[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: All right, guys, hey, good morning. Sorry, good afternoon, everyone. Sergeant Canava, I will be hosting the video, the committee today. Sergeant Rogers and Chief Buckley aren't able to be here today, so I'll be doing it here for March 21st, 2023, and we'll be going forward from there. I'll be with Alva, along with the commissioners, Alicia Hunt, Tim McIveran, and Steve Brzezinski. uh, Steve, Alicia and, uh, Tim, I made you guys co-host and along with Todd and, uh, Amy, if you guys, uh, there are any participants that kind of come through, it'd be great if you guys could help out with that.
[Unidentified]: Certainly. So should I call a roll call?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, you can call roll call. I'm going to call roll call.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Tim McGiven, commissioner McGiven.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I'm here. Thank you.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner Hunt. here. Commissioner Brzezinski, I am here. Sergeant Rogers is absent. Chief Buckley is absent and Sergeant can have a service chairperson, he will vote for the chief.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So good afternoon. Looks like we have a couple new business in order. And we can either start with that unless you want to do the.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: The first thing is.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Oh, sorry. We'll approve the minutes from last meeting. So if you want to read the roll call, it would be sorry.
[Alicia Hunt]: Sorry. I had a question about the minutes. Um, I apologize that it was last minute. I just sent it to Alva in the last 10 minutes. So I don't expect her to have seen it yet. Um, I, I'm one of the items on there was unclear because what we did was weird. Um, let me call it up. It was, um, I don't know if you want to review it and then we could do the minutes next time, but item 2020 22-66. was an opt-out petition from Spencer Road that we took off the table. And the motion was, as you wrote it down, was to return the item to the agenda and notify residents. And the vote was approved, but the way it's on the agenda, it looks like perhaps the motion was approved, I mean, the original motion, as opposed to what we actually motioned during the meeting. because it said it just says approved instead of approved to return to agenda. Like we sometimes will put a more detailed description there. And I just didn't want anybody to see those minutes and think that that item had actually been approved. And I was checking my notes to see what we had actually done. And I do note that it's still on the table this month. So I wasn't sure how it should be reflected in the minutes. But I was confused, so I would assume a member of the public would be confused.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: At our last meeting, it was on the agenda, the opt-out petition presented by the residents. It wasn't represented. Nobody was in the audience representing residents of Spencer Road. So it had been taken off the table for a vote. Nobody was there. back to the agenda to notify the residents to come to this meeting so that we can vote on their opt-out petition for Spencer Road, which was part of, Todd had mentioned earlier that when we were talking before the meeting, that it was part of the original list that was first sent out and approved for permit parking for the GLX. but the residents did not want it. And that's when they submitted the opt-out petition along with several others, which were approved previously, but nobody was ever in the audience to represent Spencer Road. So that's why it came back to this meeting. Hopefully I notified them all again. So hopefully somebody is there to represent them so that they can, you can vote on their opt-out petition.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: It seems like we have a couple of people in the queue that are participants that are from Spencer Road.
[Alicia Hunt]: It was going to be... That's clear to me the way you explained it. When I read the minutes, the minutes just sort of said approved at the end. So that's where I thought it was. I thought the minutes were confusing because of the way it was stated.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: We can readjust the minutes and then it's going to be brought back up, you know, obviously off of table business if somebody would like to bring that off the table business then we can vote on it today and then we can, you know, put the new vote from today and then readjust the minutes from last meeting that way that hopefully it will be less confusing for the public but once we have a vote on it today I think.
[Alicia Hunt]: I don't know, I just want to set the minutes aside for today and you can look at it and we can address vote on the minutes next time.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Oh, okay. Yeah, we can do that. Okay. Well, we should since you brought it up, would you like to make a motion to bring 20 to 02266 off of table business and we can discuss that since we are kind of already discussing it.
[Bob Dickinson]: If I think we need to don't we need to. Motion to delay voting on the minutes first.
[SPEAKER_23]: Well, I'll just table the minutes.
[Unidentified]: Do you have to motion that?
[SPEAKER_23]: Motion to table the minutes.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Seconded. Seconded by Steve. Sorry, Commissioner Brzezinski. Steve is fine.
[Unidentified]: All right. So we'll take a vote.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner McGibbon?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner Hunt?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner Brzezinski?
[Unidentified]: Yes. Sergeant Canaba? Yes. Four. So shall we take.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: It's tabled.
[Alicia Hunt]: So if there's a preference to take this item first, I'll motion to take 2022-66 off the table and address that first since I understand there are a number of residents here to speak to that item.
[Unidentified]: Second that motion. I will call, obviously seconded by Commissioner McGibbon.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner McGibbon?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner hunt. Yes, Mr. Brzezinski. Yes, I can can have a, yes, or nothing to absent motion passes.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Okay, so, to 02266 opt out petition from Spencer road transit resident parking area GLS permit parking. I think you were speaking of it before this was in the first. HAB-Michael Leccese-Moyers): Approval for the GLS project so, even though we voted against the second motion for this, this one was in the fourth first one, so they're opting out of the original one correct.
[Todd Blake]: HAB-Michael Leccese-Moyers): I believe that's correct, I believe, since the road was in the upper northwest corner of the original proposed area, the the.
[Unidentified]: HAB-Michael Leccese-Moyers): yeah that was approved back in August, so this would need to officially be opted out. Okay.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Do you have the list of the potential?
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Yeah, I have it, but is there anyone present to speak?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Was it Nancy that you said was, was she?
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: No, she's the handicap sign.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Okay. You can ask anybody that would like to speak for Spencer Road. You can either raise your hand or put it in the chat notes. If you're, if you're for Spencer Road to opt out and you are here in the meeting, please
[Unidentified]: either raise your hand or put it in the notes that you'd like to speak on behalf of us. Recognize any, any names on the petition.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Uh, once again, just you guys are for the. here on the Zoom for Spencer Road. If you guys could either raise your hand and or enter notes in the chat so we can have you speak on behalf of us.
[Unidentified]: Not seeing any names. You don't see no we're not.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: We, we have a list here of the names that had signed a petition, even though they're all not with their first and last name it doesn't look like anybody is here for Spencer road. They were only four homes and there's only four homes and that I think we received signatures from all four homes but doesn't seem that anybody was here for Spencer road.
[Tim McGivern]: Four houses, four homes, everybody signed it. I'll move approval.
[Unidentified]: Seconded.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner McGiven?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner Hunt? Yes. Commissioner Brzezinski?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Sergeant Canava? Yes. Fall in the affirmative. Zero negative, two absent. Motion is approved.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Okay, thank you all. You're welcome. Alright so new business. We have 20 to 023-16 and 2023-17. And the first one is to zero to three. 51 Woods Road, Nancy Stagliano. I believe the applicant is here to speak on that.
[Unidentified]: Nancy, if you could either raise your hand and then we could... Great.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: Hi.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Good afternoon.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: I'm here. Good afternoon.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So she had applied for a handicap sign and this would be for the front of your house.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Correct.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Sergeant. Yes.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: I spoke with Sergeant, I mean, officer Rogers.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah. Yeah. Sergeant Rogers went by and, um, look at this residence and I believe he spoke with you. Was it last week or the week before?
[Adam Hurtubise]: Yes.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So if you could just explain a little bit further on where you'd like the handicapped placard sign and why you're applying for it.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: Well, I don't do this lightly because that would be giving in to my being handicapped. But as necessity proves, for the past 10, 12 years, I've been suffering from rheumatoid arthritis. and is now taking over my spine, which compromises my legs. And it's very difficult, not only walking, but up and down stairs, getting in and out of the car. And also my husband has Alzheimer's and I can't get out of the car as fast as I would like to. So that's why it's, really obvious that I need the car out front. Plus, I share a driveway with my next door neighbor, and they are lovely people. But of course, you know, other people park in the driveway unexpectedly, and there are times when I cannot get in the driveway whatsoever, or out of the driveway for that matter.
[Adam Hurtubise]: And this also is a concern.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: And by having the handicap sign, I could park in front of my own home with enough space actually for another car to park in either in front of me or in back of me. So I would not be taking up a lot of space on the street.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: And the paperwork is in order for this as well. Everything is in order.
[Alicia Hunt]: So Sergeant, I just wanna make sure the applicant is aware that if we approve a handicap sign, that it is not a personal sign, that if there was somebody else to come driving down your street with a handicap placard, they could legally park there. I noticed that this is not a very dense area and there appears to be plenty of parking in general on this street. I just wanted to make sure you knew that if somebody else parked in that spot that that would be perfect. And they had a handicap placard, it would be perfectly legal.
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: I should mention, too, that my I have two daughters and they both have multiple sclerosis and my oldest daughter is Her legs don't work very well and it's difficult for her to even go from the car in front of my house up my stairs. So her being able to park there, if I'm not, would be just awesome.
[Alicia Hunt]: Right. And I do notice it, so I was looking at the street view. It doesn't seem that there are a lot of vehicles parking on your street. Is it, I assume you're coming to us for a permit because you have trouble getting a spot in front of your house?
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: Yes. Other people have been- When people on the street, and there are a lot of cars usually, but of course on a work day there aren't. A lot of people on the street too have driveways, which they facilitate. But the thing is, On the off chance that someone's having a barbecue or party, the spaces are unavailable to me. I've had to park the next street over on Roberts Road at times in the summer. And that's just not really something that's great for me. I'm sure you all have the same problem with parties and whatever.
[Alicia Hunt]: Right. Right, you're one up from Playstead, so people probably park on Woods Road when Playstead is very busy. Yes. And I will say, I can't imagine that somebody with a handicapped placard would prefer to park in front of your house when they were going to Playstead Road, or to Playstead Park, but they could. I just, you know, it's not a personal spot.
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: Right. I do have a placard on my car, which I use, but It doesn't, we're a permit parking on the street as well. That's something new in the past five or six years. And so the result of that is a lot of people try to find places that they can't park. So of course that would be probably my house in front of my house, but it's not all the time.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Is that because in front of your house isn't permit parking?
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: No, the signs are further up the street and further down the street. It doesn't seem to be something like in this area between 56, 57, there's no permit sign.
[Tim McGivern]: So the typical protocol would be that the entire street is permit parking?
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: I guess.
[Tim McGivern]: OK. And if you can't use the spot in front of your house, in other words, someone's in there, Is it usually localized or would the whole street be completely parked out at that point?
[hLm7uOhMYTQ_SPEAKER_19]: No, I've never seen. The only time, like I have said, is that when there is a lot of parties or barbecues or whatever, the street is filled. Absolutely. And that happens more, of course, in the summer hours, the spring, fall, but not so much in the winter.
[Tim McGivern]: Sure. Yeah, the questions I'm asking her to get at the idea, we would be displacing a public space that is in need in front of your house, unnecessarily, which I don't think that's the case. No, it's not. So anyway, obviously interested in what the other commissioners feel but I think this one would be a pass in my book.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Tim, is that a motion?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Tim, is that a motion?
[Tim McGivern]: It could be. I kind of wanted to know what Steve and Alicia and you, Jordan, thought about that particular question and whether or not this should be assigned. Because I know we don't really have criteria that's defined. So each one of these seems to be subjective.
[Bob Dickinson]: I have no issue with what she's asking for. I think it's a reasonable request. I'm just trying to confirm, this isn't a private road, correct? I know we. I was looking at the same thing.
[Todd Blake]: It is public. It is public road. And permit-wise, it's 7 a.m. to noon, and it looks like, Tim, it looks like the signs are posted every other utility pole, so there can be some gaps, so we could always look into supplementing that if that was an issue. And then they're only posted currently on one side of the street versus both. Usually when that occurs, the sign itself says both sides, which these don't, so we can look into that as well. Interesting.
[Tim McGivern]: All right, then, with all that said, I'd motion approval. Second.
[Unidentified]: OK, motion for approval by Commissioner McGibbon and seconded by Commissioner Brzezinski. Commissioner McGibbon? Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner Hunt? Yes. Commissioner Brzezinski?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Sergeant can have a yes order nothing to absent the motion passes.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So Nancy obviously just just give us some time and that should be put in place. Obviously, can't give you an exact date but I would say that.
[Tim McGivern]: Tim might be able to give you a better understanding on how quickly they move on that and just as soon as I get the order from the chief, so I've tried to get signs up without the order and it doesn't work very well so soon as I got. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So we will move forward to 2020 23-17 which is the winter tree bike lanes phase two. And Amy is here, so I'll ask her to speak on this.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Have you already made it so that I can share my screen?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, I believe you should be able to. I have shared screen. You're a co-host, so I think you should be able to share it now.
[SPEAKER_16]: OK, great.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Thank you. All right. I do have a bit of a cough, so hopefully you guys won't have to hear too much of that. But if I go off mic for a second, that's what I'm doing, is coughing. Thank you for coming, everyone, tonight. I wanted to start off kind of just with a refresher of the intersection in front of the high school, because we did get some feedback about that, about the temporary markings that went in there last year. So we change some things around a little bit there, and hopefully that will address some of the issues that people were having. Can you see my cursor when I move it around? Hopefully?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Great. So the issue was kind of the lane shift on this northbound direction here. This is the new design, so you don't see it. It was too much of a shift that people were complaining. They thought that it didn't feel safe, and so we kind of switch things around to, it's going to have to be a lane shift somewhere, just to accommodate this turning lane here, this right-hand turning lane here. So we kind of move the lane shift to this side. It's a little bit less dramatic to make things feel a little bit straighter going through the intersection. This does mean that the bike lane is not preserved on the northbound side here. We do have this kind of application where the bike lane is sharing the right turn lane, that space. Excuse me. which we thought was a fine idea because the right turn is pretty low volume to begin with. And almost all of it is just within an hour or so in the morning and an hour or so in the afternoon during school hours. So most of that time, this whole right lane will actually be just for bikes. So that was the extent of those changes. We don't have to vote on those today, but I just wanted to show everybody that. just generally speaking. Oops. I am going to show you two sheets of the previous design. Last year we approved phase one of this project, which was from the Winchester town line to Lawrence Road. But Eversource didn't end up getting quite that far with their pavement and repavement and markings. While some of it was approved, it's not in place at all today, even with the temporary markings. So I just kind of wanted to refresh everyone's memory on what those look like before they get installed with the permanent stuff. So that's what this first sheet is. Victory Park is right here, the speed table. All of this was approved. Nothing has changed. I just wanted to show it to you guys again. Bike lanes in both directions. We have a bus pullout here and a shared bus bike lane here. This next sheet is similar. Everything from this blue line to the left has already been approved, but just hasn't been installed yet. Excuse me. Oh, that was one thing I forgot to say. All of this stuff in the phase two, including this part of phase one, will hopefully be, if it's passed here tonight, will hopefully be installed in the summertime. So yeah, again, so we've we've passed all this stuff here, we have a bike lane that has to drop out briefly to accommodate this left hand turn lane, but the northbound bike lane continues the whole time. So now looking at the right side of this blue line, now we're starting stuff that has not yet been approved.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So this is all contingent on the project on Winthrop Street being completed. or are they, were you able to do this?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yes, so yeah. So there are still, Eversource is still doing some of their utility work on Winthrop, mostly towards the southern portion. So there, yeah, once they finish that stuff, they will resurface like they did with the northern part and put the epoxy permanent pavement markings in. But that'll all be done over the next several months into the summer, if all goes as planned. All right, let's see. So just before I jump into phase two, I just wanted to make a few things clear. As I said, this will hopefully be done in the summer. What we're voting on tonight is with Traffic Commission is just the regulation change. So I just want people to keep that in mind when they think about their comments and feedback. What I mean by that is how we're actually using the space on the road. Are we removing parking to put a bike lane that kind of thing, or we're changing the use of the road. The very specific design details, we can work that stuff out later. So if you have some comments of that nature, maybe jot them down and send them to me later. We just want to make sure we're streamlining this meeting here tonight. The design does include some parking removal. We did do some studies throughout the corridor last year, different times and days, and generally speaking, the parking usage was quite light, with a little bit more use up towards the park area and the river. I'll go into some more details about that in a minute, but I just wanted to say that before we get started. Um, and then also you will notice, um, some little black dots here in the bike lane buffer. Those are flex posts, which we do aim to install for the entire corridor, both phase one and two, when all the paint is done. Um, and of course we will, uh, consider driveways and intersections and bus stops, um, and make sure that we're not blocking anything there, but these are to help keep cars out of the bike lane and make bicyclists feel safer. Okay, so moving on to the part that we need to vote on tonight. This first bit, we're not taking away any parking just south of this intersection because there is no parking available today. They're just two bus stops. So we are proposing a shared bike lane bus stop situation in both directions here. Then continuing southward a little bit, oops, we are continuing the bike lanes in both directions, including some of this, you'll see this throughout the design. These are like conflict zone markings. Whenever a car is turning across the path of a bicyclist or adjacent bicycle lane, you have these green markings to let them know that, let both parties know really that that conflict is happening. Here we have a little bit of reserved parking for the American Legion. We've got about seven spaces that we have preserved here for that use or for any use that's public. But we are also, we have enough width to maintain the bike lane in both directions with a little bit more of a wide bike lane adjacent to the parking there to kind of keep people, help keep people out of the door zone. Continuing south towards the circle. Oh, sorry, one thing I forgot to mention on this. Yes, we are taking away some parking on this side. We're preserving the seven spaces in this area. All of our parking studies, every time we went out there, there was hardly anyone parked out there. We went at different times, different days, lots of different combinations, and we kept seeing the same thing, either nothing or very few, one or two cars. Moving towards the circle again here we have bus stops so there's no parking allowed here today anyways, but we're using that shared bus stop bike lane. approach right here. As we get closer to the circle, we kind of bring the bikes out into the travel lanes and the bike lanes. We do that because it is actually with a single lane roundabout anyways. One of the safest and most straightforward ways to get a bike through the traffic circle. You'll notice that there are some improvements to the circle itself. There was a complete streets project back in 2018 I believe is when it was Implemented or at least partially implemented on this part of the circle on the high street approach and a rural Avenue approach. But we left this part not implemented. So, because we knew that went that resource was coming through. So we're kind of doing the rest of it. With this resource will be doing the rest of it with this project. You'll, you'll notice that some of these improvements include making sure that. The approaching lanes and departing lanes, there's only one lane for each of them. Why that's important is because sometimes if you have two lanes side by side approaching a crosswalk or even approaching the circle itself, the nearest lane will block the view of this outside lane here. And that can be dangerous for pedestrians. It can block their view of the oncoming cars here. So we made it kind of put these shoulders in with some flex posts to make sure that there's just one lane coming and going into the circle for all of the different streets intersecting. And that'll just improve safety for all the different users here. Moving south again down Winthrop Street here you see the bike lanes pick right back up again. On this part between the circle and Mississippi Valley Parkway there is parking that's allowed currently today so we would be proposing to remove that parking. But we do maintain the same lane assignments here going to the intersection. All that we're basically adding is two separated bike lanes, one in each direction, with the flex posts, making sure we're keeping stuff open for the driveways here and bringing them through the intersection here with these conflict markings. And then this last page here, again, this parking is currently allowed on both sides. We don't tend to see really much, if any, in this area because cars are usually here waiting to turn. Currently today, there's not really any markings in this general area. It's wide enough to function as two lanes, and so it does So what we're doing with the design is to kind of formalize the way that it's operating today, having this lane be a through and a left and the rights having this lane here. But we also wanted to make sure we're providing a space for bicycles. So we have the bike lane stay separated until about this point and then it can share the right turn lane with vehicles. The reason we had to do this kind of shared scenario is because this right is a rather heavy movement. We needed to have some storage area for the cars there and we just couldn't come up with a safe geometry to have a separate bike lane kind of we call it in the pocket on its own between the through lane and the right turn lane. So we, this was kind of a compromise here, but we wanted to make sure that we had this part separated here because similar to what I was describing with the side-by-side lanes and the circle. We don't want side-by-side lanes in the same direction approaching a crosswalk because you get what you call the multiple threat situation. The drivers on the inside lane can block the view of drivers on the outside lane and pedestrians can get hurt that way. So we wanted to make sure we have just the one drive lane and then the bike lane with flex posts here to make sure that people can't go around, drivers can't go around a stopped vehicle. We continue the southbound bike lane here. We're able to preserve all of this parking here. So I should say, I should note that this area does, this is the one area that did see some significant parking. It was definitely time dependent and day dependent. There were many days where there was nothing at all. There was a couple, we went out a couple times during ball games and stuff at the parks over here. And even on those days, it was about 65%, 64% used. So we felt confident that we could preserve this, but keep, excuse me, preserve this side of parking on the park side here, and then use this side to have the bike lane and the turning vehicle, the turning lane. So you also will notice that we have a raised crosswalk here that will be added as well as a little bump out here. at this existing crosswalk location. Towards the bottom or the side of the screen here, the southernmost part, this is South Street. This is where the project limits are and the bike lanes will have to terminate here because Winthrop Street just becomes too narrow beyond that. But we have shares tying into it here and we've also created a little bit of a beginning of a bike lane here in space that's currently a right turn lane. That's just not really needed for South Street. I think I've hit all of the major points. I know that was a lot, so if there is something that people want to go back to, let me know.
[Alicia Hunt]: Thank you, Amy. This is really helpful and comprehensive. And I actually think that this end down here is probably in my mind, the most I'm going to cause the most angst for people. And so I just wanted to explore that a little bit because I've been under the impression that when there are ball games in the spring and summer, it's very well used and that the gardens on the opposite side of the street use that parking a lot, but obviously would not really use it between October and April. I'm wondering if people, if there was any effort made to reach out to the community gardens, make sure that people are aware that this, I know this is not the first time we talked about this, because there was previous discussion, a previous iteration a year ago for this section that talked about right hand turn lanes. through lanes, parking, et cetera. I don't actually remember bike lanes being part of that context, so.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: We did reach out to the folks at the garden. They're aware of this meeting, and I'm not sure if they're here today or not, but they know about the proposal. That is good.
[Tim McGivern]: I have a question piggybacking on that. Do I count 17 parking spaces along Memorial Field here? That sounds right.
[lq25S5HOVFA_SPEAKER_10]: I think so. Yep.
[Tim McGivern]: Do we know how many are used today by chance?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Like?
[Tim McGivern]: I know they're not striped. I know they're not striped. We don't have a defined number.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Oh, oh, oh.
[Tim McGivern]: But do we know kind of what the use is?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: I mean, we went out there several different times and it was never more. The highest percentage we ever, um, got for this entire, um, walk. So that's counting both sides was 64%.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I would say the most time that people are using this, sorry, Tim is be the, you know, baseball games for the, uh, you know, I think it's probably fifth grade eighth grade and then they have. I know night softball games that sometimes are there later at night around nine o'clock, that that usually starts around May, I would say the most that it's probably use would be for the daytime during the kids baseball games
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, that's when we that's when we went out there, we coordinated with the parks department to figure out what the schedule was for their games and stuff. And we went on on a Monday in April at 530. And I saw that there were actually games being being held. And so that's when we did the counts for and that's where we got that that highest number 64%.
[Tim McGivern]: So so this 17 here, how many cars did you did you count that day?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Uh, well, so it was for both sides, but it was a total of 15 cars and they were all yeah. On that side.
[Tim McGivern]: Okay, yeah, the one side or the other, I think is fine. And I think the garden folks, I think at most they'll have like three or four cars, three or four gardeners, whatever, something like that. They typically park along that, you know, plan North side. But if they, in this scenario, if they park on plan South side, they have a nice new raised crossing to use to get over to the garden. So yeah, so I like that. I like the better use of the public road space here. I do share concern with the, The games and the only reason I have that concern really is because there's no good other place to park. So when games are happening a memorial field. They either go, you know, along here this trip, or they might be in the con and shell lot, which is quite a stroll away. So I think what I've seen and I don't know what Jordan, you guys have seen in the police department, any sort of overflow parking when there's big events here or do people try to park on places that they're not supposed to park? I just want to get a good feel for that.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I would say that the majority of people are parking on South. I believe Aldo is another one that they were parking on and I think the bridge kind of at Winthrop itself would be the overflow from South Street if there's no other parking. I would say majority of them are probably parking on South and Aldo as well. And they just walk over either one side. And I would say the majority of them, they can't find on Winthrop Street. I mean, they're quickly kind of coming over there for that.
[Tim McGivern]: That makes sense. Yeah, South Street. So we didn't, I know we recently had the stripes done on South Street too, but we maintaining the parking on South Street. So if it's more than 17 cars, we get some overflow parking.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: So yeah, I just wanted to give a little bit of an idea of scope of how many spaces we're talking about that would be taken up here. It's not perfect because they're not striped, but based on traffic patterns and stuff, right around here is where I tend to like probably the average, I would say, the queue length is. So if we're looking at parking between here and here, that's 14 cars.
[Tim McGivern]: minus the crosswalk, right? Because there is a crosswalk there.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Oh, that's true. Yes, I didn't. Thank you for that. So I guess it would be more probably like 12.
[Tim McGivern]: So, and I guess this is kind of an important question, right? We might be even here. I want to know, I guess, and I, you know, and I don't want to put you on the spot or anything, and maybe Todd can help in the background or something, but I want to understand how many spaces, if any, we're deleting from here, because I want to be able to say to people that, you know, it's either the same amount, we lose one, you know, or we're gaining three. roughly.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: It would be 12, about 12 for this portion we're looking at right now.
[Todd Blake]: So, yeah, as everyone was speaking, I was just trying to add that up exactly what we're actually removing. So, it looks like in the unstriped areas, if you count 20 feet per space existing, there may be about 22 spaces on the baseball field side and about six spaces on the community garden side that's that's the five kind of bridge area and then the one after the crosswalk. So you know it's it's debatable how many after the crosswalk near the community garden there are because we know that it's used as a right turn only lane. So it looks like on the community garden side you're only losing about six and then you're losing a few near the corner where the hatch is opposite South Street. So it looks like it's maybe instead of 28 parking spaces overall, I think you end up here with maybe 18. So it looks like a loss of 10 out of 28. So it's about a third.
[Unidentified]: And to be clear, this includes striped legal parking on the bridge.
[Alicia Hunt]: Is that what I'm seeing? It's not striped, I don't believe. So I have been known to park in this area and walk over to my favorite bagel store. And I've always parked on the ball field side of the crosswalk, assuming that it wasn't appropriate to park on the bridge. So I think that if it was actually marked, and it's marked next to the ball field right now, and it's not marked on the bridge side, because if we're allowing parking there, which honestly, you guys are the traffic experts, you tell me whether or not we should, it would be nice to mark it so people know that it is actually okay to park there.
[Todd Blake]: I would say over the bridge right now, there are shoulder lines, but not the L's and T's identifying the exact individual spaces. And I would categorize it as this. There are currently no signs restricting parking over the bridges. And then we would stripe it as shown here, so it would support that idea.
[Alicia Hunt]: And that's part of the 17 spots or the spots that are shown. I think there's one, two, three, four, five, maybe on that five on the bridge there.
[Todd Blake]: Yeah. So, so essentially what you're losing is the other, the top side of this page, the bridge, and then maybe one after the speed table, the speed table itself will take up some, but, um, but I think Amy's count of worst case scenario in terms of parking that she collected during those data points. was 65% so if we're, you know, that seems like the remaining parking would would absorb be able to support the count data that she had available. Is that correct Amy?
[Unidentified]: Can I make a procedural suggestion?
[Alicia Hunt]: I think that there are people who wanna comment on this section, and I'd be interested in us talking about this section and hearing comments on it, and then moving up to the other portions of this plan.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, it seems like multiple people started raising their hand when we got to this section, so.
[Alicia Hunt]: Right. Could we suggest that when we're ready, take public comment on this section, hear what people have to say, discuss this section. And then we can, cause like I had a question or two about other parts of it, but there it's a much different level of concern. Like, so maybe just focus here for now.
[Unidentified]: If the commissioners are amenable to that. That's fine with me. Yep. Great.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So we look like Mr. Nuzzo, you had raised your hand first. We're just asking to speak on a section from, you know, Mystic Valley Parkway to South Street. If you have your hand raised, we'd just like to speak on that first and then we can go from there actually. He did not raise his hand. So Caitlin Robinson, I'm going to ask you to unmute if you would like to speak on that portion.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.
[Kaitlin Robinson]: Yeah, I did want to say a couple things about that portion. The first being about the shared right turn lane and bike lane at the intersection of Winthrop and Mystic Valley. Currently, as a pedestrian there, I find it to be a very dangerous intersection to cross. When I'm with my child, cars are always taking the right on red. When the pedestrians have the walk sign and I'm wondering if a no right turn on red sign would be going in there as well, because otherwise I can see there being a problem if there are bicyclists in the lane planning on going straight and people behind them who plan on taking a right on red. And another comment I wanted to make is about on the, the ball field side of Winthrop, I am a little bit concerned. It looks like it'll be a door zone bike lane. And with the new Massachusetts law about minimum four foot passing distance, I feel like putting in a bike lane like that is going to encourage people to break that law because you're going to have cyclists going along parked cars. I would actually hope, because this is a place where so many families go, that we would try to make it as safe as possible, even if it does mean sacrificing parking, requiring people to park further out. I would really like to see there be a protected lane by that area. But I very much appreciate the work going into this.
[Unidentified]: And thank you. Thank you.
[Todd Blake]: Okay, doing briefly to respond so the commission knows to the, thank you for those comments to know right turn on red would have to coordinate with TCR because that's a DCR traffic signal. So we'd want to make sure if the city proposed, it would be kind of a dual approval with TCR, but it's a good. We know, we know the request and we could look into that. There would also be, obviously, if there is a no turn in red, it would impact that combined with this painting would impact the cue that people are used to experiencing on that approach. Not to say this is not doable, but it would change the extent of that cue. But we could look into that. Yeah.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Todd, also, I wanted to bring up that crosswalk, obviously. Todd and I, we had multiple pedestrian collisions. back in 2019 and 20 at this exact crosswalk. So, excuse me, I know that they, Eversource, meaning they had proposed maybe a bump out there as well. And I'm not sure if this is what's included in that, but that crosswalk, I know Todd was instrumental in putting even just temporary cones over there, which has brought down pedestrian collisions at that crosswalk to zero. So just a bump out there. would be, you know, if non-permanent cones can work, I really feel that a bump out there. That crosswalk is used pretty heavily in the, you know, April to, you know, October months. So just wanted to kind of point that out. Todd was huge in helping out on that.
[Todd Blake]: Yeah, that's a great point, Jordan, that the crosswalk has been improved in these what's shown by Amy on there, the markings plus the raised crosswalk by Eversource in the pump out only add to that safety. So that was one of the reasons why we felt more comfortable with asking folks on the community garden side to park on the ball field side because even though they have to cross the street, if they don't have parking immediately adjacent, the crosswalk is much safer. It's already been proven to be, and it's going to be more safe. So it doesn't change the fact that you still have to cross the street, but it is a much better situation. So we felt comfortable with asking folks to do that. Next.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So we do have a couple more hands. I will go back to Mr. does oh it seems like you have your hand up here and we will get you guys. So we're just speaking on the mystic Valley Parkway to South Street side so that's going to be the year.
[Daniel Nuzzo-Mueller]: Thanks. Yeah, um, I think, first of all, let me just say thank you for the all of the work, Amy, it is much appreciated. But I think to mimic a little bit of what Caitlin said, I'd be a little bit worried about the conflict zone on the northbound side in this section with the bicycles on the right-hand side and then the turning lane, it's going to necessitate a full left merge because almost no one's going to ride their bike over onto Mystic Valley Parkway. Almost everyone's going to be going straight. It might be just helpful to maybe see what we can do about redesigning some of the paint markings there. just to maybe make the merge a little bit sooner and perhaps just reduce that conflict of cross traffic.
[Unidentified]: Great. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Amy, you had mentioned that they were probably going to rework the markings for this paint for the bike lane as well, so they would probably merge. If we did a bump out, it would probably Merge sooner, or would that start from South Street on.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: I'm sorry, I'm not sure I understand what you're saying.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So, if, if ever sources to pop out that crosswalk it's not going to affect the lines that you had already proposed here.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Well, we on the drawings that we have shown today that actually already a bump out proposed on the West side. OK, we didn't do one on the east side because we did want to make sure we could get the bike lane through. That's one kind of thing that's like bump outs and bike lanes kind of can interfere with each other. And so we didn't want to we didn't want that to happen.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: OK. We have a couple more hands raised, so we're going to keep going with that if the commissioners are okay with that.
[Unidentified]: Liz White, I'm gonna ask you on mute. Hi, Liz White.
[lq25S5HOVFA_SPEAKER_10]: I'm here as a representative of the community garden. I get on a little bit late. So I kind of missed some of it. I know you just mentioned there was going to be a bump out on the west side with the On the east side, will there still be any type of barriers or will that be like there are now those temporary, you know, things to protect the crosswalk or will those be taken away?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: We would like to keep the temporary barriers. OK. But. Obviously, if there is if Todd, if there is something else that you had planned for that, I didn't think we talked about anything else, but. I think Amy can cover this, right?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, so the raised crosswalk itself will need to be and pump out will be need to be designed. And that design has not fully occurred yet. But the what we call a detail that we have that kind of like shows the a general idea of what the raised crosswalk is going to look like. It does have kind of actual permanent bollards on either side, kind of like as a gate almost. Very similar to what's out there right now with the cones, except it would be permanent. So I think that we would move forward with that type of a combine.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Do you want to put the drawings back up?
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: I can. I don't have the detail tonight. I apologize for that. Let me see, yeah.
[Unidentified]: So yeah, so, excuse me.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: There would be bollards kind of like here-ish. This is the slopes up and down on this side. The crosswalk itself is in the middle. There would be bollards like here and here on either side. Okay. Yeah.
[Todd Blake]: I mean, ideally- We're also asking about the flex poles. This, this drawing shows the flex posts between the travel street and the bike lane. Those would remain so leading up to the slope dead, it would still prevent a car from hugging that side.
[lq25S5HOVFA_SPEAKER_10]: If that's what you meant, you know, I was just curious about that. Um, no, I mean, I, we would really prefer to have parking retained on that side of the street. You know, some of our gardeners aren't, you know, they appreciate not having to walk too far if they have something heavy. So ideally we would like some parking there. And I just as note you know totally anecdotal note but um since you know they've changed the direction of south street that during commuting hours that area is just a mess i mean it's been awful like trying to park there especially when there's a game going on um i can't imagine what it will look like with all these parking spaces removed um that they're being proposed to be removed, because it just gets very messy. And part of the problem is just people are impatient and don't want to sit in traffic. And I definitely have noticed a different sense that those changes to South Street have been made. And I think that's all I have to say.
[Unidentified]: Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Looks like we have one more. Bob Payne, if you ask you on mute, you can speak on this as well.
[Robert Paine]: Yes, thanks. I echo the comments of the previous speaker in two areas. The South Street changes have exacerbated that intersection of Winthrop Street and Mystic Valley Parkways because you can't go through to 93 anymore. on South Street. So you've got to go through that intersection, both North and South. But so it's a real heavy and more much more dangerous intersection than ever before. And adding bikes to the mix is going to be even more of a puzzle. So that's one area. I don't know if South Street will ever be changed, but it is definitely severely exacerbated this intersection at Mystic Valley Parkway and Winthrop. The other issue is that for ball ball field use, there is overflow parking on our street street and any reduction and the parking on winter street may be deleterious toward West Street so we we are keeping an eye on this. So I let you know. That's all I have to say.
[Todd Blake]: PB, David Ensign — Henderson, copyright officer. PB, Jorge Boone, foreign affairs staff member. PB, Jorge Boone, foreign affairs staff member. involved a control bike lane, and there is no proposal to change the direction of South Street. Someone in the chat was saying they're opposed to that. There's no proposal to change anything on South Street. But I do understand what they're saying in terms of once we change traffic patterns at Main to improve safety over there, traffic is like water and some of it does get redistributed possibly to this corridor.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So if there's anybody else that would like to speak, I can't see any other hands that are being raised this time. Maybe I'm just gonna close out this just so I can see if anybody else has a question. If you have any other questions about the area concerning that we were speaking about is Mystic Valley Parkway to South Street. The screen is shared here. I'm just gonna move off of it just so I could see if anybody else is. Is there a question on this area?
[Alicia Hunt]: I do just for the record, so people know, comments in the chat are not seen by the people on TV, are not really recorded as part of the public record. If it's a comment on what we're considering here tonight, we either need it stated out loud, or if you're not comfortable speaking on camera, someone can read it for you. I noticed there are a couple of comments about Maine and South and that's not on the table this evening. So those don't all need to be read out. I think the members can read them. I just want people to know that if you want something on the record for this, we need it stated clearly.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: That's either can be done by raising your hand or if you want like Commissioner Hunt had said you can put it in the notes or have somebody else read it for you, but we're only speaking on the portion in which Mystic Valley Parkway to South Street, as Todd had kind of referred to, it seems like Bob and Liz have been mentioning that when the no left turn, or sorry, no straight through on Main and South, there may be more traffic flow that occurs in this due to there not being a lot of straight. But other than that, we're just speaking on this portion. If you have a question, please raise your hand. I don't see anybody else's hand that is raised and we'd like to move forward backwards towards the other proposal. If you guys would like to speak on this, I'm open to what you guys would like to do. If you guys want to just stay here and kind of speak on this portion, we can do that.
[Alicia Hunt]: I guess I wanna make the comment that I really love the idea that we're looking at protected bike lanes throughout this entire area because a large, I am under the impression that, so this is a main route to Medford High School. And I would think that more high school students would bike to school if they felt safer. That is one of the concerns that I've heard from students is feeling safe Winthrop in order to bike to school and protected bike lanes help significantly with that. Um, that said, which I'm all enthusiastic for it in this section where we're taking away the parking. Is there any thought to doing it in stages where we paint some stuff up, see how it works before doing permanent changes. I also really love the raised crosswalk. I think it's super important. Um, cause that's a big path that will become more and more used as we move forward with paths along the river. And I guess the thing is, I guess I actually also think that the only way a bike lane on this section is actually really safe is if it's protected, because this is such a busy commuter area. And I'd love to hear what our traffic staff engineers think on that, whether they would consider, like, what makes sense.
[Todd Blake]: I didn't touch upon like the overall kind of vision, And then maybe Amy can give specifics about bike safety and things that bicyclists want to see occur. So overall, in terms of the overall picture and the vision, as Alicia noted, there are a number of other projects involving shared use paths along the river in Medford and other communities as well. And that's piecing together a long, stitching together a long network of bicycle connectivity throughout the region, not just Medford. So as those come along, and this is a crossing, that raised crosswalk, these bike lanes heading up Winter Street and in other directions will further expand that. So if someone's along one of those recreational paths, this will get them into the city street network as well and expand that network. So it's not just limited to kind of our version of the Emerald Necklace. So there is a plan, the vision, and with cyclists, usually if you build it, they will come versus, you know, if it's unsafe, they won't necessarily be there in numbers. But as we build out all this bicycle infrastructure, you know, it won't necessarily be like the Minuteman path usage right away, but, you know, years down the road, it may be that heavily used. So we got to start thinking about that and preparing and help and encourage safety that way. So, you know, So so we get it, in my opinion, keep that in mind, we're talking about a handful of parking spaces that that may provide or block a particular connection off of those networks.
[Unidentified]: Thank you, Todd. Amy.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, just to build off that a little bit more, you know, yeah, the trade-off, thinking about the actual trade-off is really the most important part. Like we're talking about creating a safe space for people to do a mode that's, you know, will help the city reach its environmental and sustainability goals. It's also a mode that, you know, kids can use who don't have driver's licenses yet. And it's one, you know, one less car in front of you in the line to the red light. You know, I understand the parking situation is is difficult and complicated, and it frustrates people. And, you know, nobody wants parking in front of their house. But but also if it's just a handful of spaces that are going away that could get absorbed throughout the city. You know, if we're getting rid of those to to create a space for people to choose a sustainable and healthy and where otherwise they would be in a car, then I think the value of that trade-off is pretty clear to me.
[Todd Blake]: One other quick note, Tim had mentioned, I think, the condensed shell or somebody else mentioned. So that is another parking option here, especially if there was a large event and there was spillover. Obviously, people are going to park where they want if they go on west or south, but Cotton Shelf is available to park without crossing any street. I measure it's 800 plus feet, so it equates to about three and a half minute walk from the Cotton Shelf to the community garden area, and just a little beyond that to the baseball field. Other neighborhoods don't necessarily have the luxury of a parking lot like that, so it is a resource that the city should use when parking happens. I just wanted to point that out.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: That's a great point. And I think the city, hopefully, you know, as these, we get more bike lanes and things like that. And we might need to take a couple parking spots here and there. Those types of efficiencies, I think we could could lean into and, you know, maybe create a signage wayfinding system or something to help people know that those parking spaces are even available because a three and a half minute walk. Obviously, not everyone can do that, but a lot of people can.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Looks like we have one more hand raised for this. Matt, we're just speaking on the Mystic Valley Parkway to South Streetside. So I'm gonna ask you if you're speaking on that.
[phPK_rgTxTg_SPEAKER_06]: Yes, thank you. Thank you all on this section, I just wanted to in my one person's limited experience I do agree with what I think we've taught said earlier that though there is parking on that community garden side. I'm a pretty frequent user of Winthrop street and I wouldn't see it being more than five or six spots and I don't see it heavily used because of the volume. of the right turn lane. I don't have the data. I'm not claiming to know for a fact, but I don't know if it's as many spots as we might be conceiving.
[Unidentified]: Thank you. Thank you. Okay, so it looks like we've spoken on this portion.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I'm not sure if you guys would, the commissioners would like to move forward backwards towards the beginning or start from the beginning. If there are any other questions on the previous portions that Amy and Todd kind of brought up, if there are other questions for that, for the commissioners, if they'd like to bring those, if we can move past South and Mystic Valley Parkway and go up, if there are other questions, or if you want to start back at the high school.
[Tim McGivern]: Jordan, can I make a suggestion? Yes, please. I think when we're done here we should go to the circle and vet any questions there kind of go backwards and then do you know probably go through the next you know the next big intersection or maybe even Victory Park. With that said, I would like to just echo a couple of things that Todd and Amy were alluding to and Amy pretty directly. mentioned it, about the use of the public space and weighing what it's being used for and whether or not the surrounding streets can absorb an overflow parking event that goes beyond the use of the strip of parking along the ball fields there. So if there's a couple of events per year where all three of those fields are being used and we have Lots of demand for those ball fields and we have a bunch of cars that need to be parked, whether it's the 20 something that were there before the 17 that are here today that that's not going to accommodate that so where people parking so we mentioned a few streets West Street kind of show a lot South Street and they're probably others. So in my opinion, I think the vast majority of the time, which aligns with the data that was produced, there's going to be plenty of parking with those 17 spots for both the garden and the use of the field. I'm not talking about every event, but most of the time. That's what it sounds like to me. So with that said, we have a huge element on the other side of the scale, which is making things safer in the right way, which is actually where the danger is and where accidents happen. So, with that said, it's, it's, it's much heavier on the side of the scale of safety and using the public space to increase safety than it is for the convenience of parking. With all that said, I would be in favor of this particular block, assuming that everything that has been said here is true. So I just want to get that on the record, because a lot of people complain about lack of parking and removing parking and things like that. But what our job is, is to look at the public space that's available in the width of Winthrop Street, and make use of it to the best that we can and increasing safety as a very heavy hand in scale. So, with that said, we can unless you know commissioners have other things to say we can, you know, move on to the circle.
[Unidentified]: Thank you, Tim. Welcome. Well,
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: If we can move back to the Winthrop Street circle here, I mean, yeah, that is my biggest concern. Um, it is, I've been in traffic for five years. It is, um, our number one area for collisions and now, and I'm not saying that there may, there may be nothing that we can, you know, change in this proposal. There may be nothing, um, that we can. per se do, but it is an area in which we as a police department, especially our traffic division would probably, I would say, I'm not going to give an exact number, but it is our heaviest area in which we respond to collisions. And I'm all for the bike lane, it's just bringing Another element along with pedestrians and bicyclists with these cars, I really would feel more comfortable. Todd and I had talked a while back. If there was another plan that Winthrop street rotary had had to slow these vehicles down from just entering this intersection rotary and not yielding and putting a bicyclist in the middle of this already busy area in which we have multiple collisions. I'm not saying it would help or hurt. I just, I feel in my eyes, like there should be another option that we should have to protect the bicyclists in this rotary that is already a really difficult rotary that we have here in the city. Just speaking from experience here on the traffic division and the police department, On my end, I thought I would share that because it is 100% the most collisions we respond to for the police department.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Now, thank you for that. I'm glad that you mentioned the traffic call being part of it, because I did kind of leave that part out accidentally. One other benefit of having just a single lane entry and exit is being able to control that lane width, which causes people to want to slow down. So I think having this circle, this design fully implemented, as the idea was originated in the Complete Streets project from a few years ago. I think you will see better results on all of these different approaches. As I said before, this one was already completed. I know when I've driven through here that I do feel a difference when I'm entering from this part of High Street as opposed to the other approaches to the circle.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: So I do think this design could achieve a lot of the stuff you're talking about. Before we go on, I just want to a couple of people just now mentioned going back to the Victory Park part. This is just a sidebar, but remember, we're not voting on Victory Park. That was already approved. We're starting from Lawrence Road about the stuff that we're voting on today. Just a reminder.
[Tim McGivern]: Oh, yes. I think I mentioned Victory Park. Yep, roger that.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: No problem.
[Todd Blake]: One quick note on this plan, I think maybe a layer might be turned off. There's actually a yellow circle around the physical circle as well that would make the circulating road a little more narrow as well to tighten things up. So it's so faded right now. It's not there, but it was a yellow line and depending on funding in the future that inside that space between the physical circle and that yellow line in other modern roundabout designs, you may have seen in. Lynn or Melrose or other places, that's usually a multiple surface. So then most pasture cars would have a tighter circle to traverse, but the multiple nature of it would allow fire trucks or trailer trucks to mount it and hop over it, but it would keep most pasture cars in a tighter circle. Right now, we just have a painted line to do that, so it doesn't necessarily have the same impact, We could experiment with cones. So we could experiment with quick build options to try to sort out and play with where things need to be located to accommodate moves, but at the same time slow things down.
[Unidentified]: And I could be totally speaking out of turn here.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So Tim or Todd and Amy, if I am, please. I know Eversource, we've kind of put a lot on them, but if, since we're doing this rotary over, is there a potential, and I'm not even sure that this would be something that could enter with this rotary for speed tables to be entered into the, while vehicles are entering from Winthrop and High, even if they are, it's just something that, I feel would work very well if it was beyond the crosswalk, but I'm not even sure that that would be something that would be even be able to be entertained, whether it's for speed tables have to be a certain length away from a rotary. I'm not positive on that. So I could be speaking completely out of turn.
[Todd Blake]: So in terms of engineering side of it, and Tim or Amy could speak up too, I haven't necessarily seen raised elements around the roundabout, but just in terms of funding and ever so just want to clear that piece up. So Evers was responsible for repaving and re-striping, and there are some other elements that were in the agreement with them in regards to speed tables, raised elements, and they're already all accounted for, so there would be nothing new on that particular project. Some of these, and beyond the markings, so that the post that is shown here is something that the city has to come up with, that wasn't part of it. That's an enhancement that we hope to add to the safety feature. So, yeah, the improvements by our services are going to be repaving and restriping whatever gets approved here. And then the few elements, the two speed tables already done on Winthrop, the two speed tables already done on South, and the raised crosswalk on Winthrop that we just discussed, that's the extent of the raised elements committed to by that project.
[Tim McGivern]: I think a lot of the unsafetiness is happening, or the riskiness, I guess I should say, is the fading out of this particular intersection. And the fact that we don't have a clear line of where cars enter and exit the rotary, and it is quite wide. So I think folks have the experience, they don't know what to do necessarily coming at the rotary. So I think by narrowing up the lanes, putting funneling everybody into one single lane around, adding a yellow line like you're talking about. I think even though we are striping or showing striping for the bikes to merge with the traffic, I think that's what happens today. I think this is the same traffic pattern as what happens today, but we're making it clearer and we're basically queuing up the cars a little bit easier so they can integrate into the circle as they go around. So that's really what it seems like to me, it's not changing the design and how a bike might enter the circle. making it clearer where everybody's going to be while the cars and the bikes are entering the circle. So I think with that said, I'm pretty sure this is going to make it much safer and smoother as an operating traffic tool, I guess. It should make it better.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I would definitely agree with that because vehicles entering from a high street, coming from Arlington, into the rotary have almost comp large access so rearranging that can only help that because that seems to be the most areas in which we see the collisions is from.
[Tim McGivern]: Yeah, ideally, we want them all entering that circle at the same speed, same sort of momentum. So they're all functioning together. And as far as raised elements, you know, it's an option, I think it would have to be looked at very, very, very closely. And it might even be where the existing crossing locations aren't right, because they're meant to really distract, not distract, but create something that a driver has to deal with while driving down the road. So we don't want them to deal with entering a rotary and a raised element at the same time. They're already dealing with the potential pedestrian crossing. So we want them to acknowledge a pedestrian crossing, not have to deal with the raised element while they're preparing to enter the circle and merge with other cars. Great. Thank you.
[Unidentified]: Appreciate that.
[Tim McGivern]: Yep.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, I don't know that I've seen the raised elements near a circle either. But yeah, part of the purpose of this modern roundabout design, which is what this is, helps cars slow down with the approach angles too. I didn't mention that. So the actual angle that they're going into the circle You can see it's adjusted to be a certain way, so they're not just going straight through. They have to come at it at an angle. So once we have all of this paint and stuff down, and the flex post especially, it'll really help people hit it at that appropriate angle that'll slow them down and ideally, yes, make everyone going about the same speed.
[Alicia Hunt]: I want to make sure I'm understanding what I'm seeing here. Like everybody else, hate the circle, the existing, it's better than it used to be. It's scary. If I'm understanding this correctly, I was checking against Google Maps. We currently have right turn lanes on the approaches from Winthrop Street, correct? And those are going away in this, right? That's part of what we're discussing here.
[Todd Blake]: That's correct. It's the approach from the bottom right corner and then from high, so one from High Street and one from Winthrop. Okay.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Or no, this one, sorry.
[Todd Blake]: Yeah, so there's coming from the bottom and right hand side of the screen, their right turns. So yeah, that gets back to the point of what the traffic commission and Amy mentioned this earlier, what you're actually approving. As Tim just touched upon too, some of this is just confirming or defining what already exists, so it's not actually an approval. So that what you're approving in the circle itself is the removal of the right turn lane from high coming from Arlington and the right turn lane on winter coming from 16. That's really all you're proving with the circle itself. The branches leading up to the circle on either side, you're proving the removal of markings.
[Alicia Hunt]: Right, okay, and so then the way you're showing this, the plan here is not, sorry, I'm confusing myself. The earlier time when there was changes to this rotary, there was actually a much more extensive bump out created, and we're seeing that at the top of the photo. And so you're not actually suggesting dramatically expanding the sidewalk and area and stuff, At this time, you're recommending putting in flex posts to prevent people from, because paint will not do it. If we just paint it out, like the right turn lane, people would still just drive right through there, right? So you're recommending at this time flex posts to prevent that, but then that makes these crosswalks super long. And then people will stand back on the sidewalk and nobody will like, I guess I'm picturing people back on the sidewalk and having to cross the whole area where the flex posts are before they cross the crosswalk before they cross the traffic, but they wouldn't actually want to stand next to the flex posts, because what about the crazy driver who just mows down the flex posts.
[Todd Blake]: The painted crosswalk and the distance across curb to curb will not change. The effective crossing, the crossing over an actual travel lane will be reduced. But like you're saying, you know, someone waiting to cross should likely remain on the curb until they see a portion to cross safely. But the effective crossing distance if drivers obey the markings and then it will be a more narrow distance. So we're not lengthening any crossings, but yes, that's suggested. I know what you're saying, with paint alone, some drivers disobey the lane marking and the flex post, that's what we keep hammering home. The flex post is a physical element that helps deter drivers and helps keep them honest following the lines. But it's just an added measure. It can't be relied on 100%, but it is better than just a painted line.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, and I would say also, well, two things that, you know, ideally this, if this type of approach does, is successful and people like it, you know, it could be something that could be made more permanent with curbing and stuff, but also just to the south of us and our neighbors in Somerville, have implemented something at Powderhouse Square. It's different in its approach in some ways, but it does employ paint and flex posts, and it does shorten crossings in that similar way where there's paint and post bump outs. By most people's accounts, I think at this point, people really like Powderhouse Circle's upgrade. I think something similar can work here too.
[Unidentified]: I'm ready to hear from members of the public on this section. I think there are clearly some people want to, unless the commissioners have anything. I agree. Agreed. Sergeant, are you going to call on them?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: At least you have that. Sorry, did you guys could was not coming through I apologize.
[Alicia Hunt]: No, you were muted.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Oh, sorry. At least if you'd like to speak please.
[9GYt_u4s5fY_SPEAKER_06]: Again, I want to thank you all so much for all the work that's been put into this. Yes, the High Street Rotary is a challenge. It's always a challenge. I have to say that I use that intersection a lot going from Winthrop Street onto High Street. I'm not sure that eliminating the right-hand turn only lane will make that easier. I was sitting here trying to think of Okay, who has the right of way now? Am I gonna have to wait for, if I'm officially in the rotary now, do I have to wait for everybody who's going around the rotary back onto Winthrop Street before I can make a right onto High Street? I'm not sure that's going to be very efficient.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Well, to just speak on the who has the right of way, anybody that's in the rotary, regardless if you're entering a rotary or exiting, if you're exiting the rotary or in it, you have the right of way. So I don't know if that helps, but before you enter the rotary, you have to make sure that the rotary is clear of any exiting or entering traffic.
[Unidentified]: Matt, I believe you have your hand up again as well, so we'll ask you to speak on that. Hi, thank you.
[phPK_rgTxTg_SPEAKER_06]: I think this design looks great. I know it's always hard to change a commonly used traffic pattern, but just narrowing the lanes looks like it's going to reduce collisions. Like you had noted, people come from high street at a full speed and just barrel into this rotary. My question with the note to Powder House was where it seems like we have significant space in these bump outs, if it would be possible on the Winthrop approaches, both from what I'm going to call the West and the Southeast, even though that might not be accurate. if the bike lane could continue into that bump out and then proceed parallel or through the crosswalk where we have that dead space, and then that would remove the bikers from the lane. But Amy had mentioned that this is the safest model, so that might be something that looks good on paper but isn't actually safer.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you. Amy, if you want to
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, that is an option that I think could be possibly explored in the future. One nice thing about the paint and FlexPost approach is that it affords you the ability to change the way you've done something. So that is, yeah, I guess I would say that. That is something that could be talked about and experimented with sometime in the future, perhaps.
[Unidentified]: Thanks.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: It looks like we have Jennifer.
[Unidentified]: I'll ask you to unmute. Oh, hi.
[SPEAKER_16]: I just want to make sure if we're coming down Winthrop Street into the circle and we have to go around, can we go on to High Street then? Where the CVS and the library are?
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_16]: To do that? Okay. I thought we weren't able to do that. Okay.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: No, there's no, no movements are restricted.
[SPEAKER_16]: We're just, you know, crosswalks and everything. It's no problem. If I could avoid the rotary, I would, but unfortunately we have to, and we're always waiting to enter it. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you. Liz White. if you'd ask to unmute as well.
[lq25S5HOVFA_SPEAKER_10]: Hi, thanks again for taking my hand. I just want to, I think it looks great. I'm very excited to see some changes made. I live very close to the rotary and it's, and I have a new driver and it's, you know, Sarah Silver, PB – she, her, hers): Anxiety inducing every time we go through it. Um, but I want to echo what Alicia was saying about the those striped areas. I think that even with, you know, Sarah Silver, PB – she, her, hers): The temporary pylons, whatever they're called, people will be knocking those down as they do around the rest of the city. So at some point, if that could be actually like a raised curb or traffic island type situation, I think that would be great for the safety of the pedestrians and the drivers as well. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you. Appreciate your comments. I am not seeing any other hands raised for this section. Commissioners, do you have any other questions or concerns with this area? Actually, we just got one hand. Is it Hoang? Ask him to mute.
[SPEAKER_09]: Hi, my name is Scott. Sorry for the Last name. Can you hear me. Yes, absolutely. We can.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_56]: Thank you for sharing this. I wrote in the chat. I just, I wanted to express concern with removing the right turn lane from the high street entrance, because Winthrop street going south, it's so backed up from the left turn traffic on to mystic. Um, even, even with the right turn, it backs up sometimes all the way back to, uh, I think it's called Warburn street. Um, so, you know, I, I take that way two or three times a day, just picking my girls up from school and dropping them off. Um, so I wanted to express concern with making that just one lane.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So you're just, you're speaking on Winthrop street coming from the rotary towards mystic valley parkway.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_56]: For the high street entrance. Yeah, that one, removing the right turn lane, because there's a lot of right turners there that that get backed up exactly on on Winthrop street going south, and I think, especially in the afternoon, it's going to be so backed up, it's just going to be impossible to get through the rotary, it's going to be depending on that that light at Winthrop and mystic. and people coming eastbound on Winthrop Street, they're also gonna get tied up and block the roadway. It already happens. So now it's just gonna be impossible to go straight or take a left from that high street entrance.
[Unidentified]: Thank you. Okay.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Not seeing any other questions, so I'll maybe move it back towards the original proposal, which would be the last leg, I think, Amy.
[Tim McGivern]: Hold on, hold on. Sorry. It's OK. I want to get some response from Amy and Todd on removing the right slip lane from Winthrop Street to High Street.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Sure.
[Tim McGivern]: Yeah, there's some salient points that gentleman was making about the backup and how it interacts with the light.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Yeah, so this kind of goes back to our previous conversation around Mystic Valley Parkway and the changes that were made at Main and South. Things that Todd said, you know, traffic does kind of feel like water at times, you know, and does disperse when there is a backup in some place or if something changes. We know that this is a heavy movement, and we understand that. But we also, it comes down to the trade-offs, you know, trading safety for everybody. I know that we can't really, I don't think anyone would argue that this brewery is safe today. Trading safety for some increased congestion is a deal that we, I think, would want to make because we know that a lot of our, that this street is scary to go through for people on all modes and that bicyclists in particular almost never go through it because it's so dangerous to do. So I think it's a fair trade-off.
[Bob Dickinson]: I have a question, Amy or Todd. Has anyone talked to DCR about the, the light at Winthrop and Mystic? I mean, this morning, I mean, this morning, the traffic down Winthrop street because of the fire on Terrace, the traffic literally went from the rotary through Lawrence and then almost to the next street. So. While I'm okay with giving up, I'm all for safety, but I don't really just want to pass along or pass over this idea of creating more congestion because it's a huge deal for people coming that way through town. And so, and I think a lot of it has to do with the bottleneck at that light. And then the lights further down the road. I mean, I think something that we'll need to visit one day is the light next to the shell, which basically when you cross the street, you have car wash to stop traffic by pressing the button. And then it all just backs up from there. So has anyone visited with the DCR about the issues that that traffic light creates on this rotary?
[Todd Blake]: So DCR, we did share this plan with DCR and they viewed it and were okay with adding the bicycle infrastructure near the signal. In terms of the signal timing, I had asked in the past for DCR to look into adjusting the timing to try to reduce the queue in this particular direction back towards the circle. And they were looking at that for us. And more recently, there's another agency looking at these areas as well, MassDOT, as well as DCR and the city, we're all kind of looking at that area to see what can be done in terms of signal and operations point of view and lane structure. It's one of those cases where there's so much volume going through there, almost no matter which way you slice the timing and the lane structure, it's still going to be there. So it's just a matter of managing it the best we can. This is a situation where I'm not proposing this, but in the CTPS study from 2018, they actually recommended a traffic signal at Winter Circle, which wouldn't necessarily be better or worse, but the thing with traffic signals is that there's no free flow through it, so it's a metered approach. So usually if you have... Anyway, so I'm getting off topic, but we do have a conversation with DCR about signals timing, but there's only so much you can do with that. And as we said, with the main itself changes, It did have this side effect where more people had to take the left from Winthrop Street onto 16, because some used to take the left from Winthrop onto South, right? So by changing Maine itself to improve safety there, which was a major safety issue, it did redistribute some people to take more people taking this left from Winthrop than they than they used to. And yeah, because it's a single lane left and not a dual lane left, you can only process so many left turns at a time. But yeah, there's other things going on in the 16 corridor, if you were referencing like along 16 towards Whole Foods in Somerville and Cambridge, there's a possible road diet going on on 16, which would reduce the amount of traffic potentially coming into Medford and having Medford be the sole bottleneck of all that traffic. back from 16 and went towards Somerville. So because it's two lanes, both directions that way for Parkway all the way up to Medford, and then it's suddenly one lane, right? So we're the bottleneck. But if that one lane started back at Mass Ave, Cambridge, then the two lanes wouldn't even be coming into us. It would be one lane the whole way coming in. So there's things like that regionally that may be happening that change the flow of all the decisions people make further back. But we are cognizant, getting back to Tim's question as well, we are cognizant of the amount of volume coming through this circle, especially southbound in the morning. These are the trade-offs, as Amy said, there's a trade-off. So these improvements shown here are reducing the effective crossing distances for pedestrians. If we kept the right turn lane, it would remain as is, right? So it wouldn't be an improvement for pedestrians. And it wouldn't necessarily get that more definition or slower speed in a single lane approach. And in the sight lines with two cars side by side, you know, versus in one line wouldn't be as nice. So, so we have to weigh all that. And, you know, I'm looking at this plan, maybe we maybe we tweak the bottom right corner of this where it says Winthrop Street. It's one lane, it's two lanes only up to where the 11 foot markings are, and then it's one lane to circle. If we could somehow adjust that to carry the two lanes at least up to the crosswalk, as they are today. then maybe receiving wise, you'll have two lanes, it won't choke that queue as much. But there is value to removing the right turn only from high to winter. But I get, it's totally understandable the reservation some people have, and it's a trade off. We're not trying to sit here and say that doesn't exist. We're just saying, the city has a complete streets policy in which supposed to be looking at all modes equally, not just cars. we're trying to perform that delicate balance. We may or may not be pulling it out.
[Bob Dickinson]: I'm all for, like I said, I'm all for the safety aspect, but this is not stance around the issue. This is going to create even more congestion on here without some other changes being made. I don't know the number of cars coming down whether that do turn directionally down or south. on to High Street to go that way. But based on the new design, now those cars get trapped in this lane and can't get out. So they have to wait for the people who are going to continue on Winter Street, which is blocked by the light at Mystic. And then Mystic is actually blocked by the light behind St. Joe's and then the light at the river by people, again, who think this car is lost, press the button, it stops traffic and they can back up all this traffic. So it's a compounding effect against this. And I just, um, I, I don't know what the solution is. Unfortunately, I think I found us in a precarious position because we've kind of agreed to this comprehensive plan for biking all the way to the green line. Um, but we have a really precarious situation here as long as we're all kind of flexible as to, um, I like the flex post idea cause it gives us flexibility to come back and change if we just create a nightmare. without getting some support from DCR to make some changes on Mystic. Because I think that is one of the bigger factors that unfortunately we don't have any control over that could actually make this a little bit better.
[Todd Blake]: I mean, this is a conversation, right? And you are the traffic commission, the regulating body. If one of the things that you're approving is the removal of a travel lane, you know, that is in your purview, Amy and I proposing what we believe is a good idea and may, you know, balancing all modes, but if there were reservations, I mean, you could potentially approve and adjust a portion if you were to suggest something like that, and we could comment on whether the plan could go forward with that adjustment or not. I will say once the road's paved, and we restrain things, we won't necessarily, even though we have the adjustment, as Amy said, and I say it all the time as well, paint and flex posts could be adjusted. It'll be a nice brand new rose. We don't wanna mark it up too much and scrape it up. But so if we came to some sort of a point where the commission was amenable to the plan, we'd wanna get that as good or correct as we can at this point so that We're not necessarily unnecessarily scraping up the brand new road to adjust things. The flex post, it does mean we can adjust things. I'm just mentioning that once a brand new road's done and it's done with the longer lasting markings, it's more challenging to change than just paint. But it's not costly, it's just gonna end up not. So if you have a suggestion for a change, I'm saying maybe make it now so that we could correct Markings, whatever's approves, get that painted properly the first time.
[Bob Dickinson]: Okay. Is, is this the best design that you have, or do you have alternate designs for this? I don't speak to the other commissioners, but I, I like what you've done the rest of the way. I think it's, um, The, the apartment complex Parker seemed to be the only ones who park on with her, but I don't even know. I mean, that would be the only ones primarily parking spots. on Winthrop Street. But everything from Lawrence to here, I think works fine. Everything from here south down Winthrop, save it except for the reservations that people have at the park, which I agree with Tim. I think the compromise on the parking that you have, unfortunately for the community people, they do have to cross the street, but it's not that incredibly far. And I think on a normal average day, not during heavy traffic, you can likely over to the side, put your hazards on and drop off what you need to and then go park. But the circle again, I, you know, I'm just afraid that we're creating, you know, more congestion and I know trying to give everybody equal rights here. But if you do have alternative plans, I'd love to see it. I mean, I'm no traffic designer.
[Todd Blake]: Steve, getting back to one of your questions while you were speaking there, I was trying to look up some data for you to answer your question. So I do have volume from 2000, late 2017, so pre-pandemic. of what the volumes are coming up High Street and what the split is going into the rotary and taking the right. So in the AM from High Street, it's 223 straight and 347 taking the right. So it's more than half the people taking the right. And then the evening, it's 291 straight and 286. So it's about 50-50 that go into the circle versus take that right.
[Bob Dickinson]: What about like in the, I guess, AM Winthrop South turning right onto High Street?
[Todd Blake]: That is not too heavy. So the AM, it's very light actually. So from Winthrop Street, from like the nursing home into the circle, that's 324 going straight across to Winthrop, 66 going to High Street, Medford Square, and only 45 taking the right towards Arlington.
[Bob Dickinson]: And then High Street North to continue on to High Street versus turning right onto Winthrop in the morning.
[Todd Blake]: In the morning, that's the 223 number. So the coming up the page coming up the page and towards Medford Square, that's 223 in the morning and 347 take the right coming up the page and taking the heart rate.
[Bob Dickinson]: Yeah, I see. I think that's I mean, if I had any suggestion, it would be to trigger trying to figure out a way to maintain that one. Because again, I think some people are as the as the citizen pointed out earlier, she's just trying to get to CVS and Medford Square. So the people who are just trying to continue on 6th, what is High Street at that point. To continue on, to not get bogged down in the people who are held back by the traffic light at Mystic, who are held back by the traffic light at St. Joe's, who are held back by the traffic light at the river.
[Todd Blake]: Yeah, so to try to be responsive to you and Tim's questions about this, I think there is an adjustment that could be made If you kept the high street right turn, but, but still eliminated the wind street winter street. Right. Because, because by, by keeping one of the eliminations the right turn from winter street to high street Medford Square. That gives us some room to play with with the travel lanes here so we might still be able to accommodate a five foot bike lane and two travel lanes for the right turn. And then, because we could shift things over to the right a little bit potentially. If you if you as a track commission said we want to keep both right only is that exists today, then we would have a challenge accommodating the bike lane. looking at this if north was up the southeast side of the crosswalk coming out of the circle would have a challenge to accommodate that bike lane but it but i think we may be able to accommodate it if if we kept if if the right turn from high is kept but we eliminate the right turn for what the has proposed okay so the The right term for winter is only 53 in the morning and 90 in the evening, according to that will come. So it's not very heavy.
[Tim McGivern]: I just want to put a put a pin in the conversation Jordan I forgot to tell you that I get I get city council so I get about 10 more minutes left I apologize. But with it. I think that. Trying to keep one of those slip lanes, one of those right-hand slip lanes. I mean, I kind of see this concern too, because I mean, everybody has driven through this thing. I have. It seems like those right-turn slip lanes do take a lot of pressure off the traffic cues that build up at this thing. So I'd definitely like to see numbers and make sure that we're not doing something that we're going to eat later on.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So if I could just make a suggestion, and I may be speaking out of turn, but if this could be tabled so that maybe other options could be presented with each either keeping the right turn only, whether that's taking them all out and, or making, like Todd had just mentioned, I know it may be tough to keep both, but there may be a way that we can, or if there were other options in which, since it seems like we're, of hung up on this doesn't seem that we should take a vote on this and if if we're still having questions on this and then everything can be presented so that everybody can kind of more take a better idea of all their options that potentially could be here rather than just this one.
[Tim McGivern]: And I'd like to add to that, Jordan, just I'd like to see maybe some of those movement numbers that Todd, you were just talking about on paper, just to understand what we're losing and what some potential cues might look like. Just to understand that fully because- Definitely.
[Todd Blake]: So yeah, cues, we may not be able to produce that, but numbers, this is a publicly available document that CTPS created back in 2018 for this week. related to Medford Square to extend it out to this intersection, so it's pandemic numbers gives us kind of a good idea. This traffic may be creeping back to what it was before. Yeah, I would make a suggestion to move on to the other part so at least we know what the other comments are so then if we come back we'll be able to come back holistically instead of coming back and then hearing comments for the other piece as well later and then having to go back again. Yep. One comment in particular I wanted to ask people about the commission and the community is on the next block on Winthrop, near the American Legion, opposite the nursing home, we did preserve that parking there. But because we preserved it, Amy, if you could go up to the next, because we preserved it, we don't have the buffered bike lanes, we just have a standard bike lane. So if it was the majority view or the commission, Commissioner's view that that parking was kind of unnecessary, it only happened once a year. And, you know, we could carry the buffer all the way through in both directions cleaner, but we wanted to provide some overhaul parking on street overflow in this block. But if it's not necessary, it would be probably safer and cleaner for the cyclists to just have the buffer all the way through.
[Tim McGivern]: That's what I want to hear, hopefully about this section. What are they for again? American Legion.
[Todd Blake]: So we had heard comments that at times, American Legion may have events that spill over out into the street, but we don't necessarily want to design for that. It's a very infrequent situation. That's why we're asking. I mean, there was an alternate design that didn't provide any parking in this block. It would look very similar to the block you just saw in front of the apartment.
[Tim McGivern]: I'm wondering if there's anyone here from American Legion.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So we do have two participants. Mr. Vasella had raised his hand. I'm not sure that he's for the American Legion, but he could be to speak on the Rotary part. So I was okay if we could open it up to the public again here for a couple.
[Bob Dickinson]: Can I just ask one question, Jordan, just to clarify, you don't want to break this up. You'd rather just have it approved at one time.
[Todd Blake]: Well, so here's the situation for everybody. So there's a scheduling thing we're trying to work out with Eversource, right? So they pave and then we follow up with painting. So at some point, they're going to repave this block and then we have to have a plan ready for them to paint. So we're trying to get our ducks in a row. So we don't want it to drag out too much. But if it got tabled tonight, I think that may be fine. I was just saying, Steve, to like, I didn't want to in the conversation table and not go through the comments for this block or the others and then come back with a plan for Winthrop Circle and then have people say we wanted to change this block too. So I'd rather hear all the changes at once that we come back to you with a holistic phase two.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Okay.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So we do have some comments if we're okay with opening it up here.
[Unidentified]: Mr. Vasella, if I could ask you to unmute if you could speak.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Steven, if you can unmute on your end, obviously you're still muted. So if you don't have a question anymore, then you can put your hand down or if you're having an issue, just let us know on the chat line. I'm going to move on to Matt and Steven, we'll come back to you. Or if you have any issues, just, just let us know in the chat comments and then we can try and help you out. Matt.
[phPK_rgTxTg_SPEAKER_06]: Uh, thank you. Um, this part really stuck out to me. I acknowledge the concern of the American Legion. Um, I think it is. Fairly infrequent. A main concern here is that this is creating a big gap in the continuity of the lane. And in my experience cycling around the city for 10 years, cars are just going to drive in that. portion of the bike lane with that slight shift where they're already to the right, coming to the driving West, or what have you or North. I think that's going to create a real conflict for cyclists if it's not protected, where I see. I think it needs to be a conversation with the American Legion. I don't know if seven spaces are going to be a benefit. I live a couple houses down from here, and in my experience, it's either 20 cars on the road or no cars on the road. I don't know if saving the seven spaces is necessarily going to do that much, but I don't want to speak for them. But I do think it's going to have a big impact on the safety and the community benefits of the bike path. And with that, I'll just generally just want to say I really appreciate the commission's efforts here I think this is a great project, and I fully support going forward with this. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you. Stephen I'm just gonna ask you unmute again, and should allow you to speak and unmute yourself. Stephen, if you want to put it into the comment section, if the commissioners are okay, then I can read what he stated in the comment section. And then we can at least acknowledge what he had written and then put it on the record.
[Unidentified]: But we'll move forward to Caitlin Robinson for this.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: She has a question as well. So move forward. And then Stephen, if you want to put it into the chat, read that forward and have that put on the.
[Kaitlin Robinson]: Thank you. I wanted to say that I strongly agree with Matt. I'm concerned about leaving these seven spaces in front of American Legion because it really compromises the route for cyclists and I would rather see a protected lane all the way through. I'm someone who bicycles with a child and so For me, the most dangerous part of the route matters when deciding whether I'm going to go ahead and bike or whether I need to look for another way to travel. So I think it's really important for this to be a continuous route. I do also want to comment on the talk about the traffic circle. And I just ask that we please prioritize safety at a disaster going through there as a pedestrian, it really feels dangerous. And so hearing that we're considering keeping slip lanes and compromising what looks to me to be a much better plan, I would just ask that we please prioritize safety over concerns about congestion.
[Unidentified]: Thank you. Thank you. Steven, I'm going to try and ask you to unmute again.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: If not, if you could type your question into the chat, then we can read that off for you as well.
[Unidentified]: While we're waiting for him, should we just move on to the rest of it?
[SPEAKER_23]: Because Tim's waiting outside the council chamber. Oh, his messages come in.
[Alicia Hunt]: Steven said concerning about no regulations on bicycles regarding speed and other requirements such as side-by-side travel. Also concerned that all previously placed flex posts have been destroyed.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Well, the first two I mean I guess we're talking about a design proposal, we're not changing any regulations or laws as to how bicyclists ride so I don't really think that we can address that unless someone else has a comment about that but As far as the flex posts are concerned, I actually, I did want to, I meant to show you guys a picture of what the flex posts will look like. What we have out already is, oops. But I have it open. What you've seen around the town mostly is just a cone. Flex posts are actually, can you see the picture now? The image? Flex posts are actually affixed to the ground. And the style that we're looking at is actually the kind here in Powderhouse Circle with the base here. So it's affixed at both ends of this kind of cone. cylindrical looking type of object here, not cylindrical. Yeah, so it's affixed at the street with bolts basically at either end here and then the post there. So they're actually fairly sturdy, not to say that they don't come up ever, but they, yeah, it's more than just the cones that I think the gentleman was referring to.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: So if we'd like to move back towards the Legion and then back towards kind of the start of the second phase, commissioners are okay with moving backwards. It doesn't look like we have any other questions. Tim, I understand you have to go to the city council meeting. So whenever you have to leave, obviously. Probably one more minute.
[Tim McGivern]: I would say that If I'm not around for a vote, I would be in favor of removing the American Legion spaces. I don't understand why they were there. And I agree that it would change the consistency of the cross section. So unless we're doing it for a very good reason, I'm not sure why we're doing it. And then I'd love for the team to explore the, congestion impacts with the slip lanes. And I will say that that does have something to do with safety because, you know, part of that balance is obviously not creating so much congestion that we are making it impossible to move around the city. So that's, I'm not saying we're doing that, but you know, it does have to do with the safety and wellbeing of Medford as well. So just to say that. So with that said, I will have to drop off. So, but.
[Bob Dickinson]: Hey Tim, one second. Did you say you were okay with tabling this for a month while we approve it all at once, or do you want to break it up? I think you said just table it and then we'll approve it all at once.
[Todd Blake]: It's not ideal to table it, but obviously there are concerns being raised, so I'm just trying to think through the practicality and constructability of all this, depending on what does get approved. We don't want to be the reason to hold up improvements, painting, and PB, David Ensign — He-Him, he-him.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Sorry, Steve, you broke up there I couldn't quite hear you. You want to make a motion for the seven spaces.
[Bob Dickinson]: Yeah, Todd is if Todd and Amy are looking to have this approved all at one full swoop I'd make a motion to table it for one month. But we can continue the banter tonight talking about it, that would allow Tim to vote on and he's going to have to rush a vote.
[Tim McGivern]: Yeah, I would agree with that. I don't think I could necessarily vote confidently in the way it is, just without some of those answers addressed, some of those questions I addressed, so.
[Bob Dickinson]: I guess, Todd, if you're OK with that, I'll make the motion to table it for one month.
[Todd Blake]: If I may, it may depend, because if you're close enough, if the commissioners were willing to approve, with the exception of, say, the High Street right turn only lane, That could be something that would help us because then it wouldn't hinder the whole painting project. And we could work on that specific fix, like we're doing the specific one for the high school area from last time. But that would help. But if there were other reservations besides that right turn only, then by all means, you got to table it. But if it was that close and it was only that one issue, then maybe there was you could consider approving with that one remaining item. I don't know. I don't want to tell the commission what to do.
[Tim McGivern]: I'm just trying to be honest and upfront. I'd approve it. I mean, I'd be okay with that exception because the parking in front of the American Legion, is that another one though that we would need to have a vote on?
[Bob Dickinson]: Yeah. I mean, I think so. I mean, I think you've raised an issue that we need to take a look at. I wouldn't necessarily think it'd be for the American Legion. I would think it'd be during voting time when canvassers have, you know, drop off stuff there. So, but Todd, it's up to you. If you want to break this up, I think we can probably approve a couple of, you know, at least the Southern Winthrop Street portion, or if you want to give us a month.
[Todd Blake]: Yeah. If, if the commission seems decided on portions, we might as well get those approved if you break it up. Yeah. That, that would be appreciated, Steve. I appreciate. They're both questions. I'm trying to, I got Owen in the back of my mind asking about schedule for the Eversource painting market. So I'm trying to.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Well, what is the schedule that, so we can maybe have an idea. Is there a, is there a date?
[Todd Blake]: The draft schedule, I believe the draft schedule might have painting this area in June, perhaps, but that's a draft, but, but, you know, there's a lot of communication to send the plan. And then they send to the contractor so like if if it was a majority approves and it was minor tweaks we could we could deal with that.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I think the next traffic commission meeting is April 11 that's the only reason I bring that up. We are a week ahead of the other one I'm not making a suggestion on any other things it just seems like a lot of questions has been raised on this.
[Tim McGivern]: There's another approach here, there's another approach here. This could be given to them for planning, planning purposes, knowing that there's an amendment coming to clarify anything. This, you know, maybe at the end of the day it gets approved as is and no changes, or there is an amendment coming before they mobilize in June. And that's probably going to be something pretty simple. So at least they'll be able to do their estimating, do their planning on the typical sections. They give them a draft pending approval in our April meeting.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: We do have one question from the public. So the commissioners are OK. I'd like to go to George here so we can least say what he has to say. And then I know Tim, you have to leave here. So we're kind of in crunch time. That's okay. I'm monitoring the meeting. So George, I'm going to ask you to speak here.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_20]: Yeah. Can you hear me now?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yes.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_20]: So my questions was just a little clarity. I'm one of a resident and I'm down right across from a badger road. So it was, if you could go down a little bit more on the other slide and I'm sorry, go back up. I think my face is blocking you there. Yeah, so right off the Lawrence Road where this Badger Road comes out. So one of the questions I had, it looks like there's two things happening. You're eliminating parking in front of my house, which we do use. And it was interesting when she talked about there was a few people that park here because it's residential. The only people that park on the street are people that live here and they tend to park at night when they come home because you have multiple cars. And also they're all shared driveways and run to the same issue that woman earlier talked about when she wants to go home, and the neighbors parking the driveway or the delivery, you have to park in front of your house now there's plenty of parking here you park in front of your house unloads groceries all that, but if you lay in all those spots. And it just means we have to park across a busy street to get to our house. And one of the other issues is in the winter time, when you have to park across the street because there's no parking on the street because of snow, the other neighbors get pissed off when someone permanently parks in front of their house. So if you're eliminating parking in front of all the people that live here, it's the personal houses, you're taking them away. We have to park in front of someone else's house on a side street in a residential area where the only people that typically park in front of your house is you, because we're really not the downtown city. So the parking elimination bothers me, and I don't think the neighbors on the side know you're proposing to eliminate the spots. That said, the thing that I think bothers me even more is those flexible posts that I have to look at when I look out my window for the rest of my life. It's kind of, I'm going to say, it's kind of an eyesore that I have to look at. I'd rather have, if you're going to limit the parking, well, you know, I'll be upset about that, but the posts I absolutely object to. It needs to be painted because it's, this is where we live here. This is my home. It's not the park around the corner you're talking about. It's really busy. There's people, houses here. We take pride in our houses and to look at those posts in front of your house all the time. And when they would do break, then you're looking at a broken, something broken in front of your home. They will take, you know, several weeks to get fixed. And it just looks junky. You know, I think that it needs to be, those things are fine when you get into rotaries, but when you're into somewhere like here where this is, and it's residential here, and we do live on a busy street, we put up with all the traffic you're talking about, I live with all it every day, and to throw this on top of it just makes it, it just bothers me. I've been here for 33 years, and the traffic gets worse and worse, but it's okay, I live with that. But to make me look at those flexible posts and take away my parking, I think we're being punished because our houses are close to this, on the main street. And I don't think the neighbors even know. I kind of glitz when I heard about parking. Everybody talked to doesn't even know that you're eliminating the parking or has seen these plans yet. You know, so I guess I just wanted to I got kind of went in here because I got really upset about about that. You know, it's it's this is I live here and I have to look at this stuff and you're taking away my parking and the neighbor next door has got three little kids. She pulls in front to unload the babies and put them in the car. So remember, people who live here have families, have kids, more than one car. And when you ask to park in a side street, you're talking about someone else's house. You get aggravated if every day you look out and someone's truck is parked, big truck's parked right in front of your house, forever going forward, because you're pushing us to the side streets. So that's really all I wanted to get out there. I think it's unfair.
[Unidentified]: Thank you for your comments. Not seeing any other questions. Patricia, would you like to speak? Yeah, I'll ask you to unmute, okay? If you want to speak, you just got to unmute yourself. Patricia, we can't hear you, but there you are.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_16]: Can you hear me now?
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: We can, yes. How are you?
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_16]: Yes. Patricia Egan, a resident, 190 High Street. And they're not apartments that I live at. They're condominiums. The driveway for two separate condominiums, the Regal and the Regency, are located at Winthrop Street. And just to the right of the exit, is where the right lane commences to take a right lane onto High Street. I know we're down at the Lawrence intersection, but I have to say, I'm made in Medford and I have seen iterations of different traffic patterns when Medford with you can come out of the street, but you can't go in the street. And this is very concerning. There are 150 parking spaces between the two condominiums. And in order to access entering, you need to be in the left lane when you come from High Street, from the west of High Street, headed east. You need that right lane to turn and then you need to not get in the immediate lane, you need to get into the left lane so that 150 feet up that you can take a left-hand turn into the driveway. As I say, my condominium has 84 units. The Regal has approximately the same. We're talking about over 150 vehicles that access that lane and to make that down into a one lane, it's not just vehicles, it's the type of vehicular traffic that we're talking about. And this is my concern is that while it's high street to the local residents, it's route 60 to people that are commuting and for all commercial traffic. And this is 24 hours a day that we have commercial traffic. And I think that we can't push this through right now. And it is a rotary, it's not a roundabout, it's been reconfigured twice in the past 25 years. I think serious consideration needs to be taken here before we put those pylons up, which in the wintertime plowing, I can't imagine what that is going to do. Yes, we haven't had much snow this winter, but when we get the average amount of snow and the number of times that we must plow, this is a serious concern. And while I'm very aware of the crosswalk situations, yes, moving them back towards the houses a little bit will help. Reducing right lane turns into one lane only so that there can be a dedicated bicycle lane. While I have respect for bicyclists, it just does not make sense in a practical manner, because as I say, we have commuters, but we also have local residents that live here. And I thought the previous speaker, George, did a fine job. That's what I have to say. So please reconsider.
[Todd Blake]: Andrew, and briefly, I just wanted to touch upon, so as Amy pointed out, some of the cones that we have out there are called looper cones. We use those to try to decipher where the best place for a more permanent flex post that Amy described would be. So I imagine this area, we would start off, if we chose to do those, we'd start off with looper cones to determine the best place for those to be to accommodate box trucks buses or 18 wheelers and then and then they would that something more permanent will be positions as such once that's determined so that's the approach we took at Boston Avenue and High Street in West Medford. Those cones in that particular corner come from Arlington. They accommodate an 18 wheeler and a MBTA bus taking that right turn. So if we went out immediately and did the more permanent, the fixed ones and then a truck, we're not able to make the turn. And, you know, that would be a problem. So we do take a kind of incremental measured approach, if that helps.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, that was kind of gonna be my next question was gonna be how if these are fixed, how is a truck, this is a truck route. And the only truck route that we have in this area, they're not allowed to drive on 16. So obviously, that would be a concern. This is the only route that they can go. And obviously, you had mentioned that that would be something that you guys have already taken into consideration. It's already an area in which you did, but that's kind of answered my question for me. George, you have your hand raised again. I'd like to speak on that since I don't speak. Go ahead, George.
[MCM00001177_SPEAKER_20]: Yeah, sorry. I thought of you. So just one quick question on maintenance now. So if you put those flex cones in and Winthrop Street is cleaned once a week in summer, Can the sweet sweepers get on the other side or is all this debris going to build up between the flex posts and my house and I'm going to be out there sweeping it myself because you can't sweep it. You know, also like you said, when the winter comes and those things are stuck there, is it going to be this permanent mound of snow between the flex posts of my driveway? It's going to make it harder to get onto the street because the plows, where they went, pushing up those flex posts the whole way down. So, I mean, you gotta think of these are affecting people's where they live. This isn't the rotary. This isn't the park. This isn't the high school. This is residential. We live here where I've been here 33 years. This is my home, you know, and I feel proud of it and I just don't wanna feel like it's being trashed by this proposal because it's it doesn't look good and I don't think you thought about these other things that I'm gonna have to, you know, clean my own street now. It's, you know, it's It's a nice area, I think, I think the painting is what we're going to have to go with for aesthetics even incident and then that's a win win I mean we're, you get something but those posts I mean the parking is going to be difficult because people have multiple cars, but I mean, I absolutely can't live with those flex posts. I mean, it's, and I think it's going to affect if I want to sell my house, who wants to buy a house with those posts in front of you? You got to think about what it does to the people that live here. These are, it's, this isn't a commercial area, it's residential. And I just, I mean, no one's talked about that cleaning part, but that just popped into my head. You know, it's just one more thing that's going to be dumped on us because of this plan.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: HAB-Michael Leccesereeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
[Todd Blake]: It's really about the bike lane versus parking or things like that for this particular approval.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Okay. Thank you, Todd. Obviously I want to stay on track for what we're actually proposing and what we passed here tonight would be to reiterate what Todd said, whether or not these are painted lines, not a flex post, we're just, it's the parking spots for the bike lane.
[Todd Blake]: I will say it is valuable to hear from the community of their opinions about that. It's not going unnoticed. It just doesn't, you know, just trying to make that clarification. Thank you.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: I can respond briefly to the snow and street sweeping questions since that was the first time that was brought up. This is not a new problem. A lot of adjacent communities are figuring out how to deal with that with new different kinds of infrastructure, bike infrastructure that looks like this with flex posts sometimes, sometimes with curbs. And there are different types of machines that you can get that are smaller that will plow but they have a smaller width. We actually did get one of those machines recently that's made to be in smaller spaces. These types of things, the maintenance concerns are absolutely real concerns, but they are also things that are one, not unique that other cities have had to deal with and problems that can be solved. We're here to solve not just the design problems, but also the maintenance problems.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.
[Alicia Hunt]: Can I ask, I didn't realize how, the first time I saw these plans were this evening during the meeting. I'm wondering if there's a way that we can make them available on the web for between now and when. They're up there.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: Are they? They were posted last week, yeah. Where? On the traffic and transportation homepage.
[Alicia Hunt]: OK. So that when people ask me, I can tell them. Yep. If it was on the agenda, I apologize. I missed that. I just saw the motion on the agenda.
[Adam Hurtubise]: No problem.
[Unidentified]: Looks like we have another question here. Matt, if you'd like to speak again, so we'll go to Matt here.
[phPK_rgTxTg_SPEAKER_06]: Yes, just as a little counterbalance I also I observed these plans. Weeks if not months ago on the city's website they might have been drafted at that point but I think George may be mischaracterizing the extent to which the community understands is happening, despite his, perhaps, having only recently learned about it. for a while. And just for some counterbalance I don't think pylons are ugly at all they reflect the entire concept of the complete streets community. And it's really just putting the needs or the interests of a few homeowners over a comprehensive bike network, which I would urge the committee not to do and to continue with this. It's entirely subjective to say that pylons are not attractive. They provide a huge benefit and a painted line is nowhere near a pylon or a protective bike lane. Thank you.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Just to reiterate what Todd had said, making the motion or we're speaking on parking spaces for the bike lane, the pylons or traffic cones or not, that would be up to the commissioner for PPW and that to be reiterated. We're just speaking on the parking spots that would be lost for this bike lane. So obviously if the commissioners would like to speak further on this, table this motion or approve for certain portions of this. It seems like there are a lot of questions that have been raised by both commission and residents along with Amy and Todd have done a ton of work for this. So I'm not sure that we got any further closer to a resolution. So I'm open to what you guys would like to kind of move forward doing here. But it seems like there are a lot of questions that have been raised just here at this meeting.
[Bob Dickinson]: I'll speak up, I'm willing to give you another month. Because I think you have some public, you know, community involvement questions that need to be answered. And which I'd like in the future to figure out how we don't make this forum the chance for the public to actually comment on these things that you kind of come to us with the community's comments in hand. So I'm willing to table it for a month, but if you're asking for approval right now, I'm going to vote no. I think that's up to the commission. Steve, if that's.
[Todd Blake]: If I may, I just want to mention that. So the first phase of the bike lanes were already approved. So. Whatever happens with this phase, we would have to figure out a transition, you know, if for some reason this got denied and bike lanes weren't included in this southern portion of Wintertree at this meeting or subsequent meeting, then we would have to figure out a transition for where they end roughly at Victory Park right now and transition back into Sheroes. So it's not like there wouldn't be anything and just trying to make people aware of that piece of it.
[Alicia Hunt]: And I just want to actually, I disagree with commissioner Brzezinski. Um, we, the traffic and transportation direct department does an excellent job of going out, talking to the public, walking the spaces, talking to people about it, but this is the place where the public are heard. This is the public hearing. And so if people still object to the proposal that's being proposed, it's not like the traffic and transportation department needs to give us what they think is best for the city. overall in a big picture way, and this is the place where the public should be expressing their, their concerns. So, I'm glad that so many members of the public heard about this. I'm actually going to actually recommend that the webpage that they're using gets elevated higher in the city's hierarchy, because it's not easy to find. But, but I do agree that it sounds like at this point we should table it because I do know that Tim really has to go into the city council meeting and at this point I probably should suit to I was going to join by zoom. So I would motion to table this till next month.
[Bob Dickinson]: Oh, Steve did he already make the motion. I just, I just, I just asked Todd again, like if he's willing to look at this, I, I think, I think we should. I don't see ever source ever staying on track for any schedule that they've ever proposed. So I think we'll be just fine to get this another month.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Okay. So Steve, I'm sorry. Is that a, is that a motion to table us until the next traffic meeting? Motion to table for one month. Second. Second invite him. Okay. Roll call.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner given.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner hunt. Yes. Commissioner Brzezinski.
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Sergeant can never.
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: For, and the affirmative to absent emotion passes to table for one month.
[Tim McGivern]: Thank you. I'm dropping off.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you, Tim. So there is no other new business. This is what we had for new business. I know there is some table business that we have here.
[Alicia Hunt]: Do we need to take, is there anything on there that's urgent or that people are waiting? If we were gonna continue, I need to take a two minute break.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: I don't believe there is, but if Steve, if you knew of something that might be on there.
[Bob Dickinson]: No, I don't think with the chief not here, I don't think there's anything we're looking to move up. to talk about tonight, especially. So somebody like just keep things as is till the next meeting. We have closer to everybody back.
[Unidentified]: Thank you. Somebody like to make a motion to adjourn the meeting? Motion to adjourn. Thank you. Roll call.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Commissioner McGiven, absent. Commissioner Hunt. Yes. Mr. Brzezinski.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yes.
[MCM00001607_SPEAKER_07]: Roger Canaba.
[MCM00001829_SPEAKER_08]: Yes. Thank you all for bearing with me on my first meeting. I appreciate the feedback and I appreciate everybody commenting on this. I will be better the next time. Thank you guys. And I appreciate it. Have a nice night and drive safe. Thanks.
[MCM00001142_SPEAKER_14]: You did just fine. Thank you.
[Unidentified]: Thank you.