City Council Meeting

Vote on closure of portions of Washington Street, W Sixth Street and Dickinson Avenue

Event Summary

City Council will vote on the proposed plan to close poritons of Dickinson/Washington Street and W. 6th Street. No opportunity for public comment on this issue will be available at this meeting. Please contact City Council Members prior to August 6 to discuss any concerns or questions you have regarding this issue.

To the letter from the NC State Historic Preservation Office and to view maps of the area under disccusion please see below:

Contact information for members of City Council 

State Historic Preservation Office letter Page 1

State Historic Preservation Office letter Page 2

Aerial Photo of Jarvis Exchange

Color Sketch of Jarvis Exchange
 

• Please urge City Council members to vote NO on the petition to close Washington and 6^th St. Closing the only continuous two-way street in the Uptown is bad for future development in the area. While traffic patterns at this time may seem insignificant there are two large pending projects (residential) that anchor each end of Washington and will certainly increase traffic on this street. Closing the street may hurt other future residential development that we are trying to establish.
• As we learned in the case of the Evans Street Mall, closing streets does not help to revitalize, but rather devitalizes neighborhoods.
  
• Please urge Council members to direct City staff to review alternative plans that will help the City meet some of its needs and still provide Jarvis with enough buildable area that it improves their usable space.
• Stress to Council members and City staff that the current 6^th Street parking lot is not necessarily the best place for a parking deck. There are other sites that the City already owns that can be used as warranted. The demand for a parking deck is on the North end closer to the courthouse not on the proposed site.
• Cost of transaction is too high. Since the City does not have to put a parking deck in that location their objective should be to assemble enough land to allow for library expansion and some parking. This would allow the City to save more money by not closing Washington and not necessarily buying as much land adjacent to the church. Typically, people do not mind walking a few blocks to get to their destination in a vibrant downtown.