Quincy examining truck restrictions in city

QUINCY — A public hearing is scheduled for 6 p.m. April 15 at Quincy City Hall to take public comment on a proposal to change designated truck routes within the city limits. City Hall is located at 104 B St. SW. 

The proposed change would remove a section of Central Avenue between F Street Southeast and the city limits as a designated truck route. A section of Sixth Avenue Northeast would also be removed. Sections of D Street Northwest, D Street Northeast and Road 11 Northwest would be added as truck routes.  

Quincy Public Works Director Carl Worley said city officials believe Central Street and Sixth Avenue don’t work as truck routes now that the city has grown.  

Quincy City Engineer Ariel Belino said Central Avenue has a lot of pedestrian traffic, and Sixth Avenue Northeast borders on residential streets.  

“Those are very densely populated areas,” Belino said. “We would like to separate the pedestrian traffic from the truck routes.” 

Central Avenue has been rebuilt over time to make it more inviting to pedestrians, which makes it less viable as a truck route, Worley said. 

“It’s really, really tricky,” he said.  

The existing ordinance establishes the city limits as the end of the truck routes, and Worley said that designation no longer works as Quincy expands to the north. As the city limits expand further north, the truck route along Central Avenue North gets longer, too, he said.  

“That’s pulling that truck route right through residential areas,” Worley said. 

Trucks making deliveries along Central Avenue or Sixth Avenue Northeast will still be allowed, he said.  

Some businesses along A Street have substantial truck traffic, and that street stays as a designated truck route. Division Street borders the BNSF tracks and is the location for a lot of businesses, and it, too, will stay as a truck route. D Street Northwest was added because it provides access to some of the data centers in Quincy, Worley said.  

Some of the changes will make it more inconvenient for trucks, he said, but the goal is to reduce truck traffic in areas with a lot of pedestrians.