Mayor Phil Nauert and members of the Bellaire City Council on Monday made it clear that sidewalks are a public safety priority in the city, where residents sometimes get “crazy” over the issue.
Residents of the small, horseshoe-shaped 800 block of Jaquet Drive were disappointed Monday, when the City Council resoundingly rejected their petition to remove sidewalks from plans to rebuild their street.
Nauert and members of the City Council made it clear that sidewalks are built for the entire city.
About 85 percent of the residents of the street had signed a petition asking that sidewalks not be built on their block. Many residents said that new sidewalks would harm trees or take away “greenspace” from their neighborhood, and that traffic was not a concern on the small street.
Although Councilman Roman Reed had proposed deleting the sidewalk — with a potential “savings” of $17,400 — Nauert and the other council members voted against the idea.
“It’s not their sidewalk,” Nauert said, noting that Bellaire has about 17,000 residents. “Anyone in Bellaire has a right to use that street,” the mayor said.
Mayor Pro Tem Mandy Nathan also noted that the small, pocket-park known as Ware Park is located on Jaquet. Nathan said the city has “a public safety responsibility” to provide safe access to the park.
“Sidewalks are a safety issue for me,” Nathan said, adding that not building a sidewalk to the park “would be a failure of our public safety responsibility.”
Other council members echoed their comments.
Councilman Gus Pappas noted, however, that Bellaire residents are sometimes “crazy” when it comes to the issue of sidewalks.
“I’ve never seen anything so crazy as the sidewalk discussions in this town,’ Pappas said, noting that most Bellaire residents support sidewalks — just not on their streets.
Pappas, who said he used to live “around the corner” from Jaquet, said “there wasn’t a moment in my life when I wasn’t concerned” about traffic coming around the corner.
“Mayor, you are absolutely correct. This is a project for this entire city,” Pappas said.
Nauert, Nathan, Pappas, and Council members Pat McLaughlan, Andrew Friedberg and James Avioli voted to keep the sidewalks in the plans for rebuilding the street.
Jane McNeel says
I cannot imagine anyone asking to remove sidewalks. Between high speed traffic, parked cars, and recent robberies, I no longer walk to the store or area restaurants because our street has no sidewalks (well, one or two new homes have one). Some past City Council required construction of a sidewalk with every new house that was built, then another group allowed builders to buy out of that requirement. Meanwhile, West University undertook a capital improvement plan to build sidewalks or crushed granite paths along both sides of every street in the city. Some paths follow the curb, but at least no one has to walk in the street.
Robert Riquelmy says
Now if we just had a sidewalk to the U.S. Post office!
I will continue to listen and prioritize Resident input
I value Resident feedback.