If firefighters stationed on Mulberry Street in Scranton have to respond to a blaze downtown, one-way streets currently slow down their response.
A new $15 million streetscape project would change that by turning most one-way streets into two-ways, and improve traffic overall across downtown Scranton, Mayor Paige Cognetti said.
"It's not just about walking, it's also about safe driving. It's also about businesses having a more attractive frontage for their customers and to be able to have people coming in," she said. "It's about getting around the courthouse in one full loop. It's about having our streets make more sense and be safer for our first responders."
Officials will present the plans to City Council this evening, Tuesday, Oct. 14. The ordinances include the conversion of one-way streets to two-ways; changing traffic lights to stop signs; and adding 69 on-street parking spots. Cognetti hopes to bid the project out this year.
"That will be the next step in us being able to do this project,” she said.
IF YOU GO
Scranton City Council meets Tuesday, Oct. 14 at 6:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers on the second floor of City Hall, North Washington Ave., Scranton.
The project also will widen curbs, make sidewalks more ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) accessible and add some bike lanes.
Together with work already completed Scranton will spend $27.2 million in total to improve traffic and pedestrian safety, said Eileen Cipriani, the city’s business administrator. The funding is from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) and grants.
"This is once-in-a-generation funding that we have through the end of next year to do it," Cognetti said.
Improvements years in the making
The first step was getting PennDOT approval. The city’s engineer, Riley and Associates, submitted a 4,000 page study.
"It's the single biggest traffic improvement study in the PennDOT District that they've ever reviewed and approved,” Cirpriani said.
The idea to change downtown started during Scranton Mayor Bill Courtright’s administration. Jeff Speck, a city planner and consultant, gave a lecture in 2018 at the University of Scranton. In 2019, with Wayne Evans as mayor, the city worked with Speck to come up with a Downtown Scranton Connectivity Plan.
That plan spurred the current proposed changes to downtown.
A “full rebuild” of Lackawanna Avenue was recommended in a June 2023 connectivity plan, according to the city. About 10,000 vehicles enter and exit Scranton at the intersection of Lackawanna Avenue and the Biden Expressway.
That project will be underway this year and includes replacing sidewalks and curbs, installing period lighting, repairing a retaining wall in the 700 block of Lackawanna, and tree planting.
The Lackawanna Avenue improvements are funded through ARPA, Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development Multimodal grant, and state Local Share Account grant.
Avoiding tragedy
One of the major changes is removing some traffic lights on Biden, Linden and Vine streets.
"If you're driving and you see a yellow light, you often try to punch through it, and when you do that in a busy downtown where people are trying to walk, people are trying to get to work, they're trying to walk their dog across the street to get back home to their apartment, that can lead to a tragedy," Cognetti said. "With a stop sign, most of the time, you have people that actually approach the stop sign slower.”
The new stop signs will light up to alert drivers to pedestrians.
Wyoming Ave. to get bike lanes
Bike lanes will be added to Wyoming Avenue, which will be narrowed. Cipriani said it's currently as wide as Interstate 81.
Cognetti said Scranton wants to be a bike-friendly city but for now officials are focused on getting drivers used to the changes.
"We also need to make sure that we're not biting off more than we can chew and not getting ahead of where drivers are at," Cognetti said. "I think we need a lot more education about bicycles sharing the road before we would have bike lanes everywhere in the city.”
Cognetti said the public investment is matching the private investment in the city.
“It shows that we, as the city, are investing $15 million just on this project alone to make our downtown safer and more attractive and better for businesses and residents," she said. "You see, in parallel, the private investment that's been coming into the city and continues to with new condos, with new apartments being built, with restaurants, with coffee shops, bars, shops.”
Projects at a glance
The plans include:
- Two-lane, one-way streets including: Biden, Linden, Adams (south of Vine Street) and North Washington Avenue will become two-way streets.
- Some traffic signals will be changed to stop signs, including on Biden, Linden and Vine Streets.
- Upgrade sidewalks and create more visible crosswalks
- Adds more lighting and trees
- Reduces the size of lanes
- Add 69 more on-street parking spaces
- Bump-outs will be added to crosswalks, which will be shortened and decrease the amount of time it takes for pedestrians to cross the street
Finished road safety work:
- Repainted around 500 crosswalks across the city
- Improved school zones using thermoplastic pavement markings that read “slow school” on streets in 16 school zones
- Added new stop signs in 10 areas of Scranton
- Improved almost 5,000 street signs
