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Mark Kamburis of Flipnotics favors the left-turn lane option for Barton Springs Road. |
The future of Barton Springs Road, in theory, is rather simple and concrete: By 2001, that strip of funky, frenetic road known as restaurant row will have undergone a major transformation to accommodate the 30,000 cars that travel it each day. Lest we forget this is Austin, however, a project of this magnitude first must have input from Zilker-area residents, business owners, city councilmembers, and, let’s see, are we forgetting anybody? Oh yes – a consultant. It also goes without saying that a project like this has spawned much debate and emotional turmoil among the players. On the up side, however, the city is inching its way toward a final decision on the project and has narrowed its sights to four design options that City Council is expected to consider and vote on at its next work session on Wednesday, May 13.
Through this debate, two camps have emerged swinging: Those who want medians and U-turn lanes, and those who want left-turn lanes. For nearly six months, the two opposing sides have wrestled over easy access into businesses, neighborhood safety, and the “new enlightened” view of modern urban development. Two weeks ago, the City Council viewed the four plans, each of which proposes to improve traffic control on Barton Springs Road between Lamar and Robert E. Lee. Two of the plans call for raised medians and U-turn-only access into businesses, another champions the two-way left-turn lane, or “chicken lane,” and the fourth is a compromise. But because neither camp has yet reached a common ground on the proposals, the City Council last month postponed action on the measure and directed the Public Works and Transportation Dept. to study all four plans and report back with its recommendations next week.
Apart from the debate over turn lanes, all the plans basically contain identical features, with a widened roadway, plus bike lanes and sidewalks on both sides of the street, and heavy landscaping along the center of the road. In essence, the idea is to expand and transform Barton Springs Rd. into a beautiful entrance from the east into Zilker Park.
A Circuitous History
Technically, this project has been on the city’s drawing board since 1984. That’s when residents approved a bond proposal to provide for several city road improvements, one of which was Barton Springs. But the economic downturn of the Eighties put the project on hold until 1992, and no plan even surfaced until last year. That was when the city presented the Zilker Neighborhood Association with an idea for a four-lane road with a continuous, two-way turn lane in the middle. That was also about the time the neighbors got their dander up in opposition to the plan.
Charles Whitford, president of the Zilker Neighborhood Association, vehemently protested the plan and vowed that area residents would never support “the South Lamarization” of Barton Springs Road or any plan for installing “chicken lanes.” So, city officials sponsored a charrette last December, and invited area residents and business owners to cook up some ideas of what could be done to improve traffic safety on Barton Springs. Thus, the “charrette plan” emerged, with some ambitious features: a European-style roundabout, and a 15-foot median extending all the way from South Lamar to Robert E. Lee. The plan would allow cars to make U-turns to get to restaurants, and offered the roundabout for those who missed the U-turns to double back. However, the roundabout idea had one major flaw: It would have required the city to purchase the site of one of the restaurants on the strip – Good Eats Cafe – which also would have boosted the project cost by nearly $2 million. Although that plan will still be on the table when City Council makes its decision next week, officials say it’s practically dead in the water.
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photograph by Jana Birchum |
Another plan has since emerged, known as the “modified charette,” which basically sticks to the original model, only without the roundabout, and still provides access for drivers to make U-turns. Still, as businesses began to weigh the effects of a U-turn plan, and more neighborhood residents became interested in the project, many began to favor the old turn-lane approach. A continuous median that only allows U-turns, they say, would limit business access and, most importantly, force cars and trucks into nearby neighborhoods, which could put children and other pedestrians at risk.
Nixing the U-Turn
Business owners along the strip then turned to Austin architect Jim Nix, who drafted a new plan. The “Nix Plan,” as it has come to be known, brought back the continuous turn lane, interrupted by three island-like medians.
But median advocates like Councilmember Beverly Griffith, Whitford, and Zilker Neighborhood Association Vice President Kaye Trybus, still argue that medians – at least if they’re longer than the ones in the Nix Plan – would calm traffic and be safer for pedestrians. So in order to gain some common ground with median advocates, a fourth plan was drafted. This “consensus plan,” as it was initially called, combines the Nix and charrette plans, allowing eastbound traffic to make left turns into businesses, while keeping 11 medians intact.
“This is the first time that all the parties are trying to work together in good faith, because a war doesn’t have to happen, you know,” said Chuy’s owner Mike Young. “I think that we can work this out.”
But even the plan known as “consensus” has its contentious side, because it was drafted during a weekend in Young’s office with only a few representatives from area businesses and the neighborhood. During the City Council meeting two weeks ago, Mayor Kirk Watson settled the naming controversy by simply redubbing the plan “good ol’ number four.” But during that same meeting, Griffith brought in Texas A&M University traffic expert Bill Lowery, who gave a 30-minute presentation on the importance of medians on heavily traveled roads such as Barton Springs. Lowery’s studies have found that arterial roads like Barton Springs have a higher chance of accidents if traffic is only divided by turn lanes. In fact, there have been 25 accidents on Barton Springs Road since March of last year.
Griffith’s office likes to refer to the installation of medians on roads like Barton Springs as the new “enlightened view” of development. “It’s very clear to me that the safest approach would be medians with controlled left-turn lanes,” says the councilmember. “They’re number one safety-wise, and number one for providing a beautiful gateway into Zilker Park.”
Left-Turn Leanings
Still, neighborhood residents argue that safety on their streets and near their school is more important than that of Barton Springs Road, and many don’t agree with their neighborhood association leaders’ position on the issue. Neighborhood resident Doug Johnston has been one of the most vocal supporters of the left-turn Nix proposal. With the help of businesses and other residents, Johnston has gathered over 500 signatures in support of the left-turn proposal to submit to City Council next week.
What upsets Johnston most about the process, he says, is the lack of communication between the city, the neighborhood association, and the residents themselves. He said he heard about the city’s proposals from one of the Barton Springs Road landowners. He said the NA never informed residents of any proposals during their early stages – much less about December’s charrette – nor did the city ever hold a public hearing. Johnston also acknowledged a certain “apathy” at NA meetings, where at most 15 people attend, giving Whitford and Trybus a green light to move forward with what they believed was the neighborhood agenda.
Johnston says it’s a “no brainer” to realize that under the U-turn proposal, cars would choose to cut through Zilker neighborhood or use nearby Toomey Road to avoid the hassle of making a U-turn, especially during peak traffic hours. “We’ve gotten to this point where it’s safer for the neighborhood if people get to the restaurants that much faster,” he said. “Traffic is like water. If you constrict it in one place, people will go right around it.”
Mark Kamburis, co-owner of Flipnotics Coffeespace and an adamant supporter of the left-turn lane school of thought, is worried that U-turns will be a big turn-off for drivers, who may choose to go elsewhere for a cup of coffee or a bite to eat. “It would be problematic for cars to even come down here,” he said. “People just won’t want to deal with making U-turns over and over just to get into the parking lot.”
Like others in the area, Kamburis is worried about a rift within the neighborhood itself. Since Whitford and Trybus, the leaders of the neighborhood association, are pro U-turn, he said, many left-turn proponents are worried that City Council will favor the charrette plan, or at least its modified version, without question.
Trybus says she never meant for the neighborhood and area residents and businesses to split into warring sides. She said the biggest problem has been people coming into the game late and then complaining about not being informed about the proposals. She said that, although the NA was only given 12 days notice prior to the charrette meeting, they made every effort to get all the stakeholders involved in the process. Not only was there an article in the Austin American-Statesman about the charrette, she said, but she even called a number of people in the neighborhood and told them about the meeting.
“This is for the future of Austin. This has never been us against them,” she said. “In no way have we tried not to inform people of what’s going on. I think it’s awful the way things have happened.”
Trybus said it’s disheartening that those in the neighborhood have pitted sides. Still, she says, the only way to achieve a safer neighborhood is to install medians. “In the next few years we’re going to have a beautiful street. I hope people will be driving slow enough to look at it.”
This article appears in May 15 • 1998 and May 15 • 1998 (Cover).