Mobile Awards Downtown Streetscape Design Contract to Volkert in Push for a More Walkable City Center

Downtown Mobile is moving toward a redesign built around people rather than cars. The Mobile City Council has approved a master services agreement with Mobile-based engineering firm Volkert, Inc. to design streetscape improvements across the city center — a step that checks off another item on Mayor Sandy Stimpson’s 100 Day Agenda for his third term.

The design work is being coordinated with the Downtown Mobile Alliance, which earlier in the year published the findings of an extensive study by nationally known urban designer Jeff Speck examining how downtown streets and walkways could be made safer, more inviting and more economically productive.

The study found Dauphin Street carries fewer than 5,000 cars a day, making it a prime target for reconfiguration. Among the ideas: narrowing the western portion of Dauphin Street to a single lane to free up space for more on-street parking.

That kind of change can carry real revenue implications. The alliance cited National Main Street Association research finding that an on-street parking spot is worth about $18,000 in sales to nearby retailers.

Other recommendations include converting one-way streets back to two-way traffic, swapping some traffic signals for stop signs to slow vehicles, and building out bike lanes on six streets identified as critical links in a larger cycling network.

“We don’t have a lot of bicycle traffic right now, but that’s because this is a network that is less integrated,” said Fred Rendfrey, director of downtown economic development for the alliance. “This will provide more and safer options for the bicyclist to travel.”

Rendfrey framed the project as an investment in community as much as infrastructure.

“When you get the street right with design it encourages community and economic development,” he said.

Stimpson echoed that thinking, saying pedestrian-friendly downtowns across the country have succeeded in drawing businesses and foot traffic to their urban cores.

Volkert hopes to begin work on the project in the first quarter of the following year, according to the alliance.

About the Designers

Jeff Speck is a city planner and author of the 2012 book “Walkable City,” which argues that downtowns thrive when streets are designed for people on foot. Volkert, the engineering firm hired for the design work, was founded in 1925 and is headquartered in Mobile.