ANNA MARIA – City officials are reconsidering the elimination of 53 parallel parking spaces in the Reimagining Pine Avenue project.
During a special commission meeting on Monday, Oct. 25, the divided Anna Maria City Commission reached an initial 3-2 consensus in favor of eliminating 53 parallel parking spaces located in the city-owned rights of way along Pine Avenue. But during the commission’s regular meeting on Thursday, Oct. 28, Mayor Dan Murphy recommended a step-by-step decision-making and implementation process that addresses sidewalks, crosswalks and lighting first and allows commissioners more time to reconsider the need for Pine Avenue bike paths and the potential elimination of the parallel parking spaces.
The city does not intend to eliminate nor significantly impact the privately-owned perpendicular parking spaces associated with the Pine Avenue businesses – as long as those parking areas do not infringe upon city-owned rights of way.
Consensus reached
During the Oct. 25 meeting, the commission reached a majority consensus regarding several Reimagining Pine Avenue design options. These included the locations of the sidewalks and bike paths as well as crosswalk and street lighting improvements and a delivery truck turnaround area near the City Pier.
Commissioners Carol Carter, Deanie Sebring and Mark Short supported the elimination of the parallel parking spaces. Commissioner Doug Copeland and Jon Crane did not.
“I do not believe there should be parallel parking on Pine. I think it’s very dangerous for strollers, bikers, walkers. There’s no space. It should never have been put there in the first place,” Sebring said.
“I’m not feeling good about parallel parking along Pine,” Carter added.
Copeland presented an alternative design option that included sidewalks on both sides of the street, two bike lanes on the same side of the street and parallel parking along the opposite side of the street. Copeland said the most important element for any of the design options is the installation of continuous sidewalks constructed of the same materials, but his overall design concept did not garner the majority support of the commission.
Short asked contracted traffic engineer Gerry Traverso if diagonal parking spaces could be installed along Pine Avenue. Traverso said that would provide fewer parking spaces than the parallel parking spaces and work better on a one-way street. Murphy noted the commission previously eliminated the design alternative Traverso proposed that called for Pine Avenue and Magnolia Avenue to become one-way streets.
When choosing between the two remaining design concepts previously proposed by Traverso, the totality of the commission’s Oct. 25 decision-making produced a design option that most resembles Traverso’s Alternative 2 option.
Alternative 2 proposes new sidewalks and bike paths along both sides of Gulf Drive. Alternative 3 proposes new sidewalks along both sides of Pine Avenue and a single multi-use trail along one side of the street only. Both alternatives propose eliminating the existing parallel parking spaces.
The commission unanimously agreed the new sidewalks and bike paths would be constructed of permeable pavers and be installed atop French drain systems that further enhance drainage.
Where applicable, the paver sidewalks will follow the existing footprints of the unpaved meandering paths that pass by several Pine Avenue businesses. Murphy said the sidewalks would extend the entire length of Pine Avenue, from Tampa Bay to the Gulf of Mexico.
The commission unanimously supported the installation of raised crosswalks with flashing beacons that double as speed tables, with additional street lighting to also be installed at the existing and new crossing areas.
The commission unanimously agreed to create a delivery truck turnaround area by the trolley stop and parking lot near the City Pier in hopes of decreasing delivery truck traffic on nearby residential streets.
The Pine Avenue improvements are desired primarily to improve safety for pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists and others, with improved traffic flow as a secondary consideration. The commission agreed to pursue the Pine Avenue improvements first and address Spring Avenue and Magnolia Avenue as future project phases. Murphy said Magnolia Avenue will still be repaved as currently planned and budgeted.
The commission made these decisions while facing a Wednesday, Oct. 27 deadline to apply for a state appropriation that, if approved, could provide state funding for the city project.
Consensus reconsidered
On Oct. 28, Murphy suggested the specific design decisions be made one at a time, beginning with the installation of sidewalks along both sides of Pine Avenue and the delivery truck turnaround area, to be followed by the crosswalk installations and street lighting improvements.
Using this approach, Murphy doesn’t envision the commission addressing bike paths and the potential elimination of the parallel parking spaces until June or July. He said the elimination of parking spaces to accommodate bike paths remains “a major bone of contention.”
“The consensus we took was 3-2. Let’s see what these first three things (sidewalks, crosswalks and lighting) are going to do for us and then we’ll go to the bike path. There might be other alternatives to the bike path, there might not. There might be other alternatives to run a bike path down Magnolia and not disturb any parking on Pine. I want you to have time to think about that and also be able see the improvements, if any, that the first three steps have made. By June or July, you’ll have been through a spring break season. Taking it in bites like this I think is a good approach,” Murphy told the commission.
He said he would bring some of these matters back for discussion at the commission’s next meeting.
City staff member Amy Moriarty told the commission the city has now submitted an initial application for a $1.2 million state appropriation from the state Legislature for the Pine Avenue improvements.
