Rethinking Ephraim

An abundance of asphalt is the first thing landscape architect Jamison Brown and his team from the landscape design firm livingLAB noticed when they arrived in Ephraim a day before holding several days of meetings with village stakeholders earlier this month.

“We like to get a first impression without the client there to kind of steer us in a particular direction,” Brown said.

What they saw was too much emphasis on places to park vehicles.

“We thought the biggest impairment to the character of the village was their attempt to correct what they believe to be a parking deficit within the village,” Brown said. “They had taken a piecemeal approach to finding available parking space, and that led to what we saw as a shoehorning in of parking in every available nook and cranny. As a newcomer, as you stand and look at it, you see they had lost sight of, I think, the breathing room their civic buildings need. Just the amount of asphalt; they have paved over a lot of the quaintness of the village. One of our recommendations was find an alternative to doing this and peel away some of the asphalt and reveal a little bit more of what was once here.”

The idea that less parking is better was eye opening for some Ephraim residents, Brown said.

“I think that satisfied some of the early skeptics of our firm, or any firm, that we were going to come in and recommend more building, when in fact we’re recommending unbuilding some of the things they’ve done over the years,” Brown said.

It seems everyone was surprised at how positive the series of meetings that ran Aug. 6 – 9 went.

“We were extremely excited about the participation level for such a small village,” Brown said. “The way people were willing to listen to other people’s ideas and come together on commonalities was pretty impressive. There seemed to be a lot of support for at least the preliminary recommendations, across the board, whether it’s business, municipal, seasonal, year-round. A lot of people commented that they had never had a community meeting where everyone came together like that. We do these projects all over and this one was a favorite so far.”

The Village Board, at its monthly meeting on Aug. 11, noted that Brown is a skilled facilitator who helped direct things in a positive manner.

“There is a bit of municipal therapy involved in our workshop,” Brown admitted.

Now Brown and his team are waiting to hear back from the village regarding the recommendations that were made. Village residents have been asked to review the recommendations (which can be seen online on the village website, ephraim-wisconsin.com) and deliver their thoughts to the village, which will then be submitted to livingLAB.

“The immediate next step is to get the final feedback from the community on our recommendations, and then develop our final plan,” Brown said.

Once the village has a final plan, Brown said the plan can be used to leverage grant money for projects or in negotiations with state departments, in particular the Wisconsin Department of Transportation in regard to Highway 42 running through the village.

“That’s a big piece of the puzzle,” Brown said. “A lot of the recommendations that we proposed dealt with finding alternatives for people to driving to a particular destination in the downtown. How can we encourage more centralized parking, limit the on-street parking, pedestrian/bicycle conflict that exists right now, and also protect some of the historic assets, too. That’s a big, big project that has many components to it. They need to work on promoting and encouraging bicycling and walking. To do that, they’re going to have to look at some policy decisions, as well as some infrastructures issues. When those are accomplished, then certainly the idea of changing the parking paradigm along 42 will have a good opportunity to change the perspective of the state DOT with regard to what that right of way should look like in the future.”

The one thing village trustees voiced concern about at the Aug. 11 meeting was a fear of losing the momentum generated by the livingLAB team.

“We can’t let it die,” said Village President Mike McCutcheon.

“I don’t think anything that was proposed in the plan is very pie in the sky. That’s a nice thing,” Brown said. “The community came together around some common ideas that aren’t wild and crazy. It’s just coming up with a plan that lays out a strategic framework that staff can follow through on.

“The goal of our firm has always been to produce plans that are implantable,” he continued. “And have milestones that are identified with people to spearhead them. We like to help a community achieve the outcomes desirable to them as opposed to just creating a plan that sits on the shelf. But there is a momentum we hope to carry through. It seems to us the leadership of the village is definitely supportive of picking out some early projects and making them happen.”

Ephraim Problems Identified

Streets

• Walkways/bikeways are not well connected or defined

• Crosswalks are poorly placed/missing

• Lack of shade

Parking

• Unsafe

• Over prioritized

• Unorganized

Public Spaces

• Not consistent/compatible with quality of civic buildings

• Lack of maintenance

• Lack of shade

• Low quality/mismatched materials and furnishings

Signage/Lighting

• Lack of uniformity

• Placement is inconsistent

• Sign clutter

Recommended Actions

Bicycle and Pedestrian Facilities

• Connect public parks and landmarks

• Link to regional trails and neighboring towns/villages

• Provide pedestrian connections through underused right-of-way

Complete Streets

• Provide accommodation for all modes of travel and all abilities of users along and across the roadway

• Opportunity to influence Hwy 42 design

Parking

• Consolidate parking within the village core

• Provide perimeter parking for visitors/employees/boat trailers, with shuttles during peak season/events

• Implement a bike-sharing program

• Limit parking on 42 to east side of the street and two-hour maximum

• Balance parking need with character/size of spaces