At tonight’s Urbana City Council meeting, years of planning and contentious debate will culminate in a discussion of the Main Street Traffic Plan. The City of Urbana is recommending that traffic be calmed in a three-block section of Main Street from Vine to Race by adding bike lanes and reducing automobile traffic to three lanes. This plan is opposed by a group of downtown businesses led by Cinema Gallery owner Carolyn Baxley. Advocates for both parties have been rallying support in the lead-up to tonight’s meeting.
The Plan is available for download from the City of Urbana’s website here (it’s a 4.2 MB pdf). The plan endorsed by city planners and local and national bicycling advocates is Option 5, while the alternative supported by Baxley, et. al., is Option 6, which would detour the bike route south to Elm Street.
Councilperson Charlie Smyth is in support of Option 5. “We have had plans for downtown for some time and a bike master plan that reflects that, all of which has had considerable public scrutiny and discussion for many years,” Smyth asserted. “We have waited too long to do traffic calming on this three block stretch from Vine to Race. These long terms plans have called for bicycle routes through downtown to complement the various streetscape (ie. sidewalk) projects that have been done.”
Smyth continued, “What we have before us is an overall package to improve safety for all involved, not just vehicles (though they will be the primary beneficiary). The total package has to be looked at for expanded parking on side streets, improved pedestrian access and more importantly better crosswalk ability at the courthouse and in the midblock at Crane Alley, as well as better loading/unloading, better signage and wayfinding, and very importantly turn lanes at two of the most dangerous intersections in our community.”
Gary Cziko, a retired U of I professor of psychology and member of local cycling advocacy group Champaign County Bikes, also supports Option 5 “because it is clearly the best of the five options being considered in terms of safety for motorists, pedestrians and bicyclists, encouraging more people to use active transportation to come to Downtown Urbana and generating business for Downtown Urbana.”
Baxley, who delivered a petition to city officials last week asking that the bike lanes be moved off of Main Street, was quoted in the News-Gazette as saying “We are asking it for the safety of bicyclists.” She elaborated in an email, in response to the following question: If your main safety concern is bicyclists on the sidewalks on Main Street, then how would opposing a plan that recommends bike lanes on the street make bicyclists and pedestrians more safe?
“It is against City ordinance to ride bikes on downtown sidewalks, and there is a $100 fine for doing so; it endangers pedestrians, period,” Baxley explained. “Putting bike lanes on Main St. is a separate issue entirely; they do not belong on such a busy thoroughfare, and merchants are asking the City to put them on Elm St., just one block away; it is a safe, wide street that still routes cyclists through the heart of downtown. No one is saying we don’t want bikes downtown or that we are ‘anti-bike;’ that is simply ridiculous.”
Cziko countered, “[Baxley’s] view is inconsistent with that of city staff, the officers of Champaign County Bikes, the Urbana Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Commission, and Ed Barsotti (executive director of the League of Illinois Bicyclists). Baxley wants the bike lanes to detour via Elm Street, requiring bicyclists to make two left turns (and one right turn). This is clearly not safer than proceeding straight through on a road-dieted Main Street with wide bike lanes. Bicyclists won’t make the detour anyway. And without bike lanes, bicyclists may be tempted to use the sidewalks.”
Smyth agreed, “The petitioners contradict themselves when they call for bicycle safety by asking bicyclists to make two left turns to use Elm Street as those left turns put bicyclists at far more risk in our cell phone-toting, distracted-driver society. They demonstrate that they aren’t bicyclists as bicyclists don’t behave in this counterintuitive [manner]. Straight through bike lanes put those 8-10% mode share bike folks right at the businesses they want to patronize. I have been amazed at the number of people who have told me that they are already boycotting the businesses along Main because of this petition drive.”
Baxley said, “It is very clear that cyclists are dead set on putting the paths on Main St. and merchants are adamantly opposed to their being located there.”
Smyth questioned the business owners’ motivations. “I think there are a couple of folks pushing a personal agenda here,” he said. “Expanded parking benefits them directly at the expense of public safety. We have an excess of parking downtown, it just means that you have to walk maybe half a block in some cases. People walk just as far when they go to a strip mall, an indoor mall or even Schnucks. The disconnect is that we are finally going to get serious about downtown. This mayor and city council have followed through on many of our goals, we don’t just talk about doing stuff. But for me public safety trumps personal gain.”
CUMTD planner Transportation Planning Consultant (and Smile Politely contributor) Cynthia Hoyle prepared a summary document of the advantages of Option 5 that can be found here.
The Council meeting begins at 7 p.m. in the council chambers at 400 S. Vine St. in Urbana. This item is 11th on the agenda.