AUBURN — Court Street’s traffic pattern has changed numerous times during the past 63 years, so testing on-street parking this summer has plenty of precedent, councilors were told Monday.
“Court Street has really been used as a vehicular transportation experiment now for almost three generations in this city,” Alan Manoian, Auburn’s economic development specialist, said.
The city will keep investigating narrowing Court Street between Turner Street and Spring Street by painting new lines. The newly painted lanes would take the street from two travel lanes in both directions to one travel lane each, with a turning lane down the middle.
New space on either side would be used to put on-street parking on the north side of Court Street, adding about 35 spaces.
Manoian outlined the history of the street, noting that Court Street merchants begged city leaders not to change the road’s traffic pattern in the 1950s and 1960s, fearing it would change the area from a business center to freeway. It was a traditional downtown at one point, with on-street parking and small business merchants.
“They told traffic planners and city officials that if you do this, you will exterminate our downtown,” Manoian said. “Business can’t function this way without a traditional sidewalk downtown. Well, they did it nonetheless.”
The result is a high-speed thoroughfare for drivers not interested in stopping downtown to shop. He’s checked with the handful of businesses fronting Court Street and they are all in favor.
“The only comment I’ve heard is that people are so conditioned to the speed, people may do crazy things with their cars,” Manoian said.
Jim Drummond, representing the Court Street Baptist Church, said he’s in favor of the change.
“We are a very active church with a lot of things and outreach into the community,” Drummond said. “That proposal, if I understand it correctly, would benefit us. It is something we’d be real pleased to have take place.”
It would be a demonstration project done in concert with the Congress for the New Urbanism New England’s Build Maine conference in Lewiston later this month, according to planner Eric Cousens.
“I’m not confident we’ll be able to do that in time for the Build Maine conference,” he said. “But we are working with (the Maine Department of Transportation) to get a longer term trial set. The discussion inspired by the conference has been great. I think that even if we miss the deadline, this has been a discussion worth having.”
Instead, the city will work to greet urban planners attending the Bates Mill conference with Festival Plaza food trucks and an inviting area. Councilors voted to re-stripe a loading zone at Court and Main streets, opening it to cafe seating for the duration of the festival.
They also agreed to let food trucks take up residence in front of Festival Plaza for the conference.
The Maine chapter of the Congress for New Urbanism New England is hosting the second Build Maine conference May 20 and 21 at Bates Mill Building No. 1. The conference brings urban planning professionals together to discuss improving Maine’s economy.
The city of Lewiston experimented with specially painted bike lanes, connecting Bates College and the Bates Mill complex, for the first conference last fall.
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