Construction on Charles Anderson Bridge in Oakland to begin
By Hallie Lauer / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
About 20 months after Pittsburgh closed the Charles Anderson Memorial Bridge in Oakland — and just days after the closure of another Oakland bridge — a major portion of the rehabilitation project is scheduled to begin soon.
City officials closed the historic overpass in February 2023, citing safety concerns and inspection reports that said the bridge needed repairs.
At the time, officials had estimated that those repairs would take about four months to be completed, but further inspections showed the need for more repairs than initially anticipated.
During that same time frame, disputes over where the funding for the rehabilitation would come from pushed Mayor Ed Gainey and his administration to lobby the Southwestern Pennsylvania Committee and the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation to move the Charles Anderson Bridge up on the list of bridges that needed repairs.
“Getting that money moved forward was monumental,” said City Councilwoman Barb Warwick, at a ceremonial groundbreaking Monday morning. Some aspects of the construction have already started, Ms. Warwick said, but those have not been visible. Soon, though, construction on the deck of the bridge — the portion that cars drive on — will begin.
Since the closure, the Charles Anderson Bridge has remained open to pedestrians, but starting Nov. 4, the bridge will be closed entirely as construction on the top of the bridge begins, said Eric Setzler, the Department of Mobility and Infrastructure’s chief engineer.
Prior to its closure, the bridge carried about 21,200 cars, trucks and buses across the ravine via the Boulevard of the Allies daily — all of which have had to navigate a new route around Oakland, only further complicated by the recent closure of the Panther Hollow Overpass, which is less than half a mile away from the Charles Anderson Bridge.
“It certainly makes it challenging to drive through Schenley Park right now,” Mr. Setzler said.
The rehabilitation of the Charles Anderson Bridge is expected to cost around $56 million and be completed by spring 2026. When it reopens, the bridge will include widened sidewalks and a bike lane.
“In this city, we can’t get [anywhere] without bridges,” Mr. Gainey said at the groundbreaking.
Mr. Gainey was just days into his mayoral administration when the Fern Hollow Bridge collapsed, prompting a citywide review of all its bridges. Since the collapse, the city has made strides to improve the quality of the bridges and said the closure of the Panther Hollow Overpass was due to “an abundance of caution.”
The Panther Hollow Overpass was rated as being in fair condition in a 2022 report. When Larson Design Group, an engineering firm the city contracts with to perform bridge inspections, was updating an analysis of the bridge, it “had some concerns,” Mr. Setzler said Monday.
The concerns came while the group was doing an analysis on the steel trusses of the bridge, “but we don’t have a lot of details right now,” Mr. Setzler said.
The Larson Group is continuing to do further analysis of the bridge.
The Panther Hollow Overpass was built in 1896, and Mr. Setzler said he believed the last rehabilitation on the bridge was done in 1999.
The overpass was less frequently used than the Charles Anderson Bridge, but was a key detour route for people in Oakland, and the groundbreaking ceremony was even partially delayed because some attendees struggled to navigate the closed bridges.
Mr. Gainey said he understood that some people would likely be frustrated at the additional congestion on Forbes Avenue and increased travel time for people following the detours.
“But the number one thing is that the bridge is going to be fixed,” Mr. Gainey said. “There will be a temporary inconvenience, but the reality is we don’t have to wake up and wonder if a bridge is going to fall.”