Athens in Motion Commission

Athens in Motion Commission Tuesday, March 23, 2021 – 4:00-6:00 pm Online via ACC WebEx: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0k2XnDRbTY PRESENT Aaron Redman Mark Ebell Teresa Friedlander Lauren Blais James Barlament Roswell Lawrence Craig Topple Jake Maas Stephen Bailey (TPW) Rani Katreeb (TPW) Todd Miller, King of Bollards (Park Planning) 1. Call to Order a. Meeting called to order at 4:13. Todd Miller was welcomed and his trails update was added to agenda. 2. Agenda Additions and Approval a. James moved to approve; Teresa seconded. Agenda approved unanimously. 3. Public Comment a. No public comments. 4. Approval of Minutes a. Teresa moved to approve minutes; Aaron seconded. Minutes approved unanimously. 5. Proposed Resurfacing List for 2021 a. Rani presented the proposed resurfacing program for this year (6:35). i. There is a lot of focus on local roads that have fallen behind on the deficit list. In future years we will look at roads like Barnett Shoals that could qualify under ACC’s road diet policy. ii. Mark bought up the intersection of Child and Barrow and how it is massively over-paved. TPW will take a look. Mark also brought up Milledge Avenue Extension, which is to be paved this year. There is a tiny spur of Greenway there, that would use some signage to direct bikes/peds to a safer and more  pleasant route. Daniel: the trail is under LS and is inspected monthly by them. Mark is not a big fan of bollards. The King of Bollards was deeply offended. iii. Lauren brought up the failure of the Mulberry St. repavement. Rani explained that older roadways are not built to modern standards, and it is prohibitively expensive to do subsurface investigations of every underlying structure (e.g. Baxter between Rocksprings and Milledge). It is more economical to pave and see what happens; then find which roads need to be remediated (Hawthorne, Vincent Dr., and Willow were remediated within the past 15 years). TPW tracks failed repavements. iv. James asked some questions about the design of the bike facilities on Rocksprings. Turn lane at Waddell seems unnecessary. Rani thought this was a good observation. The movement of busses was considered as part of design. Aaron: it’s not perfect but it is better than it was. Everyone agreed. James: what about continuing the bike/ped corridor on Rocksprings on Stanton Way? Rani: we could do this through signage. Will convey up the chain. 6. Barber Street Revisited (Daniel) a. The M&C have asked us to provide additional specific recommendations on Barber St. project. i. In terms of priority within the AiM tiering system, is this a high enough priority to use up such a large percentage of the leftover funding? ii. What order should the segments be implemented in, should we run out of money and the last priorities can’t be completed (of the 4 segments and the 3 intersections)? iii. We have updated costs for segment 4; M&C want to know what our opinion is on M-U path versus separated bike lanes. One Commissioner stated that Athens has adopted the M-U path as method of choice. We need to explain considerations. (In this case, a busy M-U path could produce a lot of bike-ped conflicts, versus bike lanes.) iv. Consultant revisited numbers to make sure there were no hidden costs. v. This is a discussion; we will do another special called session for a vote. Stephen: the vote may be needed because the work session brought up a number of other possible alternatives. b. Currently there are no plans for further connections from Dairy Pak road to Terrapin, Kathwood, etc. c. Timeframe – around 4-5 years to completion; construction to begin in around 3 years. This would be the largest bike/ped project ACC has done. Stephen: the timeline may open up other sources of funding (TSPLOST, TADs). d. Rani brought up Cedar Shoals, and other collectors and minor collectors that may qualify for road diets in the next two years. We need to consider the possibility that funds may not be available (e.g., if the next TSPLOST doesn’t pass). We can do preliminary design work in this case. e. Lauren: Our charge is to facilitate connections and not create more gaps. We don’t want to prioritize segments. f. Jake suggested that 4-3-2-1 should be priority of design for Barber Street (from Prince to Dairy Pak). Stephen: so recommendation would be to begin preliminary design on all 4 segments, with a recommendation for design of each segment. When we have the final cost estimates, we would make final recommendations for which projects to proceed  with, based on available budget. Teresa: I’m not ready to vote on anything related to this project yet. g. Stephen: Mayor Girtz has raised possibility of 3-laning segment 1 to avoid some ROW costs. Tradeoff is whether there would be enough space to accommodate all traffic (car, bike, ped). h. Teresa requested a note from Rani to delineate the determinations we will need to make at the special called session. Rani will provide one. i. Mark raised issue of width of the multi-use path. Sarah: There is existing sidewalk on segment 4, so multi-use path there is only 10’ (also that section is much more constrained in terms of ROW). On segments 1-3 the M-U path would be 12’. j. Special called session scheduled for 4/6 at 4:30. k. [Toole group departs.] 7. Bike/Ped Update (Daniel) a. Would like to meet with the Data committee for data-related work. b. No progress on vacancy yet. c. Daniel has been added to MACORTS. i. Does AiMC want a seat? It is mostly looking at federal money at a regional scale. They don’t get into the details of individual streets/areas. Stephen doesn’t think we need one. Jake opined that Daniel can be AiMC’s Mouth of Sauron. Lauren thinks that the MACORTS projects do look pretty relevant. MACORTS has a technical committee (to whom we would provide input) and a policy committee (mayors, etc.). We can come to their meetings and speak on relevant stuff if we want to. Daniel will keep us informed. 8. Trail Report (Todd) a. Bridge over Trail Creek: trees will start coming down soon; Trestle in May. Completion in Fall of 2022. b. Firefly Phase II: ¼ of concrete trail installed. Ped bridge under loop/overon-ramp will start next month. Completion in fall of 2021 (maybe Oct). c. Firefly Phase III: CDO approved last week. Under design and working on getting easements. d. Greenway Cemetery segment: Under (mostly invisible) construction. Doing soil analysis. Will be completed in Summer of 2022. e. Greenway Carr’s Creek segment: Potential trailhead with parking across from 76 gas station if budget allows. Possible restroom. Design decisions still being made. 9. Prince Avenue Corridor (Mark) a. Corridor Committee is forming a subcommittee to create a refined list of all the recommendations that have been provided in recent years. Mark will share with AiMC when this is completed. b. Then we will review Mark’s letter. Mark will provide updates on progress at our monthly meetings. 10. Atlanta Highway and Lexington Corridors a. Surveys are open and informal Q&A popups are happening. b. Do we want to come forward as AiMC with formal recommendations? Jake: we are pretty far away from having to make recommendations at this point. Daniel thinks it would be appropriate when the time comes. Stephen: it’s the order we choose the projects in that is the most important. Daniel: in the future there will be more public input with specific alternatives to choose from. Stephen: much further down the line. c. Each of these corridors only have $4M (as seed money). 11. Committees (all together) a. No current plans for Grants & Data meeting. b. Policy Committee working on equity part of Open Streets policy. Next step is to prioritize Tier 1 projects. Next meeting April 14th. 12. M&C Meeting Relevant Items a. Midblock crossing at Waddell and Rocksprings is on consent agenda. AiM is in favor. 13. Next meeting is special called meeting 4/6 at 4:30pm. 14. Meeting adjourned at 6:11pm.