Returning traffic to Main St

[HipKat]

What happened to the idea of returning traffic to Main St.??
I kow the "snooze" ran a few stories on this last year, but I haven't heard anything since.
The AM&A's Christmas windows on the Remember When thread had me remembering the crowds fighting the cold and traffic to shop downtown. Shopping and lunch on Main was a yearly ritual for me in High School for Christmas every year. Those stores, Bergers, AM&A's, etc were wonderful. It's no secret that the Metro Rail, while useful, killed the downtown shopping district on Main St.
How stupid is it that this is not being persued?? It's not hard, either. Move the rails to the outside, and the traffic back into the center of the street, or something.
Why do all improvements to this city have to happen in slow motion?

[wheresthesun]

Why do all improvements to this city have to happen in slow motion?

Or not at all?

[absolivious]

As a local radio wag has said:
"Buffalo NY - where good ideas come to die!"

[pcnorth22]

you don't even have to move the rails to the outside...here in SF, the light rail goes in the middle of the street...the cars on the outside...

[WNYresident]

They have no issues with crossing the tracks when making turns?

[pcnorth22]

Originally posted by WNYresident
They have no issues with crossing the tracks when making turns?

i forgot to mention that part...cars can actually drive on the tracks...

if you're gonna make a left you get on the tracks...its a little tought to get used to..and may get a little dicey in buffalo with the ice....but it works fine here...

SF streetcars (the Muni system, not BART) are I think almost exactly the same vehicles as the NFTA metrocars...is a tunnel downtown actually and a street-level car furhter out (like North buffalo area)

[HipKat]

The problem with that is that the roadway is narrow, and the sidewalk, if removed would provide little more room, with the roadway coming right to the building fronts

[300miles]

Originally posted by HipKat
What happened to the idea of returning traffic to Main St.??
... How stupid is it that this is not being persued?? It's not hard, either. Move the rails to the outside, and the traffic back into the center of the street, or something.
Why do all improvements to this city have to happen in slow motion?

The part you have correct is that everything in the city is in slow motion. I've heard it's still in the planning stages (something buffalo has much experience in ) and engineers are trying to find the best approach to see if it's affordable. But it is still being persued.

Where you're wrong is that it's simple. It's not. One problem is the pit/hole in the middle of the street where the train come above ground. Remember it's a subway until that point. That point is basically a dead zone. either cars have to go around it (destroying sidewalk space) or the whole thing has to be moved somewhere (costly and complex).

the other problem is that over the years since it's been a pedestrian mall, some of the businesses have built out their buildings into the sidewalks since there's so much open space without traffic. If we bring back traffic.. those structures are now in the way and would have to come down, or be re-engineered.

I hope with all the emphasis lately on the waterfront and canal area (outer harbor plans, bass pro, etc.) that they will speed up the traffic to main street issue. Maybe Bass Pro will also nudge the city on it since it would only help their bottom line too.

[300miles]

almost forgot... one thing I did here recently is that they may move quickly to bring 2 way traffic to that outer block of main street that's currently one-way (where there are no tracks) I think it's the 700 block.

That would be relatively simple to do as a first step.

[crlachepinochet]

I'm all for opening up the 700 block (I generally hate one-way streets), but I'm not ready to give up on the pedestrian mall just yet. Call me crazy or naive, but now might actually be different than any other time before. God, I don't want to bank on Bass Pro, I REALLY REALLY REALLY don't, but what if it can actually draw numbers close to what they project? I never expect it to get 5 million people a year or whatever we were told... developers like to feed us all lofty expectations. I'm just hoping it will bring in enough people to remain open.

There actually are things happening downtown for once... the NFTA has three proposals for the development of their land on Fuhrmann Blvd and there's more apartments opening up, too. Pedestrian malls need people who live nearby to be successful, and that's starting to come around. Of course, downtown still has the repuatation of closing at 5 (because it does), but maybe we can work this Bass Pro thing into some retail development further up Main.

I think the biggest problem with turning the momentum from Bass Pro up Main is that the area around the 190 is just horrible. If you've walked it, you probably agree with me. Something would definitely have to be done about that. Just 'cause this Bass Pro thing might not be so bad, it doesn't mean that people will walk through a quarter mile of wasteland to get to more retail and entertainment.

Of course, this is all assuming that the whole Bass Pro thing doesn't turn out to be another big, steaming pile of failure.

[WestCoastPerspective]

The powers that be are going to study it and study it some more and then the engineers are going to come up with the most extensive 'solution' in order to line their pockets and then the city will go the Albany and DC looking for funding and come up empty-handed. Then back to the engineers to find a more affordable solution and then....

you get the picture.

A whole lot of nothing gets accomplished. They need to remove the power poles that line the middle of the street and shrink the stations. Cars and trains mix in Sacramento, Toronto, Houston, Dallas, etc. etc. It can be done and its going to be pricey. But at least get a few blocks open ASAP especially the Main Place block, 500 block, and Theater District. I just hope it doesn't take five years to remove what took ten years to put in.