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WBNS wrote
Downtown Street To Get $8 Million Makeover
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
City council agreed Monday night to spend more than $8 million to transform three blocks of S. Front Street into a pedestrian- and bicycle-friendly thoroughfare.
Construction work is expected to begin within a few months. Updated sewers and wheelchair ramps, decorative street lights and granite curbs are included in the work, which will involve the block between W. Town and W. Rich streets.
As part of the transformation plan, S. Front Street will also become a two-way street. The street will remain open to traffic during construction.
Comments
- cheap: i highly recommend the Millersport sweet corn festival of course,the cor
- Jimmy Mak: Thanks for the write-up! Just to clarify - this is the third year we've do
- Briana Henry: Well, eventually they plan to add more bands from the region...gotta start
- bucki12: I like the business model, but the internet sales part seems like something
- racheltb: I don't see the Ohio Shrimp Fest on the list. It is truly a good time. h
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South Front Street Revamp News & Updates
By: machew
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That’s great and all, but my part of Downtown is the densest, most-established, with plenty of greenery, beautiful historic homes & several apartment buildings (it’s already lovable), yet the city won’t dish out a couple thousand for new 25MPH signs to replace the current 35MPH signs on Town St. How about making this part of town safe for the 1000+ residents that have been living here vs residents-to-be in an empty quarter of Downtown? Hell, even Oak is 25MPH and most of it is parking lots with only a handful of homes on a blocks’ stretch of that street near the highway. I guess I forgot that I-70, I-670, Spring, Long, Broad, Main, Rich, and Mound just don’t provide enough east-west routes for cars to speed on.
25, 35, meh
Cops dont ticket till 40 anyway in a 25 usually.
To me, if the biggest thing you have to complain about is a 35mph speed limit on a fairly wide, main, thoroughfare in your neighborhood than things are going alright for you. I live right on high street (a gasp!, 35mph street!) and I feel perfectly safe walking, biking, and living there. cars, the people who drive them, and efficent transporation on our roadways are not the enemies here. people in cars are not out to get you and make your neighborhood unsafe and reign down all other kinds of terror and chaos by simply driving 35mph.
Agreed. Maybe this comes with age (I know that line pisses off people in their 20s: It pissed me off), but it takes a while to change an entire city, not to mention the general mindset of a huge population. I’m sure that hundreds-of-thousands of people would love to see that money go to their own communities as well. The reality is that Columbus is trying to make some changes, and they’re doing pretty well in my opinion. There are many things I would love to see changed (ahem, education) in this city. But at least we’re making some progress somewhere.
+1
The problem isn’t with 25 MPH vs 35 MPH two-way streets. The problem lies with synchronized one-way streets. It’s hard to drive 35 MPH on High Street where there’s a lot of two way traffic and a stop light every block or two. When you have cars averaging 15 MPH because of stop lights, it makes for a much more pedestrian-friendly atmosphere.
It’s easy to go 50MPH on Third or Fourth or Front where you have a five-lane one-way freeway with synchronized lights giving you no reason what-so-ever to even think about needing to stop. It’s hard to cross as a pedestrian, and the noise-levels and speed are much more bothersome.
I really don’t think making Town Street 25 instead of 35 is going to make much of a difference at all.
+1
The problem isn’t with 25 MPH vs 35 MPH two-way streets. The problem lies with synchronized one-way streets. It’s hard to drive 35 MPH on High Street where there’s a lot of two way traffic and a stop light every block or two. When you have cars averaging 15 MPH because of stop lights, it makes for a much more pedestrian-friendly atmosphere.
It’s easy to go 50MPH on Third or Fourth or Front where you have a five-lane one-way freeway with synchronized lights giving you no reason what-so-ever to even think about needing to stop. It’s hard to cross as a pedestrian, and the noise-levels and speed are much more bothersome.
I really don’t think making Town Street 25 instead of 35 is going to make much of a difference at all.
Have they changed 3rd and 4th since 2002? When I lived there, they were timed perfectly for the speed limit (35 mph). If you go exactly 35, you will catch every green light and not have to stop. I don’t think one-way synchronization is a problem, but an easy solution to get cars to go the exact speed you want.
High Street is synchronized too, but it’s rarer that the traffic volumes are low enough that you can get through all the lights.
True, but when you’re hitting them as they’re starting to turn yellow, people will speed up to re-synch themselves. I know I’m guilty of it, but it’s not a behavior that should be encouraged.
I didn’t think it was really possible to properly synch a traffic lighting system on a two-way street since the timing has to be configured in both directions at once.
True, but when you’re hitting them as they’re starting to turn yellow, people will speed up to re-synch themselves. I know I’m guilty of it, but it’s not a behavior that should be encouraged.
I didn’t think it was really possible to properly synch a traffic lighting system on a two-way street since the timing has to be configured in both directions at once.
Two-ways can be done, but it’s usually not as perfect as a one-way street. Typically, you optimize for the direction with greater traffic flow and let the other deal with what it gets. It’s just a matter of minimizing stops as much as possible. Most traffic engineers use Synchro software to figure out the optimum signal cycle lengths, phase lengths, and time offsets from the master signal.
Here’s a nice little briefing about signal timing:
http://www.indygov.org/NR/rdonlyres/066797FD-99F2-4481-AE8A-A1A35C4C6A22/0/signaltiming.pdf
Yeah, that’s what I mean. You can’t really do it going both directions on a two-way street (High) like you can with two one-way streets (Third & Fourth downtown).
I still think that conversions back to two-way streets for all street downtown (except maybe the alleys) would improve pedestrian aesthetics. And if we want people to enjoy being downtown, that should take priority over making sure people can hit all those green lights in a row.
I still think that conversions back to two-way streets for all street downtown (except maybe the alleys) would improve pedestrian aesthetics. And if we want people to enjoy being downtown, that should take priority over making sure people can hit all those green lights in a row.
There are advantages and disadvantages to both systems. I doubt a two-way street actually improves pedestrian safety, and it could quite possibly hurt it, but it may feel safer due to less volume and fewer lanes in one direction. This is a case where perception is important though. Also, will there be a median on Front? Medians are nice.
Doesn’t look like there will be medians. Just a bricked center turn lane on Front:
http://www.columbusunderground.com/archives/front.jpg
As much as I’d like to see the mutli-lane speed zones like 3rd disappear, I have to admit it is easier to look one way and not the other when crossing a street. Aside from allowing parking on both sides of these one-ways (3rd only allows parking on the east side of the street even though there is demand for more that the west side could fill) and changing the traffic light patterns, I’m not sure what measures could be taken to make other one-ways more ped/bike-friendly, assuming they are to stay one-way. If the current Front St plan is applied to the entire stretch it will be markedly better, but the speed limit will need to be lowered. I can’t help but find how funny it is that the streetcar line from Downtown to OSU would be completed well before this three year project were they to start at the same time.
I talked about speed humps on High and those actually are possible in the form of speed lumps which have gaps so that emergency vehicles can speed through. Snow plows are mentioned as a possible problem, but I wonder how streets with speed humps here currently handle them. If we could incorporate these measures onto one-ways like the northern stretch of Front (important to note it is officially designated as a bike route yet has nothing to slow down cars) we could have some wide one-way streets that could have a 25MPH speed limit and actually have drivers adhere to it without converting all streets to two-ways. However, according to city planners there’s a consensus that two-ways are uniformly better for businesses, which makes sense especially if you’re a visitor looking for a shop and you get stuck in a maze of one-ways.
I think Town St would benefit from a change in the speed limit since it doesn’t feel like a 35MPH road, at least the stretch I live on. Again, it’s the transportation divisions fault for maintaining the high speed of traffic that cars are just following. Hell, the city is supposed to be turning Town/Bryden into a bicycle boulevard, so why not make the small (cheap) changes now and more expensive ones (medians, etc) later?
I talked about speed humps on High and those actually are possible in the form of speed lumps which have gaps so that emergency vehicles can speed through. Snow plows are mentioned as a possible problem, but I wonder how streets with speed humps here currently handle them. If we could incorporate these measures onto one-ways like the northern stretch of Front (important to note it is officially designated as a bike route yet has nothing to slow down cars) we could have some wide one-way streets that could have a 25MPH speed limit and actually have drivers adhere to it without converting all streets to two-ways. However, according to city planners there’s a consensus that two-ways are uniformly better for businesses, which makes sense especially if you’re a visitor looking for a shop and you get stuck in a maze of one-ways.
We have experimented with a rubberized speed hump in Chicago and found that it takes longer to install than an asphalt hump. Furthermore, all those bolts in the hump damage the roadway, which allows water to get in, freeze, and crack the pavement. Unfortunately the rubber humps have to be removed before winter if you intend to plow the street. Because it’s not integrated into the street like an asphalt hump, there is a lip that can be pried up by a snow plow, damaging the vehicle or hurtling the rubber pieces into nearby cars or people.
Asphalt speed cushions (lumps) can be installed, but you won’t convince anyone with a degree in transportation engineering that they should go on a street with more than about 5,000 cars per day. The problem is that even if a hump is designed for 25 mph speeds, there will be some dumb ass that will drive about 4 mph over it (I passed one such dumb ass on my bike this morning). That hard braking and temporary slow speed creates a serious risk of rear-end collisions. You also have to worry about the safety of standees on COTA buses.
I think Town St would benefit from a change in the speed limit since it doesn’t feel like a 35MPH road, at least the stretch I live on. Again, it’s the transportation divisions fault for maintaining the high speed of traffic that cars are just following. Hell, the city is supposed to be turning Town/Bryden into a bicycle boulevard, so why not make the small (cheap) changes now and more expensive ones (medians, etc) later?
I think you give aluminum signs too much credit. The form of a road (number of lanes, pedestrian presence, on-street parking, medians, trees) is more important in modifying driver behavior (speeds) than an aluminum sign. To arbitrarily change a speed limit without changing the character of the roadway won’t work all that well. Anyone else remember New Rome, how the arbitrary 25 mph speed limit on Broad Street was declared a “speed trap” and the village was disbanded?
ALL real metro cities have wide, one-way streets. If our city has to artificially create more people downtown by slowing everyone down and making travel more inefficient, then it is not ready for the big time. I live in German Village, but I think its great to get off the highway at 670 and travel down 3rd street without stopping. Its called good engineering. Something this city doesn’t have much of. Create affordable housing and people will come downtown. Don’t kill the nicely designed grid!!
The problem is that the “good engineering” for the downtown street configuration in Columbus only serves its intended purpose for around two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening, five days per week. That’s only 12% of the time. The other 84% of the time, these one-way thoroughfares are being severely underutilized for auto traffic.
It may be good engineering during rush hour as people are able to get in and out of downtown quickly, but it’s hardly good planning for a vibrant and pedestrian-friendly downtown. It’s actually very similar to the recent change in rules about parking lot sizes. Previously they were required to be built large enough to handle maximum capacities, which meant large swaths of unused empty parking during every day that wasn’t Christmas Eve. That’s a very bad allocation of resources, as are most of our downtown streets.
I agree with you that affordable housing would bring people downtown in droves, but if you want to use “all real metro cities” as your comparison model, I ask that you first point me to affordable housing in other vibrant downtown areas.
Anyway, affordability is key, but quality of life is very important for where you choose to live. And as of right now, living on top of a 45MPH street isn’t very desirable no matter how affordable your place might be. Obviously the leadership in our city is recognizing this issue as we’ve seen part of State and Gay Streets converted to two-way and slowed down, and now Civic Center and Front getting the same treatment.
We don’t always need to look at what other cities have historically done to plan for the future of Columbus.
By the way, I forgot to say… Welcome to the site! :D
I noticed you only had one other post and went back to look to see what you wrote and I was actually a bit caught off guard that you were suggesting we change the infrastructure of our downtown sidewalks due to lack of usage outside of peak hours. ;)
We have experimented with a rubberized speed hump in Chicago and found that it takes longer to install than an asphalt hump. Furthermore, all those bolts in the hump damage the roadway, which allows water to get in, freeze, and crack the pavement. Unfortunately the rubber humps have to be removed before winter if you intend to plow the street. Because it’s not integrated into the street like an asphalt hump, there is a lip that can be pried up by a snow plow, damaging the vehicle or hurtling the rubber pieces into nearby cars or people.
Asphalt speed cushions (lumps) can be installed, but you won’t convince anyone with a degree in transportation engineering that they should go on a street with more than about 5,000 cars per day. The problem is that even if a hump is designed for 25 mph speeds, there will be some dumb ass that will drive about 4 mph over it (I passed one such dumb ass on my bike this morning). That hard braking and temporary slow speed creates a serious risk of rear-end collisions. You also have to worry about the safety of standees on COTA buses.
But wouldn’t the buses be wide enough like emergency vehicles that the tires wouldbe on level ground? There would still be the issue of cars going faster and then braking suddenly, but then the humps could be for a higher speed than posted, just not by too much to help prevent rear-ending, though it may not make much of a difference.
I think you give aluminum signs too much credit. The form of a road (number of lanes, pedestrian presence, on-street parking, medians, trees) is more important in modifying driver behavior (speeds) than an aluminum sign. To arbitrarily change a speed limit without changing the character of the roadway won’t work all that well. Anyone else remember New Rome, how the arbitrary 25 mph speed limit on Broad Street was declared a “speed trap” and the village was disbanded?
I totally agree and I think it works both ways. When the city puts 35MPH on streets that can easily be 25MPH, like part of E Town and N Parsons, it only makes sense to change the signs to reflect the form of those roads. You don’t have to look hard to find identical streets with totally different speed limits. 8-lane Broad St is 35MPH. N Parsons from Bryden to Broad is also 35MPH with one lane each way lined with a walkable commercial corridor. Try explaining the logic behind that.
But wouldn’t the buses be wide enough like emergency vehicles that the tires wouldbe on level ground? There would still be the issue of cars going faster and then braking suddenly, but then the humps could be for a higher speed than posted, just not by too much to help prevent rear-ending, though it may not make much of a difference.
The buses might have a similar wheel base as emergency vehicles, but I guess that would be something to check. I still think there are too many overly-cautious drivers to put any kind of speed humps on High Street. How do we know speeding is actually a problem on High Street?
I totally agree and I think it works both ways. When the city puts 35MPH on streets that can easily be 25MPH, like part of E Town and N Parsons, it only makes sense to change the signs to reflect the form of those roads. You don’t have to look hard to find identical streets with totally different speed limits. 8-lane Broad St is 35MPH. N Parsons from Bryden to Broad is also 35MPH with one lane each way lined with a walkable commercial corridor. Try explaining the logic behind that.
I think that’s a good point. The speed limit on an 8-lane road probably should be higher than a 2-lane road to reflect the actual predominant speed of traffic. AASHTO says that speed limits should theoretically be set at the natural 85th percentile speed of traffic. Of course, that’s only if the 85th percentile speed is safe based on roadway design (curves, sight distances at intersections, etc…). Arbitrarily setting the speed limits too low will lead to widespread disrespect and non-compliance with the limit, and possibly spill into disrespecting the speed limit at other locations too. It’s also easier to enforce a speed limit if only a small percentage of drivers are disobeying. If we’re not happy with the natural 85th percentile speed, change the road, do a speed study, then change the signs.
The buses might have a similar wheel base as emergency vehicles, but I guess that would be something to check. I still think there are too many overly-cautious drivers to put any kind of speed humps on High Street. How do we know speeding is actually a problem on High Street?
From a cyclist’s perspective, High has the largest number of car-bike accidents. Due, I’m sure, in no small part to un-educated/in-experienced, nervous cyclists, but there are stretches of High that are hostile like in Downtown and Clintonville. In Clintonville you do have alternatives, but in Downtown north-south you don’t. Well, you’ll never see me choose 4th St to go to Italian Village. Speed humps or speed lumps we could do without on High, I think there are plenty of other measures that can be taken. Now with Front being a designated bike route, that’s another story.
The last thing I would want is artificially low speed limits. It would deceive cyclists by possibly putting them on roads that are more dangerous than they think and of course, be ignored by drivers.
I use N Parsons as an example because not only is it two lanes, but the commercial buildings are up against the sidewalk, narrowing the driver’s field of vision. The buildings close in on you and therefore “narrow” the road, much like the effect that streets with tall trees have on slowing traffic on residential streets. There is a stretch of the Short North in the south which is 25MPH and further north it is 30MPH, yet while High as buildings up against the sidewalk it is 5 lanes in width and taking into account both far right and left lanes being used for parking you still have the middle turn lane. This just makes it even more confusing as to how a similar street that is much narrower would justify a speed limit 10MPH faster. I see no need for a study to be done here. I mean, what could possibly be done to change this road so that it would be eligible for a slower speed limit? If you put in a median, cars couldn’t even use it. If you allowed the other side to have parking, it’d be a one-way. I’m baffled.
I can agree with that in principle, but when you consider that streets of this nature occur in exceptionally walkable places like, say, Manhattan, Chicago, and San Francisco, you’ve got a pretty high bar to clear when suggesting that their precedent is irrelevant.
Regarding the percentages… they address the quantity of utilization time but disregard quality of utilization. Think of it like this – firemen probably spend more than 84% of their time waiting or retrieving cats from trees – at any rate doing something other than fighting fires. Does that mean that they’re obsolete or unnecessary? Of course not – the small percentage of the time that they’re necessary, they’re really necessary! Similarly, to some degree every city is designed with that small percentage of time we call ‘rush hour’ in mind. I suspect that’s just an auto-related reality that isn’t going to change until attitudes towards automobiles change.
Which, really, if we’re being honest, is the point, isn’t it? To move people away from auto usage in the city? On the face of it, I can respect that… but the unintended consequences could be significant and potentially quite counterproductive. I’ll gladly elaborate on that if it isn’t sufficiently self-evident.
I guess, ultimately, I come at this from the perspective that the infrastructure follows the needs of the city, and not the other way around. While I feel as though the streetcar passes that test (and may well lead to allowing us to entertain restructuring the grid away from auto usage…), the idea of hobbling 3rd and 4th does not seem wise to me in the short term.