Downtown Roanoke

Greetings:

The "Outlook Roanoke" report contains a number of practical ideas. It is also peppered with wishful thinking.

ECONOMIC ACTIVITY

There are few true examples of a "24-hour city" (p8). The presence of artists, students, theatergoers and tourists tends to stretch business hours (as in Paris). Currently, §21.5 of the city code restricts young people to use of the city for only 18 hours of the day.

A successful tourism industry (p12) requires welcoming travelers to Roanoke's streets and businesses. If teenagers visiting downtown Roanoke are harassed by police for curfew violation, they will not want to come back with their families or as adults. A family prohibited from playing billiards on a rainy afternoon will seek a friendlier atmosphere elsewhere.

Buying and relocating a company (p14, 42) is risky. If Roanoke were to buy a successful corporation like Netscape and transplant it to Roanoke, its experts, supplies, and markets would stay put and produce a new company. Putting all the city's eggs in one basket would give the economy the instability of a one-industry town like Houston or Detroit.

Providing venture capital for relocation (p14, 42) is a safer policy, but it has the drawback of promoting portable industries that will leave Roanoke as easily as they came. Whether the companies leave or lose their markets to distant competitors, the long-term prospects are questionable.

A far more productive use of venture capital is to promote the growth of new, small, innovative enterprises, the successful strategy used by Ralph Flanders and his colleagues in Boston in 1946.¹

A wise, perhaps overdue, investment is expansion of the Roanoke Valley Graduate Center and local colleges to create a university. Opportunities for education and career development will increase workers' employability. A labor-intensive campus proximate to Downtown Roanoke will bring people and economic activity to the business district day and night.

HOUSING

The statement that "(A)ll over the country, young professionals, single householders, empty nesters and retirees live in downtown neighborhoods" (p45) is misleading; few people live in the downtown business districts of large, crowded cities like New York and Los Angeles. Frequently, they live in residential neighborhoods adjacent to the downtowns.

Apartments in the Market area are estimated to rent for $650-$1,200 (p47-48). These are top rents (p51). However, apartments above stores generally command low rents.

ROADS

It is noted that "Williamson Road is blighted by surface parking". Fortunately, a solution is proposed: dedicate two lanes of the street to surface parking (p31).

The high-volume "Williamson Road/Elm Avenue intersection" is to be improved by "street narrowing" (p30).

The heavy traffic on Williamson Road is mentioned several times (p33). One reason for the traffic is the necessity of driving Williamson Road for almost a mile to get between the Kimball neighborhood and points south of Downtown. If the Roy L. Webber Expressway had a northbound exit and southbound entrance at or near Williamson Road, the commuting traffic through Downtown could be reduced.

One advantage to one-way streets (p55) is overlooked: They are easier for pedestrians to cross.

The discussion of traffic volumes (p54-56) does not include current use of Church Avenue between 3rd and 5th Streets. Traffic on this westbound one-way stretch now uses one-way Campbell Avenue on the return trip. Where is this traffic to go when eastbound traffic on Campbell Avenue is curtailed?

I hope you will consider these factors in the final report.