This Sunday, July 12, Avenida da Igreja, one of the main points of commerce in the parish of Alvalade, was closed to traffic in the section between Rua Marquesa de Alorna and Rua José Duro. For a few hours, people can occupy the space that usually belongs to cars, on foot or by bicycle.
The stretch between Rua Marquesa de Alorna and Rua José Duro, which was closed to traffic this Sunday, was precisely the one that the City Council wanted to work on in 2015, under the program A Square in Every Neighborhood. However, opposition from residents and shopkeepers led to the project being put on the back burner.
According to the now-defunct newspaper O Corvo, a The municipality intended to close the area of the avenue between the above streets to general traffic, allowing only public transport to cross, as well as access for loading and unloading.. The remaining vehicles would be diverted to the perpendiculars and two parallels, Rua Luís Augusto Palmeirim, where the Eugénio dos Santos elementary school is located, and Rua Maria Amália Vaz de Carvalho, where the Rainha Dona Leonor secondary school is located. The section that would be practically traffic-free would see an increase in the pedestrian area. On the rest of the avenue, the council wanted to reduce the four lanes to two, placing the existing car parking horizontally in a spine.
Avenida da Igreja has lost pedestrian space in recent years. Although the sidewalks are still wide, they were two meters longer in the 1960s, as one address recalls to the newspaper The Crow. Studies e changes made in other cities prove that increasing pedestrian (and cycling) space greatly benefits local commerce.
In Lisbon, Avenida da Igreja saw its pedestrian space grow for a day. The initiative, part of the The Street Is YoursHowever, it took place on a Sunday, when most of Alvalade's shops are closed. It didn't attract enough people, so it's not expected to take place again.
