[Mike Caldera]: Hello and welcome to this special meeting of the Medford Zoning Board of Appeals. We're going to take a quick roll call and then we'll get started. Jim Tirani?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_05]: Here.
[Mike Caldera]: Jamie Thompson? Present. Andrea LaRue? Present. Yvette Velez?
[Yvette Velez]: Present.
[Mike Caldera]: I believe Mary Lee is absent. I see we have Chris D'Avetta who just joined. Chris is one of our associate members. He's not voting in this case. He was appointed after it started, but welcome, Chris. And then Mike Caldera, present. So we have a quorum. We can get started. Dennis, can you please kick us off, please?
[Denis MacDougall]: On March 2920 23 governor Haley signed into law, a supplemental budget bill which among other things extends to temporary provisions pertaining to the open meeting on March 31st 2025. Typically this further extension allows public bodies to holding meetings remotely got a call the public body physically present at the location and read adequate alternative access to remote meetings. The language is not any substantive change to the Open Meeting Law, other than extending the expiration date of the temporary provisions regarding remote meetings from March 31st, 2023 to March 31st, 2025. Thank you.
[Mike Caldera]: And can you read the first matter?
[Denis MacDougall]: 970 Fellsway, case number 40B-2023-01. The resumption of consideration of the petition of DIV Fellsway LLC, the Davis Company, is for a comprehensive permit pursuant to Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 40B. for multifamily six-story apartment development located in approximately 3.4 acres of land at 970 Fellsway, property ID 7-02-10. This proposal will be developed as an approximately 289 units, consisting of 278 units of multifamily housing and 11 townhomes, with 73, 25% of the total units of them being designated as affordable housing to low- or moderate-income households. This hearing will include a discussion on the traffic impact assessment, including the recent supplement.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you, Dennis. All right, folks. So for those unaware, this is a multi-session hearing. We've had multiple meetings to date. The focus today is the applicant intends to present an update to the transportation impact assessment. And so that will be the focus of today's meeting. We will take public comment on transportation in this meeting at the appropriate time. And this will not be the last meeting either. So there will be a number of other sessions to address other aspects of the project. So with that being said, I see we have Mr. Pat Noon for the applicant. Good evening.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: Good evening. Mr. Chair, members of the board, thank you for having us this evening. Just to confirm, can everyone hear me? We can, yes. Great. I will ask Pat Gallagher, if you don't mind, if you could bring up the presentation.
[Patrick Gallagher]: Dennis, could you allow me to share, please? Thank you.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: Great. So yes, thank you members of the board for hearing us this evening. And thank you again for granting the continuance from the hearing on February 27th to this evening to have a proper discussion on traffic. We are looking forward to presenting this evening. As we get into the next slide and just I'll do a quick kickoff and introduction here. just orienting everyone to the team that's on the call this evening. Myself and Mike Cantalupa from the Davis Companies are here. We have Bill Lucas from Bowler. We have Scott Thornton from Van Ness. They will be presenting on civil and traffic, respectively. And we have Pat Gallagher, as I mentioned, from Wilson. He is representing the legal team this evening. Attorney Tam could not Uh, be here, so just making everybody aware as I don't believe Mr. Gallagher has spoken publicly prior to this evening. Um, so just quick agenda, um, recapping, uh, some progress from the, from the previous, um, formal hearing. Um, uh, we have, uh, at the outset of that meeting, um, where site plan was discussed, um, pretty thoroughly. Uh, we have continued to work on that, um, and improving that and moving that design forward. You'll hear, um, some about that in the, um, Civil design section of the presentation this evening from Bill Lucas from Bowler. And as a part of that, we have had an initial kickoff peer review session with the civil team from beta. So, we look forward to continuing those discussions, but are continuing to make progress here and happy to be presenting some updates there. Obviously, with the main topic this evening being traffic since our last hearing, we were able to finalize our TIA and formally submit that we held a kickoff session with the peer review team from beta on traffic as well this week. So have advanced those conversations. And look forward to continuing to do so, and obviously presenting the material this evening. And then lastly, in the background, we have continued to move forward on the architectural side of things, advancing the design there and have. Started the conversation for setting up a follow up peer review session with Mr. bomber from Davis square and members of planning staff. So feel like we are continuing to move forward on all fronts of the design and coordinating with staff and and the peer review team. So. Just a quick update there for everybody, since it has been several weeks since since we last met, I won't get into all the bullet points here. I'll let Scott really do the talking on the on the, but obviously just our general agenda for this evening is to have. Scott Thornton discussed the methodology and the findings from the study that Vanessa performed. And then Mr. Chair, as was discussed at the continuance request hearing, if time permits, we can have as deep of a discussion on civil as possible. We'll be able to do, as I mentioned, some site plan updates, discuss some of the parking demand information that we were able to provide. and a truck and emergency vehicle circulation update there. So we are ready to present. And now I will turn it over to Scott Thornton to, oh, sorry, before I do that, just recapping the public process. Again, I touched on some of this already, and I won't go through these bullet by bullet, but just noting since the last hearing, we have advanced with The peer review sessions with data on civil and traffic, and we'll continue to do that and continue to track them here. So everybody is aware of of the meetings that are that are taking place and the conversations that are ongoing. So, with that, I will now turn it over to Scott.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Great, thank you very much. Pat. Mr. Chairman members of the board for the record. My name is Scott Thornton with Vanessa associates. We prepared the traffic assessment for the projects working with the Davis companies, bowler and cube 3 studios. We think that the TIA, just as an initial statement, we think that the TIA shows that the project can be accommodated by the road network and the street system. And I will get into the reasons why during my presentation. But as noted, we're calling this a supplemental traffic study. The initial TIA was submitted in November of last year, and that was a study that had been prepared previously with older data. We think that while the findings are generally consistent between the two documents, we understand that with passage of time, the study required an update. The scope for that document, the initial TIA was determined with the director of traffic and transportation for the city. This supplemental TIA used the same scope. We left the supplemental TIA as a draft because we know that city staff will review the document. As Pat mentioned, we've had an initial meeting with BETA, the city's peer reviewer. So we anticipate there may be some changes to the TIA before it becomes sort of memorialized as a completely final document and ready for the file. So the Supplemental TIA was based on the revised site plan that was presented last month. The TIA was submitted on March 5th. So the supplemental TIA reviewed impacts during the critical weekday morning and weekday evening time periods, looking at 14 intersections in the study area. And I'll get into the explanation of that in a minute. TIA considered the transit, pedestrian, bicycle facilities, as well as vehicle impacts and safety considerations in the identification of impacts for the project. The next slide shows the site in context to the study area. As I mentioned, 14 intersections in total, four signalized intersections really on the corners of the study area, a couple intersections with Fellsway, a couple intersections with Spring Street that are the signalized locations. And then we have 10 un-signalized intersections located on the periphery of the site and also in the neighborhood. We did an extensive field inventory out in the study area. We noted that all streets have sidewalks on both sides. There's generally parking on one or both sides of the streets in the neighborhood. In terms of facilities, we noted that DCR modified the Fellsway with bike lanes on each side and last year put in curb extensions at the Myrtle Street intersection. We conducted traffic counts in January between the hours of 7 and 9 in the morning weekday and 4 to 6 p.m. Those were done on January 11th, which was a Thursday. We would expect that, you know, we try to do those counts for weekday time periods between Tuesday and Thursday. That's generally when traffic is consistent at a consistent level. In general, the peak hours start in the morning around 7.45, go from 7.45 to 8.45. There's a few outliers, some start at 7, some start at 7.15, but in general, that's about the time period for the morning. And in general, in the evening, the peak hour time period occurs between 5 and 6. We adjusted the volumes to raise them to the average month conditions, which is consistent with MassDOT standards. We counted pedestrians, bicycles, buses, trucks, and vehicles. There's actually separate exhibits in the TIA depicting the pedestrians and bicycle movements that were observed at each intersection. And on average, there's between 10 and 20 pedestrians during the peak hours at each location. Some locations have a little more. I think the intersection of Riverside with Fellsway actually has a few more. It's in the 20 to 35. pedestrians range during the peak hour. But in terms of bicycles, there's not a lot of bicycle usage that showed up in the counts. But again, January, although it hasn't been a typical January, we would expect that those bicycle volumes to increase during the more seasonal months. So the next slide, we start to get into some of the detail with regard to the transit availability. I know in one of the meetings, ZBA members were curious to know the status of the 100 bus, which stops really right in front of the site at Myrtle Street. So this slide shows the public transportation availability in the area. There's the 100 bus, there's the 108, there's the 101, the 134, but 100 really is the one that stops, that would most likely see the majority of usage from the project residents. Wellington Station and Malden Center are each about 1.4 miles, about a 30 minute walk from the site. So we think that usage would really focus around the 100 bus to get to Wellington Station or other locations. We requested and received data from the MBTA on the ridership. They've really improved their ridership survey information and program. 100Bus has 42 trips per direction on a daily basis between 5 a.m. and 1240 a.m., which averages about 1,256 passengers a day. And this is based on ridership surveys that were conducted in spring, summer, and fall of 2023 by MBTA. At the Myrtle Street stop, on average, 2 to 3 passengers per bus trip were observed to get on the bus. And that's That ranges between the inbound bus in the morning and the outbound bus in the evening. Peak hours for the T are 6.30 to 9.30 in the morning and 3.30 to 6.30 in the afternoon. That's when the bus frequency goes up to three buses per hour. Other than that, the rest of the day, it's typically one to two buses per hour. So these riderships also match our observations. We were out there actually this morning and noticed between one and three passengers getting on three buses in the morning, or in the inbound direction, and that was between Roughly between 7 and a little before 7 and about quarter of 8. In terms of the outbound buses, it was about 1 to 3 passengers that were there. Actually, there was no 1 waiting to get on the bus to travel outbound, but there were 1 to 3 passengers on the bus. during that same time period. And actually, the inbound bus, we observed about eight to 14 passengers on the bus, depending on which of the inbound buses it was. So it shows adequate capacity for the additional riders that are expected. For the site, given that these buses have a 53 passenger capacity. As noted by the by the. The next slide, we get into some bicycle facilities. And so the slide on the graphic on the left shows, this shows existing facilities. It comes from the MassDOT bike trail, ArcGIS data. Indicates bike lanes on the Fells Way and Revere Beach Parkway. It's kind of hard to see at the scale, but it's the bluish, purplish lines showing where those bike lanes are. It also indicates the area of the Wellington circle improvements, which are conceptually shown in the upper graphic. There is a preferred alternative that has been identified, which improves pedestrian and bicycle connectivity through the circle. I think it's still in the planning stages, so I don't know that there's a timeframe that's been identified yet. But that is a project that is in the background. Also shown is the Malden River Greenway Wellington connector segment that would connect to the bike facilities on Commercial Street. This is the potential rail line or multi-use path that passes behind the site, and I think Bill Lucas from Bowler will touch on that in his description of the site plan. But, but again, you know, there's these future conditions. These are future conditions and projects that will improve conditions for pedestrians and bicycles, not just for our project, but for for everyone in the area. The next slide, we start to get into some of the project specific data, looking at existing and projected future mode split data. This data comes from the 2022 American commuter survey. It indicates percentages shown in the columns. And the darker numbers represent the data that's from that survey. The lighter numbers, lighter columns, represent what we anticipate the project mode split to be. We think that because of the Wellington Connector and the Wellington Circle improvements, we think pedestrian and bicycle usage will increase. So we've adjusted the census data to move some of the some of the single occupant and the high occupant vehicle, which are basically carpool trips, we moved 5% from those categories into the bike category. And we'd like to say that that's a very conservative estimate because of the the increasing number of facilities that'll be promoted and provided, as well as the TDM measures for the project, which I'll get into towards the end of my presentation. But in general, what we wound up with was a 23% non-automobile travel mode that was expected. Well, then we've got 65% automobile travel. That's the combination of SOV, you know, somebody in their car driving alone, and HOV is somebody carpooling. And then there's 12% that is working from home or commutes using some other form of transportation. Those last two categories, the 65% and the 12%, we lump those together to result in 77% auto usage, just to provide a conservative analysis scenario. So, you know, it's a little bit of a factor of safety that's built into the mode split and the vehicle trip generations and assumptions, which is what we're going to get into on the next slide. So the trip generation information is based on the ITE trip generation manual. And this is standard protocol and required by MassDOT and Department of Conservation and Recreation, DCR, for a source to estimate trip generation. So these are resulting vehicle trips after mode split adjustments for the residential uses only. The trips in the column labeled existing storage facility, those are trips that we counted and are presently there, presently existing at the site. So in terms of the time periods, we look at the weekday daily, the weekday morning, and the weekday evening peak hour. The two peak hour numbers are used for the analysis. The daily numbers, that's the total entering and exiting. So of the 1,038, that's 519 trips entering and exiting over the course of a 24-hour day. In terms of the traffic increase through the neighborhood, on the outside edge of the neighborhood, we're looking at four to 14 trips during the peak hours. On the Fellsway, we're looking at 18 to 41 trips with higher numbers if we include both directions. In the morning, I think we've got something like 47 trips at the Fellsway and Riverside intersection. In the evening at the Fells Way and Central Street intersection with Medford Street, we've got 46. So those numbers, they vary depending on the direction. You can see there's a higher split with exiting traffic in the morning and entering traffic in the evening. And I know that when Bill gets into the site plan, which you've seen already, there's site access to Amaranth and to Myrtle and to Fellsway. because of the location of the access there, would be expected to see a larger increase right on the street before it's dispersed. But again, in general, we think that the trips are manageable, which I'll get into when we get into the level of service and the analysis results. 23% of commuters using non-automobile modes of transportation, we expect that to be a low number. And we expect to put measures into place to increase the transit percentage as well as the other forms of sustainable transportation. So the next slide, we start to get into the traffic analysis. And let me just back up. We use the existing counts to develop future conditions. We look at a seven-year projection. And then we add background projects or traffic from background projects that are on the books that are proposed or that are approved and not yet constructed or constructed and not yet occupied. And we also include a background growth rate. That scenario is called the no build conditions, basically the future condition without the project. And then we add the project traffic to that, that gives us the future conditions with the project called the build condition. So as I mentioned, we used a 1% growth rate for general background growth. We included traffic from 11 background projects, including the expansion of the Encore Casino and the Assembly Row expansions. This gives us the no-build condition, which is a base to compare the impacts of the project in the build condition. So, we added the trips that you saw in the previous slide into the network to identify the delay increases due to the project. And a summary is that in terms of the level of service or LOS, which Again, backing up a little bit, assigns letters to delay ranges. So for unsignalized intersections, for instance, a level of service A is an average delay per vehicle less than 10 seconds. A level of service B is an average delay of between 10 and 15 seconds. A level of service C, like what we're talking about here, is an average delay of between 15 and 25 seconds. So, you know, we're not talking about huge delays at these locations. In fact, the project, when we add the project traffic into the network, what we find is that there's really no change in level of service at 13 of the 14 locations. There's level of service C or better at nine intersections. The two Fellsway locations, which are on this graphic, locations one at Riverside and Location 4 at Central and Medford Street, those are operating at level of service F or greater than an 80 second delay with or without the project. We also did a supplemental analysis of the operations at those 2 intersections. There's a pedestrian phase that's not to get too deep into the weeds on traffic. signal timing but if we if we remove the if we discount the pedestrian phase it gives an idea of what the what the what the impact of the project is and and again the the level of service didn't change with that supplemental analysis that's in the that's in the In the TIA, in general, delays are less than 2 seconds as a result of the project. So, the next slide, we start to get into transportation demand management. And I mentioned previously that we plan to improve on that 23% non-auto transportation component. And one way we do that is with the TDM measures. So these consist of a number of proven principles and measures to encourage the use of more sustainable transportation instead of personal vehicles. Things like a transportation coordinator or a TC would be designated for the project. It's probably somebody in the leasing office or the on-site maintenance. Somebody that residents can go to, someone that will coordinate with the lower Mystic TMA, for instance, can provide information on transit, biking, walking, what other options are available. There'll be support for telecommuting with high-speed internet and other options. Secure bicycle parking is proposed, and we're still working through the details on those, but we're looking at also providing space for e-bikes to be charged in the facility. We're also looking at EV charging facilities on site. Again, these are things that are still still being worked through the details on, but this is part of the proposal for the project. And coordination with Blue Bikes in order to potentially set up a Blue Bikes kiosk that would be able to be used by not just the residents of the project, but residents of the neighborhood as well. And as I meant, I believe I mentioned previously that Bill Lucas will also indicate how the site plan is proposed to have access to the potential Wellington connector. So all of these measures are in use, they're proven strategies, they're in use in Medford to some extent, but also in Boston and in Cambridge and Somerville and Everett and Malden, and that's because they work there. And some cities, you have to develop a TDM plan. And Davis is taking the charge or taking the lead on this to implement this plan. So, you know, just to summarize, I think the last slide just shows the conclusions. And, you know, this TIA indicates a minimal impact on peak hour traffic delays and vehicle queuing with no change in level of service at 13 or 14 intersections and less than a two-second increase in delay at most locations. Uh, the project is improving circulation and. I'm really doing a great preview for Bill, but the project is improving circulation in the neighborhood by introducing new on-street parking on Myrtle Street and Amaranth Ave. And this improves the accommodation and circulation for two-way traffic flow on both of those streets. The project is enhancing operations through the closure of two curb cuts, construction of a multi-modal sidewalk on Amaranth Ave. And there's no sidewalk there now, but the project includes the addition of that sidewalk. As I mentioned, eliminating curb cuts at the intersection of Myrtle, Amaranth, and Lawrence Street and at the corner of Myrtle Street and the Fellsway. And again, promoting alternative modes of transportation. It did another way to support the use of bicycles as an inclusion of a bicycle repair shop, as I mentioned, the secure storage and e-bike charging, as well as a tie-in to the Wellington connector. So we know that we still have the city and peer review process to work through, but we feel that all of these conclusions and points reinforce the the idea that the project can be accommodated as designed. With that, that's the end of my presentation. I'll turn it over to Bill Lucas from Bowler. Thank you.
[Bill Lucas]: Good evening, everyone. If you can't hear me, let me know. But otherwise, I'll move ahead. Just a quick summary of my discussion points for this evening. Quick site layout update. Our parking demand analysis review, which may have Scott as part of that presentation again. A fire truck access and circulation on the site itself. And then finally, utility and drainage updates. Next slide, please.
[Mike Caldera]: Sorry, just to interject, I may have misunderstood Pat earlier. Is the intention to present this all together and then the board will ask questions, or was it to split it up into two separate pieces?
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: Excuse me, the intent is to present all together. There are only a few brief slides here. We just felt like it tied the whole presentation in, closing out with a site plan update. Sounds great, thanks.
[Bill Lucas]: Mike, and further to that point, Mr. Chair, the idea is part of this presentation from a civil standpoint is to tie in the traffic elements around the site to the site itself. So that's generally how I'm approaching it. Site plan before you now is a little different than what was shown at the previous hearing. And I just want to walk through some of those points for clarification purposes. The majority of the project and the layout itself has not changed the building location size has remained in place. But what we've done is try to review this plan. From an internal standpoint, from a vehicular and pedestrian safety standpoint, and based on the same 1 of the major. review points was to look at emergency access, and I'll get into that in some future slides, but emergency access vehicles around the site itself to ensure that we were providing proper access from the public streets through the driveways around the site and around the buildings. In terms of some of the other plan changes that have occurred, we've had a minor adjustment to the configuration of the front entry point. That is for several reasons. Again, to make sure that we were accommodating emergency vehicles properly and to try to enhance the beauty and the entry of this new building and this new project to the neighborhood itself. Another minor layout adjustment was at the front of the self-storage facility out towards the Fellsway. We've had the opportunity to again review any of the trucks in and out of that facility, their turning movements, how the drive aisle's been laid out, and also a layout of the small parking lot associated with that facility. Additionally, as Scott spoke to, we've had some changes, again, minor in nature, to the on-site parking along Myrtle Street and Amaranth Avenue. In particular on Amaranth, we have widened the street for vehicle access. and then provided parking and public sidewalk along its frontage. Currently, as everyone knows, it is limited parking due to building locations, utility poles, large existing curb cuts that disallow that use to happen. And now we're going to provide almost 12 parking spaces and sidewalk along that frontage itself. We've also, again, as I noted, reviewed and adjusted on-site, some on-site features due to vehicular and pedestrian circulation in terms of some of the pathing to and from the building for accessibility and EV purposes and EV accessible stalls. Currently, we are showing a few accessible and EV stalls on the surface near the northeastern corner of the building and the remaining accessible and EV stalls are currently proposed to be within the podium parking area itself. Next slide, please. Scott, would you like to jump in and talk to this slide itself?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Sure, sure. So we had done an estimate of part in demand in the TIA and we relied on data from the ITE who compiles counts of, as well as similar to what they do with the trip generation manual, they compile uh counts of uh parking demand of similar facilities as uh as what are proposed here um and or existing so in terms of the the there's a there's a weekday demand and a weekend demand uh for both the the self-storage facility and the proposed residential development those those demand rates, those average parking ratios are applied to the specific unit or number of units or building area for whichever land use as appropriate. That gives us an average demand of 276 parking spaces during a weekday, 252 Spaces on the on the weekend, so, you know, the, the, the parking supply is is on the 1 hand is is higher than the. Estimated peak parking demand, but. But I believe, but Bill, I'll let you get into the into the next slide because I think that's that's the other part of this. Sorry, it's I guess it's not so sorry about that.
[Bill Lucas]: It's 2 slides down. Okay.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
[Bill Lucas]: So, I don't know if you want to just go right to the, I think you want to see the parking slide. Scott, is that correct?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[FGwns8hP0DA_SPEAKER_00]: I'll just jump in here quick. If you go back, Bill, I think the parking slides are condensed onto this 1 slide to just summarize quickly the zoning ordinance. We have the asterisk comment at the bottom just with what we believe would be required against what the supply is and would have you just talk to that.
[Bill Lucas]: Yes, currently with the site plan that you had seen previously, we're looking at 324 parking spaces that's inclusive of on-site and podium parking for the residential use itself. And we are proposing another 22 parking stalls for the self-storage facility. Again, those are where we stand currently, maybe subject to change. But based on everything that we've seen to date, we feel. Encouraged that the amount of parking we're providing for both of the facilities should be sufficient in nature and does take into account. the notion that we've received from the zoning board in the past to not over park this site, but try to park it appropriately for each of the uses in hand. Next slide, please. This slide provides a quick review of the fire truck for Medford and its pathing from Myrtle Street onto the site at the front of the building. It may be a little difficult to see, but it is a fire truck traveling to the east towards the Fellsway, making a right into the main entry point, and then following along to the front of the building. where it would have access to any emergency situation. And then we just show that exiting movement out to the street itself in the upper right hand corner. That is the model of the fire truck that we have utilized for this representation. And to my knowledge, it is consistent with the fire marshal's request from Medford. Next slide, please. And this provides the fire truck circulation from the Fellsway onto the site as it makes a right in, passes by the self-storage facility, and then circulates clockwise around the rear of the building and then out to Amaranth Avenue. Again, this was another reason why we had to make some minor adjustments to the site layout itself just to ensure that we could accommodate a vehicle of the size. Next step for our office is to then provide this material to the Medford fire marshal for his review and any further comments that we can take into consideration in the future. We can flip to the next slide. I believe it's the questions, but just to give an update as far as the rest of the civil design, it is we are undertaking that currently, and we look forward to submitting a full revised site plan package back to Medford and beta for peer review. We are currently reviewing utilities and stormwater management on the site itself. We do not anticipate again, any major. Differences from the package that we had submitted in January on those elements. It's just a matter of refinement at this point to confirm where all the tie in location should be at the building itself. Since that building has been adjusted and programmed slightly differently and then. At the same time, again, a lot of moving pieces on the site itself, so we need to situate the subsurface stormwater management systems in appropriate locations to ensure that they are spaced appropriately away from buildings, and then we can make appropriate connections to the downstream on-street sewer system. With that said, I can turn it back to Pat or open it up to questions as we go.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. Pat, was there anything else or can we open it up to, okay, great. So at this point, I'm going to open it up to questions and comments from the board. Who would like to go first? Andre, please go ahead.
[Andre Leroux]: Great. Thank you. Thanks for the presentation. I was wondering if you could elaborate a little bit more about the parking need assumptions, particularly around the studio and one bedroom. The 0.68 does seem a little low. I know I'm not a huge over-parking fan, but I'm wondering how that was calculated.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so that data is just based on counts of existing facilities that have been provided, developed by ITE, just based on counts of other locations. Sort of categorized down by by unit type and you know the latest values that Looking at our our point six eight four studios in one bedrooms and one point two three four two bedrooms but those and those Comps are they I mean what kinds of projects exactly?
[Andre Leroux]: you know in terms of relationship to transit, other modes.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I don't think that there's that level of detail. I can look into it, but I don't think in this particular category that there's that level of detail with proximity to transit for these uses. I do know that we had done some initial Well, the perfect fit parking report from MAPC has a lot of data that indicates in general, there's a lot of unused parking spaces for a lot of multifamily housing developments in this area. But I can look into that number further and get you an answer on that.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. All right, other questions or comments from the board? Okay, I can go next then. So I guess while we're on this one, I'd like to better understand What is the reasonable parking buffer compared to the parking demand? So I understand from this slide that by ordinance, 361 spaces are required. Applicants already requesting a reduction based on the proposal, a modest reduction of 30. The demand on the parking buffer weekday in totality seems to be this 276. So what is that? About 55 extra spaces. And of those 55, I guess 11 of the extra spaces are for the storage facility. So there's about 44 space buffer, is that the right number? Should it be a lower number, a larger number? I don't really have a great intuition about what's customary here.
[Patrick Gallagher]: Mister chair I can address that and can also let Scott weigh in on that as far as the technical elements. Pat Gallagher from Goulston and stores. And so I think we're trying to balance here that on one hand, you have what's required under the zoning ordinance. And I do want to be clear that the 361 number is just what would be required with respect to the project. So, that does not include the number of spaces that would be required for the remaining storage facility. So, we're trying to balance what's required under the zoning. Um, and what we're showing here would still necessitate a parking waiver. For the project, as well as approval of shared parking. Uh, for between the project and the storage facility that's adjacent. Um, but also to balance that against concerns among. Folks who live in the neighborhood around. overflow parking spilling into the neighborhood itself. I think we're trying to strike that balance here and be a little bit conservative. This was something that was raised by Director Hunt when we spoke yesterday as well, just the delta between what we're showing as peak estimated demand and what we'd be including. But I think wrapped into that is that You know these are these are estimates and we need to factor in. For all of those different considerations that it might be greater than that number.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay, thank you, Mr. Gordon was there anything you wanted to add to that.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: No, I think Pat summed it up pretty well. What we're finding is that there's less demand for a lot of these units that are coming They're coming online, they're being programmed with less parking, and it's people that are moving into the area that may be coming from other locations and not bringing vehicles. So there's less of a demand for a personal transportation and therefore a parking space. But I do agree that the intent here is to strike the balance between what you know, what the ordinance says and what the demand is indicating that the supply should be.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay, thanks. And then just so I'm clear, these counts do or don't include the 12 street parking spaces that are along the building frontage?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Do not.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay. My next sets of questions were in some cases referenced in the presentation and one case not specifically referenced, but they're from a detailed read of the supplemental TIA itself. Um, so I just want to make sure I'm understanding the transit ridership portion. Um, so as I understood it, the, there's data from the MBTA about the current ridership at peak times. I think it was in the morning going inbound was the worst case. It was like 29% capacity. Is that, um, as of this stop or is that all the way down? Does it get fuller further down the line or is that 29% along the entire route?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so I'll have to get back to you on that. I think the daily usage is 1,256 at maximum. And the capacity level is 5,088, so that's about 25% of capacity that gets used. But I'll get back to you on that specific number. My guess is that it's at that point, but I'll get back to you on that.
[Andre Leroux]: OK, thank you. And then I'm sorry, Mike, just on that issue, if I could jump in for clarification. Yeah, it'd be great to know if there is like peak times of the day, right? Like if that's all of the buses throughout the whole day, I can imagine, you know, late at night will be mostly empty, but I'm mostly curious about what's the capacity at the peak hours and that's, you know, are they overflowing at peak hours?
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah. So, Andre, that's what I was referring to. So in the report, there's peak hour numbers and it's, I think in the morning, on the way in, it's still 29% capacity in the peak hour. But that's spread over three buses, and it doesn't speak to whether some of the buses are fuller than others. And then evening on the way back, I think it was closer to maybe 25%. Yeah, so I would love to know the answer on that, especially on the way back. So if we have residents taking the public transit and the buses start out full, that even if they empty before the stop, I just want to make sure there's no issues there. Were you going to say something, Scott?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and certainly, Inbound from from this stop. That's where the ridership is. You know, there's plenty of seats. there's plenty of seats on the bus getting to this point inbound. After here, it may pick up. We have that information. We can probably lay out some type of ridership chart by stop.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah. I love data in general, but I guess to try to keep it tangible, I agree on the way in since it's maybe middle of the line, it's 29%. when the residents in this area, whether they're residents of this site or, uh, adjacent properties should have ability to get on. I think the board would want to know if on the way back. So if you're, if you're going into Wellington, you're probably coming back later from Wellington. If there's any issues there in the, in the capacity, if I had a guess from these ridership numbers, probably not an issue, but it would just be good to know for sure. Um, And then related to this, so I think I understood all the detailed reports here. There's the assumed 13% of the trips generated would be transit specifically. And I was looking at the numbers, and it looked like that ends up being about 12 to 13 people during the peak hour.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, exactly.
[Mike Caldera]: OK.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Okay. And if, and if that's spread out over three buses, you know, it's three to four people.
[Mike Caldera]: Right. So yeah. Worst case scenario, if everyone gets on one bus, if that bus is over capacity, but that's not really plausible. So yeah, across three buses, it would be funny. It looks like.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah. I mean, and, uh, so, so Myrtle street is, I think it's, it's stopped. Well, it's about two thirds of the way in, uh, on the route. So, you know, And there's obviously the population density increases as you get closer to Wellington. So there may be more riders that are getting on further down. But again, at this point, at this location, and I understand your question, but at this point, there sure seems like there'll be plenty of seats on that bus coming inbound or coming outbound.
[Mike Caldera]: Great, thanks. And then a different set of questions, just a clarification. So I saw in the report the unfortunate situation where a couple of the count equipment were vandalized. And so there were two intersections where, as a result, older data was used. I think it was Central and Pinkerton, Central and Kenmuir. Yeah. In the neighboring intersections where the counts way different between 2020 and now or do you think these are reasonable approximations for the current numbers?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, we used, they were a bit different, but we used the locations on either side of the two subject intersections and balanced up the traffic volumes. And then we made adjustments to the volume that was going in and out of those two streets based on counts that we had from, I think it was either 2019 or 2020. And so that, you know, it's. I mean, you know, it's unfortunate, but but I I'm I'm pretty I'm pretty confident in the in the way we the way we adjusted the volumes to account for it.
[Mike Caldera]: All right. Thank you. Those are my questions. So do we have other members of the board who would like to ask questions or make comments?
[Yvette Velez]: We have just a more of a clarification of at the end, you described that plan. Can you remind me again? Now, is that a recommended planners that the plan that will most likely that will take place the, like, having a person responsible for managing on site transportation and that list.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, I think that that is the framework of a plan. I expect that it will be, you know, it may be supplemented or it may be modified by the city and possibly by the peer reviewer, but right now that is the plan.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_05]: Okay, thank you.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, thank you. Other questions or comments from the board? All right, seeing none, at this point, chair awaits a motion to open the public portion of the hearing on the supplemental transportation impact assessment. So moved. Do I have a second? Second. All right, we're going to take a roll call. Yvette? Aye. Andre? Aye. Jim? Aye. Jamie? Aye. Mike, aye. All right, folks, the public portion of the hearing is now open. If you're a member of the public and you would like to make a public comment in regards to the supplemental traffic impact assessment that was presented tonight, please go ahead and raise your hand on Zoom. Turn on your camera and raise your hand. You can type something in the chat, or you can email Dennis at dmcdougall at medford-ma.gov. I see we have a member of the public who would like to speak on this matter. Allison D., please state your name and address for the record.
[MCM00001504_SPEAKER_11]: Hi, good evening, everyone. Allison D'Agostino. I represent the D'Agostino Trust. We're the owners of 1022-1024 Fellsway. Thank you very much for the time. I appreciate the presentation. So just a couple quick things. Just from my understanding, it sounds like the traffic assessment was just one day's worth of traffic captured. Maybe that's standard. I would like to just note that was the Thursday before holiday weekend. So probably not maybe the best to actually record Typical traffic. One other comment too is just the peak hours, I don't really agree with. I've definitely seen an evolution, been here myself 12 years, my mother-in-law 50 plus years, same house. So we overlooked the Fellsway, have a great view. I would say from the pandemic evolution, your peak evening hour commute time especially is a little bit earlier. And also your beginning time's a little bit earlier than was noted. So just something to take away. Initial comments, I just, I think I work with data for a living, so I know data can represent what you want it to show. I think the increase from a car perspective of four to 14 during peak hours in the morning for 289 units seems really completely unreasonable. And while I respect, again, great presentation, level of detail on the source of your parking average ratio comp seems something I'd expect in a meeting like this. Perhaps happens behind the scenes and I'm speaking specifically to the parking demand analysis slide. You should know your source data if that's what you're standing behind for representing the amount of cars going. up and down. And my last comment is really just the, again, the size of the street increase. I appreciate that with Amarith. I'm sure those folks do too. If Myrtle Street's not increasing in size right now, I encourage the board to walk the site. If you haven't already, you cannot pass two cars. up and down Myrtle Street without someone pulling over and let somebody go. So, you know, my concern is definitely that it's sort of being glossed over. And Myrtle continues to be a one-way, Lawrence is a one-way coming in. You write where that congestion point is, is where this property is planned to be built. To me, those weren't really spoken about. But I do want to also just say quickly, Davis Company, listen, you make great properties. Rivers Edge is beautiful. I know in the traffic assessment, they mentioned Encore and Assembly. I think we can all agree what's different there. It's not within a neighborhood in any of those properties. very separated. And again, my mother-in-law has been here 50 plus years. We just want to, you know, conserve our neighborhood. So thank you for the time.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. I just want to make sure that on a couple of those points, there's a shared understanding. So there was the peak hours. My understanding is that's as measured by the count. Is that correct?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's correct. And then as far as as far just to continue on that point, you know, we, we, we count the, we get those peak hours and, and wherever they occur, if it's, if it's seven to eight, if it's seven, 15 to eight, 15, if it's, you know, eight to eight to nine, whatever's the highest peak hour, that's what we use in the analysis. So that's, and that's just what shows up in the data.
[Patrick Gallagher]: Mr. Chair, if I may.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, please go ahead.
[Patrick Gallagher]: Could I direct to Bill Lucas, just to make a clarification on the, one of the last points about the width of Myrtle Street, and just to talk a little bit about what we are proposing out there.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, sounds great. Please go ahead Bill.
[Bill Lucas]: Great, thank you Allison. Thank you for the questions and comments on the presentation itself. And, you know, excuse me for not addressing this specific comment with regard to Myrtle Street. Again, maybe I just got a little too. It is our intention to widen Myrtle Street. It's an existing 26-foot wide curb-to-curb, and it is very narrow, being out there myself and seeing the conditions. But as part of this is, what we will do is, we're going to do a lot of work to make sure that we're able to do that. from the existing curb line along our face of the property we will adjust that in to provide an additional width of parallel parking along Myrtle Street and as part of that we will improve the sidewalk conditions and we will actually be providing some land back to the city for for both the pedestrian and the street parking itself. So as part of this, Davis will be giving up some land in order to widen Myrtle Street for that better flow of traffic that everyone's looking for.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. There was one other item. that was mentioned. So first of all, there is the supplemental traffic impact assessment is public record. It's either already in the folder or will be shortly after the meeting. My understanding from reading table six of that report is that on the weekday morning peak hour, there are 90 net new vehicle trips, 21 entering and 69 exiting, and then afternoon peak hour is 89, 55 entering and 34 exiting. So it's not 14, it's 90 and 89. Right, going in and out of the site, yes. Right. Great. I think that covers the questions. So if there are any other members of the public that would like to speak on this matter, please go ahead. OK, there we go. I see you. So I see a Christina, I always forget how to pronounce your last name.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Don't even try. Let me just tell you. Catch.
[Mike Caldera]: Just for the record, please.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Christina Kach, 130 Myrtle Street.
[Mike Caldera]: Please go ahead.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: OK. So just a quick note to add on to Allison's comment about the traffic study happening the Thursday before a long weekend. We also had a snowstorm that Monday of that week. Snow emergency, schools closed, parking restrictions. So we had a long weekend and a snow emergency the week of the traffic study. So I do have some questions. So I was fortunate enough today to have time to read through your entire 62-page document cover to cover. So I do have some comments that might be directly related to that versus the presentation. But my first question was, after you collected the data, How did you perform the analysis? Were you using a Minitab statistical software? Did you use a simulation model? Where did the data go to get this output?
[Mike Caldera]: Sorry, just to interject, I want to make sure we don't devolve into a back and forth conversation. It's supposed to be public comments. So Christina, maybe you could list out your questions. And then in general, I intend, if we don't know that information, we'll certainly ask. But I just want to avoid conversations.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Sure. I'll run through them all. So that was number one. Number two was that I saw both in your conversation today in the PowerPoint as well as your full Word document that there would be quote new on street parking and quote to create more on street parking supply. Was there a map that I didn't see of where of like how that was gonna look? So if there was, if that, new plan of how you're going to include more parking spaces on the street was somewhere, please let me know where it was so I can go check it out. And then my final question was, you mentioned in your conclusion and your summary, specifically on page seven, if you want to know where I'm looking, that with the removal of the industrial use space, the heavy traffic, the heavy vehicles and trucks will be fewer. And I didn't see anywhere in the body of the report where you did that analysis. Now, of course, obviously, you're getting rid of Art of the Event and Churchill Furniture, so they will not be there anymore. However, when you're adding 300, almost 300 units to the property with a entrance directly across from me for delivery vehicles, I have a hard time believing that there really will be fewer trucks in the Myrtle Street Amaranth neighborhood by just removing two companies when you're adding a delivery truck entrance right here on Myrtle Street. I have to realize, I have to reason that if not more, it's at least the same. And I didn't see where that analysis happened for the claim that said fewer. Those are my three.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, great. And I was taking notes. I wanted to make sure we didn't miss anything. All right. So I guess the second question, I can just speak to that. I think that what we're looking at right now does depict the street parking. So I know it's not zoomed in easily, the viewable. But if you look along Amaranth and Myrtle, set those little green bumps, those are actually separating out some street parking spaces that are on the property that are being used to extend the space. So it'd be, I don't remember the split across Amaranth and Myrtle, but it's on the picture.
[Patrick Gallagher]: That's correct, Mr. Chair. And just to elaborate on that a bit, the street. So, you know, again, I think the commitment to pull in the curb and to create new spaces by widening the street. I think that's a really unique commitment for this team to be making and not something that I've really ever come across in the context of this type of project. I think it's important to recognize that this is a real concession that the team is making to the neighborhood here. to be granting easements for this parking. The result along Myrtle is to have approximately, and Bill Lucas can speak to this more, but to have approximately the same number of spaces that exist today. The way that's accomplished is because a very large curb cut that's on the corner here is being closed off. Then the addition of new parking that does not exist today on Amaranth Avenue. and all of that would be intended to be public parking.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so it's not guaranteed for Myrtle Street, Amaranth residents. Okay, thank you for the clarification. So we're not getting more resident parking specifically on Myrtle. It's just the addition of new parking. Got it.
[Mike Caldera]: Right. Yeah. So as I understand it, it's the rules for usage of the space would be governed by the Medford ordinance. And it's complicated by it being on private property. So I'm not going to claim to know the specifics there. But I'm currently interpreting it as this is spaces that anyone in the area who's allowed to park on these streets would be able to park in. Is that accurate, Attorney Gallagher?
[Patrick Gallagher]: That's correct. Again, our intent is for this to be public parking. And that may be residents of the neighborhood, that may be visitors to the project. So that's the intent currently.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, thanks. So now the other two questions, I think these are both for Scott. So there is a question about statistical software or what's used to generate these reports.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, so the count data is processed, balanced. As I mentioned, we look at peak hours, peak hour volumes, and there's a specific traffic analysis. It's a stochastic analysis model that's used in the industry. And it's a standard software package that's one of the packages that's required by state reviewing agencies. And it's pretty widespread use amongst the consultants in the industry.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, thank you. And then the last question had to do with the heavy vehicle and truck counts. So I did try to do a keyword search of the doc myself. I didn't notice if there's something in the supplement that speaks to that beyond the statement in the conclusion.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, no, and I think it's more of a review of the operations that we've seen when we've been out there, where we've seen trucks circulating in the parking lot. I think that the delivery vehicles, Amazon vehicles, UPS, post office, these vehicles are everywhere now. I would think that the way that the deliveries are made, they're done to specific areas and they're likely to They're likely already there. A lot of these delivery vehicles are likely already on the streets in the neighborhood around the site. And we would think that instead of passing by the site like some of them do, once the development is in there, they would be pulling into the site. But I don't know that they represent really an increase from what's already in the neighborhood. Whereas I think by removing some of the industrial uses that are there, those larger vehicles would no longer be entering the site.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so have you thought about clarifying the language that when you were speaking about heavy vehicles and trucks, you're excluding delivery vehicles. Because when I see trucks, I say I bucket in delivery vehicles. So I think I would clarify that language to avoid further confusion. But also have you talked to UPS, FedEx, DHL about their predictions of how much their increase is going to be. So if you're talking about supply chains and how they determine their routes, they do it by zones because of the patterns and how much they have to deliver in a certain area at a certain time. So if you have almost 300 units, almost 300 people, that might be more than one truck. And also with UPS, I know specifically they send out more than one truck in a day. So have you looked at any operations research principles about what the traffic might look like? for the delivery trucks that have to deliver so much more.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: We have not looked at any operations research principles for delivery vehicles. This is, you know, that's a bit beyond the scope of a standard traffic study. But, you know, I mean, if the city and the peer review consultants have indicated that that's something we should review, we can make an effort to do that.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, so to that point, my intention is that the board does have peer review consultants who is. reviewing this with expertise and reviewing these sorts of reports. And so the board certainly intends to both consider the public comment and request as well as the expert guidance of the peer review consultant. So I will say just a suggestion, not a requirement, but I do generally buy into the principle that a final report should not make a claim that isn't supported by some table or data in there. So I think maybe the conclusion should either be very crisp about why we think that's the case, or maybe just not reference that specifically. But as to whether there should be supplemental analysis, I think the board intends to wait for peer review comments and make a determination at that point.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Understood. Thank you.
[Mike Caldera]: All right. So we have a resident Richmond chow please state your name and address for the record.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_04]: Hi, my name is, uh, Japan chow. I'm the owner and I live at 1 26128 Myrtle street, which is directly across from. in that picture, the new opening or the front entrance of the building. I also have a unique perspective because I am temporarily living at RE150 in Medford, which is a similar development to this, I guess, proposed area. I guess I have unique insight as to The traffic and delivery and kind of what happens from the residents coming in and out of this building. I guess I'll start off with my 1st comment, the shift of. Like, percentage usage to from cars to bikes, I don't think that's. Totally, you know, reasonable. I know. Everybody is trying to add bikes and and by capability, but, you know, we look out today and there's, there's no bikers anywhere. Um, at least half the year. Right? So, um. I would like to see if that number should be reduced at some for some amount. I also have a question related to, you know, counting the number of. additional trips or impacts of drivers into the building, right? Is the data only accounting for the residents generating the trips or does it account for the gate drivers, the food delivery, the Ubers, the packages, and the visitors, all those trips that are also going to be occurring to this building? You know, living at 150, there are food deliveries, Uber pickups, and also package deliveries around the clock. Amazon comes here four, five, six times a day. Same with UPS and FedEx. So it's not just a one-day drop-off. There is, you know, a constant stream of deliveries. Trucks, there's also people who move in and out of here. They don't stay long term people have 1 year leases. They move in and out. So, so moving trucks coming in and out constantly and being a direct. I guess. Um, directly in front of the new proposed entrance. I would like to kind of see data on. What is that what is the number of trips per hour coming in and out of. That street that that entrance, right? Because. Right now it's 0 and I can, I can live in front of my, I can live at my house and not worry about cars. Turning in and out of towards my house, especially with, you know, I know you're increasing the park, the street parking and the width of the street. A 2 lane street taking left and right is not necessarily totally sufficient, depending on how well people drive, especially if they're trucks or inexperienced type drivers or people in a hurry because they're dropping off food or people, right? They don't necessarily live there. So, I have a major concern about that that entrance point there and not speaking to. You know, you mentioned 80 trips, 90 trips. Coming in and out the facility during peak hours, but. What is that per hour and throughout the day? I guess I'm seeing somewhere between increase of 0 to 90 trips. You know, um, constantly out of that, that, that location, that, that, that, that, that entrance way, which currently nothing exists. So, um, that that's, that's my major concern, you know, having a direct entrance right in front of my house. Um, so. That's pretty much all I have to say.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. Yeah. So I do believe there in the detailed report, there are some projections that are specific to the drives themselves. Um, I'll have Scott check me on this, but I think it's figures nine and 10 and 11 and, uh, yeah, nine, 10 and 11, I think. Yep. Exactly. Yeah. And so, um, If I'm understanding it correctly, I believe Mr. Chow is by the site drive C, which is expecting 5% of the volume, or maybe 10% in totality. So 5% turning left, 5% turning right. This is exiting and then on the way in. also 5%. Am I, is that correct? Am I reading that?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yep, yep, that's correct. I mean, the majority of the trips are expected to be using the Fellsway and the Fellsway access, a lesser percentage using Amaranth and the intent of the access to Myrtle is really to get a small component of The project traffic, but, yeah, it's it works out to be. It works out to be over the course of a day. 50 trips entering and 50 trips. Exiting so that's over 24 hour period.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, thank you.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_04]: Um, do we have other members? Sorry, am I able to. Ask clarification on that assumption. Yeah, I guess so. So it sounds like we're assuming 10% of the trips come out of that. That, um, I guess, uh, interest that. You exit way during exit, right? Yeah, I, I'm not sure. Why the 10%? Why is that assumed 10%? I mean, if that's the front entrance. I would assume somewhere in the 60 to 70% people would go through there. People drive, the easiest way and the easiest way to get to the building is through Myrtle Street and into that exit. It's not through the Fells Way. You come in through the opposite streets off of Fells Way, through that area. I mean, entering the building, if I came from the West, I wouldn't come, I would enter the building right in front of my house. I wouldn't come, I wouldn't drive to the back of the building, and I wouldn't drive all the way to the Fellsway to come in that direction. So, I mean, 10% doesn't seem reasonable. It would be if at least 33% of the time, and I would think it's a lot more, because why would you drive to the back of the building when you can drive to the front?
[Mike Caldera]: So if I'm understanding correctly, Someone on Fellsway heading north, since they can't turn into the Fellsway entrance, you're saying they would, your observation is that they would use Myrtle Street, is that?
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, I'm saying the way people access this area currently is a lot of the traffic comes west. So down, I think it's Lawrence Street, or they pass through this street. If someone was going, North of the city, they would, they would exit out of that. That the entrance way and head West. And if they were coming, coming home, they would come in from the West side. Off 93, because it's easier to cut through those side streets then. To fight the traffic coming down the Fells way. I think if you're there during rush hour, you'll see how many cars just zip past up and down those side streets to avoid the Fellsway because you would get stuck at the U-turns or whatnot to turn around. It's easier to go north and south heading west than going down the Fellsway in either direction. Got it.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. Yeah. So Scott, I'd appreciate if you could clarify how the percentages are determined. And then also I was checking my notes and I had forgotten to ask about whether the trip generation accounts for delivery vehicles or not.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Sure. So it's important to note that The access to the garage is, there's one access point off of Amaranth, and then there's another access point off of that driveway. You can kind of see, yeah, right where Pat's circling there. So, you know, we are expecting that some of the traffic is gonna come, is gonna depart to the west and arrive from the west we think that traffic is more likely to use the amaranth access point than to use the myrtle street access point because that You know, that access off of Myrtle is is really intended, you know, it's not intended for residents. It's intended for for visitors and it's a, it's an area for. for those deliveries to occur. It's really not an easy path to come in from Myrtle, go around the internal roundabout, pass the townhomes, to then come to the driveway where If you're already coming from the West, I think it's more likely that you choose to use the Amaranth access point. So the traffic that's on Fellsway is likely to be using that Fellsway access point. That's where the rest of that project traffic comes from. In terms of Mr. Chow's other questions, the bike usage, I think it's a relatively small component of the trips. And again, we basically, if you look at the existing data, the transit and the walk and the work from home and the other modes that people use, that accounts for about looks like it accounts for about 30% of usage without considering the bike percentage. So we're already assuming 77% of trips using vehicles. So it's already a conservative assumption. If we backed out the, If we backed out that 5% bike percentage and used the work from home as is in the census data and used the others commuting mode as is in the census data, we'd only be using 70% of the traffic assigned to vehicular trips. So I think it's already a conservative assumption in that regard. The trips that are counted or that are projected do include all users because they're trips of the driveways for sites. So they include delivery vehicles, they include trash trucks, they include as well as the residence trips. You know, I do understand the point about people moving in and out of. Of the of the complexes and, you know, it's that's and they're moving trucks and those are things that we're we're continuing to study with the with the with the site plan and and evaluating these. These kinds of kinds of issues.
[Mike Caldera]: Mr. chair, if I may, thank you. Yeah, please go ahead, Attorney Gallagher.
[Patrick Gallagher]: I just wanted to add on to what Scott was saying that so, you know, as as Pat had mentioned, we had a very productive meeting yesterday with the beta team. And, you know, as part of that, we were talking about TDM measures and other tactics that we could use to lessen the impact of the additional trips that we're talking about. And so I think as we go through this, and I know that beta is still reviewing and is going to provide written comments. But for example, we would certainly look at things like traffic calming as a way to encourage trips in a particular direction, such as out to the Fellsway. So those are the types of things that we spoke about and are definitely looking at and we'll look for betas and the board's input as well on those.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_04]: Okay, thank you. And if it's 5% of the trips coming out of that entrance, is that even necessary then? Is closing that entrance optional? If you're saying like 5% of the trips come out of there, then it sounds like it's a useless feature to the building.
[Mike Caldera]: So my understanding of the history is this was originally added as a way for delivery that didn't uh, rely on, um, the other entrances and that would be close to the front of the building and for, um, I think maybe some of the parking for the leasing office or something was proposed there. Now it's been changed a little bit because I think it's also the way a fire truck heading north would need to enter the property from the west side.
[Patrick Gallagher]: Is that correct? That's correct. This is the site plan we're proceeding with at this point.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay. All right. And just, Scott, one last clarification just so I'm clear. So Fellsway heading north, a resident who's going to use the Fellsway entrance would do a U-turn north of the site and then come down. Is that right?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and we know that there's a lot of congestion there, but it seems like that is still a preferable move as compared with that traffic wanting to make a left turn and then going down central to come down We do have some of the traffic that's expected to do that, but there's probably going to be more delay associated with that type of movement than there would be with the U-turn. And we do have some traffic that's Again, that's coming to the site from the west, some traffic that's coming from Riverside and coming from Central, and some of that traffic is coming in Amaranth, and a lot of the traffic is on Fells Way. And just due to the nature of the locations and the access on Fells Way, that traffic is going to be making U-turn maneuvers at those two intersections.
[Mike Caldera]: OK, thanks. Jamie, did you have a question?
[Unidentified]: Yeah, I think at the previous meeting, I had brought that up about that U-turn, and I've driven around the area. I mean, realistically, the options coming up the Fellsway are to go up to the intersection, do a U-turn, come down the Fellsway, come in the Fellsway entrance, go up to the intersection, take a left, come down Kenmare, or potentially what some people might choose to do is come up the Fellsway to Riverside, go down Riverside, up Spring Street, and then come down Lawrence. But I think that's much more complex than going up to the Fellsway. I think that's less likely to happen.
[Mike Caldera]: Got it. Okay. Thank you. All right. Do we have other members of the public who would like to speak on this matter? Do not see any. Chair awaits a moment to close the public.
[MCM00000654_SPEAKER_00]: Hold on. Somebody is speaking. Somebody came off mute.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, that's someone who keeps unmuting themselves. I'll double check if they actually wanted to speak or if it's just a technology issue. Is there another member of the public that wants to speak or was that just an accidental unmute? Yeah, I think it was an accident on mute. So chair awaits a motion to close the public portion of this session of the hearing. So moved. Do I have a second? Second. All right, we're going to take a roll call. Yvette?
[Yvette Velez]: Aye.
[Mike Caldera]: Jim? Aye. Andre? Aye. Jamie? Aye. All right, the public portion of this session of the hearing is now closed. Members of the board, other questions or comments before we move on to next step logistical items?
[Andre Leroux]: Go ahead. I think Yvette was jumping in.
[Yvette Velez]: Yeah, I apologize. Can you pull up the map where you would do that U-turn? Because I think that was one of the intersections, right, that was spoken about, that have been given the, that was the low-rated one, right, to confirm. That's great.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yep. And so, so there's, so there's location four, which is central and the Fellsway, and then location one, which is Riverside and the Fellsway.
[Yvette Velez]: And so was there any discussion about the possibility of improving that? Because I'm recollecting that that U-turn line can get really long, and I recognize it's a bad intersection already, and it's not going to improve necessarily. But was there any, is there, could there be any discussion of, you know, other developments have sometimes improved the streets around them in different ways, and so. I guess, is that something that could happen? And I don't know what that would look like, but, you know, extending that left turn, that left turn, your lane or what, but.
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I mean, we, when we did the analysis, it showed that really all of the, there's a lot of delay, a lot of queuing on all four approaches and all the movements within the approaches. So, you know, if you, you know, you could potentially look at you know, modifications to signal timing, but then you're really prioritizing one movement at the expense of another. As far as modifying the median there to possibly extend it or extend the left turn lane, we have not looked at that yet.
[Patrick Gallagher]: And if I could just add onto that too, I think, um, you know, again, the, the charge and what we're, what we're trying to look at here is how we can mitigate our impact to the greatest extent that we can. Right. But these two intersections already are at the lowest rated level of service. Um, and so I think, you know, we're, we're going to have those conversations and do what we can within reason and within the scope of what Chapter 40B is asking for. But I just want to be realistic that there are some real limitations, I think, on our ability to make any sort of physical change to the Fells Way.
[Mike Caldera]: And just to be clear, those Limitations include the need for conversations and buy-in with MassDOT? With DCR, actually. That's right. Okay. All right. Well, Yvette, if you're done with your questions, then Andre is next.
[Andre Leroux]: Yeah, so I do have a couple more questions and comments. One is just around the parking management itself. I didn't hear you speak to how the parking spaces would be allocated. Would, since you're not all the And I didn't hear you talk about kind of like how they would be allocated, would residents pay for their parking? And what about how a visitor space is managed?
[Patrick Gallagher]: I think, Mr. LaRue, I think those are all things that we don't have an answer for you yet on. I think we're certainly looking at all of those questions. I'll ask Pat, if you have anything to add to that, but I think for now, the answer is that we'll follow up with you, but we're going through that process and that'll be part of our conversations with the peer reviewer as well.
[Andre Leroux]: Okay, great. And another, My other comment slash question is, I feel like the transportation demand management plan is a little bit weak. I'd love to see some additional kinds of incentives to your residents to use the bus system so that we can exceed the mode share numbers for transit. And I'm wondering if you could think a little creatively about that, whether that means you know, helping residents get subsidized passes or subsidizing passes yourself or things like that. I'm sure that there are some creative ideas out there. I'm not an expert in this area.
[Patrick Gallagher]: I think that's something that, you know, that came up yesterday in our conversation with Beta and with Director Hunt. I think, again, that's something that we'll certainly look at. And I would put into that bucket as well, you know, we would be very interested in trying to get a blue bike station out there. And I think that if that's something that looks like it's going to be feasible, I think that would add a lot as well in trying to promote bike usage.
[Mike Caldera]: Thank you. All right. Other questions or comments from the board? All right. I'm not seeing any. I know we have our peer reviewers from beta on the call. Sounds like there's been some initial Discussions with the applicant. I just want to check in. I'm just looking at the list. I see Jeff on, for example. From a timeline perspective, based on the information and discussions you have today, when do you think we'll have more details in terms of the peer review letter?
[MCM00000653_SPEAKER_05]: Good evening, Mr. Chair, members of the board. Yeah, so we've done an initial preliminary read-through of the report. So, you know, I've identified some additional information at this point, clarifications, those sorts of things. But we have not done a deep dive into checking the calculations, you know, the appendices, that sort of information. And, you know, site visits, we need to go out to the site and observe. Traffic conditions, take some measurements. You know, we're going to need another another couple of weeks. I would like. I'm actually on vacation next week, so that's kind of a dead week. So, maybe a couple of weeks after that, we just need some time to do a. You know, a complete review. We had a good, you know, we had a good discussion yesterday, several of the issues that the board members brought up, you know, like Andre just brought up with parking and TDM, we had the same initial reactions or questions. So we know some of that already, but we have to get into the details and that takes a little more time to do.
[Mike Caldera]: Okay, yeah, thank you for the update. So I know that due to the order in which things are presented in the continuance, we're not tracking to the original schedule anyway. But so the original intention was that, I guess, if we kind of carry forward the things we haven't done yet. So the next thing the board would like to see is the updated architectural plans. And then I guess the meeting after that would be when we'd ideally want to review the updated engineering and traffic plans, as well as the peer review comments. So I just want to check in with, so to be clear, so our next session of this hearing is scheduled for Tuesday, March 26, so in a little less than two weeks. So that would be the one where If everything follows the schedule, the next step would be updated architectural plans. And then that would mean the Thursday, April 11th would be the one where it's the engineering and the traffic. So I just want to check in with the applicant to just coordinate on next topics. Do you think that we're tracking to that? Or what should we be doing with these upcoming hearings?
[Patrick Gallagher]: Thank you Mister chair I I think we're in agreement on that approach. Right now we're hoping to deliver an updated architectural package to the city and and the board and and our peer reviewer at Davis square. I believe at the end of this week or early next with the goal of having a follow-up session with with our peer reviewer next week and being able to present on that at our upcoming hearing on the 26th. Um, and then for the following hearing on April 11th. I agree that to the extent beta has had a chance to provide comments, we'll certainly be in a position to talk through. The transportation analysis and more detail. And I would also add to that, that I think, and I can defer to Bill Lucas on this, but I think we'll be in a position to have a more fulsome discussion on the updated civil set. You know, if not necessarily have written comments, we'll at least be able to introduce the full civil plan set on April 11th. Bill, is that, am I speaking out of turn or is that correct?
[Bill Lucas]: You are not speaking out of turn. That is correct. Our plan is to deliver an updated set of civil drawings by the end of next week. And hopefully, that will allow sufficient time for Beda to work through that and give us good feedback in time for the 11th.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, great. Sounds like a plan then. Are there other topics we should be discussing tonight before we move on? I think we covered the primary intended topics for the night, just checking in if there's something else that we needed to discuss, whether it's logistic or otherwise.
[Patrick Gallagher]: I think that's everything from the applicant's perspective, Mr. Chair, and, you know, again, we're very appreciative of the board's time and of our peer reviewers' time, and think we've been having some really good conversations and looking forward to continuing those. We're very excited about the project.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, wonderful. Well, thank you for the update. Great to see the progress here. All right, so with that, Chair awaits a motion to continue this matter to our special meeting on Tuesday, March 26th at 6.30 PM. So moved. Do I have a second?
[Unidentified]: Second.
[Mike Caldera]: All right, we're going to take a roll call. Andre? Aye. Jim? Aye. Yvette? Aye. Jamie? Aye. Mike, aye. All right. This matter is continued to that date. So thank you, folks. Have a good night. We have two other items on the agenda, just administrative updates and the meeting. So do we have any administrative updates tonight?
[Denis MacDougall]: I think relating to this, nothing comes to mind. The only other thing would be the discussion for our meeting 2 weeks hence just. We wanted to do some of that during this portion of the meeting.
[Mike Caldera]: Yeah, so I think you're referring to just coordinating. It was a scheduling matter for the for our regular meeting. Is that right? Yes. Yeah. So that's, that's something we don't have to do. We can do that offline too, but yeah, we'll do that offline. Um, okay. Sounds good. All right. And then a meeting minutes.
[Denis MacDougall]: Um, I know I sent you some, but I'm trying to remember which ones I sent you. So I apologize. Um, I have the many times Rachel has done a bunch and they've been very good. So I just can't remember which ones I've sent you and which ones I haven't.
[Mike Caldera]: I have the January 25th. and the January 11th, which I think those were the regular meetings. Okay.
[Denis MacDougall]: I haven't sent you the February one, so that's apologies for that. I can get you that before the next one.
[Mike Caldera]: Also, yeah, just the ones from Rachel for the, I think we still have to approve the meeting minutes for the special meeting as well.
[Denis MacDougall]: Yeah, those are the ones I was mostly referring to, the special meetings, the ones that I've sent you. I think I can't remember. There's a lot of meeting minutes. So I'm just trying to go back to look at what my sent emails are. OK.
[Mike Caldera]: Sounds good. But yeah, I don't believe we have meeting minutes to approve tonight. So it sounds like a plan. You'll send those to us, and then we'll approve at our next meeting. Sound good? Excellent. All right, great. So that brings us to the end of our agenda. Chair awaits a motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn. Do I have a second? Second. All right, we've got to take a roll call. Jamie? Jim? Aye. Beth?
[Yvette Velez]: Aye.
[Mike Caldera]: Andre? Aye. Mike? Aye. All right, the meeting is now adjourned.