George,

It appears that our current city council has totally lost their way on the downtown mall crossing issue. The April 3, 2006 council agenda includes consideration of opening a temporary mall crossing at East 4th Street. Council appears ready to approve this crossing without any decision as to how it will be evaluated, and without any clear indication that it would be of any benefit to merchants, visitors, or residents. It is, however, quite clear that a crossing will have a significant impact on the pedestrian nature of the mall. Rather than implement the recommended actions proposed by the planning commission - improve visibility of the mall area to visitors and improve signage and traffic circulation around the mall without a crossing -- council will possibly go ahead with the crossing anyway.

I am very disappointed that council even has this item on its agenda. I attempted to initiate a discussion among councilors, proponents, and opponents of the crossing to identify the potential benefits and impacts of the crossing proposals, and to discuss if and how a temporary crossing could be evaluated. But, no such meeting could be scheduled in a weak, last minute attempt by one council member. Rather than move to schedule a meeting to discuss details of how a trial might be run and evaluated, it appears council is eager to move ahead without this dialog and without a plan. This is not a reasonable way to move forward on this -- or any -- city project with such significant impact on the community.

I have not been able to identify any justification for the proposed crossing. Some members of the downtown business community want the crossing, and that appears to be enough for council. The merchants apparently believe our pedestrian mall, with the nearby amphitheater and transit center developments simply doesn't provide enough customer base, and their very survival is dependent on automobiles being able to cross the mall. Merchant's claims that there is less pedestrian traffic on the east end of the mall compared to the west end were proven wrong by a simple counting experiment by a member of the planning commission acting as a concerned citizen. No revenue data has yet been produced to demonstrate that businesses have experienced reduced revenues.

How is it possible that revenue impacts on downtown businesses can be isolated from the impacts of double digit property tax increases, rapid growth of online purchasing, huge increases in gasoline and energy prices, and other economic factors - all of which affect purchasing behavior of potential downtown mall customers - and that they will be able to justify a permanent mall crossing with a million dollar price tag from any experimental results? Although I am not an expert in business management, I am quite sure that achievement of this goal through the proposed but unspecified trial would be an award winning effort. Unfortunately, that award might be the ENRON prize for Innovative Business Misinformation.

The city's planning professionals on city staff and the planning commission recommend specific, low-cost actions that will improve way-finding, traffic circulation, and promote better customer access to the mall even during this time of heavy construction on the east end of the mall - but do not support a mall crossing.

If council approves the merchants' seemingly unsupportable request for a trial crossing over the recommendations of city staff, and the planning commission, I recommend we change Charlottesville's self proclaimed status from "World Class City" to "Business Class City" to maintain some truth in advertising. If our local business people want it, that appears to be enough for council -- even if the data and professional opinions suggest otherwise. Even in our nationally recognized pedestrian space, cars appear to have priority over pedestrians in the minds of councilors and merchants. I would expect a strong case would be required to allow automobiles to invade our mall, but an unjustified trial of a mall crossing may be in our future simply because some members of the downtown business community want it. I plan to contact my councilors and encourage you to contact them, too. Not only are they lost on the mall crossing, but council's vision appears to be troubled as well.

- Peter T. Kleeman (electronic mail, March 31, 2006)