1999 Eugene Arterial & Collector Street Plan

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Appendix G Historical Influences What alternatives have been proposed in the past for difFerent street systems? In the 1960's the state highway department and local planners and engineers developed preliminary plans for very extensive freeway and expressway networks. The interconnected system of major highways envisioned in the 1965 ESATS (Eugene- Springfield Area Transportation Study) Plan would have resulted in a network that was largely superim- posed on the existing urban pattern, with existing arterial streets playing a much less important role in carrying traffic. The "freeway revolt" of the late 60s and early 70s led to rejection of the ESATS Plan and development of a new regional transportation plan known as the T-2000 Plan. This plan, adopted in 1978, signaled a major departure from earlier proposals. The two most important features of the T- 2000 Plan were its reliance on much greater use of alternative modes of travel to lessen the need for roadway capacity increases, and its emphasis on improving existing streets and roadways rather than building extensive new roadway mileage. !~ There were several areas in Eugene where the T- 2000 Plan did propose new corridors: ~~~ • the Chambers Connector, to provide a safe and effective connection from central and west Eugene to the River Road area, via a new '~ ~ railroad overpass and connection to 6th and 7th __! avenues; __, • the 6th-7th Extension, later renamed the West Eugene Parkway, to complete the connection of State Highway 126 between the 6tn _ 7tn couplet and West 11th, west of Beltline (this corridor was I selected as a replacement for the formerly '~ ' proposed Roosevelt Freeway); and • an extension of Roosevelt Boulevard, to connect Highway 99 with Beltline for truck and I' ' industrial traffic in west Eugene (utilizing the former Roosevelt Freeway corridor). The Chambers Connector and Roosevelt Boulevard were successfully completed in the 1980s, while the (--, West Eugene Parkway is still awaiting completion of supplemental environmental and alignment studies. Other than these three facilities, most of the T-2000 projects in Eugene were to be improvements to existing major streets. In a few cases, refinement studies contained proposals for other major projects, or even new corridors. The most ambitious of these was the Downtown Westside Study of the late 1970s, which proposed a Lincoln Boulevard and new I-105 ramp connections that would have relocated the traffic now using Washington and Jefferson Streets several blocks eastward. That proposal was rejected primarily based on the. impact to the neighborhood immediately west of downtown Eugene. The T-2000 Plan was updated in the 1980s, resulting in the adoption of TransPlan in 1986. TransPlan continued the emphasis on use of existing streets and increasing use of alternative modes. The most significant new corridor proposed in TransPlan is the Valley River Bridge. This proposed new Willamette River crossing would connect River Road near its south end with the Valley River/Goodpasture Island area and Delta Highway. One of the main purposes of this bridge would be to reduce out-of-direction travel between these areas on either side of the river, and in turn to reduce the resulting congestion on the Washington- )efferson and Beltline bridges and their approaches. What factors (geographic and other) and past decisions have been made that shaped the current Street system? General Influences The origin of street systems throughout the west can be traced back to wildlife trails that were followed by Native Americans who inhabited the area. In the early 1800's "military roads" were constructed to connect the existing trails, most of which followed the natural terrain and lay of the land. During the 1840's and 1850's, when gold prospecting led to immigration of settlers and establishment of the Oregon Territory, many of the Military Roads were improved as Territorial Roads. Congress enacted the homestead act, providing land for settlers in the emerging states and territories in the west, and communities which had grown out of the exploration for minerals became centers for