Pittsburgh hires bicycle director with wealth of metro experience
Mayor Bill Peduto made his intentions clear in June after his biking trek to Denmark: “Pittsburgh will become a cycling mecca.”
He laid those expectations at the feet of an accomplished California architect who he said on Tuesday can help steer Pittsburgh into its next wave of thoughtful urban design.
Carrying a backpack and wearing boots, Kristin Saunders, 30, mingled with cycling enthusiasts and city leaders from around the nation at the 2014 Pro Walk Pro Bike Pro Place Conference at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown.
She sported a dual name tag — half city of Pittsburgh, half San Francisco, where for the past three years she helped construct shared public ways and developed pilot bike lanes with local coalitions.
Saunders tucked a strand of blond hair back as she talked about finding an apartment in the North Side or South Side. A row house, she hopes, with an arching bridge between her and City Hall.
The St. Louis native accepted a job with the city last week. Her $51,055 salary as bicycle and pedestrian coordinator comes from the city's operating budget, spokesman Tim McNulty said. She's scheduled to begin Oct. 1.
“If we had our way, she'd be here now,” said city planning director Ray Gastil, who joined Peduto's team in April.
The pair joined revelers at this week's conference where Peduto held court among visiting mayors in a roundtable on Tuesday.
“I have a lot to learn, but this conference is definitely a jump-start,” Saunders said afterward. “You don't usually get this kind of introduction to a new job.”
BikePGH executive director Scott Bricker ran into Saunders in a breakout session focused on innovative solutions to connect the new Penn Avenue bikeway to Point State Park.
“Obviously, we're pumped,” Bricker said, “It means a lot that the city was able to fill that kind of important position as quickly as they did.”
Chosen from a pool of nearly 40 in an interview process that took less than two months, Saunders replaces Stephen Patchan, who left the post mid-June for a position with the Southern California Association of Governments.
Gastil said he and Saunders will continue working toward a new complete streets policy, incorporating all aspects of bicycling, pedestrian and automobile transit, last updated in the 1950s. They want to fulfill Peduto's promise to install five miles of protected bike lanes in two years and connect existing trails to protected bike lanes yet to come. Fifty bike share stations are going up across the city this fall in preparation for a 2015 Earth Day launch.
“One of the reasons we're excited Kristin is joining us now is because she brings such a strong design background,” Gastil said. “That's something we looked for.”
Saunders earned an architecture degree from the University of Kansas and spent four years working in Seattle before moving to the San Francisco area in 2011.
The Pro Walk Pro Bike Pro Place conference was a perfect place to begin making a switch, she said.
“We've got some big challenges,” Saunders said. “It should be a fun ride.”
Megan Harris is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. Reach her at 412-388-5815 or mharris@tribweb.com.
