Designs for the West End Bridge’s new pedestrian and bicycle access are expected to be finalized by the end of this year and are on track to be constructed within the decade.
Local development nonprofit Riverlife presented updated designs for the bridge’s new access structures at a public meeting on Wednesday, March 13. The plans were first shown at a December 2023 meeting, where architect El Dorado and local partners presented two distinct design strategies: “journey” and “destination.” The first design prioritized swift movement to and from the bridge, while the latter turned the spaces into community hubs.
At the meeting, Daniel Renner — El Dorado’s director of design excellence — said community feedback influenced the team to merge both concepts.
“It was really about taking the good qualities of both and tying them together,” Renner says.
In its new form, the Manchester end of the bridge will feature a spiral ramp with a central park space for community gatherings, while the two West End sites will be simpler ramps that lead into the neighborhood’s business district.
Project partner Nina Chase, co-founder and principal of landscape architect Merritt Chase, said the West End sites create a “front porch” for the neighborhood.
At the end of last year, “the West End neighborhood said very clearly that Main Street and the business district is the destination, not these access structures, so we want to facilitate those connections as best we can with future work after the structures themselves are built,” Chase said.
For community members in attendance, the pedestrian pathways that connected to the bridge and its new access structures were a point of contention. Renner said crosswalk additions at the bridge’s West End terminus are being considered but would require traffic studies to understand safety and viability.
Kelly Frey commented that the old railroad tunnel that is planned to connect the access structure to the West End neighborhood is currently underlit and secluded.
Gavin White, Riverlife’s director of planning and projects, agreed with the concerns but said the current funding and scope are limited to the West End Bridge sites.
He added that a future project could turn the area into a park with additional lighting that continues through the tunnel.
“We’re particularly excited about this idea that you could have the same sort of Fort Pitt moment … coming through this tunnel and bearing out toward the West End Bridge and the city,” White says. “What is now an unknown and — at best — unsafe space could be really an exceptional part of walking and biking around the city.”
