The upgrading of the landscaping on Ponce is long needed. Unfortunately the idea of continuing to maintain hedges on an urban sidewalk is irrational. Hedges belong in the suburbs, not occupying valuable sidewalk area and constraining the use of the sidewalk for urban activities such as walking and dining. There are several restaurants along South Ponce that have some outdoor dining shoe-horned into the meager space available and would surely like to make the seating they offer to their patrons more comfortable.

The idea of palms as urban street trees also needs to be reviewed. While they are attractive from cars driving down the road, they provide very little in the way of pedestrian comfort. That might be acceptable on Alhambra Circle which has turned into a corporate desert that has been lost to the notion of pedestrian activity. Alhambra Circle from Le Jeune to Ponce de Leon looks fabulous in a convertible at 30 or 40 miles per hour. It is a different story on foot. Alienating landscaping combined with the most innocuous national credit tenants combine to create a dead pedestrian zone. People flowing from the buildings at lunch, the only time you see anyone walking on the sidewalk there, quickly head for the more comfortably scaled side streets. The over scaled, formal, palm based landscaping also makes the street look like high speed boulevard, A Boca Raton entry feature, not a local pedestrian oriented street.

Fortunately, Ponce de Leon has the opportunity to become a complement to Miracle Mile if it is made attractive to pedestrians as well as cars. The hedges should be removed and replaced by sidewalk. The choice of street trees should be studied to make the space comfortable for walking people.