Milwaukee’s biggest traffic calming project is nearly complete and Thursday the city’s engineer said the redesign has already begun to tamp down reckless driving.
The $8.1 million project which spans 8 blocks on W. Walnut, from 12th to 20th Street, is a first of its kind in Milwaukee, switching a four-lane road into two lanes and adding protected bike paths.
“We’ve definitely been watching and seeing how it’s going the past few weeks,” City Engineer Kevin Muhs said. “We’re pretty happy with what we’ve been seeing.”
The road reopened to traffic late November, after about 7 months of construction, and includes raised crosswalks, and concrete curb extensions.
Muhs said it’s still too early to do a formal analysis because they need to give drivers time to adapt but what they’ve observed so far is a safer and calmer street.
Area business owner Giovonni Gillespie said, he isn’t sure the changes are worth the cost to his restaurant.
“I don’t really see the whole point on having those extra bike paths,” he said.
Gillespie said Speed Queen Bar-B-Q has been in his family since 1956 and not without their share of challenges. He said worries the new design will make his restaurant too inconvenient for customers.
“With that we’ve got a lot of congestion,” he explained. “It’s going like funneled into one lane, we’re going from two to one, and that makes it a little harder to make those left-hand turns.”
A spokesperson with Department of Public Works said they consider traffic congestion in the area to be “reasonably low” and that making changes to discourage reckless driving on urban streets, can’t really be done without some impact, especially during rush hour.
They also said crash analysis, completed during the project’s design phase found that the intersections of Walnut and 20th, 17th, FDL, and 12th had a crash rate higher than the statewide average for similar types of streets.
Gillespie acknowledges he is seeing fewer reckless drivers, who no longer have the option to speed past other drivers.
“We’ve had a lot of deaths here in Walnut,” he admitted. “I’m glad to see that part of it is being contained and that’s the good thing.”
Muhs said feedback overall has been positive and similar designs are headed to at least three other roads in Milwaukee: Howard Ave. on the south side, a small portion of Wells St. downtown, and N Lake Dr. between E Newberry Blvd. and E Edgewood Ave.
DPW’s spokesperson said the three were chosen, because of their pavement quality, like W. Walnut Street they were due for regular maintenance improvements, so engineering is using that as an opportunity to prioritize safety and bike infrastructure.
“We’re doing it in such a way like (W. Walnut) were we are putting in the bike way infrastructure in places where people were reckless driving before,” Muh said. “That’s really the key.”
Earlier in 2023, the city committed to have 50 miles of protected bike paths under development by 2026.
The prototype on W. Walnut will be fully finished once engineering installs more street lighting, completes traffic work, and plants more trees next spring.
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