After more than 10 years at the drawing board, Pittsburgh has started work to improve safety for pedestrians and motorists on three blocks of North Avenue near Allegheny General Hospital and Allegheny Commons park.
Although work started a couple of weeks ago, city officials held a ceremony Monday to kick off the $5 million project that will install medians, four new traffic lights and bump-outs at intersections between Arch Street and Cedar Avenue on the city’s North Side. When the project is finished in 2026, traffic will be reduced from two lanes to one lane in each direction.
The work also will include safety islands at some intersections, ADA ramps and street-crossing buttons with audible countdowns. New traffic signals at Arch, Federal, Sandusky and Cedar will have electronic sensors that will allow them to adapt the timing of signals according to the amount of traffic on North Avenue and the side streets.
Intersections without traffic lights will have other safety improvements such as bump-outs to reduce the distance crossing the street.
“North Avenue is a vital corridor for the North Side,” Mayor Ed Gainey said. “It’s important to protect the people who use this corridor every day.”
Traffic engineer Mike Maloch said officials started talking about ways to improve safety in the corridor in 2014. Statistics showed the area was one of the city’s more dangerous areas, with 49 crashes in the corridor between 2014 and 2018, 14 at the North intersection with Federal Street.
There were four public meetings over the years as the city worked with residents, Allegheny Health Network and local businesses to develop what city planning manager Panini Chowdhury called “a single unified plan.”
The plan was on pause through the pandemic, then became active again as the city cobbled together federal, state and local funding sources to finally move the project forward.
Project manager Patty Kerns said the project will be done in three segments beginning with the medians, followed by crosswalks and then the traffic signals. C.H. & D. Enterprises Inc. is the contractor.
“If people feel safer, my job has been completed,” Maloch said.
Ed covers transportation at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but he's currently on strike. Email him at eblazina@unionprogress.com.