ADRIAN — The Adrian City Commission is looking at changes to the Winter Street area between Maple and Church streets downtown. 

The goals include making the area more friendly to pedestrians and cyclists and supporting the private efforts that are underway to build housing on the site of the former Daily Telegram, Access Shoppers Guide, and Eagles Club buildings.

Bob Doyle, a landscape architect and principal of SmithGroup, which is consulting on the Riverfront project, presented some ideas at a study session before the Adrian City Commission’s Nov. 6 meeting. Two goals, he said, are to improve connectivity by tying downtown to the Kiwanis Trail and to extend the pedestrian-oriented character of downtown all the way to the river in the hopes of acting as a catalyst for private development.

Doyle presented three main ideas:

• Creating a downtown bike loop. “What we’re seeing in many communities is that when you improve connectivity for bicyclists and encourage them to visit your downtown, it helps spur economic development,” he said.
• Making streetscape improvements along Winter Street. These would include wider sidewalks, lighting, and landscaping, all aimed at making the area safer and more welcoming to pedestrians.
• Changing the streetscape of Main and Front streets to encourage trucks to follow M-52. Coming into downtown, M-52 — which is Main Street through most of Adrian — is diverted up Front Street and then follows Broad Street for three blocks through downtown before returning to Main Street via Church Street. Doyle added that the radius of the intersection of Front and Winter streets could be tightened to encourage drivers to slow down.

Doyle suggested that some bike lanes be physically separated from lanes of traffic, like some of the bike lanes in Ann Arbor. A topographic survey would guide which streets end up having separated bike lanes.

“What we have seen in our work throughout Michigan and actually throughout the Midwest is that when you separate a bike lane from potential conflicts with traffic, the ridership increases significantly because it’s going to appeal to a broader range of riders,” he said.

“You increase the perception of safety, you increase the range of people who will use it, and it actually makes the drivers more comfortable too because they’re not worried about having a bicyclist vary from their lane.”

Doyle said the plans follow the philosophy known in transportation policy as Complete Streets.

“When we talk about a Complete Street, we’re talking about all of the people who use the street, including pedestrians, vehicles, service vehicles, bike riders and walkers,” he said, “and we’re looking at a whole range of different improvements, making sure we have parking where appropriate, bike lanes where appropriate, bus stops where they’re appropriate, and nice wide sidewalks that support commerce and outdoor dining and retailing.”

The plans would require doing away with on-street parking on Winter Street, where there are currently 15 spaces. City administrator Greg Elliott said the city could turn Yew Park, on the east side of Winter, into a parking lot to get some spaces back.

“As long as you don’t have to pay for it, people prefer to park in a parking lot,” Elliott said.

Doyle said that if the city commission approves, SmithGroup will prepare an application for funds from the state’s Transportation Alternatives Program. That program typically pays between 60% and 70% of project costs. The application would be submitted in February, with funding decisions announced in July. If the city receives the grant, construction could take place in Summer 2025.

Elliott said the city would use part of the $15 million state budget earmark it received in 2022 for the match.

Mayor Angela Sword Heath told the Lenawee Voice in a recent interview that she likes the idea of more bike paths, and was concerned about taking away Winter Street’s on-street parking until the idea of using Yew Park was raised.

However, she said a concern was raised at the Nov. 8 Downtown Development Authority meeting about whether the changes would make it harder to access downtown from the east side, and she shares that concern.

“It is very difficult to get into downtown from that Broad and Front street area,” she said.

Heath said she wants people to feel that they can get to downtown from the east side, and that safely crossing the streets in that area is already a concern.

A survey has been posted on the city website asking residents to weigh in on the proposed Winter Street changes. It can be accessed here and will be up through the end of November.