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Ziggy Edwards – Junction Coalition

Ziggy Edwards

A Neighborhood Changed Forever: The Parkway East and Four Mile Run

A construction crew works on the Junction Hollow Bridge along the Penn-Lincoln Parkway (Interstate 376), known as the Parkway East. Construction began on Nov. 14, 1949, and was completed on Oct. 15, 1952. Photo courtesy of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development Photographs, 1892-1981, MSP 285, Detre Library & Archives, Senator John Heinz History Center

Carol Rizzo Hopkins, 81, lived in Four Mile Run until moving to upper Greenfield at age 14. She clearly remembers a network of trails on the hillside. “Everywhere was a path, and we walked everywhere—Schenley Park, Squirrel Hill, Beechwood Boulevard, Magee Swimming Pool. We could be anywhere in two minutes.”

“Growing up in The Run was the best time of my life,” she told me during an in-person interview in December. “It was like a little village for us.”

But the Parkway changed all that. Now, as the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (known as PennDOT) gets started on plans to improve the Parkway East Bridge over Four Mile Run, residents face the prospect of history repeating itself.

On Dec. 1, District 5 City Council member Barb Warwick posted on Facebook that PennDOT is conducting a feasibility study to explore their options for fixing or replacing the six-span bridge.

One option the department is considering involves building a new bridge beside the existing one — similar to their plan for the Commercial Street Bridge on the other side of the Squirrel Hill Tunnels. PennDOT would destroy the existing bridge and move the new bridge in to replace it. Using this method in The Run might shorten closure time on the Parkway East, but it may displace households near the bridge.

Two neighbors, Judy Gula and Ms. Hopkins, witnessed the original construction of the Parkway East bridge from 1949 to 1952.

Life in the Parkway’s shadow

Ms. Gula, 76, has lived in The Run her entire life — just like her father did. In her earliest memories, the Parkway was already under construction.

“We used to roller-skate on the Parkway before it was finished,” she recalled during an interview in December. “Kids rode their bikes and played up there. The construction workers would give us their empty pop bottles and we’d fight over who got them.”

Neighborhood children exchanged those bottles for two cents at Mary Kranyak’s candy store on Saline Street.

A construction crew works on the Junction Hollow Bridge along the Penn-Lincoln Parkway (Interstate 376), known as the Parkway East. Construction began on Nov. 14, 1949, and was completed on Oct. 15, 1952. Photo courtesy of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development Photographs, 1892-1981, MSP 285, Detre Library & Archives, Senator John Heinz History Center
A construction crew works on the Junction Hollow Bridge along the Penn-Lincoln Parkway (Interstate 376), known as the Parkway East. Construction began on Nov. 14, 1949, and was completed on Oct. 15, 1952. Photo courtesy of the Allegheny Conference on Community Development Photographs, 1892-1981, MSP 285, Detre Library & Archives, Senator John Heinz History Center

Even after the Parkway opened, non-vehicular traffic continued for a time. Locals used it in ways people might find hard to imagine today.

“My dad and I would walk up to the Parkway to watch cars,” Ms. Gula said. “It was always backed up, even then.” As high school students, she and her friends would “walk the Parkway” to get to Allderdice.

Ms. Gula grew up in the shadow of the Parkway and with shadows of what it replaced. A school behind the apartment building where she lived was torn down, but she isn’t certain whether that was because of construction.

“My mother said there were steps from [The Run] to the Bridle Path [in Schenley Park] that were taken away by the Parkway,” Ms. Gula recalled.

She also remembers older relatives remarking how much quieter the neighborhood had been before the Parkway. Along with the wall of noise produced by speeding cars and trucks, the road brought other problems that continue into the present.

“We used to get all the water from the Parkway down here,” said Ms. Gula, who lives in the eastern part of The Run near the end of Saline Street. “Water used to come up to my [front] gate.”

About five years ago, crews added large rocks to slow water down in the area at the end of the street and behind the building colloquially known as “the pump house.” Ms. Gula says that has helped.

“It just destroyed us”

Ms. Hopkins’ grandmother, who lived on Naylor Street, had a small farm in the field beneath the Greenfield Bridge. The family’s seven children, including Ms. Hopkins’ father, took turns walking their cow to a nearby field to let it graze. By the time Ms. Hopkins came along, her grandmother no longer had the cow, but she still raised chickens.

The field near the pump house where the cow once grazed served as the local playground until Parkway construction began.

“They put all their equipment on our playground,” Ms. Hopkins said. She described large, hollow cylinders that looked like pipes wrapped in metal coils.

“I broke my arm,” she recalled. “I was running at nighttime, and I tripped over a coil lying on the ground. We couldn’t play there anymore.”

Of the displaced families and businesses, Ms. Hopkins remembers three in particular: the Marbella family, a market called Husky’s, and her friend Peggy. Peggy’s family lived in a stylish house with a lot of latticework.

“That’s where a pillar is now,” Ms. Hopkins said.

Ms. Hopkins and her friends and cousins from The Run still talk about the experience of having a highway carved through their idyllic neighborhood. “It affected us kids, and I’m sure the grownups,” she said. “People had cracks in their walls [from the construction] they had to fix.”

Follow this project

Councilmember Warwick encouraged people to sign up for notifications from PennDOT about the bridge project as it moves forward. She said the PennDOT team expects to have the first public meeting on its feasibility study in mid to late summer of 2024. Until then, she promised to include any new developments in the District 5 newsletter and the Facebook page for The Run.

Visit PennDOT’s project page for the feasibility study at http://tinyurl.com/Parkway-East-4-Mile-Run to see more details and instructions for getting project notifications. Visit the District 5 newsletter webpage at https://pittsburghpa.gov/council/d5-newsletters to sign up for monthly emails.

District 5 Residents Voice Priorities for 2024 Budget

Greenfield residents and City Councilor Barb Warwick speak with DOMI representatives

On Oct. 24, about 60 Pittsburghers gathered at the Pittsburgh Firefighters Local in Hazelwood for a budget engagement meeting with city officials. It was the final meeting in a series of five throughout the city to get feedback on the preliminary budget Mayor Gainey’s office is proposing for next year.

Budget basics and a high-tech twist

Patrick Cornell, chief financial officer of Pittsburgh’s Office of Management & Budget (OMB), presented the city’s process for creating budgets and finalizing them with community feedback throughout the year.

Mr. Cornell also explained the difference between operating and capital budgets and went over broad highlights of the real 2024 budget. These included increased funds for keeping bridges and roads safe and maintaining community assets like rec centers.

He invited attendees to try creating an imaginary $1 million budget using a budget simulator. A separate feedback tool on the city’s website, Balancing Act, lets users submit their ideal capital and operating budgets.

When asked if the city has a process to use feedback from the budget simulators, Mr. Cornell said he introduced them as a pilot program this year so there is no formal process yet, explaining they would need to create a citywide campaign and leave the simulators open for longer.

Residents share their priorities

In the second half of the meeting, attendees circulated around the room, talking to representatives from city departments.

The Greenfielders we interviewed all named traffic calming on Greenfield Avenue as an urgent priority. The budget includes a 44% increase in funding for traffic calming projects, but Greenfield Avenue was not selected.

“We have no school zone,” Eric Russell said. “The cars on Greenfield Avenue go extremely fast. That’s where the Rec Center is, the playground.”

“You go to Squirrel Hill or Shadyside; I’ve seen so much traffic calming there, but nothing in Greenfield,” he added.

Anna Dekleva, organizer of a recent protest demanding traffic calming on Greenfield Avenue, wrote in an Oct. 25 text that department representatives did not provide a lot of specific guidance.

DOMI’s representatives seemed unaware of a petition for traffic calming the Greenfield School PTO and Greenfield Community Association submitted to them over a month ago, she said.

“[District 5 Councilmember] Barb Warwick is a tremendous ally and committed to this concern and through her partnership I see the most capacity to change on this issue now,” Ms. Dekleva added.

Other attendees’ priorities revolved around people, housing and green spaces.

Saundra Cole-McKamey of Hazelwood said her top priorities are “more funding for youth and senior programs, more money for low-income housing, more money for the food justice fund and grassroots organizations.”

Teaira Collins of the Hill District emphasized fixing the crosswalk signs on Second Avenue and affordable housing built to suit children with disabilities. “I had to move out of Hazelwood for one reason: no tub. My son has Down syndrome and sensory issues; he can’t take showers.”

Jazmyn Rudolph of Mt. Washington said, “There are a lot of vacant lots, so it
would be great if we could use those for youth to learn about farming.”

“I want them to build a playground down below the tracks,” commented Hazelwood resident Bob White. “There used to be one on Blair Street that was there when I was a kid.”

You can find the preliminary budget and simulator tools at https://engage.pittsburghpa.gov/2024-city-pittsburgh-budgets.

Juliet Martinez co-wrote this article, which originally appeared in The Homepage.

Hazelwood Families Organize to Get Kids to School Safely

A photo of the FaceBook post from Mifflin K-8 that announced the reinstatement of the Hazelwood route and advised families, “Please advise the students that transportation is a privilege and safe, kind and respectful behavior is paramount to continue riding.”

The 2022-2023 school year has brought transportation and safety challenges to Hazelwood students. Their families, along with community organizations, are stepping in to fill the gaps created by canceled bus routes and unsafe streets.

Filling in for a school bus

In late October, Pittsburgh Public Schools informed the families of about 40 students who are bused from Hazelwood to Pittsburgh Mifflin Pre K-8 that the route was canceled until further notice. The district blamed the national bus driver shortage for cancellation.

Amber Adkins, whose child rides the bus, told Channel 11/WPXI in an October 31 interview that service had become unreliable over the previous month.

The school district offered mileage reimbursement and bus tickets for Pittsburgh Regional Transit. But these didn’t help caregivers without their own vehicle or children too young to ride public transit alone.

Community organizations POORLAW and Praise Temple Deliverance Church teamed up with affected families and volunteers to organize carpools for Mifflin students.

“The most important part of Hazelwood is our children,” said POORLAW co-founder and CEO Saundra Cole McKamey during a November 7 phone call. She said the lack of transportation was “causing additional financial hardship and creating a burden for families.”

On November 9, Mifflin posted on its Facebook page that the bus route would resume the next day through a new carrier.

“Please advise the students that transportation is a privilege and safe, kind and respectful behavior is paramount to continue riding,” the post continued.

James Cole, who runs the Hazelwood Cobras youth football program, said during a November 11 call that parents told him it seemed like “they’re saying if kids don’t act right on the bus, they will discontinue the route again.”

Mr. Cole said the problem of unruly students is not unique to Hazelwood, and there are other ways to deal with it, such as hiring bus monitors from the community.

Ms. Cole McKamey noted that Hazelwood has no public non-charter school within walking distance because of the school district’s past decisions.

“It seems so disrespectful to me,” Ms. Cole McKamey said. “They closed our community school [Burgwin Elementary] to make all those kids go to Mifflin and get their enrollment numbers up.”

Burgwin shuttered in 2006. Pittsburgh Public Schools sold the building in 2014 to reopen as a Propel charter. Although students at Propel Hazelwood can walk to classes, they face their own safety concerns.

Navigating busy intersections

For years, residents along Johnston Avenue have been requesting traffic-calming measures such as speed humps and crossing guards during the school year. After her grandson, Jamel Austin, was hit and killed by a car in Glen Hazel in July, Desheiba Wilder made it her mission to keep his friends safe. She took on the crossing guard role herself, and a network of around 10 volunteer crossing guards has formed around her.

Mr. Cole is one of those volunteers. He said people have reached out with offers of help, including some from other neighborhoods.

“It was a beautiful thing to see people recognizing the problem and wanting to be part of the solution,” he said.

Ms. Cole McKamey reported improved lighting for night visibility in the area where Jamel was hit. She thanked Christina Spearman of MMS Group, the management company for Glen Hazel RAD’s nearby apartment building, for quickly arranging repairs to its lights.

Mayor Gainey promises safety improvements

On October 20, Mayor Ed Gainey announced neighborhood safety commitments stemming from the October 5 community meeting in Glen Hazel. These include eliminating the requirement for city-employed crossing guards to have a driver’s license. The mayor’s press release mentioned that two lights on Rivermont Drive were fixed. Mayor Gainey also promised the following:

  • Speed humps on Johnston Avenue, Mansion Street, and Glenwood Avenue.
  • Signing and pavement marking improvements including newly painted crosswalks and curb-painted bump-outs on Johnston Avenue, Mansion Street, and Glenwood Avenue. Marking improvements to Johnston Ave. have been completed.
  • Installation of a flashing school zone sign at Propel School.

No date was given for uncompleted items on the list. During the October 5 meeting, municipal traffic engineer Mike Maloch said of the speed humps, “Weather is turning so we are not going to have any more time to install this project. When weather breaks in 2023, it will be implemented quickly.”