Remember When: Soon-to-be-demolished smokestack opened in 1970 at generating station in Springdale

On July 2, 1967, the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission approved the construction of a new power generating plant for Duquesne Light Co.

The Cheswick Generating Station in Springdale included what would be a 763-foot smokestack that became one of the Alle-Kiski Valley’s most recognizable structures when the facility opened in 1970.

Soon, the smokestack will be removed from the area’s landscape.

Scott Reschly, vice president of operations for Charah Solutions, said recently that the company’s demolition plans include dismantling the smokestack.

“It has been determined that the stack will be taken down, but the exact timing and sequence has not been finalized,” Reschly said. “Due to the length of the stack, it will be imploded in two steps.”

Charah Solutions, based in Louisville, Ky., bought the plant from previous owner GenOn Holdings. On June 10, 2021, GenOn Holdings announced it was closing the plant.

The Springdale station was the last coal-fired electric plant in Allegheny County when it was shut down April 1.

It ended a 102-year legacy of electrical power generation at that site.

The original Duquesne Light plant opened in 1920. It was fed by coal from the nearby Harwick mine. A railroad was laid along Tawney Run from the coal mine to the plant.

A bridge across Pittsburgh Street near the Cheswick-Springdale border was built to allow continuous coal delivery without interfering with daily traffic below.

The railroad line was part of the old Cheswick & Harmar Railroad. The old line ran 1.9 miles from the mine to the Pennsylvania Railroad along the Allegheny riverfront.

The other Cheswick & Harmar spur connected the mine with the Bessemer & Lake Erie Railroad that runs through Harmar after crossing the Allegheny River.

That spur was built in 1903 and ran through the Harwick neighborhood to the mine.

Remnants of the railroad bed run along the Route 28 Expressway near the Syria Mosque and in front of the Springdale Township municipal building, where the railroad bed is now a pedestrian walking trail.

The Harwick mine was the site of one of the nation’s biggest mining disasters Jan. 25, 1904. There were 179 miners and two aid workers who lost their lives in what remains the country’s 10th-largest disaster.

Another explosion that killed 10 workers took place Jan. 13, 1938.

Eventually, Duquesne Light took control of the mine and the rail spur. Duquesne Light closed the mine in 1970, and the railroad track was removed.

What remains of the railbed was documented by local filmmaker Frank Festa. The Cheswick & Harmar railbed is now the start of the Rachel Carson Trail.

Remediation work by Charah Solutions is expected to take 18 to 24 months. The work will include the Lefever Ash Landfill, located 3 miles northwest of the plant, and the Monarch Wastewater Treatment facility, located on 7 acres near the plant.

Long-term plans by Charah Solutions might include a renewable energy plant and related uses.