A Downtown Pittsburgh sinkhole that ate a bus — and inspired everything from Halloween costumes to Christmas ornaments to cupcake design — has finally been repaired.
It took nearly nearly a year, tons of material and several hundred thousand dollars, but the city said Thursday that utilities and its crews finally finished repairing the 18-foot-deep hole that opened Oct. 28 and 10th Street has reopened to traffic. The 60-by-35-foot hole opened while a Port Authority bus was stopped at a traffic light and the rear of the bus fell into the hole.
No one was injured, but the incident kicked off a major repair effort that involved six utilities that had damage to underground facilities. The city and the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority split the public cost of $344,000, but it is unknown how much more the utilities paid for their work.
When the incident occurred, the city had hoped to have the street reopened within a few weeks. But utilities discovered serious problems under ground that had to be addressed while the street was open and that work was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Almost before the partially submerged bus could be removed merchants began using the image to decorate wine glasses, ornaments and T-shirts. Oakmont Bakery topped its cupcakes with a bus pointing skyward and at least one woman had it tattooed to her arm. And with the street collapse coming just before Halloween, it inspired a variety of homemade costumes.
The utilities that worked at the site included the water and sewer authority, Duquesne Light, Peoples Gas, Comcast, Verizon and Pittsburgh-Allegheny County Thermal, which runs a steam heating system for a series of buildings Downtown. The utility work included:
• Duquesne Light improving the street grid and replacing terra cotta conduit run between 3 manholes with new PVC ducts encased in reinforced concrete.
• Peoples Gas conducting a complete safety check and performed corrosion protection work on their existing steel pipeline.
• Comcast replacing conduit at the site and protecting their fiber optic system, which was secured during street restoration. Verizon secured and repaired its lines as well.
• Pittsburgh-Allegheny County Thermal removing water and soil from steam tunnels to clean and sanitize them; removing damaged concrete; repairing pipe supports and concrete anchors; and reinsulating the main steam line that sustained water damage or needed to be removed to make concrete and support repairs.
• PWSA clearing about 2,500 tons of debris from the 48-inch sewer running down 10th street to the Allegheny River outfall point, which included using a suction machine sitting on a river barge and a diver to remove debris from the river bed. The agency also installed a new bulkhead for a damaged manhole and finished the street repairs.
In all, public crews worked more than 1,100 hours on the project and used 746 tons of stone backfill to the sinkhole; poured about 395 tons of concrete; and replaced 2,097 square feet of bricks on the street.
In a news release, May Bill Peduto praised the work.
“This has been an incredibly challenging year for our city, nation and planet, and the 10th Street sinkhole represented everything 2020 has been about — danger, disruption and frustration, but ultimately solutions, due to a lot of hard work by people working together. I can’t thank our partners, and especially our Downtown residents and businesses, enough for their patience and understanding,” he said.
Ed Blazina: eblazina@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1470 or on Twitter @EdBlazina.
First Published: October 8, 2020, 4:41 p.m.
