These steps are in good condition, and form a vital link between Telescope Street and Stella Street.
There is one small point that should be address in the coming years. There is a retaining wall from an adjacent property that is leaning dangerously towards the steps. In time this may take down the railing on that side, and may even damage the steps themselves. I don’t know what the process is to have this fixed, but the property owner should be contacted.
Common to many older steps in Pittsburgh they have bridges that at one time probably linked these steps to entrances of adjacent residences, now gone. In this case these bridges have been blocked off with steel pipes welded across them, easy to duck under if you want to.
View from the top.
Although these steps are safe to climb, with good stair treads and sturdy railings, of significant note is that the entrance from Josephine Street onto Telescope Street is profoundly dangerous, both on foot and driving. If you are traveling west on Josephine Street you need to make a left across oncoming traffic coming around a blind curve. If you are traveling East on Josephine Street you need to make a 175 degree right hand turn directly in front of whoever may be exiting Telescope Street. I can imagine that large vehicles are not capable of turning tightly enough to enter Telescope Street this way.
If you are exiting Telescope Street going East, you need to make a blind merge with cars traveling too fast up Josephine Street. And would not even want to consider the extreme risk of attempting to exit from Telescope Street on to Josephine Street going west. In all, there desperately needs to be warning signs, and probably a convex traffic mirror to improve the safety of the intersection of Telescope and Josephine Streets. If you visit these steps, I recommend that you do so only from Stella Street.
