Nearly a year has passed since a majority of residents submitted comments against the permanent closure of Bell Avenue at the Texas Woman’s University campus.
TWU officials argued that the city’s thoroughfare needed to be closed due to safety concerns for its growing student population. Residents claimed that closing it wasn’t about safety and only benefited TWU and pointed to the Denton ISD campuses as examples of why the university’s argument didn’t make sense.
“You have deemed these mechanisms as appropriate for all schoolchildren for their safety, but by closing Bell to taxpayers and vehicles and school buses and city buses, you are deciding that TWU students and staff, who are all adults, somehow need exceptional protections in excess to those given to children,” said Pam Spooner, one of several residents who appeared at a December council meeting to discuss Bell Avenue after the council voted 5-2 in October to move forward with plans to close it.
But it’s still unclear when the city and TWU plan to close Bell Avenue.
“City staff is working with TWU on options for Bell Avenue and does not have a date set to bring to City Council,” said Stuart Birdseye, a city spokesperson.
Exactly what those options are is also unclear. TWU didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Justin Harmon, another city spokesperson, said that city staff scheduled the Bell/Eagle traffic analysis presentation for the Aug. 1 City Council work session.
“There are quite a few ideas in the works for Bell Avenue, but, at this time, we are not in a place where we are ready to share those concepts,” Harmon said.
For years, TWU has been trying to close about 500 feet of Bell Avenue at the campus, but the City Council denied the requests. Then, after months of construction to repair Bell Avenue with millions of taxpayer dollars, council members changed their mind shortly after the avenue reopened. They voted 5-2 at the Oct. 18 council meeting to allow city staff to move forward with TWU officials to close part of Bell Avenue.
It is estimated that it will cost taxpayers $600,000, former District 3 council member Jesse Davis told council members at the Oct. 18 meeting.
As the Record-Chronicle reported in early October, Bell Avenue divides TWU from Texas Street to University Drive. TWU will be closing 550 feet of Bell Avenue from Chapel Drive to Administration Drive on the northern part of the campus to motor vehicles but not emergency vehicles or delivery ones heading to the dining hall.
TWU also plans to create two dedicated bike lanes that will connect to existing sidewalks.
Residents against the closure created the “Save Bell Avenue” petition in November on Change.org and received about 400 of the 500 signatures they were seeking.
“The Denton City Council has voted to close Bell Avenue. Why? Because they are giving it to TWU! Not only that, but they are spending millions of dollars to make it perfect for TWU,” the petition reads. “If you are not happy with the way your tax dollars are being spent. Please sign the attached petition and let them know that Bell Avenue belongs to the taxpayers of this city, not TWU who pays no property tax of any kind!”
District 1 council member Vicki Byrd, a former TWU employee, voted to move forward with plans to allow TWU to close Bell Avenue. At a late December meeting with Spooner and the Record-Chronicle, Byrd claimed that the city spending an additional $600,000 to give part of Bell Avenue to TWU wasn’t a big deal for a city with a billion-dollar budget.
Byrd suggested that one of the reasons the city is moving forward with TWU’s plan is because TWU is giving them part of a golf course for the Mingo Road upgrade, a passion project for Byrd.
The Mingo Road upgrade is part of the November 2023 city bond package currently being discussed by a Special Citizen Bond Advisory Committee in a series of meetings at the Development Services Center. It’s estimated to cost $38 million.
At the late December meeting, Byrd was under the impression that the city would fix Mingo Road and Ruddell Street before closing Bell Avenue since they are some of the alternative routes being proposed.
“You are thinking logically,” Spooner told Byrd. “But collectively, we saw that that logic was not happening. Vicki, it’s not.”
City staff confirmed Spooner’s assumption and Byrd’s fear in January, as the Record-Chronicle reported in a Jan. 13 article.
In an early January press release, city staff wrote:
“The Bell Avenue Bicycle and Pedestrian Corridor Improvements (e.g. closing Bell Avenue at TWU) are not associated with the Mingo Road/Ruddell Street/Quiet Zones Improvement Project. ... Either project could start at any point pending a finalized scope, secured funding and City Council approval, and are not contingent upon each other.”
The Record-Chronicle contacted Byrd to get an update on the Bell Avenue closure.
“I really had not put much thought into it because of the election but with the bond Committee starting up, I would suspect that the conversation would come back around in due time,” Byrd wrote in a Thursday morning email to the Record-Chronicle. “Let’s see where it goes from that perspective. I’m counting on Mingo Road being a high priority. It will gel at that point.”
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