Plans to close a portion of Bloomington’s Kirkwood Avenue for additional restaurant and merchant capacity due to the coronavirus pandemic are almost set.
The city’s Board of Public Works approved the plan initiated by Kirkwood retailers Tuesday night.
The temporary measures make it easier for the Kirkwood Community Association to request street closures by relaxing rules and allowing a single application for participating retail entities. It also allows the planning and transportation department to give road closure approval.
If city council approves as expected next Wednesday, a trial run is scheduled the weekend of June 19.
City Economic and Sustainable Development Director Alex Crowley says the trial Kirkwood closure runs from Grant Street to Indiana Avenue.
“They picked these two blocks initially because they got unanimous approval, they didn’t pick other blocks because there was some question as to whether or not they could get that,” Crowley says.
Traffic will continue to run north and south on streets intersecting Kirkwood.
The closure will start 5 p.m. Friday and last until Sunday evening. Then Crowley says, they’ll evaluate.
“The reason why we want to start off with a single weekend and spend a lot of time and energy really evaluating what happens is to ensure we’re not inadvertently creating an unhealthy situation,” Crowley says.
The temporary measures run through September 30.
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