One of things I love when we go on vacation is the ability to walk to where I want to go. Most residential college campuses are set up this way too. The town my family and I vacation in has good sidewalks everywhere. Bike paths exist all up and down the main arteries. I have a corner grocery, bakery, restaurants, and other amenities all within a quick walk. There’s a beach too, but that’s not particularly relevant to our discussion today.

Plain City has a couple walkability issues that they are working on. We know there needs to be sidewalk connecting more parts of the community. We know we need safe crosswalks in more spaces. We know we need more safe places to ride bikes. These are just the beginning of what makes a town walkable. Kittelson & Associates, a transportation engineering and planning consulting firm offers up the following plan for a walkable city:

• Community: Having enough people to support businesses.

• Safe Pedestrian Infrastructure: Offering easily accessible transit services, complete streets and safe paths for biking or walking.
• Affordable Housing: Providing attainable housing at varying income levels.

• Recreation: Centered around shopping districts, parks, and other public spaces.
• Commuting: Proximity to schools and workplaces so commutes are accessible by foot.

We’re doing good work upgrading our pedestrian infrastructure. The recent walkability townhall was a great show that they’re interested in this part. What we are running short of are some of these other areas. Plain City is on the cusp of having COMMUNITY wrapped up. People are taking notice and development is happening for this reason.

I will be dedicating more time for each of these items, but the short version is that our development is very short in attainable housing. Outside of parks in the new developments, we don’t have a good setup for being able to meet your needs via walking. If people don’t have places they can easily walk to, they will have to drive to other places which will cause more congestion and cause the troubles we’ve seen in other cities - acres of parking lots, multi-lane roads through town, and congestion.

To do this, our zoning code needs to allow for incremental development in mixed-use zones. From what I can see, our expansion plan is based on “sudden” development where we’re putting in fully developed storefronts and housing. This prevents the smaller businesses we need from being able to start small and grow as they see fit. It prevents us from being able to easily change gears in a neighborhood if the early bets are wrong. With incremental development, housing and commerce grow in response to the need rather than forcing a “need” where it doesn’t fit.

As your council member, I will work on creating a town in this mold. A place to live. A town designed for people, not for cars.

Plain City - Strong Town

For more information, see this source article: 5 Ways to Make Cities More Walkable