I don't get out to Coddington Avenue very often, so I was surprised recently to see just how crummy that road has gotten between Highway 77 and Van Dorn. Not only is the road in rough shape, its two lanes don't do a very good job of managing traffic flow. Fortunately for residents in the area Coddington is now on the City's widening list. Deena Winter suggests area Councilman Jon Cook may have sold his soul to the devil to Mayor Beutler, swapping a "yes" on the Mayor's pet "one-stop development shop" for the road improvements. I don't have any opinion on that, except I will say that if a deal had to be made to get the job done, that's not such a terrible deal.
It sounds like the road project will not take the form of one of Lincoln's nasty five-lane scars (like Pioneers between 70th and 84th), but rather something more modest (and hopefully less bugly). I sure hope that's true. Nothing about Coddington requires a beast of a road. I would argue, in fact, it would even do well with two lanes, a center turn lane, and a bike lane. Given Lincoln's track record, I won't hold my breath for that.
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We used to live over there and I love how the ornamental pear trees that line Coddington have matured. I hope the road project doesn’t require them to rip out those trees. It’s a nice little stretch of road and I agree, a center turn lane would be nice. I wouldn’t want to bike on that stretch of road, but a bike lane would make it more safe. I always went through residential areas rather than ride my bike on Coddington.
You make a good point about the trees, and that relates to my pie-in-the-sky vision: a true boulevard with wide, treed medians. That neighborhood association seems to be active enough they could easily care for the medians themselves as a neighborhood project.
Having lived in that area since 97, the need is there. Roper Elementary’s expansion, the shopping center at Coddington and West A and the ever increasing population show the need.
West A Street west of Coddington needs widening just as badly but I hear no talk of that.
Maybe councilman Cook can make another deal, er, not a deal, with the mayor.
Heh!
I tried to get the city to lower the speed limit on West A, west of Coddington, because it’s ludicrous that cars barrel through a residential area like that at 45 mph. That is, if they are obeying the speed limit. A house on West A, not far from where we lived, has been hit by a car at least twice. This last time it could have killed someone inside the house. The city’s response was to put down some strips and monitor the speed of the cars. They said something about road funding and the speed limit ... a bunch of the usual garbage that meant the city would do whatever it wanted, which translated into nothing.
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