Transit Malls

The transit_mall is a great concept, but there is always the potential for improvement.

Nicollet_Avenue in Minneapolis, was never wide like Woodward_Ave_in_Detroit. https://www.mlive.com/entertainment/erry-2018/04/57da31c03d/woodward_avenue_detroit.html

Back in the day, there just wasn't any reason to have Nicollet_Avenue to be as wide as Canal_Street,_New_Orleans or Market_Street_(San_Francisco).

However, Nicollet_Mall should have had 2 passing lanes, instead of only two lanes. Whenever a bus breaks down or there is some emergency, half of the Nicollet_Mall can easily get blocked up.

Fortunately, Portland,_Oregon decided not to follow the Minneapolis and Vancouver, BC examples. MAX_and_bus_side-by-side_on_Portland_Mall, this is so much better than funneling everything into just 2 lanes. The Portland_Transit_Mall remains as one of the best transit corridor examples. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portland_Transit_Mall#Renovation_and_rebuilding

Granville_Street in downtown Vancouver used to be 6 lanes wide. While the initial concept of the Granville_Mall was a good idea, cramming everything into only 2 lanes became another quintessential Vancouver example of bottleneck & congestive planning. It's all part of the narrow-minded BC mentality.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granville_Mall,_Vancouver Of course right at some crucial blocks, the 2 lane segments provide great spots for congestion, all by design. Whenever a bus breaks down or there is some emergency, there isn't a passing lane. Thus, one side of the street remains blocked until the bus can be towed away. Of course it was considered to be a wise decision to have so many bus routes funneled through such a narrow corridor & then remain stubborn about improving the situation.

Reducing the downtown section of Granville_Street from 6 lanes to 4 would have allowed passing lanes for busses & the sidewalks could have still been widened. Plus, it would have been so much easier for emergency vehicles to get through as well. Unfortunately, Metro_Vancouver is all about creating congestion & inefficiency.

If one side of the street has a bus breakdown & the other side has some emergency requiring a bus to remain parked, there isn't an extra couple of lanes for emergency vehicles to pass on some blocks of Granville_Street. Again, it was deemed essential & appropriate to have such a bottleneck on what is suppose to be a high volume bus corridor.

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