You may have heard that the City recently approved funding for the Markham Street Road Diet, which will improve walkability along Markham Street from Woodrow Street to Brown Street!
Back in 2018, StudioMain hosted PopUp in the Rock on Markham Street to reimagine this corridor to be more welcoming to people who walk, bike, and roll. This community initiative inspired the city to pursue what is known as a “road diet”.
What is a Road Diet? A road diet typically redesigns a roadway to remove or reduce lanes for traffic and repurposes the space to encourage street life.
If the PopUp demonstration was such a success, why don’t we have a road diet now? It comes down to funding. The full Markham Street Road Diet is expected to cost approximately $2.35 million, so it has been broken into Phase 1 and Phase 2.
Phase 1 is expected to cost $1.35 million and has been funded with a Metroplan implementation grant and a 15% match from the City. It will be from Woodrow St. to Brown St. on Markham. The City last week has approved this budget and there will be bids from private contractors for this work going out sometime in Spring 2024.
What about Phase 2? Phase 2 is expected to cost about $1 million. It will run from Brown St. to Pine St. The City has not secured grant funding or budget for this portion of the project…yet. If there are any grant applications or efforts to pursue funding for Phase 2, please let us know. We would love to see the full road diet implemented!
