For a quarter of a century, the silhouetted images of four geese have adorned the top of the outbound side of the Tenth Street Bridge spanning the Monongahela and connecting the South Side to Second Avenue at the Armstrong Tunnels.

The geese look vaguely like dinosaurs lumbering across the suspension bridge’s yellow background if you squint. They were painted by artist Tim Kaulen in the middle of the night as traffic to and from the South Side cruised four lanes many stories below.

It was no wonder that the geese became symbols of both youthful ingenuity and the ongoing vitality of the city’s artistic community in the face of decline and deindustrialization. It was forward-looking even as the mills and factories that once dominated the landscape shut down with the regularity of fading stars.

It was as if such a modest piece of public art was screaming to those with the courage to look up from the potholes as they drove over the bridge that extinction was not a foregone conclusion. Pittsburgh was still home to many creative individuals and would welcome others with a similar bent. The city was more than the sum total of its shuttered steel mills and smokestacks.

Last summer, major renovation work began on the crumbling Tenth Street Bridge for the first time in decades. And though the economic decline that made the bridge an unlikely canvas for regional aspiration 25 years ago has been reversed, now that Pittsburgh regularly tops lists of America’s most livable cities, a smoothing away of the rough edges of much of its industrial character has commenced.

The now-iconic geese atop the Tenth Street Bridge face the prospect of being painted over — erased from the narrative of the city’s revitalization as if it were a common eyesore lacking any meaning or historic connection to the region.

Mr. Kaulen — now 52 and a million years removed from a time when he would willingly scale more than 100 feet of bridge at night to make an artistic statement without the consent of local authorities — has started an online petition: Go to thepetitionsite.com and type “Save the 10th Street Geese” in the search box. https://www.thepetitionsite.com/401/781/788/save-the-10th-street-geese/

Addressed to the City of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, the petition drafted by Mr. Kaulen asks those sympathetic to the cause to respectfully appeal for the preservation of the work. “The artwork … has been documented and recorded as part of Pittsburgh’s landscape. The painting is understood to be an important landmark, specific to Pittsburgh’s image of revitalization. By preserving the artwork, and its symbolic gesture of resilience and the spirit of the local arts community, the City of Pittsburgh will be once again recognized for its commitment to public art and expression.”

Hundreds of names and comments from Pittsburghers and folks in the region are already on the petition. Mr. Kaulen would like to see more signatures and comments on the petition in advance of his meeting with representative from the city and Allegheny County in two weeks to discuss the issue.

Mr. Kaulen is a renowned regional artist whose metal sculptures, photography and paintings have been exhibited far and wide in galleries and museums. He made it clear that his motivation for the petition isn’t rooted in either ego or nostalgia.

“I’m not trying to preserve my art ‘right or wrong,’” the soft-spoken artist said. “I’m asking the decision-makers if there’s room to value something that has cultural meaning to so many people. Is there room in the 20-plus year span this has existed to say all these steps, including public art, were significant? People recognize what this transformation was all about and where it came from.”

Mr. Kaulen’s argument makes sense to those who don’t dismiss the piece out of hand as vandalism or daredevil graffiti. He smartly compared the bridge renovation to what happens when a construction project gets underway. Since contractors are obligated to check what’s in the soil and what they’re building on before they start digging, Mr. Kaulen wants to have a similar discussion about the four geese and the fate of public art.

“These [geese] resonate with the public and the petition represents that,” Mr. Kaulen said. “I’ve done all sorts of public art and have never gotten this response,” he said, admitting that he didn’t anticipate such strong support from such a wide cross-section when he mounted the petition. He’s heartened by the comments.

“It doesn’t have an art value — it has a cultural value that’s important to people,” he said. “It doesn’t land on the scale of monetary value. It lives in people’s experience.”

“I understand the importance of restoring the bridge and its architecture,” Mr. Kaulen said. “I don’t want to be disrespectful to Allegheny County or the city because they have the greater responsibility for maintaining public safety,” he said, adding that he doesn’t advocate artists doing today what he did two decades ago.

Mr. Kaulen suspects the support for the art may prompt the authorities to offer him space elsewhere, closer to ground level, to reproduce the images. He’s not interested.

“There are a number of solutions that would be cost effective that would preserve the art and beautify the space,” he said adding that he’s willing to repaint them and donate his own labor and material to do it right. He just wants to have a discussion. “These geese go much deeper than a single individual’s creative output.”

Tony Norman: tnorman@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1631.

First Published: June 15, 2018, 4:00 a.m.