Sorry about not clarifying earlier.

I'm a current Oxford student. Grew up in a poor, redneck neighborhood in Monroe - my family was not, but our neighborhood was. "Culturally tied" to Middletown - spent a ton of my days going to the fast food places on Briel, shopping at Towne Mall, going to the laundromat off Oxford State Rd, etc. I consider Middletown to be my hometown.

But you would be correct if you assumed I never spent time near downtown. That is true, only really interaction with it was from looking out a car window driving down Verity. 

But to the Reinartz Blvd. point - why not just use University? It has good, if not better, access to the same area via 14th st. Also, I'm basing my points of view on the lack of demand for these roads to exist - simple economics.

How many people used to work at AK in 1970? How many work there now?

How many people live in parts of the city that demand these roadways? How many lived there before?

Why pay for what you don't need?

And why not utilize what you have in the most inexpensive and effective way possible?

I'm seeing a lot of bare asphalt for no good reason, and an easy way for Middletown to gain a competitive advantage over every other city in southwest Ohio for young professionals and empty nesters. Seems like a no-brainer to me. 

Thanks for the perspective VietVet. The wide boulevards looked '60's era but I could never be sure. Nice to know for a fact.

But I am going to push back on the bolded statement. The speed limit on Grand is 35, which is probably the same as it would be as a 2-lane road. Same goes for Lefferson if I remember correctly. No one drives on Reinartz, so that's a non-issue. Honestly, if I was mayor the first thing I would do is throw a wild party on the Reinartz/Verity interchange and provide people with plenty of sledgehammers and cheap beer..... but that's beside the point.

University, sure, I can understand that being a tougher sell. But it runs almost entirely through residential areas on its northern end, and even to the south it's primarily residential or dead retail. It would be a great way to get people out of their cars and connected to one another.

Yes, it would. You are correct.

But who said anything about destroying or removing lanes? 

Keep the same infrastructure, just close half the road. Heck, don't even bother to pave the half with the bike path, just pave the other section.

And yes I agree closing lanes on Briel and Roosevelt would be moronic. But the ones I listed I don't see how there could be an issue. Again, I don't have traffic counts, but I do have a decent memory. They don't have many cars. Heck, Reinartz Blvd. could be shut down tomorrow and I doubt more than a dozen people would even bat an eye. Don't believe me? Here's a great visual of all the traffic it DOESN'T HAVE, just to give y'all an idea....