The battle over rebuilding Annapolis' Main Street has ended with the city's historic preservation board approving a reconstruction plan stripped of several elements sought by city officials and local business owners.
The Historic District Commission approved the $5 million face-lift for the street Wednesday night after a lengthy public hearing. The new plan calls for burying overhead utility wires and laying new bricks on Main Street, but leaves the street's design mostly unchanged. The proposal for wider sidewalks that were at the center of the controversy has been eliminated.
The plan now goes before the state historic preservation board, which is likely to grant approval within 30 days.
Commission members complained of the contentious fight, but clearly were pleased with the number of concessions the preservation board had won from the city.
"It's as though we've gone through the whole process getting beaten up by the mayor, beaten up by the City Council members, beaten up by the business owners," commission member Michael Ricketts said. "But I think what you have here is a really good plan."
The city's reconstruction plans began to unravel earlier in the fall, when city dwellers and government officials clashed over a proposed blueprint for the thoroughfare that included wider sidewalks and new pedestrian gathering areas in certain spots.
Debate over the sidewalks polarized Annapolis. The city administration and some business owners argued that wider sidewalks would enhance the street's historic character and allow pedestrians a greater run of downtown. But preservationists and residents said the wider walkways were part of a less tasteful design that threatened to overrun downtown with tourists and sidewalk cafes.
After several weeks of arguing, city officials and the Historic District Commission drafted a compromise plan that met nearly all the commission's initial objections.
"I'm relieved," commission Chairwoman Donna Ware said after the vote. "We had a real sense of agreement and understanding for the first time."
Originally, the city government had proposed widening the sidewalks by as much as 20 feet in some places. But in the plan that was approved, the walkways would grow only by 2 to 4 feet in most spots, with slightly wider spots at a few corners.
City Administrator Michael D. Mallinoff said that city planners offered what they thought the public wanted. Last June, he noted, the historic commission approved the plan with wider sidewalks and a more dramatic redesign.
"The community misjudged and miscommunicated during the early stages of the project," Mr. Mallinoff said.
City officials may have failed to push their original plan into action, Mr. Mallinoff said, but they did succeed in listening to their constituents. "The goal of city representatives is to represent the community as a whole," he said. "The majority of the community wanted this."
There are only minor issues left to be resolved, such as the design of handicapped-access ramps and the placement of newspaper boxes on the sidewalks.
But true to the nature of the Main Street debate, residents, historic commission members and city officials debated these finer points for hours.
One by one, audience members rose to evaluate many aspects of the plan. They came with handmade maps and archival photographs of Main Street to prove their points.
Some people even wanted to perform live demonstrations. Local architect James R. Urban and engineer David J. Wallace brought in a model of new sidewalk ramps and offered to demonstrate how well they would hold up in the rain by volunteering to pour a bucket of water over the model as it sat in council chambers.
The bitter fight over Main Street prompted city officials and business people to try to curb the power of the historic review board.
At a public hearing last Thursday, local businessman Jeff Clum called for three of the five commission members to recuse themselves from the Main Street vote because they had been members of the Ward One Residents Association, which opposed the original plan, and he said they had a conflict of interest.
Mr. Clum's effort failed, and the entire commission ruled on the street plan.
Earlier Thursday, business owners on Main Street had collected nearly 60 signatures on a petition to put off installation of new bricks until January 1996.
The city says the reconstruction should begin by March, but merchants argue that even if it does, bulldozers will be in front of their stores at the height of next year's holiday shopping season.
Mr. Mallinoff tried to assuage those concerns, noting that the yearlong construction project still would leave portions of the street open to window shoppers and restaurant-goers.
Nevertheless, he said, the struggles over Main Street are not likely to disappear. Business owners are concerned that they will not be able to attract customers with their shops behind a barrier of construction tape.
"The groups that have portrayed their interests thus far are going to be safe at home," Mr. Mallinoff said. "It's these business groups who are going to be out there dealing with it now. And we have to be sensitive to them."