bike lanes will be added in the spring paving and striping season.
AirtimeAficionado t1_j1f6jf8 wrote
I hope that you are correct, but I was under the impression that they are just going to be “sharrows” on the outer lanes on Forbes. I know there were some big victories on Beechwood and Dallas, but I thought Forbes was remaining pretty much the same…
AMcMahon1 t1_j1a1m0c wrote
I remember people didn't think it would open until 2024
This was a critical infrastructure emergency that needed completed asap.
Sucks that not everything that needs repaired is seen as an emergency though and most of the time is held up by funding/paperwork
his_purple_majesty t1_j1ab56w wrote
> needs repaired
true Pittsburgher
jmachee t1_j1b8emx wrote
Shakespeare: “To be or not to be?”
Pittsburgher: I’ll pass.
28carslater t1_j1bmz9r wrote
Left lane to pass, then make a right to cut off the previous lane.
Der_Missionar t1_j1beq96 wrote
Dude that was fast! ('n at)
pittpanthers95 t1_j1a5b2s wrote
I just drove from Regent Square to Squirrel Hill and back, just for the experience of going across the new bridge.
Having that easy access has been sorely missed.
SystemOfADowneyJr t1_j19zm27 wrote
You first.
Stenyel t1_j1a1jm7 wrote
Lol no you
Steely_McNeatHouse t1_j1b6q7o wrote
The upcoming precip followed by a deep freeze is a tad ominous a parallel to what happened the evening-morning it collapsed.
Idk about yinz'all, but I'm staying away from that Blvd bridge over Junction Hollow tomorrow.
psychopompandparade t1_j1bxbvg wrote
if they actually double check things late next week after it ices, drops, and goes back up and rains again maybe they can catch any similar problems before they go unnoticed for years and almost kill dozens of people.
DannyLameJokes t1_j19tat1 wrote
Does anyone know if the tranquil trail below open yet?
geoffh2016 t1_j1a1y9e wrote
No, it’s not open. There’s still construction equipment, platforms, gravel down there.
enemy_of_your_enema t1_j1a8i4k wrote
There's apparently going to be a whole restoration project to get it cleaned up and accessible again.
geoffh2016 t1_j1au50o wrote
Exactly. It's clearly a mess down there - they built up some platforms for the cranes, minor debris left from the collapse, the gravel path they used to get equipment down there, etc. And there's supposed to be some sort of public art on the underside of the bridge. (Not sure the final plans are public yet. This is the latest I could find.)
Steely_McNeatHouse t1_j1b6ahp wrote
I assume it'll be awhile before it opens up. A lot less urgency down there too. But given ho much they had to tear up to rebuild the bridge at an amazing rate, there could be some really cool opportunity to do significant landscaping to really make an amazing creative moment in the park.
[deleted] t1_j1b76rp wrote
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FocusFlukeGyro t1_j1bvz8p wrote
Hold the 'ef up!!! Gravel!?!
Romanakis t1_j19t1sb wrote
The most beautiful photo I’ve seen this year.
JonMiller724 t1_j1at6ko wrote
The company I work for, worked on materials for this bridge; decking, stay in place concrete forms, railing etc.
This job was prioritized and there wasn’t a lot of messing around with bureaucracy and scrutiny on material costs.
Sometimes a year or more of a project is just bidding materials.
chrisfyb t1_j1a2e8m wrote
Only 600 more to rebuild!
Betterdaysalwayscome t1_j1a21hd wrote
Is that the one that collapsed with a bus on or around this time last year?
chrisfyb t1_j1a2caf wrote
Yes. Almost exactly a year ago.
arguchik t1_j1ab3dz wrote
Late January.
Edit: I know because it happened about 2 weeks after I moved into my current place.
Big_League227 t1_j1ba006 wrote
January 28th... I know because I had a dentist appointment at 7am on Forbes. I normally would have been taking that bridge up Forbes from S. Braddock, but because of the snow, I stayed on the Parkway. Instead of getting off at Edgewood/Swissvale, I took the parkway to the Squirrel Hill exit instead. I arrived early for my appointment, and while waiting in the parking lot, started seeing tons of cop cars and ambulances heading down Forbes. Heard about it when I was in the dentist's chair. I would have been going over it about when it collapsed if it wasn't for the snow that morning. I still get a little chill down my spine thinking about it.
psychopompandparade t1_j1bxha7 wrote
I absolutely still get chills thinking about how bad that collapse could have been had it been a different day or a different time. i'm not one to call things miracles but this feels damn close
arguchik t1_j1c61ni wrote
Yeah, it had far to fall. And a BUS, my god.
psychopompandparade t1_j1ca4xb wrote
yeah for that bus the difference was seconds. If there hadn't been a snow delay called, there may have been school buses and way more commuters. if it had happened a few hours later, the bridge would have been full. If it had happened on a different day in the afternoon, you could have a crushed after school running club underneath as well.
I have heard several different stories like the one above, people who are usually there or would have been there at that time of day, and didn't on a whim, or because of the snow, or because they were being lazy.
It's truly remarkable no one was killed. The couple in the car that were pulled to safety had some gnarly injuries, but this could have been dozens dead, easily.
arguchik t1_j1bn6uz wrote
Woooooooowwwwww. I'm getting a little chill down my spine now too.
[deleted] t1_j1adzrb wrote
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Betterdaysalwayscome t1_j1a7gby wrote
Damn, that was pretty quick! My friend at the time almost went over that bridge on her commute to work. She called me evidently upset, when I googled it, I then understood exactly why lol
chrisfyb t1_j1anfsm wrote
I drove over it within the hour of collapse haha. I work near Bakery Square, got to work, got on Reddit and saw that. Had to Google the name Fern Hollow though. 😂
Betterdaysalwayscome t1_j1awgku wrote
I’m not even from the area, I’m from Jersey but had a friend in the area. She called me nearly hysterical. I thought it was a small overpass that collapsed. After I got off the phone I went “holy shit” at the pic I googled lol. Thankfully I didn’t know what it looked like while on the phone with her or I probably would’ve been just as much of a nervous wreck.
arguchik t1_j1ab23p wrote
It was 11 months ago, almost on the nose.
Betterdaysalwayscome t1_j1amx37 wrote
That’s wildly impressive
kentuckycarbomb t1_j1a9fo4 wrote
Any idea when buses will resume using it? Apologies if this has been mentioned somewhere, but I haven’t seen it.
EDIT: I DMed the PRT Customer Service account on Twitter, and they confirmed that the plan is for buses to resume using the bridge next quarter. Gahhh.
butteredpotatos t1_j1ae7om wrote
I saw a post on Facebook (so take this with a grain of salt!) that they won’t switch back until the “regular schedule change” in February. Hoping they don’t stick to that, but we will see!
Ok-Campaign-2355 t1_j1dlu62 wrote
They probably want to wait for traffic patterns to settle down before making the change. Bridge might be open, but construction traffic is still there.
JadePossum t1_j1ejk1m wrote
At least Penn Ave will be less congested for the time being
hooch t1_j1a2tf2 wrote
I like that it's down to 2 lanes. This is one of those relatively short stretches of road where people always drive needlessly fast.
OcelotWolf t1_j1a3v8e wrote
That’s not permanent. They’re still working on installing light poles and a pedestrian crossing
godard31 t1_j1a58nl wrote
It’s permanent. That crew and equipment will be stationed there for the next collapse.
OcelotWolf t1_j1a5glt wrote
They should really install some cranes that can hold the bridge up 24/7/365, that way we don’t have to rely on just the main supports.
Wait, did I just invent the suspension bridge?
MaynardWaltrip OP t1_j1a38n3 wrote
I think it’ll eventually be opened back up to four lanes…
hooch t1_j1a50ol wrote
Booo... Oh well. I'll enjoy the 2 lanes for now.
Danthezooman t1_j1aayel wrote
I sure hope so
Darkest_97 t1_j1byb9g wrote
Yea how is this gonna work? Everyone funnels from 2 lanes to 1 for 10 feet then back to 3?
wondoring t1_j1asjxu wrote
Really hope that left turn lane is going to be bigger once the bridge is open. It would back up sooo far during the pm rush hour. That’s gotta be fixed.
Steely_McNeatHouse t1_j1b71yw wrote
better than no bridge. (shrug)
but yeah, this is very different from the proposed renderings. I assume it'll be two lanes each way until they replace that Parkway East bridge. Hopefully after that, it can go down to three, with two inbound and one outbound, which is the same standard as Forbes near CMU.
wondoring t1_j1cbkqo wrote
The thing that frustrates me is the lack of improvements being made to the surrounding infrastructure on projects like these.
“How can we replace this bridge the quickest and cheapest and easiest? (Not the worst motivator)”
“We can make it the same width as before.”
“Oh, there were terrible backups and an additional lane is needed for a bigger turning lane”
“That’s outside of this project”
Stuff like that. When yeah, it’s nice that we have the beige back. But how about addressing the huge bottle neck while you’re at it.
Steely_McNeatHouse t1_j1dh6el wrote
S.Braddock won't grow. Neither will Forbes in Sq.Hill. No matter how they configure lanes in the Frick part of Forbes, as long as the same volume of people are driving cars over it, it will be close to the same condition.
SomeoneSaysHi t1_j19yf42 wrote
LIES!!! What sort of witchcraft is this? /s
Confident_End_3848 t1_j1a25yn wrote
Is it eventually to be four lanes?
OcelotWolf t1_j1a3pea wrote
HistoryHunk1991 t1_j1ape98 wrote
It’s a Christmas miracle.
evil_iceburgh t1_j1ay36c wrote
So who rode in the first bus to cross it?
Tako-Jerome t1_j1aycn5 wrote
I am really deeply excited for this but if you think I'll be convinced to drive on it the same weekend as the first blizzard of the season you'll have to try harder you dumb coyote
arguchik t1_j1aar82 wrote
WOOOHOOO! They made it before the end of the year - that's super impressive.
lapindeux t1_j1acx30 wrote
Bridge party bridge part-ay!
Niagaraballs71 t1_j1amjhu wrote
Are there more pics?
Aphrodisiatic922 t1_j1az75w wrote
I’m genuinely excited to drive across it! 🤩
Brandonguth1985 t1_j1bp011 wrote
Until tomorrow..closed for ice
[deleted] t1_j19rxsm wrote
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jpgPGH t1_j1ajs2e wrote
It’s a Christmas miracle. God bless us, everyone!
[deleted] t1_j1amcga wrote
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psychopompandparade t1_j1b77dl wrote
It is going to be stress tested on weather fast, too. I hope after we go from 40 to 0 tomorrow and then from 0 back to 40 on wednesday they get crews out there to see if they can see anything, just in case. I'm excited for the protected sidewalk.
fybertas09 t1_j1b7aex wrote
this is exciting news!
VespiWalsh t1_j1b83u1 wrote
Wasn't this bridge 4 lanes before?
billfriedman9987 t1_j1bd63n wrote
That was fast!
Kielbasa_Nunchucka t1_j1c0rrn wrote
for now... MUWAHAHAHAHA
its-saute t1_j1caepv wrote
I wonder if they fixed the bus too and if it will be used to drive the same route again. Reunion.
[deleted] t1_j1edv9i wrote
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JadePossum t1_j1efg6l wrote
My god they did it.
Those sons of bitches managed to replace the whole bridge before xmas
28carslater t1_j1bmv23 wrote
This is actually massively impressive given the notable handicap of yinzerism.
davetheotter t1_j1bg6th wrote
Needs to be renamed for Franco
28carslater t1_j1bn33d wrote
This.
EnnuiDeBlase t1_j1a0skd wrote
That "Opposing traffic has extended green" sign can go fuck itself right off the bridge.
Wish they would have gotten rid of that shit.
OcelotWolf t1_j1a3tx0 wrote
Gotta get as much weight off the bridge as possible. You saw what happened last time!
superm455ive t1_j1aedq8 wrote
Why, a lot of traffic is going to come off the bridge and go left on S Braddock. What’s wrong with them having a protected green left. I thought trailing green arrows were now more preferred than leading.
[deleted] t1_j1cgles wrote
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EnnuiDeBlase t1_j1cgojz wrote
I'm not worried about the people coming left off the bridge, straight and right is the issue.
superm455ive t1_j1clsoo wrote
What are you worried about? If they have a green and other directions don’t what is the conflict?
EnnuiDeBlase t1_j1cs2ef wrote
That people coming towards the bridge from Wilkinsburg trying to turn left toward 376 can get stuck for several light cycles because they never get priority.
DrMarianio t1_j1d14px wrote
The impossible left.
EnnuiDeBlase t1_j1e13zu wrote
Truly. I've given up and driven through sq hill before.
superm455ive t1_j1dbrxj wrote
Then the problem isn’t the extended phase for bridge traffic but the lack of a protected left for westbound traffic.
aeboi80 t1_j1bexlx wrote
They couldn't have built a more basic, uglier bridge than that. It looks like a highway through the trees. The least they could have done was added some architectural railings along the side, used some color in the concrete to blend it in or really anything other than opening the truck and pouring out gray concrete. I guess we should be happy they kept the little bridge building next to it. Modern construction methods are just so vanilla. We live in the city of bridges. One would think they could have taken this as an opportunity to build a real looker. Even the rebuilt Greenfield bridge was at least green.
beeblebr0x t1_j1avt47 wrote
And as is tradition: bikes can go fuck themselves. Thanks Gainey!
psychopompandparade t1_j1bxnt8 wrote
the one protected walkway I think is supposed to also be for bikes? i'm just excited they bothered with a single protected walk way at all
[deleted] t1_j1bs7pj wrote
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awesomelybearded t1_j1c7i0h wrote
$25M for bike lanes.
Slightly-Evil-Man t1_j1az3u4 wrote
They built this too fast. No way do I trust it after last winter.
qaopjlll t1_j1b6hfp wrote
I heard driving over it alters your DNA!
Slightly-Evil-Man t1_j1b6nd7 wrote
Lol idk why I'm getting downvoted. Even if it is well-built, the traffic will still be horrendous especially with that slow ass light at the end.
babyyodaisamazing98 t1_j19tovx wrote
Crazy how fast they got it done. I wish they could fix all the bridges this fast.