Neville Island, PA
General Description (1919 report):
"With the opening of the war it was soon determined that it would be advisable to construct a large gun foundry and shell finishing plant to be owned by the Government. Accordingly an agreement was entered into with the United States Steel Corporation to construct such a plant, which would produce cannon of the largest size for use either in Europe or for coast protection at home.
"On account of the enormous size and weight of these guns and the amount of material needed a centralized but protected location was necessary, which on general principles would be established and maintained in the heart of the iron and coal region a safe distance from the coast and available for either railroad or river transportation. Accordingly Neville Island, adjacent to Pittsburgh, Pa., was selected as a site for a plant.
"Neville Island comprises a township of Allegheny County, Pa., and is an island 6 miles long and from one-third to one-half mile wide, lying in the Ohio River 2 miles from the corporate lines of the city of Pittsburgh, Pa. "
1919 excerpt describing the design of the Neville Island site:
Area planned:
500 acres. Housing planned for 2,000 families.
Corapolis site- Area planned: 15.16 acres. Housing planned: Detached houses, 32 families; semidetached houses, 34 families; row houses, 9 families.
Total, 75 families.
"The principal housing site recommended by the investigating committee lies adjacent to and paralleling Neville Island on the south bank of the Ohio River ... Among the reasons for selecting the site was the fact that the Neville Island Factory was to be a permanent industrial plant, demanding a permanent town serving the plant, but independent of it and comfortable and convenient... with a sufficient area for the location of 5,000 to 10,000 houses and a possible population of 100,000 people...
"The street plan as here illustrated grew naturally from meeting the necessities of the case; access to the upper land from the plant and from the city of Pittsburgh, and utilization of all the land possible in the upper area for housing without excessive street grading or lot grading. The topographic conditions were so severe that no regularity or apparent design of street layout on plan was practicable or reasonable... To get even tolerable results, economic or aesthetic, under these circumstances, particularly when speed is essential, the work must be studied at first hand on the ground.
"The Housing Corporation appointed its committee of designers, constructed offices for them on the ground, authorized them to collect their office and field forces,and the design had come to the general conception here shown and some actual preliminary construction work and shipping of materials was under way when the armistice suddenly ended the whole venture in midcourse.
"To call the Neville project a housing development would be to use too limited a name. The magnitude of the necessity called for the construction of a first-class city."
The Neville Island Site Today
