The City Council of St. Petersburg, FL recently approved its Complete Streets Implementation Plan, which aims to make streets safer and more accessible for users for all modes of transportation, including pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists, persons with disabilities, users and operators of public transit, seniors, children, and movers of commercial goods. The plan follows on the previous complete streets plan created in 2015, which incorporates vehicular traffic with safe sidewalks for pedestrians and bike lanes for cyclists. The city intends to make additional updates every five years.
Planners point out that St. Petersburg has a grid-style street network that provides significant transportation mode options and viable route alternatives. The Complete Streets program aims to make strategic connections and improvements within the grid of streets.
Local funding for the plan will come from the Multimodal Impact Fees Capital Improvement Fund and the Neighborhood and Citywide Capital Improvement Fund. The first and second phases of the plan, which will take place over the next five years, entail more crossings and eventually a 330-mile ( ~ 530 km ) connected network of trails and bike paths.
“Today is an important day for the future of transportation in our city. With the passage of our Complete Streets Implementation Plan, we will continue to make our streets safer for bicyclists, pedestrians, and yes, even drivers. This plan has wide-ranging support across our city and is bolstered by national data showing that Complete Streets equal safe streets,” said Mayor Kriseman. “ My thanks to a majority of the St. Petersburg City Council for their support of this plan and for their understanding that in order to build a complete city we need complete streets.”
