Create 1 (one) pedestrian shopping street in your city. Where do you put it?

Cirrus · #1 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 10:01 PM**

Let's play a game. You are tasked with converting one street in your city that currently has cars to become a pedestrianized shopping street. What street do you choose?

Further clarification on rules of the game:

Pick only 1 contiguous segment of street. No, your city is not a special snowflake with too many to choose. The point of the game is to choose. You may opt to choose an "L-shaped" segment that covers more than 1 street in name, but your selection must form one single cohesive corridor.
Pick a street with shops. It's supposed to be a shopping street, not a mainly residential street.
Pick a segment of street at least 4 blocks long, but no longer than about 1 mile.
If your city already has a pedestrian street, you may choose to either select another street or extend the existing one.
This is not a thread to debate the merits of pedestrian malls. Just pick one; it's not that hard.
If you like, show us a map and/or photos of the existing environment or what you think it should look like.

Crawford · #2 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 10:05 PM**

Pedestrian only, or transitway?

For NYC, I'd have a hard time picking any major retail arterial that shouldn't have transit. But if we're talking pedestrians only, I'll go with Fulton Street in Lower Manhattan. Dense mixed use retail corridor, buses aren't critical to functionality, and probably easily adaptable to pedestrian-only usage.

Cirrus · #3 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 10:16 PM**

Call the transit/no-transit question dealer's choice, but don't give an answer for both.

Cirrus · #4 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 10:27 PM**

For DC I would pick 7th Street in Gallery Place.

If possible I'd find a way to connect with nearby Palmer Alley (already a pedestrian street), to make them contiguous somehow.

Pedestrian · #5 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 10:36 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crawford

Pedestrian only, or transitway?

For NYC, I'd have a hard time picking any major retail arterial that shouldn't have transit. But if we're talking pedestrians only, I'll go with Fulton Street in Lower Manhattan. Dense mixed use retail corridor, buses aren't critical to functionality, and probably easily adaptable to pedestrian-only usage.

This distinction is pretty critical because San Francisco in fact has a street that's private car free for its downtown portion--Market Street--and that's probably the best choice . . . but it couldn't be transit-free. It's a critical transit artery.

If you demand no vehicles including transit, maybe Clement St in the Richmond District (alternate selection: Union St). All the other obvious possibilities like Mission St need their transit.

wwmiv · #6 Posted **Jun 15, 2021, 11:33 PM**

Austin:

Congress Avenue between the state capitol building and Cesar Chavez. The state has already shut the street down north of the capitol until the university and is building a state mall and the university shut the street down decades ago thru the university. Extend the pedestrian space all the way south to the river along the main historic commercial spine of downtown and divert northbound traffic to a newly one-way Brazos and southbound to Colorado.

Allow all cross streets to continue crossing the space, and utilize the public spaces as restaurant seating areas. Austin doesn’t really have a cohesive restaurant district, but Congress with all of its current restaurants and retail could be it, if only the public space around it made it obvious that’s what the district was catered to. The city has already allowed build outdoor seating areas in the parallel parking strips on their street block as a pilot program, but only a few have done so. Austin is a culinary city, but we lack a real culinary district. Sadly.

iheartthed · #7 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 3:04 PM**

I'd probably choose Prince Street between Broadway and West Broadway. There is already just one lane of traffic, and it gets extremely congested with both cars and pedestrians. It would probably be better off as a pedestrian plaza. Spring Street, which runs parallel to Prince, would also be a candidate. I could see a scenario where they're both plaza'd in tandem.

From here: https://goo.gl/maps/8fbwNvn88G756MHK8

To here: https://goo.gl/maps/mMjw8BikqKNq78n59

MolsonExport · #8 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 3:38 PM**

rue ste. catherine (Montreal) https://www.google.com/maps/@45.4978...7i16384!8i8192

Innsertnamehere · #9 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 4:28 PM**

Toronto is easy - Yonge St. From Church Street to the lake, please!

They are in the process of sort of pedestrianizing a stretch of it already, or at least as close to it as possible while still providing the required property accesses.

Crawford · #10 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 4:45 PM**

I don't think Yonge would be a very good pedestrian-only street. It's the main north-south arterial, and has significant surface transit, both on Yonge and crossing Yonge. Also there are a ton of curb cuts and garage entrances that would become useless.

I could see smaller pedestrian plazas, or a long pedestrian-transit corridor, though.

MonkeyRonin · #11 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 4:51 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Crawford

I don't think Yonge would be a very good pedestrian-only street. I mean it's the main north-south arterial, and has significant surface transit, both on Yonge and crossing Yonge. Also there are a ton of curb cuts and garage entrances that would become useless.

Yonge St. isn't really a major traffic route for either cars or surface transit (pedestrian traffic vastly outnumbers car traffic; and the Yonge bus is redundant as there's a subway running below it), and most building garage/service access curb cuts are from back alleys or side streets.

It's already planned to be semi-pedestrianized: (some blocks fully pedestrianized, some will be pedestrianized part-time, while the others will be local vehicle traffic only)

https://urbantoronto.ca/news/2021/01...y-council-vote

JManc · #12 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 5:44 PM**

Post Oak Blvd between San Felipe and Westheimer. Car-centric mess now but they just finished a BRT and it is a heavily visited area with lots of hotels, shopping and restaurants.

Steely Dan · #13 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 6:40 PM**

great thread idea!

out of pure selfishness, i'll select this half-mile stretch of Lincoln Ave., from lawrence down to montrose, that constitutes the core retail corridor of my neighborhood, Lincoln Square.

google-drive south on Lincoln starting here: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9685...7i16384!8i8192

the street already has a nice and cozy pedestrian plaza (created from a de-mapped section of side-street) that serves as the heart of the neighborhood, so expanding that out to make the whole street pedestrianized would be cool in my book.

giddings plaza: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9675...7i16384!8i8192

too bad it'll never happen.

IrishIllini · #14 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 7:35 PM**

Wells St. between Lincoln and Division.

Rush St. or Fulton Market could work too.

Atlas · #15 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 8:00 PM**

There's talk of closing Main Street in Salt Lake City to cars permanently, from South Temple to 400 S. They've been closing it on summer weekends and it's been a big success.

LAsam · #16 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 8:04 PM**

LA peeps... it's gotta be Broadway between Olympic and 3rd St, right? Lots of theatres, restaurants, shops, historic architecture, etc.

proghousehead · #17 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 8:12 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I'd probably choose Prince Street between Broadway and West Broadway. There is already just one lane of traffic, and it gets extremely congested with both cars and pedestrians. It would probably be better off as a pedestrian plaza. Spring Street, which runs parallel to Prince, would also be a candidate. I could see a scenario where they're both plaza'd in tandem.

From here: https://goo.gl/maps/8fbwNvn88G756MHK8

To here: https://goo.gl/maps/mMjw8BikqKNq78n59

Heck - pedestrianize both Spring and Prince all the way from the Bowery to 6th.

Do the same for Mott and Mulberry between Houston and Worth.

Camelback · #18 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 8:21 PM**

If I were in charge, I'm putting it downtown!

"Oh shoo, way downtown."
-The Jerky Boys

AaronPGH · #19 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 11:03 PM**

Walnut St in Pittsburgh's Shadyside. It's basically ready to go. It just needs the cars to disappear. Not the most unique retail district (apple, lulemon, big chains, etc), but the scale is perfect and it's not a major traffic artery that would screw up flow for other parts of the city. Nobody takes Walnut to get anywhere. There are also still some special mom and pops that have flourished over the years alongside the big guys.

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.4514...7i16384!8i8192

badrunner · #20 Posted **Jun 16, 2021, 11:23 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by LAsam

LA peeps... it's gotta be Broadway between Olympic and 3rd St, right? Lots of theatres, restaurants, shops, historic architecture, etc.

I don't support this. Broadway is such a great street for cruising. Plus it's a major through street connecting Northeast LA to downtown and South LA. People actually use it to get places. A better candidate for pedestrianizing would be a shorter street with a lot of foot traffic that's not heavily used for transportation, like Abbot Kinney Blvd in Venice.

Broadway:

• Video Link

Abbot Kinney:

• Video Link