The fundamental idea behind the North Las Vegas North 5th Street superarterial transportation project is to create a major traffic and transit axis from the city's southern boundary with Las Vegas, north to the Interstate 215 beltway.
But in two recent meetings, as well as in the recently released North Fifth Street Transit Supportive Concept Plan, pedestrians were repeatedly made the focus of development along the corridor.
In a Feb. 22 presentation to the North Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, Patrick Sweeney, senior planner with PB Placemaking of Portland, Ore., the firm that was hired to help develop the plan, cited pedestrian-oriented and walkable neighborhoods during a PowerPoint program.
"The pedestrians come first," he said. "It's going to be a very pedestrian friendly area."
A community meeting for residents who wish to learn about the project is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. March 29, in Room 404 of Mojave High School, 5203 Goldfield St., at the corner of Goldfield Street and Washburn Road.
Sweeney also said political willpower and leadership will be critical to the success of the project. In his 159-page report released earlier in the month, he wrote, "For the concept plan to succeed, it needs to have a project champion within the City of North Las Vegas with the time and the authority to facilitate implementation."
He put it more vividly to the chamber and, later the same evening, to the North Las Vegas Planning Commission: "The city has to run with it now, and we're hoping the running back is a good one."
But North Las Vegas Councilman Robert Eliason pointed out one political reality: No one can predict what future city councils will do, nor can anyone foresee, as an example, how residential encroachment may affect industrial areas in the meantime. "I don't know," he said. "I can't say it won't come."
The report calls for the division of the corridor into five distinct districts. From south to north, they are:
Gateway Redevelopment District -- a largely residential area stretching from Owens Avenue north to the Martinez Elementary School at the Carey Street bridge over I-15. Considerable land takings are seen likely in punching through a much wider avenue, but Sweeney's report said the area is ripe with opportunities for urban redevelopment.
Industrial District -- an industrial zone running north from I-15 to Alexander Road. Non-residential uses would allow future development of mixed-use projects that would make sense within a transit corridor.
Fifth Street District -- along the 4-mile stretch from Alexander Road to Centennial Parkway, wrote Sweeney, existing single-family residential neighborhoods would be enhanced and expanded with mixed-use development -- residential, commercial, service, public use.
Deer Springs District -- an eastward jog of the corridor from North 5th Street to Pecos Road across a relatively vacant area that would be targeted for intense, innovative mixed-use development.
University District -- north along Pecos Road to the proposed site of a new UNLV campus north of I-215, also little developed.
Sweeney said the overall plan is a complex system. "You've got several horses racing at once," he said, and the city must monitor progress carefully and be ready to make changes as needed to achieve its vision.
City urban designer Ned Thomas agreed that the concept involves an area with its own dynamics already in place. "We already have the developers at our doorstep," he told the chamber audience. Of the need to balance development pressure against the needs of the people in each of the districts, he added, "It's almost a juggling act."
Dayton Blaine of Blaine Equipment, a businessman who attended the presentation at the chamber, expressed concerns about how well the city will handle the North 5th Street project and the pedestrian priorities.
"You've got to figure this out, because it ain't working the way you've got it," he said.
Pointing to the northern and southern ends of the corridor, he said he was reminded of a bull his father had once bought. "You got two points and a lot of bull in between," he said.
Roger Patton, of the Berger Group, which has contracted to redesign much of North 5th Street, said the city needs to convince developers that the concept outlined by Sweeney's report is not only feasible but worthwhile, and that mixed-use is a valid idea.
"They should not do business as usual -- traffic light, shopping plaza, traffic light, shopping plaza," he said.
Eliason said two crucial aspects of the proposal involve encouraging pedestrian use and controlling vehicular traffic.
"We need to get those people out of their cars and use mass transit," he said. "We've got to move traffic. Those are the two goals -- move traffic and mass transit."
Speaking to the planning commission, Sweeney suggested careful development of what he called transit villages in the half-mile radius around each of the proposed nine transit stations along the corridor. The outer edge of each village would be a roughly 10-minute walk from its transit station, which Sweeney said is about the maximum time people are willing to walk to catch a bus or light rail commuter train.
Just to start with, he said, such stations should be surrounded by mixed-use development -- retail shops at street level surmounted by offices and then topped off by apartments or town houses -- and not parking lots. Parking, he said, should be kept at a convenient distance from the stations so that commuters and visitors would be more inclined to make use of stores and services available at each site. Specifically vehicle-oriented businesses should be limited or even banned from such centers.
He stressed, however, that the corridor concept should be seen as supporting mass transit, not depending upon in. "When the transit arrives, the transit is like the icing on the cake," he said. The more an area encourages walking, he explained, the more it will naturally produce mass transit ridership.
At the same time, he said, roads throughout the corridor also need to be arranged with pedestrian concerns in mind. "Roads that are difficult and scary to cross are not what you want," he said. "If it's threatening, then you have a problem."
Each transit station should feel like a self-sustaining destination with its own character, Sweeney said, not just another cookie-cutter shopping center.
Cherlynn Thomas, who lives near North 5th Street and Lone Mountain Road and is the wife of planning commission member Ned Thomas, told the panel she is passionate about the need for community planning and transit development. "This is a wonderful plan," she said. "I love that plan. If we don't move quickly, we'll lose the opportunity because other things will be built there."
Commission Chairman Jay Aston waxed positive about the whole idea.
"I think it's just an awesome direction for this city to go in," he said.
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