“Both
north and south of Sixth Avenue, we have a lot of traffic that is not
vehicles and a lot of them are kids. On a bike, you have a
fighting chance of crossing the street, but you can’t do it with a
stroller and you can’t do it on foot. It’s our residents who are at
risk.”~ Christopher McVoy
Talking about future improvements to 6th Avenue South, a road that was designed to "move traffic" with no crosswalks for pedestrians and no traffic lights. The CRA spent $5.8 million on that road to attract development. Other than the affordable rentals on the rail road tracks (LaJoya Village), not much has happened all these years later.
Read more about the problem, the CRA and 6th Avenue South.
This is when Clemens was chair of the CRA board. He loved going through money like water. Too bad it was not used to fix potholes and the slum, blight etc. that plagues our city.
ReplyDeleteI think it makes good sense to move traffic on 6th Ave. South because its a gateway (same for 10th). Although it would have been nice to add bike lanes when it was being done by CRA (although my recollection is there was not enough width), the sidewalks are good along both roads.
ReplyDeleteBut, it would be better and safer for all to put bike lanes or bike paths and pedestrian paths not on the collector gateway roads but on parallel roads Like 7th Ave. South or 9th Ave. North, let's put some separation between the gateway roads and peds/bikes.
The CRA has just such a project that has been funded through grants that will move the pedestrian and bike traffic off 6th Ave South and onto 5th Ave. South between A Street and F Street. As the path crosses the alphabet streets, it will provide traffic calming by raised crosswalks and lighting.
ReplyDeleteThe perception of it being an unsafe road is overblown. I agree that it looks 300% better than before the CRA did the re-do. No one was going to develop on it the way it was and there WERE too many drug dealer around 6th and F. We dealt with that problem through nuisence abatement and threatened to shut down the convenience if they didn't hire guards and clean up their act. (Needs to be bulldozed)
We have been trying to get non-developers to build un-affordable homes in the least desirable neighborhoods in Lake Worth..... but it's a hard sell. So I guess we should continue to encourage building homes similar to what are already there, only newer.
Poor people want to live in nice, safe neighborhoods too. Not the slums we have that need to be knocked down.
I agree---poor people and all people want to live in nice, safe neighborhoods--not slums. Why then, does our city continue to be trashed? Make me understand that.
ReplyDeleteThe CRA was told this would be a death trap for pedestrians. Jeff Clemens, Shannon Materio, Peter Myerhoffer and Brendan Lynch didn't give a hot damn. They basically spit on the people begging them to have a better design.Now that former CRA has blood on their hands.It was other people's money and they couldn't blow through it fast enough. Now the CRA can't even afford a couple hundred bucks to properly maintain their property.Maybe St Joan can auction off one of her fake boobs or a pair of her high priced CFM pumps to pay for yard work.
ReplyDeleteBegging to have a better design? Like what, crosswalks at every street? These are the main entrances from I-95 into the city. Maybe 25 MPH speed limits? What are your traffic design qualifications anonymous @ 8:27?
ReplyDeleteI drive 6th and 10th every day and thank God the CRA did something with them back then.
Yeah, you DRIVE 6th and 10th. Just what you could do before millions was wasted. You don't have to LIVE and get from one side to the other of those roads. Be thankful. And your "let them eat cake " attitude really sucks, by the way.
ReplyDelete