Awash With Opportunity: Let’s Create a Better Stormwater Plan for Pittsburgh

Pittsburghers, opportunity is just around the river bend.

Nine Mile Run in Frick Park, a favorite spot of park visitors, is also often flooded by combined sewers.

For older cities such as ours, stormwater poses a serious challenge to our archaic sewer system. Every major rain event results in combined sewer overflow (CSO) and unclean rivers.

This isn’t a new problem. Groups all across the region have been making strides to address this issue through green infrastructure (e.g. rain gardens and bioswales), more conscientious development, and investments in our parks and green spaces. These efforts have the two-fold benefit of making our communities better while quelling stormwater.

Pittsburghers are ready to take these efforts to the next level. Fortunately for us, there’s a multi-billion-dollar opportunity at our fingertips. Recently, however, an uninspired plan to use this money would mean not only a missed opportunity, but would actually negatively impact the assets that we’ve all worked for years to gain. This plan, revealed by the Clean Rivers Campaign of Pittsburgh United last week, would mean an investment in over a dozen “drop shafts,” or underground tunnels, disrupting some of the most well-loved spots in Pittsburgh: our riverfront parks.

There are better, proven solutions. Wise partnerships, expert planning, an active and informed community, and the will to work together for a healthier and more vibrant city is a very powerful force for change that benefits us all. Proof of this is in the parks:

McKinley Park
After years of inattention, this 79-acre community park underwent a $250,000 makeover. The completed project includes an entrance area parking lot surfaced with porous asphalt that allows storm water to be absorbed into the ground; rain gardens; and accessible walkways from the street to the playground and the basketball court. A stone wall dating from the 1930s at the entrance of the park was also carefully restored to historic detail.

Porous pavement, rain gardens, and accessible entrance at McKinley Park.

Panther Hollow
For more than a decade, we’ve been working alongside ALCOSAN, PWSA, and the City of Pittsburgh to heal this ecologically important area. This long-term project includes planting trees; addressing erosion; installing meadows, rain gardens, infiltration trenches, and other green infrastructure; and collaborating on sustainable projects at the Bob O’Connor Golf Course. Most recently, the $2.5 million restoration of the Westinghouse Memorial ties together historic restoration with stormwater management.

Iconic Panther Hollow in Schenley Park, the focus of years of restoration projects.

Frick Environmental Center
Among many exciting aspects of this project, the state-of-the-art Center will be net-zero water, meaning stormwater must be captured on site and the building won’t depend wholly on municipal water. Built in partnership with the City of Pittsburgh, the Center will capture water from the roof and in a 15,000-gallon underground cistern to be used within the building and on the grounds, eventually replenishing park streams.

The new Center, October 20, 2015.

There is an abundance of parkland for critical, large-scale and strategically placed green infrastructure; these spaces can and should play a vital role in water quality and stormwater management. Green efforts are already working in and for our communities. Let’s pursue an integrated approach that includes parks, rights of way, transportation, and residents’ input.

Let’s keep Pittsburgh on the path of world-renowned green innovation.

 

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.

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.

Who’ll Stop the Rain: Green Infrastructure in Schenley Park

Big, green things are in the works in Schenley Park and the Panther Hollow Watershed.

If you’ve been near Bartlett Playground in Schenley Park lately, you might have seen some of our progress on a nearby hillside, which right now looks a little like

Soon, though, the area will look something like

Is that the Cathedral of Learning off in the distance?

Instead of a field of poppies, though, a lush, textured, and completely native meadow will be springing up this summer. The meadow will be replacing a swatch of non-native, monochrome grass as part of a larger effort to revitalize the Panther Hollow Watershed.

You may be asking yourself: Why remove a field of grass? Doesn’t grass absorb rainwater, keeping it out of our sewer system?

Answer: Yes and no. Grass does absorb a bit of rainwater. But with its shallow roots and often compacted soil underneath, it can almost as hard as a slab of concrete for water to penetrate. On this hillside between Bartlett and Beacon Streets, towards the upper sections of the Panther Hollow Watershed, we see a stellar opportunity to reduce environmentally-taxing maintenance (read: mowing), establish a walking path, and capture rainwater in the ground rather than having it run right into our sewer systems.

The grass to by phased out between Beacon and Bartlett Streets

A concept drawing of what this area will look like after, complete with wildflower meadow and walking path

Like many older cities, Pittsburgh has a combined sewer system in which both stormwater and sewage flow in the same pipe. The system is prone to overflows, with rainfalls greater than ¼ inch triggering large quantities of untreated sewage to discharge into our rivers. By increasing the amount of water retained in the soil throughout the watershed, we’re keeping rainwater out of the park streams and City sewers. This project is the first stage of a plan to reduce the volume of water flowing through the watershed.  This summer and fall, infiltration trenches and berms will be created along the street. Combined, these projects will remove an estimated 1.7 million gallons of water from the combined sewer system.

As the grass on the hillside along Beacon Street dries out, we ask that everyone stays on the marked path so that the meadow seedlings have a chance to really take hold. The seed mix that we’re using can handle the foot traffic anticipated for the Vintage Grand Prix. Until then, excuse the look of this meadow-in-progress and look forward to a ‘low-mow’ biodiversity magnet and an overall green improvement in Schenley Park!

This project is done in collaboration with the Allegheny County Sanitary Authority (ALCOSAN), Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority (PWSA), and the Department of Public Works (DPW).

Thank you to the generous funders who are making this project come to life. We’d like to thank Allegheny County Conservation District, Dominion Foundation, Western PA Conservancy, Foundation for Pennsylvania Watersheds, and The Pittsburgh Foundation for their support!

11 Things You Didn’t Know About Mellon Square: Part 2

May 29th, 2014: The grand rededication of Mellon Square.

Fifty-nine years after the ribbon was cut for the newly constructed Mellon Square, Pittsburghers once again celebrated their Downtown emerald oasis. After a $10 million makeover, the Square is back, looking handsome and vibrant once more.

The ribbon cutting during the Mellon Square rededication.

As we revel in the reopening of the green heart of the Golden Triangle, join us in celebrating this unique space with part 2 of our series of lesser-known features and facts of the Square. (And again, thanks to Parks Curator Susan Rademacher for providing the information below!)

6. Walking on the wild side

A number of Pittsburgh’s city parks were home to animals wilder than deer and pigeons. The Pittsburgh Zoo sits in Highland Park; Riverview Park had enclosures for bear and elk. While Mellon Square was being dreamed up, there was a serious discussion about having live animal displays in this city greenspace.

Among the most talked about potential animal exhibits was one for sea lions. Looking at the sketch below, you can see the circular swimming area and platforms drawn up for flippered park denizens:

7. Hand-picked flowers

No detail was overlooked when it came to Mellon Square’s restoration — including what would be putting down roots there. After taking out a majority of the dead or dying trees and seeing that some greenery was struggling to survive, our park management team decided on more appropriate flora that is rugged and hardy, but also fragrant and textured. Here’s what you’ll see growing there:

Chamomile. Photo: Steve Brace/Flickr license

Magnolia stellata. Photo: Margrit/Flickr license

Bearberry. Photo: Sarah Gregg/Flick license

8. Iconic inspiration

The design and landscaping of Mellon Square sells itself. And over the years, it’s been used to sell products, such as Fort Pitt Beer. It’s also been used in photo shoots, movies, and even a medium for a love letter.

An old ad for Fort Pitt Beer, found during a local Pittsburgh resident’s home renovation, features Mellon Square’s signature cascading fountain. Image courtesy Laura Aguera.

Cover for the Three Rivers Cookbook featuring a painting by Susan Gaca.

Winter in the summer! Batman was shot right beside Mellon Square. Other movies, like The Mothman Prophecies, were shot in the Square.

The text under this Post Gazette clipping reads, “Novel! A swain, as they once were called, apparently performed this feat – or shall we say feet? He walked in the snow at Mellon Square, Downtown, forming the words, “Hi Bonnie.” Who is Bonnie? Perhaps she’s employed at the Penn Sheraton Hotel, from which this photo was taken, and she can look out upon her boy friend’s message.”

9. Investment impact

What’s that old real estate adage? We know it had something to do with location…

When the idea for Mellon Square was put on the table, many property owners in that part of town complained about diminishing property values from lost parking and demolition of the then-deteriorating buildings on that block.

Quite the contrary.

Just as a gorgeous public park is a magnet for new investment, a park that’s rough around the edges pushed investment away. Vacant properties around the Square have started to come back to life in the short time that the Parks Conservancy has been renovating Mellon Square. Said Jeremy Waldrup, Executive Director of Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership, the recent renovation has created an investment uptick to the tune of $200 million around the Square. With the reopening of the Square and a plan to refresh the storefronts on Smithfield Street, new investment and tourism are soon to follow.

Crowds flock to the Square in 1955, much like they do today. Photo courtesy Historic Pittsburgh Image Collections.

10. Bonsai approach

We’ve already talked about the careful planning that went into each of the plant types in the Square. Learning from flora failures there in the past, our stellar gardeners will be using what we like to call the Bonsai approach to keep the trees, shrubs and flowers in the Square growing for a long time to come. This means not letting them get too tall, helping them stay healthy, and making sure they withstand the temperature extremes in the open Square.

A tree being planted in the Square. Photo courtesy Historic Pittsburgh Image Collections.

11. Planning for the future

The chronic issue with Mellon Square has been it’s lack of sustained maintenance. When the Parks Conservancy first assessed the Square, the fountains had not run for years. (They were only put on when a worker was on site to manually check on the fountain every hour because none of the automated controls worked.) The unique terrazzo (the triangle pavement) was grimy and chipped. The stairs were in deplorable condition. Water was leaking into the parking garage below.

Without a long-term maintenance plan, the restoration of the Square would have been done in vain. But with a new, thoughtful plan — and a $4 million maintenance budget — in place, Mellon Square will continue to shine on for generations to come.

Mellon Square is now open for all to enjoy. Check our Facebook and Twitter to see pictures of the opening ceremonies and festivities, mark your calendars for upcoming Mellon Square events, and of course, visit the Square the first chance you get!

Content for this blog was adapted from a presentation by Parks Curator Susan Rademacher.

Some of the Parks Conservancy gang on opening day.