Vernon R. Covell was an American engineer. He was chief engineer of the Allegheny County Public Works Department.
A number of his works are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. [1]
Works include:
His leadership and relative contribution vis-a-vis others in one design project is discussed in a HAER document. [3]
He was author of "The Bridge-Raising Program on the Allegheny River in Allegheny County," an article in the Proceedings of the Engineers' Society of Western Pennsylvania41 (1925): 83, and author of "Erecting a Self-Anchored Suspension Bridge—Seventh Street Bridge at Pittsburgh," in the Engineering News-Record97 (1926): 502. [3]
Allegheny County is a county in Pennsylvania, United States. It is located in Southwestern Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 1,250,578, making it the state's second-most populous county, after Philadelphia County. Its county seat is Pittsburgh. Allegheny County is part of the Pittsburgh, PA metropolitan statistical area and the Pittsburgh media market.
The Monongahela River, sometimes referred to locally as the Mon, is a 130-mile-long (210 km) river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-central West Virginia and Southwestern Pennsylvania. The river flows from the confluence of its west and east forks in north-central West Virginia northeasterly into southwestern Pennsylvania, then northerly to Pittsburgh and its confluence with the Allegheny River to form the Ohio River. The river includes a series of locks and dams that makes it navigable.
Downtown Pittsburgh, colloquially referred to as the Golden Triangle, and officially the Central Business District, is the urban downtown center of Pittsburgh. It is located at the confluence of the Allegheny River and the Monongahela River whose joining forms the Ohio River. The triangle is bounded by the two rivers.
The Three Sisters are three similar self-anchored suspension bridges spanning the Allegheny River in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at 6th, 7th, and 9th streets, generally running north/south. The bridges have been given formal names to honor important Pittsburgh residents:
The Jones and Laughlin Steel Corporation began as the American Iron Company, founded in 1852 by Bernard Lauth and Benjamin Franklin Jones, a few miles south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River. Lauth's interest was bought in 1854 by James Laughlin. The first firm to bear the name of Jones and Laughlin was organized in 1861 and headquartered at Third & Ross in downtown Pittsburgh.
The Smithfield Street Bridge is a lenticular truss bridge crossing the Monongahela River in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA.
The Monongahela Incline is a funicular located near the Smithfield Street Bridge in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Designed and built by Prussian-born engineer John Endres in 1870, it is the oldest continuously operating funicular in the United States.
The Allegheny County Courthouse in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is part of a complex designed by H. H. Richardson. The buildings are considered among the finest examples of the Romanesque Revival style for which Richardson is well known.
The Liberty Bridge, completed in 1928, connects downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to the Liberty Tunnels and the South Hills neighborhoods beyond. It crosses the Monongahela River and intersects Interstate 579 at its northern terminus.
South Tenth Street Bridge, most often called the Tenth Street Bridge, but officially dubbed the Philip Murray Bridge, is a suspension bridge spanning the Monongahela River in Downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is the only cable suspension bridge in Allegheny County and its 725-foot (221 m) main span is the longest span on the Monongahela River. The bridge was renamed on Labor Day 2007 for Philip Murray, the first president of the United Steelworkers of America.
The Hot Metal Bridge is a truss bridge in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that crosses the Monongahela River. The bridge consists of two parallel spans on a single set of piers: the former Monongahela Connecting Railroad Bridge, built in 1887, on the upstream side and the former Hot Metal Bridge, built in 1900, on the downstream side. The Monongahela Connecting Railroad Bridge carried conventional railroad traffic, while the Hot Metal Bridge connected parts of the J&L Steel mill, carrying crucibles of molten iron from the blast furnaces in ladle transfer cars to the open hearth furnaces on the opposite bank to be converted to steel. During World War II 15% of America's steel making capacity crossed over the Hot Metal Bridge, up to 180 tons per hour. The upstream span was converted to road use after a $14.6 million restoration, and opened by Mayor Tom Murphy with a ceremony honoring former steel workers on June 23, 2000. The bridge connects 2nd Avenue at the Pittsburgh Technology Center in South Oakland with Hot Metal Street in the South Side. The downstream span reopened for pedestrian and bicycle use in late 2007 after two years of work. The Great Allegheny Passage hiker/biker trail passes over this bridge as it approaches Pittsburgh's Golden Triangle area.
The West End Bridge is a steel tied-arch bridge over the Ohio River in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, approximately 1 mile (1.6 km) below the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. It connects the West End to the Chateau neighborhood on the North Side of Pittsburgh.
Andy Warhol Bridge, also known as the Seventh Street Bridge, spans the Allegheny River in Downtown Pittsburgh. It is the only bridge in the United States named for a visual artist. It was opened at a cost of $1.5 million on June 17, 1926, in a ceremony attended by 2,000.
George Westinghouse Memorial Bridge in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, carries U.S. Route 30, the Lincoln Highway, over the Turtle Creek Valley near to where it joins the Monongahela River Valley east of Pittsburgh. The reinforced concrete open-spandrel deck arch bridge has a total length of 1,598 feet (487 m) comprising five spans. The longest, central span is 460 feet (140 m), with the deck height 240 feet (73 m) above the valley floor, for a time the world's longest concrete arch span structure. It cost $1.75 million. The design engineers were Vernon R. Covell and George S. Richardson, with architectural design by Stanley Roush. The pylons at the ends of the bridges feature Art Deco reliefs by Frank Vittor.
Pittsburgh, surrounded by rivers and hills, has a unique transportation infrastructure that includes roads, tunnels, bridges, railroads, inclines, bike paths, and stairways.
The Armstrong Tunnel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, connects Second Avenue at the South Tenth Street Bridge, under the Bluff where Duquesne University is located, to Forbes Avenue between Boyd Street and Chatham Square.
The Point Bridge was a steel cantilever truss bridge that spanned the Monongahela River in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Waddell & Harrington was an American engineering company that designed bridges from 1907 to 1915. It was formed in 1907 as a partnership of John Alexander Low Waddell (1854–1938) and John Lyle Harrington (1868–1942) and was based in Kansas City, Missouri, but had offices in Portland, Oregon, and Vancouver, British Columbia. The company designed more than 30 vertical-lift bridges for highways and railroads.
The Pittsburgh-Des Moines Steel Company, and often referred to as Pitt-Des Moines Steel or PDM was an American steel fabrication company. It operated from 1892 until approximately 2002 when its assets were sold to other companies, including Chicago Bridge & Iron Company. The company began as a builder of steel water tanks and bridges. It also later fabricated the "forked" columns for the World Trade Center in the 1960s, and was the steel fabricator and erector for the Gateway Arch in St. Louis. A number of its works are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
George Sherwood Richardson (1896–1988) was an American engineer known for his elegant bridges, innovative construction techniques and skillful planning of highways. Designer of many bridges in the Pittsburgh and Allegheny County areas in the 20th century, he has been called "the dean of Pittsburgh bridge engineers".