Let’s Make Wilton Walkable, Resident Offers Suggestions

In response to Lynne Vanderslice’s request for citizen input on the Wilton Master Plan, Wilton resident Philip Murphy shares three simple and inexpensive steps that would make Wilton Center more inviting

Let’s Make Wilton Walkable

The Wilton Comprehensive Plan overlooks a fundamental reason why Wilton Center is not like its counterparts in Ridgefield and New Canaan. Generations ago, Wilton, like many rural communities wishing to “modernize,” decided to grant primacy to automobiles over pedestrians. Today, modernization means the opposite. Fortunately, the town can make Wilton Center more friendly to humans in three simple steps:

Extend the sidewalk. As you walk on Old Ridgefield Road from CVS to the Library, the sidewalk is interrupted four times by parking lot entrances that force pedestrians to stop, look, and step down to street level. Replacing pavement with a continuous grass-lined sidewalk would create a park-like feel without the intrusions. Since each of the parking lots is accessible from Hubbard Road, the continuous sidewalk would not prevent cars from parking.

Raise the crosswalks. Stepping down into the street sends a subtle signal that walkers are secondary to the cars that occupy the road. But raising the crosswalks so that cars must slow in order to ride up and over the hump sends the opposite signal and restores primacy to the pedestrian. It also has the advantage of making cars drive slower and with greater care in the Center.

Reroute the cars. If traffic moved in a single lane counterclockwise from Hubbard Road to Godfrey Place to Old Ridgefield Road, there would be room for on-street parallel parking which would form a barrier between people on the sidewalk and cars moving in the road. Where Center Road enters town at Rise Donuts and Post Office Square there could be a formal rotary that would restore order to a particularly tricky intersection.

The town’s character is more apparent when you’re on foot rather than in a car. Walking toward the Library you’ll notice the old school building that anchors the Town Green behind the gazebo. This proud historical building is closed off and appears vacant from the front, but it could be a handsome asset. What’s not a handsome asset is the solid rectangular Bank of America branch that blocks the Library from the Green. Imagine this concrete box pierced with windows as a welcoming cafe with outdoor tables rather than a pillbox guarded by security.

Taken together we could have a walkable Town Center that is friendly to cars with a pocket garden that would invite shoppers, strollers, and kids on bikes to linger and talk and enjoy the town . . . all at a reasonable cost.


 

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Submitted by Wilton, CT

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