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Broad Street TIA redesign would gain structured stalls but cut surface spaces; commissioners weigh parking, bike lanes and road diets
Summary
Engineers showed revised Broad Street plans that restore more street-level parking than earlier designs but would still reduce the total number of surface-standard spaces once stalls are brought up to current size; staff also presented options to add on-street spaces by changing Reynolds or Ellis, and urged a management plan for downtown parking.
Augusta-Richmond County engineering staff updated commissioners on the Downtown Tier Transportation Investment Act (TIA) Broad Street redesign and a set of parking-management and street-section options intended to balance traffic flow, bike infrastructure and parking supply.
What was presented: Engineers said Broad Street currently has 760 on-street parking stalls but most are substandard in width or length; restriping to modern vehicle standards would reduce the usable surface total by roughly 140 spaces. A revised project design replaces many planned planting islands with angled stalls and yields roughly 590 street-level spaces on the rebuilt Broad Street (compared with 430 in an earlier design), but the project will still reduce the current substandard surface count when stalls are made to modern standards.
Staff also identified underused garage capacity available to the public: the convention center deck (610 stalls) was observed about 15% full during midday counts, the Cyber Center deck about 31% full and other municipal decks underused. Engineering proposed pursuing better use of those existing structures to offset street-level changes.
Other options explored: - A “road diet” for Reynolds Street (four lanes to two with parking) could create about 400 additional on-street parking stalls between Fifth and Twelfth streets while remaining within typical lane-capacity limits (staff cited 7,000 vehicles per day on Reynolds, and two-lane capacity of 10,000–12,000). - Making Ellis Street one-way could reorganize chaotic parking and recover roughly 330 on-street stalls (projected net gain ~90 stalls for downtown segments studied). Engineering said the Hyatt’s access requires keeping one block two-way.
Bicycle lanes and management: The design includes consistent raised/segregated bike lanes to connect to the Freedom Bridge and other routes. Staff and several commissioners argued that continuous, connected bike lanes encourage use; they warned against fragmented bike lanes that “start and stop.”
Parking-management recommendation: Commissioners were urged to create a coordinated downtown parking-management strategy — parking time limits, enforcement, and more effective use of underused garages — because many stalls are currently reused for long-term employee parking and vehicle storage.
Schedule and construction concerns: Engineering said construction will be phased; some landscape and linear-park elements will begin soon, but the block-by-block streetwork downtown is forecast to begin in the fall. Commissioners asked the department to meet with the prime contractor (E.R. Snell) about schedule acceleration and to present cost estimates for any accelerated work. Engineering cautioned accelerated schedules would increase cost and require identified funding.
What’s next: The committee agreed to forward the plan to the full commission and asked staff to schedule a business-owner outreach meeting and to return with cost estimates for accelerating work and with a recommended parking-management policy.
