60. Sycamore Street Grade Crossing and Bridge Street Improvement.—Bridge, Freeport and Main Streets should be lifted over the Baltimore & Ohio tracks at Sycamore Street. Bridge Street had best be kept up, probably on a viaduct, clear to the Sharpsburg bridge. The South Main Street approach to this bridge will thus be cut off, but another eastern approach will be provided. (Section 61 below.)
61. Allegheny River Boulevard.—From the Sharpsburg bridge up the river to Hoboken and possibly to Montrose, a first-rate opportunity is presented for a riverside thoroughfare or boulevard. Such a line will have rare scenic value and will also take much traffic from Main Street and the Freeport Road. It is understood that the Pennsylvania Railroad owns all the land from the Sharpsburg bridge to Aspinwall between the river and Main Street, but as no railroad development has yet taken place it seems not unlikely that sufficient land can be obtained next the river for the boulevard.
At its western end this new street would connect by a viaduct directly with the Sharpsburg bridge.
62. Main Street Grade Crossing.—The railroad grade crossing on Main Street (Sharpsburg), near North Canal Street, is peculiarly dangerous because the sudden angles in the street interrupt all view of the crossing until one is almost upon the tracks. No better way of separating the grades appears than to raise Main Street and carry it over the railroad. The railroad grade might be lowered somewhat but probably not enough to materially reduce the grade damages for filling on Main Street.
A connection should be made from the bend just east of this crossing out to the riverside boulevard proposed above. (Section 61.)
63. Squaw Run Thoroughfare.—North from Claremont is the valley of Squaw Run with its branch Stonycamp Run. The thoroughfare in this valley should be extended south to the Freeport Road and the proposed riverside boulevard. (Section 61.)
64. Carson Street.—South of the Ohio and Monongahela Rivers, Carson Street is a continuous thoroughfare from Ormsby, on the east, to McKees Rocks and points down the Ohio River, on the west. All thoroughfare lines from the south and west feed into Carson Street and are thence distributed to the bridges leading into the city proper. This street is of varying width, nowhere (except for ten blocks east of South Seventeenth Street) more than 50 feet and often much less.
(a) From Brownsville Avenue to South Seventh Street the vehicle capacity of the street can be somewhat increased by removing the south sidewalk which is next to the railroad. This improvement, however, would not obviate the need for a general widening of the whole street. The gradient from South First to South Fourth Street should be reduced by filling at the former end and cutting slightly at the latter.
(b) From the Point bridge to Main Street (West End) West Carson Street is most in need of improvement and is at the same time most difficult to improve. Though much study has been put upon this problem, no plan has been hit upon less expensive or less difficult of accomplishment than a generous widening accompanied by slight re-alignment. By widening entirely on the south side most of the property between the street and the Panhandle Railroad would be taken and what is left could be used for warehouses, coal pockets and the like. The manufacturing property north of Carson Street would thus be undisturbed.