Jackson Aldermen consider ways to keep cars from hitting store

The best way to keep vehicles from jumping the curb and hitting Jones Drug Store in Jackson may also be the simplest and most affordable solution -- parallel parking.

Vehicles have crashed into the drugstore on Court Street, just west of the old Cape Girardeau County Courthouse, three times since the 1970s, most recently in January.

No one, neither the driver of the curb-jumping vehicle nor anyone inside the drugstore, was injured in the Jan. 20 incident. Following that accident, store owners Brian Thompson and Bryan Kiefer asked city officials to find a solution to prevent similar crashes in the future.

During their study session Monday night, members of the Jackson Board of Aldermen discussed several options to help keep vehicles from hitting the drugstore, as proposed by the Lochmueller Group, a traffic consulting firm headquartered in Evansville, Indiana, with offices in St. Louis.

Lochmueller's suggestions included installation of concrete planters or bollards to serve as barriers between the street curb and building. The consulting firm also proposed changing parking spaces from angle to parallel.

Court Street is wide enough to accommodate angle parking on both sides of the street without impeding two-way traffic. Angle parking can also accommodate more parking spaces than parallel parking.

However, at Monday night's study session, aldermen David Hitt and Larry Cunningham said parallel parking in front of the drugstore could be the best and most economic way to keep cars on the pavement and away from the drugstore. Hitt said installation of bollards or other barriers along Court Street might set an expensive precedent.

"I think we're about to open up a can of worms (if we do planters or bollards) because other businesses will want the same thing," he said.

"Parallel parking is the right thing to do," Cunningham added. "If we lose four spaces, we lose four spaces."

As a compromise, the aldermen said they would be open to the idea of "hybrid" parking on Court Street, with parallel parking, possibly reserved for handicapped drivers, in front of the drugstore while retaining angle parking elsewhere along the street.

Jackson city administrator Jim Roach said city staff would develop a proposal for the aldermen to consider at a future board of aldermen meeting.