SE side area needs safer pedestrian options

While walking on my street, Memorial Drive Speedway (south of Mount Vernon Road), I was thinking that when the city insists on putting sidewalks on both sides of the street, that cuts in half the number of streets that have any sidewalk at all. People walk on my street to school, nearby stores, the mailbox, the bus stop, the Dairy Queen, the neighbor’s house, and for dog walking and exercise.

We want walkable neighborhoods. We need to cut carbon emissions from our exhaust pipes. But walking on busy streets is dangerous, particularly with so many folks walking with their backs to traffic instead of facing traffic. My busy dragstrip is going to get even busier with the huge housing development going in down on Otis Road. I would like to see the city of Cedar Rapids change its sidewalk policy so we add more safer walkways on ever busier streets.

Nancy Sauerman

Cedar Rapids