Father Pitt

Tag: Station Square

  • Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Freight House

    Freight House
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.

    The preservation of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie station complex as “Station Square” showed Pittsburgh that historic preservation could be good business. As “the Freight House Shops,” the freight house was a successful shopping arcade for many years. But all the shopping arcades, and many of the indoor shopping malls, have collapsed in the past decade or two as shopping habits changed. Now shoppers demand stores and restaurants with individual external entrances. But the shopping arcade saved the building; and now, though other uses have been found for most of the space (a large part of it has been turned into a rock-climbing gym, because where would you find rocks in the wild in Pittsburgh?), the building itself is in no danger of demolition.

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  • Merry Christmas

    A Christmas tree at Station Square.

  • P&LE Central Warehouse, Station Square

    Central Warehouse
    Canon PowerShot SX20 IS.

    The central warehouse for the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad’s freight depot, now converted to offices and other uses and known as Commerce Court. These two pictures were taken just about a year apart, but nothing significant changed during that time. While he was donating the newer one to Wikimedia Commons, old Pa Pitt ran across the older one and realized he had never published it here.

    Central warehouse
    Canon PowerShot SX150 IS.
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  • Station Square Station

    Blue Line car at Station Square
    Station Square station
    Red Line car at Station Square
    Fujifilm FinePix HS10.
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  • Freight Office for the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie

    Freight office
    Freight office in 1968
    David Wilson from Oak Park, Illinois, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

    Back in 1968, the streetcar fan David Wilson from Oak Park, Illinois, USA, took this picture of a PCC car in front of the freight office for the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad. Except for looking cleaner, the building hasn’t changed much. Streetcars no longer pass in front of it, but they stop diagonally across the street at the Station Square station.

    Rear of the freight office
    Kodak EasyShare Z1285.

  • Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Station

    Night view of the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie station, Pittsburgh

    The Pittsburgh & Lake Erie could not quite get a foothold downtown, but it had the next best thing: a station right on the Smithfield Street Bridge, so that it was only a short walk from downtown to the P&LE trains—or a short trolley ride, since the streetcars ran on the bridge.

    P&LE station from the south
    Smithfield Street Bridge entrance to the station
    Kodak EasyShare Z1285; Samsung Galaxy A15 5G.

    The entrance to the station was right at bridge level, with a grand staircase down into the grand concourse.

  • Stairs into the Grand Concourse

    Stairway down to the Grand Concourse

    The stairway from the Smithfield Street Bridge down into the Grand Concourse of the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie railroad station.

  • Station Square Station

    Station Square station

    The Station Square subway station was built in the 1980s, when the streetcars were diverted from the Smithfield Street Bridge to the Panhandle Bridge and into the subway downtown.

    Station Square station

    Even though it’s clearly above the ground, this is the end of the section of combined trolley lines that Pittsburghers call the “subway.” From here the outbound streetcars go underground into the Mount Washington tunnel, but that’s not a subway. That’s just trolleys running underground. You need to be a Pittsburgh native to follow the logic.

    Station Square station
    Trolley leaving Station Square
    Trolley leaving Station Square

  • Reliefs on the P&LE Terminal

    We seldom look up as we pass the station on the Smithfield Street Bridge, but at the top of the building, directly over the main entrance, is this lively locomotive relief.

  • Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad Terminal

    This station (architect William George Burns) was made as splendid as possible to show that the P&LE was serious competition to the big railroads. Its front entrance opened directly on the Smithfield Street Bridge to be as convenient as possible to downtown without actually being downtown.