Pittsburgh spending $2.6 million on landslide repairs

Pittsburgh officials on Wednesday announced the start of work on two landslides threatening streets in the West End and Squirrel Hill and said construction was progressing on two others in the North Side and Oakland.

The four landslides are costing the city an estimated $2.6 million.

Karina Ricks, executive director of the Department of Mobility and Infrastructure, said her department is gearing up to repair a fifth slide on Fallowfield Avenue in Beechview, which has been restricted to one lane.

Squirrel Hill’s Forward Avenue has been restricted to one lane of alternating traffic for one year because of a slide. The city has plans to build a $750,000 retaining wall designed to shore up the street.

Forward will close for about four months starting on Feb. 3.

The city also plans a $350,000 retaining wall along Greenleaf Street in Duquesne Heights.

The city in 2018 spent more than $1 million on Greenleaf repairing a massive slide that destroyed a home. A lawsuit filed against the city by homeowners Beth and Charles Butler is pending in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court.

Ricks said the street is sliding in a different area. Greenleaf will also close on Feb. 3 between Horner and Bradley streets for approximately four months.

Swinburne Street in Oakland has been closed since late October as workers repair a slide between Greenfield Avenue and Edgehill Street. The work is estimated at $630,000.

The North Side’s List Street has been closed since November during construction of a retaining wall. That job is costing the city an estimated $880,000.

Ricks said the city would soon begin construction on a landslide that is collapsing Fallowfield Avenue. She could not immediately provide a cost estimate.

She attributed the slides to a mix of hilly topography and record-setting rainfalls over the past few years. Pittsburgh is paying for remediation through capital budget allocations.