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Couple Weighs in With Comprehensive Plan Committee.
Posted on Wednesday, April 06 @ 13:19:41 EDT by jfbailey
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WPCNR MR. AND MRS. AND MS. WHITE PLAINS VOICE. April 6, 2005: Regular readers of WPCNR have sent in the following commentary to the CPRC (Comprehensive Plan Review Committee), in which they list specific requests they'd like the committee to address:
April 1, 2005
TO: The members of the Comprehensive Plan Review Committee, City of
White Plains
Topic: Comments About Close-in Neighborhoods, and the City Core.
Dear Friends,
We have comments and suggestions, some very detailed, about planning for
the Close-in Neighborhoods, and the City Core. We respectfully submit
them to you.
About half of White Plains residents live in apartments, condominiums,
and cooperative residences, and most are in or near the city core. Many
of the residents are elderly; many are pedestrians. We must be
interested in their safety and well-being.
1 Planners should keep in mind that pedestrians must be able to safely cross streets. There are at least two corners in the central city where they cannot do so: Crossing (walking west) at Westchester Ave. & Bloomingdale Rd., from the northeast corner, going toward the Nordstrom corner. It is never safe to cross that corner because of cars making a right turn on red, exiting from the Stop & Shop car driveway; and cars making (unfortunately legal!) u-turns coming south on Westchester Ave. and making the u-turn to go north on Westchester Ave.
It is also never safe to cross (going east or west) at Hamilton Ave. and N. Broadway—on the south-west side. The walk sign lights when cars are coming around the corner from the east side of Broadway.
It is nice to maintain the flow of vehicle traffic, but it is also mandatory to think about the morbidity and mortality of pedestrians.
2 Planners should keep in mind that the most dense areas profit the most from open space. Why create a public park (and public debt) near Hillair Circle property, where people have their own, individual open space?
3 Planners, please, no fancy, impractical bricks on walkways and crossways! We hope the city continues to replace the breakable, broken, and missing red bricks with cement, perhaps colored and scored to look like brick. We hope the city in its planning considers the practicality and safety of design, along with the aesthetics.
4 The city should place more railings as barriers to people unsafely crossing/dashing across the street midblock in certain busy and dangerous areas. An example of existing railings for safety is at The Westchester, on South Armory Place. Examples of where additional substantial railings could be placed are on the west side of Lexington Ave. between Hamilton Ave. and Main St., to prevent the eastward dashing people; and at Tibbits Park, N. Broadway, near Main St. (to prevent people running across, for example, toward 10 or 16 N. Broadway).
5 In planning, the city should prevent the juxtaposition of multiple driveways and streets, which can be dangerous. An example is Main St., the south side, at the City Center (approximately across from City Hall). A pedestrian must now cross a driveway, the two-way City Center Place, and then another driveway. We know that the City Center complex includes lots of buildings needing access and egress in a relatively small area. Maybe this kind of congestion in the future is preventable.
If it’s not preventable, maybe such a project is unfeasible.
6 Please, planners, do not “dump” (for example, build more special housing) on the Eastview/Lake St. neighborhood. More buildings mean more vehicles. The neighborhood has more than its share of congestion. Lake St., Eastview Ave., and S. Kensico Ave. are major arteries (and short cuts) out of the city—to West Harrison, Westchester Avenue, and the Cross-Westchester Expressway. Especially in the late afternoons, evenings, and weekends, Eastview Ave. and S. Kensico are hardly navigable by car even though these streets have two lanes. The problem is large vehicles (such as SUVs), which park on both sides of the street, making the passage of vehicles back and forth on the two lanes impossible. This neighborhood, and all neighborhoods, deserves safe vehicle access and egress, as well as open space, clean air, maintenance of views, and pedestrian safety.
7 Any new parking garages do not have to look like prisons. The Fortunoff, Stop & Shop, and City Center parking garages are massive, monolithic, ugly, and uncreative. Couldn’t they have been designed with some varied glass brick detail, ceramic mural, or Gaudi-like eccentricity? (Stand at Eastview School, and look at the supermarket garage.)
8 Respect the zoning codes that have already been created. If developers want zoning changes, are they motivated by greed?
Respectfully submitted,
Renee and Steve A. Cohen
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