The Municipal Affairs Bureau (IAM) has announced that it expects to start a project today to improve pavement facilities surrounding Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park in Nape, with the aim of resolving the current situation in which pedestrians have to make a “detour” to cross the road there.
The project will also include the removal of the park’s fences that currently separate the park from the streets.
According to an IAM statement on Thursday, the improvement work will make it easier for pedestrians to walk through the park to cross the road, i.e., Alameda Dr Carlos D’Assumpção.
The bureau is aiming to complete the project in January next year, the statement said.
Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park, which opened in 1996, is a rectangular public park in central Nape, covering an area of around 22,000 square metres.
The avenue outside the park is the two-way Alameda Dr Carlos D’Assumpção. However, the avenue’s two directions are separated by the park in the middle. The avenue’s northbound vehicular traffic runs along the west side of the park, while the southbound traffic runs along the park’s east side.
The park runs from the UNESCO Centre of Macau building to the Kun Iam statue on the waterfront. Buildings surrounding the park are primarily office buildings.
‘Inconvenient’ pedestrian passage
The IAM statement acknowledged that the current pavement layout design outside Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park is making it “inconvenient” for pedestrians to cross the road. “Currently, pedestrians have to make a detour to cross the road,” the statement said.
“Currently, some parts of the pavement outside Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park are narrow so that pedestrians [from certain locations of the road] have to walk around the periphery of the park to cross the road,” the statement said.
The statement noted that the four vehicle entrances and exits of the park’s underground carpark also “cut off” the pavement outside the park, resulting in “persistently unfavourable” conditions for pedestrian passage.
The level difference at the entrances to the park also obstructs wheelchair access, the statement said.
According to the statement, the project will improve the pavement layout design outside the park with the aim of improving the flow of pedestrian passage and their accessibility to the park. The statement said that the project will enable pedestrians throughout the avenue to more easily walk through the park to cross the road so that their walking distance can be shortened.
In addition, the statement said, the project will also remove all fences surrounding the park with the aim of improving the park’s “visual transparency”. Barrier-free facilities on the pavement outside the park will also be improved, the statement said.
Furthermore, the statement said, “green belts” will also be set up on the pavement with the aim of enriching the park’s green elements, adding that the green belts will also “have a function that more clearly separates pedestrians from vehicular traffic”.
According to the statement, the project will be carried out in three phases, with the first phase at the park’s south side, i.e., near the Kun Iam statue.
During the project’s duration, according to the statement, only areas where work is being carried out will be closed, while other areas where work has not started will remain open until the commencement of work.
The statement also said that the project will not require the relocation of any trees in the park.
This artist’s rendition released by the Municipal Affairs Bureau (IAM) on Thursday shows the future design of the pavement outside Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park in Nape.
Pedestrians cross Alameda Dr Carlos D’Assumpção outside the west side of Dr Carlos D’Assumpção Park on Friday. – Photo: Tony Wong
