At the August 21, 2023, meeting, the Richardson City Council was shown two draft designs for a redeveloped municipal campus. The Council generally favored the building placements of Option A, but with one controversy. That was a new entrance off Arapaho Rd between the library and a relocated City Hall with a drive that will go by the fountain. It's safe to bet that the building placements in Option A will be part of the selected site plan, but what to do with that drive is very much up in the air.
Below, after the diagram for Option A, are selected comments by the Council Members that I find illustrative of their thinking.
Joe Corcoran: "I don't want to sound like a broken record about over-parking this year. But it just seems like if the only reason we're doing it is because we're required to do it by law, not because it's necessary, why add the extra parking?" Huzzah. Build only as much parking as you think is needed. Grant yourselves a variance to do it. And if others ask for variances, too, because the law requires too much parking for their own projects, then grant those variances, too. Meet the need with existing parking to keep costs down and preserve as many trees as possible.
Curtis Dorian: "One of the things I really liked about option B is the corridor down the center of the space. I thought that that was a nice design detail to be able to see down a sort of a corridor that was cut out of a building. You could see the fountain." Dorian seemed to miss the point that the options presented were for the site plan, not building plans. What he liked in the big gray box shown in Option B could easily be added to the big gray box in Option A.
Dan Barrios: "I am concerned with the road cutting through that plaza." Huzzah. Other than the placement of the new city hall, this is the biggest difference between the two options. Option A adds an entrance off of Arapaho with a driveway running next to the fountain. Option B preserves the pedestrian nature of fountain plaza.
Arefin Shamsul: "There is more flexibility in Option A than Option B for the future development." Huzzah for flexibility for future development. That should be a primary design criteria. Except I don't see why Option A has more flexibility than Option B. It seems to me like either option would allow for expansion of City Hall or the addition of a parking garage or underground parking or another building altogether, like a Richardson Museum of History and Art. These draft plans didn't go into how the plans rate from that careabout. That's an oversight.
Ken Hutchenrider: "I will very much say Option A is by far, the minute I saw it I said this truly is, I'm going to use one word, it activates this entire campus 100%...As far as the road coming through, I think that road actually activates and allows people to come out and see the fountain." Huzzah for not being wishy-washy, but no. The road allows people in cars to see the fountain. It robs the fountain of room better used to allow it to function as a gathering space for people, not cars. With the road, the fountain becomes simply a water feature to admire as you drive past it. You don't need a road going right by the fountain for people to see it. As long as the entrances to the library and city hall face the fountain, people will see the fountain when they enter either building. (It's not too late to fix the library redesign.)
Jennifer Justice: "Plan A is the better plan without a row of bollards smack down the middle of this space." Huzzah. Concise and on the mark. Well said.
City Manager Don Magner: "I'd like to bring you back for your consideration an option where it is a drive and an option maybe where it's just a pedestrian mall. Or, you know, maybe it's just open space some other way. Let us think through that." Please do that. Why must every time the City redevelops something, we end up with more roads and more parking? If you think more roads and parking is what is needed to "activate" a property, you're not thinking hard enough.
Mayor Bob Dubey: "With having events there...We do it in Cottonwood Park. We do it at Wildflower. We're about to do it at the Core. We said we were going to do it here in the IQ and so how many destinations do we really need?" This is puzzling. Normally, Dubey can be counted on to act as the City's loudest and proudest cheerleader. Here he's saying maybe we're full up on outdoor event space.
"Road's harsh intrusion,
Fountain's peace, an illusion,
not destination."
—h/t ChatGPT
4 comments:
Without looking closely at the plans I’d always assumed that lane past the fountain was a walking promenade. Putting cars on it would destroy any sense of a campus where folks would hang by the fountain. The reason traffic was restricted in front of the library at the Arapaho entrance is because too many cars used it as a shortcut to city hall and endangered folks walking up to the library. Same thing will happen with a fountain drive. I’d also hope to that the new parking on the east side of the new city hall could be eliminated.
Steve Benson
Steve Benson, thanks for the historical perspective. You say we tried a drive past the library and had to eliminate it. I predict a drive by the fountain would be just as unwelcome there.
I called Fountain Plaza "a gathering space for people, not cars." A reader reminds me of an even stronger point. That plaza is not just any gathering space. It carries symbolic significance like no other in the City. It was the destination for the BLM march. It was the setting for the memorial for Officer Sherrard. Instead of using placemaking to emphasize that role, the road treats it like something to get by on the way to the parking lots.
Mark, just to be clear, the entrance into the library parking from Arapaho originally was two way in front of the building. Drivers, using that entrance as a shortcut to city hall parking, often drove past the building too fast. I thought library patron deserved better than running a gauntlet of cars as they walked to the library entrance. So, with help from Traffic and support from CMO we diverted traffic entering from Arapaho to the right - before they crossed in front of the building.
Putting two way or even one way traffic past the fountain will make it less safe for folks at the fountain. It would make sort of a grand entrance to the campus - for cars. And it might save those drivers 30 seconds off the time to travel to a different campus entrance. But, reading Don’s comment, I think he understands the detraction that a driveway there would create.
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