[Vision2020] re: Third Street Bridge

[Tom Ivie]

The City is in the planning
stages of a proposal that will be going before City
Council for approval in the near future.  A proposal
to bridge Third Street so that it will connect to
Mountain View Rd. has already passed through the
Transportation Commission and is now in Public Works
Finance (tentively Sept. 12th). This proposal includes removing the on-street
parking that currently exists on Third St. from Hayes
to the other side of Blaine St. heading east. 
Connecting 3rd St. to Mountain View Rd. would
significantly increase traffic on the street and
create the portion between Hayes and Mountain View as
a main arterial. It would prove to function as a main
connection to downtown and straight on to Pullman.

The idea of a thoroughfare is to control through
traffic in residential areas and promote public safety
by designating an arterial network to help channel
extraneous traffic around neighborhoods. Connecting
3rd St. to Mountain View does just the opposite of
this because the area East of Hayes Street was not
designed to handle congestion. The street narrows
before Blaine, going west, and remains narrow until
Hayes.  This creates a bottle neck which is
exacerbated by the fact that there is on-street
parking on the south side of the street between Blaine
and Hayes.  However, the on-street parking is
essential because of the density of housing in the
area and the proximity to East City Park and Lena
Whitmore elementary school.  The single family houses
that are east of Hayes sit closer to the street than
those west of Hayes.  Also, the apartments that are
between Cleveland and Hayes sit close to the street
(the apartments west of Blaine are extremely close to
the street) and do not appear to present the
opportunity to widen the street (The current front
yard requirement for R3 and R4 is 20ft).

The quality of life in residential neighborhoods can
be significantly affected by traffic issues. Any
significant increase in traffic would degrade the
environment for pedestrians, bicyclists, and nearby
residents.

Traffic issues affect Lena Whitmore Elementary School
children.  Not only between 8:00 and 8:30 am and 2:50
to 3:30 pm is there plenty of traffic on Blaine which
slows traffic on 3rd St., but children often cross
Third Street later in the day and on the weekends as
Lena Whitmore is also used and maintained as a park. 
Increased traffic will only create more unsafe
conditions for walking children or those riding their
bikes, scooters, skates, and skateboards. There is a
general lack of crosswalks because this is an
residential area.  There is also a limited amount of
sidewalks because this is an older neighborhood.  Not
usually a problem in low traffic areas, but with a
significant increase in traffic, it would be a
tremendous problem.  Crosswalks join sidewalks at
corners.  What does the child (or family) do that
lives on the block without a sidewalk?  Take their
chance crossing the street to get to the side with the
sidewalk?  A national study released in October 2000
shows that two-thirds of drivers speed through school
zones, despite safety measures such as crosswalks,
flashing signs and crossing guards.  In addition to
Lena Whitmore, the Jr. High is also affected.  Many
students cross Third Street at Cleveland on their way
to and from school.

Sixth Street and D Street are already designated as
arterials.  Whereas, Third Street is currently
designated as a collector.  It is bad engineering
practice to try to designate an arterial two streets
away from one arterial (E/W) 6th street and four-five
streets away from another (D Street).  Streets should
be for people, not just car funnels to outer
destinations. 

The book titled Planning for Street Connectivity which
was published in 2003 by the American Planning
Association states, “it's really not necessary to
force open every subdivision in order to improve
community-wide connectivity. It would be
counter-productive (not to say, poor planning) to
insist on a rigid connectivity principle applicable to
every block. The key is to create strategically
located links that benefit broad cross-sections of the
community....”

The firm of Robert Peccia & Associates did a report
for the Helena Transportation Coordinating Committee
in 2004.  This Civil Engineering firm does projects
all over the United States.  The report stated that a
collector street differs from an arterial in that
collector roadways may traverse residential
neighborhoods.  The city of Helena defines collector
routes as carrying between 2,000 and 5,000 vehicles
per day.  Whereas, they define an arterial as
typically carrying more than 15,000 vehicles per day. 
They go on to state that "Long, continuous collectors
will encourage through traffic, essentially turning
them into arterials.  This, in turn, results in the
undesirable interface of local streets with arterials,
causing safety problems and increased costs of
construction and maintenance.

Moscow’s Comprehensive Plan – Section 10
(Transportation) talks about the extension of 3rd
Street to Mountain View.  However, by its adoption of
the Comprehensive Plan, the Council is aware that
“It’s desirability as a traffic corridor is limited
by
narrow widths in the section east of Hayes Street
and
by a lack of parking for a two-block portion.”  The
Plan goes on to state that 3rd Street is not ideal for
heavy traffic.  Section 10 (Transportation), as it
relates to 3rd St., appears to be in conflict with
Section 4 (Central Business District).  “The flow of
traffic through the downtown area between eastern
residential areas and the university and other
destinations on the west side of town creates a
problem of access to the central business district. 
Third and Sixth Streets carry a majority of the
east-west traffic in the city, in addition to
providing major access to the central business
district.  Distribution of a portion of Third and
Sixth Streets’ traffic to other streets is needed to
eliminate congestion on these streets and to
facilitate access to the central business district.” 

Many in Moscow feel that this proposal will hurt the
accessibility of programs in East City Park.  Events
that occur at East City Park draw many who find it
convenient to park their vehicles along Third Street. 
For many events, we have personally seen vehicles
parked clear down to the Cleveland intersection of
East Third.  As the City would experience an
overwhelming increase of traffic on Third St. would
they choose to eliminate more parking West of Hayes? 
What would that do to further the parking problem
during East City Park events? 

Moscow is fortunate to have preserved many of its
historic resources and to have documentation for them.
 As you are aware, Moscow has 17 individual structures
and 1 district of 116 structures on the National
Register of Historic Places.  One of these structures
is the Mason Cornwall Residence at 308 S. Hayes, a
corner property that is also situated on Third Street.

Furthermore, the increased traffic on Third Street
between Hayes and Mountain View will unnecessarily
burden the adjacent property owners and residents,
creating a traffic funnel that will simply degrade the
adjacent neighborhood. 

Unlike the intersections of Mountain View to Sixth and
D Streets, the Third Street intersection has houses on
it.  These houses, especially the ones closest to
Mountain View, will experience great difficulty in
exiting their driveways.  Furthermore, the two houses
that sit across Paradise Creek on the corner of Third
and S. Roosevelt Streets have driveways that are on
the creek side of the property.  These two houses will
also experience difficulties exiting their driveways
with a bridge next to them. 

The honest truth of the matter is that it does not
take long to get anywhere in Moscow, 5 to 10 minutes
tops.  That does not constitute a traffic problem. 
Some may argue that we need more east/west
connectivity. Welcome to D, 6th and State 8. And
welcome to proper planning for arterials in new
subdivisions (actually, White Avenue in the Salisbury
Subdivision is a good example of this).  You may also
hear about winter and how 3rd street is the only
reasonable way east when it snows. Try again... 3rd
street functions just fine as a neighborhood collector
and serves this function to Hayes Street, right at
Hayes, left at 6th and Mountain View here we come
DURING THE WINTER, on bad days, when 6th street is
impassable, etc.  People can easily use State 8 to get
to Mountain View if east of Mountain View is the
destination... a straight-line path is not required! 
 
If you are against the Third Street extension, I invite you to not just talk about it here.  Get involved writing letters to the City Council members and the Mayor.  Perhaps even the school board and superintendent.  They need to hear from the citizenry that this is a bad idea.  Don't wait until it is already a done deal and then choose to complain about it.  Do something about it now.  Don't wait for the city to let us all know about what is going on.  They have proven to us time and time again that they do not value what the citizens want.  They rarely ask for our input and don't get me started about their communication.  They only communicate to the extent of what is minimally required by law.  Did you know that that a regularly scheduled public meeting only has to have the agenda posted for it 48 hrs in advance at the site of the meeting?  They are not required to post the agendas on the City web site.
 
Anyway, I am new to this list and am done with my rant.  Thanks for listening. 

-Tom Ivie


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