Council Committee Proposes No Alteration of Brattlewalk

A Cambridge City Council sub-committee recommended Monday that Brattlewalk remain unchanged until final plans for traffic, parking, and pedestrian use of Harvard Square are approved in conjunction with the opening of the Kennedy Library.

The recommendation, made by the Subcommittee on Transportation and Parking, is in response to objections by Harvard Square businessmen that Brattlewalk is hurting business. The City Council will vote on the recommendations of the subcommittee next Monday.

Francis H. Duehay, dean of admissions and studies at the Education School and chairman of the subcommittee, said that the largest number of residents communicating with his subcommittee urged the City Council to continue and extend Brattlewalk.

"Certain Harvard Square businessmen are not pleased with Brattlewalk and will probably come up with an alternative Monday." Duehay said. "But I think they'll eventually see it improves business as malls have done elsewhere."

The objections to the current pedestrian mall center on several points:

* that it is inadvisable to continue Brattlewalk until several planning, parking, and traffic studies are ready and until the final plans of the Kennedy Library are complete:

* that no substitute parking for automobiles has replaced the parking spaces lost and that shoppers are therefore discouraged from driving to Harvard Square:

* that the mall is inadequately landscaped and that the area is in general dismal and unsightly:

* that cars, trucks, and taxis too easily pass through the area, making it hazardous for pedestrians.

The subcommittee, responding to several of the objections, recommended that appropriate City departments be charged with the responsibility of beautifying Brattlewalk.

It also recommended that the traffic and parking departments tighten regulations on deliveries to stores and investigate the closing of one end of the mall. This measure, the subcommittee report said, would censure that the mall