BIKEPGH MESSAGE BOARD ARCHIVE

The posted time is 11am

I'm lukewarm on that thing. Smooth ride, yes. However, when I look at new, elevated structures around town I wonder who will pay for the inspection and preventative maintenance? Who will keep it clear in the winter, and how?

I understand a structure like that was a path of least resistance from the Army Corps' regulatory branch, but jeez that'll be a hefty fund raiser in 10 or 15 years...

Public and private investors love ribbon cuttings, but where will they be when the deck begins to spawl, or when every one of those concrete piers will need underwater inspection to evaluate scour or erosion conditions? Is there any money set aside for these long term issues?

Was there a reason they didn't just use fill/ballast to extend the shoreline at the edge of the river to accommodate the trail? Seems like that would have been a more simple solution than a raised structure. Not complaining or anything, just wondering.

The money for the long-term maintenance is in the same bill as the funding for the public employees' pensions. It'll happen when Babies!! Guns!! Jesus!! Gay!! stop winning elections.

It will happen when the bikers get jobz and start payin some taxes!

What are you complaining about? Seriously. Have you considered the alternative: NO TRAIL AT ALL.

Have you seen how they are shoe-horning the road improvements in? It is a wonder that trail is there at all, considering the way these projects normally go.

==ALMKLM Not long ago, the easy answer would've been to simply widen the road, move the trains over, and say "bikers lose".

Props to bike-pgh and every other pro-bicycle and pro-pedestrian organization around here. I moved here in 1990, and the difference isn't just noticible, it's staggering. Back then, even something as seeming simple as painting sharrows on Penn would've been controversial. People would've said, "Don't paint the sharrows there. That will only encourage more people to bike on Penn, and we don't want that." Trails were very limited, and they were strictly recreational - the usage model was that everyone would put their bikes on a rack on a car, drive to the trail, then unrack, ride up the trail for a few miles and back, then rack up and drive home.

The use of bicycles as a primary mode of transportation was strictly limited to areas around the universities, and even then, cyclists were freaks and public enemies.

Since I live in the North Hills and use the trail regularly, I love the idea, love it! The views of the river and the island are going to be awesome. I'm glad to see my donations and tax dollars go to something I will enjoy for a very long time. Yay!

For the record I think the bridge is cool.

I think sloaps has a good point, it's certainly nice to have more trails but my first thought when I saw it was "damn that looks expensive". I still can't believe how much the Hot Metal Bridge cost. Seems like there has to be a cheaper way to do these sorts of things, or ways to have more impact for the same money.

What I'd like to think is that, now that it's been done once, how different are the dozens of other places in the area that could use something similar?

Same question goes for switchback structures connecting trails to overhead bridges.

Put these structures in perspective, too:

$500 million (-ish) to extend the T under the river.

FIVE BILLION to build the MFSOB.

re: "...or ways to have more impact for the same money."

I think you take the big ticket items when you can get them, rather than trickling away the funds on scattered small projects, and the big ticket items continue to provide a ripple of benefits once they're in place. I mean, imagine how much more use the EFT and South Side trails get because of the Hot metal bridge, and then, how much more use the Panther Hollow trail gets, then how much more demand there is for sharrows in the east end, and so on. The smaller stuff is much easier to get whenever.

@roadkillen: Exactly! though federal and/or state regulatory issues may have been a factor... dunno.

@salty: Not so much that we're seeking a cheaper way, but more effective and efficient, with a loooong design life and low life cycle costs.

Hot Metal Bridge is a perfect example of reuse. Excellent condition for it's age, and incredibly overbuilt for it's new use. Provided the piers remain sound, that bridge will last longer than the approach ramps constructed to facilitate bike/ped use on the bridge.

Bike and pedestrian issues are slowly achieving more state and federal funding sources and finding its way into broader surface transportation policy and planning, but in this neck of the woods we have to be smarter with this money than the last three generations were with our money.

That will only encourage more people to bike on Penn, and we don't want that. so true. i'm in chattanooga right now at a conference with bike advocates, planners, etc from all over the country and it's interesting hearing about some of the struggles some cities are going through and thinking "ahhh the good ole days." there's a town in georgia where the city is debating whether they should install "share the road" signs for the very reason that you stated, and whether it is "legal" or not.

yeah, it seems like a ton of cash, but when you compare it say, to one mile of highway, it's still pennies. If there's one thing i've learned is that there is no shortage of money, it's just what they choose to spend it on. and there's a lot of agencies that have a lot more power who can demonstrate "need" much better than us.

Sharrows, bike lanes, and other 'striping only' improvements often qualify as the required 1% of expenditure towards site improvements required by most construction projects. Getting big projects funded this way is impossible, so we may as well take then when we can get them. Painting is easy to get as a 'tack on' through so many other means later on.

did they build piers instead of doing cut-and-fill so it would have less of a negative environmental impact on the riverfront?

Nick; I think that is part of the reason, but doesn't quite grasp the complexity of the site. They'd have had to do a lot of fill (almost no cut) and with the potential for river flooding, they'd have required substantial retaining walls to keep it all in place. Walls instead of natural riverbanks result in different drainage/runoff volumes and patterns, etc. And, there's the permitting end of it. As a navigable waterway, construction that alters the banks/waters of the Allegheny River require serious permits by the Corps of Engineers. By keeping the pilings (supports) on dry land, many of the permit requirements are eliminated, or at least substantially reduced.

Rode on it today for the first time. It was pleasant. However, does anyone know what they are going to do to the trail immediately before and after it? Right now it is just rock, not very smooth or easy to ride with road tires.

^^ it will be crushed limestone acording to the folks I talked to at the dedication.

I hate to be picky, but for 3 million dollars - that's the smoothest they could get the seams? Felt like mini speed bumps every few feet. Still it's much better than the trail on the other side.

And I am grateful that is the only complaint I have - the dedicated permanent sanctioned trail is bumpy! What a complaint to have! (seperate from maintenance worries, which are different)

Near the northern end of the "Back Channel Pathway", there is some sort of drain structure at the river level. There is an access road beside the trail to access it. You could not have built the trail with fill without covering up this drain or reengeneering it. Also, any fill would have narrowed the back channel even further. To avoid that, one would have had to have built a 15 foot high retaining wall and then brought in a lot of fill. No, I think the bridge on pylons design was probably the best choice.

The bridge is nice, but what is up with the 2-3" heigth difference at each joint? It sure is a bumpy ride. Penn Dot's finest work.

Drain structure is most likely an ALCOSAN outfall, and encroachment within the back channel navigable section is an Army Corps regulatory issue.

Free draining and erosion resistant fill material to extend the riverbank would have been the best long term solution, but would have most likely required the most time and cost for planning and design.

In short, ALCOSAN would have requested the design and construction of a replacement outfall structure paid for by PennDOT and or Riverlife - PennDOT or Riverlife would have politely stated NO. Corps would have required extensive analyses and supporting documentation to justify encroachment to and reduction of the navigable waterway of the backchannel - PennDOT and/or Riverlife would have concluded that there was no time or money to perform these tasks and delay the reconstruction of 28.

The only reason why I joined Bike-Pittsburgh and continue to be a bother on this board is so projects like these are A+ by all accounts. That a path is simply constructed is unacceptable, but considering how far into the process Riverlife was able to assert their position and steer the final design to include this structure it's a pretty damn good result.

Learn from this; what is most important is that Riverlife and Bike-Pittsburgh hone their skills, anticipate these planning and design issues, then assert their positions at the appropriate time to the appropriate people.

It looks like you're nearly there with the City and County, and I think they're getting there with PennDOT. Completion of the GAP and continuation of the Allegheny River trail upto New Kensington will be the biggest bike/ped issues for the region-at-large, with retrofitting existing surface transportation infrastructure throughout the region as a close second. With the right advocacy from Bike-PGH and Riverlife, these issues can obtain federal, state and local funding. Without proper and effective advocacy, these issues simply become an expensive nuisance at the backend of the design process, or worse - an even more expensive afterthought.

Rode the trail yesterday for the first time.

AWESOME!

I don't miss the old black mud trail as much as I thought I would. And I don't miss the temporary trail at all.

I'll take some bumps in the concrete over getting splattered with that mud/crap/coal/oil that was the old trail.

Are they widening the end of the 31st street bridge? I noticed they built a new concrete wall that is wider than the current deck.

I love Pittsburgh, Its always under construction.