How does Glenside represent "America the Beautiful"? That is the design question Arcadia University set for the new mural on the Keswick Avenue SEPTA bridge. This fall, a team of volunteers is answering it in paint on both sides of the underpass.
The Keswick Avenue and Easton Road underpasses do more than carry trains. They are the doorways into downtown Glenside, and both carry community murals. Art on a working rail bridge does not last forever. When SEPTA rebuilds the steel, the community has to remake the paint. The mural going up at Keswick Avenue this October and early November is the newest round of that cycle.
What the 2025 bridge work left behind
The work started with SEPTA. In February 2025, Glenside Local reported that repairs at the North Easton Road underpass would be followed by a Keswick Avenue bridge replacement, with all of it expected to be finished by early June. The heaviest stretch came in late May. Work ran from Monday, May 19 through Friday, May 30. Buses replaced rail service from Friday, May 23 until the end of the service day on Monday, May 26, while crews swapped out the bridge's superstructure.
The trains came back. The art did not come through as well. The Glenside Civic Association said, as Glenside Local reported, that the existing Keswick murals needed "significant restoration" after that summer's bridge repairs. Arcadia University's announcement added that a garden at the Keswick underpass had been lost to SEPTA construction. The plan calls for volunteers to replace it with native perennials.
A small grant tied to a national anniversary
The money came through Campus250, a regional program for America's 250th anniversary in 2026. Campus Philly runs it with the Philadelphia Higher Education Network for Neighborhood Development, known as PHENND. Arcadia's Division of Civic and Global Engagement received $7,500 to restore and create murals at two SEPTA underpasses. The Campus250 program page lists 31 funded projects and more than $125,000 awarded across the region. Glenside's grant is one modest piece of that. The grants are paid for by the Philadelphia Funder Collaborative for the Semiquincentennial.
Campus250 funds partnerships between colleges and their neighbors, and that is how this project is built. The Glenside Civic Association is the community partner, and Abington and Cheltenham townships are both involved. Dr. Alison LaLond Wyant, executive director of Civic and Global Engagement, explained the aim in Arcadia's announcement. Neighbors and students would "not only participate directly in design sessions and volunteer days, but will also enjoy the murals as permanent community landmarks, deepening their sense of connection to place."
Designed at Grey Towers, approved in Cheltenham
The Civic Association put the project's formal title, "Glenside the Beautiful: Arcadia Celebrates the Semiquincentennial with Public Art," in its call for residents. "Community input is essential to this project, and we invite you to help shape the design," the association said, as Glenside Local reported in February. The design session took place Wednesday, February 18, from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. at Arcadia's Grey Towers Castle.
Arcadia planned the sessions to be hands-on. Tables would be covered in brown paper, with crayons for small groups to sketch ideas and talk them through. The idea was for residents to shape the first draft before any artist refined it.
The design then went through township review. In August, Cheltenham Township's Public Affairs Committee discussed the mural. According to the committee agenda, the Board of Commissioners would consider a resolution approving the final design at its meeting on Wednesday, August 19. Glenside Local's August coverage included a rendering of one side of the bridge.
The schedule moved by a season
Arcadia's original plan aimed the whole project at a familiar local date. Here is how that plan compares with the work as it is happening now.
| Step | Arcadia's plan, November 2025 | As scheduled in 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Planning meetings | January | Underway by the February announcement |
| Community design | February and March sessions | February 18 at Grey Towers Castle |
| Draft feedback | Glenside Arts Festival, end of April | Final design before Cheltenham's board, August 19 |
| Painting | Starting in May | Priming October 3 and 4, painting through early November |
| Finish line | By July 2026 | No completion date announced |
The July target had a specific reason. LaLond Wyant said in the announcement that "it will be great to have the mural at the Easton Road underpass restored in time for the annual Glenside 4th of July Parade, which marches right through that underpass." The 2026 parade stepped off Saturday, July 4, at 4 p.m., according to the Patch event listing. The Keswick painting is now landing in the fall. In a project that needs approval from two townships, sits on a working rail line, and depends on volunteers, a slip of a few months is ordinary.
The older sibling at Easton Road
The Keswick mural follows a precedent on the same rail line. The Easton Road underpass carries artist David Guinn's mural, which his portfolio lists as Bits and Pieces, 2018, at Easton Road and Glenside Avenue. It credits the lighting installation to Sasha Anistratova and lists Arcadia University, Cheltenham Township and SEPTA as sponsors. Arcadia dates the start of that work to its 2017 Public Art Project and has a photo of community members painting at the overpass that year.
The same community-built approach shaped that mural. Glenside Local's 2019 profile of Guinn explained that his Arcadia Public Art Project murals were painted on a wallpaper-like surface and then carefully glued to the wall. Guinn, now Arcadia's Arts Event and Marketing Coordinator, is leading the Easton Road restoration under the same grant. In Arcadia's announcement he said, "At its roots the mural is a story of Glenside, and we want to continue to tell that story to reinforce our shared local heritage."
That makes Easton Road the model for Keswick Avenue. Easton Road was a community-painted mural on a SEPTA bridge, with Arcadia as the organizer and the townships as partners, and it is now due for a restoration. The new Keswick mural starts the same life with the same partners.
Picking up a brush, or just walking past
According to the Civic Association's call, as reported by Glenside Local on October 2, painting runs through October and into early November. Volunteers need to know a few things:
- Age: Volunteers must be 14 or older for this phase. The association said younger Glenside residents will have chances to take part at later stages.
- Experience: None is required. The mural team directs volunteers, with tasks for a range of experience and comfort levels.
- Sign-up: The association has asked for "lots of helping hands for painting" and is taking volunteers through a sign-up form linked in the Glenside Local article.
The announcement set no completion date. Glenside Local and the Glenside Civic Association are the places to watch for remaining volunteer days and any word that the work is finished.
At Diane Reddington, we watch the shared spaces that make a place feel like home, and this mural is being built by neighbors. If you would like to talk about Glenside and the community projects that shape it, Let's Connect.
