Pedestrian plaza anchors Malvern plan

The city has to foster more parity between pedestrians and parking to remake the Malvern Avenue approach into part of downtown, the Hot Springs Board of Directors was told earlier this week.

The final draft of the Complete Street Master Plan for Malvern Avenue presented by architect Stephen Luoni removes or relocates 73 parking spaces, many of which would be claimed by a pedestrian plaza connecting Transportation Depot to the block north of Bridge Street that Luoni calls “Restaurant Row.”

The plaza would also require the elimination of Broadway Street’s Malvern Avenue intersection, with a rerouted Broadway intersecting Bridge Street via the Spencer’s Corner parking lot. Luoni told the board the area has a surplus of parking that goes unused most of the year.

“You planned this area for events that take up 3 percent of the year,” Luoni, the director of the University of Arkansas Community Design Center, said. “We’re designing it for the other 97 percent of the year.

“Everything is a trade-off. Do you want to value parking or a cityscape that values pedestrians?”

The UACDC was awarded a $40,000 contract last year to develop the master plan for Malvern Avenue, the focus of its architectural students’ spring project. The presentation Luoni delivered earlier this week concluded the UACDC’s contractual obligation to the city.

An exposed Hot Springs Creek would traverse the pedestrian plaza, which would be anchored by a large sculpture where Broadway currently intersects Malvern. A statue of Hernando de Soto at the Bridge-Malvern intersection would complement the sculpture.

Luoni said Malvern lacks the visual stimuli that encourages pedestrian traffic. The proposed artworks are meant to incentivize pedestrians to access downtown through the Malvern, Broadway and Convention Boulevard corridors.

“People will walk if you reward the walk,” Luoni said. “That’s why you see people on Central Avenue. This is why you don’t see people right now on Malvern and Convention, because the physical environment does not reward the election to walk.”

District 4 Director Larry Williams asked how Broadway was relevant to Malvern Avenue.

“I thought this was a Malvern Avenue gateway,” Williams said. “I’m having trouble understanding what we’re doing on Broadway.”

Luoni said making the eight-block stretch from Grand Avenue to Spring Street more inviting to pedestrian and bicycle traffic requires a holistic approach.

“Cities are like bodies,” he said. “Every part is connected. If you want Malvern to really function as a pedestrian corridor, you really have to look at the tributaries and streets tying into it and that traffic behavior.”

Williams said eliminating the Broadway-Malvern intersection would congest Bridge Street, which is less than 100 feet long, but Luoni predicted traffic patterns will make allowances for the new intersection.

“I’m going to bet what the modeling will show from our design is that people will make a different set of decisions about how they travel through the city,” he said. “You’ll change behavior and patterns.”

Williams said area businesses will object to repurposing parking for a pedestrian plaza, which would claim all of the parking under the Regions Bank skyway. Deputy City Manager Bill Burrough said the new private parking lot being developed on Park Avenue and the addition of another level on the Exchange Street Parking Plaza will increase the downtown’s overall parking inventory. The city’s seeking a federal grant to help pay for the latter project.

Luoni recommended implementing the Malvern components of the plan first, particularly the bioswales and other green infrastructure at the center of the plan’s stormwater-mitigation piece. The more than one mile of bioswales envisioned by the plan would significantly reduce Malvern’s impervious surface footprint.

“If you build all the bioswales, you’ll be the bioswale capital of the Southeast,” Luoni said.

In addition to capturing runoff, the vegetation can serve as low-impact barriers protecting bicyclists and pedestrians from motorists. The city has said the existing right of way can accommodate bike lanes along Malvern and plazas for people to congregate in front of the National Baptist Hotel and The Hotel Hot Springs & Spa.

Luoni said private capital will follow the public investment, bringing a commercial presence to an area where several large parcels are vacant.

Parks and Trails Director Jean Wallace said the UACDC’s blueprint is not an action plan. Its intent is to excite and expand the city’s imagination about the area’s potential, she said.

“This plan looks at public rights of way as functioning ecosystems, at streets as community gathering places that strengthen neighborhoods, businesses and tourism and plazas that celebrate history, culture and art,” she said.

“The plan will remain a draft until officially adopted by the city board. But even after it’s adopted, it will still be a visionary plan.”