Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania - July 2006

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My map showed that the Comfort Inn and Suites at Banksville and Potomoac was within walking distance of the T stop in Dormont, so I reserved a room there. My map didn't show the topography; after two trips in one day up the hill on foot, I found the park-and-ride lot. This is the view down toward the motel, from about halfway up the hill.

The view north toward the Golden Triangle from an intersection on Potomac in Dormont

A short stroll around Dormont's downtown before going to the T station.

Thank you to everyone who buys Pennsylvania lottery tickets, for providing me with free local transportation during my visit!

Trains and buses to and from the South Hills area use the transit tunnel beneath Mount Washington and stop at Station Square.

The Smithfield Street Bridge, designed by Gustave Lindenthal and built 1881 - 1883, carried streetcar tracks on the upstream side prior to the subway opening in 1985.

Flashback - The Smithfield Street Bridge with a trolley en route to Library in 1985.

From across the rivers, Pittsburgh appears defined by shining, towering skyscrapers like the 1984 PPG Building by Philip Johnson. Up close, though, it reveals many 19th- and early 20th-century buildings of imposing mass and elaborate design lining narrow streets. The city has a fascinating mix of architectural styles.

Probably one of Pittsburgh's best 1920s buildings, and one of my favorites anywhere, is the 1927-1929 Koppers Building designed by Graham, Anderson, Probst and White, the successor firm to D.H. Burnham & Company. The building was constructed using Indiana Limestone.
Graham, Anderson, Probst and White's other well-known buildings include Chicago's Union Station and Cleveland's Terminal Tower.

The USX Tower was built as the headquarters building of the United States Steel Corporation in 1970 using Cor-Ten steel, a corrosion-resistant, high-tensile-strength material that weathers to a dark rust-colored surface and then becomes stable without paint or other coatings. The tower has 64 stories and is 841 feet tall.

Port Authority Transit's Steel Plaza Station.

Just before evening rush hour fares kicked in, I headed back to my motel to get something to eat and rest a little while. About 7:30 I grabbed my camera and tripod and headed back to Station Square and the Mon Incline up Mount Washington. There, I walked to the Duquesne Incline and back and took photos from a few different vantage points as darkness fell.

Starting out early on Saturday morning ...

Through the Cultural District ...

Three Rivers = Lots of bridges.

Public Art.

Streets leading to the ball park were barricaded to vehicle traffic, but pedestrians were allowed.

Rent a kayak, retrieve a ball.

Oneof two armed Coast Guard craft deployed for security during All-Star festivities.

Functional public art - bike racks.

At noon I met up with three other like-minded folks, and we set out upon a Grand Tour of Pittsburgh Neighborhoods. Please forgive me if I screw up the details/locations. This was all new to me!

Little Italy ...

Shadyside ...

Oakland ...

The Cathedral of Learning, dedicated in 1937, is 535 feet tall and has 42 stories. The 36th floor is the highest accessible to the general public, and that is the location of the following high-level views.

Next, we set out on a tour of amazing little-knwon overlooks and city skyline views.

That ended the driving portion of the Grand Tour, and three of us continued on a walk around the Golden Triangle.

At this point we were near the Steel Plaza station, so I thought it would be a good time to head back to my motel to rest and get something to eat.

Sunday morning before heading for Washington, I went to Station Square to get a few last-minute photos of steel-industry artifacts on display there. The morning was muggy and hazy.

Opened in 1870, the Monongahela Incline is the oldest and steepest in the United States. It travels 645 feet to reach an elevation of about 340 feet, and moves at about 6 mph. Each car carries 23 passengers, and the hoisting mechanism is configured so that one car ascends as the other descends.

This ancestor of the modern blast furnace was used at Clinton Furnace from about 1859 until 1927 to produce pig iron. This type of furnace gave Pittsburgh early dominance in the iron industry.

Before the invention of the Bessemer Converter in 1856, steel was refined from iron in small quantities by highly-skilled artisans and used mainly for weapons and tools. The Bessemer Process made it possible for relatively unskilled workers to produce huge quantities of steel comparatively quickly.

Molten iron is loaded into the converter, and compressed air at 25-35 pounds per square inch enters through tubes at the bottom of the vessel and passes through the iron. Impurities are burned off, exiting in a spectacular shower of sparks emitting from the mouth of the converter. Each blow takes a maximum of about twenty minutes. This converter could process about ten tons of iron per charge; the largest ones could process up to 30 tons at a time.

Bessemer Converters were almost entirely replaced by open hearth furnaces by the 1930s, and the last one in North America went out of service in 1960.

Molten iron passes through the various production steps at temperatures above 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit; if steel surfaces of equipment and vessels were to come into contact with it, they would erode rapidly and the iron would lose its heat. All equipment that comes into contact with molten iron is lined with refractory material (fire brick) composed of clay and other minerals. This press was used to produce refractory lining materials for blast furnaces, ladles, and other steelmaking equipment.

Bowing engines pumped compressed air for blast furnaces, Bessemer Converters and coke ovens. A large mill would have dozens of the giant engines lined up in one or more long, high-roofed buildings.

This is a steam engine; ealry iron works often used bellows driven by water wheels, and later mills used internal combustion engines that used gas from the coke-production process. Modern mills use rotary fans driven by electric motors.

This engine is requipped with Corliss valve gear, common on large engines that operated at speeds slower than 100 rpm. Corliss valve gear admits steam to the cylinder at full boiler pressure, and regulates engine speed by controlling the duration of the opening of the inlet valve. This system provides higher efficiency and more precise speed control than the throttling governors used on engines equipped with slide or piston valves. Corliss valves were used on engines in electric power plants, gas pipeline compressor stations, municipal water works, and other large industrial applications.

Gears on the flywheel shaft drive the Corliss valve gear, keeping it synchronized with the movement of the piston.

'Bye for now, Pittsburgh and Smithfield Street Bridge. I'm headed for Washington, PA, and the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum.

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