Take Into Account Our Changed Needs Beware Inertia Enthusiasm Should Be Tempered With Prudence.

A decade ago, perhaps, building a Lincoln Street bridge was a good idea. The bridge was intended to alleviate poor air quality and congestion in downtown Spokane.

But once a good idea doesn’t mean forever a good idea. Things change and construction plans don’t seem to gracefully accommodate these changes. Ambitious renovations of our city’s core have opened a window of opportunity for reinventing the downtown neighborhood. The heart of these renovations - River Park Square - is adjacent to the proposed Lincoln Street bridge corridor.

These opportunities don’t come along even every decade. Enthusiasm to charge ahead with any plan, regardless of its historic roots, should be tempered with prudence and we should have the civic courage to postpone, even abandon, plans that won’t contribute to our central goal. A vital downtown neighborhood is essential to the city’s cultural fabric. And much work has been done to define what would constitute vitality: shopping, foot traffic, restaurants, entertainment, public and residential spaces - what urban planners term mixed use.

Planners James Kunstler and University of Washington Professor Douglas Kelbaugh say there are ways to create the ambiance of this kind of city neighborhood with promenades, good lighting, sidewalk plantings and parallel parking as a buffer between traffic and pedestrians. They also agree that multi-lane arterials tend to carve up neighborhoods, creating psychological barriers for pedestrians, and one-way streets result in higher vehicle speeds. The bridge could create both threats to the dream of a downtown neighborhood rich with varied activities.

The original reason for the new bridge was alleviation of downtown air pollution by moving traffic quickly through and out of downtown. The air quality has improved. Now, there are compelling reasons to want people to come downtown, linger, shop, go to a movie. The new bridge could be an impediment to our dream if motorists view the Lincoln Street corridor as a fast track straight through downtown.

, DataTimes MEMO: For opposing view, see “Build this bridge to Spokane’s future”

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