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It might take a decade or more before there are shovels in the ground but the imagining process of reimagining the LaSalle Expressway has commenced.
Highland Planning, the Rochester firm overseeing the Local Waterfront Revitalization Plan hosted a meeting Monday at LaSalle Preparatory Academy to gather community input on what the future of the Expressway, built over old railroad tracks in the 1960s may look like.
When the work will start, who will pay for it and what it will achieve remains to be decided.
Council Chairperson Jim Perry attended the meeting and remembers when the corridor was a railroad and cars were the No. 1 concern in public infrastructure. Those days have passed. Today, designers favor more holistic, bike and pedestrian friendly green planning.
Design alternatives shared included everything from a parkway dotted with trees to a more integrated plan reconnecting long detached streets.
The only thing that kept the LaSalle Expressway from being a signature Robert Moses plan was while it divided neighborhoods and kept people from the waterfront it didn’t oppress black people.
The main objective in creating any new thoroughfare is to make it more integrated into the community. The current configuration makes it easy for drivers to avoid the Buffalo Avenue business district and scoot from the north Grand Island Bridge or Niagara Scenic Parkway to Williams Road and the Land of Oz. ( Sarcasm alert: OK, Land of Oz didn’t happen, Summit Park Mall anyone? When do they extend the Twin City Memorial Highway? How is progress on the Oppenheim Zoo. Oh darn, shut off the sarcasm font before I fall over Aqua Falls or pine for a hockey rink next to the casino.)
Next up, planners will host a parallel meeting at John Duke Senior Center to discuss reimagining the carcass of Robert Moses Parkway between the north Grand Island Bridges and downtown and the possible reuse of the asbestos-laden former public safety building on Hyde Park Boulevard. That meeting will be from 6 to 8 p.m. tonight.
The next step is for organizers to put together findings and hold more meetings hopefully resulting in a plan which finds a place in line for state and federal funding.
Mayor Robert Restaino was not able to attend because he is in Albany lobbying on behalf of the city
