A City of Knoxville proposal to turn the 500 block of Union Avenue into a one-way westbound street has downtown residents and business owners worried about what it could mean for traffic, deliveries, and foot traffic near Market Square. About 25 downtown residents and business stakeholders gathered at The Pembroke building on August 10 to question city officials about the plan, which would leave the block with a single westbound traffic lane.
As reported by the Knoxville News Sentinel, downtown businesses are worried about the proposed change, which affects a stretch of Union Avenue that anchors some of the city's most recognizable dining spots. City of Knoxville Downtown Coordinator Ellie Moore and Transportation Engineering Manager Evan Hoffman fielded questions from the crowd, which included HOA leadership and representatives from Pete's Coffee Shop and Chesapeake's, according to Inside of Knoxville.
Why the City Wants to Change the Block
City transportation officials explained that expanding secured event footprints around Market Square has pushed vehicles into dangerous patterns on the remaining open stretch of Union Avenue, including turnarounds, wrong-way driving, and collisions with buildings, the outlet reports. Staff characterized much of the current westbound traffic volume on the block as pass-through drivers rather than people stopping to patronize local businesses.
Rather than pursue a costly sidewalk expansion, city planners designed the one-way conversion as a low-cost, paint-and-signage reconfiguration. The freed-up street space would be reallocated for ADA parking, commercial loading zones, and additional metered spaces, per the same report. Officials also noted that because the setup relies on paint rather than permanent construction, it could be reversed if it doesn't work as intended.
A Corridor Already in Transition
The 500 block and its surrounding corner are home to some of downtown Knoxville's most established names, including longtime dining spots Pete's Coffee Shop and Chesapeake's, along with fine-dining restaurant J.C. Holdway, which landed on USA Today's 2026 list of the nation's top restaurants — a distinction Hoodline covered in this earlier report. Those businesses depend on downtown accessibility, making curb and traffic changes on their block a high-stakes proposition for owners.
Union Avenue has already been adapting to pedestrian priorities for years. Hoodline previously reported on the city's weekend pedestrian closures, established in October 2024, which shut down vehicle access along Union Avenue between Walnut and Gay streets, and along Market Street, from Friday evenings through Sunday nights to improve pedestrian safety during events like University of Tennessee football games, according to WATE. Before that, the city tested a four-weekend pilot in late 2023 that closed Gay Street to cars between Wall Avenue and Union Avenue from 7 p.m. to 4 a.m., a trial WBIR reported drew positive feedback from merchants over foot-traffic gains.
A Grid Built on One-Way Streets
Union Avenue also closes routinely for the weekly Market Square Farmers Market, operated by Nourish Knoxville on Saturdays from May through November, which already brings dozens of regional farm and craft vendors directly onto the street. The pattern of temporary and semi-permanent closures reflects a broader shift the city has been navigating for more than a decade.
A 2015 Downtown Circulation and Mobility Study found that 60% of downtown street segments — 48 of 80 blocks — were one-way at the time, a configuration planners said hampered accessibility and forced motorists to backtrack. That study evaluated converting several one-way segments to two-way traffic, a notably different direction than the current Union Avenue proposal. The city's Complete Streets policy, adopted by the Knoxville Regional TPO in 2014, mandates that transportation projects accommodate pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit users, and it has shaped past corridor overhauls on Central Street and Cumberland Avenue.
Separately, the city has authorized capital construction contracts for traffic signal upgrades at core downtown intersections along Gay Street, including its intersection with Union Avenue, with Stansell Electric contracted to replace signal heads, poles, and wiring. It remains unclear whether the city will revise the one-way design based on the concerns raised at the August 10 meeting or move forward with the paint-and-signage plan before the fall event season begins.
