Greetings faculty and staff,
Yesterday afternoon (February 18th) I attended a meeting in Vice
Chancellor Richard Brown's office. Also attending were Faculty Council
President Marvin Ernst, Facilities Planning and Management Director Tom
Ellis, and Chattanooga Traffic Engineer John VanWinkle. Dr. Ernst and I
were invited to represent the faculty viewpoint on the Fifth Street
configuration/safety issue and discuss options with the decision makers.
At the meeting, I presented the other attendees with the final results
of my e-mail survey of faculty and staff regarding the Fifth Street and
McCallie/MLK/Bailey configurations. Those results were:
Regarding Fifth Street configuration: (53 responding)
In favor of restoring the original two-lane configuration: 42 79.2%
In favor of keeping the current three-lane configuration: 1 1.9%
Undecided or prefer some other alternative: 10 18.9%
Regarding proposed reconfiguration of MLK/Bailey/McCallie:
(23 responding)
In
favor of changing to two 2-way streets: 2 8.7%
In favor of retaining current status as two 1-way streets: 18 78.3%
Undecided or not concerned about it: 3 13.0%
I strongly advocated the view of the vast majority of the faculty and
staff reflected above, namely, that for safety reasons Fifth Street
should be returned to a two-lane street with one lane in each direction.
As it turns out, according to Mr. VanWinkle this view is strongly
opposed by CARTA, which wants to keep the bus lane as they are afraid
that their drivers would have a hard time getting back out into the
single lane of traffic after stopping on Fifth Street to pick up or let
off passengers. Mr. VanWinkle presented two proposed solutions for us
to consider, both of which would retain the three-lane configuration but
make more room for the three lanes by deleting all the parking on the
south (UC/Holt Hall) side of the street. One plan was for two "normal"
eastbound travel lanes with a median between eastbound and westbound
traffic and with the buses and "regular" eastbound traffic sharing the
right lane; the other kept the rightmost lane as a "bus/bike only" lane,
but with several feet of buffer space marked and populated with "traffic
buttons" to discourage cars from switching to the right lane to pass.
Both plans also incorporated the idea of raising the existing crosswalks
to a height of approximately 4 inches above the roadway, with a six-foot
"ramp" area on either side, creating the effect of a "speed hump"
(hopefully not the jarring "speed bump" typically found in parking
lots). Mr. VanWinkle stated that the idea of the raised crosswalks
would be to force traffic on Fifth to slow down to the posted limit of
25 mph. The crosswalk design he is proposing could be negotiated
smoothly at that speed, but not at higher speeds.
Considerable discussion of the various options ensued. I continued to
advocate returning to the original two-lane configuration as that was
obviously the only way to not lose all the parking on the south side of
Fifth Street and, as we all know, parking in the University area is at a
premium. However, Mr. VanWinkle appeared strongly committed to trying
something that would preserve the third lane as requested by CARTA, and
Dr. Brown stated that he felt we should give the third lane "the old
college try" before giving up and returning to the two-lane
configuration. (If the proposed changes are implemented and don't
improve the situation, Vice Chancellor Brown said he would support
"punting" and going back to two lanes.) He also said that most of the
parking on the south side of the street would be lost soon anyway due to
the construction required for the UC expansion. After some discussion
it became apparent that faculty/staff views notwithstanding, the city is
committed to doing all it can to keep the three-lane configuration and
that for safety reasons this would require the elimination of parking on
the south side of Fifth. Recognizing that I had lost that battle for
now at least, I continued the discussion with the goal of reaching the
best and safest compromise possible given a three-lane configuration.
Discussion focused on Mr. VanWinkle's proposal to keep the bus lane but
move it over to the far right (south) side of the street, overlapping
the former parking area. This would allow for a 7-foot buffer between
the two 11-foot eastbound lanes. (The westbound lane is 12 feet wide.)
Mr. VanWinkle said that this boundary could be populated with
"buttons" that would strongly discourage automobile drivers from
crossing it to pass in the right lane. I suggested reducing the buffer
zone between lanes to 5 feet so that the traffic lanes could all be 12
feet wide (better accommodating the width of the buses), and Mr.
VanWinkle indicated that this was possible. This would make the new
configuration of the 48-foot-wide street, from north side to south side,
as follows:
7 foot space for parking on the north side
12 foot westbound travel lane
12 foot eastbound travel lane for normal traffic
5 foot buffer zone (with markings and buttons to discourage changing
lanes to the right)
12 foot bus/bike lane
Past the last crosswalk (in front of Holt Hall), the bus/bike lane would
end and the right lane would become a turn lane for accessing Lot 10.
I commented that the right turn lane as it exists now is rather short
(sometimes cars back up turning into Lot 10) and suggested moving the
existing crosswalk from the east side of the north parking area to the
west side. This would shorten the bus/bike lane by a few feet and
correspondingly lengthen the Lot 10 turn lane. Mr. VanWinkle saw no
problem with this and speculated that this move might allow us to get by
with two raised crosswalks instead of three since it would reduce the
spacing between crosswalks. As the raised crosswalks are projected to
cost at least $3000 each to construct, this is not insignificant.
I am not completely satisfied with the results of this meeting, but I
feel that I represented the concerns of faculty and staff to the best of
my ability and obtained the best and safest compromise possible given
the determination of the city and CARTA to keep three lanes on Fifth
Street. I do believe that the raised crosswalks, if correctly
implemented to allow traffic to proceed smoothly at the posted limit but
not beyond it, will significantly improve the safety of motorists and
pedestrians on Fifth Street whether it has two lanes or three. And
while I regret the loss of the parking spaces on the south side of the
street, it turns out that the upcoming UC construction would have
claimed many of them anyway; however, giving up those spaces should
improve safety by increasing visibility of pedestrians on the south side
of the street and by providing a buffer zone between the bus/bike lane
and the "regular" lane.
If you have read this far, thank you for your patience. I will close by
saying that my experience with the Fifth Street situation (specifically
the city's unwillingness to revert to the original state of affairs) has
driven home to me the necessity for anyone and everyone who opposes the
reconfiguration of McCallie/MLK/Bailey to SPEAK UP LOUDLY and SPEAK UP
NOW. Once they are reconfigured as two-way streets it won't matter how
big a disaster it is, how much traffic is snarled, or how many people
trying to get in or out of the downtown area are inconvenienced. The
city will have spent the money, done the work, and gotten the press
coverage, and there is NO WAY they will return those streets to their
present state. The only way to stop this next misguided experiment in
traffic mismanagement is to stop it BEFORE IT IS DONE, in the same way
concerned citizens spoke up and stopped the city's takeover of the water
company. If enough people speak up BEFORE the changes are made, it
MIGHT be possible to stop this from happening (even though I have been
told by long-time area residents that the "fix is already in" and,
"independent study" or not, it is a done deal). It is DEFINITELY a done
deal, and one that WILL NOT BE REVERSED, if we sit back and do nothing.
Joe Dumas
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