Some developers have had enough of freeways

Prefer boulevards

David Crossley, Apr 25, 11.

America’s infrastructure is crumbling. And that’s a good thing—at least when it comes to freeways, say some developers in a story in Urban Land:

It would be better—both economically and in terms of quality of life—for communities that suffer from blight and division to demolish obtrusive throughways, expressways, and overpasses, according to a growing number of advocates of old-fashioned boulevards.

Perhaps the most famous example of this is the destruction of San Francisco’s Embarcadero Freeway—and it took an earthquake to make that happen. Originally designed to connect the Bay Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge, the Embarcadero instead divorced the city from the waterfront for years. The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake damaged it beyond repair, but the event did not worsen congestion; in fact, the local street grid absorbed traffic and the economy improved.

In 2002, the freeway became a palm-lined boulevard, designed by ROMA Design Group, with two banks of thoroughfare traffic and a streetcar line. The economic boost was dramatic, according to a Congress for the New Urbanism report: “Dense commercial development has lined the street, housing in the area has increased by 51 percent, and jobs have increased by 23 percent. High-profile redevelopments like the old Ferry Building and Pier 1 have continued to transform the waterfront. Similarly, the old industrial South Market area was redeveloped as a dense, mixed-use neighborhood.”

Alex Twining, president and CEO of Twining Properties and chair of ULI’s Urban Development Mixed-Use Council (Red), says the country is in the next phase of knitting back together the many neighborhoods that were ripped apart by the Interstate Highway System. MORE AT URBAN LAND