WILMINGTON – Improved lighting around the historic Kenan Memorial Fountain at Fifth Avenue downtown may be the best short-term solution toward reducing the destructive vehicle impacts sustained there so many times over the years, city staffers told Wilmington City Council on Wednesday.
The $10,000 plan would involve the installation of white LED lighting around the fountain for increased awareness among approaching drivers, Traffic Engineering Manager Don Bennett explained, adding it would not require the permits needed for more intensive measures. For instance, an option to raise the intersection with enhanced crosswalks to calm traffic would take considerable design, construction and permitting.
But as staffers resolved to pursue the lighting project, City Council members on Wednesday opened their minds to more dramatic changes around the iconic fountain, located at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Market Street between the Bellamy Mansion and the Carolina Apartments building five blocks from Wilmington’s riverfront. The city received the fountain in 1921 from William Rand Kenan Jr., who deemed it a memorial to his parents, according to city information.
“This is a historic landmark,” Councilman Charlie Rivenbark said. “There comes a time when you have to make a compromise to save something like this.”
Most council members seemed interested in limiting the travel to a single lane each way around the circular fountain. Currently, cars steer around it in two lanes–and some smack right into it.
In August, a driver impacted the fountain with such intensity it knocked it out of service. Water hasn’t sprung from it since.
Other cracks, scrape marks and car-scars are evidence of the 20 total impacts it has sustained in the past five years alone. In the greater plaza at Fifth and Market around the fountain, the city has documented 75 miscellaneous accidents in the past five years.
The majority of them occurred around 2 a.m., Bennett said.
A change of behavior on the roadways in and out of downtown may be the best hope, Councilwoman Laura Padgett said Wednesday. The city may need to explore traffic-slowing methods like single-lane corridors or reflective strips to “let people know that they’re not coming into a speedway; they’re coming into an historic downtown,” she said.
Councilman Kevin O’Grady said he supported the lighting plan for the short term, but “everything that’s been said about slower speeds, I agree with.”
Contact Ben Brown at [email protected] or (910) 772-6335. On Twitter: @benbrownmedia
