Broadway plan a winner.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Last September, Eugene voters gave resounding 2-to-1 approval to a measure calling for reopening the last remnant of the city's downtown pedestrian mall: Broadway between Oak and Charnelton streets. That vote was Step 1.

This week, the City Council approved Steps 2 and 3 by supporting the carefully constructed design of the soon-to-be-reopened street and a $2.4 million plan to pay for it.

When Broadway is reopened - with luck, in time for the Eugene Celebration in the fall - it will mark the end of a 30-year-old ambitious, but ultimately doomed, attempt to turn the downtown core into a pedestrian's paradise. Broadway was closed to motorized traffic, as were Willamette and Olive streets. But rather than re-invigorating the downtown area, the mall caused some businesses to flee to suburban malls and others to simply close up shop. The hoped-for influx of pedestrians didn't occur; many people found getting to and around downtown exceedingly inconvenient. And some parts of the closed streets began to fill not with revelers and shoppers, but with panhandlers and worse.

Recognizing the mall's failure, the city reopened Olive Street in 1992 and Willamette Street in 1996. Now, it's Broadway's turn.

The funding plan approved by the City Council was stitched together by the city staff, working with county officials and downtown businesses. It calls for $1.6 million of the $2.4 million cost to come from the Lane County road fund, $634,000 from the city and $200,000 in the form of a promissory note from property owners along Broadway. The private contribution was negotiated by Downtown Eugene Inc. The overall funding plan is creative and similar to the one used to reopen Willamette Street. The plan deserved the council's approval.

The council-approved design for the reopened street, developed by a team of public and private designers, is also quite creative. It is patterned after the deservedly praised section of East Broadway between Oak and Pearl streets. The design will feature 12-foot sidewalks, wide enough to encourage outdoor dining and special events. The street will be overlooked by at least 60 trees. Two, 10-foot-wide traffic lanes - with East Broadway-like landscaped median strips - will allow cars to traverse the street in both directions. The medians and the narrower lanes should slow down drivers, but will prove to be a challenge for bicyclists. That trade-off should work since it's only for three blocks. The design also envisions a street that will be easy to convert to an outdoor festival site. Appropriately, the design team asked for input from downtown merchants, property owners, neighbors and the public.

If all goes well, the design work will be finalized in about two weeks, the bid package should be completed in six weeks and construction should begin by May. That's a fast-track time line that will allow Eugene voters to see the fruits of their vote by fall.

The reopening of Broadway joins with other important downtown projects already completed, under way or soon to begin. Those include the new Lane Transit District transfer station, the renovated McDonald's Theatre, the new city library, an updated Amtrak train station, the conversion of the First Baptist Church into a performance space and the new federal courthouse. All of these improvements in downtown should serve to bring people to the core area. And if the people come, the shops, apartments, restaurants and performance venues will follow.