Barricades to a ‘walkable’ Quarter?

The Mayor’s proposal to convert the Vieux Carré into a pedestrian-only zone intrigues, but what about the residents who might wish to drive to their homes? Or the restaurant owners dependent on motor traffic to deposit goods and customers to their doors?

These are just a few of the complaints that have flown since Mayor LaToya Cantrell proposed the idea last Wednesday in a town hall sponsored by the daily paper. Nevertheless, the mayor’s proposal to turn the French Quarter and other city areas into pedestrian-only thoroughfares may prove the only way to save public music performance, as well as preserve quite a few historic bars and restaurants during the pandemic. However, without some simple technological precautions, which would still allow residents to drive to their homes, the idea could also kill this and other historic neighborhoods.

Excluding vehicular traffic from historic areas frequented by tourists around the world has literally saved old neighborhoods from the wear-and-tear of traffic shaking the structures to their foundations. More importantly, auto bans have allowed for a flourishing of street performance — and alfresco dining. One need only look at our own pedestrian-friendly Jackson Square to see a once busy set of streets converted into a gathering place for performance and visual artists.

Moreover, Mayor Cantrell hit upon the central dilemma of the COVID-19 lockdown for the local jazz and music community. Closing down bars constitutes one of the easiest ways to stop coronavirus transmission, yet without those performance spaces, even well-known musicians lack a place to profitably play their songs. Few restaurants are equipped to provide a substitute, and the restrictions to 25 percent occupancy and 100 maximum guests makes the economics of paying musicians to play problematic.

Mayor Cantrell hit upon the idea of allowing the Vieux Carré to become one continuous performance zone. With automobiles restricted from the streets, other than a few hours in the early mornings, performers could ring out tunes on the streets — before tourists and locals seated on chairs, spilling onto the sidewalks from the bars and eateries — ones faced with restricted dining and drinking space indoors. Imagine a constant French Quarter Festival, in other words, matched with a dining experience closer to Venice than Manhattan. Use the open airspace backdropped with the romance of the historic structures as one’s stage and dining “room.”

Of course, this laudable idea can drive permanent residents from their homes even without banning cars. Barcelona found the constant presence of street musicians and performers so cacophonous in the late hours of the evening than the city government banned singing on the streets so as to stem the tide of residents leaving for quieter neighborhoods.

Also, often unnoticed, many French Quarter homes possess off-street parking. Many residents drive from their homes to their offices and back, just like everyone else. The driveways and parking areas are disguised might maintain the 18th Century charm of the architecture, yet the houses still have automobile access. Closing the streets to cars might understandably aggravate those who call the Vieux Carré home.

It’s already difficult enough to live within a tourist mecca. Literally driving away the residents’ ability to drive might be the proverbial “final nail in the coffin.” The number of permanent French Quarter residents declines each year, despite bans on AirBnB and new hotels in the Vieux Carré. Faced with their cars parked in lots blocks away, many might give up the struggle. And, transforming the Quarter from a neighborhood to an adult Disneyland is no victory.

A couple of simple modifications to the mayor’s proposal could create a viable pedestrian French Quarter and allow some limited residential automobiles. Many historic districts have movable barricades at their extremities. The streets that lead into the historic areas of Santiago de Compostela, Spain are interrupted by metal poles that come up into the cobblestone streets. However, any registered resident, licensed delivery driver, or taxicab can enter a code, and the poles retract into the ground for three minutes — allowing the motor vehicles to enter.

Walking the streets of Santiago de Compostela feels quiet; cars rarely intrude. Street musicians play relatively unobstructed as café tables face the streets and pedestrians walk by. Simply using technology to restrict motor traffic to the historic core has achieved the effect, without the impact to residents and most visitors of banning cars altogether. As New Orleans already uses retractable barricades on Bourbon and Royal streets, albeit ones that shift sideways rather than up and down, the idea is hardly new.

Of course, an interim solution may prove a simpler long-term answer. The City currently closes Royal Street in the afternoons to cars, and Bourbon St. at night. Merely extend the hours for both from 11 a.m. to 7 a.m. Make both streets pedestrian-only twenty hours per day, and perhaps add Chartres to the combination. In other words, the horizontal thoroughfares in the front of the Quarter would be mostly closed to automobiles, other than those possessing the electronic codes to pass, while Dauphine and Burgundy, as well as the vertical streets, would remain passable.

Admittedly, drop-off difficulties would emerge for Theaters like Le Petit and restaurants ranging from Tableau to Muriel‘s to Arnaud‘s to Galatoire’s — not to mention the difficulties of public auto access to Louisiana Supreme Court. Yet, the cafés on those streets, the shuttered bars now reopened to serve outdoors, flanked with performance spaces and boutiques might experience a renaissance as pedestrian traffic increases. Simply allowing some limited auto traffic in the Quarter could provide the balance to the “walkers” and the “drivers.” The mayor’s challenge to “reimagine” the city’s French Quarter with no cars, more pedestrian malls, and more investment in its outdoor spaces might prove a serendipity of this tragic interregnum of COVID-19 — if the needs of the Vieux Carré residents are taken into account.

This article originally published in the June 1, 2020 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.