Young Girl Hit by Car on John May Drive Near Western Avenue

A young girl was hit by a car in West Knoxville on Sunday night. Her family tells Local8News she is currently in the ICU. MORE:

Posted by WVLT Local 8 on Sunday, August 23, 2015

Scoping First Creek Greenway at Broadway Shopping Center

The City of Knoxville's plans for First Creek Greenway near First Creek Park route the path along dangerous, unenjoyable "Broadway" sidewalk.

Exaggerating, you say?  There was an accident on Broadway literally as I was walking on the West side of First Creek.  See the last video for the accident!

My alternative suggestion includes many benefits being entirely ignored by the city in their "feasibility" studies.

Benefits of the ideal alignment along First Creek include:

Economic

• Improving access to / visibility to businesses at Broadway Shopping Center
• Reduced Creekside maintenance costs for property owners
• Adding to "park like" setting already invested in by private sector
• Removing "blighted" properties that encourage homeless camps (up for auction August 28, 2015)

Environmental 

• Reducing chemical pollution of First Creek by filtering de-icing agents, anti-freeze, oil, and other chemicals
• Reducing thermal pollution of First Creek by filtering hot parking lot runoff during storm events
• Reducing urban "heat island" effect by increasing "green" space and reducing wasted blacktop
• Reduced physical trash entry to First Creek from Broadway Shopping Center Parking lo

Health and Safety

• Reduced risk of death / accident from vehicles on Broadway
• Removing blind turns by setting street crossings back from Broadway / busy intersections
• Reduced exposure to carcinogenic motor vehicle exhaust / road dust from idling / passing vehicles

Recreational

• Reduced noise pollution by moving greenway users away from Broadway
• Increased urban forest canopy via plantings in otherwise blacktop surface
• Decreased time spent waiting for traffic signals / crossing opportunities

Broadway Shopping Center Landscaping
Private investment in aesthetics has already taken place.


Stormwater Infiltration Opportunity
Stormwater management at Broadway Shopping center is dated. Retention and filtration would positively impact water quality in First Creek.


Broadway Underpass / Broadway Tunnel - West Side
Like Cumberland Avenue underpass at Third Creek, and Neyland Drive Underpass at Second Creek, there is plenty of room for a passageway through the Broadway Viaduct.


Broadway Tunnel from West Side Video
Video shows internal dimensions of the Broadway Viaduct.


The Creekside Aesthetic


Broadway Tunnel from East Side Video
Broadway Viaduct from the East Side / First Creek Park.


A problematic crossing at Broadway
Design does not mitigate the problematic crossing.

 

I have no idea how you could consider people putting a greenway anywhere in that area. 
Unless you never visited the site in person?

Kroger Fuel Center to Fulton High School
Could have a path through here. Not suer why it's not been done already. Complete with Raccoon! You're a little bit set back from the road here, don't have to worry about all of these people making turns blindly, and crossing right here, you're at the steps to Fulton high school! Right there.

Steps of Fulton High School
From Woodland to Kroger Gas Station: the logical connection!

Idea of the Traffic Along Broadway.
Doesn't feel very safe just waiting here by the side of the street waiting to cross.

Death Awaits 
There was actually an accident right on broadway while I was walking on the mortuary property! Check towards the last third of the video.
 

City's First Creek "Creekside Example" Fails to Deliver

Brian and Chris,

First Creek Greenway is supposed to be the city's exemplar urban greenway project.

I didn't see anything "exemplary" in the plan we reviewed yesterday.

It demonstrated the same unimaginative, uninspired thinking that will not make the city a leader in urban recreational trails, and will not make Knoxville a "cool" city in which to live, work, and play.

Here's a map of an alternative I have in mind that seems more likely to meet greenway users' expectations for an actual "greenway," rather than a "sidewalk pretending to be a greenway."

https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=z28J9y8jeSEY.kNg9KOci-S2k&usp=sharing

My suggested path is nowhere near the City's and/or Ross/Fowler's concept. 

And, as I expressed interest in at yesterday's Greenways Commission meeting, my path goes by the Howard House / Walmart property.

If the developer wants a Walmart at the parcel as depicted in the schematic shown above, the developer should be required to put in a greenway, as was done at Love's Creek Walmart in East Knoxville (see image below). 

The Wal-mart developer's plans call for a "retaining wall" on the property, further "boxing in" First Creek and making it forever unaccessible to Knoxvillians to enjoy our natural heritage.

In the center of the conceptual image I created directly below is Centerpoint Church, where the Walmart and retaining wall on First Creek is planned.

Instead of losing this creek access to yet another concrete canyon, we should seize on it to install a greenway as part of the development.

Note the curving area along the Northwest side of First Creek at the top of the image: collaboration with two property owners is all that is needed to accomplish this.

Collaboration with one property owner is all that is needed to connect Atlantic to the Howard House property.

In all of these feasibility studies, the idea of collaboration with private property owners seems to be anathema, "too difficult to consider." I'd like to suggest that a thoughtful proposal for "what might be" could be the first step in convincing property owners to grant easements or other accommodations for greenway infrastructure.

​

​Further up is in the image is the section, "Office Depot to Atlantic."

Although this shows a path along Broadway for a bit, gaining a truly "creekside" path seems to be the trade-off.  And if a flood control project is done on the South side of Emoirland, perhaps even more "creekside" pathway could be installed.

​​

Finally, the greenway should go on the West side of First Creek at Broadway Shopping Center.

I believe there is plenty of room, even with the gas station taken into account.

​

I also believe that the businesses at Broadway Shopping Center would welcome a greenway.

I also think we should try to go under the bridge, it is similar to the concrete arch bridge at Cumberland Avenue and Third Creek Greenway.

This brings me to a key complaint:

It infuriates me when sidewalks are proposed as greenways.

We should have greenways AND sidewalks, not sidewalks that are also greenways.

I don't want to be beside a road when I'm running, biking or walking.

Sidewalks are historically nicknamed "deathwalks." 

It is only a matter of time before a car hops a curb and kills someone using a "greenway" on a sidewalk.

Besides risking death, I do not want to breath car exhaust or be splashed with oily road water during rain storms.

We do not need to be spending "greenway" funds on "neighborhood connectors" that should already have exemplary pedestrian infrastructure.

We do not need to be designing greenways along roadways.

I've put together some alternatives to the City's proposal, which I find unacceptable. 

I do not understand the city's fixation with connecting Parks; this is the wrong way to go about things.

I don't understand the city's aversion to approaching private landowners as part of the feasibility study; this is also wrong.  

The plans being proposed should present the "best" route, not the "easiest" route. 

Furthermore, "best" for users is likely highly divergent from "best" for city planners.

We still don't have the criteria the city is using to advise Ross Fowler on the "best route."

"Connecting Parks" Should not be one of them.  

As a spur? Certainly, I'm all for that.  

But centering the design on Park connectivity, and "easiest" park connectivity at that, is incorrect.

For all of this money we're spending on "feasibility" concepts, we need to be inspiring people for what might be possible, not inspiring people to take the path of least resistance.  

Sidewalk "greenways" and "neighborhood connectors" are not, by any stretch of the imagination, inspiring.  

Thanks,

Tanner