The City has presented a plan for Northgate's Fifth Avenue and it is a disappointment. It does not achieve the connectivity, protection, and aesthetic detailing necessary for a successful pedestrian street. We must set higher standards if we wish to create a safe and attractive pedestrian-oriented streetscape. This is no time to accept compromises, or planning that is just wishful thinking. Review the City's proposal and you will better appreciate my comments and recommendations.

 This is what the City needs to do:

 € Widen the sidewalks: Pedestrians will not feel, or be, safe from moving vehicles without the protection of curbside parking. Twelve-foot wide sidewalks are then insufficiently wide. It is unlikely that experiments with curbside parking at the south end of the street will succeed and again pedestrians will be exposed to curbside traffic. We must be ASSURED that we have achieved pedestrian prioritization along this critical sidewalk. Without the protection of curbside parking, sidewalks must then be 16-18 feet wide.

 Consider your own experience on sidewalks abutted by commercial buildings, no cars parked by the curb, and traffic streaming by the sidewalk edge.

 € Remove all those monstrous poles and power lines: Leaving this as an option for commercial development is no plan at all.

 € Reduce the dimensions of the superblock by adding crosswalks and traffic lights: Street crossing opportunities are currently spaced too far apart. Slowing down traffic and defending street crossings are essential to good planning.

 Without these improvements we are exiling our library and community center to a desolate margin of an auto-oriented shopping mall.

 € This pedestrian street for Northgate must be designed to succeed: We now have the greatest opportunity to influence the development of this Urban Center pedestrian street. We must create sidewalks that are safe and attractive. We must provide more frequent opportunities to cross this street. If we are unable to produce one length of quality public right-of-way in this high-density Urban Center, how do we imagine that we will manage the inevitable future of increased traffic and social stress?

 I urge you to not approve a plan for our Civic Center site, including our library and community center, unless the City commits to a responsible streetscape plan that includes ALL the elements that are necessary for providing safe, attractive, and well-connected pedestrian walkways.

 - JOEL TUFEL, Maple Leaf