It’s been a comfortable summer in Durango, early warm temperatures – a couple of days were a record – plus a mix of hot sun and a heavy June rain, unusual. Now are the more common afternoon and nighttime light showers.
Residents’ temperatures, however, are not so mild. On three of four fronts there’s the belief that the city is moving too fast and hard to incorporate some questionable and perhaps unwelcome changes.
Least concerning is the effort to slow traffic on West Park Avenue. Bollards, white in color and first tall then short, narrow the driving surface at several points to give an “it-feels-better-to-drive-more-slowly” route environment. Narrow width does what speed limit signs, including those with a form of radar, don’t do, traffic experts rightly say.
Anecdotally they seem to be working, but there’s the sense that the bollards are an intrusion on the street that everyone was familiar with.
A mostly acceptable addition, although some say “just ticket the speeders.”
Not so for property in the 19th and 20th blocks of East Second Avenue where a city owned lot and the Head Start building are being eyed for somewhat dense likely workforce housing. Neighbors say that only the lot was to be considered, with the Head Start property across the street, which would roughly double the size of the effort, added without proper notice.
Too much, they say, and please be more up front about what’s being considered.
Where the Third Avenue Boulevard joins 15th Street to take traffic west down to Main Avenue and east toward Chapman Hill, the awkward sloping three-way intersection looks to become a roundabout. But a roundabout will require more square footage, footage that is planned to come from the fronts of a couple of residences on the Boulevard.
And, will a roundabout even work at all at that location? The climb up from Main Avenue will still be there, and northbound traffic on the Boulevard may back up even more than it does now in the late afternoon.
There may be no real solution to improving the challenges of that intersection, which will become even more threatening as new development along Florida Road adds to the traffic.
Hottest in terms of feelings is the Downtown Next Step plan that in its initial stage will widen sidewalks and narrow the parking and center lanes of two Main Avenue blocks, 6th and 7th. With that comes sidewalk extensions at the intersections, and a loss of some parking spaces.
Downtown merchants to a large degree say leave well enough alone, that what exists works. A narrower parking lane will be dangerous for drivers steeping out of their cars and a narrower center lane a risk for truckers delivering to retail stores and restaurants. And, parking spaces are precious. Do sidewalks really need to be wider?
A meeting the 27th of this month is certain to produce a crowd.
Durango is a community of engaged residents; just ask newly arrived city staff members. This month, and into the fall, they will be especially engaged. That’s as it should be.
