Garland Avenue changes need not destroy neighborhood

I agree with Genevieve Scalan's letter to the editor of the Northwest Arkansas Times quoted below.
Scalan writes:
"I disagree with comments in Scott Shackelford's July 1 column regarding the extent of expansion required for Garland Avenue. While I do agree with him in believing some congestion relieving measures and a bicycle path are needed, I do not think his suggested grand boulevard for a mere three quarters of one mile is the solution. Mr. Shackelford wants us to shoot the bird with buckshot. I am a resident of the neighborhood in question, I travel this section of Garland Avenue every work day and I am well acquainted with the traffic issues. The problem is the brief rush hour, morning and evening, during the fall and spring semesters with traffic turning left onto Sycamore and Deane streets. Yes, occasionally a person traveling at other times may need to wait to turn left and back up traffic for a short time. It is annoying; but, can be addressed without drastically altering the nature of a residential neighborhood.
"Mr. Shackelford says Christine Myers, whom he quotes, is wrong. While he is entitled to disagree with her, she is not wrong because Garland does run through a residential neighborhood. He characterizes Garland Avenue as "front door to the University of Arkansas. "Garland Avenue is not only the figurative door to the university; it is literally at the front doors of neighborhood residents. Shackelford's suggested grass median thoroughfare would be lovely in the context of a commercially zoned area like College Avenue; however, the fact remains the suggested boulevard is less than one mile in a residential neighborhood.
"In my opinion, Shackelford overreaches when he summarizes the problem along Garland Avenue. If, by his statement the street "sees a crush of traffic on most Saturdays each fall," he means there are six university football games per year in Fayetteville, then I suggest we must take his other statements about traffic as being hyperbolic as well. Designing a road based on its use for six afternoons each year is tantamount to designing a toy store parking lot based on its use the week before Christmas. It is wasteful. The ultimate solution to the traffic problem should be devised with the most common use of the street in mind. It is used for commuter traffic to and from the university and its environs by automobiles, university buses and bicycles.
"The solution should accommodate these needs and our limited taxpayer funds should not be spent acquiring the rights of way for and construction of a four block Fayetteville Champs Elysees. The issues with Garland Avenue can be solved with two traffic lanes, a turn lane, a bicycle path and a few lights. I find it interesting that other neighborhoods surrounding the university are afforded traffic calming measures while our neighborhood is slated for traffic increasing measures. Could this be because, as Shackelford states, we aren't "anything to write home about ? "Fayetteville is better than that.
Genevieve Scalan
Fayetteville
As seen in the Sunday July 6, 2008, Northwest Arkansas Times