The Gateway subway station religiously avoids right angles, making it an irresistible target for abstract photography.
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Gateway Abstractions
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Christmas in the Subway
CAF car no. 4322 in the subway between Gateway and Wood Street. Someone put a lot of effort into decorating it: all the interior lights were replaced with alternating red and green, all the poles and grip rods were covered with spirals of electrical tape, and stick-on Christmas decorations were all over the windows. Whoever is responsible should get a raise and a promotion. In fact, whoever is responsible should be in charge of Pittsburgh Regional Transit.
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Hampshire Stop, Beechview
A two-car Red Line train stops at the inbound Hampshire safety island on Broadway in Beechview.
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Fallowfield Station
An inbound two-car Red Line train stops at the Fallowfield station in Beechview. The leading car is in the new chain-of-circles livery; the trailing car is in the older checkerboard livery.
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Streetcar in Late-Afternoon Sun
There are some sections of the Red Line through Beechview and Dormont where the streetcars seem to be carefully threading their way through the back yards of the neighborhood.
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The Traffic Light in Beechview
Central Beechview has one traffic signal, but it’s a very complicated one, regulating traffic on Broadway, Beechview Avenue, and Hampshire Avenue—and also the streetcars.
Yes, that streetcar was still in the intersection when the light turned red. But are you going to argue with the streetcar?
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Walkway on the Fallowfield Viaduct, Beechview
The Fallowfield viaduct is an important transportation link, both for streetcars and for feet. It connects central Beechview to the streets on the next hill over. But old Pa Pitt admits that he publishes this photograph, not because it is useful and educational, but simply because the lines and colors made an interesting composition.
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Stevenson Stop on the Red Line, Dormont
Many streets in the Pittsburgh area used to have a median where the streetcars ran in a separate right-of-way: Center Avenue in West View and Brookline Boulevard in Brookline are two examples. Broadway in Dormont is the only one where the streetcars still run in the median. We could also count the Silver Line through Bethel Park as a broad instance of the same kind of development, although the streets between which the trolleys run have different names.
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East Busway
Other cities have King Boulevards; we have an East Busway that is officially named for Dr. King, but no one ever uses the whole official name, because by the time you have pronounced the decasyllabic name “Mar-tin Lu-ther King Ju-nior East Bus-way,” you have forgotten what you were talking about. Why not just “King Busway?” We do less honor to Dr. King by using his full name as the name of the busway, because no one ever speaks it.
At any rate, here is the East Busway with two of its stations, in pictures that demonstrate why this busway is such a useful transit artery. Along with the railroad, it runs in a hollow that winds through Bloomfield and Shadyside, giving it the grade separation of a subway without the construction cost. It is in effect a rubber-tired metro line. Pittsburgh invented “bus rapid transit,” and for the most part we did it right.
Above, East Liberty; below, Negley.
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Trolleys at Fallowfield Station
Two 4300-series CAF cars pass at Fallowfield station in Beechview.
