Of Trees & Mullan Ave Realignment

During a meeting between the Coeur d’Alene City Council and the city’s Parks & Recreation Department, realignment of Mullan Avenue was discussed. The realignment could result in the removal of 2 dozen City Park trees and loss of 70 feet on the north side of the park to realignment and a parking lot:

“Commissioner McDowell explained that when they first began discussions regarding moving into the park area, he looked at the proposed configuration and estimated it would encroach approximately 70 feet.  Upon his review of the trees (depending where you drew the boundary) there were approximately 2 dozen trees that would need to come out.  Commissioner McDowell felt that the trees were not in that bad a condition and is concerned about trade-off of removing trees for parking when there are possible options with the Ignite CDA property.  Mayor Widmyer asked if there is any portion of the Ignite property that could be used for realignment of the road.  Mr. Boyd said that the Ignite property would not change the alignment of the road.  Commissioner McDowell felt that diagonal parking would be a potential option.” Full report of the meeting here.

DFO: I don’t know why the city has to mess with City Park. It simply could narrow Mullan Avenue from 5 lanes to 2 and permit diagonal parking. City Park, which came into existence before the city of Coeur d’Alene did, would be left intact & the roadway would become somewhat quieter. Thoughts?