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The Athens-Clarke County Leisure Services
Department Invites You to Celebrate...
36\Lf is
NATIONAL
PARK AND
RECREATION
MONTH
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6AN0ERADDUE
Fri. & Sat., July 15 & 16 9-11 pm
Sandy Creek Park
S8 ACC resident and $12 non-resident
Pre-registration required by calling
706-613-3615
RORSICUES
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Saturday, July 16
Lay Park Playground
Free popsicles from 10:00 11:00 a m.
Free! 706-613-3625
W
Saturday, July 16 3-5pm
Lay Park Pool
S 1 per child. Pre-registration required by
calling 706-613-3596
03
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www.athensclarkecounty.com/leisure
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2455 Jefferson Road in Homewood Hills
706.546.0840
Open at 2pm M-F • 12pm Sat
Wednesday
KARAOKE & DRINK SPECIALS
9pm
Thursday
BLUES NIGHT with
THE SHADOW EXECUTIVES
8:30pm
Friday July 15
WILDCARD
9:30pm
Saturday. July 1C
BREATNLANES
9:30pm
'Poof' Tree Popcorn • %keho^
facebook.com/OfficeAthens
THGIS,69
Half Marathon
^
13.1
Are You Ready?
Early Registration Deadline
juiy 3i - oniy $50
REGISTER ONLINE AT
ATHENSGAHALF.COM
M&C Approve CC Plan,
Three-Laning Measures
With a few reservations, Athens-Clarke
County commissioners last week approved a
schematic plan for the long-debated expan
sion of the Classic Center. Concerns that the
sprawling building will block circulation down
town were met (somewhat, at least) by the
Classic Center's promise to maintain pedes
trian access through the building between
Thomas and Foundry streets, even after a
roofed atrium is added. (The atrium will be
open between 6 a.m. and 11 p.m., Monday
through Saturday.) An alternative route will be
an existing pedestrian walkway over Foundry
Street that leads to an elevator and stairwell
to the Multimodal Transportation Center.
That aerial walkway is "easy to use, if
you know where it is" Commissioner Alice
Kinman noted, but she also said signs need
to be added to mark the route. Commissioner
Jared Bailey voted against approval. "I still
feel like the design is incomplete," he said.
"I don't think that the design company or
the people proposing this project have really
addressed the issues that we brought up about
pedestrian access through this block, and
how they're going to address the front side of
the building—how it's going to interact with
downtown."
The commission also voted to revise down
town's sidewalk cafe ordinance for the third
time since outdoor tables became legal in
1979; the change expands the allowable width
of outdoor table areas to half the sidewalk's
width wherever the sidewalk is more than
10-feet wide. Most existing downtown outdoor
cafes won't change, but the revision will allow
wider table areas outside the new mixed-use
parking deck along Washington and Clayton
streets.
And while three-laning of county streets
has been contentious in the past, no citizen
spoke for or against proposals to three-lane
Athens West Parkway and the non-residential
section of Pulaski Street downtown. Both
streets, presently four lanes, were approved
for three-laning on 8-2 votes; both will be
restriped with a center turn lane and four- to
five-foot bicycle lanes in both directions.
ACC policy is to evaluate four-lane streets
for three-lane conversion whenever they are
about to be repaved; where traffic volume is
not too heavy, three-laning improves safety
and permits bike lanes to be added. The
four-lane portion of Hawthorne Avenue (from
Prince to Oglethorpe) was also evaluated, but
that road's traffic volume could exceed 20,000
cars per day by 2021, and "should not be con
sidered for conversion," county transportation
staffers said.
Commissioners Doug Lowry and Harry Sims
voted against three-laning Pulaski, while
Lowry and George Maxwell opposed the Athens
Wesfmeasure. Sims said ACC spends "a lot of
money" (including $6 million proposed for the
T-SPLOST vote) on bike lanes, yet bicyclists
often disobey traffic laws. "If people are not
going to follow the rules," he asked, "why
should we give them this gift?" He called for
better enforcement of traffic laws.
"If you're a cyclist, you need to follow the
rules of the road," added Commissioner Ed
Robinson. "You can't have a bicycle-friendly
city if you are allowing cyclists—just a few
bad apples—to violate the rules... We're not
going to have a bike-safe town until we have
people safely cycling."
John Huie
A Rou*jo toiajm
WATjoU Wi|LL
6 FLAGPOLE.COM-JULY 13,2011
