The Arlington County Board is expected to take up a change to the county鈥檚 Master Transportation Plan (MTP) that would allow pedestrian-only streets.
The Board is set聽to consider a request to advertise hearings on the change at a meeting later this month, according to a .
The proposal would add 鈥淧edestrian Street鈥� to the MTP鈥檚 existing four defined street types. A pedestrian street is described as聽鈥渁聽car-free travel corridor that provides public pedestrian access to adjacent聽buildings and properties fronting the street and serves as a public meeting place and location for聽commerce, communication and other community activities.鈥�
鈥淎 pedestrian street is [predominantly]聽paved with a hard surface suitable for walking and includes physical measures that prevent聽regular access by motor vehicles,鈥� the proposal says.
There are currently no pedestrian-only streets in Arlington, but a few are proposed, including in Rosslyn that would replace the neighborhood鈥檚 aging skywalk system with a several blocks of a new pedestrian-only street between N. Oak Street and N. Lynn Street, with the Rosslyn Metro station in between.
In addition to pedestrian-only streets, the proposal updates the definition of an existing street type 鈥� a pedestrian and bicycle priority street. The newly-defined 鈥渟hared streets鈥� are intended to聽鈥渁llow people to comfortably聽walk within the roadway鈥� thanks to 鈥渋mplicitly slow traffic speeds through the mixing of travel paths,聽physical measures and visual cues.鈥�
A 聽plan for the Courthouse neighborhood calls for portions of 14th and 15th streets to be shared streets, primarily intended for pedestrians but open to slow-speed vehicular traffic.
If the request to advertise the changes is approved in September, the Planning Commission and the County Board are likely to hold hearing on the change in October.
Hat tip to Jim Hurysz
