Sidewalks as Raleigh’s Urban Open Space

Anyone walking by Raleigh's popular hangout spots with outdoor dining knows it can sometimes be tricky to traverse along the sidewalk. We all love the vibrancy and vitality of urban life but it sometimes comes at the expense of safety and preserving the sidewalk's original purpose: to allow pedestrians to walk parallel to the street separated from vehicular traffic.

Raleigh is a planned city with streets aligned in a grid pattern and axial boulevards with terminated vistas. William Christmas created this original plan back in the late 1700's. His plan included five main squares: the center square as the location of the capitol building and the other four as open space. Only two of those four squares remain as public open space today, Moore Square and Nash Square. Outside of those areas, the only other places for open space in downtown are the sidewalks. While the four axial streets provide wide right-of-ways allowing for wider sidewalks, all the other streets in our downtown are narrower, thereby limiting sidewalk width.

Current code requires the minimum width of sidewalks anywhere to be at least five feet wide, and in more urban areas (covered by the Downtown Overlay District or Pedestrian Business Overlay Districts) we are working towards increasing sidewalk widths. Any development of a property that necessitates a site plan also requires that all sidewalks along the property in question increase in width accordingly. Sidewalks that are currently less than fourteen feet must increase to fourteen feet; any sidewalk that is fourteen feet is required to increase to eighteen feet. While this can be a strain for developers trying to make the most of their property, the benefits include meeting open space requirements and improving the vitality of their property by encouraging pedestrian activity.

Fourteen feet would seem to be adequate to handle the urban environment's pedestrian activity; however, these sidewalks are not used for pedestrian movement along streets only. Downtown and anywhere where pedestrian activity is encouraged are places where the sidewalk takes on other uses, such as outdoor dining, signage, parking meters, fire hydrants, benches, bike racks, street trees, store displays, and bus stops. Each of these features takes up space in the sidewalk. These activities along the street attract pedestrians, but if it is not held in check, it takes away from pedestrians' space to move safely along a sidewalk. This is why the City enforces sidewalk use easements for anything from a newspaper dispenser to an A-frame sign to tables and chairs. These uses are allowed so long as a five-foot minimum clearance is maintained along the sidewalk.

The problem with the five-foot clearance rule is that it is solely based upon ADA accessibility standards - it is the minimum width needed for a wheelchair to turn around. It does not take into account pedestrian use patterns and intensity. Based on typical design standards for how pedestrians use a space in calculating corridor widths, most people take up about two feet of width and walk with a shy distance of two feet. This means that for two people to pass each other comfortably a minimum clearance of six feet is necessary. In an urban environment you can expect more than one pedestrian in the sidewalk at any given segment.

A recent pedestrian count study conducted by the City of Raleigh and Downtown Raleigh Alliance confirms several areas with high pedestrian activity. The Fayetteville Street district experiences the highest concentrations of use, peaking around lunchtime. Glenwood South has a pretty consistent flow of pedestrians but it peaks in the evenings, as does the Historic Warehouse District. These places are also the most heavily used for alternative features such as outdoor dining, bike racks, and benches and consequentially where you see the most strain on the sidewalks.

So how can we fit in all the needed uses onto our city sidewalks while maintaining sufficient clearance for people to move along a sidewalk in safety? By implementing updated requirements of fourteen and twenty feet there is the chance to maintain the needed sidewalk clearance as well as the expected alternative uses of the space. The Right-Sizing Sidewalks study conducted in the summer of 2010 looks at appropriate sidewalk widths and treatments based on existing patterns and development plans for the future.

Overall, what can we do but echo the sentiments of the Urban Design Center Manager, Grant Meacci, "It's a great problem to have - so many people wanting to use our sidewalks."