Cutting Our Blocks Down to Size

Erik Bjornson, an attorney whose office is downtown just off Fireman's Park, has been inspired by the recent Project for Public Spaces workshop and his own reading of Jane Jacobs to focus on walking downtown:

Jane Jacobs recommended "short blocks" when designing a downtown. We, of course, cannot redesign the city.

However, many of the connectors between streets, especially between Pacific, Commerce and Broadway are inoperable as they are far too cluttered to be functional. Thus, they are not used.

Perhaps we could identify them and work to have them improved. It shouldn't cost too much and would be a great benefit to downtown than many of the proposals I am hearing about.

Erik is hoping that some other readers of this blog might join him in seeking a more walkable city center. He has identified the following steps:

1. Identifying connecting passages between streets downtown with names locations and intended function;
2. Identifying the difficulties of passing through them and suggesting design changes and solutions--"the cheaper and easier the better so we do not have to wait for 5 years to get a $250,000 grant for each one";
3. Prioritizing them based on the amount of foot traffic currently impeded and how central they are to downtown Tacoma.
4. Additionally, Erik would like to have a few pictures taken if someone has a digital camera.

Sound interesting? Please contact Erik and lend a hand!