Portland To Have “Sunday Parkways”, Can Milwaukee Join The Party?

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Originally uploaded by compujeramey

Portland, Oregon is getting on-board with a program I would love to see Milwaukee jump on in the near future.

Slated to happen on June 22 (in conjunction with the International Carfree Conference), Sunday Parkways will offer Portlanders a chance to stroll, pedal, and play on a six-mile loop of streets that will be closed to motor vehicle traffic from 8:00 am to 2:00 pm…. reports BikePortland.org

They’re linking the route up with parks and live entertainers, to offer a little more than a unique place to ride your bike.

As far as Milwaukee goes, it would be amazing to have a loop available on a Saturday or Sunday during the summer for people to just play in the absence of dangerous cars everywhere.

Linking up with parks for entertainment value I think is huge, along with having a view of the lake.

A potential route starting at Cathedral Square Park might include heading north on Van Buren Street, east on Brady Street, south on Prospect Ave, and west on Wells or Kilbourn to come back to the starting point.

This is really a tool the Third Ward, East Town and West Association’s could use to market their neighborhoods as safe places for both fun and work by drawing people in from other areas who are otherwise intimidated by the speed and noise of the cars on city streets.

I would imagine businesses would be behind this and traffic on Saturday or Sunday mornings is next to nonexistent anyway, so it would bring business in, not chase it away.

The only thing that I can think of that compares on a scale basis is the Bastille Days Run through downtown with Jazz in the Park going on afterward.

Milwaukee needs to convert that to an open day-time event for everyone to enjoy in a non-competitive environment.

Any thoughts? Support? Yays or nays?

Special thanks to the Streetsblog for pointping the Portland event out to me. I can’t find anything, but I think they have something like this in Manhattan too.