It’s only been a few months since a two-way traffic pattern was restored on the block of Ocean Street between D and E streets in South Portland’s Knightville neighborhood, but those opposed to the action have now turned in a petition calling for a citywide vote on going back to one-way travel with angled parking.

City Clerk Emily Carrington said this week that her office has 20 days from Monday, July 18, to verify whether enough qualified signatures were gathered on a the initiative that’s been circulating across the city since late spring. If there are enough signatures, she said, the issue would then go to the City Council for a public hearing.

She said that the council has several choices, including adopting the petition or sending the issue out to voters in a referendum. Mayor Tom Blake told the Current Tuesday that if enough signatures were gathered and the petition is legal, it would make sense for the council to put the measure on the ballot this November.

“Speaking just for myself,” he said, “if the petition passes muster, I think it would be prudent to hold a vote in November because we want maximum public input.” He fears the city would not that maximum input if the issue were to be decided in a special election.

Blake was one of two city councilors, along with Linda Cohen, who voted against returning to two-way traffic in Knightville in March, following months of controversy. Many business owners and residents supported continuation of the one-way traffic pattern, but many others argued the one-way configuration was dumping too much traffic onto their quiet, residential side streets.

The key concern about going back to a two-way traffic pattern the entire length of Ocean Street, business owners in Knightville told the council in the spring, was the loss of additional on-street parking that the one-way traffic configuration provided.

The one-way traffic pattern was first installed in 2012 after the city spent considerable time and money redeveloping the streetscape in Knightville, which was designed to make the neighborhood more attractive for pedestrians in particular.

However, according to the majority of the council, one-way travel between D and E streets was only supposed to be in place for a trial period and was supposed to be revisited by city leaders in 2013. That wasn’t done, but there were also no complaints.

But, late last year and early this year, a group of residents who wanted to get rid of the one-way traffic pattern got their wish when the council voted 4-2, with Brad Fox absent, to allow two-way traffic the full length of Ocean Street.

Before the March vote, Bill Dunnigan, who co-owns CIA Cafe at 72 Ocean St., said 75,000 people visited his cafe last year, and the biggest complaint he heard from patrons is that they had trouble finding parking.

Carrington told the Current Monday that for the petition to qualify under the South Portland’s city charter, the number of signatures needed must equal at least 5 percent of those who voted in the last regular municipal election, which equates to 944 signatures of registered voters.

The petition states that notwithstanding any other traffic ordinances or rules in South Portland, “the section of Ocean Street between E Street and D Street within the Knightville section of the city shall be one-way traffic with diagonal parking.”

April Cohen, daughter of Councilor Linda Cohen, was one of those who circulated the petition. She does not live or work in the neighborhood, but said she goes there every day to get a latte at CIA or to shop at the Legion Square Market or to get a meal at one of the restaurants.

“No one person is in charge,” she said about the petition drive. “This is really a group effort of a mix of people, both residents and business owners,” who want to see the one-way traffic pattern re-installed.

Cohen, who is president of the South Portland/Cape Elizabeth Buy Local group, said that while her organization has not taken a formal stance on the question of which traffic pattern serves Knightville best, she is personally concerned about the negative impact on the small local businesses in the neighborhood from the loss of parking with two-way travel.

“I am friends with a number of business owners down there and I know it’s just not right for them to lose parking spots,” she said.

Cohen said that even before the return to two-way traffic on Ocean Street, parking in Knightville was “always a challenge, but now I’ve noticed a big difference.”

She said since the change to two-way traffic, “D Street is an absolute mess. (It’s) really become an overflow parking lot” for the neighborhood. Cohen said there was a recent occasion where she could not get down D Street because cars were parked on both sides of the road and an oil truck was taking up the middle of the street making a delivery.

She argued in support of a citywide referendum, saying the question of whether the traffic should be one-way or two should not be left up to “a small group of people on either side.”

Cohen said the issue is really one that impacts the whole city, particularly because as the economy changes and big box retailers fade even more, South Portland must depend on its small businesses to keep the local economy going.

She said most of the people who signed the petition did not live or work in Knightville, but still had “a strong opinion” with a majority saying their goal is for easy access to the businesses and the park located in what is South Portland’s downtown area.

Cohen said the emergence of businesses like CIA “have done wonders for Knightville, but we need to provide access or (that success) won’t last.”

Blake said he has kept a close eye on the traffic situation in Knightville since the city re-striped the roadway to provide for two-way traffic and parallel parking.

He said there are always vacant parking spots whenever he drives or rides his bicycle through Knightville and said he has “not heard a lot of complaints, certainly not as much as before,” since the restoration of two-way traffic.

Blake said in addition to the question of whether enough signatures were gathered, the council must determine whether the traffic pattern is even a legislative issue on which the public is allowed to vote.

The signatures of 944 registered voters are required before any referendum could be held on changing the traffic pattern on Ocean Street between D and E streets in South Portland’s Knightville neighborhood.

Petitioners in South Portland are seeking a return to the one-way/angled-parking practices in Knightville.

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