I would like to follow up a bit on Ben’s recent post about our Friday site visit.

Jaime was really excited about the idea of adding amenities at the dead end/fire truck turn-around. As Ben recalled, he was concerned about safety, with making sure there were no blind spots and keeping things safe for little kids, but he had a lot of positive things to say, as well. He liked the idea of integrating the space with the community gardens, both physically and maybe through programs (like  cooking classes, farmer’s markets, gardening classes, etc.). He had a valid point to consider about the market idea, though, that the space has no visibility from Front or 218, so only foot traffic would know it was there. Perhaps that affects the size or the frequency; just something to consider when programming the space.

Another possibility with that space is to link it more with the street itself to kind of make a thoroughfare headed South to the Plaza and North to the High School or Community Center. Maybe a green street, maybe an arcade. As for linking up with Front Street and the park across the tracks, apparently the neighbors are very much against any traffic through their properties, and they aren’t going anywhere soon, so that seems like a dead end. Jaime didn’t even know about the park, so my guess is the residents don’t use it very much.

As far as the migrant worker population is concerned, Jaime said that it is in the FHDC’s best interest to target the more stable, year-round families than the individual migrant worker. He said that, from what he had seen, the idea of the family unit moving from camp to camp was mostly gone.  In the last fifteen years moving the family has become too expensive and risky (especially at the border), and therefore individuals now make up most of the migrant workforce.

The crosswalk is way down at the end.

Closer-up view of crosswalk.

And here are some images of the busy 218 and desperately needed crosswalk in front of the high school. See Ben’s words about these here.