The impending construction of North Village, apartment-style dorms and parking on the block bounded by North Main, Limber Road, Highland Avenue and East John Street, rekindled the flames in May 2005. Pat Bywater, a resident of Highland just north of the development and the Tribune’s executive editor, prompted a discussion of the impact of both the students and parking for their vehicles. At the time, Mayor Richard Friedberg suggested using the Sherman Street solution to any long-term parking problems that might arise — banning overnight parking on surrounding streets.

The most recent seeds of this change were planted in June 2007, when Meadville City Councilman Christopher Soff expressed his fear that someone was going to get hurt crossing North Main as it travels through the center of campus. At the time, there were three specific crossing areas.

According to Soff, many of the scariest moments took place at night. “If you add rain to that, it can be very difficult to see someone waiting to cross the street,” he said at the time. During the summer that followed, the three existing crosswalks were consolidated into two, and parking was eliminated in the surrounding areas. From King’s perspective, it made a difference.

The latest move would complete the elimination of parking along the stretch, a step King believes would help the situation even more. “A flashing yellow light — especially at night, might help,” he added during a Tuesday interview.

When Meadville resident B.J. Smith suggested the possibility of eliminating parking along both North Main and Park Avenue in May 2008, Lee wrote an opinion piece for the Tribune ending with the words, “The time seems right for the city to consider banning parking on North Main Street in the area of Allegheny College, and we are fully supportive of this move.”

“We’re not pushing for it, but if people want the cars removed, OK,” Lee said Monday

A safety-related project involving the same area, the creation of “pedestrian refuges” at the crosswalks along the west side of the street, had recently been placed on temporary hold. During council’s Aug. 6 study session, Chriest said that city crews had too many other projects under way to “do it and do it right” before the start of school.

The project was specifically designed to give pedestrians a safe place to wait where they would no longer be hidden by parked vehicles. If the parking experiment is successful, that may not be necessary, according to Chriest.

Lee agrees. “The combination of consolidating crosswalks and removing cars had a tremendously positive impact on the safety of people crossing North Main,” he said Tuesday. “If that made it that much safer, how about moving the other cars? When you have a community of 2,500 people, you are going to have those who cross between cars. If you remove the cars, there aren’t cars to come out between.”

What to watch for next

Meadville City Council will meet Wednesday at 4 p.m. in the Meadville City Building on Water Street for its regularly-scheduled study session. The public is welcome to attend. In addition to a resolution authorizing the removal of parking on North Main Street where it passes through the Allegheny College campus, other items on the agenda include a continued discussion of a city curfew and a discussion on updating the city’s property-maintenance regulations.