Town Branch Commons

• Improve traffic, bike, and pedestrian safety and reduce vehicular speeds and crashes through a complete street approach.
• Improve perception of safety along the corridor through combination of physical separation from cars, increased space dedicated to bike and pedestrian trails, and improved lighting.
• Highlight and educate visitors about cultural and natural histories, vernacular materials, forms, and construction techniques.
• Reduce stormwater runoff and improve stormwater collection, treatment, and management.
• Sequester carbon through increased tree canopy and native planting areas.
• Increase biodiversity and habitat in a formerly ecologically barren corridor.
• Enhance social connectivity and community identity.
• Improve aesthetics, visual appeal, and human experience along the corridor.
• Improve sense of well-being and satisfaction of visitors.
• Increase adoption of healthy alternative transportation and recreation options of biking and walking.
• Connect people to downtown, local businesses, and civic assets such as parks and libraries.
• Stimulate the local economy through increased visitor spending by attracting visitors through improved pedestrian and bike facilities and connections between different downtown districts.
• Catalyze investment in the downtown core through construction and renovation of nearby housing and commercial developments, public parks, and open spaces.

• The 2.2-mile-long complete street corridor consists of a network of bike and pedestrian trails that link to 8 public parks. It completes a 22-mile regional trail network, connecting the downtown core to the surrounding Bluegrass region to the north and northwest.
• The width of the complete street corridor ‘behind the curb’, encompassing trails, plazas and planted areas, ranges between 20 ft at its narrowest to more than 60 ft at its widest.
• Dense, predominantly native plantings form a green ribbon along the length of the corridor that safely separates bikers and pedestrians from vehicular traffic and includes more than 300 individual trees, 1,700 shrubs and more than 40,000 grasses, perennials and groundcovers that are supported by more than 3,200 cy of specialized soil mixes designed to support plant health and stormwater infiltration. Species include Kentucky coffeetree (Gymnocladus dioicus ‘Espresso’), downy serviceberry (Amelanchier arborea), sassafras (Sassafras albidum), summersweet (Clethra alnifolia ‘Hummingbird’), rattlesnake master (Eryngium yuccifolium), clustered mountain mint (Pycnanthemum muticum), purple prairie clover (Dalea purpurea) and the prominent switchgrass (Panicum virgatum ‘Shenandoah’), which creates a vegetated buffer between cars and bikes along much of the corridor.
• The green infrastructure system consists of 27 curb cuts, 4 curb inlets, and 139 lf of flumes that collect and direct runoff from the road into 41,400 sf of rain gardens that filter and slow stormwater to enhance urban resilience by preventing flooding during extreme weather events by reducing peak flow.
• 2 recirculating water features, which use potable water, reinterpret the interplay between water and the region’s karst geology, with references to springs, limestone streambeds and sinking streams, creating opportunities for people to engage and interact with the water while echoing the location of the culverted Town Branch below.
• Vehicular streets were re-aligned and reduced in area by just over 18% through a ‘road diet’ that reduced lane widths from an average of 12.2 ft to 10 ft, creating more space for people and natural systems by limiting the space dedicated to vehicles.
• The pre-existing variable-width sidewalk, ranging from 4 ft to 16 ft, on the north side of the corridor was replaced by distinct 8-10 ft bike and 8-ft pedestrian trails along the entire length of the corridor. The trails are separated by stone walls, rain gardens, and vegetation where space allows. In narrower sections of the corridor, whether due to property lines or vehicular right-of-way, the trails are directly adjacent to one another.
• Bike and pedestrian trails were constructed using custom concrete mixtures for beneficial grip and aesthetics, and 58,500 sf (5,238 sf of which is pervious) high-albedo concrete pavers were installed in a custom, high-contrast pattern at intersections to provide visual cues that improve safety and reference the limestone geology and wall construction methods, as well as the vernacular 3-board horse fences commonly found in the Bluegrass region.
• 6,600 sf of soil cells was installed below a suspended pavement system where trees were planted within pavement, primarily near intersections, to support healthy soils in an urban environment and improve plant health and longevity. No fewer than 3 trees were planted in each of these areas to provide sufficient volume of connected soil cells.
• More than 2,400 tons of dry-laid, native limestone walls, locally sourced from southern Indiana, were installed along 2,900 lf of the corridor by skilled local stonemasons. This placemaking feature reflects traditional masonry techniques while using a modern, flexible construction detail. Hand-tooled monolithic limestone slabs are stacked diagonally and set in a decomposed granite base, relying on mass and gravity for their structural integrity.
• 5 interpretive signs highlight the cultural and natural histories of the region and connect users to the online Town Branch Water Walk website where they can learn more.
• The primary lighting system incorporates 3 types of full cut-off, energy-efficient fixtures to minimize light pollution and improve safety along the trail, supporting use throughout the day and night. Along the corridor, 50 pedestrian pole lights (single fixtures on 12 ft poles), 69 combination pole lights (staggered fixtures at 12 ft and 25 ft on a single pole) and 24 vehicular pole lights (double fixtures on 25 ft poles) were used to illuminate the adjacent roadway and trail. In addition, 149 inset wall lights and 54 tree well lights were used to provide continuous low-level illumination and accent lighting for an inviting nighttime experience.

The origins of this site date back to the founding of Lexington in the late 1700s. Town Branch, a healthy stream and tributary to Elkhorn Creek, both invited frontier settlement and dictated the unique orientation of the downtown, with its primary roads running from the northwest to the southeast. Common development and engineering practices, such as cutting down forests for construction of buildings and roads, and channelizing streams and using them for waste disposal, led to increased flooding and sanitation concerns. As a result, Town Branch was gradually covered over and ultimately culverted through downtown (Merkin 2001). More than 200 years later in the 2000s, a grassroots community idea began to take the shape of “one big gesture that connects all the dots and captures Lexington in its timeless essence: the reassertion of the Town Branch Creek in the urban plan.” (Petitt 2011) This ‘big gesture’ helped build momentum towards an international design competition to reimagine downtown Lexington, its public realm and relationship to Rupp Arena and the former Town Branch in 2013. The competition drew entries from pre-eminent international firms which were broadly shared and presented. This, in turn, raised public interest, knowledge and support for a modern and innovative approach to urban infrastructure that celebrates the legacy and historical significance of Town Branch.

Although project implementation followed a traditional structure of a national firm developing a masterplan that was implemented by a local firm, the approach was unique in many ways. First, the partnership between both design firms and the city to develop grant proposals early in the process was instrumental to its implementation. Second, the depth of community education and engagement initiatives during the conceptual design phase shared the bold vision and built a broader, more supportive constituency for ‘good design downtown’ that focused on people and more diverse transportation and environmental systems. Third, the level of collaboration between the national and local firms in the design development and construction documentation phases was enhanced by including the national firm on the program management team. This created a pathway for consistent communication and collaboration throughout the project and the combination of fidelity to and flexibility within the original vision created a high standard of execution throughout the construction process, resulting in a highly-used and broadly-supported project.

Town Branch has come full circle. The stream was an impetus for the founding of Lexington 250 years ago, as a source of water for industry and means of waste disposal, when people and goods moved by foot, horse, and carriage. After being buried over time, it has symbolically resurfaced as Town Branch Commons, a catalyst for and connector among a larger system of public spaces, trails and civic assets that reflects shared community values to repair past environmental harms while improving the human experience through downtown. This complete streetscape has inspired a greater vision for, focus upon, and investment in Lexington’s public realm.

• Urban hydrological conditions are complex, and the perfect can be the enemy of the good. The strength of the original winning design competition entry was recognizing that daylighting Town Branch was not feasible – it was buried too deep underground. Instead, the design team recognized the importance of its history in building community interest and support, celebrated it through material and formal expression in the design, and leveraged it as an opportunity to educate the public in the final built project.
• Although instrumental in ensuring the implementation of the project, there are challenges when blending multiple funding sources. Each source had their own programmatic goals, requiring identification and alignment with the design by the project team, as well as unique reporting requirements and locations within the project. This resulted in a complex reporting and invoicing process for the owner’s representative. It is important to write grant applications broadly—both in scope and geography—while still meeting intent and anticipating likely expenses. For example, avoid tying specific sources of funding with particular zones within larger projects, if possible. This will allow project teams to better manage common issues such as cost overruns with greater funding flexibility. Include budget line item(s) for qualified and knowledgeable consultants to oversee critical tasks related to construction administration, also referred to as construction engineering and inspection, to avoid need for time-consuming budget modifications. Lastly, when working with multiple federal and/or state agencies, coordinate early and often among the different entities in order to ensure language and details in project drawing and construction bid packages meet all applicable standards and expectations, which sometimes can conflict with one another.
• Narrow ribbons of planting can create a significant impact in urban corridors when properly planted and maintained. One of the streetscape’s greatest successes was the integration of concentrated amounts of vegetation into an area that was formerly dominated by hardscape and devoid of green, except for a few struggling street trees. The streetscape incorporates trees and shrubs which are complemented by densely planted perennial and grass plugs, which filled in quickly and helped combat invasive species while maintaining aesthetic integrity. An irrigation system was essential to help the plugs’ small root systems become established, which benefits all plantings in a harsh urban environment. Long-term plans include phasing out irrigation as plants establish and mature.
• Starting small can help build critical mass when investments are made in the right location. The current 2.2-mile trail is too small to make significant impacts on reducing vehicle trips in favor of commuting by foot, bike, and transit, and the ultimate benefits of a more robust alternative transportation network are yet to be realized, especially for people that are transit-dependent. Nonetheless, this complete streetscape represents a strategic initial investment made in the most important and challenging section of the city: the downtown corridor navigates a complex web of utilities, connects a larger regional trail network, and provides an important link within the hub-and-spoke transportation network. This nascent alternative transportation network is a catalyst for improved connectivity within Lexington, supporting future build-out of the system in all directions, and serves as a model for complete streets within the state and region.
• Green gentrification can threaten the social benefits of equity and access to improvements in the public realm, and the City engaged the historically Black East End neighborhood to shape reinvestment in nearby parks to benefit and honor the history of the community. In addition, and concurrent to the development of Town Branch Commons, the City and community banks provided tax credits and funding to a local organization focused on community revitalization to build a mixed-use development, creating a vibrant blend of food, arts, and housing that includes affordable units and represents the first major economic investment in the East End neighborhood in many years.
• A linear park and complete streetscape involve complex maintenance and management structures across many jurisdictions and stakeholders, which for this project included local government and state transportation officials, utilities, aquatics specialists, and a private landscape contractor, among others. Include all potential partners at the table from the beginning in order to better understand and consider design, specifications, maintenance, access, schedules, and repairs. It is important to evaluate design implications of utilities early on, for example the heights of culverts and space to collect, move, and infiltrate stormwater, and develop tight specifications that ensure accountability and quality for future contractors and repair work.

Concrete Unit Paver: Reading Rock
Polymeric Sand: Gator Maxx Sand G2 
Soil Cells: Stratavault by Citygreen
Pedestrian and Vehicular Lighting: Torres by Landscape Forms
Bike Rack: Cordia by Forms + Surfaces
Receptacles: Dispatch by Forms + Surfaces
Table, Shade, and Chairs: Four Seat Tangent Table Ensemble with Solaris Sunshade by Forms + Surfaces
Bollards: W-114 Street Sentry by Victor Stanley
Bike Ped Counter: Ridepod BP 5920 by Metrocount

Project Team

Client: Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government (LFUCG)
Design Team Lead: SCAPE
Final Design & Implementation, Landscape Architect of Record, Transportation Engineer, Traffic Engineer: Gresham Smith
Stormwater and Civil Engineering: Strand Engineering
Landscape Subconsultant: Element Design
Design Subconsultant: EHI Consultants
Design Subconsultant: Lochner

Program Management: AECOM
Planning Subconsultant: Lord Aeck Sargent

Partnered Institution: University of Kentucky
Partnered Institution: VisitLex, partnered institution
Partnered Institution: Town Branch Trail, Inc.
Construction: Pace Contracting
Construction: Aguilar Stone Masonry

Role of the Landscape Architect

The landscape architects were instrumental in shaping the vision for the Town Branch Commons project and was part of a diverse team that successfully transformed this project from a linear park to a transportation project, thus aligning it with federal funding opportunities. The landscape architects’ contributions were pivotal from the inception to the execution of the project’s success. They articulated the vision in the original master plan and collaborated with a multidisciplinary team to mold a project that served multiple benefits. They crafted the construction and permitting documents for a complex corridor and worked closely with the contractor during construction to ensure the vision was accurately realized. Further, the landscape architects developed a comprehensive long-term operations and maintenance manual for the city, ensuring the project’s sustainability and longevity.