Possibilities

In as dispassionate a way as possible, I present a few thoughts on why the City, on behalf of its citizens, should consider looking a few hundred feet  west of the current Farmers Market location for a new and better location for this important community feature. I will present this list for discussion at Thursday's Common Council Meeting. 

 

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REASONS WHY MOVING THE FARMERS MARKET TO THE PARKING 

 GARAGE CAN BENEFIT THE MARKET AS WELL AS THE DOWNTOWN        

 

1. Doubles covered area of market

2. Provides covered, shaded parking for vendors’ trucks, keeping food items out of heat

3. Already handicapped accessible

4. The concrete mass of the garage acts like an air conditioner

5.  Approx. 10,000 square feet of dedicated street and sidewalk space during market hours

6. Traffic not blocked—one side of Market Street (southern side of median) would be open to traffic

7. Garage would be livened up to make it a more inviting space for market with added lighting, decoration, and functional upgrades, such as electrical hookups for vendors

8. Historic Farmers Market of New Albany was located in Market Street area in front of the parking garage

9. Bathrooms can be added at garage site and would be a more wide-reaching amenity for the entire downtown, its shoppers, visitors, and its merchants

10. Bathroom facility could double as an information kiosk, like Madison’s Comfort Station—a refurbished filling station in downtown Madison, Indiana

11. Redevelopment funds for this Tax Increment Financing facility might cover some physical alterations to garage, possibly leading to future use of garage for customer parking during Saturday market, if feasible

12. After bathrooms, lights, and facelift, money would still be left to cover other enhancements for the market beyond the physical expansion, such as pedal-powered taxis to carry shoppers back to their cars with their purchases. Offering such a service could also provide a few good part time jobs for pedal-taxi drivers

13. The Bank and Market site can be elevated to higher use than the 8-10 hours a week for ½ the year of the market’s use, such an upgrade of this strategic corner could solidify the downtown revival while building a foundation for future growth

14. The parking garage is especially under-utilized on weekends. Moving the market here helps unlock the value of the sunk costs in this multi-million dollar community asset.

Nip It. Nip It In The Bud.

Deputy Bernard P. Fife

 

As  legions of electronic visitors to Mayberry know well, Barney Fife was diligent in the prevention of mayhem. His sage advice, often proffered to Sheriff Andy Taylor, was to engage in bud nipping whenever and wherever the situation called for it. And, in the good deputy's view the early derailment of trouble was always the best course.

 

Noted author and planner, Jeff Speck, has been chosen to study New Albany's traffic situation. It is hoped his fresh perspective will yield a plan to help us deal with a possible double whammy, courtesy of the Bridges Project: 1. the effects of a period of  disruption resulting from bridge construction, only to be followed by 2. the on-going,  increased flow of pass-through traffic, owing to the dubious honor of being the main toll-free passage across the river.

 

As we await the results of Speck's work, I've been considering a rather nagging empirical counterpoint to the notion of converting one-way streets to a two-way pattern.  If two-way streets are better than one-ways, why is East Spring Street, east of Vincennes, such an unappealing place to be? I fully believe two-ways to be superior to one-way streets, but here's this major stretch of one of the majorest streets in town, populated by many nice houses that have seen their better days, many days ago. Here's a street where I witnessed a child barely escape being run over because there's no truly safe way to cross that street in places.

 

I don't share Speck's background, education , or experience, yet I think I know something Mr. Speck doesn't know yet. That's not a knock on him, he is yet to begin his study, so he hasn't looked in depth at this place we call home. What I think I know is that Spring Street is the open, unrestricted pipe pouring traffic into New Albany. Once that traffic pours into town, it causes traffic problems there, and down the line; problems we have earlier attempted to deal with by using parking restrictions and one-way streets. In the other two lanes, the traffic is flowing unrestricted the other way, out of town. It also creates traffic problems, and these we addressed by eliminating on-street parking. Put both those high volume corridors together and you have an inhospitable place for people. Make someplace inhospitable to people, and it becomes a place where property values fall, rental housing dominates, and the neighborhood slips further and further toward the point of no return.

 

Because this section of Spring Street delivers such a volume of traffic into the city, and because of the effects  this traffic has on the people who live there, East Spring Street is a prime candidate for the doctrine of Fifeism.

 

We need to nip traffic in the bud there. The place to do it is on Spring Street, as high volumes of traffic flow into and out of the city. And the way to do it is to allow on-street parking, from the entrance to New Albany to Spring Street Hill.

 

The positive impact of such a change would be to lessen the volume of traffic, slow the speed of traffic, make the street safer and more inviting for pedestrians,and I believe, those changes would make the houses along that section of Spring Street more desirable. That is a first step in re-establishing this neighborhood as part of a Walkable City.

 

Much of the traffic that does not flow on Spring Street would instead use the beltway of I-265* to get into or out of town. Because the flow of traffic through town would be reduced, I believe many of the other issues facing inner city traffic would be diminished, to the point of nearly solving themselves. But the good thing is, we don't have to let those problems solve themselves. That's why Jeff Speck is coming to town. When he gets here, I hope he will at least consider what Traffic Consultant, Barney Fife, might have told him if he were on the beat here today.        

 

 

 *Disclaimer:  My wife and I live within the pernicious aural shadow of I-265 and I-64. Whether we stay put or get blown out of a place we've lived for 27 years on the blast of a Jake Brake, the fact remains, New Albany's traffic problems can be greatly controlled by nipping traffic in the bud at Silver Creek. Soon the deleterious effects  the Bridges Projects has on the people who live near these interstate arteries must be addressed. That won't be simple and it won't be cheap. And, it wasn't included in the original cost of the Bridges Project. 

Pitch Till You Win

At tomorrow's Board of Works meeting, New Albany will likely take a step toward re-orienting its traffic grid. The Board will consider the Mayor's proposal to hire Jeff Speck as the studier-in-charge of a closer look at our streets. That's a very good portent of better days for downtown.

Although I've been opposed to spending money on a traffic study, because I think the answer such a study would reveal is self-evident. And, it seems, Mr. Speck has been opposed to such studies as well, if one can deduce that an opinion, "traffic studies are bullshit", (Page 81, Walkable City, Jeff Speck, Copyright 2012, Farrar, Straus and Giroux) translates to at least a modicum of disapproval of such an exercise. I am most heartily on board with this turn of events, since at least we know where this study is likely to lead us. Which of course begs another question, but who's asking? And, why stand in the way of something positive?