Park Road Sidewalk SlugFest
Under the city’s sidewalk policy, areas to be designated as thoroughfares, such as Park Road, are identified by staff. No public meeting is required for a thoroughfare sidewalk project, and no set percentage of neighbors requesting or opposing sidewalk placement is necessary. But that hasn’t prevented residents in opposition from speaking out.
“The thoroughfare sidewalk is inconsistent with the rest of Park Road and its size and scale are unnecessary,” said Robert Fitzpatrick, who owns property that would be impacted by the proposed project. In some cases, Fitzpatrick told councilmembers, the sidewalk’s width would span seven feet, with eight-foot setbacks, and would require tearing up as much as 25 feet from neighboring yards.
Fitzpatrick and other neighbors also expressed concerns about the precedent the project would set for others areas along Park Road, should they also be retrofitted to the thoroughfare standard. For example, he said, to bring the sidewalk in front of Holy Trinity School, which is only about three-feet wide, up to the thoroughfare standard would require moving the school’s football field. The stretch of road right in front of Park Road Shopping Center, he said, receives heavy pedestrian use, but doesn’t have any sidewalk.
“We don’t see the city having the capacity for changing any of this in the near future,” Fitzpatrick said.
Because the project falls under an already-adopted city policy, it doesn’t require specific approval from the council, although that august body will have to sign off on the construction contract and expenditure. And if the city can’t reach agreement with impacted homeowners to purchase part of their front yards, the council would need to vote to snatch the property by eminent domain.
Given the amount of community feedback and concern, Councilmember Michael Barnes, a Democrat, asked that the council’s transportation committee receive an updated briefing on the project, to include an accounting of its price and more details about tree-save efforts.
Councilmember Patsy Kinsey, a Democrat whose district includes Park Road, said that’s appropriate.
“It deserves our full consideration,” she said. “I’m trying to balance both sides of the issue. The policy calls for having a sidewalk on both sides of the road, for pedestrian safety, but we also have to take into consideration the disruption the project will cause residents and the impact it will have on our efforts to save our tree canopy.”
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