BIKEPGH MESSAGE BOARD ARCHIVE

7/28/16 8H15 4 Pgh Parking Authority staff working on EFT/Jail Trail w/ weed whackers/blowers edging next to Second Ave Parking lot/Jail. Just be aware.

Lots of bollards down in the Penn Avenue and 6th Street bike lanes, reported to 311, told they, "will be evaluated for repairs." Also, I tried to get them to repaint the intersection treatment at Penn and 10th, but I got this: https://twitter.com/FerranteJason/status/758648563446538241 Apparently, according to 311, BikePGH owns the bike lanes.

Dump trucks on the Jail Trail at 8AM http://imgur.com/a/56fMH No signs up to let anyone know the trail's closed (if it is).

FOTR advisory states, "The ELIZA FURNACE segment will be closed July 28th and 29th. The Trail is getting new asphalt and limestone jogging track on both sides from the Birmingham Bridge to the Swinbure Street Parking lot. The Trail will be closed at this time and all users who will be crossing at the Hot Metal Bridge are asked to use the Smithfield Street Bridge until the work is finished. This is part of a restoration give back by Duquesne Light and their contractors for installing underground utility work." That said, I was on it at 8H15 this morning and had no problem coming in. Would appreciate any realtime updates on whether or not it is actually closed for the commute home.

I wasn't sure where would be a good place to put this item, but here it goes; Folks "could" take the opportunity between now and Saturday to ride out to the St. Mary's Ukrainian Festival in the McKees Rocks bottoms on currently the widest mixed use path in Pgh, West Carson Street, before they open it up to the auto-madness. Obviously this is still a construction zone, but the work is 99% complete and there is little construction activity left. Nonetheless I'm not saying people should do this, but one "could" do this. (at your own risk, BikePgh in no way supports this behavior, etc. etc.) I know at least a couple of individuals are doing this... If nothing else one can simulate the splendid experience that could have been if effing PennDot had met it's commitments for non-motored infrastructure here.

7/29/16 8H15 Construction workers working on EFT/Jail Trail using a steamroller to tamp down those crushed rock "jogging tracks" on the sides of the new asphalt they laid down. Wasn't posted closed on the wood ramp from Second Ave, but take it easy. Workers were nice and waved me through.

The Warhol bridge will close to vehicle and pedestrian traffic for over a year: http://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2016/07/29/TRAFFIC-Liberty-Bridge-Tunnel-inbound-closing-this-weekend-for-next-phase-of-rehab-project/stories/201607290196 Work begins on August 15

Bollards on 6th street bridge have been removed, presumably to replace them.

Re: @edmonds59 comment, The OpenStreets route is conveniently located next to the West Carson project...

On River Ave near whatever large warehouse business the dead railroad spur that cuts across the road has warped metal in several places along the rail bed. Never seen that before and no idea how it happened. Looks dangerous to cars and bikes alike Also, took the Allegheny landing detour, which sucks. The ramp from the trail up to pnc park isn't bike friendly (designed for wheelchairs) and then there are no curb cuts to cross over to the other side, so would theoretically need to bike down sidewalk to light, cross over, and bike down sidewalk the other way. Or go off the steep curb into traffic. Best to take the ramp up much earlier (if coming from Heinz Field area then take ramp between Heinz and pnc) and go around pnc on the street.

8/01/16 8H15 There was a dump truck parked on the sidewalk at the corner of Bates & Second Ave, workers were doing landscaping type stuff & blocking access to EFT/Jail Trail.

FYI they've milled the hill on Wightman from Wilkins to Northbumperland. It would currently be classified as "suboptimal", but that puppy should be smooth and new sometime soon.

Lots of road work on S. Millvale ave in bloomfield north of the busway bridge. Frequent southbound lane closures in the AM and early PM hours. Use caution, I've been able to take a detour around this by going around the block where the work is being done, but as the work approaches the bridge, I'm not sure what the setup will be. It looks like they are installing or repairing utility lines below street level. City plans to repave this in 2016, so the end result will hopefully be a nice smooth street eventually.

As mentioned by Benzo, take the lane if needed when going inbound to Oakland on S Millvale St. The ditch dug by the workers is not filled properly and is about 2 inch lower than the road level. To make matters worse, the metal grates covering the work area areas are sitting higher than the road level, causing the road quite dangerous to ride on. I hit one at some speed this morning which almost caused me to fly over the bar.

Yeah, millvale is still being worked on daily in the AM hours. Southbound Closures as recent as this morning. Still able to detour around it by going around the block.

Yale Cohen's photos from 8/6 10pm. It appears someone butchered a tree along the Southside Trail near Riverhounds lot, under the Ft Pitt Bridge. Friends of the Riverfront and Pittsburgh have been notified. Does anybody else know anything about what happened here? https://flic.kr/p/KyTJZQ https://flic.kr/p/K4tYJE

Watch out at the point around the area of the sand sculpture. It is collapsing and not fenced off. I am not sure if they plan on hauling it out anytime soon, but as of this morning, it was sandy approaching the fort Duquesne pedestrian bridge.

A friendly reminder that the Warhol bridge is closed as of 9 am today and will remain so for the next year-plus. Also, saw that the repaving work on the North Shore trail between the Clemente and Warhol bridges is coming along nicely. Aside, noticed two sets of counting strips on the Chateau trail, on that section that is slowly falling apart due to erosion. Oddly enough, the sets are located within a few hundred feet of each other and with no way out of the trail between the two, so you are guaranteed to trigger both if you're riding through that section (assuming both counters are working). Maybe they are trying to gather data for a future project in this area?

The counters on Chateau section have been there for "a while".  Maybe they're calibrating them to verify the counts are the same?

The sidewalk in front of the gas station right in front of the West End Circle is currently completely torn up. This is noteworthy as this short sidewalk is basically the only way for cyclists to get from the WEC staircase to the Southside trail. It's also my daily commute. There's basically no way around the sidewalk besides taking the street - going towards downtown, this puts my swimming upstream. Gah. Street view of where I'm talking about: https://goo.gl/maps/vpHwFMtsfjJ2 I'm not really grousing so much as I'm warning others. This sidewalk has been a horrorshow for a while and needs to be redone. Actually, I usually go through the gas station parking lot instead of the sidewalk as the pavement is way better. Note that this is impossible because of the sidewalk work.

Bloomfield Little Italy Days are August 18-21 2016.  Be prepared for liberty ave bike lanes though the main Bloomfield business district to be blocked by tents. Expect street closures over the weekend. Plan accordingly to detour. Lots of traffic will divert to friendship ave and side streets.  Setup will begin a day or two ahead of time and cleanup may last  day or so after the festival. More details about Bloomfield Little Italy days: https://www.facebook.com/BloomfieldLittleItalyDays/ http://www.littleitalydays.com/

It's already started. This afternoon the bike lane (outbound, possibly inbound as well) had poles with signs saying "no parking". Only the ones towards Baum had details (dates, times). Naturally the signs were in the middle of the bike lane as opposed to, say, in the parking lane. A distinction that perhaps only one of us entitled cyclists might be expected to notice. Anyway, taking the lane seemed to work just fine (YMMV). At some point I tend to run out of energy to deal with such things. So many such things. No usable contact info on their website. And, likely, the signs will be gone by tomorrow, replaced by booths. What signs? Fun starts Thursday at 6pm. The website notes that Paisan Dominic Ierace (aka "Donnie Iris") will be performing at some point. You go, Dom.

Related to the above post, I was on Liberty last night on both the inbound and the outbound section. Generally speaking, its not that bad for bikes to use the lane because traffic (even at 10:30-11 PM) is kinda slow moving to the point where you'll easily be able to stay behind a car. In fact, I do not recommend staying in what is left of the bike lane, as people poke their heads out from behind the booths all the time, and you would not want to encounter them that way.   Also, anyone who uses the S. Millvale climbing lane up to Liberty: there is ongoing construction work going on there, the road is all torn up with some pretty nasty holes and debris in the bike lane. Also, they staged equipment right at Liberty Avenue on the downhill side, so turning traffic coming off of Liberty has to make a bit of a wide turn, if you are turning left onto Liberty from Millvale, I would stop well before the stop line.   Another point of note: on game days, on the 6th Street Bridge, the police turn it into a three lane bridge, making the usual only inbound lane a right turn only lane, which means that if you are riding in the bike lane, you will be right hooked. Best bet is to time it so you are waiting at the red light with the Sheriff (they were directing traffic last night) and ask him what you should do.

Be careful going downhill on Centre between Dithridge and Craig: the eastbound lane has a section where there are three metal plates and they overlap each other. The one in the middle is the worst, as it is the narrowest one.

Ellsworth Avenue at the end of the road (at Neville) is under construction, bringing with it uneven pavement, road closures, and road plates. Use caution.

Wow, according to an email blast from PennDOT, West Carson Street/Rt. 51 FINALLY re-opened to bi-directional traffic from the West End Circle to McKees Rocks. The good is that a 2+ year construction project is ended. The bad is that this route isn't even close to safe for cyclists. Not only is the route design obviously dangerous and un-cyclable, as has been discussed here plenty, the sidewalks and general street condition in the area is still awful. No matter where you go, there's brush sticking out at you or a construction sign in your way. On a more personal note, the really really bad is that this totally messes up my morning commute going from the west towards downtown. I have been using the closed stretch of West Carson from the WEC steps to gas station before the ramp to get to the sidewalk in front of the Bucher building. I will no longer be able to do that. Put simply, I now have no safe way to get from the WEC to the South Side trail. I'll now have to cross an extra bridge and add a good 10 minutes to my commute. It's bonkers that I can't safely get from points west of the city to downtown Pittsburgh without crossing two different rivers and two different bridges.

So I just drove W Carson Street today, inbound. It's all striped, painted, fully open. Not even any sharrows anywhere. So even after paring down an optimal mixed use road design to the least they could possibly do (sharrows), no sharrows. If they didn't apply these along with the rest of the road painting, I don't know when they would do it. I suspect they don't plan to. Bike Pgh, who do we contact at PennDot to find out why they haven't even sharrowed this stretch as they promised? I fking despise PennDot. Sidenote, the automobile backups this morning were almost identical, perhaps even a little worse, than they were when the outbound was completely closed. So much for burning 30 mil or whatever it was. Also doublestraps you may already know this but they are pouring new concrete for the sidewalk at that gas station today.

Yup, noticed that. Good stuff. There are a few new "Share the Road" signs on West Carson! Those'll save lives, for sure.

8/25/16 8H15 Near intersection of Bates & Second Ave, someone has placed stones and garbage from under the bridge that goes over Bates halfway across the multi-use sidewalk.  It's been 311'ed, but the last couple of days I've seen a guy who panhandles the people coming off the Parkway there get aggro with pedestrians, I believe the same guy put out the stones.  FYI.

Watch out for some broken glass on S. Highland Avenue between Mad Mex and Noodlehead. It was there last night around 10:30.

Morning post-storm commuter report (8/29 5-6am): I ride from morningside into town. On Bayard approaching Neville: traffic light out, broken glass all over intersection. Fifth and Neville: still no antislip plates. Construction vehicles still parked in bike lane on Neville outbound. Loud popping noise at bike share on Ellsworth. Not sure what that was. Boundary past the RR tracks: tree down in travel lane. Junction hollow trail: scattered debris. Boundary just after junction hollow trail: appeared to have flooded last night. Part of road has buckled in the middle and is raised. Debris across the road. Second Ave at Swinburne (where you take a right to get to UMPC/jail trail head parking lot): debris and gravel. Caution when turning. Jail trail: sandy limestoney stuff from walking path washed over onto trail before the ramp to bridge over bates. Tree down after the bridge. Tree down right after newly paved section ends.

8/29/16 8H15 Seeing a lot of residual stuff down from last night's storms.  Bates St. sidewalk near Hodge St. right in front of that constantly changing "club" is being jackhammered and you're down to a tight 1/2 of the sidewalk that is too bottlenecked and restricted to fit more than one ped/rider either way, take it very slow through there; I'm seeing a lot of silt/gravel/sand that has been deposited (Bates St./Hodge St. curb cut, right underneath the bridge at the corner of Bates/Second Ave on the street and also right on the sidewalk where you would make the turn to get to the wood ramp); EFT/Jail Trail from wood ramp to PNC has some light detritus down, other than that, fine, no trees or anything.  Be careful, out there.

Anyone know what the GAP is like in Connellsville after the storm?

All kinds of bollards down on the Penn ave bike lane especially in the blocks with the theaters.

Those bollards have been up for almost two years. For all of them to be flattened in one day is hardly due to chance. If it was done on purpose, that's wanton destruction of public property. I bet there is video footage. I bet someone could get a plate number of the vehicle that did it. Taxpayers should not have to pay for their replacement.    

Part of Maryland Ave, Shadyside, to be plated this weekend due to developing sinkhole: https://twitter.com/pgh2o/status/771760519933939713 https://twitter.com/pgh2o/status/771777069315338240

Penn Ave cycletrack near Heinz Hall been blocked for two solid days.   9/13 AM: http://imgur.com/a/8crQ6 http://imgur.com/chW2ong 9/13 PM: http://imgur.com/fVfVDPx   9/14 AM: http://imgur.com/O0WRX6F

I assume you're 911'ing this, right?

Unrelated to @RustyRed's post above, the cycle track has been blocked with construction vehicles at night, along the 500 block of Penn. Crews are performing utility work on the road. It's not affecting the cycle track road surface (yet?), but it's sad that they're tearing up that road after it was just repaved last year

Meh, they have squatters rights at this point. (about an hour ago, tents occupy the cycletrack.... and no "Road Closed" signage.)   http://imgur.com/kYfgyau

The whole point of not including the 500 block of Penn in the original opening of the bike lane was because they had to tear up the street to rebuild a broken storm sewer. Which they did, I thought. So what's this new thing they could not have foreseen, or which has already broken, in under two years?

@stu, it's not water/sewage. I think it's fiber/cable. Who knows why they didn't do it last year. Butler St suffered the same fate recently, after last year's repaving. That being said, there's some utility work being done in Stanwix and Liberty, in sections that are not in good shape to begin with. At least for Stanwix, this could be a prelude to future repavement and subsequent installation of the GAP to Point bike lanes  

my guess is that the floods did a number on the road...

nope, not floods. Utility work starts on Cecil Pl (that alley that connects Penn and Fort Duquesne Blvd. This alley has been milled, btw) and then goes east on Penn towards the middle of the road, where you don't usually find any storm drains/sewers. This is all being done with relatively small equipment, so guess is phone/cable infrastructure. Also, the rightmost outbound lane on Liberty, between Fifth Ave and 6th/Market St has also been cut but not dug up yet. This area badly needs a full repaving...

There Is a metal road plate on commercial/forward Ave going down hill between summerset neighborhood and the Irish center. Since it's down hill, you'll feel the need to brake when you approach it. It's unavoidable.  Just be aware of it.

Because of all the crap blocking the Penn Ave. bike lane, this close call happened to me today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTzZTH79WY8

The thing that bugs me the most about all the tents on the Penn Ave cycle track is that I doubt that the PGH Symphony (or whoever is organizing this) would have gotten a permit to block that traffic lane if Penn was still a two-way street...

For around the last two weeks, I've been encountering a tanker truck on EFT/Jail Trail spraying what I'm assuming is some type of herbicide on the brush next to the bikeway.

They have the sidewalk shut down now too; peds have to walk in the street and salmons too.   http://imgur.com/tWnIt3p   Seriously, if this private event is so big that they need that entire plaza, a sidewalk and two lanes of traffic, MAYBE they need a larger venue?

All that stuff Rusty reported still in bike lane as of today on Penn between 7th and 6th. Today they were setting up stuff   Fox Chapel Road milled from Delafield to sq run road East. I assume once repaved then will be milled from. Sq r r east to Powers Run.

Time to switch to the Fall thread! http://localhost/message-board/topic/fall-riding-conditions-report/