To The Reader’s Forum:

During the course of the coming months and years tens of millions of dollars will be invested in making downtown Jamestown a destination for comedy, tourism, craft brewing and residency. This will bring more pedestrians, cars and bicyclists to the downtown and river walk areas. The Washington Street corridor bifurcates the West End from Central and Eastern downtown and can be hazardous for pedestrians to cross.

Stakeholders will hopefully seek ways to influence the NYS Department of Transportation to look at and implement creative ways that will reduce the average speed of vehicles as they pass through downtown on Washington Street. A greened center median, reduce travel lanes down from four to two or three, install speed bumps, install raised intersections, install bike lanes; these are just a few improvements that could be looked at.

However, if left solely “the experts at the state” then little more may be accomplished other than what is warranted by state design guidelines. Community input could have a positive influence transforming a rather drab and simple retiming of traffic signals to a more elaborate “community vision” of what needs to be installed. Perhaps even looking at ways to create a truck by-pass around the city.

Greg Lindquist,

Norwalk, Conn.