Green Streets Demonstration Project

                 Southwest corner of Harvard St. and Louise St.

Plans are underway to construct the City’s first Green Streets Demonstration Project. This environmentally friendly project will take place on approximately 1.1 miles of roadway on Harvard Street between Brand Boulevard and Isabel Street, and on Louise Street between Maple Avenue and Wilson Avenue in downtown Glendale. It will provide a safe and inviting pathway to encourage walking and biking to the Central Library, Adult Recreation Center, YMCA, Americana at Brand, Glendale Galleria and the future Museum of Neon Art. Plans are to expand this pilot project into a city-wide network of greenways as discussed in the City’s adopted Bicycle Transportation Plan.

The major features of this project include:

• Curb extensions with bioswales
  Curb extensions are an effective pedestrian safety tool. They shorten the distance a pedestrians must walk to cross an intersection and make pedestrians waiting to cross the street more visible to oncoming traffic. Additionally curb extensions create a traffic calming effect on busy streets. Bioswales and curb extensions often go hand in hand. Bioswales are landscape elements, created in order to clear away silt and pollution from surface runoff water. 
• Trees to be planted along parkways
• Mid-block pedestrian crossings
• Bicycle lanes or sharrows to be installed on roadways- Sharrows are markings on the streets that visually alert motorists and pedestrians that bicyclists may use the entire lane. They also prevents dangerous circumstances such as wrong way bicycling.

The estimated cost of the demonstration project is approximately $2.9 million. Project funding is possible through a $997,900 grant from the Proposition 84 Urban Greening Grant, which primarily focuses on improvements to storm water and “greening” of urban environments. Additional funding sources have been identified including approximately $1.9 million in State of California Gas Tax Funds, which will be used to complete the project. It is anticipated that planning for the project will occur from late 2014 through late 2015, with construction of the project to begin sometime in early- mid 2016.