The left turn lane at Hamilton and Ferris streets in Ypsilanti was closed Tuesday afternoon not as a result of construction or a traffic collision, but for a
city-planned demonstration.
Organized by City Planner Teresa Gilloti, with the support of local business owners and those with the Urban and Regional Planning program at Eastern Michigan University and the Let’s Save Michigan campaign, an experiment based on the public’s reaction to more open space for alternative transportation took shape.
“The city has been doing a lot of work on non-motorized transportation, so we’re improving busing, biking and walking,” Gilloti said. “The idea of it is you want to plan how you make your streets include everyone; basically, access to all dimensions.”
From roughly 2-5 p.m., mostly EMU business and music students rallied in the turn lane to play instruments, Scrabble and corn hole while the weekly farmer’s market functioned around the corner. According to Gilloti, Hamilton Street was chosen because it bisects the community as a state-owned “trunk road,” like Woodward Avenue in Detroit.
“One thing that we advocate is for [the Michigan Department of Transportation] to be more responsive when making decisions about these roads to what the local communities want as opposed to just the need to move traffic through here,” said Sarah Szurpicki, project coordinator of Let’s Save Michigan. “Those interests have to be more balanced.”
Just as Gilloti and Szurpicki suspected, the farmer’s market was an asset to the demo.
“This is a part of the community where people are active,” Szurpicki said. “There are seniors in apartments right across the street; the farmer’s market brings people, so I think there are good reasons for having it here in addition to the trunk road issue.”
Don Bush, an Ypsilanti resident, came out to the farmer’s market after a health scare for safer foods. Between the gospel songs, saxophone player Steven Thomas performed for the market crowd, Bush said he heard hints of guitars.
“They sounded pretty good over there,” he said. “And to see students out of their norm and promoting something no one else really has time for is inspirational.”
Unlike the farmer’s market expected every Tuesday May to October in the Key Bank parking lot, road blockages are harder to organize. With so many roads in Ypsilanti run by the Michigan Department of Transportation, a plan has to be well organized before permission of modifications is requested.
But when Gilloti sent the details of the street project to MDOT, the feedback was encouraging.
“We threw the whole thing together in like two weeks,” she said. “We have kind of a legacy of streets that were designed sort of before that type of thinking. So we talk about it a lot, and people have been interested, but we thought, ‘Let’s try one out even if it’s just a block to see what it would mean if we did a road blockage.’ ”
City streets are easier to temporarily alter, according to Gilloti. In fact, there are already plans to add bike lanes on Spring Street next time it’s redone.
Szurpicki, who initially suggested the idea to Gelloti, said there are two effects from this case:
“They show how people hang out and how community builds when you have more public space. The other is that traffic didn’t really slow down, so that’s maybe a positive for making the argument that this won’t effect traffic. But from my perspective, I wouldn’t mind if a little bit by the downtown area.”
The Planning Awareness Club of Eastern, a club apart of the Urban Planning program,
had its own reasons for attending.
“It’s their decision whether they want to pick tree planting in Detroit to be involved in, or a community cleanup that they want to be apart of,” said Nina David, adviser for the Urban Planning Program. “I think they chose this because is capitalizes what already exists in the community, and uses those things to make the city even better.”
Gilloti didn’t do much to publicize the event in order to learn as much as possible.
Not everyone agreed it would bring a successful turnout, though.
“It’s been good today,” senior Mackenzie Lake, a member of the Planning Awareness Club of Eastern, said. “I think next time there should be even more advertising and people involved, but it’s a start. This city’s got a lot to offer; people just don’t realize it yet.”
Szurpicki said she is hoping the Hamilton Street demonstration is the first in a series of similar projects, especially in downtown areas where the most businesses and people can be found.
