Decorative Asphalt Stamping for Intersections and Crosswalks on Main Street

Starting today Monday, June 15 and going until Sunday, July 12, 2015 crews will be working on Main Street from Country Club to Mesa Drive to increase safety and the visual appeal at both street  intersection and crosswalks between the intersections.
Center Street will remain open all the time, with phased closures as the work progresses.
Here in the image to the right is the schedule and work zone plan.
According to an email just now from Rob Antoniak, Community Outreach Director for the Valley Metro Central Mesa Extension, all the crosswalks between Country Club Drive and Mesa Drive get treated in a similar fashion with several of the intersections in between Country Club Drive and Mesa Drive get treated through the intersection as well.

Eastbound traffic will be detoured to 1st Avenue. Westbound traffic will be detoured to 1st Street
Work activities and restrictions may change due to weather or other unforeseen conditions

Maria Polletta: Spotlight on The Human Cost of Escalating Land Values

Residents Speak Up @ City Council Meeting

An updated Preface to this post:
Please watch the video that was included in Maria Polletta's reporting . . . According to Robert's Rules of Order, comments from the public are invited and they are heard for three minutes - however if there is to be further action by the City Council, a motion must be made to place that item on the next meeting's agenda. There was no such action, only that the item "would be looked into".
In the detailed and approved minutes for this session "Mayor Giles apologized to the residents and said that the Council was unable to discuss their concerns because the matter was not agendized."

See this link: http://apps.mesaaz.gov/meetingarchive/ArchiveDocuments/ClerkDetailedMinutes/June%201,%202015%20RGL.pdf

Mobile Home Park Mesa Royale is turning out to be "a not-so royal mess" for the City of Mesa, after ignoring a point in a decade-old 2004 Housing Master Plan.
What's the benefit of all these "Master Plans" when the city only takes action on "a case-by-case basis" and nobody speaks up to raise attention at public meetings directly with city officials?
In that so-called Housing Master Plan, Mesa officials were highlighting the city's larger-than-average amount of manufactured-housing stock — much of it concentrated along the Main Street corridor — and the problems it could create. At the time, the city had 63 mobile-home parks with nearly 14,000 manufactured units.

"The availability of these affordable properties is an asset to lower-income households," planning officials wrote in the city's 2004 Housing Master Plan . . . " 
Now the City of Mesa recommends the best option is clearing the property by bulldozing, after 100+ residents get evicted
Deanna Villanueva-Saucedo, now the Mesa Association of Hispanic Citizens board chair, cautions now that it was a warning that somebody needs to be paying attention to this. ... This property has been on the city's radar screen for decades, so for there to be such a delayed, reactive response on everybody's behalf doesn't behoove our community."

The City of Mesa has a double standard - one for investors/developers and a different one for residents who live on land for years paying rent for the only housing  they can afford. The City of Mesa provides direct financial incentives for investor-developers , discounts on utilities, tax relief, providing millions in infrastructure, but in this case . . .  Maria Polletta quotes this:
City Manager Chris Brady said Mesa is indeed trying to help, but it can act only as a facilitator, not as a direct provider of financial aid or other services.
 
Here's a link to the excellent reporting in yesterday's Arizona Republic http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/mesa/2015/06/15/mesa-royale-mobile-home-park-decision-human-cost/71235678/

Here's a link on the same subject written IN SPANISH by Maria Polletta and Laura Gomez on June 5th from La Voz: Translation = Hundred of Families in Mesa Face Imminent Eviction

Cientos de familias en Mesa enfrentan desalojo inminente 

Who's Having Fun in The New Urban Downtown Mesa???

Chalk-on-Blackboard > front of LoFi Coffee

On/Off Main Street anyone taking a walk can find some surprising great stuff that's slightly to the left and off-center and outside the official Chain-of-Command that approves and funds public art installations or wayfinding signage, appearing on blackboards or in empty lots ... like these two.

They may not conform to the official line drawn for public art on the sidewalks with all the bronze statues of a pig, Mormon town founders, a bear, frogs, dinosaurs and Humpty Dumpty located around town, but ya gotta admit they are "charming" and quite "innovative" in the eyes of some people with a sense of humor and delight.

On the stretch of Main Street between Robson and Country Club your blogger could find only one source of information to point the way to find businesses located downtown - see image to the left.

If you take a close look at the base you'll see a colorful extraterrestrial on the base of the drum from which rises an over 12-foot tall support for arrows with names of downtown businesses pointing in the directions to find them.

If you're wondering what purpose that big empty wall in the background has other than marking off the side of a building, it's used as the screen for a series of night-time family-oriented movies that take place in an empty lot in downtown close to a new lightrail station at Country Club Drive called The Sliver Lot.

Valley Metro provides some funding for these outdoor movie showings to make The New Urban Downtown an attractive place for families who want something to do at night. It's part of the Neighborhood Community Series.

Link here:  
Mesa Diversity Office Community Cinema

Noted In Passing: Urban Picnic is Closed

-----------------CLOSED---------------

Everybody loves it when two new businesses open up downtown, but it goes with little notice or fanfare, except for 112 Yelpers on Yelp, that a business on Main Street has closed down.

It' hard to say if Urban Picnic just didn't deliver on its promise to create and give meaning to seriously sophisticated fast food at a reasonable price for the hip modern-day on-the-go person who is health-conscious, or there were issues with management, the quality and prices of the food, or customer service, or maybe its location in  close proximity to a national franchise Subway right across the street and a national franchise Taco Bell within a block.

This Notice of Business Closure, issued by Maricopa County Department of Environmental Services,  has been posted on the door.

Notices like this are usually done as a last resort when then are serious violations of of the health code standards for food establishments that must be corrected within a certain amount of time. Failure to do so results in this action if the violations are not corrected or removed.

From reviews of Urban Picnic posted on various sites, there were numerous negative comments about food quality, sanitation, and infestations of ants, as well as bad reviews for employee attitude/service and high prices.

The block on Main Street between Robson and Country Club Drive, where a new Valley Metro Light Rail Station will be open on August, is way overdue for some attention by all the property owners and planning offices in City Hall.
It's the only block west of Center Street that does not have verandas overhead to create shade on the sidewalks for pedestrians.
There's a mix of retail shops, like Fiber Factory, a gallery named Two Hawks specializing in Native American art, an aesthetics and cosmetology institute adjoining the Yoga Studio on Robson, and a number of churches, an auto repair shop, and a pawn shop as well as other established businesses like Mezona Inn and Il Viniao - quite a mix.

The now-closed Urban Grill on the left side of this building next to The Fiber Factory might be in a good location close by what is probably the highest-density residential housing in all of downtown, an early mid-rise apartment building that's taller than City Hall.
Robson Villas, a condominium complex, is on the other side of it @ 225 West First Street.