Focusing on North Avenue: Tosa’s Main Street

Running east-west through the City, North Avenue functions as one of Wauwatosa’s most important neighborhood-oriented commercial corridors. In addition to providing convenient and accessible goods, services, and community facilities to the surrounding neighborhoods, North Avenue has the potential to better unify east and west town Tosa. To maintain and enhance the character of North Avenue, the City intends to work in collaboration with ETBMA, WEDC, business owners, and nearby residents to develop a corridor plan for North Avenue. Such a plan should address the following:

• Enhancing pedestrian friendliness and safety along the corridor. This may involve the installation of public improvements to more clearly define and regulate pedestrian and traffic zones, including the installation of medians, modified on-street parking regulations, alternative pavement types (e.g. brick) and additional traffic lights.
• Define a unified streetscaping and signage theme that helps to connect the area west of Mayfair Road with the area east of Mayfair Road and East Town Tosa but that also helps to signal transitions between unique segments of the corridor such as East Town Tosa, Mid-Town Tosa, and West Town Tosa.
• Promote and support the establishment of business associations in areas like Mid-Town and West Town Tosa.
• Address strategies for shared public parking in key locations to encourage people to get out of their cars and walk between destinations.
• Ensure the long-term viability and visual appearance of buildings along the corridor.
• Advance the redevelopment of key sites and the rehabilitation of certain buildings to preserve and enhance the character of the corridor.
• Consider ideas for programmed events along the corridor.
• Develop an implementation strategy that defines opportunities for the City, RDA, and WEDC to actively assist in the redevelopment and revitalization process (e.g. land acquisition, establishment of public parking, land assembly).
• Promote the establishment of more commercial block watch efforts, especially along North Avenue and potentially Bluemound Road. Coordinate these efforts with the Community Support Division of the Wauwatosa Police Department.

Excerpt from pages 123 – 124

To download a complete plan and associated maps click here.

For those interested in discussing the plan and providing feedback jointly, please meet on Saturday, September 6, 9am at Cranky Al’s. Please review the plan in advance and be prepared to provide your input at the meeting. We will compile the notes and send them to Megan as well as make sure there is a representative at the September 17th meeting at City Hall.

Yield for Pedestrian Signs have been posted in crosswalks on North Avenue to help highlight pedestrian traffic and encourage traffic slowing. Though they are not posted in all crosswalks, we hope to have most covered. Additionally, we hope to further encourage increased police presence in this area to slow traffic, ticket for illegal use of the left turn lanes and failure to yield to pedestrians in crosswalks.

Help Make North Avenue Safer! If you would like to see more action to make North Avenue safer, please contact your Alderman and the police department and request increased police presence, enforcement of current laws and more signs in crosswalks.

District 1
Peter Donegan 259-8973 | pdonegan@wauwatosa.net
Linda Z. Nikcevich – 453-7873 | lnikcevich@wauwatosa.net

District 5
Jerry Stepaniak – 258-0709 | jerrystepaniak@wi.rr.com
Michael G. Walsh – 477-2830 | mwalsh@wauwatosa.net

The Wauwatosa Police Department can be reached at 471-8430

In a community survey, over 350 residents of the Pabst Park and East Town neighborhoods responded to questions about how current businesses meet their needs, types of business where they would likely spend money, pedestrian safety and crime.

Top concerns included pedestrian safety issues and the desire for greater variety of businesses and amenities catering to the needs of these neighborhoods.

Summary of Findings: This summary highlights the major findings of the North Avenue Neighborhood Alliance Community Survey. To view a PDF of the complete summary, please click here.