Pittsburgh’s Bridges and Tunnels

Bruce Cridlebaugh created an amazing and authoritative reference guide to Pittsburgh’s bridges and tunnels. He documents both the historical legacy and the current structures. His website is thoughtfully organized and the information is meticulously researched.

Tired doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel after this week…
if you live in Pittsburgh you bound to come across a bridge or a tunnel ever time you go somewhere…
I like walking over a bridge over the waters and looking down at my reflection below and dropping a pebbles in the water… just because… I also like tunnels… the light’s on the walls that shin on the windows of the car as you drive past… the darkness… the mysteriousness of everything and the endlessness of the tunnel… how weird am i for having so much fun going through Pittsburgh bridges and tunnels!

If you’re in Pittsburgh, you’re going to experience our bridges (and tunnels) — we are, after all, «The City of Bridges». We need to be, given how many waterways and even hills we deal with in the area.
I’ve definitely seen some debate on whether or not we have the highest number of bridges in a city — whether this is true or not seems to depend on what people classify as a bridge (i.e. pedestrian, auto, both, etc.). But no matter how we slice it, we have a LOT of them — and a huge array of them. The original wood bridges that started going up in the 1800s are long gone, but over the last hundred years or so our city built many, many more to replace and add onto the originals. Drive around the city and you’ll find suspension bridges, cantilever bridges, arch bridges, and more — and many of them were built from locally-​produced steel, a great tie-​in to the city’s history. Whether you live in the area or you’re just visiting, you won’t go far without hearing something about our bridges — it could be trivia, or it could be news about how the bridges will be used for an art project (I’m looking at you, Warhol yarn bombing!).
And in addition to our bridges, we have a lot of tunnels. A lot. Some are abandoned and rarely used, particularly where old railroad tricks used to run, but others are used quite often — and honestly, on game days and during rush hour, they’re the bane of my existence. The tunnels aren’t nearly as much fun as our bridges. In fact given our traffic patterns, they’re worth avoiding if you can do it!
I won’t go as far as to say our bridges are perfect — our tunnels certainly aren’t — but they are a huge part of our city’s history and even our culture now. And I’m admittedly not sure how to end a review about bridges and tunnels, so I’m going to bow out here!

Pittsburghs bridges and tunnels are defining features of this big town. Paris gets props for a few neat bridges. I’ve been there. They’re lovely. And our bridges are every bit as romantic, beautiful, and picturesque.

Pittsburgh has the most elegant bridges I’ve seen — there’s over 900 bridges spanning mostly over the Allegheny River and Ohio River. There’s a lot of interesting history about each bridge and the city does a great job maintaining the beauty of these structures.