A road diet reduces the number of travel lanes on a road, typically from four lanes to two, and repurposes the reclaimed space for other uses — a center turn lane, bike lanes, sidewalk extensions, on-street parking, or greenery. The goal is not to remove capacity, but to reconfigure it so the road serves everyone who uses it: drivers, pedestrians, cyclists, and local businesses.

The Broad Street Traffic Calming and Pedestrian Safety Project proposes to reconfigure Broad Street from four travel lanes to two, with a center turn lane. The redesign also includes dedicated bike lanes and sidewalk bump-outs with shorter crosswalks. The project is the result of decades of advocacy by residents and local business owners, and has been incorporated into Windsor's Transit-Oriented Development Master Plan and Plan of Conservation and Development.

No. The project is fully funded. This will not effect property taxes.

Windsor’s charter requires different approval processes for projects of different costs, measured against the towns total budget. The original project included two roundabouts and it’s cost exeded the existing funding for the project.

The March 2025 referendum on the full Broad Street project failed, with opposition due to the possible impact on property taxes, concern about roundabouts, and a general sense the that Town Center was changing too fast.

The current iteration of the project addresses the first two issues. The Windsor Center neighborhood supported the project in the referendum. Voters who opposed the original plan due to roundabouts and cost spoke in favor of the current version in public meetings.

Ultimately Broad Street, remains extremely dangerous to all users of the road. Like any project whose costs come in higher than expected, the town government and Council found ways to reduce costs and address residents’ concern while still addressing the underlying safety concern.

This is the most common concern and the research consistently shows it doesn't hold up. Four-lane undivided roads with frequent left turns are often less efficient than three-lane roads with a dedicated center turn lane, because left-turning vehicles block through traffic and create unpredictable lane-change conflicts. A properly designed road diet eliminates that problem, allowing traffic to flow more smoothly.

The Federal Highway Administration has found that road diets "reduce overall crashes by 19–47%" while maintaining comparable traffic throughput, because intersections, not mid-block lane count, are the primary constraint on capacity. Most road diets handle rush-hour traffic without incident. Broad Street is no exception: roughly 7 in 10 of its 10,000 daily vehicles are just passing through, and those drivers will continue to pass through; they'll simply do so more safely.

No, and the evidence points strongly in the opposite direction. Businesses thrive when people feel safe enough to walk, linger, and shop. A Broad Street that moves cars at high speed through town is not good for Windsor Center's retail environment. Most of those 10,000 daily drivers aren't stopping — they're cutting through.

Road diets and pedestrian-friendly streetscapes attract foot traffic, increase dwell time, and raise property values. Hamburg, NY's road diet, completed in 2009, produced a 60% decrease in crashes, a 90% decrease in serious injuries, and — perhaps most notably — catalyzed a wave of social and economic revitalization: a farmers' market, outdoor movie nights, street festivals, and steady population growth. A village trustee called it transformative: "Not a day goes by in my store I don't hear about how everyone loves our village."

Studies from cities across the country show similar results. Businesses near dedicated bike infrastructure see improved economic activity. Safer crossings mean more people on foot, and more people on foot means more customers.

Road diets actually help emergency vehicles, not hinder them. With a center turn lane replacing two of the four travel lanes, ambulances and fire trucks have a clear path to use the center lane to get past stopped traffic — something that's impossible on a four-lane undivided road, where there's no dedicated space to pull aside. Slower vehicle speeds also mean fewer severe crashes for emergency services to respond to in the first place.

This concern is understandable but not supported by the evidence. Road diets reduce conflict points and smooth flow on the main road — they don't divert drivers who are already using that road as a through-route. Side streets typically see reduced cut-through traffic after a road diet, because the calmer main road no longer creates the backups that push drivers to seek shortcuts.