GROWTH, TRAFFIC TAKE A TOLL ON SOUTH HILL

The pounding of heavy traffic from the suburbs has worn deep ruts in Spokane's Grand Boulevard. Once a quiet, tree-lined residential area, the South Hill is being overrun by impatient speeding motorists. "To hell with your neighborhood," the drivers seem to say as they gun their minivans toward anyone who dares set foot in a crosswalk. "We're headed for our neighborhood, and you're in our way."

Is this any way to build a community? No, but it's how we do it here - as North Siders know, having watched traffic from the 'burbs fight its way through their neighborhoods.

Arterial improvements have brought some relief to the North Side; not so for the South Hill. And city growth forecasts indicate the problem there will triple in intensity.

Last month, the City Council backed away from impact fees, which might have raised seed money needed to attract state and federal matching grants for street improvements. The council will spend some more time studying the issue while problems worsen.

A city study prepared before the non-decision on impact fees indicates the problem will worsen most dramatically on the South Hill. The study examined growth potential on the city's edges; the greatest growth area, by far, is Moran Prairie. There, enough land is zoned for residential use to accommodate another 14,000 dwelling units. That's three times the number of units that already are pouring streams of cars from the prairie onto the South Hill's narrow, winding arterials.

None of the South Hill's north-south streets is in line for a big increase in capacity. City engineers have plans for a few minor interchange improvements. Neighborhoods, understandably, fight street projects that would increase traffic past their homes. But planners, developers and buyers need to ask: How will Moran Prairie commuters get to town?

Spokane home builders, who contend impact fees wouldn't raise nearly enough money to improve infrastructure, have pointed out that sales and property taxes from new construction do bring large sums to the city. But under current policy, little of that money goes to needed street improvements.

To make matters worse, most of Moran Prairie is outside the city limits. Development there brings new tax revenues to county government, not to city government for its streets, which county residents use.

At the moment, this is a problem without a solution. Local government listens to developers who don't want impact fees and to residents who dislike arterials in their neighborhoods as much as they dislike the taxes that might be required to enlarge and maintain them.

This is nuts. It hurts the quality of life for all of us.

Copyright 1996 Cowles Publishing Company
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