"The Magic Genii"
Letter to the Editor, St Johns Review 10/28/15
Dear Editor,
The strongest support for the Farid Bolouri Development is the blind Lombard curve and the safety issue at Charleston. Believe me, I always have a wave of gratitude once I’ve crossed it! It doesn’t matter how slow the vehicles are traveling, they just appear out of nowhere. You don’t see them and you assume that they don’t see you. It feels dangerous. It is blind because the Huk Lab/ Weir Building blocks the line of sight.
Now imagine that you are a giant Genii and with your great hand you can magically lift the whole Huk Lab building and move it four or five feet away from the street. Instantly your vision down Lombard would be changed from 50 ft to 150 ft. With the complete razing of Bolouri’s lot, as will be done, that offers a clean slate with which to build and something like this can be done. Simply put, if the sightline on Lombard is moved back four or five feet, the curve is no longer blind. In the making of the St. Johns Lombard Plan (SJLP) this option wasn’t even a consideration because the current structures were immovable markers. Any plan made had to work around these buildings. Now we don’t, for the buildings will no longer exist.
If the sightline is moved back, Charleston becomes as safe as any street on Lombard. Pedestrians can see approaching vehicles, and if they step onto the street, vehicles can see them. The current speed limit is 25 mph, perhaps because it’s an entrance to a Business District the speed could be reduced to 20 mph. And it’s the same moderate traffic one finds in Downtown SJ. The urgency is dissipated. At this juncture, more conventional approaches to making it safe will do. For example at John Street, safety was achieved with a pedestrian crossing signal.
This intersection, in the SJLP, was seen as a Gateway into our Community, and visibility into St. Johns was an important developmental aspect. An added benefit to moving the sightline back, is that vehicles on RT30/Lombard now have greater visibility into Downtown St Johns. More to the spirit of the St. Johns Lombard Plan, and a solution that couldn’t be forseen in 2004. Where currently from Oswego you can see to Signal Pizza/ Peninsula Station, now you'd be able to see to John Street and beyond. A much warmer invitation for business entry.
In the Bolouri Development, because he squares his building at Charleston and because it’s bigger and taller, you will have a four story wall of apartments that will not allow visibility into downtown St. Johns until just before you reach the proposed right turn stoplight. As you travel west you will be greeted full on by a four story apt. wall. It is a physical, visual, and psychological barrier, NOT an invitation into St, Johns.
Letter to the Editor, St Johns Review 10/28/15
Dear Editor,
The strongest support for the Farid Bolouri Development is the blind Lombard curve and the safety issue at Charleston. Believe me, I always have a wave of gratitude once I’ve crossed it! It doesn’t matter how slow the vehicles are traveling, they just appear out of nowhere. You don’t see them and you assume that they don’t see you. It feels dangerous. It is blind because the Huk Lab/ Weir Building blocks the line of sight.
Now imagine that you are a giant Genii and with your great hand you can magically lift the whole Huk Lab building and move it four or five feet away from the street. Instantly your vision down Lombard would be changed from 50 ft to 150 ft. With the complete razing of Bolouri’s lot, as will be done, that offers a clean slate with which to build and something like this can be done. Simply put, if the sightline on Lombard is moved back four or five feet, the curve is no longer blind. In the making of the St. Johns Lombard Plan (SJLP) this option wasn’t even a consideration because the current structures were immovable markers. Any plan made had to work around these buildings. Now we don’t, for the buildings will no longer exist.
If the sightline is moved back, Charleston becomes as safe as any street on Lombard. Pedestrians can see approaching vehicles, and if they step onto the street, vehicles can see them. The current speed limit is 25 mph, perhaps because it’s an entrance to a Business District the speed could be reduced to 20 mph. And it’s the same moderate traffic one finds in Downtown SJ. The urgency is dissipated. At this juncture, more conventional approaches to making it safe will do. For example at John Street, safety was achieved with a pedestrian crossing signal.
This intersection, in the SJLP, was seen as a Gateway into our Community, and visibility into St. Johns was an important developmental aspect. An added benefit to moving the sightline back, is that vehicles on RT30/Lombard now have greater visibility into Downtown St Johns. More to the spirit of the St. Johns Lombard Plan, and a solution that couldn’t be forseen in 2004. Where currently from Oswego you can see to Signal Pizza/ Peninsula Station, now you'd be able to see to John Street and beyond. A much warmer invitation for business entry.
In the Bolouri Development, because he squares his building at Charleston and because it’s bigger and taller, you will have a four story wall of apartments that will not allow visibility into downtown St. Johns until just before you reach the proposed right turn stoplight. As you travel west you will be greeted full on by a four story apt. wall. It is a physical, visual, and psychological barrier, NOT an invitation into St, Johns.