Pittsburgh planning extension of trail from the Point to Highland Park Bridge

Pittsburgh is planning to purchase a nine-block section of abandoned rail line in the Strip District for an extension of a riverfront trail that officials hope will someday run unobstructed from Point State Park to the Highland Park Bridge.

City Council this week introduced a resolution that would authorize officials to apply for a $500,000 grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources that would help pay for acquisition of a CSX Transportation rail line between 24th and 33rd streets. Pittsburgh would provide an additional $500,000 in 2021 capital funds if the grant is approved, according to the resolution.

Karina Ricks, who heads the city’s Department of Mobility and Infrastructure, said an existing trail runs along the Allegheny River from the Point and dead-ends at 24th Street. The trail is closed where it enters the Strip District because of residential construction along Waterfront Drive.

“This is a piece of a long-term vision, which is to create that sort of continuous riverfront trail to the Highland Park Bridge,” Ricks said Wednesday. “There’s approximately five miles of connection that still needs to be established. It’s going to be built incrementally, and this is just one piece of that larger, more extensive vision.”

Kelsey Ripper, executive director of Friends of the Riverfront, said the old rail bed is overgrown with vegetation and runs a little less than a mile along the river.

“It’s almost not even visible anymore because of the growth around it, but there are still tracks actually on certain parts,” she said. “It will be an extension of the Three Rivers Heritage Trail. It’s a critical extension because there are incomplete sections of the trail between the Strip District and Lawrenceville, so this fills a substantial portion of that gap.”

If all goes as planned, Ricks said, Pittsburgh would close on the purchase with CSX sometime next year. The city after that would have to improve the property as a trail.

“We’re hoping that — again, if all goes well — we can get it open in two-and-a-half to three-and-a-half years,” Ricks said. “That is a best-case scenario.”

She said the acquisition would complement the city’s plan for a 6.5-mile tree-lined multiuse trail dubbed the Allegheny River Green Boulevard running mainly along railroad rights of way through the Strip, Lawrenceville, Morningside and Highland Park.

Eric Boerer, advocacy director for BikePGH, said the trail extension would help provide a safe bike route from the city’s East End neighborhoods to Downtown.

“We are supportive of it, especially because a high priority of ours and our membership is a safe and convenient connection between Downtown and the eastern neighborhoods, especially Lawrenceville,” he said. “We’ve also supported the Allegheny River Green Boulevard since it was launched. This trail will help toward achieving both of those goals.”