Construction of Pittsburgh's second protected bike lane is underway. It runs from Schenley Plaza to Anderson Playground in Schenley Park.
Rendering: alta Planning + Design, from https://pittsburghpa.gov

From Sept. 8-11, Pittsburgh hosted the Pro Walk, Pro Bike, Pro Place conference, which drew some 1,000 city planners, transportation engineers, public health advocates, elected officials and community leaders.

The conference is all about creating greater access to walking and bicycling, initiatives that Pittsburgh officials are working to further incorporate in their city. Toward that a aim, Pittsburgh has just hired California architect Kristin Saunders to continue the city's complete streets work, whose goal is to have bicyclists, pedestrians and vehicles sharing the streets.

Over the last three years, Saunders has helped construct "shared public ways" and developed pilot bike lanes in San Francisco. Saunders, a St. Louis native, earned her architecture degree from the University of Kansas, spent four years working in Seattle before moving to the San Francisco area in 2011.

Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto and city officials have been working with nonprofit Bike Pittsburgh to pursue both creative and proven solutions that increase biking and walking. The mayor seeks to have five miles of protected bike lanes installed over the next two years, and connect existing trails to the planned protected bike lanes. Two-way bike lanes, the first for the city, are already installed on Penn Avenue in downtown Pittsburgh. Fifty bike-share stations will be in place by this fall.