August 26th, 2008 at 6:44 pm

I am a resident of Isbell Street in the southwestern part of the city. Isbell Street was reconstructed several years ago, the last project in the city done without a charrette.

While Isbell Street was reconstructed, with the driving surface better than before, there are problems navigating it when people are parked on both sides (which is allowed) because of the narrow width of the street. Talk about gridlock! And the "mountable" curbs are problematic as the area on the residence side of the curb gets rutted if anyone overshoots the curb.

The "parking areas" along Isbell Street look like someone poured asphalt on top of the grass. The way it ended up on Isbell, if you have asphalt parking in front of your house, you can also park on the street. So at times, it looks like people are double parking along the street.

The Clinton Street reconstruction ended up to be a beautiful project. My street, not so good. The difference? I think it was the charrette process.

My advice is that everyone attend the charrettes, make their opinions known and stay engaged with the project. Demand real curbs, not the mountable kind. There are reasons for curbs, and it's not for driving on. And demand actual parking bump-outs.

869

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