Posted by Kevin Matthews on January 27, 2004 at 22:01:47:
Dear Friends and Neighbors,Here is a link to the Central Area Transportation Study (CATS), June
2003 DRAFT UPDATE, on which the Eugene City Council had a hearing last
night. The record was left open for one week past the hearing,
allowing written testimony to be submitted until 5pm on Monday,
February 2, 2004.
http://www.ci.eugene.or.us/PW/Transportation/TransPlanng/CATSupdate.htmPage 19 of this is what I passed out at tonight's NLC meeting. It
shows both the current and planned routes of Highway 99 into downtown
on the east, from Franklin Blvd. to 6th and 7th.CATS is the planning document which would implement re-routing of
Highway 99 to run along the Willamette river front, to pass around on
the north side of the new Courthouse area. The City Council is
scheduled to vote on its approval on February 9th, in tandem with an
update of the overall downtown plan.That highway routing would not only cause significant environmental and
experiential threat to the Willamette greenway, right where we're
trying to connect it with downtown. It would also badly confuse the
experience of arriving at downtown from the east ("wayfinding"). And
by leaving one set of pedestrian crossings of Highway 99 for 8th Ave
and Broadway to reach the courthouse area, while adding another set of
Highway 99 crossings between the courthouse area and the riverside (in
addition to the railroads tracks there), this ill-advised split highway
approach would probably lead to a general failure of the entire
expensive project of trying to connect downtown to the river.Putting Highway 99 along the Willamette riverfront would be a major
historic mistake for our community, and a setback both for downtown and
the greenway environment.Please take advantage of the extended opportunity to comment, and send
your thoughts to Transportation Planning Engineer Chris Henry,
"chris.c.henry@ci.eugene.or.us", 682-8472, Senior Planner Allen Lowe,
"allen.d.lowe@ci.eugene.or.us", 682-5113, and to the Mayor and City
Council at "mayorandcc@ci.eugene.or.us".Future Eugenians will thank you forever!
best wishes,
Kevin Matthews
matthews@artifice.com
Southeast Neighbors
Friends of Eugene