Two city councilors eye stretch of Highway 78 as 'complete street'
Birmingham City Council members Darrell O’Quinn and Hunter Williams have asked the Regional Planning Commission of Greater Birmingham to study the feasibility of reconfiguring a portion of Highway 78 between Oporto-Madrid Blvd. and 41st Street South using complete streets design principles.
This long stretch of Highway 78, reaching from the Eastwood area to the heart of Avondale, includes Crestwood Boulevard, where O’Quinn would also like to see improvements in the landscape design of the medians.
The term complete streets refers to transportation policy requiring that a city’s roads -- wherever possible -- offer safe, convenient access for all users, including people who walk, bike or ride buses.
The ordinance was submitted by O’Quinn -- a long-time complete streets advocate -- in his capacity as chairman of the council’s transportation committee.
A complete streets redesign could make Highway 78 a more inviting corridor for alternative modes of transportation, according to Williams.
The highway is currently “not a safe corridor for people to walk or bike because of the way it’s engineered, so there’s no easy access from that eastern corridor to the Avondale and downtown areas,” Williams said.
Area residents have asked for improvements to the highway, according to Williams and O’Quinn.
And a complete streets redo of the highway would have “a lot of benefits,” O’Quinn said.
“It will improve safety," he said. "It will reduce traffic speeds. It will provide accessibility to alternative modes. It is completely consistent with the complete streets initiative."
“The accomodation for pedestrians, particularly at the corner of Crestwood Blvd. and 56th Street, is terrible, currently,” O’Quinn said.
The project is located primarily in District 5, represented by O’Quinn, and District 2, represented by Williams.
A portion of the area along Crestwood Boulevard is located in District 3, represented by Council President Valerie Abbott, according to O’Quinn.
O’Quinn formally requested the feasibility study in a March 30 email to Michael Kaczorowski, a principal planner at the RPCGB.
The feasibility study would be an APPLE (Advanced Planning, Programming and Logical Engineering) study.
These studies -- conducted by outside consultants engaged by the RPCGB -- are capped at about $60,000. Federal dollars pay for most of a APPLE study, but a 20 percent local match is required.
O’Quinn and Williams said they are committed to providing that match.
The councilors will use money from their own public improvement funds if necessary, according to O’Quinn.
“The APPLE study had been useful in the past in showing a need and a path forward to get street work done, especially streetscaping and to turn a street into a complete street,” Williams said.
The RPCGB also commissioned a APPLE study, at the request of the city of Birmingham, to look at options to improve pedestrian access and safety on a stretch of Richard Arrington Jr. Blvd. atop Red Mountain near Vulcan. Those options were recently unveiled at a public meeting at Vulcan Park & Museum.
Kaczorowski confirmed on April 6, that the RPCGB will proceed with the study as requested by the councilors.
The timing will depend on when the city can supply the matching funds, he said.
"We should be able to get underway in the next two or three months with a engineering firm," Kaczorowski said. "They will look at potential bike lanes, sidewalks -- what they can reasonably construct in that corridor."
UPDATE: This story was updated April 6 at 12:30 p.m. to add the comments from Kaczorowski.