How to find us

Getting to Pittsburgh

Carnegie Mellon is located in Pittsburgh, the metropolitan center of Western Pennsylvania, at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela river. Many roads (and many bridges!) lead here, but for people coming from more than ~300 miles away, Pittsburgh International Airport (PIT) remains the most common arrival and departure point.

The airport is located about 20 miles west of the city, and multiple options for ground transport exist:

• Public transport via the Pittsburgh Port Authority Busline 28X. Here is a detailed schedule that also lists fares and stops. The bus departs from the lower level at the landside terminal (where the baggage claim is); follow the signs for “public transport”. The bus ride to CMU takes approximately 1 hour. The stop for Carnegie Mellon is called “Morewood Avenue“. Get off there, turn right into Morewood Ave, walk one block (it bends a bit to the right), and you arrive right at the main entrance of Carnegie Mellon.
• Taxies are located at the lower level of the landside terminal (where the baggage claim is); follow the sign for “Taxi”. The fare is abour $40, and the ride to CMU takes approximately 30 minutes.
• Uber and Lyft also serve the airport; they are located at the lower level of the landside terminal (where the baggage claim is); follow the sign for “Uber/Lyft”. A ride is usually a bit cheaper than a normal taxi, but it also varies more, depending on time and demand. The trip to CMU takes approximately 30 minutes.
• If you need a car while in Pittsburgh, you can rent one at the airport. Several agencies are located at the central region on the the lower level of the landside terminal. Here’s a Google Maps Link with the directions from PIT to CMU. The ride to CMU takes approximately 30 minutes.

Getting to Carnegie Mellon

Getting to the Physics Building: Wean Hall

The Department of Physics is housed in Wean Hall—a big beige brutalist concrete building on the main campus. The picture on top of this webpage is a view of Wean Hall, taken from a south-east vantage point.

• If you arrive at Carnegie Mellon by public transport or taxi, you are typically dropped off at the main entrance on Forbes Ave, north of a grassy area known as “the cut”, between the main administrative building “Warner Hall” to the east and the “Cohon University Center” to the west. You will also see a large art installation called “Walking to the Sky“, showing people walking up an inclined steel rod. From here walk south, into campus, until you see the US flag, and shortly after it, “The Fence“.  From there, bear right onto another grassy area known as “the mall”. Wean Hall appears shortly after on the right. The easiest way to enter Wean is under the huge bulging concrete box that protudes from it (and which houses our biggest lecture hall). Entering Wean from there, you will be on the fifth (!) floor. Incidentally, past the entrance you find “La Prima Espresso“, where you can get good coffee and a variety of pastries, in case your journey has left you hungry and decaffeinated.
• If you park at the East Campus garage, you need to make your way to the center of campus. You can exit the garage to the south, walk around the west end of the Tartan’s sports field, until you finally meet a bigger east-west walkway. Turn right, walk past the tennis courts on your left, then bear left towards the US flag, and past it towards “The  Fence“. There, bear right onto another grassy area known as “the mall”. Wean Hall appears shortly after on the right. The easiest way to enter Wean is under the huge bulging concrete box that protudes from it (and which houses our biggest lecture hall). Entering Wean from, you will be on the fifth (!) floor. Incidentally, past the entrance you find “La Prima Espresso“, where you can get good coffee and a variety of pastries, in case your journey has left you hungry and decaffeinated.
• If you parked in the Gates Garage, there are two ways to get to the Department of Physics. Either exit through the entrance you came with your car, walk across towards the big beige building (Wean Hall). The pedestrian entrance is about a hundred feet to the right. Going in, through two glass doors, you get to the central elevators. If you take the elevator to the 7th floor, that’s where the Physics Department Head office is. Alternatively, you can take an elevator from inside the Gates Garage, which after taking it up to the 4th floor will get you to inside the Gates building. There is ample signage to find to Wean from there, but it’s too tedious to describe here…

Finding us in Wean Hall

The 4-digit room numbers in Wean Hall encode a hidden Cartesian coordinate system: the first number is the floor, the second number the corridor, and the remaining two numbeers count along any corridor.

The Department of Physics is located on floors 6, 7, and 8 of Wean Hall, mostly in the 300 and 400 corridors. The office of the Department Head secretary is in WeH 7325. The offices of most Biophysics faculty are on the 6th floor, in either the 300 or 400 corridor. Other useful room numbers are: the mail room is in WeH 7322, and the stock room is in WeH 7415.

Delivering to Wean Hall

If you need things delivered to Wean Hall, especially if they are a bit more bulky, you will want to direct the delivery people to the loading dock of Wean Hall, which is on the eastern side of its northern face.

The easiest way to find it is to actually search for the entrance to the Gates Garage, which is just opposite of the loading dock. The following Google Maps Link leads all the way to the garage. The delivery crew can also try to put “CMU Gates Parking Garage” into the GPS or Google maps, but the official address given might not lead directly to the garage. To be safe, the following two maps should illustrate the tricky end part of the journey, for the case that the driver is comming from Fifth Avenue.