Downtown Bentonville A Ave

Bentonville AK

NE “A” Street Bentonville

Walton Enterprises & Blue Crane

NE “A” Street in downtown Bentonville runs north from city hall town square. BlueCrane and Walton Enterprises retained Metrocology to assess and prepareconceptual plans for the pedestrianization of the street.For such investments tosucceed it is important to nurture a business and cultural environment that is ableto support the levels of visitor and investment activity required to coverconstruction costs and ongoing maintenance of any such facility

Metrocology determined that NE A Street is a good candidate for a pedestrian-onlyzone for the following reasons:

Bentonville’s existing tourist draw of cultural and recreational destinations withinimmediate proximity of NE A Street currently stands at over 1.2 million annually.This does not include the business traveler volumes associated with Walmart and itsvendors.
Bentonville’s downtown street network has sufficient redundancy andconnectivity to absorb the removal of NE A Street from the City’s transportationsystem with minimal to no impact on traffic circulation and accessibility.
Bentonville’s population is large enough to support a “pent up demand” for thetype of development that comes with such zones, yet small enough to notoversupply the market with competing venues for the attention of people’s timeand money.

The Master Plan illustrates the proper approach for designing successful pedestrianonly streets that differs from that used to design “open space” in a suburban, orrural setting. A pedestrianized “street” is not the same as a park, or green space.Park space draws people to participate in recreational and meditative pursuitswithin its boundaries. What surrounds a park is not as important as what the parkcontains because when designed correctly a park’s success relies on the details ofthe natural amenities and active/passive recreational opportunities within. APedestrian Zone’s success is determined almost entirely by the offerings thatsurround it. Pedestrian spaces draw people to its edges. The success of theamenities that surround the space are what fills the space itself