Dimly lit sidewalk on Capitol Avenue

If you regularly walk, bike, or take the train or bus, you are more likely to notice how  this part of the Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD)¹ is uninspired at best.

Sure, there are stated goals like reducing “reliance on automobiles” and “providing a higher level of service for alternative modes of transportation than for automobile traffic so that alternative modes will become safer and more attractive,” but so long as education efforts focus on the vulnerable users rather than on re-training those steering tons of metal and plastic, it is hard to take the plan too seriously.

Case in point: “Major improvements are needed for Hartford’s traffic control system. The existing system is based on decades old technology that is not well supported by the traffic control system manufacturer and generally unreliable. […] Such a new system will also bring traffic control technology to 220 intersections under computer control. The state of the art traffic control signal system will provide for a smooth flow of traffic along City streets, reducing congestion and stopped vehicles at problem locations, thereby improving air quality and reducing fuel consumption.” The level of service (LOS) for pedestrians has stagnated or notably declined in many intersections, such as the crossing to Bushnell Park from the east side of Wells, along with the removal of traffic islands.

The bottom line there was the desire to move cars quickly. Reducing fuel consumption and improving air quality can be tackled more effectively in other ways — ways that are not attempts to maintain what had been, at the time of POCD approval, the status quo.

Bike lane on one block of Broad Street

But then, there was more ink dedicated to parking than it ever deserves. They say that the “City’s goal is to create a parking supply and pricing policy that balances the needs of the City and helps move it toward sustainability.” There is no need to “balance.” Places like Boston and New York do not suffer because of expensive parking rates. Any place that uses free or cheap parking to promote itself should be questioned.

A positive development not fully anticipated in the POCD was dramatic changes made to Hartford’s zoning regulations; it is no longer required for new construction to include a minimum number of parking spaces, and there is also a maximum number of spaces for each type of development. This does fall within the stated POCD goal of including “TOD concepts in revised zoning code,” however. In the next POCD we should see an increase in smarter parking policies that dramatically reduce surface parking so that we can see real development emerge in Downtown. And, FYI, parking garages do not count as real development. We can and must do better than that.

Behaviors can be shaped by policy, and in times of crisis, should be. Those who will be long dead before 2040 may not feel the urgency for change in their bones, but for the younger generations, this is no joke.

One way to lighten our impact would be to improve access to short-term vehicle rentals, like Zipcar. Those who truly only need wheels on occasion are freed from the expense of registration, car tax, and insurance, along with routine storage costs. Back in 2010, there was talk about getting more “Zipcar locations around the City, particularly in the Downtown, at the hospitals and at the insurance company campuses.” Zipcar has locations at University of Hartford, Trinity College, and UConn Law — all considerably outside of Downtown. Efforts to bring Zipcar into Downtown have been revived in the last year, but have stalled for a number of reasons, including the company’s inability/unwillingness to seal the deal. Metro Hartford Alliance was supposed to take the lead on this, with support from Hartford Parking Authority.

Reducing “the number of vehicles traveling on Interstate 84 and Interstate 91 by focusing future investment on public transit” has seen some attention through CTfastrak and CTrail, but not anywhere on the level needed. Bus and rail need to step up frequency of service, for one. The last Wethersfield Avenue bus, for instance, leaves downtown at 6:10 PM on weekdays. Nobody along that corridor works a late shift? We do see extended hours for the free downtown circulator bus (Dash) when there are major events, but this does not do much to benefit those who commute by public transit. CRCOG has completed studies about how to potentially modify bus routes and it seems we are sticking with the spoke-hub model, though POCD correctly identified that “The bus system is designed primarily to bring riders from the neighborhoods and suburbs into Downtown, with very few cross-town routes. This poses a problem for those dependent on bus transit, and creates a disincentive for non-dependent individuals to utilize the bus system.”

The other way to get cars off the road is to make it inconvenient and expensive, which seems like political suicide. . . so thanks in advance to Lamont if he takes one for the team. Our local government should do anything and everything it can to erase the single-occupancy vehicle norm which is — besides terrible for the environment and damaging to roads — the cause of traffic during rush hour. The POCD says as much, quoting CRCOG’s data of the time that over 78% of those residents who commute by car (73%), commute alone. An action item in the POCD was for Hartford Parking Authority to offer discounted rates for multiple occupant vehicles in HPA facilities. That should have happened in the 2010-2013 timeframe; it does not appear to have been implemented. Likewise, no discounted rates for alternative fuel vehicles have been offered, despite its mention in the plan.

A goal that has seen little movement has been that of improving “the Capitol Avenue corridor by creating a mixed-use neighborhood, replacing surfacing [sic] parking with structured parking, and developing available land with new buildings.” The sea of parking lots at Capitol and West remain. This was marked as a goal for achieving in the 2010-2013 time frame, led by the Department of Development Services. Walk this area after business hours and when nothing is playing at the Bushnell, and you’ll experience why thoughtful development here is desperately needed.

Within the POCD, there is mention of the Transportation Pathways Strategy Conceptual Plan — because we sure love creating plan after plan. This portrays a number of features we have yet to see, including a sculpture park in that sketchy area at the corner of Myrtle, Church and Spruce Streets; a Transit Center at the southeast corner of Church Street and Union Place, and what they called “Art Wall Pathways” on the Asylum bridge over I-84. Not noted in this is improvements to the tunnels in that area, which would need little more than better lighting and installing a mural.

It has not all been an abysmal failure. We have seen an increase in bicycle parking, including a few bike lockers at Union Station, in Downtown. Last year the City of Hartford began holding monthly rides in the parks to encourage people to get on bikes, though the stated purpose in POCD was really to “encourage individuals to try biking and walking for transportation purposes,” and that was intended as the responsibility of Health & Human Services. There has been an improvement in pedestrian wayfinding, particularly in Downtown; it’s time to expand this deeper into the neighborhoods where there are also attractions: Twain, Stowe, and Connecticut Historical Society, to name a few.

Some streetscapes have seen improvements. Farmington Avenue was making progress, though one of the handy speed-calming islands at Woodland Street was removed because it served its purpose well enough to garner complaints. The center islands are hugely useful to pedestrians, but what’s needed is a consistent and protected bike lane in this corridor. Right now it feels as if planners could only imagine people riding bikes from Asylum Hill to the West End and back all day. The Farmington/Asylum intersection has not been meaningfully addressed; the striped intersection box is ignored by motorists and not enforced by police. There is not even a crosswalk on one side of the Broad and Farmington intersection. The pedestrian cycle is too short for the average person’s needs. This is an overly wide intersection that encourages cars to travel at high speeds. So, while there is a partial bike lane on Farmington and one block of green bike lane on Broad, disconnected infrastructure yields lackluster results.

Something that was a fail has been redeemed. Bike lanes were installed on Brookfield Street. Then, half-thought-out speed humps were installed that did not span the street. The result: motorists swerving their cars into the bike lanes in an attempt to maintain their speed. This is what happens when people who do not regularly use the infrastructure design it. They would’ve known it’s preferable as a cyclist to slow down than to have cars darting into our designated space — regardless of what NACTO might suggest. So, after hearing it, the City came back to fix the problem, installing flex posts, then putting the speed humps across the entire street. Traffic on this segment of Brookfield is now slower, more predictable, and safer.

Several one-way streets were converted to two-way. The goal of changing one block of Asylum Street (between Ford and Trumbull) to be two-way was unmet. That and the dedicated bus lane on Asylum got chucked because one upscale restaurant publicly threatened to leave Hartford if anything interfered with its valet, on-street parking.

There have been improvements in bus route maps and signage, overall, but we have also seen the development of apps that are more accurate.

Hartford adopted a Complete Streets policy in 2016, but it has not been applied to all construction projects. The South Green trident cluster redesign is an example of where the policy was ignored.

The POCD listed establishing “a goal to allow for 4,500 additional housing units in Downtown” as an action item to reduce dependence on single occupancy vehicles. The new units in and just outside of Downtown have rapidly filled.

CRCOG had been tasked with printing and promoting maps showing safe and convenient bicycle routes. Since we have not developed safe and convenient bicycle routes, there is not anything to map. At this stage, loading this into an app and creating on-street wayfinding makes more sense than tossing money into printed maps. CRCOG had also been responsible for taking the lead on providing “education on safe riding skills, as well as sharing the road for bicyclists, pedestrians, & motorists.” Not sure if they are doing this, but BiCi Co has been offering skills classes. This paradigm of listing motorists last as those needing education, however, is woefully flawed. It is rare for a pedestrian or cyclist to be fatally injured in any crash not involving a motor vehicle. In the next go round, it would make more sense to prioritize educating those who can cause the most damage, while providing safer infrastructure for the most vulnerable users.

Want to help shape the next Plan of Conservation and Development? Take the survey.

 

¹This link was not broken during the drafting of this piece in March 2019. At time of publication, none of the section links were working — only the one for the massive document.