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Pay the Bridge Troll

Hi all, I haven't been on the board in a while! I've been in an unending battle for the last couple years to try to get somebody ANYBODY to take responsibility for maintaining the sidewalks of the 40th Street bridge. Every winter the sidewalks go uncleared and every other season the sidewalks are covered in glass and trash. I'd been working myself up into a rage, and getting into a bad mental state, just putting in the hours calling people trying to get to the bottom of who's job it is to care about the bridge. This past winter I got hit by a distracted truck driver while I was making my way home via the 40th street bridge. It's been a mess for me, and i know it's a problem for lots of folks who use this bridge. So! I've officially given up trying to get our local governments to care. That was giving me actual ulcers. Instead I'm going to devote one afternoon a week to maintaining the sidewalks myself. It's much easier. I've set up a gofundme page to help cover the cost of supplies and *hopefully* help get me a cargo bike so I can carry more than 70lbs at once, which is what I'm working with now. Cleaning the 40th street bridge is something I've been doing sporadically since last summer, but I'm committing to doing this on the reg now. If you think it's worthwhile to toss me a couple bucks, that would be great. Or if you could share the link around, that would help me a bunch as well. https://www.gofundme.com/pay-the-bridge-troll
parvipica
2018-03-06 20:09:02
This is great!  But sorry it has to come to this.  What about Dan Gilman, Peduto's chief of staff?  He seems to be able to get stuff done. Can you tweet him? Or if you want I can tweet him for you with your gofundme link?
edronline
2018-03-06 20:35:30
It's only half in the city, but Deb Gross is the councilwoman. Have you contacted her office? Glad to contribute, though.
jonawebb
2018-03-06 21:37:38
I haven't contacted Gross or Gilman directly. I mostly ended up in a lame cycle of 311, Penndot, millvale public works, PGH public works. Different people each time, all referring me to each other and shirking responsibility. I'm not good at talking to people, and I found all of it pretty upsetting and frustrating. I'm all for advocacy, but I've found that in this particular instance, I'm better off taking physical action. Thanks again for sharing the link with folks!
parvipica
2018-03-06 21:45:06
I'm glad to help. City council has people on staff, who respond to email, which you can obviously write well. Worth a try.
jonawebb
2018-03-06 22:20:24
40th Street bridge sidewalk maintenance is a frustrating topic. I was happy to throw a few bucks towards maintenance since the city/millvale/penndot don't communicate about this well. Honestly, it's entirely unclear who is responsible for: a) Snow Clearing (City sometimes says not their problem, penndot not very responsive) b) Fixing the pedestrian button/post that was hit by a car (pennot says not their problem) c) Litter/Glass Cleanup Was happy to throw a few bucks at Dani to help with this issue to make something happen while the buck gets passed between organizations/government entities. I don't use 62nd street bridge or Highland Park bridge, but I assume there are similar issues (see GG's complaints about construction signs).
benzo
2018-03-07 14:52:00
I can help clean the Highland Park Bridge sidewalk every so often. I really can help out with any bridge on the Allegheny River up to Highland Park, the Bloomfield Bridge, and some other minor bridges over the East Busway.
zzwergel
2018-03-07 18:10:13
The GFM page was just featured on WPXI.
rustyred
2018-03-07 18:49:42
I hope it spurs/shames the city into taking care of it.
edronline
2018-03-07 20:19:05