“This is Bonnie Diver reporting a tunnel backup INSIDE the Pittsburgh airport”
"Wait. Are we going to Monroeville?!"
Happy Wednesday! Lots to cover this week, so let’s get right to it!
1. Pittsburgh is getting another tunnel!
The Pittsburgh International Airport unveiled the design for a dynamic pedestrian tunnel modeled after the Fort Pitt tunnel, that will connect the old terminal with the new, and I have to say, I love it. Here’s a walk-through from the airport website (depending on how you’re reading this, you may need to click that link to watch):
The only thing missing is one sign at the mouth that reads, “Maintain speed through tunnel,” and another that reads, “If you stay in the right lane but don’t actually want to go to Monroeville, God help you.” It’s all fun and games until Pittsburghers hit the brakes on their wheeled suitcases and walk through the tunnel like
The jokes write themselves! The gifs help!
2. Your weekly math quiz!
We had full kegs of beer, baby elephants, corgis and now:
I need to state for the record that, yes, obviously Sixty-Nine American Alligators is my new band name. Our debut album is entitled Nice.
The articles tells us that American alligators can grow up to 4.6 meters in length, which wtf does that mean? I can’t visualize that. Give it to me in American! These are American alligators are they not? Google says 4.6 meters is 15.0919 American feet. Wow. That’s big and sounds very teethy. This asteroid is estimated to be at its largest 320 meters wide. In American, that is 1049.87 feet. Pretty big! Sounds murder-y and a skoosh apocalyptic. But what we need to know is how many American alligators of destruction are flying past the earth all, “Made you flinch!”
Here’s the “math”: 1049.89 feet of bigness divided by 15.0919 of American Alligator-ness = 69.565131 American alligators.* Oh man. I will literally only accept 69.5 or “almost 70” for an answer. If you rounded down to 69, you’re mathematically wrong and have the emotional intelligence of a 12-year-old. “Almost 69”? Even more wrong! F-. Go to the principal.
But hurry back or you’ll miss the lesson on how to convert American alligators to Eat’n Park Whale of a Cod filets.
* You could also do this by dividing the meters, but then you’re not being ‘Merica enough
3. Quickly …
I’ve been laughing about this for a week now:
It could have been worse. His name could have been Raven … or BROWN. [shudder] That’s a stink that just doesn’t ever wash off. Also, honestly surprising that there aren’t more babies named Steele in this city.
4. History roundup
As usual, I’m spending tons of my time doing history research and that means I’ve stumbled on a bunch more great things for you! First, this 1852 map of the city and its surroundings is huge! Go full screen and zoom in for remarkable detail. If I were the thieving kind, this is the thing I would steal with Nicolas Cage and a ragtag group of ne’er-do-well yinzers. I mean look at the detail in the screenshot on the left:
The ‘Childs Residence’? Yeah, just the estate that was eventually sold to C.L. Magee who added on to it and then upon his death donated it to become the Elizabeth Steele Magee Hospital which is today Magee-Womens Hospital. That is a photo of the house when it was part of the hospital (it no longer stands). I love history. There other estates on there and cool boats in the rivers. Dig in!
Showing you the Frick Coke exposition display from 1893 sent me hunting for more local companies’ exposition displays. Look at Heinz’s from 1907!
You must click over to it and view it full size so you can zoom in on the details. And here’s Alcoa’s “Aluminum Office” exhibition from 1931 in New York City:
Please zoom in on the door. Where is it today? Does anyone know? Surely that didn’t just get discarded? And lastly, here’s a chocolate Fort Pitt Blockhouse that appeared at the 1926 Kaufmann’s International Exposition, complete with a little guard:
Me zooming in on the deliciousness: “10/10. Would eat.” It weighed a whopping 200 pounds and this goes without saying, but how many baby elephants is that?
Finally, I stumbled on two photos that show the rollercoaster at the Point in the early 1900s. Here’s the clearest photo I’ve ever seen of it, from 1911:
And I found this one from 1914 that shows the track in clear detail:
How about that? Stunning.
5. Speed Limit: “‘ders kids playin’ aht ‘der n’at!” MPH
I’ve never seen one of these signs before, but I love it so much. (Click the photo to watch the TikTok because embedding it wasn’t working correctly)
If a local company wanted to make a kajillion dollars, they’d sell these things:
… but make them reflective neon yellow, have the hat say n’at, the flag be a city of Pittsburgh flag, and the text read “Yinz Jags Better Slow Dahn!” I have so many good ideas. Why don’t any of you ever do them??
6. A few final things!
—I occasionally check in on the Hays bald eagle cam and enjoy watching the parents tuck in their two eggs and wiggle on top of them to make sure they’re snug as bugs. Drag the time bar around to find some action and you’ll spot the eggs.
—I’ve reorganized the artifacts listing on the Pittsburgh Remains to be Seen website, grouping them by area of the city to make it easier to navigate. Check it out!
—I’ve been nominated in the Pittsburgh Magazine Best of the Burgh awards as favorite local writer. If you’re the voting kind and wish to, you can vote here.
7. That’s all!
Sorry for the rapid-fire nature today! Some weeks, that’s all I have time for. Have a lovely week, enjoy the sun, be kind, and most importantly, email me if you know where that Alcoa door is so I can let Nicolas Cage know.
For no particular reason.*