Part of Downtown Pittsburgh's Grant Street to close over weekend for Christmas tree installation, decoration
Part of Downtown Pittsburgh’s Grant Street will be closed for portions of Saturday and Sunday as crews install and decorate the city’s official Christmas tree on the City-County Building’s portico.
Grant Street will be closed from Third Avenue to Fifth Avenue from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday while Forestry Division crews transport and install the tree, city officials said. On Sunday, the northbound travel lane closest to the City-County Building will be closed from 6:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. while crews finish decorating the tree.
Motorists can expect temporary delays and rolling traffic closures beginning at 7:30 a.m. along Route 28, Interstate 279, Fort Duquesne Bridge and Grant Street as the tree is delivered Downtown on Saturday.
The city’s 107th Christmas tree is a 40-foot blue spruce that was donated by Guardian Angels Catholic Parish of Natrona Heights from their Springdale campus.
Decorating an official Christmas tree dates back to 1914 when crews put up a tree at what was then the construction site of the City-County Building.
Julia Felton is a TribLive reporter covering Pittsburgh City Hall and other news in and around Pittsburgh. A La Roche University graduate, she joined the Trib in 2020. She can be reached at jfelton@triblive.com.
Remove the ads from your TribLIVE reading experience but still support the journalists who create the content with TribLIVE Ad-Free.