Each week, the City of Champaign shares a throwback photo of times-gone-by in Champaign. This week, it was of the ribbon cutting of the newly reopened Neil Street. For just over ten years, from 1975 to 1986, Neil and Taylor Streets in Downtown Champaign were a pedestrian mall, closed off to traffic. It was not a successful endeavor.
Would something like this work now? As far as we know the Neil Street Plaza project is still a thing. Not quite the same, but it’s dipping a toe into the possibilities of a reimagined downtown. This pedestrian mall in Iowa City is pretty cool. Could that happen here? We already do a little temporary street closing during Friday Night Live. What if that whole area became pedestrian only for a couple of hours on Fridays in the summer?