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Key issues in connector roads review

Posted on February 10, 2009February 10, 2009 by Staff

By Dan Coleman

As recently reported, the Carrboro Board of Aldermen will soon be reviewing the town’s Connector Roads Policy. This policy, first adopted in 1986, has been a frequent source of contention over the past decade.

This is in part because, as residents of Wexford and adjoining neighborhoods recently pointed out, the policy fails in its stated goal “to disperse newly generated traffic and to give a sense of connectivity and unity to the town as it grew.”

Carrboro’s land-use planning seeks to follow New Urbanist principles, creating diversity, walkability, public spaces and emphasizing community. According to new urbanism pioneers Andrés Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, a fundamental tenet of this approach is that “streets within the neighborhood form a connected network which disperses traffic by providing a variety of pedestrian and vehicular routes to any destination.”

Under this paradigm, residents of Wexford, Cobblestone, Cates Farm and Williams Wood were correct in pointing out that the proposed Claremont connector to Colfax would funnel cut-through traffic through their neighborhoods, damaging rather than improving any desired sense of unity.

While Carrboro policy calls for a “more intricate grid of smaller connector roads,” efforts to achieve such a grid are stymied by piece-meal development of oddly shaped parcels, topographical features and the difficulty in making connections to established neighborhoods.

This has resulted in efforts to jury-rig connectivity onto neighborhoods that were not truly designed for it. It is no wonder that residents along the narrow and winding Tallyho Trail brace at the thought of the Colleton subdivision dumping scores more cars speeding along its length each day.

The other key issue raised by residents at the recent public hearings is the notion of streets serving as a commons. Residents of several neighborhoods spoke of children playing in the streets, adults taking their exercise along them and all sorts of casual neighborly encounters being facilitated by pedestrian friendly streets. Their concerns are heightened when no sidewalks are available.

Destruction of such commons has marred the development of modern society. Urban historian Lewis Mumford examined how Napoleon III had the narrow alleys and cul de sacs that defined the neighborhoods of Paris replaced with the now familiar boulevards to facilitate authoritarian control of the populace. Social philosopher Ivan Illich described how the development of roads designed to serve the automobile changed Mexico City from a place where the streets were a commons filled with vendors, meetings, coffee klatches and play to places where “people can circulate no more on their own. Traffic has displaced their mobility. They can circulate only when they are strapped down and are moved.”

In the U.S., Robert Moses’ destructive reshaping of New York’s highway system is a matter of legend. Closer to home, Durham’s Hayti neighborhood was sacrificed in the building of the East-West Freeway. While these historic cases may seem to dwarf the concerns of Carrboro neighborhoods, the lived experience of those whose day-to-day lives are affected is similar.

There are myriad examples of how not to do connectivity. The challenge for Carrboro is to focus on what works and re-tool our ordinances so they best meet our goals.

To do so, there are several issues for the board of aldermen to examine when this matter is reviewed: Paramount is to determine whether the intricate grid of small connectors will ever be attainable. If not, how can the town in fact meet the goals of dispersal, unity and connectivity in establishing connections between neighborhoods? How does the absence of sidewalks affect potential connections? And, finally, can we add a sense of respecting and valuing the life-ways of our established neighborhoods as a fundamental element in the Connector Roads Policy, recognizing when a road serves as a commons?

Dan Coleman is a member of the Carrboro Board of Aldermen.

1 thought on “Key issues in connector roads review”

  1. Terri Buckner says:
    February 21, 2009 at 8:57 am

    Thank you, Dan. My only addition would be linking ordinances together in some kind of logical relationship or writing some type of superseding policy for negotiating situations such as this one when one policy directly contradicts other policies or community standards.

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