URBAN REVITALIZATION/Plan promotes pedestrian access to downtown
Officials in Powder Springs, Ga., are telling residents and visitors to take a walk. As part of a 20-year master plan, the city is constructing several trails and greenways, enhancing sidewalks and streetscapes, and installing gateway signage to create a pedestrian-friendly community where businesses can prosper.
Situated northwest of Atlanta, Powder Springs has 12,500 residents and a village-scale downtown. “Years ago, the downtown was a thriving corridor,” says City Planner Pam Conner. “Like a lot of small towns, [Powder Springs] has suffered as businesses have closed.”
Intent on reversing the downturn, Powder Springs officials developed a master plan for citywide enhancements. Finalized in 1996 with the help of Miami-based PBS&J, the plan included strategies for bringing renewed focus to downtown and making the district a destination.
At the heart of those strategies was one of the city’s most visible assets: the Silver Comet Trail, a 38-mile rail trail connecting Smyrna, Ga., to the Alabama state line. Bisecting Powder Springs, the trail was the perfect anchor for a citywide trail system that would connect outer neighborhoods to downtown.
By June 2000, Powder Springs had completed the first leg of its connecting trail system, the 1.5-mile Wild Horse Trail, and it followed in 2001 with Phase I of the 1.5-mile Lucille Trail. Linking downtown to the eastern and western portions of the city, respectively, the Wild Horse and Lucille trails can be used for a number of activities such as walking, cycling and rollerblading.
“Because of the [Silver Comet’s] east-west direction, our trail system and all the connections to the Silver Comet are north-south,” Conner says. “You can get on the Silver Comet and then reach these connections and get to different parts of the city.”
As work progressed on the connecting trails, Powder Springs put the first of many beautification and signage projects in motion. By the end of last year, the city had completed sidewalk and landscape improvements to major travel corridors entering Marietta Street (the city’s main street into downtown), and it had added streetscaping and sidewalks on Dillard Street, a residential street connecting Marietta Street to the Silver Comet Trail. It also had installed directional signs guiding visitors to downtown, and welcome signs at four of the city’s six gateways.
As the new year gets under way, Powder Springs is pushing forward with its revitalization efforts. For example, it will begin Phase II of the Lucille Trail this summer, and it will complete additional sidewalk projects and installation of the final two gateway signs.
Officials also are looking ahead to 2004, when the city will bury utilities, enhance the streetscape and improve sidewalks along Marietta Street. “[We want to] promote bicycle travel and make it more pedestrian friendly downtown,” Conner explains. “The idea [behind the overall plan] was to make downtown a destination people want to come to, so we want to slow them down, get them to stop and get out of their cars, and walk around.”
Already, Conner is seeing positive changes. “We are seeing more foot and bike traffic,” she notes. “The sidewalks are in place, and people are walking between businesses. There are a lot of people who are walking or biking to work.”
Costs for the Wild Horse Trail, Phase I of the Lucille Trail, sidewalks and the Dillard Street beautification totaled approximately $2.7 million. The projects were funded primarily with federal transportation dollars, as well as with local and state funding and Community Development Block Grants.