Mayor Moncrief’s State of the City Address: Car-Centric Planning a Mistake
Edit: Added the full transcript of the Mayor’s discussion related to this topic.
Mayor Moncrief has given his State of the City address, and one of the items he discussed was the city’s transportation and planning. The mayor stated in no uncertain terms that Fort Worth is facing severe transportation challenges, that they stem from too many years of car-first planning, and that Fort Worth can no longer be designed and built in a car-centric fashion – topics certainly familiar to Fort Worthology readers:
Commuter Rail, street cars, and other alternative modes of transportation also remain a priority for me and this City Council. Unfortunately, Fort Worth and other major metropolitan areas are finding out the hard way what a mistake it was to design and build cities around automobiles years ago. Friends, we cannot continue to focus solely on building more roads for more vehicles. That’s counter productive at best.
Business as usual is dead!
North Texas requires a transportation overhaul. No more band-aides, no more patches—a complete overhaul!
Regrettably, it’s becoming more and more obvious that we cannot depend on the state or federal government to help us in the near term. In fact, there is no guarantee of any new money to build any new roads in Texas after 2012.
Frankly, I’m tired of talking about this. This afternoon, workers at BNSF…employees at Lockheed Martin or Bell Textron…even many of you in this room will leave work and then sit…and sit…and sit in traffic. It’s a frustrating daily routine that carries a great cost once you consider the impacts to our quality of life, our environment, our air, and our ability to attract and keep new business investment.
If this is a mobility crisis—and I believe it is—then it must be treated like one!
In the spirit of the early Fort Worth pioneers who took it upon themselves to pick up shovels and extend the first rail line to our city, it’s time that we took matters in our own hands. It is clear to me that we are not going to get where we need to be by relying only on help from the feds or the state.
We are going to have to pull ourselves out of the ditch!
In the coming weeks, I will appoint an 11-member Blue Ribbon Task Force. I will charge this body with returning specific recommendations to the full City Council on how we fix or relieve pressure on Fort Worth’s aging transportation infrastructure.
Bike Friendly Fort Worth Velocache_001 – Photo Clue 2
We have received Clue #2 from our friends at Bike Friendly Fort Worth.
Below, you’ll find Clue #2 as to the location of Bike Friendly Fort Worth’s Velocache_001. If you can recognize this spot after figuring out Clue #1 posted yesterday, we think you’ll be closer to uncovering the cache.
Aggarwal Building Update
The Aggarwal Building, a new mixed-use development on Lipscomb just north of Rosedale (across the street from the Bajaj Building), is pretty well complete at this point. The building was designed by TMA Architects, and is four loft apartments upstairs with a medical office downstairs – another example of the small infill mixed-use buildings being built all over the Near Southside.
We’ve been in touch with some of the people involved in the building and are planning a walkthrough in the not too distant future. We hear that of the four apartments, one is already occupied, and another has a tenant coming in this summer. We’ll have an update with contact information on the lofts in another post.
Bajaj Building Update
One of the Near Southside’s ongoing series of mixed-use infill developments, the Bajaj Building, continues to progress at its site on Lipscomb just north of Rosedale. The development will feature a ground floor medical office and loft apartments upstairs, and was designed by the Near Southside’s own TMA Architects, who have been specializing in these small single-lot mixed-use infill projects.
On-Street Bike Corral
From BikePortland.org, here’s a great shot of the sort of bike parking infrastructure we’d like to see in Fort Worth’s urban areas (for example, in the Near Southside, Downtown, and the Cultural District) – the on-street bike corral, with space for large numbers of bikes.
We can imagine several spots where this sort of setup would encourage more bike use and lead to a better environment for users. This sort of parking is talked about in the newly adopted Bike Fort Worth transportation plan, so the city sees their usefulness as well (in the space equivalent of two car parking spaces, these corrals can hold 24-28 or so bikes – extremely efficient). As we talked about during the earlier Bike Fort Worth posts, now we must encourage the city to start building the sorts of things they have officially adopted.
Since most of this new bike infrastructure now adopted in the city’s plan is pretty unknown around these parts, we’ll be posting examples of it from time to time to introduce the concepts and encourage the spread of knowledge about them.
Bike Friendly Fort Worth Velocache_001
We are pleased to announce that Bike Friendly Fort Worth Velocache_001 is up and running!
“Bike Friendly Fort Worth Velocache_001 is now in play.
The Rules:
1. Get out of the car, and get onto a bike.
2 .The cache is on public property.
3. You will not have to dig, break, or climb anything,
4. The cache is very well camouflaged.
5. Follow the directions inside the cache.
The site was selected to highlight a new neighborhood park located in the Near Southside area of Fort Worth. I was pleasantly surprised see how close the project is to being complete. The addition of a multi bike lock up instead of the city wide “Lollipop” racks encouraged me get off my bike and take a look around.
The first three photo clues will be posted shortly. Good luck and happy hunting!”
Photos from the Fort Worth South Banquet
Last night, at the beautiful Masonic Temple, Fort Worth South, Inc. held its latest annual banquet celebrating the ongoing continued success of the Near Southside’s revitalization. Fort Worth South president Paul Paine gave a stirring presentation on the accomplishments in the Near Southside thus far, and several upcoming projects and developments.
In the photos above, you can see the overall crowd, a shot of the banquet’s them – People and Places – and a shot of Paul during the presentation. You may notice the rendering in the background – that showcases a brand-new streetcar-oriented development planned for South Main Village at South Main and Pennsylvania – TownSite Co.’s project at the former Motheral Printing Plant.
Among the items touched upon by Paul:
- The Magnolia Avenue refreshing was just the beginning, as streetscape improvements are coming to South Main, Hemphill, and Evans, and more are being planned for streets like Jennings, Pennsylvania, and Vickery.
- The Near Southside will be home to a fully-integrated bicycle transportation network. The Magnolia bike lanes are the first example, and there are plans for bike lanes on Jennings, Pennsylvania, Vickery, and more.
- Even in a down economy, the Near Southside is doing incredibly well – employment is up, rents are strong for both office and retail, residential work is steady, and restaurant sales are up 117% from last year. He also mentioned the impending arrival of the Near Southside’s second bike shop, Trinity Bicycles in South Main Village.
- Crime continues its steady downward spiral, with Fort Worth South working with the Fort Worth Police to strongly reduce crime. Bicycle patrols are reappearing in the Near Southside, and the police are moving from their current home at Magnolia & College into a larger building at Magnolia & Hemphill currently being renovated (more to come on that project).
- In two to three weeks, the Magnolia streetscape project finishes up with the activation of LED net lighting in all the trees along Magnolia from 8th Avenue to Hemphill.
- Paul stressed the need for more construction of quality rental apartments, as there are just over 740 units in the Near Southside and the district is over 95% on occupancy. Considering the Near Southside’s more affordable nature compared to Downtown, there is a strong need for more quality rental units.
- He touched upon several upcoming projects, including the Oleander West development, the Motheral development, a nearly 300-unit apartment development planned near the Schaumburg Lofts not far from South Main Village, and more.
- Edit: Paul also mentioned specifically that they are trying to attract a real urban grocery store to the Near Southside, using Fort Worthology’s photos of Austin’s Royal Blue Grocery as an example.
Catering was provided by Chadra Mezza & Grill, and was delicious – as was the beer provided by Rahr Brewery. The banquet points to the incredible success in revitalizing the Near Southside and the excitement of its upcoming projects.
So7 Sidewalk Improvements Continue
The So7 development continues to do major sidewalk improvements. The development is adding new sidewalks and widening existing ones throughout its property, to create a much more fully integrated pedestrian experience. One of the most important for pedestrian quality and safety are the new full sidewalk crossings at the rail line running between the Stayton and the ArtHouse condos. This creates a new, fully paved, much safer crossing of the rail line than what was there before.
The Stayton – Progress
The Stayton, in the So7 development, continues its rise from its underground parking pit on its way to its eventual 11-story height. The three-tower retirement condo complex is making steady progress upwards – at this rate, it won’t be that long before we start to see it poke its way up above ground.
Bike Friendly Fort Worth presents Velo-Caching!
Bike Friendly Fort Worth has combined two things we really love – bikes and treasure hunting – into something we like to call Velo-Caching. We have caches of gifts from local bike friendly businesses that have been cleverly hidden throughout the city, and we want you to find them.
You will not need GPS devices, shovels, or metal detectors to locate these caches. All you need is a sense of adventure and a desire to find some cool stuff. The photo clues for Velo-Cache 001 will be posted this afternoon.
Good luck, and happy hunting!
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