Pittsburgh Main Thoroughfares and the Down Town District / Improvements Necessary to Meet the City's Present and Future Needs

by Frederick Law Olmsted

The following are some notes, made in the course of the main thoroughfare investigations, regarding certain special opportunities for parks and parkways in and about Pittsburgh.

1. Moultrie Street Playground.—The small playground at Moultrie Street, in the Soho District, should be enlarged; for it is in the midst of a section where the need for public recreation facilities is very great. Moultrie Street, running north from Fifth Avenue, can be abandoned beyond the south side of the playground, because the proposed street on the hillside to the west[25] will furnish the needed connection between Fifth Avenue and Centre Avenue. The playground can then be extended from side to side of the valley bottom and north to the foot of the dump, thus getting an area of some 3½ acres. This dump, by the way, should not be extended any further down the valley.

2. Millvale Playground.—At Millvale, Butler Street bends into the mouth of the valley leaving a fair space of vacant land (some 5 or 6 acres) between the street and the railroad. Although this would not be an ideal location for a large neighborhood park, because the district benefited is entirely on one side, and the maximum number of people that could be accommodated would not be found within easy walking distance, a small park such as this, adjacent to the dense population of Millvale, would probably be within reach of all the people it could reasonably serve. Where flat vacant land is so scarce, this opportunity for a small park should not be neglected.

3. Etna Playground.—At Etna there is some vacant land in the hollow between Butler Street and Pine Creek in the vicinity of Isabella Street. Though the area is small, it should be reserved for public recreation, for it is in the midst of a dense population of working people, a place where playground space is most in demand.

4. Etna Park.—A short distance up the Pine Creek valley, just above the upper mills of the Spang-Chalfant Company, is a large meadow between the railroad and the main valley thoroughfare on the east, and the steep hillside on the west. Bearing in mind that this valley is the most important line of connection from Pittsburgh to the northern districts and is consequently sure to build up thickly, even as less important valleys have done, it seems wise to secure this land for public use while it is still vacant. Some fifteen acres are now available, and a complete, useful, and beautiful recreation ground could easily be made therewith. The flatness of the ground would make the development of such a park easy and comparatively cheap.

5. Chartiers Valley.—There is a good deal of vacant land along the Chartiers Valley, even in the vicinity of McKees Rocks. Considering the character and density of the population at McKees Rocks, and in the northern corner of Sheraden, it would seem eminently wise to secure a reasonable amount of this for local parks.

6. Rankin Playground.—In Rankin there is a hollow east of Kenmawr Avenue between the Pennsylvania Railroad and Braddock Avenue, which is available for a playground. Eight or ten acres could probably be obtained, and, by controlling the banks of the hollow, a beautiful and secluded little park could be made. It is in the center of thickly populated sections of Rankin and Braddock.

7. Sawmill Run Parkway.—The Sawmill Run valley, from the West End to Fairhaven and possibly beyond, offers a park and parkway opportunity which should not be neglected until commercial development becomes a serious stumbling block to its realization. It is an interesting valley of varying width and form, enclosed by high, steep banks, occasionally wooded; in some parts it is wide enough only for a drive, while in others large, flat meadows make ideal places for play. And Sawmill Run itself, when it is no longer used as an open sewer, will be an additional element of park value. Surrounded as it is by land accessible to the city and reasonably adapted to residential use, this valley seems an unusual opportunity for effective park service. In taking it for park use, Shalerville and the Bell Tavern settlement would, of course, be excepted; otherwise, the holdings should be continuous from Temperanceville to Fairhaven; and such scattered buildings as would in any way impair the value of the park should eventually be removed. A boulevard thoroughfare should extend the length of the valley, serving not only as a cross-town connection between important radial thoroughfares, but as a link in a circumferential parkway system.[26]

8. Nine Mile Run Park.—Perhaps the most striking opportunity noted for a large park is the valley of Nine Mile Run. Its long meadows of varying width would make ideal playfields; the stream, when it is freed from sewage, will be an attractive and interesting element in the landscape; the wooded slopes on either side give ample opportunity for enjoyment of the forest, for shaded walks and cool resting places; and above all it is not far from a large working population in Hazelwood, Homestead, Rankin, Swissvale, Edgewood, Wilkinsburg, Brushton and Homewood; and yet it is so excluded by its high wooded banks that the close proximity of urban development can hardly be imagined. If taken for park purposes, the entire valley from the top of one bank to the top of the other should be included, for upon the preservation of these wooded banks depends much of the real value of the park.