Earning their stripes
Get ready for the squeeze when you drive down Ingersoll Avenue, as four traffic lanes will soon become three between Polk Boulevard and Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway. The new design will create a lane for each direction, a turning lane and bicycle lanes on each side.
Traffic on Ingersoll is bad enough now, and despite proponents telling us that this change will slow traffic down and ease congestion, we have our doubts. Let’s just say when I-235 is backed up, you better find another option to drive downtown.
Fortunately, this change won’t require major construction, but rather some simple re-striping of lines on the road at a not-so-simple, tax-payer cost of $10,000. The work was to start in April but has been postponed to early May, if the weather cooperates.
We wrote about this subject last September, offering our support for anything that promotes more access for bicyclists and pedestrians, but sharing concern over what this change may do to the Ingersoll business owners who have suffered the construction pain of the Restoration Ingersoll project too much already.
Recent news reports show that business owners may be more open to the change now and are at least willing to see what happens. Many of the 550 or so who signed a petition in opposition last year may still feel otherwise. Even so, kudos to the Des Moines City Council for taking time on this change and collecting input. The implementation of a six-month review is also a key to this plan, providing an “exit strategy.” If things don’t go as planned, just slap on some more paint. Too bad all the council’s decisions don’t have such an easy “out.”
We hope this plan works, as it has merit and appears now to have been well thought out. Even those who will be annoyed by the bicyclists should appreciate the 50 or so additional parking spots. Let’s just hope there are still cars there to fill them. CV
