Complete S. 2nd St. celebrated in Walker's Point

Ten years in the making, the completed reconstruction of S. 2nd St. will be celebrated Thursday afternoon with a party hosted by the Walkers Point Association.

Initial engineering on the project started in 2001. Planners focused on rebuilding the road between Pittsburgh St. and National Ave. and maintaining four traffic lanes in each direction.

The Walkers Point Association and area residents sought a different approach: bike lanes, wider sidewalks and trees.

Dave Schlabowske, the bicycle and pedestrian coordinator for the city, details the result in this Over the Bars in Milwaukee blog. As travelers will find, the segment of S. 2nd St. now has one traffic lane in each direction, well-marked lanes for bikers and landscaping.

It's a version of the Complete Streets required by state law.

The final bills are being tallied but the total project cost estimate is $4,494,000, according to the city.

The cost, the process and the final result has detractors. This blog attacks the bike lanes and sidewalks as wasteful spending.