Is it possible to smile about anything when you read or hear "PennDOT construction" or "Fort Pitt Bridge and Tunnel work?"
Try these fun facts, tidbits and trivia. They'll help you to:
(a) impress family and friends
(b) win arguments at the bar
(c) pretend you're a PennDOT engineer
(d) know where your money goes
(e) all of the above
PennDOT's electric bill for lighting the Fort Pitt Tunnel and operating the huge ventilation fans was $197,840 for the last fiscal year.
The most-distant signs advising motorists that the outbound bridge and tunnel (Interstate 279) in Pittsburgh will be closed for repairs have been erected on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in the Somerset area.
About 700 new lights will be installed in each tunnel, approximately doubling the lighting levels and providing for "transition lighting" to help eyes adjust when entering and leaving the tunnels.
Trumbull Corp. of West Mifflin, prime contractor for the project, used more than a dozen people and spent $120,000 just to prepare its bid for PennDOT. The $84.2 million contract is the second biggest in Trumbull history. Its biggest, awarded to Trumbull last June, was $94.3 million to rebuild 12 miles of the Pennsylvania Turnpike in Somerset County.
Each side of the Fort Pitt Tunnel is 3,614 feet long. On average, 28 accidents occur in the tunnel per week, most of them minor.
The main span of the Fort Pitt Bridge is 640 feet long. The maximum height of the deck over river level is 47.1 feet, at a pier near Point State Park.
Contractors rehabilitating the tunnel and bridge will employ union members representing 11 crafts: carpenters, cement finishers, Teamsters, laborers, equipment operators, electricians, painters, sheet metal workers, plumbers, iron workers and brick layers.
About 2,700 directional, detour and other informational traffic signs have been installed for the Fort Pitt project.
The bridge is painted a color called Aztec Gold. The entire span will be repainted in the same color.
The Fort Pitt Bridge was opened to traffic in the spring of 1959 after three years of construction. The Fort Pitt Tunnel opened 15 1/2 months later.
More than 207,500 ceramic tiles, measuring 4 1/4-inches square, will be used to reline both tunnels. A dozen union craft workers are to apply a thin coat of mortar, then a special adhesive, and then set the tiles over a six-week period, working two shifts a day.
A computer-based "logic controller," using 24 fiber-optic cables running the length of both tunnels, is being installed. It will monitor microwave traffic detectors, tunnel ventilation, electrical and lighting systems, carbon monoxide, temperature, a closed-circuit TV system and a system to detect over-height trucks outside of the tunnel portals.
Seven "cross passages" are located between the inbound and outbound tunnels so people can escape from one side to the other in emergencies. Every cross passage has fire extinguishers.
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