Morningside 360 Update

The SCAN meetings last week reminded me to check in on the Morningside neighborhood. You may recall that late last fall the neighborhood association kicked off the Morningside 360 project to update the neighborhood plan.

The document library is full of documents, and if you're not already involved some of it is worth browsing. Here's the 1984 neighborhood plan. It's disheartening to read the list of needed sidewalks and to see how many on the list still need sidewalks.

Results of the surveys have been posted, and the notes on Parks and Open Space are interesting.

The City also gave a presentation on the Transportation System Plan, and posted notes on the February 2nd transportation discussion.

A lot of the neighborhood issues stem from the mid-century and heavily auto-dependent development patterns.

This map of the dates of tax lots makes several of the issues easy to see:

• An arterial-collector-local street hierarchy that insists on sort and separate traffic, with busy roads especially oriented towards through-traffic
• Development standards, especially for unincorporated county land, that did not require sidewalks
• Loop-and-lollipop subdivisions that created disconnected and insular neighborhoods
• Commercial districts that are mostly strip development along busy arterials, and are auto-dependent or auto-oriented

Much of the larger neighborhood isn't very walkable or connected.

If you are not already involved and you live in the neighborhood you should check out the update process!

The next meeting is on Thursday, February 16, 2012 at 7:00PM
Painters Hall, 3911 Village Center Dr SE

(Tax lot map modified from presentation on Housing and Heritage. It shows the date tax lots came into being, the earliest before 1929 in dark brown to the newest in light yellow.)