tiffehr:
Google Maps caught Chester County, PA in its mid-winter color scheme. When colonists moved into the land, apparently nobody felt like using a carving out a field with fewer than 5 sides. Four sides must have been too English.
Before living in Pittsburgh, I lived in Savannah, GA, for 4 years. Savannah was the first planned city in the United States. James Oglethorpe designed the city around a series of squares (small, public parks) distributed on a grid. Steer your horse toward the river, you’re going north. Toward the ocean, you’re going east. Pretty intuitive stuff, and within a month of having moved to Savannah, I knew my way around quite well.
Not so for Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh from the sky looks like Chester County viewed through a kaleidoscope while taking LSD from the sky. I’ve lived here for 9 years, and 95% of the time, I still don’t have the foggiest notion which way I’m pointed. No kidding.
Moreover, the Western Pennsylvania Cultural Heritage Road Naming Policy mandates that no curvilinear road may bear the same name for more than ¼ mile. If that sounds fun for getting and giving directions, consider the magnifying effects of Pennsylvania’s Confusing Signage Doctrine, initially established in the early 1400’s to repel potential invasion by Canadian steel trappers and maintained today in order to encourage the enclave-based settlement construction patterns favored by such city planning theorists and practitioners as Ryan Homes and Dr. Toll Brothers.
So 12 winding roads bearing 29 different names are strung together, labeled a color, and locally known as “belts.” Orange, red, yellow, green, blue, and purple. I live near the Green Belt. Don’t ask me for the street name - I couldn’t tell you if I wanted to. If I die here, an old man decades from now, I will still not know the precise location of Cranberry Township. I know you can get there by taking the Green Belt to Ingomar (road, township, or borough - I can’t recall), going left after the second sign for the Yellow Belt, staying on past Sorgel’s, crossing your fingers, saying three Our Fathers and spitting dip juice into a half-finished Mountain Dew can, and taking a hard right after the car wash near the Home Depot. Or maybe it’s a left. I’m not sure.
But you’ll know it when you get there. Good luck, call me if you get lost, and welcome to Pittsburgh.