What would you say if someone at Ludington City Hall proposed mixing vehicle and pedestrian traffic on one or more downtown streets, eliminating sidewalks to enhance the pedestrian experience and reduce traffic accidents?

The idea may sound a bit crazy, counter-intuitive, and somewhat European, but more and more American cities are adopting curbless streets within their jurisdictions, usually around business or downtown districts.  The prototypes of these street-sidewalk combos began over in Germany and Denmark over ten years ago and is even popular in Israel.  The pioneers of the curbless street movement shifted the usual paradigm about what a street is thought to be, particularly in America:  a place where vehicles move about.  Curbless streets are designed to allow for vehicle traffic, but they are not designed for vehicles.

Proponents of curbless streets conclude that the transformation from “a street you go through” to “one you go to” adds numerous benefits. These includes safety (reduced speed and drivers paying more attention), economic (increased property values and decreased vacancy), quality of life (access to open space, improved aesthetic), and mobility advantages.

Progressive urban cities across the nation have adopted curbless streets as a resource in their streetscape toolbox.  Philadelphia, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Seattle are increasingly using this design to flip areas without a lot of vehicle traffic and/or accessibility issues into what they believe is a better thoroughfare.

Yet, curbless streets are coming to smaller cities, including one in our general area.  Muskegon will go curbless in portions of Western Avenue.  WZZM TV 13 reports Western Avenue will have around two dozen fewer parking spaces next spring when work to remove select sections of curbs and widen sidewalks finishes.  Curbs will be eliminated from both sides of Western from Third to Fourth, a section on Western in front of the Leonard development and at the corner of Second Street.

Some of the sections identified to go curbless are currently being used by restaurants for outdoor seating. The new street design will result in the removal of large cement barricades used to define the outdoor dining areas. 

The curbless areas correspond with the new social districts and one can expect the restaurants may want to expand their outdoor dining and drinking experiences even if/when the pandemic someday ends.  Muskegon Mayor Steve Gawron gushes:  "It's really an enhancement of the pedestrian experience, as opposed to being overly concerned with the amount of cars we're pushing through an area."

Will this be considered in Ludington by our city leaders?  It probably already has in some way, particularly since it seems to be almost feasible on South James Street.  It is also endorsed by Chuck Marohn's "Strong Towns" organization, who actually featured Muskegon's proposed curbless street earlier this evening, noting that Muskegon has already won one of their awards back in 2018:

Ludington's leaders often looks to Muskegon and Grand Rapids for guidance in bettering their downtown, so expect them to have already noticed this 'enhancement' and be in the process of considering whether it could work in their city, especially with the ST endorsement and nearly $850,000 in free stimulus money that could likely be used for the project.

Do you think curbless streets, in general, can accomplish the goals that their civil engineer proponents speak of?  Do you think that curbless streets could work for some or all of South James Street?  Could it work in Scottville for South Main Street?

Please, express your opinion(s) in the comment section.

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If they want to make the road into a pedestrian only path and keep the curbs, I could support that but mixing motor vehicles and pedestrians makes no sense. Also, curbs are used to control the flow of water to storm drains and removing the curbs and redesigning the street and drains will cost a huge amount of money. This might work for larger towns with pockets full of cash and a multitude of streets to choose from but Ludington has a limited amount of cash that they rob from the public twice a year and an even smaller number of streets that would benefit from this change. All of Ludington's main streets need the motor vehicle traffic and the curb space to park those vehicles. The City would have to add a body collection team to pick up all the drunks hit by cars during and after one of those downtown drunk fests. 

I can usually depend on you to take a picture from one of my articles and do something creative with it, Willy.

I see some major issues on South James (MDOT approval, loss of convenient parking, cost, to name a few), but I also see a lot of potential advantages that would make some DDA and city leaders seriously consider such a scheme when the street is once again ready to be repaved.  One would think they would use bollards (basically three ft. posts) to segregate dining/walking areas and vehicle traffic areas.  This prevents cars from crashing into your outdoor dining tables/sidewalk merchandise, which would now go out to where parking currently takes place.  

Bollards aren't faring too well down by the beach at the end of Ludington Avenue, two have been decimated and replaced by red pylons, most others are dinged up pretty bad in the mini-parking lot there.  The SUV driver in the picture below can't even figure out that they're not in a parking spot.

This idea is as bad as the last stupid one of narrowing down Ludington ave. to one lane.   As it is now the pedestrians just Walk off the curb without  looking when the light changes.  People just aimlessly walking anywhere on a curbles street is just stupid with vehicle traffic . Can the vehicles drive up next to the business doors?    It'll just take one person who is in a hurry  , pissed off or drunk  run someone down. 

If you recall, the DDA and many other city officials were really wanting to do the Ludington Avenue Road Diet, even after the MDOT study indicated that it would be ill-advised.  If the avenue wasn't also a state highway, you would have probably seen it painted down to 3 lanes.  Since the MDOT could not legally approve of angle parking, the change would get nothing new other than wider lanes and a little more space protection for those drivers getting out of their parallel parking spaces.  They viewed the potential loss of traffic flow as a benefit, since people might be more tempted to stop in the downtown if it takes minutes to get through it.

Don't discount this happening in Ludington when you have it being hyped in all of the progressive cityscaping resources, it sounds from the last Scottville meeting that they want to do something like this with Scottville's Main Street, enhancing their outdoor social district with an outdoor dining district too.  It's going to be a tall order though, Scottville's downtown doesn't have as many draws for dining and drinking as it once did.  

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