The City of Madison is looking to remodel West Wilson Street this fall but they’re facing a problem when it comes to space.

“It has up to 10,000 vehicles a day, plus a couple of bus routes, and heavy pedestrian use as well. It gets a lot of use,” said city engineer Jim Wolfe.

Because of the heavy use on the one-way street, it’s due for a remodel from Martin Luther King Street to Henry Street.

“Right now that pavement is rated a four out of 10, which is very poor,” said Wolfe.

The current design includes two lanes of traffic, parking and an expanded sidewalk, but one group argues the plan is missing a key piece.

“It really doesn’t accommodate bikes at all,” said the President of Madison Bikes, Grant Foster.

Madison Bikes thinks if the city is going to remodel West Wilson Street they should consider putting in a two-way bike lane.

“If we really want to promote biking and walking we need to give people the space to do that,” said Foster.

But the problem is just that; the city is running out of space to work with.

“When you start looking at trying to get new dedicate space in, you have to look at making sacrifices elsewhere,” said Wolfe.

This means to accommodate a bike lane the city may have to reduce parking, or a travel lane, which raises other concerns because the parking on Wilson Street is full 90 percent of the time.

Wolfe said space isn’t just a problem with the Wilson Street project, but in downtown Madison it’s becoming increasingly difficult to make room for everyone.

“Being on an isthmus everything’s kind-of pinched, so we’re trying to see what we can do to make improvement where we can,” said Wolfe, “but the solutions won’t always be ideal.”

Foster, and Madison Bikes feel if the city continues to grow, there needs to be a few trade-offs.

“It’s not a war on cars. We’re two blocks off the capital we need to create space for people down here,” said Foster.

If you would like to provide your input of the street construction, Madison is hosting a Wilson Street public input meeting Monday March, 20. The meeting will begin at 6:30p.m. at the City County Building(210 Martin Luther King Blvd).

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