Last week’s Project DeRenne open house at Savannah Technical College was an impressive affair.
Area residents showed up in significant numbers to give feedback on the latest plans, while a variety of city officials and project consultants offered detailed explanations.
I was impressed with the level of discourse from all sides.
Susan Broker, head of Savannah’s Citizen Office, pointedly reminded me that Project DeRenne is about more than just traffic.
In addition to improving traffic flow, Project DeRenne’s goals include neighborhood preservation, commercial revitalization, economic development, beautification and greater accommodation along the corridor for bicyclists and pedestrians.
I think that all those goals would be furthered by the plans on display last week.
I’ve raised questions in this column about finding the $76 million for revamping the DeRenne Avenue corridor.
But funding uncertainties should not deter planners at this point.
If we don’t make a big investment in DeRenne Avenue in the next decade or so, the traffic will become worse and economic development could be stifled for the next generation or two.
I might touch upon additional topics in an upcoming column, but here I just want to say a few things about two of the project’s key goals: Beautification and traffic.
The traffic on DeRenne makes it a physical barrier between older portions of the city to the north and newer ones to the south.
But for those of us who spend most of our time in the downtown area, the barren ugliness of DeRenne serves as a psychological barrier as well.
When I first started writing this column back in 2000, I heard routinely from folks who lived on the Southside but rarely ventured downtown.
Now I’m much more likely to hear the opposite. There seems to be a growing number of downtown area residents who just don’t want to cross DeRenne.
While the city can certainly make a variety of improvements that will beautify the DeRenne Avenue streetscape, much will ultimately depend on owners of commercial properties, especially those west of Abercorn Street.
Improving the public infrastructure might push landowners to make new investments, but at some point we also might need tougher standards and tougher enforcement of current standards.
Of course, however much we discuss other goals, Project DeRenne’s success is contingent upon improving traffic flow.
The plans on display last week will certainly reduce congestion, improve safety and save countless hours of wasted time.
One of the displays at the open house included computer simulations of traffic in 2020 under the current configuration and under the ambitious plan for Project DeRenne, which would result in a widened Hampstead Avenue, a traffic circle on Montgomery Street near Hunter and a flyover on I-516.
There were stark differences in the two simulations.
But the benefits for the many will come with costs for the few.
From comments I heard last week, I expect some Poplar Place residents living on the north side of Hampstead Drive to fight this proposal.
Those residents will not lose any of their property in the dramatic expansion of Hampstead and will therefore not qualify for buyouts. But they’ll go from living on a busy two-lane street with about 10,000 cars per day to living on an even busier four-lane road with about 25,000 cars per day.
Unemployment rate, labor force participation rate fall
According to the most recent estimates from the Georgia Department of Labor, the unemployment rate for the Savannah metro area (Chatham, Effingham and Bryan counties) was 7.4 percent in March.
That’s down pretty dramatically from 8.3 percent in March 2012.
The unemployment rate for the city of Savannah was 8.5 percent last month, down from 9.8 percent a year ago.
These numbers show considerable improvement, but they are still high by historical standards.
As I noted last week, there are notes of caution creeping into some of the recent economic data.
The Savannah metro area unemployment rate declined so dramatically over the last year because approximately 1 percent more area residents reported being employed.
But the number of civilians in the local labor force in March was almost exactly the same as it was a year ago, suggesting a decline in the labor force participation rate.
There are many variables that can affect labor force participation, but we’d generally expect to see that rate increase during an economic recovery.
These latest hints of weakness might mean nothing. They might be statistical blips that will be erased in the coming months.
Still, there are logical reasons to think the economic headwinds have picked up.
The payroll tax break expired at the first of the year, which reduced take-home pay for workers, and sequestration is inevitably having broad impacts, especially in areas like Savannah with large federal installations.
City Talk appears every Tuesday and Sunday. Bill Dawers can be reached via billdawers@comcast.net and http://www.billdawers.com. Send mail to 10 East 32nd St., Savannah, Ga. 31401.