Mayor Kerry Thomson

Page last updated on November 5, 2025 at 9:55 am

College Avenue and Walnut Street Corridor Study

We will be hosting two identical open houses where attendees can provide feedback on two designs proposals for the College and Walnut Corridor Study. Members of the public are encouraged to attend either meeting to share input.

 

Project Update: Design Alternatives Now Available

We have completed the first phase of the College and Walnut Corridor Study. Using public feedback, crash data, multimodal analysis, and community goals, staff and the consultants from Toole Design have developed two conceptual design alternatives for the corridor. These concepts are now available for public review and comment.

The College and Walnut Corridor Study examines opportunities to improve safety, comfort, and access for everyone who uses these pivotal north-south streets. Each alternative features infrastructure improvements to help achieve our community’s goals. 

You can view and download each design alternative below. Please note that these are large files and may take time to download or open on some devices.

  • Alternative 1: One-Way Configuration
    • This alternative maintains the current one-way traffic pattern while adding a new protected urban trail along both streets, improved pedestrian crossings, and intersection and midblock safety improvements. It also adds opportunities for environmental, streetscape, and accessibility improvements.
  • Alternative 2: Two-Way Configuration

    • This alternative converts both streets to two-way traffic, introduces a center turn lane in key segments, and includes intersection and signal upgrades to manage flow and improve safety for vulnerable roadway users. A new urban trail would run alongside Walnut St., connecting neighborhoods and downtown. 

       

Provide Your Feedback

The City invites the public to share thoughts on both design alternatives. Input from the community will help inform the City’s evaluation and assist in shaping the preferred design recommendation. 

Complete the online feedback form here by 12/01: https://forms.gle/ip9GXQZ7mCGmrSJh8

 

Purpose: The need for a corridor study was identified in the 2019 Transportation Plan. The Corridor Study focuses on busy streets where there is a lot of automobile traffic, but where safety and comfort improvements are needed for pedestrians, bicyclists, scooter users, transit users, and drivers. College Avenue and Walnut Street are one-way couplets that are currently designed to carry high volumes of traffic at higher speed. A detailed corridor study will identify how best to support the Comprehensive Plan Objectives to “Nurture Our Vibrant City Center” and “Provide Multimodal Transportation Options,” through the design of our most prominent north/south streets. The goal should be to determine how best to:

  1. Provide pedestrians with safe passage and safe access along and across the length of the corridors;
  2. Provide bicyclists with safe, protected bicycle paths throughout the length of the corridors;
  3. Provide buses and other forms of mass transit with safe and efficient ways to travel along the corridors;
  4. Accommodate potential new and emerging forms of transportation that further the goals of the Comprehensive Plan;
  5. Facilitate safe and efficient automobile traffic to the maximum extent possible in light of the aforementioned goals; and
  6. Enhance the vitality of Downtown Bloomington’s businesses and institutions.

The City of Bloomington’s Planning and Transportation Department is launching a Corridor Study of College Avenue and Walnut Street. As our central north/south transportation corridors, College and Walnut serve as gateways to our community as well as the front door for hundreds of local businesses and thousands of residents. However, we are aware that these two streets are not meeting the needs of all of our residents. For example, the sidewalks, ramps, and crosswalks along the corridor do not all meet current accessibility standards; many of the bus stops are lacking shelters; and each year, there are several hundred motor vehicle crashes along the length of the corridors.

The Corridor Study is an opportunity to examine College Avenue and Walnut Street from the State Road 45/46 Bypass to Allen Street. The study will look at what’s working well, where challenges exist, and where improvements can be made. Using public input, research, analysis, and community goals, the Corridor Study will develop several conceptual designs for the streets. 

Study boundaries: The College Avenue and Walnut Street Corridor Study will examine the two streets from the 45/46 Bypass on the north end, to Allen Street on the southern end.  

 

History of How College and Walnut Became One-Way Streets: 

In 1956, the State Highway Department converted College and Walnut into paired one-way streets. The decision was met with some local opposition at the time and marked a significant shift in how people traveled through and experienced downtown and all of Bloomington. You can read a short summary of that history here: https://bton.in/HCW1W

 

Here's how you can be involved: 

  • Sign up for emails to hear about project updates, public meetings, and more.  
  • Public input on design alternatives Input from the community will help inform the City’s evaluation and assist in shaping the preferred design recommendation.
  • Upcoming meetings: We will be hosting two identical open houses where attendees can provide feedback on two designs proposals for the College and Walnut Corridor Study. Members of the public are encouraged to attend either meeting to share input.

Past meetings: 

We want to hear from you. If you have any questions about the project, feel free to email the Project Manager, Ryan Robling, at [email protected].