It’s official! FAMU Way now begins at Monroe Street

Last week, a citizen-championed vision was realized when the one-block section of Oakland Avenue located between South Monroe and South Adams streets officially became FAMU Way. Public Works crews with the City of Tallahassee installed the new signage less than one month after the City Commission voted to approve the street renaming. The decision came after Charles  U. Smith, a retired FAMU sociology professor, expressed the need to give FAMU Way a presence on a major city thoroughfare.

“From the beginning of the FAMU Way Extension Project, Dr. Smith advocated for FAMU Way to be connected to Monroe Street,” said Gabe Menendez, director of Public Works. “The FAMU Way Citizens Advisory Committee, FAMU leadership and the City agreed that connecting FAMU Way to a major roadway would bring greater recognition to the university.”

With the new street signs in place at South Monroe Street, FAMU Way will extend all the way to Lake Bradford Road when the extension project is complete in 2015. Construction is scheduled to begin next year. Oakland Avenue will continue on the east side of Monroe Street through the Myers Park neighborhood.

Another Southside street will also soon see some dramatic changes as it undergoes a $1 million make-over. As part of the City Commission’s placemaking initiative, construction will begin in October on Palmer Avenue. Over the next six months, crews will install sidewalks along both the north and south side of the street located between South Monroe and South Adams streets. Other planned amenities include brick seating walls, bioswales (landscaped areas that are specifically designed to filter storm water runoff), gas lamps, an upgraded traffic signal at Monroe Street, patterned crosswalks and enhanced landscaping, which includes elm trees on the north and crepe myrtles on the south.