Bagby Street has seen better days. Now, with the new year underway, downtown area officials are doing to the street what a lot of people promised for themselves in 2020: Slimming down, fixing up and promising to put walking and biking front and center.
Beaten by flooding and traffic, the street on the western edge of downtown is home to some of the oldest infrastructure in the central business district. It is showing its age as the pavement undulates and crumbles at the sidewalk corners, despite being lined by some of the region’s most iconic buildings.
”It is a street of parks and civic buildings and performing arts buildings and I think it deserves that attention,” said Bob Eury, executive director of the Houston Downtown Redevelopment Authority and the Houston Downtown Management District.
The project, two years in planning, will widen sidewalks on both sides of the street and add a bike lane along Bagby from Franklin to Clay. The street, now between four and six lanes wide through the 12-block stretch, will constrict to three or four lanes for vehicles.
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The Bagby rebuild, expected to cost $28.8 million, is funded through the redevelopment authority. The management and redevelopment agencies, which are, essentially, the same but have slightly different geographic boundaries, work in tandem on improvement projects in the downtown area. The redevelopment authority captures and spends a portion of property tax revenues in the area, subject to city approval of plans.
In addition to changing how the street is divided among drivers and pedestrians, the construction will add more inlets to the drainage system so water moves faster from the street to the storm sewer pipes — some that will be expanded to handle heavier flows. New lighting and new trees, some acting as a buffer between traffic and walkers and cyclists, also are planned.
Construction on the first phase of the work from Franklin to Walker begins Saturday, and will affect traffic along Bagby for months as work on the street and sidewalks is expected to take until December 2021. At least one southbound lane on Bagby will be closed from Franklin to Rusk, along with a northbound lane from McKinney to Walker in the early phases.
Crews will maintain two-way traffic along Bagby even as some lanes are closed while work progresses along the street, said Lonnie Hoogeboom, director of planning, design and development for the downtown district. Work in phase one mostly will occur on the west side of Bagby.
Construction will come with headaches, officials said, but the aim is to minimize them as much as possible, Hoogeboom said, and the downtown district will send out advisories as conditions change.
Eury said crews are hoping to work around major events, such as the Chevron Houston Marathon, the route of which will cross Bagby in its first mile at Congress and last mile at Lamar, the annual Art Car Parade and other events to reduce disruptions and detours.
What the work cannot avoid, officials said, is significant tree removal along Bagby. Though officials are planting 79 new trees — many mature so they will provide shade from the moment they are planted — they are removing 59 trees. Many of those destined for the mulch pile are mature oaks along Tranquillity Park and the west side of City Hall.
“We just can’t proceed along some of the blocks with the trees where they are,” Eury said.
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Work also will spill onto a few adjacent streets as part of the first phase, notably rebuilding Walker between City Hall and Tranquillity Park. Crews also will install a raised pedestrian crossing and parking area along McKinney between City Hall and the downtown library.
The only major changes in appearance, however, will be along Bagby or at intersections, where the goal is to transform a street with only moderate traffic into something that better carries its users and caters to their needs, officials said. Bagby’s busiest blocks, around Allen Center, carry about 1,200 vehicles per day, according to the latest traffic counts. That is far less than other parallel streets, such as Smith and Louisiana, where many blocks handle 1,600 to 1,900 vehicles per day.
Bagby simply operates differently, Eury said.
“You have three rush hours because you have showtime,” he said.
Eury said traffic studies over the past two years have shown the street can be taken to four lanes — three mostly south of Walker — with dedicated turn lanes and accommodate traffic.
Some drivers, as is common when Houston streets are narrowed, remain skeptical.
“It just seems like cars will back up at the light, and then the next light, and everything will just poke along,” Mark Ewanu said.
The proximity to so many major downtown destinations makes Bagby a major street that visitors and daily workers all encounter. It is the way to and from many entertainment destinations — the library, Hobby Center, Sam Houston Park, Bayou Place and Wortham Theater — and home to constant daytime foot traffic to and from City Hall, the adjoining annex and the Allen Center between Dallas and Clay.
“I personally think it is great you walk out of City Hall and see this bikeway,” Eury said. “It sends a great message.”
Bicyclists are cheering the changes because more room along Bagby “can be the bicycle friendly backbone” advocates have sought, said Clark Martinson, executive director of BikeHouston.
The project is one of a handful adjacent to one another that when completed will add a new complexion to the western side of downtown, tucked between skyscrapers, government offices and Interstate 45. A separate project by the city’s general services department to rebuild the sidewalks surrounding City Hall and Hermann Square, the green space and fountain in front of the building on Smith is schedule to begin in July. The sidewalk replacement is expected to finish in December.
A bike lane along Bagby joins other recent developments devoting more room to cyclists. A green-painted lane on Gray from the Columbia Tap Trail in EaDo to Bagby is mostly completed. Crews will spend the next ten weeks or so putting the last touches on the bikeway, including the installation of traffic signals similar to those along the bikeway on Lamar that give riders and pedestrians a slight head-start to avoid vehicle turns in front of them.
“The West Gray two-way bike lane is fantastic,” Martinson said.
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Riders are not resting on what’s in motion, however. Martinson said Bagby can only be a backbone by providing key connections, some of which remain merely plans. He noted the city’s bike plan, approved in 2017, includes bikeways along Dallas, from Bagby west to Shepherd, opening more neighborhoods south of Allen Parkway to riders along routes parallel to Buffalo Bayou.
Criss-crossing those routes with others, such as a planned bike lane along Montrose between Dallas and Allen Parkway, will make them much more navigable.
Along the east side of downtown, meanwhile, the office of Harris County Precinct 1 Commissioner Rodney Ellis and the city are working on bike lanes along Austin Street, part of a major push for green-striped lanes in Ellis’ district. Paired with Bagby, it will allow cyclists to ride into downtown from either side.
dug.begley@chron.com
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New year, new look for Bagby Street with bike lane, wider sidewalks - Houston Chronicle
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