I've seen a lot of people support pedestrianizing King Street when the topic is brought up. However, I've never seen a detailed proposal of what the pedestrianized street would actually look like. This is my attempt to create that proposal. I was particularly inspired by this paper which also explores pedestrianization.
First of all, pedestrianization is absolutely viable. King Street is the single busiest pedestrian corridor in all of Charleston, and there's usually far more pedestrians than cars. Most (reasonable) drivers take Meeting or East Bay instead. We already pedestrianize King Street once a month for Second Sunday, and it ends up being the busiest day of the month for businesses along the corridor. Second Sunday is a wildly successful event and pedestrianizing the street would make that success permanent.
My proposal only pedestrianizes King Street from Calhoun–Queen (the same corridor that is closed on Second Sundays). My full concept is too big to be uploaded, but you can view it here. Here is a snippet of the larger proposal:
There are several things I really tried to accomplish:
- King Street is turned into a promenade, but cross-streets are still drive-able. For example, drivers can still drive all the way through Wentworth Street, even at its intersection with King. They will just no longer be able to drive down King St. (See Lincoln Road in Miami Beach as a precedent)
- A two-way bike lane runs down the middle of King Street to provide a reasonable cycling route for the lower peninsula. Right now, there is no good two-way route for cyclists on the lower peninsula, especially because Lower King only allows one-way traffic. This cycletrack would solve the problem. This would also complement the Lowline which will serve the upper peninsula.
- The cycletrack is offset from the center of the street for two reasons: first, because the offset position works better with the street's tight geometry at intersections (Liberty & Society; Hasell & Beaufain); second, so that there is a 'wide' section of the promenade which can be used for events and programming (e.g. food trucks, street vendors, the kind of things you would expect to see on Second Sunday).
- The cycletrack will also serve important secondary functions as a route for emergency vehicles and as a parade route (for the many parades and events which happen on King Street). To this end, the cycletrack will be wide enough to fit a firetruck down it. This will be a godsend for emergency vehicles trying to navigate the peninsula when there's traffic on other roads.