The Municipality of Lisbon will not, after all, go ahead with changing traffic directions on the side streets of Avenida da LiberdadeThis project also implied the renovation of the cycling network on that artery and improvements to the sidewalks. Fernando Medina pushed the changes for the next mandate, for a "a matter of prudence". The mayor doesn't want to not be opening "a new front of tension and stress" to the stores and restaurants.
"It is a work that will involve a significant construction site" and which will last for "many months"even with the block-by-block phasing. "It seemed to us that, in the process of pandering and at such a delicate time for local commerce, to be disrupting and causing additional inconvenience with a work of this nature would do more harm than good"said Medina in the public meeting of the municipality of this Wednesday.
Postponed like ZER
Medina's justification for the postponement of the intervention on Avenida da Liberdade, initially scheduled for the first half of this year, is similar to the reason given by Medina for the suspension of ZER Avenida-Baixa-Chiado (ZER ABC). Presented in early 2020, the ABC ZER foresaw the requalification of public space in Baixa and Chiado, and the reduction by 40% of road traffic in that area.
The ZER project included the requalification of Avenida da Liberdade and the reversal of the current circulation scheme on the laterals, which does not allow the entire avenue to travel in the same direction. In other words, one of the laterals would allow for a continuous upward movement along the avenue and the other would allow for a continuous downward movement. Last June, the Mayor announced the indefinite postponement of ZER ABC, so that it would not become "one more factor of difficulty and disruption" for traders.
Teresa Leal Coelho's insistence
In October 2020, despite the suspension of ZER, the Councilwoman Teresa Leal Coelho, elected by the PSD, decided to recover the idea of restoring the original traffic directions on the side streets of Avenida da Liberdade. The proposal was approved in a meeting of the city council with the votes in favor of all parties and the abstention of the PCP; Teresa Leal Coelho celebratedspeaking in a "Christmas present for the people of LisbonHe was convinced that the work would be simple.
Promptly, Miguel Gaspar, the councilman in charge of mobility, denied this, stating that the changes on Avenida da Liberdade would only happen in 2021, in the first half of the year. "It's not just changing a traffic signal, there's even physical work that needs to be done in adjusting some sidewalks, and it's necessary to switch traffic lights sideways", pointed out in statements to TSF. "We're going to do a repaving of the sides, we're going to introduce the cycling channel, as was planned, and we're going to do a number of works that also aim to improve the pedestrian crossings of the avenue."
A similar understanding is held by Fernando Medina, who, in the public City Council meeting this Wednesday, said that the work to be carried out on Avenida da Liberdade will be "deep"involving the resurfacing of the laterals, where "right now there are still streetcar tracks". To the Mayor, who said it won't be an intervention for this term, "there may be an advantage" in realizing at the same time the needy "re-profiling and repairing the sidewalks"which today present several irregularities. Medina was responding to Teresa Leal Coelho, who brought up the subject in the above-mentioned meeting.
From pop-up bike lane to real bike lane
Medina did not mention the bicycle path, but it was in the ZER ABC drawings and in the bicycle path plan pop-upannounced in June last year. Although Avenida da Liberdade is already part of the city's cycling network - with two shared lanes (30+Bici) on the sides - the city council wanted to change that design and turn it into a two segregated, unidirectional tracksThe new traffic directions on the sides of the avenue have to be followed.
The bike path pop-up on Avenida da Liberdade, which was scheduled to be implemented by the end of July 2020, was discreetly exchanged for a more profound work, to be carried out in the first months of this year, as implied in the discussion launched by Councilwoman Teresa Leal Coelho in mid-October.
The traffic direction on the side streets of Avenida da Liberdade had changed in 2012 during António Costa's administration, by the then councilman for mobility, Fernando Nunes da Silva - a measure with the intention of reducing the flow of vehicles and to send the crossing traffic to the central streets of the avenue. In statements to Público newspaperFernando Nunes da Silva commented that the reversal of the directions on the side roads is "a total nonsense" and that "Before the sidings were reversed, peak-hour traffic was around 750 to 1,000 vehicles per hour on the sides. The following year, when traffic counts were taken, it was down to 200, 250 vehicles per hour, and sometimes even less. The most heavily loaded block was the Tivoli Hotel block.".
However, the evolution of the pandemic and the new confinement, which was not foreseen in October, have changed the municipality's plans. Fernando Medina continues to defend the reorganization of traffic on the Avenida da Liberdade side streets and the remaining public space interventions framed within the ZER, but he pushes the two issues to a new decision by the next city council. Meanwhile, there will be local elections.
