Transit Authority

The City of Morgantown 389 Spruce Street Morgantown, West Virginia 26505 (304) 284-7412 Fax: (304) 284-7409 www.morgantownwv.gov Traffic Commission July 1, 2020 Traffic Commission Minutes Matt Cross: Welcome to the July 1 traffic commission meeting for 2020. My name is Matthew Cross, I am Chairman of the Traffic Commission, and let me begin with a brief statement from the City of Morgantown regarding the video meetings being broadcast. Good Evening. This meeting of the Morgantown Traffic Commission is being conducted by electronic means consistent with the city council Policy on Conduct of Public Meetings by Electronic Means adopted on May 5, 2020, the West Virginia Open Governmental Proceedings Act, and the guidance published by the West Virginia Ethics Commission due to the current State of Emergency given the outbreak of COVID-19. In order to mitigate the transmission of the virus and reduce risk of COVID-19 illness, we are holding this meeting electronically. In keeping with the Policy on Conduct of Public Meetings by Electronic Means, and the authority provided by the Open Governmental Proceedings Act and the Ethics Commission guidance allowing the conduct of public meetings by electronic means so long as the public is able to observe the meeting, this meeting is being conducted by remote electronic participation and in-person attendance by the public is not permitted. This meeting will include a public comment portion concerning matters not on the agenda and public hearings for each of the cases listing on this evening’s agenda. Members of the public will be permitted to comment during these portions by submitting comments in writing or by speaking during their designated time if they have signed up to do so prior to the start of the meeting. Even if members of the public do not provide comment, participants are advised that people may be listening who do not provide comment, and those persons are not required to identify themselves. For this meeting, the Traffic Commission is convening by Cisco WebEx video and telephone conference as posted on the City’s Website identifying how the public may join. Please note that this meeting is being recorded, and that some attendees are participating by video conference. Accordingly, please be aware that other people may be able to see you and your video feed, and that you take care not to “screen share” your computer. Anything that you broadcast may be captured by the recording. Various Members: Moving on to the agenda with that statement let us proceed with the roll call for the representatives of the traffic commission. Let us begin with First Ward, First Ward is represented by Francis Brownfield. Samuel Zizzi, Second Ward. Saba Ashfaq, Fourth Ward. Martin Dombrowski, Seventh Ward. William Blosser, Planning Commission. Dave Harshbarger, City Council. Drew Gatlin, City Engineering. Chip Wamsley, Municipal Bicycle Advisory Board. Chip Wamsley: Bicycle Board I have talked to a few of our members coming into the shop, but I have been well, stuck there. It has been busy with everyone trying to get their bikes out. So hopefully next week we will go over some things by a zoom meeting if I can get Drew to help me set something up. I've got a couple people, Harry and Marilyn are looking over some of the stuff on the American Bicyclists application because that's our next point of business and also to review some of these new loops that we're coming up with to want to see what we're coming up with tonight for the activity loops and some of the neighborhoods and see if we can maybe do some bicycle input with those too. Matt Cross: Pedestrian Safety Board The only thing I have is we are continuing to talk about the ward active loops as well. I like the title of Healthy Streets. I did apparently see the Metropolitan theater downtown will be utilized by WVU for some student classes. We might be having 500 kids walking downtown sometime during the fall semester. We need to keep attention to detail keeping them safe, getting them to abide by the Traffic Laws. Get the sidewalks in good condition. That is going to be a high volume downtown at those specific classroom times, so we will talk about that at the Pedestrian Safety Board meeting upcoming in the middle of the month. So that is it for the committee reports any questions for Chip or me. Drew Gatlin: New Business 1. Themed crosswalk & roadway markings requests The city received a petition for a couple of new crosswalks and roadway markings. Ash Cutright submitted this petition to the City of Morgantown that contained 148 names recently asking for this type of roadway marking on Arch Street in Greenmont. They suggested that if this city did not want it on that street that perhaps Prospect Street would be a better place. Discussion ensued. Samuel Zizzi, Second Ward: I really love it, I think it will fit in well over in that area, Greenmont, 100% support it. Chip Wamsley: Bicycle Board: Even though the thermoplastic is one color in the daylight, does it all show up as white, when under the reflective conditions at nighttime use? Drew Gatlin, Engineering: It does mostly yes, not completely. Chip Wamsley: Bicycle Board: I think that's having the light background I found I notice people at nighttime crossing crosswalks, a lot better with the wider crosswalk bars that we started using where there's more light background to see them against. If that is the case where those are also going to show up as a light background, I think, then that would work out well. Drew Gatlin, Engineering: If we were to do the crosswalk, we probably would not do this in thermoplastics inside of crosswalk it would be a water-based paint. Discussion ensued. Samuel Zizzi moved to approve the installation of the themed crosswalk. Chip Wamsley seconded the motion. Martin Dombrowski asked if both were being recommended for approval. Matt Cross stated that the motion should read that the Traffic Commission approved the proposal to install the crosswalk at the specified location and roadway markings at the specified location. Drew Gatlin reminded TC Members that the request was not specific in the locations, it stated Arch Street or Prospect Street. Matt Cross reworded the motion to say, “the TC approved the proposal to install the crosswalk and roadway markings at a specified location”. Motion passed unanimously. 2. Regional bike/ped plan – next steps How do you think the City should proceed with adopting implementing and maintaining the plan? I am sorry that I do not have this information perhaps Councilor Hershberger can help us out. Has the City Council formally adopted this plan? Or have you been formally presented this plan? Dave Harshbarger, City Council: We've been presented the plan and we have adopted it; we have been working with county commission on prioritizing it. I think what might be helpful, perhaps ask Bill Austin to provide an update on where we are with the prioritization because we did meet in December and I don't know if the results have been shared and if they have there's been no follow up. Discussion ensued. Matt Cross, Chair: I guess I would suggest as commissioners if we can get a hold of this plan and start to look it over and figure out within our particular wards. Some of those recommendations from the Alta Plan within our wards that we want to do a focus on and bring to the attention and see if they correspond with any of the paving plans for 2021 next year. Discussion ensued. Drew Gatlin: Unfinished Business 1. Healthy Streets / Neighborhood Activity Loops The neighborhood activity loops, and they are now called Healthy Streets. There was a large petition. calling for a Healthy Streets initiative. That petition specifically asked to close Wagner. You all may remember we were already sort of planning to do that as a pilot part of a pilot projects. That may happen tomorrow, on Thursday, I said that it was going to happen, or more likely early next Monday. Discussion ensued. So, one of the streets that was requested to be closed in a petition was Fairlawns, it is a very commonly used walking route. If we had a sidewalk on there, it would connect very easily to Krepps Street, and then lead into the middle, and go all the way to the park. It is partly one of the common running routes. Oakland Street, we have a lot of construction happening out on Oakland right now. So, not hoping to send a bunch of pedestrians and bicyclists over there until that has been finished at the end of the month. Western Avenue, that is part of the suggested streets. This is one of the five projects that we are hoping to move forward with as a pilot project, as you all may remember. Elmhurst Street. Discussion ensued. These would be soft closures. So, the definition of a soft closure is that emergency services, and people that live on the street, would be able to access the street, as well as delivery services on the street. So, it would basically eliminate any cut through traffic. These people up on Lawnview and Hillview do not necessarily need to go down Western right they can both exit onto Collins Ferry and then everybody else that lives, south of Western does not need to go this direction if they need to access a Lawnview or Hillview, they can again go on Collins Ferry. Elmhurst is down here; you may remember that there is a lot of contention about this street. Being a cut through for the neighborhood. When there was a stop sign at Laurel that you all decided to allow the city to change that Stop Sign it did divert a lot of people around Elmhurst. Elmhurst Street is a classic example of a traditional cut through neighborhood Street, Laurel street is the primary Street. Inglewood Boulevard is just over here, it is in student lands, I believe. We received multiple requests for Wagner, Euclid, or Maple. Euclid is a street in South Park. Maple is the next street up. If we close the whole length of Maple, then people absolutely would not be able to access their houses. We received the comments, and any street designated as a healthy street should have the support of the persons living on those blocks. If we close the road down, we looking to get broad levels of support from people that live on it. We have not made a rule, at this point, yet about if there is one person that does not support it if that cancels the whole project. I do not think that it should. Again, these are experiments, temporary things. We are not doing this forever. And Mulberry Street, or Fairlawns so again most of this neighborhood uses either Laurel or Mulberry to get out onto University. That would be essentially a rough one to close. Elmhurst, Laurel, Parkview, Rotary, Kenmore, Mulberry and Fairlawns, so just close this whole area, nobody from outside can enter Suncrest, I do not know if that would be going over very well but we could experiment. We received a request to close, Allison. Discussion ensued. Samuel Zizzi, 2nd Ward: Yeah I just want to reiterate the city to take care of that low hanging stuff a lot more marketing so time of COVID we don't have a lot of money for big projects, great moment to just put down better pedestrian markets. That is, it. Saba Ashfaq, 4th Ward: Thank you for me on board today if there's any way I can help with the survey writing or question writing just send an email to me, I have some experience with public health so I'm here to help. Just a quick question. I cannot remember the name of the street, after Kirk Street. The turn signal is long, and traffic backs up at that intersection. Martin Dombrowski, 7th Ward: Thank you to the fine folks over there working behind the curtains, making this meeting happen, Drew for keeping the Traffic Commission together even with COVID, thank you for doing that. Welcome Saba, you are greatly appreciated being on the traffic commission. Chip Wamsley, Municipal Bicycle Advisory Board: Good to see the Healthy Streets initiative, getting some traction. And I think one of the big things if it's successful, it'll just make Morgantown a better place to live, which should encourage other people to come and open up businesses and make Morgantown an even better place. Dave Harshbarger, City Council: Well I think this was a great meeting I really enjoyed the dialogue. Thank you. And to Sam's point about the low hanging fruit. I really think if some of these ideas that we come up with that we want to bring forward to city council, if they were to come to a committee the whole meeting which is the last third Tuesday of the month, that it would, you know if they weren't that much money and a lot of them are, it would be really hard to say no and, and we would vote at that committee the whole meeting to move it to the next agenda to vote on it. So I would just encourage us to think about prioritizing some of this low hanging fruit that might need some signage for the Healthy Streets, that might need some, whatever, and then consider sort of making that pitch at that meeting, and I look forward to these Healthy Streets I think is going to be a great thing. Matthew Cross, Pedestrian Safety Board, Chair: I do as well so thanks to Drew for all his hard work again and Michaela for putting this on. Thank you very much Saba, glad to have you on board with us. I am glad that we can make it happen. Appreciate your work in the past that you have done with the Ped Board so glad to have you on board. One thing I will say I received a note from a friend of mine, do I don't know if you saw the email, there's some stop signs at Sixth Street and trails that are not present anymore and creating a safety hazard for wheelchair users. If you can look into that and just wanted to point that out anyone out there if you've had some questions comments about signage any street concerns you can certainly contact one of us your Traffic Commission representative for your words or contact City Engineering directly and we try to be responsive as we can to keep the community safe. So, last thing I will say is obvious is coming up quick students are coming back into town. We noticed increase West Virginia increasing some of the COVID cases so we are going to have to see how this goes. But we are doing what we can to make some, some changes for this year and possibly in behavioral aspects regarding how we treat our city. And hopefully we are accommodating requests for public safety, and safety for the kids, and the integrity of our neighborhoods, which is very important. So, with that, got nothing else to say. NO ONE MADE A MOTION TO ADJURN THE MEETING. CHAIRMAN MATT CROSS: MEETING ADJURNED WITHOUT ANY CONTESTMENT.