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Batavia streetscape project could be so much more

Batavia prides itself on being a river city. People ice skate on a pond near the Fox River in winter, stroll the brick Riverwalk along it all year, and jog and bicycle along the Fox River Trail.

But as far as it being a downtown attraction, there’s a problem: “This is a river city, but you can’t see the river,” streetscape consultant John MacManus of Altamanu Inc. told a Batavia committee last week.

Former factories and the back ends of restaurants and offices line its banks through the downtown. It was one of several topics brought up by MacManus during a presentation of a “framework plan” for sprucing up the downtown. The city hired Oak Park-based Altamanu in part because it wanted an outsider’s impartial perspective.

“This whole project started out as a streetscape project and it kind of evolved into a vision for the downtown,” said Alderman David Brown, chairman of the community development committee.

If Batavians want to attract others to downtown, for one thing, they need to do a better job of pointing the way. An eye-catching element — perhaps combining large sculpture and signage — should be stationed on Kirk Road at Wilson Street and on South Batavia Avenue, MacManus said.

The firm also recommends installing an arch over Wilson at Route 31 to mark the downtown, and using other objects such as large permanent vertical artsy banners throughout.

The consultant conducted meetings with an advisory committee, residents and business people this spring, soliciting their comments on initial drawings.

Besides the river talk, another theme emerged, MacManus said: Pedestrians do not feel safe in downtown Batavia. They think sidewalks are too narrow in spots, that drivers take some corners too fast, and that in several areas stairs make it difficult for people pushing strollers or pulling wagons. Residents who live west of Route 31 likened that state highway to a medieval moat discouraging them from walking to the downtown. The intersection does have crosswalks and walk timers.

“ ‘It should be safe’ — that comes up all the time (in the comments),” MacManus said. The firm suggests measures such as installing colored or brick pavement in crosswalks, and perhaps making whole intersections colored pavement, to draw attention to the fact pedestrians are present.

As for the river, the firm has a big idea — clearing away some scrubby trees and undergrowth and creating a stepped plaza between the current bike bridge and the Batavia Government Center, opening up a vista to the river.

“We can make it a quaint little river town,” Alderman Michael O’Brien said. The automobile, he says, “took community away. We need to get it back.”

How to pay for any of this is on aldermen’s minds. The city has a $1.5 million grant from the federal government to improve the lights, landscaping, sidewalks and other infrastructure along Wilson Street from Route 31 to River Street. It is soliciting proposals from engineering firms to come up with construction documents for that work, which it expects to start in 2012. What the grant doesn’t pay for on Wilson, property taxes from the downtown tax-increment financing fund will.

But no costs have been put out about what it would take to do the rest of the plan MacManus presented. And there would be lots of details to be worked out, like replacing old water and sewer mains and service lines when sidewalks are torn up. “It’s not just park benches and bricks,” Brown said.

Details about the plan are available at cityofbatavia.net, “Downtown Streetscape Project.”The consultant is also scheduled to speak at Monday#146;s city council meeting.

  The Batavia Lions Club sponsors a Plant Day sale each year, which includes a stand in the downtown area. JOHN STARKS/jstarks@dailyherald.com, 2009