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PLANNING ON PRINCE
Will It Ever Be a Complete Street?
A thens-Clarke County now has a Complete Streets policy,
but will it apply to Prince Avenue?
Passed in December, Complete Streets signals ACC's
intention to accommodate all users???not just cars???when
street changes are being planned, but it includes no specific
projects or money. And in the meantime, ACC commission
ers have explicitly excluded streetscape changes from an
ongoing study and discussion about making zoning changes
along Prince???an exclusion that doesn't make sense to some
participants.
The proposed zoning changes would loosen some square
footage limits on new development and were recommended by
last year's Prince Avenue Corridor Study, along with transition
zones between businesses and neighborhoods. But that study
by county planners makes broad recommendations for Prince
that go far beyond zoning tweaks: It recommends streetscape
changes, accommodation of "bike routes along, across, and/
or through" the entire length of Prince, protection of historic
buildings and more greenspaces. So far, though, commission
ers have only authorized moving forward on the new zoning
category.
If Not Now, When?
"If you're going to allow for more density and intensity of
use along the corridor, make sure you have the infrastructure
(in terms of traffic planning, pedestrian safety, protection of
historic resources and other amenities)," wrote six members
of a stakeholders committee Mayor Nancy Denson appointed
to give feedback on the proposed zoning changes. County
planner Bruce Lonnee, who has been working with the com
mittee, told Flagpoie that ACC commissioners had specifi
cally directed planners at a work session late last year not to
formulate any streetscape or traffic proposals for Prince.
"They didn't want us to initiate anything with GDOT at
this point," he said, referring to the state Department of
Transportation, which must approve streetscape changes,
because much of Prince is a state highway.
The Oak/Oconee Street corridor, not Prince Avenue, will
be the first test of the Complete Streets policy, Lonnee
told Fiagpole. Nor were members of the citizens' committee
encouraged to discuss historic preservation or transportation
issues.
"They did come up from time to time" at the committee's
meetings, said Dan Lorentz, a committee member and presi
dent of the Boulevard Neighborhood Association, but "we
all sort of understood that [zoning] was the scope" of the
committee's input.
"That's a big, big problem," said BikeAthens President
Elliot Caldwell, who also served on the stakeholders com
mittee. Several committee members and other citizens told
the ACC Planning Commission earlier this month that zon
ing changes shouldn't be considered in isolation from other
Prince Avenue issues.
"You're putting the cart before the horse," said Tony
Eubanks, a longtime Prince Avenue activist.
Planning commissioners seemed to agree: "Just pick
ing land uses seems the wrong place to start," said Chrissy
Marlowe, citing dangers to pedestrians crossing Prince.
"We're just not having the right conversation right now."
ACC commissioners need to apply the required resources to
questions about Prince, planning commissioner Lucy Rowland
said.
"I just don't want this to drag out for years, because every
one will be frustrated," she said.
Planning Director Brad Griffin has estimated that a
Complete Streets analysis by his department could take 18
months; Griffin has insisted on spacing out assignments to his
department after having them piled on in the past.
Nothing is likely to happen quickly on Prince.
Commissioners' reluctance to raise issues of traffic or pres
ervation may smack of politics???and changes to Prince have
certainly been controversial in past years, which is why they
haven't already happened???but bureaucratic inertia is a factor,
too. Perhaps to space out planning department assignments,
commissioners decided last year to limit the discussion to zon
ing only. Nobody seems to remember when that happened, or
why???work sessions are open to the public, but they are not
televised, no official notes are taken and there are no formal
votes.
IfNot This, What?
"Any project this extensive is going to be phased and pri
oritized," Commissioner Kelly Girtz told Flagpole, but he didn't
remember the work session discussion.
"To be honest, I don't recall the specifics," agreed
Commissioner Andy Herod.
If commissioners do decide to backtrack on a decision they
don't seem to recall having made, it will take awhile to undo
it; the zoning question goes first to the planning commission,
then back to the county commission no sooner than June.
There are precedents for avoiding discussions of Prince
Avenue, which have brought political firestorms in the past.
In 1998, then-Mayor Doc Eldridge's campaign included adding
bike lanes to Prince Avenue, but it never happened. A 2001
study by ACC's transportation department (which had received
"numerous" requests for bike lanes on Prince Avenue) con
cluded that reducing the street from four lanes to three and
adding bike lanes would be "feasible" between downtown and
Milledge Avenue; beyond Milledge, traffic counts are higher and
the street is controlled by the state GDOT.
The lane change could be accomplished with no loss of on
street parking, the study said. But the proposal became politi
cally charged, hysterical emails flew and then-Commissioner
Hugh Logan orchestrated a dramatic vote that removed Prince
entirely from the county's long-term Bicycle Master Plan.
Commissioner David Lynn subsequently defeated Logan at
the polls, and a rather different group of commissioners later
restored Prince to the bike plan. But the commission rejected
three-laning and bike lanes on Prince in 2005.
Prince has also shown how negotiation can work to defuse
conflicts like the threatened expansion of Athens Regional
Medical Center into adjacent neighborhoods. In the early
2000s, CAPPA (Citizens' Approach to Planning Prince Avenue),
led by Eubanks, mounted a grassroots study to reimagine the
entire corridor. It suggested adding trees along the right-of-
way (as the county has since done) and parking lots, adding
medians and bicycle lanes, putting utilities underground and
turning some one-way street outlets into pedestrian malls.
Some of CAPPA's varied visualizations of Prince's possible future
are on view at www.historicboulevard.org. They influenced
the county's own 2012 Prince Avenue Corridor Study, which
some feel that commissioners are ignoring along with the new
Complete Streets policy.
That corridor study, developed by the ACC Planning
Department, recommends increasing densities, both residential
and commercial, along Prince.
"Increases in transit frequency and neighborhood-oriented
and -scaled businesses both require greater residential densi
ties to sustain these services," it says.
"A detailed, master streetscape plan" should be developed
for all segments of Prince Avenue, according to the study, and
a traffic study should be done, with consideration given to
mid-block crosswalks and "lane configuration changes" (pre
sumably three-laning with bicycle lanes and perhaps taking
control of Prince from the state with attendant maintenance
costs).
Buildings on the Piedmont College and UGA Health Sciences
campuses should be considered for historic protection, the
study said, stronger greenspace connections and pocket parks
should be developed and a new zoning category should be for
mulated for some parcels.
Meanwhile, a public hearing on the proposed Prince Avenue
zoning changes will be held on Monday, May 20 at 7 p.m.
at George Hall on the University of Georgia Health Sciences
Campus.
John Huie
MAY 15, 2013 ??? FLAGPOLE.COM 7
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