Parkway East El for Pittsburgh - Penn Pike/Figg proposal

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is proposing a Tampa style reversible express lanes for the Pittsburgh area's busiest highway, I-376 or Parkway East as it is known locally. Figg Engineering of Tallahassee FL who designed the Turnpike's successful new Susquehanna River Bridge in Harrisburg using their specialty design - post-tensioned segmental box girder - have done a conceptual study of a 15-mile (24km) roadway for the major radial highway east out of Pittsburgh.

The suburban half would be above I-376 supported by a line of median piers, while the western half closer in to downtown Pittsburgh would be an expansion of the Busway East transit facility running a couple of miles to the north of the Parkway East.

Turnpike CEO Joe Brimmeier has told local reporters it would be either 3 or 4 lanes.

He says that Figg Engineering who also designed the successful Tampa Crosstown Expressway Reversible Express Lanes have concluded the Parkway East Reversible Express Lanes (PEREL) project is feasible.

Highly congested route

There is certainly a need for extra capacity on the Parkway East. It's the major commuting route and truck route in to central Pittsburgh from the east - which direction is the center of gravity of the larger metro area. Along with the Schuykill Expressway (I-76) in Philadelphia, the major north-south highway there, the Parkway East in Pittsburgh is probably the most heavily congested major highway in the state. It may have the highest traffic count in the country for a highway with major segments of only 2x2 lane expressway - 120k average daily traffic.

Robert Moses of New York fame was involved in the design of the Parkway East, it's that old. It is little improved since it was constructed half a century ago. It has 19 interchanges though many have directions missing. Exit and entry ramps are closed spaced and short. Also the tight 2x2 lane Squirrel Hill Tunnel forms a serious bottleneck.

The tunnel 1.3km (0.8mi) long, constructed 1946 to 1953, has twin tubes each with 7.3m (24ft) pavement kerb to kerb for two travel lanes, no shoulders. There's only 4.11m (13.5ft) overhead clearance, limiting truck traffic.


The Parkway meanders snakelike in plan because the planners located it in narrow unbuilt ravines to minimize house-taking.

The 24km (15 mile) journey along the Parkway East from its beginning at the Turnpike Mainline interchange in Monroeville to downtown Pittsburgh regularly takes 45 to 50 minutes in morning peak periods.

Preliminary concept

The Brimmeier-Figg plan proposes elevated reversible lanes following in the middle of the Parkway East from Monroeville about 11km (7 miles) to the Wilkinsburg area. From there on in through the university to the downtown area it becomes increasingly difficult to accommodate an elevated roadway:
- more cross streets are already overhead on bridges where an elevated would naturally go
- housing becomes closer and so traffic sound issues from an elevated become more problematic
- the Squirrel Hill Tunnel needing to have an added tube

From Wilkinsburg about 13km (8 miles) in to Pittsburgh the reversible express lanes are planned to follow the line of the Port Authority of Allegheny County's Busway East, a 2 lane dedicated busway built in an abandoned railroad right of way leading right in to Pittsburgh's downtown near the old railroad Penn Station.

The Busway is already on structure in many places and is generally further from housing than the Parkway, making it easier to place the widening or bridging required.

Successful busway

The Busway East is one of the most heavily used in the US with nearly 1,000 buses from 34 different routes operating each weekday and 30k riders/day - more than most passenger rail lines.

The busway is 15km (9mi) long.

There was a study several years ago of extending transit from the end of the Busway in the Wilkinsburg area out east along I-376 and beyond the Turnpike on its continuation US22, in what was called an Eastern Transit Corridor. Nothing happened for lack of needed subsidies from the tax pool.

Integrating transit into toll express lanes

The Brimmeier-Figg plan provides an opportunity to have toll express lanes integrated with a free flowing busway in what Bob Poole and Ken Orski have called virtual exclusive bus lanes. The toll express lanes might be able to carry the buses financially - as provided for in the Westpark Tollway and the Katy toll lanes in the Houston area.

Tampa's El cost $420m. Most of its 10km (6 miles) of length elevated is 18m (59ft) width kerb to kerb, and in Tampa is is striped for three travel lanes plus a full breakdown shoulder on each edge. But it could be configured for four travel lanes and a single breakdown shoulder. Or it could be equipped with a moveable median barrier for variable two-way operation.

The $420m spent in Tampa included almost $100m attributable to foundation design mistakes and rebuilds, but assuming similar per mile costs the total for the Parkway East Reversible Express Lanes would be $630m. Adding more direct connector ramps and bus stations might bring the cost into the $700m to $800m area.

That's a lot less than the cost of the present plan for adding capacity in the corridor - the final stage of the Mon-Fayette Expressway (MFE), whose 376 to 376 loop south to the banks of the Monongahela River is somewhere around $2 billion capital cost.

The Turnpike has put that MFE leg to 376 on hold. It is permitted and designed, but tolls don't finance it.

"No money for it"

State transport secretary Allen Biehler on hearing of the Brimmeier-Figg express lanes plan for the Parkway denounced it saying "there's no money."

It wasn't "even on our radar screen," he was quoted.

There speaks a true state DOT official, whose whole world revolves around tax monies.

There was no tax money for the Tampa express lanes project either. They were fully funded with bonds secured to the future toll revenue streams of the Crosstown Expressway of which they are a part.

If Parkway East express lanes can offer motorists half an hour time savings plus peace of mind they might pay $5 or so per trip. If a fifth of the Parkway East traffic was attracted to the facility (with weekends about one weekday) it would have $35m to $40m in annual toll revenue. With the prospects of growth it might be financeable based on prospective tolls?

TOLLROADSnews 2007-06-18