Healthy Watersheds, Greener Streets

Imagine for a moment that you’re a doctor. But instead of treating people, you’re charged with healing a watershed.

The meadow at Bartlett Street in full bloom.

Like the human body, watersheds are complete systems; one part of the system influences another. If you get a fever, it’s usually the result of a chain reaction inside resulting from any number of ailments. Likewise, too much runoff, pollution, and chemicals like pesticides cause a ripple effect throughout a watershed.

Keeping watershed ecosystems healthy requires work and persistence. Over the past decade, the Parks Conservancy, along with partners Allegheny County Sanitary Authority, Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority, and the City of Pittsburgh, have been nursing back to health an ailing Panther Hollow Watershed. Read more about the history of this project here.

Some symptoms are visible (sediment build-up in Panther Hollow Lake), while others are below the surface (combined sewer overflow, or CSO events after major rains).

Two of the last remaining above-ground streams in Pittsburgh flow in Schenley Park.

So, what’s the prognosis?  With a holistic approach (a comprehensive restoration plan), it’s looking better and better. The recently installed meadow at Bartlett Street and infiltration berms at the Bob O’Connor Golf Course will help absorb rainwater, naturally letting it replenish the water table.

The next treatment to better the health of the watershed involves Schenley Drive.

Making up a large portion of the impervious surface of the park, Schenley Drive acts as a sort of autobahn for rainwater, channeling gushing gallons into the sewer system every year. Estimates for the Schenley Drive Green Street project that 70,000 bathtubs of water would be diverted from the sewer system every year. Plans for this road are just starting to take shape, with the second public meeting having been held on July 29th. Thanks to the feedback of so many park users, bikers, walkers, neighbors, and community members, this project will be shaped not only to better the health of the park, but to better serve as a “complete street,” accommodating all park and road users.

Help us in shaping this next step in the Panther Hollow Watershed restoration — give your feedback on what you’d like to see happen on the Schenley Drive Green Street!

Click here to take the Green Street Survey.

Keep abreast of projects going on in Schenley Park here on our website.

Parks Are Gyms: Your Guide to Working Out

In the parks, we have a whole different approach to working out.

Smelly, sweaty gym socks? We’ve got blooming daffodils.
Recycled air? How about a cool breeze and wind through the trees.
Beige walls? Try chirping robins, rolling clouds, and kids riding bikes.

For the low, low membership fee of $0.00, you can sweat it out all day every day in the parks. Train for your first marathon, conquer hills on the bike sitting in your basement — just get out and get moving! Here are some ideas to start your new workout regiment in the parks:

Tai chi in Mellon Square. Photo: John Altdorfer.

Tai chi in Mellon Square
Some call this Chinese traditional practice meditation in motion. Originally designed for practicing self-defense, this class is a splendid and graceful way to balance, strengthen, and de-stress. Take a class in the Modernist masterpiece park, Mellon Square, or in Schenley Plaza, for free all spring and summer. Schedule to be posted here.

Yoga in Schenley Plaza
Breathe in, breathe out on the Emerald Lawn in Schenley Plaza during these bi-weekly yoga classes. Bring your own mat or borrow one when you arrive at these free, open classes taught by expert instructors. Schedule to be posted here.

Disc golf in Schenley Park
Spread across rolling hills and sprinkled through shaded woods are 18 metal baskets that make up the Schenley Park Disc Golf Course. This go-at-your-own-pace course is an effective arm workout and a healthy walk, the length of which depends on how well you aim your shots. Find directions here.

Volleyball in Highland Park
Recently renovated, the sand volleyball courts in Highland Park are an ace place to work out while working on your tan. Find directions here.

Biking in the park. Photo: Melissa McMasters.

Bike in Riverview Park
The popular Riverview Loop is all about the gluts. The topography of this two-mile loop is a challenge but takes you past amazing spots like the Chapel Shelter, Allegheny Observatory, and gardens throughout Riverview. See the Bike Pittsburgh bike map here.

Tennis in Frick and Arsenal parks
Serve it up on the red clay courts in Frick Park or the newly refinished courts in Arsenal Park for two unique playing experiences. If you’re game, there are a plethora of clinics and tournaments held on the many courts throughout the parks. Click here for the Frick Park Clay Court Tennis Club.

Have your own workout recommendations? Leave them in the comments below!

25 Ways to Celebrate Your Galentines and Valentines (Part 1)

Whether you’re celebrating your Valentine, Galentine, or really anyone that you enjoy, we’ve compiled a list of date ideas — platonic or romantic! — that will knock your next park adventure, well, out of the park:

1. Catch sunset at the Highland Park Reservoir

The Overlook at Schenley Park is a fan favorite for sunset spotters. Take a stroll around the Highland Park Reservoir, though, to see the sun set betwixt trees and the Giuseppe Moretti entrance statues in the peaceful entrance garden.

2. Ride a bicycle built for two on Pocusset Street

Don’t have the balance to reenact that timeless Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid scene with your sweetie? Riding a tandem bicycle (or any bike, really) down the biker- and walker-only Pocusset Street in Schenley Park is the next best thing.

Knock, knock!

3. Hunt for fairy doors 

In Frick and Mellon Park, Allegheny Commons, and many other parks are teensy little doors for the resident fairies. Find and knock on them to see if anyone’s home.

4. Gaze at stars in Riverview Park

The iconic Allegheny Observatory opens its doors weekly to star-struck astronomers for free tours, lectures, and open houses at this incredible space. On clear nights during these events, the 100-year-old-and-older telescopes are generally open for use.

5. Gaze at stars in Mellon Park

Whatever the weather, you can always see 150 stars peeking up from the lawn of Mellon Park’s Walled Garden thanks to 7:11AM  11.20.1979  79º55’W 40º27’N, a memorial art installation.

6. Read Shakespeare in a Shakespearean garden

Whilst we speak of Mellon Park, o’er the hill of the Walled Garden thou must recite verses when alighting in the Shakespearean Garden.

7. Make a snowman or snowbeast

This is an anywhere, anytime activity. Let your creativity run wild. Just try not to sing that one song from Frozen when you’re out there; it’s contagious.

Telescope in Allegheny Observatory in Riverview Park.

8. See the cityscape from Emerald View Park

The Mount Washington overlooks get a lot of love (deservedly), but seeing Downtown peek in and out from the undulating trails of Emerald View Park is always a rewarding experience.

9. Take a trip around the world with a visit to the Plaza

Immerse yourself in international flavors with the fares served in Schenley Plaza. Your hankerings for Chinese, Greek, Belgian, or the ever-changing cuisines at Conflict Kitchen are all conveniently in one square acre.

10. Traverse the tufas

The solid bridges along the lower and upper Panther Hollow trails in Schenley Park, made of a limestone variety (tufa) and built by W.P.A. crews, are straight from a storybook, covered in moss, lichens, and now snow. See these and other old-timey Works Progress projects sprinkled throughout the park.

Tufa under snow.

11. Latch a love lock and throw away the key

Make a statement with your sweetie by adding your own lock to the Schenley Bridge and throwing away the key — just as you do it in the proper waste receptacle. (Forgetting the combination also acceptable.)

 12. Tour the neighborhood, visit parkside cultural establishments

While you’re in the neighborhood, drop by the Carnegie Museums, the Frick Pittsburgh, Phipps Conservatory, the National Aviary, the Pittsburgh Zoo and PPG Aquarium, and many other must-see institutions around the parks.

13. Think spring

Send warm thoughts to family, friends, or someone you’re flirting with this Valentine’s Day with the gift of daffodils in the parks. Make a donation of $25, and we’ll plant 50 daffodils in the park of your choice — and send your someone special a personalized e-card to boot. Get started here.

 

Check back next week for the second half of our park date ideas. Share your inspired date ideas below or through Facebook and Twitter!

XOXO,

The Matchmakers at the Parks Conservancy

Better Bikeways, Better Watersheds: Big Plans for Schenley Park

Standing in a semicircle of maps and renderings of Schenley Park and surrounding streets, Mayor Peduto, Bike Pittsburgh‘s Scott Bricker, and the Department of Public Works’ Patrick Hassett recently announced exciting and progressive plans for protected bike lanes in Pittsburgh.

Peduto, Bricker, and Hasset share the mic at the press conference.

The first of the three segments of this project that we’re particularly thrilled to see will run from Schenley Plaza, snake along Schenley Drive and Panther Hollow Road, and end at Anderson Playground. Partitioned with bollards and marked with paint, the new bike lanes make it so that “families can bike with their kids, older folks can bike all over the city, to get to life, to connect kids to their schools and people to work and grocery stores and places of entertainment,” as Bricker said in the press conference.

BIkers came out in support of the new lanes.

“Schenley Park is our backyard,” one family told us at the event. Living so close to Anderson Playground, they’re enthused to see the new lane help them get from A to B in a way that’s safe for their entire clan. The new, protected bike lane (the first in Pittsburgh!) is slated to begin this month, and all three sections will be completed by Labor Day.

The Levin-Boykowycz family at the Mayor’s press release.

Schenley Park, further down the road

These infrastructure upgrades in the park are only just the beginning. Mayor Peduto in his announcement of these soon-to-be upgrades touched on his administration’s attentiveness to improve not only transportation infrastructure, but also stormwater infrastructure — often at the same time.

The Parks Conservancy’s work in the Panther Hollow Watershed is the quintessential opportunity to merge stormwater and transportation improvements.

Schenley Drive creates a number of challenges in the Panther Hollow Watershed:

• Winding through the upper sections of the watershed, it makes up a large part of the impervious surface of Phipps Run. This generates a large amount of runoff every time it rains, leading to erosion.
• The too-wide roadway does not serve pedestrians, bicyclists, or golfers well.
• Grassy golf turf traditionally require intense mowing regimes, fertilizers, and herbicides, which eventually harm the watershed.

Recommended in the Panther Hollow Restoration Plan is a two-birds-with-one-stone kind of solution:

“Create a “complete street” that welcomes people, mitigates stormwater runoff, increases baseflow and improves water quality. Infiltration Berms capture runoff generated by the compacted golf course lawn, allowing for increased infiltration that can support a natural meadow within “rough” areas. Vegetated Swales slow down remaining runoff. The street will be narrowed and a separate path created for pedestrians and bicyclists. This path could be porous asphalt and will include an infiltration bed to capture and infiltrate the runoff in the upper portions of the watershed. Where infiltration is not feasible in the lower portions of the watershed, the stormwater bed will slow the movement of runoff for slow release of treated water to Phipps Run.”

All in all, this comprehensive approach addresses stormwater issues (at least 70,000 bathtubs of water per year would be taken out of our overloaded combined sewer system!) while making the road more usable for everyone.

Before that happens, though, we’re working hard on other points of the Panther Hollow plan. Currently, the new meadow on Bartlett and Beacon Streets is being seeded and will be full-grown later this summer.

Stay tuned as these restoration projects progress, and be sure to take a spin on the new protected bike lanes when they’re installed.

That First Ride

The best place for that glorious first bike ride is now open for cruising.

Nothing comes close to the thrill of the first ride. It could be the first time you wobbled along after the training wheels came off, or when the ice and snow finally melt so you could venture out for the first ride of the season. Whether you’re eight or 80, we very happily encourage you to take that first ride on Pocusset Street.

A ‘road shift’ of Pocusset connects Squirrel Hill to Greenfield via non-motorized roadway in Schenley Park

The first of its kind in the nation, Pocusset Street is a successful experiment in ‘road shift’, a term coined by Bike Pittsburgh. The project, spearheaded by Bike Pittsburgh and the City of Pittsburgh, was all about rethinking and resizing this paved surface, taking a structurally unsound and sharply curving through-street and creating a safe — and repaved! — avenue for bikers and walkers through Schenley Park. Linking Squirrel Hill to Greenfield, Pocusset Street has been shifted into a very sleek and safe thoroughfare with ‘lanes’ for bikers, wide shoulders for walkers, new LED street lighting, and reflective bollards that bar motorized traffic. Now, it’s a road for everyone.

Pocusset Street after the ‘road shift’. Photo courtesy Dan Yablonsky.

Officer Rose stops by the entrance to Pocusset in Squirrel Hill.

Signs and candlesticks keep the street clear for bikers and pedestrians.

The new design includes lanes and shoulders designed for bikers and walkers. Photo courtesy Bike Pittsburgh.

The recent installation of the bright yellow candlestick bollards are the final pegs in this redesign. The project is a real testament to committed community members; with the support of neighbors, a road that would have normally been shuttered has contributed tremendous value to the park. On a larger scale, Pocusset Street is another step for connected bikeways through Pittsburgh and is definitely something worth bragging about on a national level (did we mention the perfect timing?)

Jump on Pocusset Street as the weather breaks for a cruise with a sweeping vista to one side and the park to the other. Bring along your friends, your grandparents, your little one with the training wheels — anyone you want along for that first ride.

James, a recipient of an adaptive bike, and his sister Krissy. “I’m not sure that I’ll ever get used to the surge of joy that I feel when he’s on his bike,” says Mary, James’ mother.

 

 

Remember your first foray on two wheels? Roads like Pocusset make the parks bikeable and enjoyable for everyone. This spring, enable an awesome child to get out in the parks to ride a bike of their own through Variety the Children’s Charity “My Bike” program. Through this happy project, children with special needs are outfitted with a bike specially tailored to their disabilities. Currently, they have 150 souped-up bikes for eligible kids that fill out the application before April 1st. Spread the word!

 

 

Lauryn Stalter for the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy