Letter: Streetscape will help, not hurt parking on Main. St.
Mar 05, 2010 | 1417 views | 10 
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Those who fear change might opt for doing nothing. Brad Jones calculates that under present plans, there will be 46 parallel parking spaces along Main Street. That is approximately what is available today. So, there would be no economic advantage over the current situation.
However, if we persuade GDOT to close the center lane, we can increase to a maximum of 88 angled parking spaces. According to the estimates by the City of Rome parking manager, each on-street parking space in the downtown area is worth an additional $60,000 in retail revenue annually. So, the advantage of adding 42 parking spaces is $2,520,000 in additional retail revenue each year.
To achieve this increase, we must find a way to close the center lane. One option is to make left turns at West Avenue illegal for cars traveling north along Main Street. Traffic along West Avenue would remain two-way. This would achieve the $2,520,000 annual economic advantage mentioned above.
Another method of doing this is to make West Avenue one-way eastbound between Main Street and College Street. This would eliminate the possibility of northbound cars on Main Street turning west on West Avenue. So, there would be no need for a center lane on Main Street nor for three traffic lanes along West Avenue. An additional advantage of this option is that eliminating westbound traffic from West Avenue makes space available for 32 additional diagonal parking spaces along West Avenue. At $60,000 additional retail revenue per space, that is a $1,920,000 advantage, over and above the $2,520,000 for additional parking spaces along Main Street. This is the plan I recommend.
In summary, the economic advantages of the various options are:
Doing nothing: $0
Making left turns from Main St. illegal: $2,520,000 each year
Making West Ave. one-way for one block: $4,440,000 each year
In the past, Cedartown has survived economic problems because leaders of vision came to the forefront. Seeing the need for a market center to serve the Cedar Valley farming community, Prior and West laid out a town. Adamson saw agriculture failing and brought in the textile industry to provide needed jobs. Trippe realized that textiles were declining and built an industrial park to diversify production.
Leaders with vision would be nice. But, at a minimum, we must have leaders who can add and subtract. I am putting a plan on the table that offers a $4,440,000 annual advantage over the status quo. That is much better than $0 advantage. It’s almost twice as good as a $2,520,000 advantage.
The parking issue is not about what I like or what someone else does not like. It’s about money. “I don’t like it” and “I’m afraid” are merely excuses for inaction.
If someone has a better plan, let that person provide some details. Please let the people of Cedartown know how doing nothing or doing less will benefit our merchants, property owners, shoppers, and taxpayers.
Tommy Engram, Ph. D.
Director of Redevelopment
Cedartown Downtown Development Authority
404-316-9539
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Debating about parking spaces is just weird to me. Seems like businesses are needed before worrying about parking. Just my two cents. I would love to see the area come to life.
It's because our focus on the past has voided the future of this town. This is NOT Rome! We don't have a 4-lane Main Street comparable to Rome's Broad Street. We have two congested lanes flanked by insufficient squeeze-in parking. Rome city planners were fortunate. Their bygone predecessors had the foresight to build a four-lane Broad Street. This made a historic revitalization feasible for them.
PLEASE stop trying to emulate Rome and the revitalization success on Broad Street. It CAN/WILL NOT WORK HERE! Our best bet is revitalization with an eye toward the future, NOT the past. We need a MUCH wider Main Street, with a vibrant, future-oriented, shopping district.
Rome this ain't, and never will be. We should be carving our own niche and forming our own future identity. Being Rome-Lite isn't very appealing to me anyway. If I want Rome, I'll just go to Rome...
Yes, I certainly agree that there are many buildings in downtown Cedartown that need a facelift. And yes, there are ways to correctly restore a building's facade/structural elements without lowering the structure's historical value. Another thing to keep in mind is that "historical value" isn't just limited to the date or year that a building was erected -- or simply just how old it is. The design of the building, the builder himself, the craftsmanship in which a building is created, all have a role in determining historical value.
A lot of people don't care about historical value, craftsmanship and preservation, and that's fine. But there are many of us that do.
Tearind down blocks of Cedartown's history and replacing it with a strip mall isn't the answer. Cedartown can't support such an investment even if they wanted to.
I don't see the logical reasoning behind tearing down a sound structure that has potential and replacing it with one that looks similar, but is cheaply made with inferior materials. How does everyone think those buildings have stood for over 100 years? Certainly not from being designed and built with pre-fab materials from China. You couldn't just order a load of bricks from Home Depot back in the 1800s. Next time you're downtown, take a look at the details on some of those buildings. You don't find those today.
Just look at the Houseal Building. It was an eyesore several years ago, and now, it's simply beautiful. And if I remember, most of the cost was taken care of through a grant. The only thing different from that building versus the one two blocks down is that someone realized the potential value that it had, took pride in doing it right, and wasn't afraid of a little hard work.
"When history impedes present or future then history should be cast aside" is a poorly thought-out line of reasoning. If we applied that theory to everything, we wouldn't have much of value. You can have history without impeding the future if you're smart about it.
I'm curious to see if anyone thinks tearing down these buildings, clearing the site, preparing the site and then rebuilding would be a financially responsible move? I don't see how that could be justified.
The stores that I one like to shop in were, in no particular order, The Jewel Box, Western Auto, Belks, Glen's, the old Drew Pharmacy, Allen's and Top Dollar. They are all gone but even in their heyday some were in bad shape. I can still hear the boards creak in my mind as I walk from front to back.
With that being said, you can renovate until the cows come home but it's pretty much useless if you have got to do it again in just a few years and all the while it's virtually vacant.
If anyone like the architecture of these junk heaps so much then they could tear them down and rebuild them one block back or build duplicate buildings one block back.
Pouring tax dollars into the same revitalization idea over and over, planting trees after seeing the damage it does to the sidewalks, restoring buildings again and again and expecting a different outcome. "its a stupid idea"
Another idea would be to TEAR DOWN these old dilapidated buildings facing main street on at least one side, preferably the east side from at least the Holmes (and about the front half of Holmes) clothing to Canal street and widen main back to where the back alley is presently. Then a street could be cut through from the West Ave/Main intersection to Philpot. May require closing Herbert between main and Philpot.
Any new buildings on the east side facing main could be built all at once in a strip shopping fashion but with presentable architecture close to what now exists. This would provide head-in parking for both side.
Second option would be to take the fron half of all East side stores and rebuild the from with same designs.
Third option would be to make Philpot easier to travel. Take out any dips and extend it to MLK.
One way streets and restrictive turns are not popular and in this case not an answer. Probably would just deliver the death blow to any downtown.
Another thing that hurts is the amount of traffic forced through TOWN just to pick up a burger or groceries. On south side there are a lot of people actually living in neighborhoods from Moores all the way to the Paulding county line but no grocery store south of Caseys and no franchise fast food south of Bojangles.
Many people on the south side drive to Bremen to shop and some even to eat.
What is Dr. Engram's proposal for the routing of traffic that currently travels the routes he proposes eliminating?