School is out for summer, and for many Pittsburghers, that means more time spent outside: swimming in neighborhood pools, walking shaded trails or biking along the city’s rivers.
Programs like Pittsburgh Park Conservancy’s Outside Voices cohort, geared toward Homewood teens, are equipping students with the experience and skills needed to take advantage of these warm-weather spaces. Students in the program have spent the spring fishing in Lake Carnegie, forest bathing in Squirrel Hill and trying out POGOH’s fleet of e-bikes.
Neil Walker led the cohort’s bike ride from the South Side to Point State Park last month. He’s a Homewood native and certified cycling instructor with the League of American Bicyclists.
“I built a bicycle and it became something that allowed me to get out of my community, go places and see things,” Walker said. “It really allowed me to expand my worldview.”
On his bike, Walker saw other communities in Pittsburgh for the first time, visited the Carnegie museums in Oakland and attended his first baseball game.
“Now I’m starting to see different things,” he added. “Now my imagination comes into play and I’m just imagining going places and doing things.”
The ride was 14-year-old Curtis Bumpass’s first time on the trails. The Westinghouse Academy rising sophomore said he will miss exploring nature with his peers in Outside Voices after the program finishes this month.
Students in the program, based at the Homewood-Brushton YMCA, spent three months participating in nature-based learning, as well as public space revitalization efforts concentrated on nearby Baxter Park.
The cohort coincides with the Park Conservancy’s redevelopment plan for Baxter, located along Frankstown Avenue. City officials and the Park Conservancy finalized an improvement plan for the park last year, and are now moving into the permitting and design phase.