OVERLAND PARK, Kan. — A study up for review Monday night in Overland Park, Kansas, presents the concept of building a pedestrian bridge over the intersection of College Boulevard and Metcalf Avenue, but it’s a long way from becoming reality.
The city’s committee of the whole will review the now completed College and Metcalf Mobility Study at 6:15 p.m. at city hall. The study is part of a larger Vision Metcalf project in place since about 2008 to find ways to make one of the city’s main north-south thoroughfares more friendly for walking and bicycling.
The mobility study looked at ways to make the College Boulevard corridor from Nall Avenue to Lowell Avenue a destination for walkers and bikers.
The study proposes options like adding a cycle track to College Blvd, creating linear parks with pedestrian pathways, transforming part of 112th Street near Lamar Avenue into a convertible “festival street,” as well as adding several placemaking amenities.
Special projects listed in the study include the pedestrian bridge, a large staircase gathering area on the former Sprint campus called the “Aspiria Steps,” and the Lamar Brook - a creek linking the corridor to areas north and south of College Blvd.
“I would like to turn it [the intersection of College Blvd and Metcalf Ave] into, I’m going to call it, an 18-hour destination,” said city councilman Fred Spears. “So when you get off work at five, or six, or whenever your boss lets you go, you can walk over to a nearby restaurant or bar and have some fun with some of your friends. With the Convention Center there, we want it so all the conventioneers from out of town can come in, not have to rent a car, not have to drive to someplace else, but they can just walk down the sidewalk to a restaurant, a bar, a shop, whatever it may be. So that they can have an evening activity without the hassles of parking or anything else.”
The concepts are simply up for discussion during Monday’s meeting. There will be no formal vote or approval. Over the next several months, city staff will use feedback from city council members to prioritize projects. Some individual projects may come up for approval in the fall as part of the formal budgeting process.
