North Washington to open to vehicles

sabatoa

Crews on Saturday will begin work to open the 200 and 300 blocks of North Washington Square to vehicle traffic.


http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070615/NEWS01/70615010

Jared

I rode my bike through Washington today and saw them cutting down all the trees on the two blocks. I was just coming to the website to let everybody know, only to find out it had already been on here. Thanks sabatoa for posting this. It will be really nice to see the blocks opened up, I'm now hoping that maybe some ground floor retail can move in to these blocks.

Jared

As the first block to be reopened, the 100 block of Washington parking stays pretty busy, but I think these 2 new blocks will show the emptyness after 5:00, especially in the parking. But maybe, as it gets closer to LCC, the parking will be used by students taking night classes.

hood

The key is that this opens up the street to be redevoleped with retail and residential. I think we'll see something relatively soon, like next year.

binto

I'd been going to LCC for the last two years and have spent much time in Washington Square, reading class books and stuff. Its funny because although it was a nice place to sit, it did feel quite desolate and for the longest I was thinking it should be opened up. I was quite surprised to read one day that they were planning it. Its like they read my mind. The way I see it, it is kinda true that it would be hard to do much ground floor retail at this point but that's ok. It will still be a great improvement because of what it does. Just the not looking like some desolate man made concrete desert of nothing (at times lol) will be good. Moreso than that though I believe the opening up will be great because it can introduce some students more towards the businesses in the downtown area and maybe provide greater traffic flow in general. You guys talk a lot about the need for parking improvements so the additional conveniently located spaces can only help when things get busy. And because it has a few large buildings and later leads towards the restaurants/retail etc. that are more tightly knit in proximity to eachother it indeed "lends some of that feel back" that LMich has mentioned. And no leisure space will really be lost as there is a park nearby, etc. That's my two cents.

hood

Welcome to the site!

I think many people shared your sentimate regarding Washington Sq, I'm still suprised it has taken this long for it to be reopened.

Jared

I think it's telling how much of a failure the idea of pedestrian malls were, when you notice that there are no people to be seen in any of the pictures of the mall.

mindbender

The Riverwalk in San Antonio is another one. It's rad.