Friday, May 31, 2019

Speed Bumps on Maple, Action on Allan Bros Space: Newsbits

Yesterday the City announced they'd finished up installation of the speed bumps on the Winter-Maple Greenway.

via Twitter
Maybe over the weekend there will be a chance to check it out.

Have you used it lately? And more significantly, has anyone observed an increase in people biking on it? Does it draw in new people biking? And how does it function for kids? There was no "walk and roll to school day" hoopla earlier this month, and it had seemed like some might be keyed to the Greenway.

Is there a plan for post-construction assessment?

Governor's Cup Expanding or Moving?

Others will have more detail on whether the Governor's Cup is moving or is expanding, but details in a Hearing Notice at the Historic Landmarks Commission show that the old Allan Bros. space downtown on Liberty Street should not be vacant long and strongly suggest the Governor's Cup is going into it.

The main thing the HLC will consider is the request to eliminate the recessed porch with a new storefront system continuous with the windows and wall of the second floor. (Probably there is an anti-camping element in play here.) But it's good that the space will not be vacant long.

Some have cited the coffee shop's closing as a sign that our downtown is ill. But Allan Bros has been closing shops around the valley. In Eugene a third-wave roaster, Farmers Union Roaster, recently went in the old Allan Bros shop in 5th Street downtown, and they seem to be plenty busy. In that instance, and likely here in Salem also, the problem may have more more to do with a tired brand than problems of downtown economics or politics. Allan Bros did not seem be able to bring themselves out of a 1980s model of coffee retailing, and the market has moved on to newer styles in coffee shops. There are other ingredients also, and it's true the Starbucks on Chemeketa and Liberty closed, but it's not like Allan Bros elsewhere have been thriving. That's surely the main factor.

Here's an old photo
of the upper part of the building.
(More discussion of it here)
Because of previous rounds of remodeling, the building is designated a "non-contributing" resource ("this building does not contribute to the historic character of the district in its current condition"), and this may be another instance where our Historic District could impose disproportionate process on routine alterations. (Curiously, the Hearing Notice calls this building a "contributing resource," and this could be an error or the designation might have changed. That will be a detail to which we return.)

Dennison Building in Downtown Historic District
Probably there will be more to say when the Staff Report is published and closer to the Hearing on June 20th.

7 comments:

Jim Scheppke said...

Why does the City insist on calling it a Greenway and not a Bikeway? I think that branding will hinder getting to the outcome of more use by cyclists. It reminds me of their insistence, for a time, of referring to a proposed Climate Action Plan as an "Environmental Action Plan." The City sometimes tries to avoid calling things what they are in a effort to deflect criticism. Is that the case here?

Salem Breakfast on Bikes said...

RE: "greenway" - I think the idea was to conform to the usage in Portland. Greenway is thought to be more inclusive of all road users, not something for "special interests," which "bicycle boulevard" might be (mis)read as. In PDX, if I recall, this designation also made it possible to assign stormwater funding sources, since they also included rain gardens sometimes that had a dual-purpose as a traffic calming feature.

So it is, in a way, as you say, to deflect criticism. But there has been a national move to this nomenclature, and it is defensible.

Salem Breakfast on Bikes said...

Here's a discussion of the term at People/Places for Bikes.

Anonymous said...

I was just reading the AASHTO bike guidance, they are still bound to "bicycle path" and "~lane." They have a separate multi-use infra guide.

I take issue with the term bike path/lane/blvd for a lot of the same reasons the Places for Bikes article discusses. Plus the denotative failure of the term of "bicycle," as tricycles (especially recumbents) gain popularity amongst boomers. But I digress...

I commute on the greenway, and I see almost every mode on it. I've read this discussion elsewhere, talking about "medium speed lanes," "micro-mobility," and "human-scale," but nothing seems to float to the top. I think "bike lane" (path, whatever) is likely to become the generic term, much like teflon or aspirin.

Salem Breakfast on Bikes said...

(If we are talking "-lanes," how about "smile lane"?!)

Salem Breakfast on Bikes said...

And here's the Staff Report on the Denison building. It recommends approval:

"At the time of designation in 2001 the building was documented as the Dennison Building and was evaluated as historic noncontributing due to the alterations to the primary façade in the 1960s (Attachment B). In 2006,the primary façade of the Denison Building was substantially restored and the status was changed to historic contributing (Attachment B1). In 2018, research completed as part of the Downtown Historic District update confirmed that the spelled of Dennison was incorrect and should have been Denison."

Anonymous said...

A tattoo parlor went in the Allan Bros. space, so no Governor's Cup there, at least for now!