Category: Water Under the Bridge

I have been involved in Pitt’s Civil Engineering Senior Design Project program for more than a third of my life; initially as a mentor, then as program coordinator, and now as an advisor to the coordinator. The program serves as the Department’s Capstone event, the culmination of the students’ undergraduate careers. Each student functions as a member of a multi-disciplinary team challenged with the design of the solution of a significant near-real-world problem. One of the responsibilities of my current role is to suggest potential projects. This year one of the projects I suggested, the problem of abandoned mine drainage…

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It is surprising how much more I see when I am a passenger in a car than when I am driving. This is the obvious consequence of my current enhanced sensitivity to what I am seeing and experiencing, in contrast to my commitment to concentrate on my principal responsibility when I am in the driver’s seat. One of our favorite sights along I-79 as we travel north toward Chautauqua is an open field full of bison, on the east side of the highway immediately north of the Edinboro exit. We eventually determined that this is the Wooden Nickel Buffalo Farm….

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The Bridgeville Area Historical Society kicked off its 2026/2027 program series with an entertaining presentation by Kathy Grant on the “Duncan & Miller Glass Museum”. A docent at the museum, she deftly used a collection of twenty Duncan and Miller pieces to chronicle the evolution of the glass industry in western Pennsylvania, the history of the Duncan & Miller Glass Company, and the changes in what was considered fashionable during the time period 1874 – 1955, while at the same time illustrating the wide variety of tableware and patterns produced in that era. The manufacture of glass in Pittsburgh began…

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I have been interested in sawmills and gristmills for many years. Since we have been spending time in western New York State, I have learned that there is an operating (occasionally) grist mill in Busti, New York, not far from our house at Chautauqua. The Busti Historical Society maintains it and actually grinds grain in it once a month during the late Spring, Summer, and early Fall months for the benefit of historical buffs like me. This Fall it was convenient for us to visit it the last Saturday of September, which coincided with the Society’s annual Apple Festival. Elizabeth…

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Last week I went to a “Town Hall” which was advertised as an opportunity for the people currently operating the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (PG) to introduce themselves to the general public and to solicit feedback from the community regarding its coverage of local news. This specific Town Hall was conducted at the Mt. Lebanon Library for the benefit of folks in the South Hills. Two other similar events will be held elsewhere in Allegheny County. It was well attended; perhaps one third of the audience were current or previous PG employees. Earlier this year Block Communications, the owner of the PG,…

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I am proud of the fact that most of my ancestors are folks who came to Pennsylvania in the eighteenth century from Germany and the German part of Switzerland. It may be a stretch to call all of them Pennsylvania Dutch, but that certainly is a convenience. Typical of them are the Smiths, my father’s mother’s family. When my father was growing up, the Smiths lived on the farm next to the Oyler homestead, a farm they had acquired following Pontiac’s Rebellion in 1763. When word that year arrived that hostile Indians had entered “the Valley”, most of its residents…

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Last week’s column on the replacement of the Commercial Street Bridge described an impressive local engineering project; this week we would like to discuss another equally impressive project, the ALCOSAN Combined Sewer Remediation Project. This project has a much broader significance; cleaning up the Ohio River affects millions of people downstream. It is also significant to the folks who will be footing the (estimated!) two billion dollars bill to pay for it – all of us ALCOSAN customers. ALCOSAN is the acronym for the Allegheny County Sanitary Authority, an organization with eighty-three customers – the city of Pittsburgh and eighty-two…

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When I learned that PennDOT was going to replace the Commercial Street Bridge, my initial reaction was that somebody had a big problem ahead of him. Located just east of the Squirrel Hill Tunnel on the Parkway East, that location is notorious for traffic jams. The prospect of partially closing down the Parkway for several years to replace this bridge would be a massive headache. Then I learned that a combination of three prominent local organizations – PennDOT; HDR; and Fay, S&B USA Construction– was planning to utilize the Accelerated Bridge Construction concept to reduce the shut-down period to less…

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Last week we were treated to a special experience, the opportunity to attend an open rehearsal of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (PSO), an opportunity made available occasionally to long-time patrons. We have been season ticket subscribers for nearly sixty years (initially in combination with two other families). Beth, Mike, Rachael, and I enthusiastically accepted the offer and showed up at the Heinz Hall stage door on Penn Avenue promptly on time. Camilla Pearce, one of the senior members from Development, welcomed us, gave us visitor passes, and led us backstage into the Garden Plaza. She had to keep encouraging me…

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I am back home after my second two-week stint at the Chautauqua Institution. The final week was especially memorable since we had our three children and three of our grandchildren together for the first time in several years. Sara and her daughter Claire flew in from Colorado; John and his daughter Lai An, all the way from China. Beth’s daughter Rachael had arrived the previous week after spending the summer in a workshop in New York. The three granddaughters are an interesting trio, each about to enter a new phase of life. Rachael graduated from Bryn Mawr in the Spring…

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