More Room For Cars In Downtown!
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/3828581758_8T3FttL-L.jpg)
With a couple buckets of extra paint, Jefferson and Broad Streets have been quietly widened to become downtown's latest six lane one-way pair.
Read More: http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2015-jan-more-room-for-cars-in-downtown
It doesn't look like six lanes to me...Broadway in downtown Nashville actually is a six lane street (plus dual parallel parking) wider than any streets in DT Jax, but nevermind that though...
What is a six lane street or one-way pair supposed to look like? It's basically three travel lanes in each direction. Nevertheless, the basic point is many of our streets are wider than they have to be. Several can be retrofitted at a minimal expense to increase multi-modal connectivity and safety.
I've always believed that one way streets destroy our grid system. It actually works against free flow of traffic. How can this be good for downtown improvements?
Good thing downtowns aren't places where people might walk across the street.
Sad, doing the bike Lane would have cost no more money and could possibly save lives.
How does something like this happen without public hearing? Do they not need to announce things like this?
Your headline makes it sound as if it is horrible having cars in downtown Jax. No cars; no business. We Americans love our mobility and we're all not about to park our cars and walk/bike/ride a bus/tram to downtown. So get over yourself. Once you make downtown into your own image, no one might come.
Quote from: Redbaron616 on January 19, 2015, 08:33:13 AM
Your headline makes it sound as if it is horrible having cars in downtown Jax. No cars; no business. We Americans love our mobility and we're all not about to park our cars and walk/bike/ride a bus/tram to downtown. So get over yourself. Once you make downtown into your own image, no one might come.
The point isn't NO cars, it is to allow for cars AND pedestrians at a minimum, and ideally bikes as well. How many businesses are flocking to Union and State streets? The traffic count on those streets is high, but only a fast food/convenience store or two has opened there in many years. Highways attract highway oriented business but nothing else.
How many bicyclists are there (or would there be) in this area in the first place ? Just asking...
As someone who lives downtown and regularly cycles, I guess I'll just stick to the dilapidated sidewalks on my way to five points... Also, I'm glad to see the real problem with these streets was fixed, the paint, not the horribly uneven surface ::)
Quote from: Redbaron616 on January 19, 2015, 08:33:13 AM
Your headline makes it sound as if it is horrible having cars in downtown Jax. No cars; no business. We Americans love our mobility and we're all not about to park our cars and walk/bike/ride a bus/tram to downtown. So get over yourself. Once you make downtown into your own image, no one might come.
Lol, how did you get that out of the headline? Are you a Green Bay Packers fan or something? You shouldn't make assumptions without at least first putting forward the effort to dig for more information to validate the predetermined opinion.
The title wasn't negative. It just said "More Room For Cars In Downtown". You inaccurately believed it was a negative because of a predetermined personal opinion.
Then there was a tirade about loving our cars and then for me to get over myself. Let the anger go, because it will take the stress out of your life. Seriously, this is only an internet forum.
In reality, I'm fine with using white paint to alter traffic capacity, for cars or any other mode. The point of the article wasn't a tirade about cars. It was just highlighting how fast things can happen when we want to do them. There was no years of wasted tax dollars on studies and then excuses to why we couldn't afford white paint to add an extra lane to an existing street.
Somebody determined that there was a need and it happened. We can do the same to inexpensively improve pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure connectivity. That's the gist of the story.
The way that I look at it is that particular section of Broad has always been an awful bottleneck, with the additional traffic dumping out from the off ramp. The new courthouse added additional traffic. With those two issues alone, I have no problem with the transition adding a 3rd lane. Even if they was to add a bike lane instead (the demand for it is very questionable on Broad IMO, with no 'source' to start) it would be a certainty to stop at State St, not that far away.
This is part of the JTA BRT project. The outside lanes will be reserved for buses in the peak hours. That said, there are now extra travel lanes for cars at all other times.
Quote from: I-10east on January 19, 2015, 10:46:11 AM
The way that I look at it is that particular section of Broad has always been an awful bottleneck, with the additional traffic dumping out from the off ramp. The new courthouse added additional traffic. With those two issues alone, I have no problem with the transition adding a 3rd lane. Even if they was to add a bike lane instead (the demand for it is very questionable on Broad IMO, with no 'source' to start) it would be a certainty to stop at State St, not that far away.
The article wasn't about adding a bike lane on Jefferson and Broad Streets. It was just highlighting restriping as an inexpensive way to enhance travel on existing streets.
In the case of Jefferson and Broad, an extra travel lane was added. On Adams, a travel lane was removed to add parallel parking spaces that were lost on Broad, as a part of the conversion.
Instead of debating whether this is the right use of roadway width on these two streets, we should be looking at restriping on wide streets like Park, Adams, Bay, Hubbard, Edgewood, Myrtle, Oak, Forest, etc. as a quick and cost effective way to improve pedestrian and bicycle connectivity and safety throughout the city.
FYI, the article isn't about adding a bicycle lane on Jefferson and Broad Streets. It was to point out
Quote from: tufsu1 on January 19, 2015, 10:58:59 AM
This is part of the JTA BRT project. The outside lanes will be reserved for buses in the peak hours. That said, there are now extra travel lanes for cars at all other times.
Originally, the plan was to rebuild these streets and streetscape the sidewalks. Has that been modified to restriping to add the extra lane, meaning the sidewalk improvements have been taken out?
^ I don't think so.....this may just be the first step
Quote from: stephendare on January 19, 2015, 09:09:11 AM
Quote from: coredumped on January 19, 2015, 08:07:04 AM
Sad, doing the bike Lane would have cost no more money and could possibly save lives.
How does something like this happen without public hearing? Do they not need to announce things like this?
They do have them at public meetings, but we gave all the authority to the DIA. And our correspondent, Noone, who goes to every single one of the meetings, reports nothing back at all except whether or not they talked about kayaks or fishing and the fact that he's the only one at the meetings ;)
:)
I thought JTA was at least going to repave Broad and Jefferson. I think the sidewalk upgrades are limited to the bus stop areas - which are much bigger than the existing 6 foot shelters.
Wouldn't Davis or Pearl streets be better choices for bike lanes than FDOT maintained streets like broad and Jefferson?
Unless I totally missed it (which is possible), I don't recall this ever being brought up at the Urban Core CPAC meeting.
Quote from: urbanlibertarian on January 20, 2015, 10:26:22 AM
Wouldn't Davis or Pearl streets be better choices for bike lanes than FDOT maintained streets like broad and Jefferson?
Although this article doesn't suggest that bike lanes should be on these streets as opposed to roadway lanes, ideally all streets should be designed for multi-modal use in mind. On busy streets with cars moving at high speeds, a cycle track or parallel facility may be more suitable than a bicyle lane. On limited access corridors, you'd need a barrier separating motorized and non motorized traffic. On streets with low levels of traffic, sharrows or nothing at all may be more suitable. This is where a change in FDOT and local roadway design standards is needed. Such a move would be instrumental in incrementally reducing pedestrian and bicycle accident and death rates.
If there is sufficient space, bike lanes could be separated from road lanes via e.g. low bushes. As an additional benefit, this should reduce noise levels at least a bit and create a visible barrier (vs. simply painting lanes on the road).
Reading some of the comments here...oh man. MJ easily has the most "progressive" base of followers in Jax and yet I find myself feeling like I'm on a Fox News set, even here, on MJ, concerning the comments on this daily piece.
Jax needs to think more "small town" like Greenville, SC than "big city" like Manhattan/SF. One ways are not needed.
And I believe the point of the article was that if a town with no money, no real traffic issues, no real parking issues, etc can find it in themself to spend money to accommodate more cars, unnecessarily, the town can surely do the same for bikes and pedestrians.
And RE: why spend money if there are currently no bikes or pedestrians? Well let's look at a couple of things:
1) The existing infrastructure is not there, so of course there are going to be no bikes/peds, though building the infrastructure could attract more
2) The peds aren't there because there isn't a lot of office/residential in a dense environment to promote that activity, and there are a lot of reasons why, but perhaps one reason why more multifamily/office gets built sporadically around the burbs as opposed to downtown is that downtown isn't made a nice place to build/house offices/workers/residents, much of that to do with aesthetics/infrastructure
So I think a small, minor step that can be taken is to basically copy the Greenvilles of the world when building out sidewalks, planning for streets that can accommodate both cars and bikes, and infusing a touch of charm into the area, which in Jacksonville's case, one-ways do not do.
And anyone talking about "major bottlenecks" downtown simply has never left Jacksonville. What a crock. A major bottleneck would imply an abundance of office in a concentrated area, or a super high density of people and commercial street level uses creating a constant hive of activity that would slow down traffic, or street transit and trucks loading/unloading constantly to cater to that level of commercial density.
Downtown Jax is neither large nor dense, and is served by more interstate access and wide open roads than most. I would say it literally has NO traffic compared to most. Certainly not enough to justify road expansions.
Jacksonville's citizens, including the mentality of a few on this very board, are Jacksonville's own worst enemy, and the city's City Council/mayor, even the business community, is a direct reflection. It's a tad sad.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 20, 2015, 10:38:07 AM
Quote from: urbanlibertarian on January 20, 2015, 10:26:22 AM
Wouldn't Davis or Pearl streets be better choices for bike lanes than FDOT maintained streets like broad and Jefferson?
Although this article doesn't suggest that bike lanes should be on these streets as opposed to roadway lanes, ideally all streets should be designed for multi-modal use in mind. On busy streets with cars moving at high speeds, a cycle track or parallel facility may be more suitable than a bicyle lane. On limited access corridors, you'd need a barrier separating motorized and non motorized traffic. On streets with low levels of traffic, sharrows or nothing at all may be more suitable. This is where a change in FDOT and local roadway design standards is needed. Such a move would be instrumental in incrementally reducing pedestrian and bicycle accident and death rates.
This. One has to start somewhere. Part of the BRT project or not, whatever I was just looking at in the pictures looks like a wasteful turd.
Wow! It's amazing how quickly and efficiently government moves when they care about something. They didn't even have to bicker about how to pay for it. They just did it. It's like magic! lol