Celebrating the wins

I get mixed responses whenever I tell people how good I think the King William Rd revitalisation is. People’s comments range from complaints about how difficult it is to park, to the works not having changed anything and being a waste of public money. I contend, however, that something fundamental changed about King William Rd, and that it is one of the great Adelaide urbanism success stories of recent years.

That fundamental change is that King William Rd went from being a shopping strip along a main road, to a place for people that happens to have a street running through it. Have a look at the two photos in this post. Before the redesign, the vast majority of the roadway was given over to car travel, with the footpath ending just after the verandah posts. What clear space there was under the verandahs was taken up by signs, pot plants, shop displays, and, if lucky, a tiny bit of outdoor dining squeezed in under the dark eaves. Crossing the road was a nightmare as you risked your life stepping out from between parked cars.

In the new King William Road, most of the roadway is given over to people. Key to the whole redesign was what I consider a genius decision to bring the car parks up to the level of the footpath. This achieved three things:

• It narrowed the apparent width of the travel lanes and widened the apparent width of the footpath, slowing cars down and signalling that the priority for this place is staying, not moving.
• It opened up the ability to reallocate car parking space to space for people on a flexible, piece by piece and as-needed basis. In a matter of minutes and by the insertion of a couple of bollards, a car park space can become outdoor dining.
• By making parking slightly more difficult it slows everything down, making the roadway safer for everyone.

The end result is that it just feels natural to go for a stroll along King William Rd. It’s safe, there’s a lot to see, and it’s incredibly easy to cross the street to go and look at something that catches your fancy on the other side. There are people everywhere: walking, outdoor dining, sitting. There are places to sit, there’s shade (from trees! unthinkable!) and even some sculpture that, no matter what you think of their artistic merit, function well enough as local landmarks.

You’ll notice that I’ve only talked about the benefits of the redesign to business incidentally. Too much of our public discussions on our streets focus on business, and the voices of business owners are often amplified such that they are taken as the only ones who deserve a valid input into what happens with our public space. But I firmly believe that our public spaces are for everyone, whether you are a business owner, resident, or visitor, even if you have no money to spend (like, say, a child!). That’s why I like King William Rd. Because it is a better place for everyone. And I think that business does alright out of it too.