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Gap Trail announcement event

I decided to start a new thread for this. I am guessing there is not much to announce that is not known. But if you are interested Dan Onorato is holding an announcement event at Sandcastle on October 19th at 11am.


11am at Sandcastle  Oct 19th


eppi
2010-10-17 23:53:11

Oh please oh please let this be exactly what it looks like!


myddrin
2010-10-18 01:00:44

allegheny county is declaring war on sandcastle. as governor dan onorato well see that sandcastle burns to the ground and the soil will be salted so that nothing will ever grow there again.


nick
2010-10-18 01:55:31

As it turns out, the deal with Sandcastle -- an easement allowing the trail on park property -- was wrapped up in July. But the county also needed an easement from the railroad, whose line runs along the edge of the park, and Mr. Onorato said he didn't want to make an announcement until everything was in place.


Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10290/1095960-455.stm#ixzz12i4UAWRq


jeffinpgh
2010-10-18 11:43:36

I had been saying that there would be an announcement when it was more politically advantageous to do so and exactly two weeks before the election sounds about right.


I'm asking for the day off so I can attend. We'll see if my employer is feeling generous.


kordite
2010-10-18 11:50:15

This is very exciting! Yay!


swalfoort
2010-10-18 13:43:43

is unfortunately stuck working. but this is AWESOME!!!!!


bikelove2010
2010-10-18 13:59:16

AWESOME! AWESOME! AWESOME! :D


bikeygirl
2010-10-18 14:28:02

Bad ass!


greasefoot
2010-10-18 14:49:15

So...do you suppose they will think to open the gates with the monster sign so people can get to the event from the trail?


edmonds59
2010-10-18 14:50:54

good question..


erok
2010-10-18 14:51:45

Isn't that sign brand new? Why would they go to the expense of the fence and sign if they were just about to make things better for us? I mean, look at the first thread. It started a couple of years ago (8/2008), and got topped just over a week ago (10/10/10) when the sign was noticed, and bingo, suddenly there's an announcement. They almost had us riled up enough to "do something" and not in a good way. I just don't understand why they'd go to the trouble of pissing us off at the very moment they are about to appease us.


stuinmccandless
2010-10-18 15:17:29

Left hand, right hand, split brain.


lyle
2010-10-18 15:31:44

Or did they post the sign just so that they'd have something to REMOVE....


swalfoort
2010-10-18 15:40:57

Stu, that sign has been there for awhile.


IMPORTANT: If going to the event tomorrow remember that you can NOT go via the south side trail due to construction at Becks run water treatment intake. I think going jail trail to 2nd ave. to Glenwood bridge would be most direct way from town, although not very pleasant. Is anyone interested in meeting up to ride out?


marko82
2010-10-18 15:43:17

"As it turns out, the deal with Sandcastle -- an easement allowing the trail on park property -- was wrapped up in July. But the county also needed an easement from the railroad, whose line runs along the edge of the park, and Mr. Onorato said he didn't want to make an announcement until everything was in place."


...and it makes good campaign fodder! LOL


pghbikeguy
2010-10-18 17:14:54

I am definitely interested in meeting up to go to event. If Second Ave is the best way and not Carson. Want to meet at the Jail Trailhead? Is 10:30 a good time to shove off?


pittsbarb
2010-10-18 20:13:31

As somebody that takes second ave over the Glenwood bridge four times a week I can attest to it not being pleasant, but it is better than Carson. Second Ave is wider and cars occasionally have the opportunity to pass on your left, whereas Carson is very narrow for a long time with only two opposing lanes and so you either have to take the lane and slow down like 60 cars or try and let them pass and be forced to run over drain grates every 50 feet or so


sgtjonson
2010-10-18 21:09:28

How about meet at 10:15 at jail trail parking lot, leaving at 10:30. All are welcome to join us. (going 2nd ave.)


marko82
2010-10-18 21:12:17

make sure to get video


dbacklover
2010-10-18 22:58:59

ON second thought, if they can't open up the trail then I'm not interested in going. It's crazy to go on unpleasant roads to go to the announcement of the completion of a trail...


pittsbarb
2010-10-19 01:24:05

Second ave shouldn't be as bad as everyone is saying, especially in a group, at 11:30 on a weekday. I imagine you will not have any problems at all.


dwillen
2010-10-19 01:51:05

I might be riding from Regent Square, depends how much I get done tonight. I haven't decided whether to take Rankin Bridge or Homestead Grays.


erink
2010-10-19 03:41:52

From regent square, working your way down through swissvale west of braddock is pretty calm and you end up just at the end of the rankin bridge.


I'm not sure whether y'all are going to be on 2d ave or irvine, but I'll second the comment that with a group, midday, on a weekday, you'll be fine.


lyle
2010-10-19 11:48:41

regent square? I think Forbes, Beechwood, Homestead Bridge makes the most sense to me. That or Frick to Duck Hollow, then Homestead Bridge.


pratt
2010-10-19 13:01:32

Wish I'd been able to make it. A facebook friend just posted some pics, looks like my sandcastle boycott if over.


myddrin
2010-10-19 15:54:23

The former owners of Sandcastle for years resisted efforts to build the trail through the park, saying there wasn't enough room.


"The next time you visit Sandcastle take a close look at the tight access road and try to visualize a 10-foot-wide trail running between the road and the railroad tracks. I hope you will conclude that not having the available land wide enough for a trail does not make us stubborn," said Peter McAneny, then-president of Kennywood Entertainment, in a 2008 letter to the Post-Gazette


erok
2010-10-20 00:44:09

In fairness, it is pretty tight, and to get the 10 feet they wanted, the RR had to kick in some land too.


If he meant that Sandcastle alone didn't have 10 spare feet, that's not inconsistent with the eventual solution of combining their land with the RR land to make the path. (Of course he still could have been using the space issue as an excuse, to avoid doing what he didn't want to for other reasons.)


steven
2010-10-20 03:42:51

Kordite was on the TV news with Dave Crawley (KDKA), represent.

Ironically the piece was followed by a report on the ongoing efforts of the family of a cyclist killed in 2005, in Blair County, Sean Pearce.


edmonds59
2010-10-20 11:05:26

Totally sweet. I can't wait.


chinston
2010-10-20 13:21:46

To see that KDKA video story on Tuesday's event: do a google search for [kdka "kd country allegheny passage"].


The story wasn't very deep; it didn't mention Steel Valley Trail Council's ongoing efforts to build the trail past Kennywood, and the engineering work that will be required near Keystone Metals, under the Glenwood Bridge.


paulheckbert
2010-10-20 14:28:22

Anybody got a map of the mew trail section? I'm interested how we'll get through the scrap yard.


eric
2010-10-20 17:35:21

The map that was at the press conference just had a line running down the street. Completely inaccurate. The trail will run between the road and the railroad tracks, I'm not sure how much road will be lost or how far the existing fences may be moved. I haven't heard any details on how it will get from the Glenwood Bridge to the end of the Baldwin Trail but I suspect that it may run where the "railfans" get by now because there is a significant hill and an old railroad pylon to get by.


Engineering apparently hasn't started yet so I don't think there are any actual plans yet.


kordite
2010-10-20 18:42:52

I think you can see the map Kordite mentions in the P-G video. The camera doesn't get very close, but from that, it looks like they're running the trail next to the CSX tracks, just like the existing part to the west and the Sandcastle part to the east. Of course that rough line on a map might mean nothing.


BTW, I wrote about a 10 foot path above, but the various articles say they'll actually have an 8 foot path, and in one spot even less.


So in the end, Sandcastle didn't give up the 10 feet it said it couldn't spare (perhaps correctly). The trail compromised and accepted 2 feet less than the usual trail width, the railroad kicked in some land (a foot or two maybe?), and Sandcastle came up with the rest. A fine example of everybody compromising a little to get this finished.


387 days to go....


steven
2010-10-20 18:55:21

^^ I overheard a few “suits” talking at the dedication and they were commenting on how that will be probably be the last section completed. It will run on the scrap yard side, not through the gravel plant.


marko82
2010-10-20 18:57:10

Today's Post-Gazette story:


http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10293/1096495-455.stm#ixzz12vXaVjuB


Sandcastle cedes land for last link of trail

Path will run from Pittsburgh to D.C.


Wednesday, October 20, 2010

By Jon Schmitz, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


Bicycles, rarely seen in the parking lot at Sandcastle Waterpark, were everywhere on Tuesday as riders celebrated the deal that will complete a trail network from Pittsburgh to Washington, D.C.


The park's property was the last piece needed for the Great Allegheny Passage, and for the longest time, securing the owner's permission was like pumping air into a punctured tire.


"A lot of you thought we'd never get to this day," Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato said at a ceremonial signing of an easement allowing construction of the last 0.85-mile trail segment. "You had a right to be skeptical."


Years of resistance by Sandcastle's operators melted away after the park was taken over by Palace Entertainment, a California-based subsidiary of Parques Reunidos.


"The new ownership really picked up the ball," Mr. Onorato said. "They had a lot of things to worry about just running their business. They kept us as a priority."


The agreement likely dissolved much of the ire in the region's burgeoning cycling community toward the park.


Darla Cravotta, the county's special projects coordinator, jokingly suggested that park general manager Damian Dondero try to sell season passes to the assembled cyclists.


"This is a crowd that hasn't been purchasing," she said to a wave of laughter.


"We're looking forward to all the bikers that are coming up and down the trail," Mr. Dondero said. "I'm looking forward to putting more bike racks at the entrance."


The ceremony was a milestone in the county's four-year effort to fill the last nine unfinished miles on the 150-mile Great Allegheny Passage, which connects in Cumberland, Md., with the C&O Towpath to Washington.


To do so, trail developers had to find a way across the Monongahela River at McKeesport, over busy freight railroad lines in Duquesne and Whitaker and through Sandcastle, which improbably turned out to be the hardest piece.


"There have been many miracles needed to be accomplished in this last nine miles," said Linda McKenna Boxx, president of the Allegheny Trail Alliance, one of the trail's developers. "We have a lot of work ahead of us to get the trail done by 11-11-11," the county's Nov. 11, 2011, target date, she said.


Ms. Boxx said contributions have been arriving from all over the U.S., from visitors who rode the trail. "People all over want this trail to be done," she said. "This is a true testament to 'If you build it, they will come.' "


Cindy Dunn, deputy secretary of the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, said the trail attracted 750,000 visitors and generated $40 million in spending last year.


She suggested that trail advocates not rest on their saddles.


"On 1-1-12 let's stand at the Point and look north," she said. "Let's run the Great Allegheny Passage to Erie and the Pennsylvania Wilds."


Jon Schmitz: jschmitz@post-gazette.com


paulheckbert
2010-10-20 19:02:03

Thanks for going, those who did. I wanted to attend but I was in Europe being tortured by the Bike Rental machines that would not work with any of my American Credit Cards because of the crappy insecure credit card standards.


eppi
2010-10-22 10:27:59

"On 1-1-12 let's stand at the Point and look north," she said. "Let's run the Great Allegheny Passage to Erie and the Pennsylvania Wilds."

Outstanding. I don't know this person, but I like.


edmonds59
2010-10-22 10:36:15

North: Like swalfoort said a few months back, let's get a corridor in place that we can use soon, and then work on getting a trail in place along the corridor. A trail will sell itself as soon as we have people using the corridor.


stuinmccandless
2010-10-22 14:45:56

So you think they will open up the section from Duquesne to the Waterfront in spring 2011? Then open up the sandcastle section in the fall.


Or will they just hold off and open up everything next fall.


igo
2010-10-22 21:58:49

Next to the Waterfront entrance ramp across from the storage facility, the bed is in place. It apparently just needs paved to connect it to the already paved section of trail that connects to the Whitaker Flyover Bridge. With the bed in that condition I would guess they are planning to pave that soon.


There is a little bit of paving to be done to connect up with the flyover bridge ramp. Again, it's an easy enough thing that could be done soon.


On the other side of the flyover bridge, the dirt has been packed down and, from what I've heard, it's in much the same condition for the length of the Gas Pipeline segment. I'm not sure what needs to be done. Are they going to just pave it, do more work and then pave it or are they going with a crushed limestone surface. I'm guessing it will be paved.


I don't know what the latest is at the Port Perry Flyover but I might guess it is similar.


With that, I see no reason why the section of trail between Duquesne and the Waterfront shouldn't be completable by the end of the year.


From what was said at the press conference, It sounded like they were going to start rolling with engineering and as soon as they had that worked out, starting with construction. The hope is to have it done before the park opens in April. If not, construction will be shut down until after Labor Day when they will have 2 months to finish up before the 11.11.11 deadline.


If they get the engineering done quickly, I think it could be done before spring.


kordite
2010-10-25 19:45:11

I think if they get the section to Duquesne finished before the Sandcastle section, they'll open it. They won't wait for the whole trail to be finished (just as they opened the Riverton bridge before there was any trail to connect to it on the north).


But for them "finished" won't just mean a rideable surface. They'll likely wait until all the fencing and such is in place too (especially where their agreement with the property owner specifies fencing).


Last I heard, the estimate for the section from Homestead to Duquesne was February 2011.


steven
2010-10-26 02:47:37

Kordite, About two weeks ago I road the section of incomplete trail to see how it was going. They have 1/10 mile paved trail after the Port Perry Flyover (on the side closer to kennywood). The gas pipeline section was leveled dirt.


igo
2010-10-26 21:34:29

I knew people had been on Gas Pipeline section, I just couldn't get there because there was a fence blocking that side of the Whitaker Flyover. If there is pavement on the Port Perry side, then I expect the rest will eventually be paved as well.


Yay, February.


kordite
2010-10-27 12:04:34