Plans in review for downtown two-way street conversion

[thelakelander]

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/

[Charles Hunter]

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.

[thelakelander]

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.

[Charles Hunter]

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?

[simms3]

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.

[Charles Hunter]

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.

[Charles Hunter]

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?

[thelakelander]

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

[simms3]

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.

[thelakelander]

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.

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.

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.

[simms3]

The unconstrained version is likely to happen, as it is the one that plans have been developed for.

Good.

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.

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.

[thelakelander]

^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.

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.

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.

[fsu813]

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.

[vicupstate]

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.   

[jaxlongtimer]

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  .  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.