Is a $5 million facelift for Wichita’s West Douglas worth it? | Opinion

Let’s say we were playing Wichita Family Feud and asked 100 residents, “What’s the best thing the city could do to improve the local transportation system?”

I seriously doubt that spending $5-plus million for a makeover of Douglas Avenue between Seneca and Meridian would be on the board.

But that’s that’s what City Hall has its heart set on, for some reason.

The project in question would narrow the street from four car lanes to two, with a center turn lane, and a two-way bike path with a signalized crossing, to eventually connect the central city bike-lane system with the Prairie Sunset Trail out west.

Putting in bike paths and reducing car lanes to “calm” (read that slow) traffic has been a priority of City Hall for a while.

But so far, that impulse has mostly been limited to restriping streets, which could be relatively easily striped back if the changes create traffic headaches.

This project goes well beyond that.

In addition to the bike path, the project includes permanent concrete curb extensions at the intersections, like the ones on Douglas further downtown, six-foot-wide sidewalks, and $400,000 for street art, according to a staff report.

The project budget includes $3.9 million of federal funding and at least $1.1 million of city sales tax revenue.

The staff report said the total project budget will be $5.66 million, but Paul Gunzelman, the interim city engineer who presented at Monday’s meeting of the District 4 Advisory Board, said it will be $5 million.

Monday was the second time in two months that city staff urged the district board to approve the design plan, which the board first rejected in June.

Several residents who live on the street said it’s OK the way it is and questioned why this project, and why now?

Those are good questions.

A few blocks farther south lies Maple Street, a rougher and more flood-prone street that the City Council member for the area, Jeff Blubaugh, says is “like a Third World country.”

Maple gets more traffic than Douglas because it has a bridge across the Big Ditch. It also regularly does duty as the primary detour street when the Kellogg freeway is backed up because of an accident.

John Whitmer, a former Kansas legislator and conservative talk-show host, pressed Gunzelman on that.

“Maple is a serious issue,” he said. “This (Douglas project) is largely cosmetic, benches and trees and some grass, versus a flooding issue. Why couldn’t you take the federal funds that are earmarked for this and put it into Maple Street?”

Gunzelman replied that the city got the federal money for Douglas mainly because it’s the project City Hall asked for, and it scored high with the Wichita Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, which distributes funding.

WAMPO is big on projects that include “active transportation,” i.e. walking and biking.

If the city doesn’t go through with the Douglas project, there’s no guarantee that the money would come back to Wichita, much less that it could be redesignated for Maple, Gunzelman said.

Whitmer wasn’t buying that and pointed out the city is forecasting budget shortfalls of $12 million to $25 million in years to come.

“I don’t want my property taxes going up for designer benches in Delano,” he said. “I wouldn’t mind if they’re going to have to necessarily go up in order to fix flooding down on Maple.”

Dalton Glasscock, the chairman of the district board, asked another good question: “What about this plan changed from the June meeting to today’s meeting?

“Nothing,” conceded Gunzelman. “We just wanted to provide additional information.”

While the project hasn’t changed, the politics of it have.

Since the June vote in District 4, city staff also took the project to the District 6 Advisory Board, which approved it 9-0. On Monday, the District 4 board reaffirmed its rejection of the project on a 6-2 vote.

The dividing line between District 4 and District 6 runs down the center of Douglas, so there’s a district split here.

The board representing the north side of the street says yes, the board representing the south side of the street says no.

Interestingly enough, one of the justifications for the project is that sidewalks in the area are buckled, creating trip hazards for pedestrians. Some of that’s tree roots and some is just general sinkage over time.

But when that happens elsewhere in the city, homeowners usually get a nastygram from City Hall telling them they have to hire somebody to fix it, or the city will hire someone to fix it for them and add the cost to their property tax bill.

So why would the property owners on Douglas be getting a free ride on that?

Maybe it’s because Douglas west of Seneca appears to be the natural extension of the trendy city-assisted restaurant and business district east of Seneca.

Now it’s mostly a motley collection of marginal, high-turnover businesses and vacant buildings. Farther west, from Glenn to Meridian, it’s almost entirely residential.

Knowing how things generally work in this town, it wouldn’t surprise me if a developer has designs on the area and has been whispering to someone behind closed doors “Wouldn’t it be nice if somebody gave that street a multi-million-dollar facelift?”

Blubaugh said he’s tried to find out who wanted this project in the first place and gotten nowhere. “I’ve asked everybody,” he said.

It’s due to come to the City Council on Aug. 22, and the council needs to ask some questions — and more importantly, get some answers.

I’d start with these:

1) Whose idea was this in the first place?

2) Is it a $5 million project or a $5.66 million project?

3) Has the city been approached by anyone who has designs on developing that strip of street?

4) If the project goes forward, who benefits?

The people of Wichita deserve some answers.

Here’s hoping they get them.