Quote
Design plans for the two-way conversion of Adams and Forsyth Streets in Downtown Jacksonville have been submitted for civil plan review. Intended to calm traffic and boost walkability, the two-way street conversion project is a major Downtown Investment Authority (DIA) public infrastructure initiative.
Read More: https://www.thejaxsonmag.com/article/plans-in-review-for-downtown-two-way-street-conversion/
Just took a quick look at the images shared here. What are the differences between the "constrained" and "unconstrained" plans? Do they represtent two construction options?
I have downloaded the 10-set, which should answer that, but it may be awhile before I can carve out the time to really look at those plans.
They appear to be two different concepts. The constrained concept appears to be milling and resurfacing but not moving curb & gutter and widening the sidewalks. The unconstrained concept appears to be a full blown streetscape project.
I wonder if the City will bid both concepts. Or, if they are all-or-nothing, or if one street, or if it could vary by block between the two concepts?
I've never been a fan of the 2-way street concept for downtown as a way to "calm traffic". Having spent many pedestrian hours in many cities, I just don't think that our traffic is necessarily worse than other cities in terms of aggressiveness or speed. Also, I really don't believe that 2-waying all of the streets will be a reason for retailers and restauranteurs to come in (as if aggressive one-way traffic is one of the things holding downtown back right now). I believe this is just another gimmick. Also, as a frequent pedestrian, when you know all of the cars are coming from one direction, it actually makes it easier, imho, to pay attention and cross the road more safely.
What I do think will happen is that once we get a few more tall office buildings in (IF God help us we ever get there) and the existing office buildings get back to higher occupancy, 2-way streets will result in much more hassle getting in and out of downtown and will make it harder, not easier, for employers to want to be downtown. Employers bring thousands and thousands of employees, who spend money on small businesses downtown. If they don't want to be there because traffic becomes a total cluster, then 2-ways could end up doing more harm than good for downtown.
I truly do love Greenville's downtown and all that charm and its walkability, and I see lots of things we can take away from Greenville (I was there walking around just last year). However, I do not think it's ultimately 100% translatable to our downtown. (I am guessing we got the "2-way" concept from that downtown).
Greenville's tallest buildings are 10-15 floors and they are more spread out and the whole downtown is a bit more linear. Even so I do think I recall that some of the streets that parallel Main St were 1-way (my memory could fail me). Atlanta is very similar and is having a lot of success in its urban core, and yet really it's just Peachtree St that is 2-way and the parallel streets are still 1-way.
There is no bigger advocate for having more pedestrians and having more people out on the sidewalks in Jax, but 2-waying most if not all of downtown will result in more harm than good, in my opinion. I've never heard anyone say they don't go downtown because the 1-ways and the fast traffic scare them away. 2-waying all of the CBD will snarl traffic at some point, and that could become reason for employers to stay away in the future.
Quote from: simms3 on December 27, 2022, 02:36:30 PM
I've never been a fan of the 2-way street concept for downtown as a way to "calm traffic". <snip> Also, as a frequent pedestrian, when you know all of the cars are coming from one direction, it actually makes it easier, imho, to pay attention and cross the road more safely.
<snip>
I will leave it to the urban planners here to respond to the rest of the points in simms3's comment (the ones I snipped out). But, to the part I copied - if you are crossing at a signalized intersection, and not jay-walking, it should not matter if traffic is coming from one or two directions.
I have looked through the "10-Set" plans linked to in the linked article and have prepared a summary of the major changes (hey, someone has to do it)
Adams Street will become a 2-way between Jefferson Street and Market Street, while Forsyth Street will become a 2-way between Jefferson Street and Liberty Street. Adams loses that last block due to the "Hart" Ramp that comes down there.
There will be seven "Sidewalk Expansions" between Hogan and Ocean Streets. They will have a floor area of about 30 feet by 5 feet with six 2-top tables and be buffered on three sides (not the sidewalk side) by 3' tall planters. There will be a 20-inch buffer between the planters and the travel lane.
Three of these will be Adams Street:
- south side, just east of Hogan
- south side, midblock between Laura and Main
- north side, midblock between Main and Ocean
There will be four along Forsyth Street
- north side, between Pearl and Julia
- north side, just east of Hogan
- north side, midblock between Hogan and Laura
- south side just east of Laura
At many intersections 6' by 6' tree planters will be placed in the parking lane before the first parking space. Many of these appear to be located to block traffic from crossing through the intersection and entering the parking lane.
Except for the intersections with Jefferson, Broad, Main, and Ocean Streets, and the Skyway at Hogan Street, the existing mast arm signals along Adams and Forsyth will be replaced with vertical signals mounted on poles on the corners - like currently at Laura Street. Additional mast arms will be added at the listed intersections to handle the new direction of traffic.
The "unconstrained plans" are only shown as artist renderings, not construction plans. So, I still don't understand the reasoning behind the "constrained" and "unconstrained" plans. The unconstrained appear to have more trees and such. Maybe the unconstrained will be bid as an option, and if the cost is low enough, the City will go with the fancier plan?
Quote from: simms3 on December 27, 2022, 02:36:30 PM
I've never been a fan of the 2-way street concept for downtown as a way to "calm traffic". Having spent many pedestrian hours in many cities, I just don't think that our traffic is necessarily worse than other cities in terms of aggressiveness or speed.
In Downtown Jacksonville's case, two-waying a few streets will make things more accessible for the end user. As of now, if you are traveling on Adams and miss Hogan Street, you can't turn northbound until you get to Broad Street. That is ridiculous.
QuoteAlso, I really don't believe that 2-waying all of the streets will be a reason for retailers and restauranteurs to come in (as if aggressive one-way traffic is one of the things holding downtown back right now). I believe this is just another gimmick.
Two-waying streets alone won't result in economic development of any fashion. I hate when transportation planners make these types of claims. Most of the time, there are a host of socioeconomic and political issues that need to be addressed for economic development to prosper, regardless of street conditions. However, reclaiming a portion of the street from cars and dedicating it to people could positively contribute to a plan for economic growth and revitalization.
The unconstrained version accomplishes this through the widening of the sidewalks, allowing for outdoor dining and increased dining capacity for restaurants and bars. The constrained version attempts to do this in select spots through the inclusion of parklets. DT Jax will need some of this and a lot more for a vibrant pedestrian scale environment to flourish.
QuoteAlso, as a frequent pedestrian, when you know all of the cars are coming from one direction, it actually makes it easier, imho, to pay attention and cross the road more safely.
This is a false assumption. Both are dangerous if you can't get your target speed down. Also people routinely drive the wrong way on Jax's downtown streets. I see them all the time and have even saved a few pedestrian from being hit over the years. Regardless of the direction of travel, always look both ways before crossing the street.
QuoteWhat I do think will happen is that once we get a few more tall office buildings in (IF God help us we ever get there) and the existing office buildings get back to higher occupancy, 2-way streets will result in much more hassle getting in and out of downtown and will make it harder, not easier, for employers to want to be downtown.
Unfortunately, this isn't happening anytime soon in DT Jax. There's a greater possibility of us having to come up with ways to adaptively reuse much of our vacant office spaces. As for making it harder for employers to get in and out of downtown, the core is roughly 50% less people now than it was during its heyday. Our street infrastructure is built for a capacity well above what's there today and what will be there in the future. Hopefully, as it densifies, we can properly invest in transit as an alternative to widening streets or taking away parallel parking for more travel lanes.
QuoteEmployers bring thousands and thousands of employees, who spend money on small businesses downtown. If they don't want to be there because traffic becomes a total cluster, then 2-ways could end up doing more harm than good for downtown.
Traffic becoming a cluster in DT Jax is a pipe dream at the moment. Our AADT is so low that one could pitch a tent during rush hour on some of our streets and not worry about getting hit by a car. I'm not making a case for keeping streets one-way or converting them to two-way. I'm just stating that the traffic analysis data isn't there to successfully make a case that DT Jax should be worried about its streets suffering from a failing level of service anytime soon.
QuoteI truly do love Greenville's downtown and all that charm and its walkability, and I see lots of things we can take away from Greenville (I was there walking around just last year). However, I do not think it's ultimately 100% translatable to our downtown. (I am guessing we got the "2-way" concept from that downtown).
Greenville's tallest buildings are 10-15 floors and they are more spread out and the whole downtown is a bit more linear. Even so I do think I recall that some of the streets that parallel Main St were 1-way (my memory could fail me). Atlanta is very similar and is having a lot of success in its urban core, and yet really it's just Peachtree St that is 2-way and the parallel streets are still 1-way.
Greenville's Main Street is a good example of a road diet in a small city. I'm not aware of it being a one-way to two-way street conversion. Historically, most of the one-way streets in America's cities were likely two-way prior to the 1960s and 1970s. I think for many cities, its more about trying to create more pedestrian friendly environments and sometimes for some that means replacing what Robert Moses minded autocentric planners and civic leaders took out in the mid-to-late 20th century.
I interned for an architectural firm in Downtown Lakeland in the late 1990s, while in college. At the time, Main and Lemon Streets were three lane one-way pairs. As a driver, me and others speed to try and hit all the green lights (i.e. like people do on Main/Ocean, Jefferson/Broad, and State/Union in Jax today). They completed their two way conversion before 2000. In doing so, they reclaimed space that had been given to cars to create pedestrian promenades and linear parks through their core. They also strategically improved adjacent public spaces and provided incentives to restore long blighted properties along these corridors. The transformation has been pretty amazing to see. Based off that track record of success, that community was able to raise $110 million in seven years for a 100% privately funded urban park. Jax has more resources and should be able to accomplish more......if we can get our act together.
Touche on the likelihood of getting downtown "to capacity" anytime soon. I will concede on that point alone, however, I will still point out until I'm blue in the face that many great urban environments are characterized heavily by 1-way streets (Manhattan is a great example, and pretty much any other major major city), so to me it's not 2-way streets alone by any means that will pave the road to paradise, and the bigger we get, the less I think 2-ways without any 1-ways to supplement them will be truly useful. Lakelander, to your point, we are a ways off from being too crowded for 2 ways.
I think if we are going to do this and obviously at this point we are, we should select the unconstrained version because wider sidewalks are definitely a very common mark of superior walkable urban environments (even if 2-way streets aren't). If we are going to "diet" the roads, then do so at the expense of pavement, not sidewalks. If/when we need to reconvert something back to 1-way, 2 lanes in one direction will dramatically increase road vehicular efficiency and you won't need more than that in this town, so we could easily still keep the parallel parking and wider sidewalks.
A restaurant that wants a parklet in front of it for outdoor seating should be able to "buy" or "lease" some parking spaces from the city with which to create its own parklet. The city should leave the parklets up to the businesses to figure out where and in what sort of configuration. In the meantime, the additional parallel parking should help them.
Quote from: simms3 on December 27, 2022, 08:44:15 PM
Touche on the likelihood of getting downtown "to capacity" anytime soon. I will concede on that point alone, however, I will still point out until I'm blue in the face that many great urban environments are characterized heavily by 1-way streets (Manhattan is a great example, and pretty much any other major major city), so to me it's not 2-way streets alone by any means that will pave the road to paradise, and the bigger we get, the less I think 2-ways without any 1-ways to supplement them will be truly useful. Lakelander, to your point, we are a ways off from being too crowded for 2 ways.
The most important element here is that Manhattan has a population density of 72,918 residents per square mile, compared to Downtown Jacksonville's 3,168 residents per square mile. When you have any type of real density, you will have a higher level of pedestrian activity and vibrancy regardless of a street being one or two-way. I agree with you there. Hopefully, people in Jax aren't of the believe that a streetscape or change in lane configuration will stimulate economic development. Locally, the result of town center streetscape improvements to McDuff Avenue and A. Philip Randolph Boulevard twenty years ago should put that thought to rest. However, I don't see a big fuss or negative in two-waying a few streets in Downtown Jacksonville. Heck, this place is so in need of public infrastructure investment, even a simple milling and resurfacing of the streets would be a vast improvement.
QuoteI think if we are going to do this and obviously at this point we are, we should select the unconstrained version because wider sidewalks are definitely a very common mark of superior walkable urban environments (even if 2-way streets aren't). If we are going to "diet" the roads, then do so at the expense of pavement, not sidewalks. If/when we need to reconvert something back to 1-way, 2 lanes in one direction will dramatically increase road vehicular efficiency and you won't need more than that in this town, so we could easily still keep the parallel parking and wider sidewalks.
The constrained version is likely to happen, as it is the one that plans have been developed for. Btw, the overall auto/truck capacity is likely the same or pretty close. You'll just be able to drive in both directions on both streets instead of one direction on each of them.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 27, 2022, 10:10:19 PM
The unconstrained version is likely to happen, as it is the one that plans have been developed for.
Good.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 27, 2022, 10:10:19 PMBtw, the overall auto/truck capacity is likely the same or pretty close. You'll just be able to drive in both directions on both streets instead of one direction on each of them.
My main harp will be those wanting to turn left, either onto a street or into a garage...I know we have been talking about traffic, or really the lack thereof as it stands now, but when you only have one lane in each direction, during rush hour someone turning left could really throw a wrench in the cog of traffic flow when there aren't passing options because of only one lane and a consistent flow of oncoming traffic.
I know it's not really an issue on Laura St due to lack of traffic - Adams and Forsyth have a bit more traffic and are routes towards the highway (and garages) so it could be a little different when those streets go 2-way, so I would say that one could make an argument that during certain times there will be less vehicular capacity when they go 2-way. We all know the mentality in Jax - it only takes one gnat for people to abandon any sympathy for downtown (like it takes seeing the sight of one homeless person). I just worry that even a slight increase in traffic inconveniences could turn people off of downtown.
^That's only five garages sporadically spaced along a 10 city block stretch in a CBD where one can easily argue that "rush hour" is non existent.
A good rule of thumb is things start getting pretty dicey for two-lane roads when the AADT approaches 20,000. Outside of State and Union, nothing in downtown Jax is remotely close. Bay between Broad and Main is the closest at 12,000.
Adams has an AADT of 5,300 and Forsyth is at 7,300. In comparison, in downtown Orlando, SR 526/Robinson Street has an AADT of 17,500 and that city is actively working with FDOT to reduce it from 4 to two lanes in order to squeeze in a cycle track and shared use path. They are of the belief that the lane diet with improve multimodal safety and the quality of life for their downtown residents. Another comparable would be Flagler Street in downtown Miami and its AADT of 6,400.
Assuming target and posted speeds are 25mph or so, there should be plenty of opportunity to make vehicular left turns into a couple of parking garage entrances between 7-9am on weekdays on Forsyth Street. I don't know how far they are going along with this, but considering the pedestrian should be the multimodal priority in the Northbank, if it ever became an issue, they could simply not allow mid-block left turns. In the end, its hard for me to see it as an issue that would keep a company from coming downtown.
Quote from: simms3 on December 28, 2022, 09:59:54 AMWe all know the mentality in Jax - it only takes one gnat for people to abandon any sympathy for downtown (like it takes seeing the sight of one homeless person). I just worry that even a slight increase in traffic inconveniences could turn people off of downtown.
Now I don't think two-waying Forsyth and Adams alone will tilt things in either direction but I'm a huge believer of not prioritizing suburban preferences over urban residents when it comes to revitalization of urban core neighborhoods. There's a huge captive audience we tend to ignore by placing to much focus on trying to turn the SJTC and St. Johns County lover on to downtown. IMO, we should place higher priority and focus on the people who reside within a three to five mile radius and cluster as many complementary pedestrian scale uses as possible within a compact setting. If all we can muster up is two blocks of compact traffic and activity, then make it the best two-block urban stretch of activity in the region. Do that well, and I believe we'll attract a lot more people (including some suburban people who will be drawn to the lively scene) than the handful we'll lose.
The 2014 COJ Community Redevelopment Plan called for Monroe, Adams, Forsyth, Pearl, Julia and Hogan streets to be converted from 1 way to 2 way. Slow progress is better than no progress, I suppose.
For the record, Greenville only has ONE pair of one-way streets, and they are East-West and perpendicular to Main Street, not parallel. There are NO other one way streets in the rest of the city either. While the speed limits on them are no different than the rest of DT, they definitely see higher speeds. This is particularly true of the west-bound one. That street has on street parking only on half of its length too, which I think is a big reason for the increased speed.
I have found DT JAX's one way streets to be a major pain in the ass. They should two-way all of the ones discussed and probably others as well, such as Church. It won't be a 'saying grace' for DT JAX, but it will be a definite improvement. Like Greenville, JAX doesn't have 1- way streets outside of DT. It is just one more mental 'adjustment' you have to make, when driving DT that you don't have to deal with elsewhere. Not a good thing.
I agree with all of Lake's points.
Casual observation: Our most successful retail corridor, St. Johns Town Center, has two way streets and it doesn't seem to be an issue at all 8). What is an issue there is a serious lack of reasonable parking spaces in proximity to the stores. But, that does also prove people are willing to walk some distance from parking to their destination when appropriately motivated. This suggest to me that moving much of Downtown parking to its edges should be on the table for future planning. Adding a circulating downtown shuttle (ideally free due to some corporate sponsorships) would be icing on the cake.
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on December 28, 2022, 10:45:26 PM
Casual observation: Our most successful retail corridor, St. Johns Town Center, has two way streets and it doesn't seem to be an issue at all 8). What is an issue there is a serious lack of reasonable parking spaces in proximity to the stores. But, that does also prove people are willing to walk some distance from parking to their destination when appropriately motivated. This suggest to me that moving much of Downtown parking to its edges should be on the table for future planning. Adding a circulating downtown shuttle (ideally free due to some corporate sponsorships) would be icing on the cake.
Congratulations! You have just re-invented the mid-1970s downtown plan. Peripheral parking lots connected by shuttle buses to the downtown shopping and business core, eventually to be supplemented or replaced by the elevated people-mover. Alas, the city continued to build and permit parking garages within the core. Then all the retail left DT for Regency, the Avenues, etc.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 27, 2022, 07:53:00 PM
I interned for an architectural firm in Downtown Lakeland in the late 1990s, while in college. At the time, Main and Lemon Streets were three lane one-way pairs. As a driver, me and others speed to try and hit all the green lights (i.e. like people do on Main/Ocean, Jefferson/Broad, and State/Union in Jax today). They completed their two way conversion before 2000. In doing so, they reclaimed space that had been given to cars to create pedestrian promenades and linear parks through their core. They also strategically improved adjacent public spaces and provided incentives to restore long blighted properties along these corridors. The transformation has been pretty amazing to see. Based off that track record of success, that community was able to raise $110 million in seven years for a 100% privately funded urban park. Jax has more resources and should be able to accomplish more......if we can get our act together.
Here's a before and after picture of Downtown Lakeland's one-way to two-way street conversions. They incrementally converted their entire one-way street system during the mid-1990s and early 2000s. To say it has been a success is an understatement.
Kentucky Avenue - Before
(https://photos.moderncities.com/History/Lakeland-History/i-CmKc6rS/0/1fa821c5/L/rc13873-L.jpg)
Kentucky Avenue - After
(https://photos.moderncities.com/Cities/Polk-County-November-2017/i-Z9j8Q9S/0/7b4cc8f4/L/20171124_111425-L.jpg)
Main Street - Before
(https://photos.moderncities.com/History/Lakeland-History/i-FKzBGxh/0/a10c05e9/L/fr0916-L.jpg)
Main Street - After (constrained version......did not move the curb & gutter initially)
(https://photos.moderncities.com/Cities/Polk-County-November-2017/i-WVFKSDH/0/0e126471/L/20171124_101648-L.jpg)
Main Street - After in 2022 (unconstrained version = recently went back, eliminating some parking to widen sidewalk)
(https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-K8dQKSn/0/L/i-K8dQKSn-L.jpg)
Lemon Street - After (two-way conversion + road diet = linear park through the downtown)
(https://photos.moderncities.com/Cities/Polk-County-November-2017/i-x8DpJt2/0/d9e01aba/L/20171124_102411-L.jpg)
Quite the transformations.
Jax definitely needs to go with the fully unconstrained version.
It would be nice to have some dedicated ROW for ebikes and escooters, too. The only time I tried the ones downtown I was definitely nervous about getting run over and the asphalt made for a really uncomfortable ride, too. You have no idea how hidden dips are in the road until you travel by escooter. lol.
Bidding is expected to take place during the first quarter of 2023. Construction is expected to commence during the second quarter of 2023. The project is expected to be completed within 18 months of the project award. The estimated project cost is $4.9 million.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AM
^That's only five garages sporadically spaced along a 10 city block stretch in a CBD where one can easily argue that "rush hour" is non existent.
I agree "rush hour" is non existent (now). I'll just re-circle back to my original thought process - in the future I [hope] Jacksonville has, rush hour will certainly not be non-existent (and there will be more large garages eventually built to handle more office buildings). Don't forget about big events happening downtown, as well.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AM
A good rule of thumb is things start getting pretty dicey for two-lane roads when the AADT approaches 20,000. Outside of State and Union, nothing in downtown Jax is remotely close. Bay between Broad and Main is the closest at 12,000.
Adams has an AADT of 5,300 and Forsyth is at 7,300. In comparison, in downtown Orlando, SR 526/Robinson Street has an AADT of 17,500
Ok, but a couple things - wouldn't the two other factors here be:
1) How the AADT is spaced (for instance, what percentage of the count is held in how many hours)?
2) Is the 2-way two lanes or four lanes or more?
I Jacksonville's case, we are 2-way'ing to two lanes with no turn lanes. It is possible and often done to 2-way to three lanes with a median lane that can either switch direction or act as a turn lane.
Not necessarily arguing here with you but just bringing up variables here because I don't believe in "formulas" since everything requires a bit of common sense and a plan unique to the situation and environment.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AMand that city is actively working with FDOT to reduce it from 4 to two lanes in order to squeeze in a cycle track and shared use path. They are of the belief that the lane diet with improve multimodal safety and the quality of life for their downtown residents. Another comparable would be Flagler Street in downtown Miami and its AADT of 6,400.
Ok well good for them...I hope it's good for us too. I don't know enough about either of those roads specifically to compare them to any of the roads we are 2-way'ing as I don't (and have never) live in those cities. I'll have to trust your judgment in the comparisons there.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AMAssuming target and posted speeds are 25mph or so, there should be plenty of opportunity to make vehicular left turns into a couple of parking garage entrances between 7-9am on weekdays on Forsyth Street.
I totally agree that right now there are no issues. In my dreams downtown has about double the office space it does now in the same area and then it becomes more of an issue. I guess we can worry about that issue then.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AMbut considering the pedestrian should be the multimodal priority in the Northbank
I don't agree or disagree. I just don't see, as a frequent pedestrian myself downtown, how the existing setup penalizes the pedestrian for the automobile. But, Jax pedestrians are a different breed. I rarely see jay walking (which is crazy to me that people would wait for the walk sign on streets that DON'T have much traffic, to your point). Maybe to the analogy that people think parking is incredibly difficult in Jax, people also think walking downtown right now is taking one's life into one's hands.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AMIn the end, its hard for me to see it as an issue that would keep a company from coming downtown.
I am hyper aware of a company right now that is switching downtown office buildings in 2023 (announcement coming soon) and for a variety of reasons (not saying it's my company or anything 8) ) I am aware of the employees' thoughts and the "steering committee"'s thoughts when choosing. Let's just that you would be surprised, perhaps, how fragile people are about things downtown. I know I was shocked at my fellow employees' opinions, in some cases.
People literally don't want to walk, at all, to the building (on-site/attached parking is just so crucial). People are pretty apprehensive about homeless people. Just the comments would blow your mind. The Jax downtown office employee situation is a fragile little egg shell.
Quote from: simms3 on December 28, 2022, 09:59:54 AMWe all know the mentality in Jax - it only takes one gnat for people to abandon any sympathy for downtown (like it takes seeing the sight of one homeless person). I just worry that even a slight increase in traffic inconveniences could turn people off of downtown.
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AMNow I don't think two-waying Forsyth and Adams alone will tilt things in either direction but I'm a huge believer of not prioritizing suburban preferences over urban residents when it comes to revitalization of urban core neighborhoods. There's a huge captive audience we tend to ignore by placing to much focus on trying to turn the SJTC and St. Johns County lover on to downtown. IMO, we should place higher priority and focus on the people who reside within a three to five mile radius and cluster as many complementary pedestrian scale uses as possible within a compact setting. If all we can muster up is two blocks of compact traffic and activity, then make it the best two-block urban stretch of activity in the region. Do that well, and I believe we'll attract a lot more people (including some suburban people who will be drawn to the lively scene) than the handful we'll lose.
I can't disagree. I am one of those residents who lives pretty close to downtown and purposefully chose my house to be within walking distance of a few dining/drinking options. We all want the same things.
I just chalk "2-waying downtown" as a "fix" for things to "we need 10,000 units downtown and we'll be good then", meanwhile the same people expand the definition of downtown to 4 square miles and botch every single thing.
Vicupstate and Lake:
I don't think Greenville and Lakeland are apt comparisons for downtown Jax, in terms of this. I think there's plenty to learn from each, but looking at Lakeland, a literal small town with a cutesy downtown, as a guide for what we should do in terms of capacity for our streets, is not common sense to me. Greenville sort of the same, in my opinion.
I will just say this, as well - San Francisco started lane dieting some roads for buses and bike paths. There are some successful corridors that didn't raise a lot of flags and worked better in the new formats, but they tried applying that scheme to any and all roads and it ruffled a lot of feathers and didn't always work out well. There are a lot of studies from that city, and some actually show an *increase* in pedestrian accidents after changing a streetscape for multimodal options.
This is because it led to confusion for everybody and cabs/drivers who actually became more aggressive in frustration. Now obviously that's a city with absolutely hectic and busy pedestrian and surface level transit activity, but, having lived there and immersed myself in the real estate/development/planning community, there, results of some of this stuff were actually pretty iffy and measured frustration in the city amongst all groups of street users increased in some cases. There was never really any discussion I can remember to 2-way any existing 1-way streets and I don't think anyone ever thought the 1-ways were a problem.
I lived my entire existence there in multiple locations in and fairly close to downtown on 1-way streets, and I didn't own a car and walked or used transit everywhere. My perspective on this is just so different. I just never thought of 1-ways as an actual issue to urbanity since the biggest and best urban environments everywhere are basically built on 1-way streets and it never seemed to hamper businesses or pedestrian activity. It's just so weird to me that we think this is an issue here.
Quote from: simms3 on January 02, 2023, 09:14:53 AM
Vicupstate and Lake:
I don't think Greenville and Lakeland are apt comparisons for downtown Jax, in terms of this. I think there's plenty to learn from each, but looking at Lakeland, a literal small town with a cutesy downtown, as a guide for what we should do in terms of capacity for our streets, is not common sense to me. Greenville sort of the same, in my opinion.
I will just say this, as well - San Francisco started lane dieting some roads for buses and bike paths. There are some successful corridors that didn't raise a lot of flags and worked better in the new formats, but they tried applying that scheme to any and all roads and it ruffled a lot of feathers and didn't always work out well. There are a lot of studies from that city, and some actually show an *increase* in pedestrian accidents after changing a streetscape for multimodal options.
This is because it led to confusion for everybody and cabs/drivers who actually became more aggressive in frustration. Now obviously that's a city with absolutely hectic and busy pedestrian and surface level transit activity, but, having lived there and immersed myself in the real estate/development/planning community, there, results of some of this stuff were actually pretty iffy and measured frustration in the city amongst all groups of street users increased in some cases. There was never really any discussion I can remember to 2-way any existing 1-way streets and I don't think anyone ever thought the 1-ways were a problem.
I lived my entire existence there in multiple locations in and fairly close to downtown on 1-way streets, and I didn't own a car and walked or used transit everywhere. My perspective on this is just so different. I just never thought of 1-ways as an actual issue to urbanity since the biggest and best urban environments everywhere are basically built on 1-way streets and it never seemed to hamper businesses or pedestrian activity. It's just so weird to me that we think this is an issue here.
If one way streets were problematic in a smaller city (Lakeland), they would be even more so in a larger city. That said, both Lakeland and Greenville have been exponentially more successful with their DTs. So that speaks well for having 2 way streets, not the opposite. Besides, outside of 9-5 on weekdays, Greenville and Lakeland probably have a MUCH higher population in the DT core.
As far as San Francisco, you are bring SF sensibilities (with its uber high density) to a city without them. If JAX is too big to compare to Lakeland/Greenville, then surely SF is too dense to compare to JAX.
The fact is, good urban design is the same regardless of city population.
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AM
The fact is, good urban design is the same regardless of city population.
Bingo.
Quote from: simms3 on January 02, 2023, 09:02:16 AM
Quote from: thelakelander on December 28, 2022, 11:07:38 AM
^That's only five garages sporadically spaced along a 10 city block stretch in a CBD where one can easily argue that "rush hour" is non existent.
I agree "rush hour" is non existent (now). I'll just re-circle back to my original thought process - in the future I [hope] Jacksonville has, rush hour will certainly not be non-existent (and there will be more large garages eventually built to handle more office buildings). Don't forget about big events happening downtown, as well.
Conducting traffic analysis would include big special events as well.
QuoteOk, but a couple things - wouldn't the two other factors here be:
1) How the AADT is spaced (for instance, what percentage of the count is held in how many hours)?
2) Is the 2-way two lanes or four lanes or more?
AADT means Average Annual Daily Traffic. Without getting into too much technical detail, it can be described as the total volume of vehicle traffic of a highway or road for a year divided by 365 days. It doesn't matter what the number of lanes are or the direction the traffic travels. Here is a link where you can see the AADT for all major roads throughout the state:
https://tdaappsprod.dot.state.fl.us/fto/
QuoteI Jacksonville's case, we are 2-way'ing to two lanes with no turn lanes. It is possible and often done to 2-way to three lanes with a median lane that can either switch direction or act as a turn lane.
Not necessarily arguing here with you but just bringing up variables here because I don't believe in "formulas" since everything requires a bit of common sense and a plan unique to the situation and environment.
It would really be a horrible path to make infrastructure and traffic decisions without considering data, when there's a ton available to help you make these decisions to get the best ROI. You'd be amazed how dumb common sense alone can be. In generally, one can argue that downtown Jacksonville is what it is today because people have used too much of their own version of common sense instead of logic and factual data that was also available to help in the decision making process. TMCs or Turning movement counts should also be considered when determining the ultimate design of these types of projects. From the look of the plans, it does seem that they are including left turn lanes at certain locations. I suspect, identifying the existing and future traffic conditions through a certain horizon year was conducted prior to the two-way conversion design work getting underway.
QuoteOk well good for them...I hope it's good for us too. I don't know enough about either of those roads specifically to compare them to any of the roads we are 2-way'ing as I don't (and have never) live in those cities. I'll have to trust your judgment in the comparisons there.
This is where doing traffic analysis on the front end help temendously. Plus, Jax benefits from this not being anything new or transformational. The country is full of good and bad examples. As of now, if you want to know how not to do downtown revitalization, we would be a great example. So it's a good thing that we're starting to embrace some things that have been successful in big, mid-size and small communities across the country for decades now.
QuoteI totally agree that right now there are no issues. In my dreams downtown has about double the office space it does now in the same area and then it becomes more of an issue. I guess we can worry about that issue then.
To me, this is the bigger question and challenge for downtown Jacksonville. I find it really hard to see something coming along in the near or distant future that will result in downtown Jacksonville's glut of 1980s office spaces being backfilled with that same use. Most of our towers were built by large local companies that are now defunct. Plus the office market has changed. FIS is a good example, as they preferred building new instead of taking over a dated high-rise. Then, now in a post pandemic economy, I wonder if they would have bothered building that new office building at all, if they knew what was ahead. So what do we do with these buildings and spaces long term? Office, hotel, residential?
QuoteI don't agree or disagree. I just don't see, as a frequent pedestrian myself downtown, how the existing setup penalizes the pedestrian for the automobile.
Right sizing streets that have too much capacity for one mobility choice over others can come in many forms. Perhaps there's a corridor where wider sidewalks to accommodate more outdoor cafes (increasing seating capacity or revenue for restaurants and bars) is of more important than having that space wasted by an extra auto travel lane (Lakeland). Perhaps, there's a strong desire to integrate fixed transit like LRT (Houston) or a cycle track (Orlando). Or maybe there's a desire to cut out auto traffic 100% for pedestrian use (Manhattan has several examples in recent years). Every street and every city has a unique story and vision. It's infrastructure should be tailored to properly serve it.
(https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-SGV63Mk/0/X2/i-SGV63Mk-X2.jpg)
QuoteBut, Jax pedestrians are a different breed. I rarely see jay walking (which is crazy to me that people would wait for the walk sign on streets that DON'T have much traffic, to your point). Maybe to the analogy that people think parking is incredibly difficult in Jax, people also think walking downtown right now is taking one's life into one's hands.
I don't see Jax has any different from most places. Historically, I think we (political and civic leaders) overcomplicate our revitalization strategies, which tend to end up with us doing things that hurt more than help. The Landing is a good example. A dated asset that could have been a $12 million fix is now a hole that will be empty for a generation and cost taxpayers $100 million to attract back the foot traffic that was already there. A simple learning lesson is keep/upgrade what you have and focus on complimentary infill on adjacent lots, abandoned buildings and parking lots. Upgrading public infrastructure like streets, parks and sidewalks are a good example of upgrading what you have.
QuoteI am hyper aware of a company right now that is switching downtown office buildings in 2023 (announcement coming soon) and for a variety of reasons (not saying it's my company or anything 8) ) I am aware of the employees' thoughts and the "steering committee"'s thoughts when choosing. Let's just that you would be surprised, perhaps, how fragile people are about things downtown. I know I was shocked at my fellow employees' opinions, in some cases.
People literally don't want to walk, at all, to the building (on-site/attached parking is just so crucial). People are pretty apprehensive about homeless people. Just the comments would blow your mind. The Jax downtown office employee situation is a fragile little egg shell.
I'm, not surprised at all. Now I would be very surprised if that company's decision makers and employees were demographically reflective of Jax's overall demographics. I would also be surprised if the majority of its decision makers and employees actually lived in downtown or the immediate surrounding neighborhoods. With that said, those same fragile people would have a totally different mindset of the downtown environment if Laura or Adams Street were lined with shops, restaurants and consistent foot traffic. Everything is a bit of a balancing act to achieve the desired long term outcome or vision.
QuoteI just chalk "2-waying downtown" as a "fix" for things to "we need 10,000 units downtown and we'll be good then", meanwhile the same people expand the definition of downtown to 4 square miles and botch every single thing.
The key is knowing that 2-waying downtown streets isn't a "fix". However, that doesn't mean some streets should not be converted from one-way to two-way. It really means that Jax civic leaders and politicians should stop using buzzwords that they don't understand, to sell people on solutions that these things don't actually deliver.
My observation is that many world cities, much larger than Jax in most cases, are moving toward pushing cars altogether out of their urban cores. Imagine totally closed streets that serve as pedestrian plazas and bikeways as NYC has done with Broadway. Tokyo is taking a step forward, closing the famed main street through its high end shopping district, Ginza, on weekends. Heck, St. Augustine's closed St. George Street probably does more in a week than all of downtown Jax in a year ;D.
For once, why don't we become a leader to the future and plan a downtown for only mass transit, delivery and emergency vehicles and drop off/pick up vehicles for hire.
As I noted about Town Center, most everyone parks on the fringes and walks to the stores. Walking or ferrying in visitors to Downtown could similarly work if we properly planned it with things to motivate people to want to visit.
This is where a long term master plan pays off but our City leaders are asleep at the wheel. Rather than steer with the wheel, we just spin it.
Tokyo's closed street through Ginza on weekends:
(https://live.staticflickr.com/3824/19229815712_1faeeeaa54_b.jpg)
NYC's Broadway:
(https://patch.com/img/cdn20/users/23562214/20210805/025933/styles/patch_image/public/broadway-garment-district-street-art-midtown___05144117181.jpg)
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on January 02, 2023, 03:15:14 PM
My observation is that many world cities, much larger than Jax in most cases, are moving toward pushing cars altogether out of their urban cores. Imagine totally closed streets that serve as pedestrian plazas and bikeways as NYC has done with Broadway. Tokyo is taking a step forward, closing the famed main street through its high end shopping district, Ginza, on weekends. Heck, St. Augustine's closed St. George Street probably does more in a week than all of downtown Jax in a year ;D.
For once, why don't we become a leader to the future and plan a downtown for only mass transit, delivery and emergency vehicles and drop off/pick up vehicles for hire.
As I noted about Town Center, most everyone parks on the fringes and walks to the stores. Walking or ferrying in visitors to Downtown could similarly work if we properly planned it with things to motivate people to want to visit.
This is where a long term master plan pays off but our City leaders are asleep at the wheel. Rather than steer with the wheel, we just spin it.
Congratulations! You have - again - summarized the mid-1970s downtown plan. Very limited traffic within the core, which would be bound by one-way pair of State/Union, Main/Ocean, Broad/Jefferson, and (my memory is fuzzier on the south boundary) Bay/Water. Parking would be outside of this ring and connected to the core by, at first shuttle buses (JTA's "Spirit Special" - hey it was the bicentennial), then by the People Mover. Alas, that didn't work out.
^ Thanks for the moral support ;).
I might add that the theme parks are also 100% pedestrian oriented and visitors either walk or are ferried in from some distance.
I also point out that the Main Street Bridge and Bay Street were closed to traffic during the Super Bowl here and it was a huge success. Hard to believe that has become a faded memory rather than an example to aspire to permanently emulating. We don't even learn from our own lessons :-\.
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on January 02, 2023, 07:01:03 PM
^ Thanks for the moral support ;).
I might add that the theme parks are also 100% pedestrian oriented and visitors either walk or are ferried in from some distance.
I also point out that the Main Street Bridge and Bay Street were closed to traffic during the Super Bowl here and it was a huge success. Hard to believe that has become a faded memory rather than an example to aspire to permanently emulating. We don't even learn from our own lessons :-\.
You still need to give people a reason to go down there. I remember the Super Bowl; that was a huge event and a big reason to go downtown. So is (was?) the Jazz Festival. And Art Walk, once upon a time. I'm just one person, but anytime I come back and visit, I ask about going downtown. The response is always the same from friends and family: "Why?"
I live in a not huge but pretty dense city (about 4 or 5 times as densely populated as Jax) and our small downtown is pretty busy most nights and packed on weekends... two way streets and all. Because there are businesses and restaurants people want to visit. Ample parking in big, free garages.
Changing the streets back to 2 way sounds great but it sure isn't going to change much else. Not until people have a reason to want to be downtown. I'm not sure what you can do to fix that in Jacksonville. I will say that Greenville's downtown is amazing. Whatever Jax can steal from them, do it.
Quote from: Bativac on January 03, 2023, 07:57:15 PM
And Art Walk, once upon a time.
Can someone remind me, what happened with Art Walk that caused it to become such a shell of its former self?
Funding?
Violence?
It's honestly a pretty sad sight in 2022.
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AM
If one way streets were problematic in a smaller city (Lakeland), they would be even more so in a larger city.
Who said that one way streets were problematic in those cities? I didn't...maybe the citizens of those cities did? I don't know...I honestly didn't know or think that the one ways were problematic here, but people are claiming they are...
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AMThat said, both Lakeland and Greenville have been exponentially more successful with their DTs.
I cannot disagree. I've only been to Greenville's but it was super impressive for a city of its size/stature.
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AMSo that speaks well for having 2 way streets, not the opposite.
Does it though? Causation is not the same as correlation. For me, I'm not necessarily opposed to two way streets, but I just don't see how it's the magic fix we need to prioritize and spend money on. Maybe it is? It's not sinking into my brain for some reason...
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AMBesides, outside of 9-5 on weekdays, Greenville and Lakeland probably have a MUCH higher population in the DT core.
I don't disagree, but resident traffic is not the same as commuter traffic and so my concerns about traffic patterns and capacity have never revolved around how many residents are crammed into an area. One office building can have thousands of employees. One garage can hold 1,000++ cars, and these things fill up and empty out in roughly the same span of time.
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AMAs far as San Francisco, you are bring SF sensibilities (with its uber high density) to a city without them. If JAX is too big to compare to Lakeland/Greenville, then surely SF is too dense to compare to JAX.
Perhaps, but I keep thinking more about daytime employment/office worker density moreso than residential density when it comes to downtown areas and traffic. Downtown residents often work downtown and never even use their cars to get to their buildings...
Quote from: vicupstate on January 02, 2023, 10:50:03 AMThe fact is, good urban design is the same regardless of city population.
Right, so one way streets versus two way streets is one thing that is not uniform across world class urban environments. We can be selective and look at cities with mostly if not all two ways and we can also look at cities that have basically mostly one ways and find successes in both cases, and failures in both cases, as well. To that end, I'm not sure whether one ways or two ways are what make an urban environment or pedestrian environment great.
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on January 02, 2023, 03:15:14 PM
My observation is that many world cities, much larger than Jax in most cases, are moving toward pushing cars altogether out of their urban cores. Imagine totally closed streets that serve as pedestrian plazas and bikeways as NYC has done with Broadway. Tokyo is taking a step forward, closing the famed main street through its high end shopping district, Ginza, on weekends. Heck, St. Augustine's closed St. George Street probably does more in a week than all of downtown Jax in a year ;D.
For once, why don't we become a leader to the future and plan a downtown for only mass transit, delivery and emergency vehicles and drop off/pick up vehicles for hire.
As I noted about Town Center, most everyone parks on the fringes and walks to the stores. Walking or ferrying in visitors to Downtown could similarly work if we properly planned it with things to motivate people to want to visit.
This is where a long term master plan pays off but our City leaders are asleep at the wheel. Rather than steer with the wheel, we just spin it.
I just don't think any of those are apt comparisons for our downtown, for so many reasons in each case. The BIG cities that have been the world's leaders for so long and had many millions even before the automobile are closing off some prominent areas, great for the headlines, but there are so many variables to list that aren't the same for us. Plus, there is always another side of that story, the one where people and businesses are actually upset about these things in many cases (and even to the point of acting on them), that doesn't get told because it doesn't fit the popular narrative.
St. George St in touristy St. Augustine and the Town Center are just not comparisons for our downtown, in my opinion.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PM
AADT means Average Annual Daily Traffic. Without getting into too much technical detail, it can be described as the total volume of vehicle traffic of a highway or road for a year divided by 365 days. It doesn't matter what the number of lanes are or the direction the traffic travels. Here is a link where you can see the AADT for all major roads throughout the state:
https://tdaappsprod.dot.state.fl.us/fto/
Thanks Lake, I understand AADT. Let me rephrase - AADT as a measure by itself is pretty useless. I work in site selection and users will very closely monitor and study traffic patterns, in addition to the overall volume, among other traffic related variables.
My point was that the average per day doesn't do a good job describing how much of that traffic occurs in certain hours. If it were all evenly spaced, some of those streets would have just 1 car per minute throughout the day, but the reality is there are times when the traffic stacks up and that's impacted heavily by the capacity of the road, as you know.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMFrom the look of the plans, it does seem that they are including left turn lanes at certain locations. I suspect, identifying the existing and future traffic conditions through a certain horizon year was conducted prior to the two-way conversion design work getting underway.
Great, this is by far my biggest concern! So glad to hear this!
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMAs of now, if you want to know how not to do downtown revitalization, we would be a great example. So it's a good thing that we're starting to embrace some things that have been successful in big, mid-size and small communities across the country for decades now.
Yes it would appear so and the incremental changes are noticeably positive.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMTo me, this is the bigger question and challenge for downtown Jacksonville. I find it really hard to see something coming along in the near or distant future that will result in downtown Jacksonville's glut of 1980s office spaces being backfilled with that same use. Most of our towers were built by large local companies that are now defunct. Plus the office market has changed. FIS is a good example, as they preferred building new instead of taking over a dated high-rise. Then, now in a post pandemic economy, I wonder if they would have bothered building that new office building at all, if they knew what was ahead. So what do we do with these buildings and spaces long term? Office, hotel, residential?
All big questions but I really don't think office space is dead and what we just saw was largely a fad. As soon as employers get the upper hand, we have better leadership to steer our economy back to prosperity, and the American workforce returns from sitting on the sidelines, office space will come roaring back. My prediction, at least. Now in Jax since we have such a dismal office market for decades now, limited office users, and some older building stock that is too expensive (given our market rents) to retrofit into solid office space, it may be a little different.
Let's just hope and pray that JEA finds a solid end user for its Church St former HQ so that it doesn't change its mind on demolishing it.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMRight sizing streets that have too much capacity for one mobility choice over others can come in many forms. Perhaps there's a corridor where wider sidewalks to accommodate more outdoor cafes (increasing seating capacity or revenue for restaurants and bars) is of more important than having that space wasted by an extra auto travel lane (Lakeland).
I don't see why we couldn't have just done this without converting one ways to two ways? Would have cost less and probably produced similar results.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PM
Quote from: simms3 on January 02, 2023, 09:02:16 AMBut, Jax pedestrians are a different breed. I rarely see jay walking (which is crazy to me that people would wait for the walk sign on streets that DON'T have much traffic, to your point). Maybe to the analogy that people think parking is incredibly difficult in Jax, people also think walking downtown right now is taking one's life into one's hands.
I don't see Jax has any different from most places. The Landing is a good example. A dated asset that could have been a $12 million fix is now a hole that will be empty for a generation and cost taxpayers $100 million to attract back the foot traffic that was already there. A simple learning lesson is keep/upgrade what you have and focus on complimentary infill on adjacent lots, abandoned buildings and parking lots. Upgrading public infrastructure like streets, parks and sidewalks are a good example of upgrading what you have.
Well I don't know, I think the Landing *was* an example of Jax just being a different breed. I feel like this situation would have been handled differently by other cities and ordinary citizens would have also responded to the overall decline of the Landing differently. While I'm seemingly opposed to this two way conversion, I am not opposed to urbanity, and I do believe that Jacksonville's citizenry has the most suburban mindset of any place I've really ever been, and this gets reflected in our leadership and even down to how people behave as pedestrians or parkers.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PM
Quote from: simms3 on January 02, 2023, 09:02:16 AMI am hyper aware of a company right now that is switching downtown office buildings in 2023...Let's just that you would be surprised, perhaps, how fragile people are about things downtown.
I'm, not surprised at all. Now I would be very surprised if that company's decision makers and employees were demographically reflective of Jax's overall demographics. I would also be surprised if the majority of its decision makers and employees actually lived in downtown or the immediate surrounding neighborhoods. With that said, those same fragile people would have a totally different mindset of the downtown environment if Laura or Adams Street were lined with shops, restaurants and consistent foot traffic. Everything is a bit of a balancing act to achieve the desired long term outcome or vision.
Well, you might be surprised, then, to learn that most of the employees of this company DO live closer to downtown than to the far suburbs or beaches. And it's not that they're fragile, but really it's the parking that's one of the biggest things. People just cannot imagine walking. Part of me gets that because it really does absolutely stink throughout most of the year in a button down and jacket (if that's what you wear). What I've found since moving back is that downtown and the employers who choose to be there have a closer tie to urban core residents than other office submarkets, it would seem, unofficially just from my anecdotal observation.
Regarding "reflecting Jacksonville's demographics", no, my company is a woke F500 trying desperately to only hire minorities and women, but it is still mostly white men (and I work in commercial real estate so that's probably not going to change for a long time).
If you want to bring in the whole diversity argument, in many elite downtowns it is actually very expensive to live there and so I don't think many downtown areas "reflect their cities' respective racial breakdowns", so I am not for or against that I'm just saying that's not a fair way to assess my company as one that is open or closed to downtown based on what the employees may or may not look like.
To your last point, yes, any person, literally any person, would like there to be more shops, more restaurants, more attractive streetscapes, more things to do, etc etc. I think you will get literally no argument from anyone, anywhere, about that.
Quote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PM
Quote from: simms3 on January 02, 2023, 09:02:16 AMI just chalk "2-waying downtown" as a "fix" for things to "we need 10,000 units downtown and we'll be good then", meanwhile the same people expand the definition of downtown to 4 square miles and botch every single thing.
The key is knowing that 2-waying downtown streets isn't a "fix". However, that doesn't mean some streets should not be converted from one-way to two-way. It really means that Jax civic leaders and politicians should stop using buzzwords that they don't understand, to sell people on solutions that these things don't actually deliver.
Well and there it is...the first person I really ever heard clamor for the two-way street conversion was Lori Boyer, the queen of buzzwords and of formulaic ideas (some good, some questionable). I think she's great, I think she's smart, but she is also the person who has helped to perpetuate this weird lifetime long city leadership obsession with reaching 10,000 residents (oops now it is 10,000 units) to achieve downtown whatever...
I don't know if the idea is really good, or bad, but to me I just don't see how it will make a difference for street life or for pedestrians, and that's how it's being sold. I do see a risk in it creating potential traffic issues, but maybe not if they are factoring in those turn lanes. It just seems like there are other ways to help our downtown businesses and improve streetscapes without going so far as converting the existing paths with which we enter and leave downtown. I mean, if we are going to spend the money...aren't there better ways to do so?
Quote from: simms3 on January 03, 2023, 08:17:29 PM
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on January 02, 2023, 03:15:14 PM
My observation is that many world cities, much larger than Jax in most cases, are moving toward pushing cars altogether out of their urban cores. Imagine totally closed streets that serve as pedestrian plazas and bikeways as NYC has done with Broadway. Tokyo is taking a step forward, closing the famed main street through its high end shopping district, Ginza, on weekends. Heck, St. Augustine's closed St. George Street probably does more in a week than all of downtown Jax in a year ;D.
For once, why don't we become a leader to the future and plan a downtown for only mass transit, delivery and emergency vehicles and drop off/pick up vehicles for hire.
As I noted about Town Center, most everyone parks on the fringes and walks to the stores. Walking or ferrying in visitors to Downtown could similarly work if we properly planned it with things to motivate people to want to visit.
This is where a long term master plan pays off but our City leaders are asleep at the wheel. Rather than steer with the wheel, we just spin it.
I just don't think any of those are apt comparisons for our downtown, for so many reasons in each case. The BIG cities that have been the world's leaders for so long and had many millions even before the automobile are closing off some prominent areas, great for the headlines, but there are so many variables to list that aren't the same for us. Plus, there is always another side of that story, the one where people and businesses are actually upset about these things in many cases (and even to the point of acting on them), that doesn't get told because it doesn't fit the popular narrative.
St. George St in touristy St. Augustine and the Town Center are just not comparisons for our downtown, in my opinion.
Every case is different for various reasons but that is not relevant here. My point is that, big or small, over a wide variety of scenarios, the concept of pedestrian-only avenues has proven it can be a huge success.
What is missing here, again, is leadership, vision, consistent master planning and priorities and a reason to walk about Downtown (cars or no cars, for that matter). Whether the public or the private sector, it is easy to figure out. Tokyo or St. Augustine, theme parks or the Town Center, Super Bowl or other event, it can be and is done. It has even been perfected on large cruise ships with simulated "main streets." It isn't complicated - I could do it in my sleep at this point.
There really are no excuses and people here are tired of hearing the ones falsely offered up. Hard to believe any business in Jacksonville would complain given the near-nothing activity that currently exists. Only way left to go is up. "Just do it!"
Quote from: simms3 on January 03, 2023, 08:58:53 PM
Thanks Lake, I understand AADT. Let me rephrase - AADT as a measure by itself is pretty useless. I work in site selection and users will very closely monitor and study traffic patterns, in addition to the overall volume, among other traffic related variables.
My point was that the average per day doesn't do a good job describing how much of that traffic occurs in certain hours. If it were all evenly spaced, some of those streets would have just 1 car per minute throughout the day, but the reality is there are times when the traffic stacks up and that's impacted heavily by the capacity of the road, as you know.
There's a lot more that goes into this than just AADT that's available. I could go into more detailed traffic planning and engineering analysis but I don't think its necessary. At the end of the day, Jax is a pretty autocentric city. If the variables were remotely strong enough to suggest that maintaining that two-waying these streets would be a detriment, this project would have certainly died on the vine years ago. The debate around the design of the One Riverside development entrance is a great example of this. It's about as auto-oriented as can be because of Public Works, despite the DIA vision of doing a lane diet from 6 to 4-lanes.
We have a lot of problems to overcome downtown. Congestion at any time of the day isn't one of them that's strong enough to economically hurt downtown. We'd probably be better off replacing most of our stop lights with four-way stop signs (i.e. San Diego's Gaslamp Quarter) at this point.
QuoteQuote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMFrom the look of the plans, it does seem that they are including left turn lanes at certain locations. I suspect, identifying the existing and future traffic conditions through a certain horizon year was conducted prior to the two-way conversion design work getting underway.
Great, this is by far my biggest concern! So glad to hear this!
You can see the plan here. Left turn lanes are included at the higher volume intersections: https://www.thejaxsonmag.com/article/plans-in-review-for-downtown-two-way-street-conversion/
QuoteQuote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMTo me, this is the bigger question and challenge for downtown Jacksonville. I find it really hard to see something coming along in the near or distant future that will result in downtown Jacksonville's glut of 1980s office spaces being backfilled with that same use. Most of our towers were built by large local companies that are now defunct. Plus the office market has changed. FIS is a good example, as they preferred building new instead of taking over a dated high-rise. Then, now in a post pandemic economy, I wonder if they would have bothered building that new office building at all, if they knew what was ahead. So what do we do with these buildings and spaces long term? Office, hotel, residential?
All big questions but I really don't think office space is dead and what we just saw was largely a fad. As soon as employers get the upper hand, we have better leadership to steer our economy back to prosperity, and the American workforce returns from sitting on the sidelines, office space will come roaring back. My prediction, at least. Now in Jax since we have such a dismal office market for decades now, limited office users, and some older building stock that is too expensive (given our market rents) to retrofit into solid office space, it may be a little different.
Our fad is +30 continuous years at this point. There will always be a need for office space. However, it's hard to imagine the likes of Independent Life, Gulf Life, Barnett Bank, Florida National, etc. coming back to consume all that corporate headquarter office space they built.
QuoteLet's just hope and pray that JEA finds a solid end user for its Church St former HQ so that it doesn't change its mind on demolishing it.
We successfully fought this battle offline back during the pandemic in 2020. JEA isn't going to demolish it. They are doing the smart thing and selling it. Was very happy to see JEA move in that direction after getting rid of Zahn. Hopefully, who ever buys it will take advantage of spaces that were originally designed for mixed-use.
QuoteQuote from: thelakelander on January 02, 2023, 02:31:51 PMRight sizing streets that have too much capacity for one mobility choice over others can come in many forms. Perhaps there's a corridor where wider sidewalks to accommodate more outdoor cafes (increasing seating capacity or revenue for restaurants and bars) is of more important than having that space wasted by an extra auto travel lane (Lakeland).
I don't see why we couldn't have just done this without converting one ways to two ways? Would have cost less and probably produced similar results.
Our DT roadway network would have still been screwed up. We have to be one of the only U.S. cities with a totally screwed up one-way system of streets based on a dumb half implemented 1970s plan. Even with Adams and Forsyth being two-way, we need to do the same with some seldom streets like Julia and Pearl.
Broad is also another one that needs to eventually be addressed. It's been all economically downhill since we turned it into a one-way death trap with no parallel parking for retail storefronts that also have no off-street parking. I was a first responder to a pretty bad accident at Broad and Church a few months ago. Luckily the lady speeding lost control and took out a street light and another car in the bus lane. If she lost control in the opposite direction, she would have hit me, a few others and the Richmond Hotel. Because we've created wide streets with wide +12' travel lanes, people are treating them like they are expressways. A result of this has been many of the incremental demolitions over the years as people lose control and crash into adjacent buildings (i.e. Wormans). As I mentioned, everything is a balance. Two-waying some streets are a positive thing for increasing multimodal accessibility and simply making it safer by slowing traffic down to posted speed limits.
QuoteWell I don't know, I think the Landing *was* an example of Jax just being a different breed. I feel like this situation would have been handled differently by other cities and ordinary citizens would have also responded to the overall decline of the Landing differently. While I'm seemingly opposed to this two way conversion, I am not opposed to urbanity, and I do believe that Jacksonville's citizenry has the most suburban mindset of any place I've really ever been, and this gets reflected in our leadership and even down to how people behave as pedestrians or parkers.
The Landing issue had little to do with the average Jaxson. It was moreso silly political games from a few powerful individuals. An event as simple as Brown getting re-elected would have altered the outcome of the site and the amount of money that taxpayers will be on the hook with it.
QuoteWell, you might be surprised, then, to learn that most of the employees of this company DO live closer to downtown than to the far suburbs or beaches.
I consider Urban Jax as the pre-consolidated city, as the infrastructure was built out prior to the automobile becoming the dominant form of local mobility. Urban (Pre-consolidated) Jax was Flint, MI before consolidation. So once we get outside of a good three mile radius of DT, you're basically in the burbs. I'd be shocked if the majority of downtown workers in any major Northbank or Southbank company resided within pre-consolidated Jax's limits.
QuoteAnd it's not that they're fragile, but really it's the parking that's one of the biggest things.
I work downtown and parking is a big pet peeve of mind as well. However, it's not about walking. It's about paying to park in a place that's void of activity to come to work. Even though I can afford it, I park outside of downtown and ride the Skyway to Central Station near my office everyday. Because the Skyway is unreliable and slow, it adds 30 to 45 minutes each way to my daily commute. However, I rather spend the parking money on supporting our struggling restaurants and coffee shops each day.
QuotePeople just cannot imagine walking. Part of me gets that because it really does absolutely stink throughout most of the year in a button down and jacket (if that's what you wear). What I've found since moving back is that downtown and the employers who choose to be there have a closer tie to urban core residents than other office submarkets, it would seem, unofficially just from my anecdotal observation.
I believe people will walk when there's a reason to walk. They walk all over malls, amusement parks, beaches, museums, Jags games, etc. with no problem. What the average person does not like though, its walking in scenes that can can give zombie movies a run for the money at times. With that in mind, one of our biggest low hanging fruits to capitalize on is flipping the ground floor retail in our office towers to the street, spilling that activity out on the sidewalks and programming the streets on a regular basis. Anything to stimulate some additional activity and foot traffic on the cheap will go a long way to making a change for the better, which will ultimately influence others.
QuoteRegarding "reflecting Jacksonville's demographics", no, my company is a woke F500 trying desperately to only hire minorities and women, but it is still mostly white men (and I work in commercial real estate so that's probably not going to change for a long time).
It ain't truly woke if that cultural diversity isn't reflected at the decision making table. I even get on my firm about this. I get tired of hearing people use those buzzwords when they aren't really about that life.
QuoteIf you want to bring in the whole diversity argument, in many elite downtowns it is actually very expensive to live there and so I don't think many downtown areas "reflect their cities' respective racial breakdowns", so I am not for or against that I'm just saying that's not a fair way to assess my company as one that is open or closed to downtown based on what the employees may or may not look like.
I'm not accessing an individual company. If that's how it came across, that wasn't my intent. If anything I was trying to make a point about not making infrastructure decisions for the greater good of the community on one company (yours, mine or anyone else's). Our opinions and desires are no more important that the person trying to get back on their feet with the help of places like Clara White Mission. Our offices aren't representative of the community. They're small elements with opinions that should be balanced with others. Public planning and infrastructure decisions need to be more inclusive to the needs of the overall community. As I've said earlier, it's all a big balancing act.
QuoteWell and there it is...the first person I really ever heard clamor for the two-way street conversion was Lori Boyer, the queen of buzzwords and of formulaic ideas (some good, some questionable). I think she's great, I think she's smart, but she is also the person who has helped to perpetuate this weird lifetime long city leadership obsession with reaching 10,000 residents (oops now it is 10,000 units) to achieve downtown whatever...
Many of the local buzz words and theories predate her time. The 10,000 residents myth has been around a while. There are cities with more vibrant downtowns with less residents than DT Jax. That myth should be taken out back and shot. I honestly think we'd be better off if we didn't call most of our projects as world class, transformational, game changers, etc. The misuse of buzzwords cause more harm than good.
QuoteI don't know if the idea is really good, or bad, but to me I just don't see how it will make a difference for street life or for pedestrians, and that's how it's being sold.
One difference it makes is traffic will be able to travel eastbound on Adams and westbound on Forsyth. If they help slow auto traffic down to 25-30mph, that's another plus. There's also additional marked crosswalks and RRR. These things alone would make those two streets safer and storefronts on them more accessible. This alone, may be worth it. Not a "game changer" or "world class" but an improvement that should be reinforced with additional complimentary public investment and tax incentives for better utilization of adjacent buildings.
QuoteI do see a risk in it creating potential traffic issues, but maybe not if they are factoring in those turn lanes. It just seems like there are other ways to help our downtown businesses and improve streetscapes without going so far as converting the existing paths with which we enter and leave downtown. I mean, if we are going to spend the money...aren't there better ways to do so?
We can two-way a few streets, if necessary, and invest in other improvements. We need just about everything right now.
The Left Turn Lanes are planned at
Adams Street
WB @ Jefferson (not sure why, since Adams returns to 1-way WB west of Jefferson, so there is no opposing traffic)
EB @ Broad (which is 1-way NB)
WB @ Main (1-way SB)
EB @ Ocean (1-way NB)
Adams is 1-way WB between Liberty and Market
so all EB traffic must turn onto Market
and there is a WB left-turn lane at Market
Forsyth Street
west of Jefferson, Forsyth is 1-way EB, so all WB traffic must turn left onto Jefferson
EB at Broad (1-way NB)
WB at Main (1-way SB)
EB at Ocean (1-way NB)
Quote
From thelakelander
One difference it makes is traffic will be able to travel eastbound on Adams and westbound on Forsyth. If they help slow auto traffic down to 25-30mph, that's another plus. There's also additional marked crosswalks and RRR.
Adams and Forsyth will be posted at 25 MPH
The crosswalks at each intersection will be marked with "high emphasis" (aka "ladder") crosswalks, except at Hogan and Laura, where the "brick" treatments will be kept. There are no additional (say, midblock) crossings. I don't know what you mean by "RRR".
Sorry...a resurfacing. I was at FDOT D5 PLEMO too long and speak in abbreviations at times.
RRR = Resurfacing, Restoration and Rehabilitation work
Quote from: thelakelander on January 04, 2023, 09:51:42 AM
Sorry...a resurfacing. I was at FDOT D5 PLEMO too long and speak in abbreviations at times.
RRR = Resurfacing, Restoration and Rehabilitation work
I should have known that ... but for the civilians! :)
With the pedestrian talk, I was trying to bend it into RRFB (Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacon) - and there aren't any of those in the Adams/Forsyth plans.
I do agree that good urban planning makes sense regardless of city size. That said, in cities like Lakeland and Jacksonville they arrive via a car. In Chicago and New York, a considerable number take public transit and are forced to walk. For them, the street is already two-way; they can walk in either direction. If the pedestrians had to travel one-way in the direction of the car traffic, what a sight to see that would be.
There's also the dynamic that in Chicago and New York the one-way streets help move a substantial number of cars. If we had that many cars, I'd be fine with one-way streets - that means that those people would have to park and walk somewhere and we'd have that critical mass we're all craving.
Well, here we go:
https://www.jaxdailyrecord.com/news/2025/feb/10/closures-coming-as-forsyth-and-adams-streets-are-returned-to-two-way-traffic/
I am still dreading this change and think it's wild lunacy. In the process of installing the new traffic lights, I've already encountered what it can mean to be down to one lane on these streets. One time already coming in on Forsyth, traffic didn't budge long enough for me to emergency park my car at a meter by the courthouse and literally run to my building to be on time for a meeting.
This is going to be an unmitigated disaster.
Fortunately, downtown commuters coming in from the beach or the southside will be less impacted (and I would say probably those coming from the northside who exit at Union), but those coming from the westside/SW Jax who enter from Forsyth may expect more backups than usual, especially if office use increases (as it is in other markets) and our extreme vacancy downtown decreases (which would be a good thing).
The "point" as per the article and many frequent conversations and dialogues is to "slow" traffic so that people "notice" shops/businesses or decide to stick around longer. As someone who LOVES downtown and urban environments, I truly don't think the way to get people and office users to love downtown more or stick around longer is to deliberately harm their commute and aggravate their livelihoods. That's not the way to foster interest and demand downtown.
People will stick around more if there are more things to do or places to go! That simple. Downtown has a somewhat thriving entertainment district and does have places to go, as it is. If we want more of that, then the key is to attract more office users and more residents (daytime/permanent population), and continue incentivizing small businesses (restaurants, bars, shops). Worsening commutes into downtown is not a good way to attract more office users, though.
This whole notion that we have to punish auto commuters for good things to happen is a total farce and one of the dumbest things we have latched onto in a while. And in similar vein, the idiotic poorly planned "Market St San Francisco" level bike lane they did at probably high cost along Liberty St is from the same ideological parent thought.
Agree many cities have multiple lanes that are one way and it doesn't seem to bother foot traffic many people will walk to those places if they want to especially new york. This city is bigger than downtown and people need to get from place to place even to downtown to work or passing through downtown to any of the neighborhoods nearby to get home or where work is across the city. People aren't going work at some retail or restaurants to stay downtown and work forever with low pay or stay to shop or browse around. they also want higher paying jobs which is office or industrial especially industrial which this city should be more of better jobs and income for this city. You can piss this city off removing more lanes and expect them to drive in those areas
And they will avoid the area making businesses suffer more and cause accidents when it's been one way for a long time.
Tighter smaller roads and truckers will hate driving to deliver goods to retail and restaurants and construction sites which require bigger and longer semi trucks to deliver long loads. Truckers in Boston hate it because they can't see everything around them all at once when turning thats why a stupid bicyclist got herself killed when she didn't care to pay attention and rode through when the truck was making a wide turn and ran over her. When construction was happening on hogan to revitalize the buildings there was a 53 footer that had a difficult time turning down that road just to deliver construction supplies for them and then make another delivery across town and then on to orlando. These trucks don't deliver everything in those trailers for just one place they deliver parcels to many locations and some of those supplies come from outta town.
Not all streets are being converted to two way, and there's no indication such projects will keep drivers out of Downtown or reduce traffic, though it will calm traffic and make the pedestrian environment better. We've seen this is places like Laura Street and San Marco Square, which are both far better off now than they were before. This is a great project and a long time coming.
Based on my experience, many drivers already think Forsyth is a 2 way street. I can't count how many times I have encountered wrong-way drivers there ;D.
There is probably no perfect solution for streets that will satisfy everybody. Are they to be pedestrian, car or truck friendly? One solution for larger trucks is to restrict them to certain hours of the day such as before 7 AM or after 6 PM. Businesses and others would have to adjust but the trade-off is not having their workers and customers be held up by them or have safety issues.
St. Augustine has lots of narrow streets, some one-way through the historic area, and it doesn't seem to impede anyone but given the narrowness and the foot traffic no one is going to speed through. Yet cars keep coming... so, it comes down to how bad people want to be downtown. Lots of small towns like Fernandina Beach have narrow two way streets and do just fine. Create the draws and people will put up with a lot to be there.
Additionally, if we had a bus loop that circulated Downtown, people could park more on the fringes and not drive through the heart of it. This is another big issue with why Downtown doesn't thrive more... public transit there is not good. It also shows how undesirable the Skyway is as it reaches to some of those fringe areas for parking and people still don't use it much - maybe because it doesn't stop close enough to desired locations? is unreliable? runs too infrequently or for too short hours? fringe parking isn't safe? too expensive? not marketed well? not enough of it? in the wrong places? How hard is it answer these questions and come up with some viable solutions? Does anybody even care to look at these things?
In response to simms3, I don't think it will be unmitigated disaster.
I agree that recently when Forsyth has been closed down to one lane, there has been stagnant traffic in the morning. But that won't happen when Forsyth is converted to a two-lane road. Currently, there are four major parking garages on Forsyth between Julia and Main. Two on the north side of the street and two on the south side of the street. Everyone who needs to park in those garages must travel east on Forsyth.
After the two-lane conversion, if you are traveling east on Forsyth you will not be able to make a left and enter the garages on the north side of the street (if they do allow that they need to change that in the plans immediately). Instead, you will need to travel east on Adams street and then travel south and then travel west on Forsyth street to park in the garages on the northside of Forsyth street.
Roughly assuming each parking garage generates similar traffic, by forcing drivers to go west on Forsyth to park in the two northside parking garages, the two-lane conversion will actually reduce the current traffic flow that goes east by about half. Which lines up pretty well with a two-lane conversion.
An historical diversion
Quote from: jaxlongtimer on February 10, 2025, 10:37:49 PM
Additionally, if we had a bus loop that circulated Downtown, people could park more on the fringes and not drive through the heart of it. This is another big issue with why Downtown doesn't thrive more... public transit there is not good. It also shows how undesirable the Skyway is as it reaches to some of those fringe areas for parking and people still don't use it much - maybe because it doesn't stop close enough to desired locations? is unreliable? runs too infrequently or for too short hours? fringe parking isn't safe? too expensive? not marketed well? not enough of it? in the wrong places? How hard is it answer these questions and come up with some viable solutions? Does anybody even care to look at these things?
jaxlongtimer, you probably realize this, but you have just invented the Downtown Circulator system JTA started in the mid-1970s. Originally two routes, each serving fringe parking lots. One served parking lots on Liberty Street near State and Union, and lots on either side of Market Street, between Union and Beaver. The route looped through the downtown core serving most of the retail and office destinations. A second route served parking lots on the Southbank (before it was called that). One lot was adjacent to the then site of the JTA offices, on Prudential Drive next to the Main Street approach to I-95. If I remember correctly, there was also a parking lot along Prudential, east of Main. The south route crossed the Main Street Bridge, and served similar destinations. It being the US Bicentennial, they were called the "Blue" and "Red" routes (respectively, I think). JTA purchased 35-passenger buses (most buses had 45-50 seats) with upgraded seating for this service. A couple of years later, a third route was added, connecting to parking lots near the Gator Bowl. The Bicentennial being over, the red, white, and blue, color scheme was dropped, and geographic names adopted. At some point, the 35-foot coaches were replaced with similar sized buses that looked like old-time trolley cars. When downtown was busy, so were these circulator routes.
The Skyway was supposed to provide a spine to connect parking on the edges of downtown with the core. Circulator bus routes were supposed to extend the reach of the Skyway by connecting the stations to parts of downtown beyond a typical walk-distance. In the original concept, these circulator buses would have been the only ones within the core. The suburban bus routes would terminate at one of the end stations of the Skyway, and passengers would transfer to the elevated system. With the potential of very short headways (time between Skyway vehicles), it was calculated that switching from bus to Skyway would be quicker than staying on a bus caught in downtown congestion.
But, alas, offices and retail left downtown, taking with them the Skyway riders. That, and JTA didn't do a great job of keeping the thing operating reliably.
^This! There's nothing new under the sun with this stuff.
While on the topic of Two-waying streets and making streets more pedestrian friendly, can we please push the DIA, City council, COJ to make Independent Drive in front of Riverfront Plaza more pedestrian friendly?
If we really want to increase foot traffic and reduce store/retail front vacancies we have to address the following:
(http://file:///C:/Users/n01035724/Downloads/Image%20(3).jpg)
Well? The suspense is killing me!
Does anyone have updated pics or progress on the conversions? Out of town and would love to know how it's going
Quote from: urban_ on May 27, 2025, 08:56:37 AM
Does anyone have updated pics or progress on the conversions? Out of town and would love to know how it's going
Here's a rough picture I took while on lunch where you can see the new lane striping. They don't seem to have much left
(https://i.postimg.cc/ZnWQZStP/Adams-St.jpg)
Quote from: Zac T on May 27, 2025, 12:18:04 PM
Here's a rough picture I took while on lunch where you can see the new lane striping. They don't seem to have much left
Thanks! It's a big step in turning that road from a thoroughfare into a street
...and they are adding outdoor dining parklet spaces - the kind that folks on here envisioned more than a decade ago!