Father Pitt

Category: Transit

  • A Ride on the Brown Line

    Although the Brown Line through Allentown is no longer in regular service, the Port Authority keeps it active for use as a detour when the Transit Tunnel under Mount Washington is closed. For several weeks in August of 2019, the tunnel was under construction, and all Red Line and Blue Line cars had to go over the Brown Line route. This is a simple record of what you see out the right-hand window on a car inbound from South Hills Junction to Steel Plaza. We go up Warrington Avenue and down Arlington Avenue, over the Panhandle Bridge, and into the subway.

    If you are not a trolley geek, this may possibly be the dullest video you have ever encountered. If you are a trolley geek, you are already panting and drooling, so go to the Wikimedia Commons hosting page..

  • Siemens Trolley in Old Livery

    For trolley geeks, here is a 4100 series Siemens car picking up passengers at the Hampshire stop on Route 42 in Beechview in 2001. This is the livery these cars were originally issued when they were put in service in the middle 1980s. Route 42 is now the Red Line, and the 4100 series cars were rebuilt as the 4200 series, with a new livery to match the newer CAF cars.

  • Mount Lebanon Station in the Fall

    A 4200 series Siemens trolley comes out of the Mount Lebanon subway tunnel into the Mount Lebanon station, and then continues on its way.

  • Inbound and Outbound

    At the Alfred Street crossing on the Red Line in Mount Lebanon. Above, an inbound Siemens trolley on a training run. Below, an outbound CAF trolley.

  • Panhandle Bridge

    An outbound Blue Line car heads toward Station Square on the Panhandle Bridge, an old railroad bridge repurposed, along with the railroad tunnel under downtown, for the subway in the 1980s.

  • Forbes Avenue, Oakland

    A 61C bus comes eastbound on Forbes Avenue toward the stop in front of the Carnegie Museum of Art. In the background we can see central Oakland, with two of the three Litchfield Towers, the distinctive cylindrical skyscraper dormitories.

  • Siemens SD-400 Trolley

    Here are two pictures especially for trolley geeks. These 4200-series Siemens cars (this one is number 4232) were bought in the 1980s and completely rebuilt in the 2000s. They make up about two-thirds of the fleet. They are very similar to the later CAF cars, but easily distinguished by the two headlights in the center (rather than at the sides) and the “cyclops eye” high beam mounted on the roof. Of course, they are also easily distinguished by being numbered in the 4200 series; the CAF cars make up the 4300 series. This car is southbound on the Red Line, heading for central Beechview.

    The picture above gives us a good look at what old Pa Pitt calls the “Pittsburgh door,” the extra street-level doors that have to be added to all Pittsburgh trolleys to deal with our odd combination of platform-level stations and street-level stops.

    Camera: Canon PowerShot A540 (hacked).

  • Riding the Subway

    The unusually deserted interior of a 4200-series trolley (number 4239 in this case) as it runs in the subway between Steel Plaza and Wood Street. The 4200 cars are Siemens SD-400 LRVs built in the 1980s and rebuilt a few years ago; they are almost identical inside to the newer 4300 series, built by CAF.

    Camera: Canon PowerShot S45.

  • Gateway Station

    The entrance to the Gateway station, which as a work of architecture is hard to classify. The best term Father Pitt can come up with is “whimsical.”

    A train of two Siemens SD-400 cars, built in the 1980s and rebuilt a few years ago, stops at Gateway on its way to the North Side. Trolley geeks will be interested to know that St. Louis also uses SD-400s; but the St. Louis cars do not have the extra street-level doors—which old Pa Pitt calls the “Pittsburgh doors”—to cope with Pittsburgh’s odd mix of platform-level stations and street-level stops. The newer CAF cars in Pittsburgh had to make the same adaptation. One wonders whether trolley makers groan when they get a call from Pittsburgh, or whether dollar signs pop up in their eyes when they think of what they can charge for customization.

    Camera: Kodak EasyShare Z1485 IS.

  • Gateway Subway Station

    The Gateway station is a feast of strange and slightly unsettling angles. If you like eating angles.