The city council will decide Tuesday whether to seek a more than $5.8 million grant to upgrade pedestrian safety infrastructure along Fifth Street.
City Engineer Kevin Stafford proposed the project Thursday during a council work session at City Hall. It would upgrade sidewalks and Americans with Disabilities Act accessibility along Fifth Street between the Magnolia Bowl and Columbus Light and Water headquarters, as well as add curb extensions, called bump-outs, at each intersection of the corridor where pedestrians cross.
“The crosswalks will be upgraded,” Stafford said. “ADA ramps will be upgraded. When you bring in those curbs, it also slows traffic down.”
The project would be the most tangible culmination of a study the city began last year through the Federal Highway Administration’s Safe Streets and Roads for All Grant Program. Study results, posted on the city’s website, identified road segments and intersections in the city where accidents with injury – ranging from minor or moderate to serious or fatal – occurred over the last five years.
While the study found those issues across the city, Stafford said downtown showed the greatest concentration of issues, especially along the Fifth Street corridor.
“You have issues at every single intersection (in the corridor),” Stafford said. “… This is a heavy pedestrian corridor, being near the courthouse, the (Trotter) convention center, the Rosenzweig (Arts Center), just all the things that are downtown. So it will benefit all those areas.”
A $200,000 grant funded the study and action plan. Now that those are complete, Stafford said the city has until June 26 to apply for implementation money through the program, which is available for projects with price tags ranging from $2.5 million to $25 million.
Stafford said implementation grants require a 20% match, which means the city would need to pony up nearly $1.2 million for the Fifth Street proposal. That amounts to about six months of the city’s internet use tax revenue – which must be used for roads and bridges – but Stafford said the city would have plenty of time to save up for it. Grant approval would come in late 2025 or early 2026, and it would take even more time to get construction underway.
“You could easily be two to three years before any real money has to be spent,” he said.
While Stafford said the bump-outs would enhance safety at each intersection, he specifically addressed how they would help at Main and Fifth, where they would eliminate the existing right turn lane, add parking in front of the arts center and reduce the pedestrian crossing distance by 52 feet.
“We’ve been talking about, for years, trying to bring Main Street and Fifth up to speed with ADA issues, with parking issues, with speeding – especially coming down Main,” he said. “… The implementation grant could tackle this.”
The project would also connect with a Transportation Alternatives Grant project from the Mississippi Department of Transportation on Fifth Street North. That estimated $1.3 million project, for which the city is currently accepting bids, would add sidewalks and landscape islands between Fifth Avenue North (at the Magnolia Bowl) and Ninth Avenue North (the last cross-street before the Highway 82 East on-ramp).
Mayor Keith Gaskin, as well as some on the council, expressed concern about whether the federal Safe Streets and Roads for All program would face cuts similar to other programs since Donald Trump took office as president in January.
Stafford said “the grant is real,” though there may be delays and this may be the last round of implementation money available.
Starkville, for instance, was approved in October for $10 million through the program to upgrade an intersection at Garrard and Highway 12 near the Walmart Neighborhood Market. The city still hasn’t gotten the money, Stafford said, because it must scrub language related to sustainability and helping impoverished neighborhoods – priorities for the program when the Joe Biden administration implemented it.
He said he believes Starkville will get its money and that the revisions to the grant agreement won’t change the project’s scope or purpose.
“One of the things that’s being asked right now is when we submit this grant application, things like climate change and diversity, and the things this grant was originally written for, are being asked to be pulled out or not being as big of an emphasis,” Stafford said of Columbus’ application.
Ward 5 Councilman Stephen Jones, who will become mayor July 1, said he supports the project.
“It’s definitely a plan that needs to be looked at,” he told The Dispatch after the work session.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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