City council approves permanent closing of 40th Street

The Omaha City Council on Tuesday approved the closure of 40th Street between Dewey and Emile streets on the UNMC campus.

What it will look like … View a map of what the campus will look like with 40th Street closed and the green space complete.

“This is excellent news and we thank the city for its support of this measure, which will improve safety and accommodate campus growth and improvement,” said Chancellor Harold M. Maurer, M.D.

UNMC consulted with neighborhood associations and other local officials before asking the city to close the section of road, which was only used by about 200 cars per day while it was open.

The concerned section of 40th Street has been temporarily blocked off for the past several months. The permanent closing is effective immediately.

The closure will allow UNMC to:

• Complete its student plaza green space, which will connect the Student Life Center and Harold M. and Beverly Maurer Center for Public Health with the other campus academic buildings;
  
• Provide safer foot travel on the east end of campus;
  
• Facilitate roadwork scheduled for next summer to move Emile Street between 40th and 41st streets so that it connects directly to Jones Street; and
  
• Accommodate a future building site on the east side of campus.

The student plaza and green space will be complete in the late spring.

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