Comment 115444

By mdrejhon (registered) - website | Posted December 06, 2015 at 21:40:36 in reply to Comment 115441

That'd be true too. Removing traffic lanes make it so much easier to design the street cross-section for non-motorized people.

But for a single "revitalization cycle" (approximately once a generation) I'm not sure we can narrow Main 5 lanes per direction to only 1 per direction suddenly all at once (for a 3-lane 2-way config -- 1 lane per direction and center turning lane). Historically, look at the frustration raised by many drivers just by narrowing International Village to 2 lanes -- and that probably affected some elections at the time too.

So, for this cycle around, need to find a place for about 2 traffic lanes in both directions somewhere.

At this stage, I almost -- ALMOST -- wonder if it's even politically easier to turn King Street into a car-free corridor (LRT/cyclke/pedestrian corridor from Gage to downtown), and just assign Main as a 4-lane 2-way road (narrowed from 5 lanes). This would be quite European, though it would require a large campaign to do so -- complete with trees in the middle of the street (between LRT tracks and cycle track), along with wider (braille) sidewalks, all the way to Gage Park.

A bit of a crazy idea, but a car-free King Street corridor all the way between downtown and Gage Park, and turning Main into a 2-way street (2 traffic lanes per direction, wider sidewalks or cutout parking, no bike lanes)? This might require two revitalization cycles to achieve (25+ years) given the large number of automobile-optimized businesses in this corridor.

The city is going to be making some very tough decisions regarding the future of Main/King...

Comment edited by mdrejhon on 2015-12-06 21:47:58

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