Walk on

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Urban planner and author Jeff Speck discusses how walkability saves cities
by Gretyl Macalaster, photo by Chloe Kanner

Jeff Speck has spent many years analyzing what makes communities work, and Portsmouth is the kind of community he likes to study. The multi-use small-scale buildings and connected street network make it a city people drive miles to walk in.

But even in a walkable city like Portsmouth, there is room for improvement. That’s what Speck told a group of about 150 area residents at the Seacoast Repertory Theatre on Thursday, Jan. 22.

“If we believe, as most people do now, that walkable places are thriving places … then that suggests for a place to be successful, it has to be walkable,” Speck said. People have been “burdened” with the transportation costs that come with living in the suburbs, according to Speck, and those suburban developments may have a detrimental impact on the environment.

Speck is an award-winning urban planner and the author of “Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time.” He also spent 10 years as director of town planning at Duany Plater-Zyberk and Co., where he led or managed more than 40 of the firm’s projects.

Speck was invited to speak by Portsmouth Smart Growth for the 21st Century (PS21), a year-old nonprofit group focused on presenting ideas and fostering discussion about planning and policy development in Portsmouth. Doug Roberts, a founder of PS21, said Speck’s ideas are intriguing because they are counterintuitive.

“Everybody thinks that Portsmouth is already walkable, but what we’ve learned from reading (his) book … is that walkability isn’t just about sidewalks and that sort of thing, but more (about) making a city successful with making it more livable, more sustainable and more economically successful,” Roberts said.

During the event at the Rep and a two-hour workshop at city hall last Friday, Speck presented ideas for making Portsmouth more walkable. These suggestions included narrowing travel lanes, reducing the number of travel lanes and increasing parallel parking on streets like Chapel and Fleet near RiverRun Bookstore. He also proposed improving the entryway to the city at the Memorial Bridge by adding a park or a building where there is currently a surface parking lot. His most dramatic suggestion was converting State, Congress and Pleasant streets from one-way to two-way streets.

“Your businesses will do better with two-way streets,” Speck said, adding that two-way streets force motorists to slow down and pay more attention to their surroundings than one-way streets.

Speck said his research on walkability has focused on several areas, including a study of two-way versus one-way traffic. Case studies suggest that two-way streets slow traffic and improve business for retailers, he said. Parallel parking does the same thing, and improves pedestrians’ feeling of safety by creating a barrier between them and moving vehicles.

“If we believe, as most people do now, that walkable places are thriving places … then that suggests for a place to be successful, it has to be walkable.” — Jeff Speck

Speck also suggested hiding any new parking facility from the street with other buildings or greenery to improve the landscape for pedestrians — plans the city already has in place for a possible parking garage at the site of Gary’s Beverages on Deer Street.

Walkable cities like Portsmouth are valuable because there are so few of them left, Speck said. He cautioned that improving walkability could attract new residents to the city and could lead to higher rents that force local businesses to leave and larger businesses to move in. It’s something any city needs to consider alongside street and sidewalk improvements, he said.

Deputy city manager David Allen said he appreciated Speck’s recognition of the city’s work.

“A lot of the things that he talks about that are elements of making a city walkable (are things that Portsmouth) either has or has done, and I think he did a great job through his short time here and his quick visit to the city. He came up with a lot of creative ideas that we’ll be taking a look at,” Allen said.

Some of them, like re-striping Fleet Street between Hanover and Congress streets, are easily done. Others, like conversion of downtown streets from one-way to two-way, require a more in-depth analysis, Allen said.

The city is also looking at making roadways more bicycle-friendly. A public meeting is scheduled for Feb. 12 to discuss adding bike lanes on Middle Street and Lafayette Road. Allen said the city is considering two scenarios. One, recommended by Speck, involves stand-alone bicycle tracks on the southeast side of the street. These lanes would be created between the sidewalk and a row of parallel parking, separating the bicyclists from vehicular traffic. Speck says these types of bike lanes have been shown to decrease conflict between drivers and cyclists and to make less-comfortable cyclists, including families, feel safer while riding. A second scenario would feature more traditional striped bike lanes on either side of the roadway traveling with vehicular traffic.

“Urban biking, I like to say, is the biggest planning revolution underway in only some American cities,” Speck said. He said wherever buffered bike lanes like those being proposed on Middle Street are introduced, the biking population increases.

Walkability also is likely be discussed during a multi-day public design workshop about potential new zoning for the Islington Street corridor to be held at the Frank Jones Center Feb. 20-23.

Members of the city’s planning, public works and economic development departments attended Friday’s presentation and gained valuable information that will inform future planning discussions, including those related to parking, Allen said.

“We learned a lot, we have a lot of residents who learned a lot … and I think it helps everyone as we grow and move forward with development in the city,” Allen said.