Smithfield Street Bridge closed this weekend
After four days of overnight preparation work this week, the Smithfield Street Bridge will be closed to most vehicular traffic this weekend. The bridge, which joins Station Square on Pittsburgh’s South Side with Fort Pitt Boulevard, Downtown, will be closed from 10 p.m. Friday through 6 a.m. Monday. Regular cars and trucks will be prohibited…
PRT to offer South Hills rail riders free shuttles
Pittsburgh Regional Transit will offer free rides for customers in the South Hills whose light rail trips will be interrupted during an 11-week closure for construction that begins June 16. The agency will create temporary bus routes and operate rail shuttles while the light rail’s Red Line is closed between Overbrook Junction and South Hills…
‘Eager to get to work’: Workers at Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh vote to form union
Workers at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh this week voted “overwhelmingly” to organize with the United Steelworkers, the union said. The 65 newly unionized workers include museum educators, events staff, exhibit technicians, cleaning and retail associates, visitor services professionals, and more, according to USW. “We are thrilled to become USW members and are eager to…
Pitt faculty union tentatively agrees to first historic contract with university administration
The union that represents full- and part-time faculty at the University of Pittsburgh announced Thursday that it has reached a tentative agreement on its first contract with the school. The United Steelworkers, which Pitt faculty joined in 2021, said the deal includes “historic” language on wages and job security for the workers. “We unionized nearly…
From our friends at PublicSource: ‘EQT says fracked gas is a climate solution, but scientists call that deceptive greenwashing’
PublicSource on Thursday published the second installment of its series “EQT’s Gas Play,” examining how the Pittsburgh gas giant “pledges to tackle climate change and flexes political muscle. Communities in its frack path, though, face stark realities.” The story by writer and photographer Quinn Glabicki is headlined: “EQT says fracked gas is a climate solution,…
Pittsburgh Regional Transit hears bus riders’ needs, expects route changes early next year
Pittsburgh Regional Transit’s bus line redesign process is finding what the agency suspected: Riding patterns have changed since the pandemic and the agency’s ability to grow will depend on meeting those needs. The agency’s route planning division began a review of more than 90 bus routes last October and discussed the first round of its…
‘We can build peace from Pittsburgh to Palestine,’ Lee says after resounding win
Shortly after 9:30 Tuesday night, Wasi Mohamed stepped onto a small stage in a crowded second-floor ballroom at Downtown’s Renaissance Pittsburgh Hotel, grabbed a microphone from a podium and announced he was going to find his boss and bring her into the room. The crowd then broke into a spontaneous chant, “Wasi! Wasi! Wasi!” Mohamed…
Keep it flowing: Allegheny CleanWays event needs help to clear debris from stormwater grates
Allegheny CleanWays has worked since 2000 to keep Allegheny County’s waterways clean and to empower people to eliminate illegal dumping and littering in their communities. This Saturday, it is trying something new with partners Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority and Penn State Watershed Stewards: a community cleanup of stormwater grates in Larimer. It is the…
Global Links and Western Pa. Diaper Bank holding free diaper distribution in McKeesport
In support of local families experiencing financial hardship, humanitarian aid organization Global Links and Western Pennsylvania Diaper Bank will hold a drive-up diaper distribution event this Saturday from 10 a.m. to noon at McKeesport Area Senior High School. Families and caregivers of young children are invited to line up by car to receive approximately a one-month supply of…
‘Our students are not throwaways’: Parents speak out about school plan
You’ve got to speak loudly if you want to be heard on South Bellefield Avenue in Oakland during rush hour, so that’s what Paulette Foster did shortly after 5 p.m. on Monday. “Why do we always have to be on the chopping block?” Foster said, her voice rising above the occasional roar of a passing…
‘Huge news’: National Labor Relations Board is ‘seeking injunction’ that could end Pittsburgh news workers strike
Exactly 18 months and 1½ hours into their unfair labor practices strike at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, a small and tired but still-hanging-in-there group of unionized newsroom workers gathered Thursday afternoon, in person and on Zoom, for a hastily called meeting to hear what had been described in urgent messages as a “strike announcement.” Zack Tanner,…
We’re a year and a half into this strike, and it’s taught us something about solidarity
Late one Saturday night in April last year about 20 of us — strikers and supporters — converged on a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette distribution site in Monroeville to set up a picket line. We arrived around midnight so we could meet the trucks delivering Sunday editions of the PG. It was dark and cold. We paced…
Former Pine-Richland wrestling, football standout Cole Spencer is taking on two sports again — this time at Division I Penn
It was a persistent, creeping notion. Cole Spencer even found himself considering the thought this winter while wrapping up his junior season as a member of the nationally ranked University of Pennsylvania Ivy League wrestling team. After all, the 2021 Pine-Richland graduate was a two-sport standout at the WPIAL Class 6A juggernaut. A three-year starter…
A longtime dream realized, North Allegheny grad Ayden Owens-Delerme reflects on qualifying for Olympics as his preparation for the Games ramps up
As Ayden Owens-Delerme caught his breath after completing the most successful and one of the most memorable decathlons of his burgeoning track and field career last week, what he had just accomplished in a stadium in Walnut, Calif., hit him like a ton of bricks. “It definitely hit me, man,” Owens-Delerme said from Puerto Rico…
PUP softball notebook: North Hills defying expectations behind influx of young talent
Three years after capturing its sixth WPIAL softball championship with a surprising run to the title as a No. 8 seed, North Hills is once again exceeding expectations under longtime coach Libby Gasior. What else is new? With only a few players returning with any semblance of varsity experience, not many expected the Indians to…
In other news …
‘All Robinsons are fast’: Avonworth senior and Pitt recruit Hayzes Robinson continues family’s sister act of champion sprinters
A video of Hayzes Robinson zooming down the track and finishing ahead of her opponents at last week’s Butler Invitational made its way onto social media shortly after the race. Robinson’s father, Troy, saw the tweet and replied, “All Robinsons are fast!” But this wasn’t an example of a parent dishing out praise without merit.…
No ordinary ace: Southmoreland’s Maddie Brown shining on and off field while propelling Scotties toward title contention
She stands only 5 feet 5, but Maddie Brown is the last pitcher you would ever want to charge the mound against in the event of a bench-clearing brawl. Not that Brown would ever do something to incite such a squabble, but don’t be fooled by her cheerful, bubbly demeanor, either — this ace pitcher is…
Seton LaSalle’s sweet-swinging shortstop Gio LoNero in a class of his own among WPIAL’s top hitters
It’s often said that baseball is a game of failure, but somebody must have forgotten to tell that to Gio LoNero. A multi-talented pitcher-shortstop with a laser-like focus on the mound and in the batter’s box, LoNero was already on the short list of the top overall players in the area going into the season.…