City has a history of tinkering with downtown's traffic flow.
With downtown traffic rules, change isn't forever, but making changes seems to take forever.
That's evident on South Greene Street, where work continues on making adjustments to restore Greene, between Washington and McGee streets, to a two-way thoroughfare.
It only seems like the work has been going on since shortly after the city made Greene a one-way street in the 1940s. Adam Fischer of the city's transportation department says the Washinton-Elm project should be completed by June 9, maybe earlier.
The restoration project includes a roundabout at McGee Street and Greene, the first since the early part of the 20th century. This new roundabout sort of makes up for the eye-pleasing traffic circle the city removed in the mid-1960s at McGee and South Elm streets, at an intersection locals call Hamburger Square.
"I think they are an effective way of managing traffic," says Fischer, adding that an even larger roundabout nears completion at Bass Chapel and Lake Jeanette roads in northern Greensboro.
He says he can foresee more roundabouts, although he says the upfront costs are higher than conventional intersections with traffic lights.
In the 1940s, traffic engineers believed abolishing traffic circles (as roundabouts tended to be called then) and turning two-way streets into one-way thoroughfares was essential to unclogging downtown traffic in Greensboro. And maybe those were the right moves for that era.
At the time, downtown was at its peak as a center of retail and commerce and even had some manufacturing, including cigar making on McGee, then known as Edwards Place.
Cars and trucks competed for pavement space with street cars until the 1930s and overhead electric trollies and gas-powered buses after that.
Four of the state's major highways, U.S. 220, U.S. 29, U.S. 70 and U.S. 421 converged at Jefferson Square, the Elm-Market intersection. It became known as Jefferson Square after the Jefferson Standard Life Insurance Building opened on the northwest corner in 1923. The Lincoln Financial Group now owns Jefferson-Pilot Corp. Logically, Jefferson Square is now Lincoln Square.
In 1935, traffic became so tangled at Jefferson Square the city announced - in an A1 story in the Greensboro Record - that turns at the square would be prohibited starting the following week. Ministers were urged to preach that Sunday about the need for obeying traffic laws and to make downtown safer for pedestrians.
The no-turn at Elm-Market was partially abolished some years ago. Left turns from North Elm onto one-way Market can be made at non-peak traffic hours.
What next? A return to parking in the middle of the street? It's about to happen. Among the changes taking place on South Greene is creation of center-of-the-street parking from Washington to McGee in front of the Carolina Theatre.
And keep your eye on other parts of Greene. The city already has restored to two-way traffic on North Greene between Smith and Bellemeade streets.
With coming changes on South Greene, that will leave Bellemeade to Washington as the only part of Greene still one-way.
And that might not be for much longer. Fischer believes North and South Greene will be totally two-way in a year or so.
