 Looking up Canton Avenue. | |
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| Location | Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States |
|---|---|
| South end | Coast Avenue |
| North end | Hampshire Avenue |
Canton Avenue is a street in Pittsburgh's Beechview neighborhood which is the steepest officially recorded public street in the United States. [1] [2] [3]
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Canton Avenue is 630 ft (190 m) long (the hill is about 213 feet long) and is claimed to include a 37% grade 21 feet (6.4 m) long. [4] [5] [6] The Guinness Book of World Records uses a 10m section to define the world's steepest street, currently held by Baldwin Street, in Dunedin, New Zealand, with a gradient of 34.8%. [7] This record is disputed; Pittsburgh news and international media have claimed Canton Avenue is the steepest street in the world. [8] [9] [10] The United States record is also disputed, as Bradford Street in San Francisco includes a 39% grade nine meters long [11] and Waipio Valley Road has sections as steep as a 45% grade. [12] [13] [14] [15] Additionally, the steepest paved mile by average and maximum grade is Lincoln Gap, Vermont with 15% and 25% respectively.
In March 2016 Canton Avenue was the subject of a commercial, [16] featuring freeskier Bene Mayr, snowboarder Heikki Sorsa, downhill mountain biker Aaron Gwin, and racing driver Mattias Ekström for the Audi Quattro A4 automobile. [8] [17]
