Greening The Pikes
By Shuangwen Yang, Design Education Fellow
10 min read Roads have been around since civilization. While they have always brought us so much efficiency for personal and commercial use, it’s important to understand why they need to be improved as our communities grow. This blog focuses on the history, critics, and advocacy of Nashville turnpikes to make it greener and more pedestrian friendly.
HISTORY Of TURNPIKES AND WHY THEY WERE POPULAR IN THE U.S.
The idea of turnpikes came from the early settlers from England. Long pikes were used to construct toll gates which were directed toward vehicles or animals to stop traffic for toll collection. After the fee was paid, the pikes were then turned to let traffic pass.
The first engineered road in the US was the Lancaster Turnpike spanning 62 miles between Philadelphia and Lancaster in Pennsylvania from 1793 to 1795. Its opening quickly attracted the attention of merchants in other states in the recognition of its potential to expand commerce opportunities beyond their regions.
The popularity of toll roads grew rapidly throughout the 19th century, at one point, there were between 2,500 and 3,200 companies that had great success in finance, construction, and operation of their toll roads across the country.
Franklin Pike Toll House in Brentwood, TN
It may seem that toll roads only benefited very few as profits often went into private ownership. As a matter of fact, they indirectly facilitated trade and encouraged long-term community gain. Business entities were often located along pikes instead of clustering in a certain area. Farmers, land speculators, merchants, or even ordinary households were often investors and stockholders. Restrictions have also been put in place to grant exemptions from toll payment in certain places. People who were attending and returning from church services, family business, funerals, town meetings, military duties and those who lived within a mile of a toll road were exempt from paying tolls. Numerous toll road projects involved monument building for the community. Throughout time, toll roads gradually became a symbol of civic pride.
By the end of 19 century, with the rise of automobiles as well as the accumulated resources and capabilities in state and county government, new governmental highway agencies started leaning toward more centralized highway management. As a result, the popularity of private toll roads was gradually stamped out. From the east to west coast, a great number of them were bought out or shut down. In Tennessee, state law authorized counties to purchase turnpikes from private companies and free them from toll charges. The last toll road in Tennessee was the Nashville to Franklin turnpike which was freed in 1926.
PIKES IN NASHVILLE Today
Pikes are no strangers to Nashvillians. If you don’t live near one, chances are that at some point you have relied on one to get around. Though pikes are no longer one of the only transportation means like the old times, they serve as important fabrics that connect different areas around town. Take Nolensville Pike as an example, being one of the earliest road developments in town, it has been known for its business diversity—Middle Eastern, Asian, Kurdish, and Latino businesses all have found a niche in the growing immigrant population South of Nashville. Leading straight to downtown, this pike not only serves as the international corridor of Nashville with its colorful retailers, restaurants, and service shops, which also serve as gathering places and employment centers, but more importantly, it narrates the stories and success of Nashville’s vibrant immigrant communities and gives us a sense of belonging.
An intersection at Nolensville Pike and Harding Place in Nashville reimagined with raised landscaped medians
While pikes support our daily activities anywhere from commuting to shopping and conducting businesses, they are struggling to provide aesthetically pleasant views and equitable services for everyone in need. Issues such as a lack of walkability, lighting, and landscape have exposed themselves over time. Poor infrastructure not only contributes to higher accident rates, but it can also raise a series of environmental and health concerns. Having raised medians or better yet, landscaped medians are effective ways to help ease these problems and ultimately build a healthier and stronger community.
What effective design changes can we make to our pikes?
Raised MediansAlong the pikes where there are more storefronts, businesses, and bus stops, there tends to be more pedestrian activities. However, with speed limits being around 40-45 mph and practically no one drives below the speed limit, crossing a pike safely in those areas can be a highly skilled task for a pedestrian. If someone were to cross a five-lane road without a proper crosswalk of any protection, chances are that person needs to estimate how fast the vehicles are approaching, predict vehicle paths, and adjust their walking or running speed to accommodate. If you are in a wheelchair, crossing outside a crosswalk is absolutely life threatening.
At night, pedestrian crossing can be even more dangerous because of glaring and lighting issues. Whenever there’s low visibility in the surroundings due to a lack of street lighting or bad weather, it’s difficult for a driver to slow down soon enough to avoid contact with a pedestrian. Take the intersection at Dickerson Pike and Hart Lane as an example, convenience stores and the bus stops are located near this intersection where many people walk to. Around the intersection, there are no crosswalks, pedestrian signals, or medians. A wide, straight, and flat road condition creates almost a perfect opportunity for cars to fly through the area going at least 60 mph. Between 2018 and 2021, there have been 22 pedestrian crashes, which resulted in serious injuries and fatalities at the location.
The pedestrian crash risk for crossing a multi-lane road without a median is 6.48 times higher than when one is crossing with a median. Pedestrian crashes contribute to 12 percent of all traffic fatalities annually. Among that 12 percent, over 75 percent of these fatalities happen at non intersection locations.
Pedestrian crashes can be reduced by 46 percent with raised medians or pedestrian refuge at marked crosswalks and by 39 percent at unmarked crosswalk locations. Pedestrian refuges not only allow them to cross one direction traffic at a time, which already reduces the complexity of crossing, but also allows room for lighting and signage improvement at pedestrian crossing locations. Sufficient lighting has been proved to reduce fatalities caused by pedestrian crossing at nighttime by 78 percent. Additionally, raised medians can reduce motor vehicle crashes by 15 percent, ultimately providing safer driving experiences for drivers.
Landscape BuffersOne of the most common elements used for raised medians is landscape planting including trees, shrubs, and groundcovers. The use of landscape not only provides great aesthetic value but tremendous environmental and health benefits.
Tree canopies have been proven to be very useful to help reduce urban heat island effect, which occurs when cities replace natural land cover with buildings, pavement, and other surfaces that absorb and retain heat from the sun. Trees help lower surface and air temperature by providing shade and through transpiration – a natural air-cooling effect that happens when trees release moisture into the air.
Trees are air filters that not only help absorb odor and pollutant gasses such as nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide, but also filter particulates out of the air by trapping them on the leaves and barks. Trees are also great stormwater infrastructure that help reduce stormwater runoff and improve water quality by absorbing and filtering rainwater.
Landscapes can reduce sound by absorbing sound waves and reducing sound intensity. Leaves, twigs, and branches on trees absorb and deflect sound energy. Studies indicate that the greatest noise reduction happens at the ground level, which implies that the more layers of planting, the better noise barrier it will serve.
Landscaped medians in a road with multiple lanes often help in decreasing glare from the oncoming direction, which greatly minimize chances for accidents. [The Google Street View features landscaped medians with a variety of planting layers along Parkside Drive in Farragut, TN.]
Commuting can be stressful for many urban travelers, stress from difficult commutes tends to make drivers behave more aggressively on the road and may result in lower job satisfaction and performance and higher sickness rates. Studies have found that greener routes can greatly enhance driving experience for drivers as they help create feelings of relaxation, more positive mood changes and tension relief.
A Case Study for Landscaping on Major Roads
Michigan Avenue in Downtown Chicago before 1993
Prior to 1993, Michigan Avenue in Chicago, IL was widely dominated by gray infrastructure. However, four parkway planters that were put up by Crate & Barrel’s flagship store caught the mayor’s attention to develop a plan along Michigan Ave with similar designs. The stakeholders understood both the tangible and intangible value that greener streets would bring. Not only would people want to come to Michigan Avenue more, but they would want to invest more into it. The beautification of the street would bring more shoppers and real estate investors. Seeing the financial and social return on investment of the street, a collaboration between civic leaders and designers began.
To achieve the vision was not easy. As one of the city’s first public-private partnerships, it took nearly a year to raise the fund from private investors in the area to upkeep the costs of the first 20 years of the project maintenance. Disagreements had to be resolved among stakeholders, architects, and landscape architects on the use of plant materials, planter types and maintenance budget. Plant materials were carefully selected to endure the urban environment, adapt changing conditions, and provide aesthetic visuals without increasing the cost and blocking the views of the retail windows.
Seasonal planting inside landscaped medians on Magnificent Mile in Chicago
The design formula for Michigan Avenue streetscape was established over time including three different installations that correspond to Spring, Summer, and Fall each year. There were 80 median planters that covered 27,000 square feet of plantable surfaces and stretched 2.3 miles in total. Spring season features Tulips planted at a high density and is well mixed so the blooms can last as long as possible. The Summer display showcases more robust and vibrant plants with various heights and shapes. Midwest native perennials and grasses have also been predominantly used on the design. In the Fall, cooler plants are used to accommodate the changing atmosphere.
On a local scale, the streetscape project provided numerous benefits for Chicagoans. It provides a permanent employment program, as the maintenance is contracted out by the city to local consultant crews. One of the crews is run by A Safe Haven Foundation that trains and employs at-risk youth, veterans and people recovering from substance abuse. To keep waste to a minimum, planted materials that are changed out on the project are often donated or replanted at different institutions and gardens across the city.
Over 20 years, there were more than 60 planting designs developed and implemented on Michigan Avenue. The positive effects of this project have inspired both informal and formal landscape design trends throughout the city. Since then, Chicago has planted over 100 miles of landscaped medians to beautify its communities.
Why is it difficult to advocate for more landscaping in Nashville?
Public roadways come with their own complexity as some of them could be operated by state, federal or local municipalities. Deciding which section needs improvement and who to reach out to can be a complicated and lengthy process before any work begins.
Insufficient environmental education and awareness and a lack of open-minded thinking from policy makers and people in positions of power can be a major setback for more tree canopy and landscape along public roadways. The idea of urban forestry is often insufficiently understood, especially when the value of the benefits is not represented or tangible. Unlike other public infrastructure such as education systems that have been more valued and invested in by the public and the government, trees and public spaces are often considered as “nonproductive public goods”, which means that they do not exclude anyone from enjoying the benefits of them whether the individuals pay for them or not. Without evidence of direct economic value, there may be very little motive to prioritize things like landscape in land development and planning.
Nashville no doubt is growing to be a developer friendly metropolitan city. From a development standpoint, budget and maintenance are often hurdles that limit the opportunities for more landscape. Driven by the high construction cost, unlike things such as architectural and paving materials that are considered as essential, it’s more than reasonable to deprioritize the landscape budget. Generally, a development needs to meet a tree density requirement determined by the site acreages and building footages. Both preserved and newly planted trees are credited for different values toward the required tree density units. When the requirement can’t be met, developers would need to pay the difference owed at $725 per tree density unit. This can help them overcome certain constraints because many urban sites allow very little room for tree planting because of overhead utility lines or poor soil conditions etc.. However, many builders choose code minimum planting and pay into the "tree bank" to expedite completion and to avoid more future landscape maintenance. Sometimes the amount paid could be tens of thousands of dollars. Additionally, the Urban Forestry Department is understaffed with just 2 people, which makes it almost impossible to maintain high quality performance when it comes to public responsiveness and operational efficiency.
A lack of environmental education and awareness of the public may also make it hard to implement landscape, particularly along existing roadways. With a predominately driving oriented lifestyle here, many residents could reject the idea of having more landscape on roadways as they can create more roadway construction, take away more driving lanes and ultimately inconvenience drivers.
THE BIG PICTURE
On a city level, green infrastructure must be included in the big conversation as Nashville continues to grow and learn to be a big city. Reinforcing Metro's new tree ordinance (BL2018-1416, BL2020-288, and BL2021-619) and making sure the tree bank payment goes toward planting on public properties is crucial. More directions and regulations on landscape codes would help raise the design standards and also help developers better implement landscape in future developments around the city.
On a community level, it takes motivation. Educational workshops could be implemented to spread more awareness of the benefits and long-term gains of a greener city. On an individual level, advocacy for more landscape can simply begin with internet research or conversations with neighbors, local organizations or council members. Environmental education curriculum with hands-on experiences in K-12 classrooms can also be a great way to foster future advocates.
We can only advocate for something that we care about and believe in. It all comes down to an individual’s mindset. And depends on who that individual is, the outcome could be very influential. To make our streets greener and more pedestrian friendly takes all levels of involvement. Though it may be an uncomfortable and difficult process to begin, it will help bring our communities closer, make our city more sustainable, and fuel more economic growth in the long run.
Want to learn more? Here are some visions the Design Center created for Nolensville Pike.
Special thanks to Judson Newbern from Nashville Tree Conservation Corps, Meg Epstein from CA South, Ed Henley from Pillars Development, and Stephan Kivett from Metro Urban Forestry for their contributions and inspirations.