The Downtown Business Improvement District recently concluded a pedestrian count on the streets of Downtown Waukesha.
I was lucky enough to get the chance to volunteer as one of the counters for a day and let me tell you, I had no idea that standing in one place for two hours could be so interesting.
I took my post at 11AM on a rainy Wednesday afternoon. The idea was to count the pedestrians wandering by on Main Street between Barstow and Clinton, up and down Broadway, and coming down Grand from South Street. To see all of this, I was positioned at the “Five Points” on Main Street- where the old Spring House used to be.
The streets were bustling with a variety of people from the usual to the slightly unusual. As I began to take count, the weather began to clear up and it became increasingly colder.
Twenty minutes into it, I was cold. Interestingly enough though, the weather didn’t seem to affect the pedestrian traffic. I was already up to 40 people- some shopping the stores on Main, others going into Dave’s Restaurant for lunch, and a few leaving their apartments to go to work.
Forty-five people. Forty-six people. As I shuffled back and forth to keep warm, I continued my count. A car pulled up to the curb and asked me for directions to the 164 Highway. That was an easy one. I received a hearty thank you as the driver pulled away.
As I counted fifty-five and fifty-six- I noticed pedestrian fifty-seven was headed my way with a steamy drink in his hand. As he drew closer, I recognized him as my good friend, Brian. He was Downtown on business, saw me shivering on the corner, and was bringing me a hot chocolate from Coffee and Beans.
It was REAL good- and it was just what I needed to warm my bones.
I was up to sixty pedestrians when a man stopped to ask me what I was doing. I told him I was taking a poll and I asked him if he would mind answering a few questions.
He obliged so I asked away.
My first question- “If you were a lip gloss, what color would you be?”
After an uncomfortable pause, he laughed and said, “C’mon, really, what are doing?”
I told him I was counting pedestrians and we both had a chuckle. He wanted to know what number he was.
Sixty-one.
It was approaching noon and the streets were becoming busy. Traffic at the Five Points was picking up and the number of pedestrians was on the rise. As I counted past the seventy mark, a woman stopped to chat (number seventy-one).
She told me she has lived in the Waukesha area for over fifty years. She began to fill me in on the history of downtown.
This building used to be that, that building used to be this- it was fascinating. I learned more about Downtown’s history in that 10 minutes than I have in all the books I have read on the subject.
What’s even better is that I was getting her perspective of the City- some thing a book won’t always give you.
Although I was truly enjoying the conversation, I had to remain diligent to the task at hand.
Seventy-three. Seventy-Four. And then- seventy-five.
Pedestrian seventy-five had chosen to cross the Five Points intersection using the “shortest distance between two points is a straight line” theory instead of using the cross walk.
Although a huge time-saver, this theory can have deadly results when practiced in this location.
As seventy-five stepped up on the curb, pedestrian seventy-one told her she should be more careful.
Seventy-five then began to tell us her story.
Seems she was at Wal-Mart a few days prior and was hit by a car in the parking lot. She rolled up her coat sleeve to show us the cast on her now broken arm.
Now I would think she would have been a little more cautious seeing as she was just coming off a major “vehicle vs. pedestrian” impact, but it seemed to have an opposite affect. I think she is going off the old- “what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger” saying.
Seventy-one then made the comment that seventy-five’s first mistake was going to Wal-Mart.
Seventy-five said she wouldn’t have gone to Wal-Mart but she is a new Waukesha resident and didn’t know where she could buy black hair-care products downtown (her words, not mine).
I informed her she could buy them just down the street at Walgreens.
She looked me in the eye and said, “what the @%$& do you know about black hair-care products?”
Now that is a question I never in a million years would have though I would have to answer. I was perplexed. What did I know about black hair-care products?
As I stood searching for the answer, seventy-five belted out a good laugh and told me I was right. She now knows she can get black hair-care products at Walgreens.
However, she was still baffled at how I, a thirty-something white man, would know where to buy black hair-care products.
Do you want to know why I know this? Because the black hair-ca
