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Downtown mall may have parking
Access committee suggesting 24 spots at east end
CUMBERLAND — Shoppers who are unable to find parking downtown may soon find relief if the efforts of the Retail Access Committee come to fruition.
Regis Larkin presented the committee’s first set of findings at Wednesday morning’s meeting of the Downtown Development Commission. The committee first met Nov. 30.
Larkin formed the committee at the last meeting of the Downtown Development Commission on Nov. 12. Its stated objective is to “determine the necessity, feasibility and viability of providing automobile access at the east end portion of Baltimore Street for patrons and visitors to downtown Cumberland.” The committee believes that this objective can be accomplished by allowing automobiles access to this portion of the mall and by making parking more available by adding 24 spaces.
The change would result in a limited opening of the mall on the east end. The area would be controlled parking rather than a through street, and sidewalks would be available on both sides of the street.
“What people like is the park-like setting and the safety,” said Larkin, who added that the committee doesn’t intend to make changes that would harm downtown’s culture. “We’re supposed to be good stewards of the mall.”
According to research from Eastern Michigan University presented in the committee’s report, of the approximately 200 pedestrian malls constructed between 1959 and 1984 in the nation, only nine can be considered “successful pedestrian malls.”
Successful malls — those that have experienced commercial growth, have high occupancy or have high property values — are located in Colorado, Minnesota, New York, New Jersey, Vermont, Virginia and Wisconsin. In nearly every case, these malls are located in cities with a large population of nearby residents, usually those located near a four-year college campus.
According to EMU’s research, the vast majority of pedestrian malls studied have been re-opened to automobile traffic and have experienced commercial growth as a result.
“Right now, folks, we have one of 30 remaining malls (in the country),” said Larkin. “(Some say) that we have a successful mall, but that’s not what everyone else looking inside from outside sees.”
Larkin said the changes would improve public interest in the mall. “If all 24 spots are full, that’s also psychological. People think something’s going on.”
The committee’s report said that 24 parking spots would cost approximately $60,000. Larkin said that according to city Director of Administrative Services Jeff Rhodes, the Downtown Development Commission has $220,846 available in its reserve fund.
“My understanding is it’s our job — I mean, if you wanted to take a trip around the world, I think you might have a problem,” said Larkin. “But as it relates to downtown — the primary and secondary district — and something needs to be done, my read on that is that it’s absolutely our discretion to utilize those funds.”
“It’s a new time, it’s 2010, it’s a new economy,” said Wade Clark. “I think that people want to be able to come down and they want to be able to park. We need to change the perception (that there’s not enough parking).”
“If this is to be considered, it ought to be looked at right now,” said Downtown Manager Ed Mullaney. “I would also push working with the city because I think it’s very vital that that Baltimore Avenue corridor coming in (to the city) gets spruced up.”
The commission passed a motion, 8-1, to change the committee from fact-finding to a mission-oriented committee that could begin to work with the city, with Doug Schmidt voting against.
The committee will begin to seek definite costs, a time frame and support from the city.
City Councilman Brian Grim said the commission would need approval from the mayor and City Council to make such a change to the pedestrian mall. “There would at least be some sort of signing off,” said Grim. “I expect that a change of that caliber would involve a formal approval.”
Grim said he would be interested in seeing the results from studies conducted as to the effects of opening the pedestrian mall to automobile traffic. “I would hate to lose the beauty of downtown Cumberland with the pedestrian mall,” said Grim. “But at the same time we definitely have a parking problem that we have to resolve.”
“I don’t really believe it can be done for a cost that is worthwhile,” said Mayor Lee Fiedler. “But the city is willing to sit, look at their program, and talk to them once (the proposal) gets done.”
Fiedler said he would be interested if the cost could be held to the $60,000 range mentioned in the report. “This has been gone through several times ... the times we’ve looked at it before it cost quite a bit of money,” said Fiedler. “If it was something like $60,000, I think it’d be very interesting.”
Attempts to reach the other council members and the city administrator were unsuccessful.
Larkin will make another presentation at the Downtown Development Commission’s next meeting Jan. 14.
Contact Cory Galliher at cgalliher@times-news.com.
