CC Min 1997-07-28 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

In response to Vice Mayor Howard's question asking if the subject plan was the consensus of the downtown merchants, Engineer Lynch said "yes." MEMO 7/29/97 Community Development Director Nelson described her participation in this process and said she and Engineer Lynch met with many merchants together and she met with some others independently. She described the criteria used for placement of the benches: there are no benches on the 2600 block of Broadway because it is very narrow; blocks where there are restaurants or cafes or even the potential for one, there are no benches to allow for those places to expand their outside eating areas; the decisions for the 2000 block and the block in front of the D.C. building have been delayed until the building is built, and until the usage on those two blocks can be determined. Director Nelson said, "We did put a lot of thought into where they would be placed, with consideration of use and merchant desires." In response to Vice Mayor Howard's questions, Director Nelson said the merchants actually requested bollards as a pedestrian safety issue and to keep cars away from restaurant and café eating areas. Councilwoman La Berge said she was aware of merchants' concerns about the number of benches that will fmally be deployed. Engineer Lynch said a typical block would have 4 benches, 4 new trash receptacles, 3 bike racks and 15 bollards. Some may have one or two more, or fewer. Councilwoman said, "My own opinion is that we would be better off keeping down the number of benches. I think it is extremely important to have the trash receptacles and the bicycle racks. I assume that we will be learning about alternate modes of transportation. I think benches do encourage people to find a place to sleep, even though these benches are designed so it won't be quite so easy. My sense is that we would be better off with fewer benches than more benches." In response to Councilwoman La Berge's comments, Councilman Leipzig, said, "The Streets Committee agrees with that. We are reducing the number of overall benches that we are going to have compared with what we have had in the past. The most benches... will be in front of the County Court House where we hope to have one hundred thousand plus people coming to our new museum. In other areas we eliminated them completely. We took the view that we are building a downtown where people are going to come and the streets are going to be full of pedestrians and shoppers. We don't want people sleeping on the benches, they have the arch in the middle so we avoid that problem. We also eliminated the water fountains for that same reason." In response to Councilwoman La Berge's concerns regarding the cost of the trash receptacles and the possibility they are the most expensive version, Engineer Lynch and Councilman Leipzig assured her they were not the most expensive. Engineer Lynch added that they matched the receptacles that are in the Gateway Plaza and they are bolted to the pavers. REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING MINUTE BOOK NO. 55 WLY28,1997 MINUTES Page No. 484 PAGE 10