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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2011-09-15 Minutes1 MINUTES OF CITY OF EDINA, MINNESOTA TRANSPORTATION COMMISSION COMMUNITY ROOM SEPTEMBER 15, 2011 6:00 P.M. ROLLCALL Answering rollcall were Members Schold Davis, Thompson, Braden, Schweiger, Housh, Nelson, Janovy, Bonneville, McKlveen, Bass APPROVAL OF MEETING AGENDA Chair Janovy proposed to change the meeting agenda as follow: moving the presentation by Karen Nikolai ahead of Traffic Safety, and adding an October meeting date under Chair and Commission Members Comments. Motion was made by member Bonneville and seconded by member Braden approving the amended meeting agenda. All voted aye. Motion carried. APPROVAL OF MINUTES - REGULAR MEETING OF AUGUST 18, 2011 The minutes were amended as follow: page 2, paragraph 2, under France Avenue corridor update/pedestrian bridge: strike Parklawn and change ‘couple’ to ‘three.’ Motion was made by member Thompson and seconded by Nelson to approve amended minutes. All voted aye. Motion carried. REPORTS/RECOMMENDATIONS Karen Nikolai – Hennepin Department of Housing, Community Works, and Transit France Avenue Corridor Study Ms. Nikolai said she is with Hennepin County in Public Works in the department of Housing, Community Works and Transit. She said the Corridor Study was conducted as part of a community works planning grants in 2008. She said Community Works has been around approximately 15 years and serves to stimulate employment development; build bridges for affecting planning and implementation; maintain and improve natural systems; to strengthen communities thru connections and to enhance the tax base. Regarding this project, Ms. Nikolai said Hennepin County called for proposals in 2008 with them providing the planning grant and Edina received one of the grants and URS (Kathryn Ryan) was hired to work with her and Heather Worthington over a 5-6 month period. She said the purpose of the study was to look at land use planning along France Avenue, knowing that it is an ‘A’ minor arterial and matching this with the Comp Plan which states “…defines France Avenue as the central spine of the Greater Southdale District and calls for a development of urban design framework for primary roadway corridor such as France Avenue. Potential improvements call for pedestrian amenities and landscape improvements.” Ms. Nikolai said this is the purview that Ms. Ryan used to develop the study. She looked at existing conditions to see what could be done to match what the City was looking for while working in the existing right-of-way. She said various options were presented to the City to decide what to do and how to go about implementation and Hennepin County’s involvement ended. Ms. Nikolai was asked if the City wants to pursue the study what the procedures are. She said the City would work with one of two departments in Public Works (environmental service and/or housing community works in conjunction with transportation) depending on what is being done. She said projects that Community Works were involved with include Lowry Avenue which was redesigned from four-lanes to two-lanes, turn lanes and bike lanes; Humboldt Avenue which included removing housing as part of the roadway redesign; the Midtown Greenway; bridge over Hiawatha Avenue; and two current projects include Hiawatha-Minnehaha intersection which is in design to make it safer for pedestrians; and Southwest LRT Corridor is the newest to become a Community Works project. She said usually projects go to Hennepin County board for approval and that the head of Community Works, Patrick Connoy, could speak more to this. 2 She said if TIF (HRA) money were to fund this project it be more in the realm of Community Works. Some other possible funding sources for inexpensive items are Roadside Enhancement Partnership Program (REPP) for things such as pedestrian level lighting and some vegetation; and Transportation Enhancements at the Met Council but it is being held up in the senate. Ms. Nikolai was asked why Complete Streets approach was used for the study and she said this approach in conjunction with land use, goes hand-in-hand to make it more appealing instead of having parking lots adjacent to the corridor. In reference to the pedestrian bridge, she said it could end up being used by only one person. Chair Janovy said the ETC has discussed this and other options such as sidewalks and crossings. Ms. Nikolai said she believes they have planning studies money available for 2012 and encouraged the City to apply for a capital improvement program grant for a deeper study of France Avenue. Additionally, she said it does not cost much to do a charette to look at different options with the community or actually going on site with construction cones and staging various layouts so people can see what it feels like. Chair Janovy said this is the first time that they are hearing how the study came about and how Community Works works She said there is a sunset date of March 2012 for the federal funds which is puts them in a tight timeline. Ms. Nikolai suggested contacting MnDOT’s Bicycle and Pedestrian section who could talk about successes and failures of pedestrian bridges and also MnDOT’s newly formed Scott Bradley, Director of Context Sensitive Solutions for MnDOT, to help the ETC inform their decision. Traffic Safety Report of September 7, 2011 Section B. 1. The policy on the web that shows 500 vehicles per day is not updated; it should be 300 vehicles per hour for any 8 hours said assistant engineer Sullivan. Streets with an issue that does not meet volume are addressed separately using engineering judgment. Section C.2. & 3. Chair Janovy said the NTMP is the only Council prescribed way of dealing with traffic calming and asked if there is a different way of handling these in practice to inform them. Mr. Sullivan said they should not have said the above listed items needed further study. He said item 2 was taken off by the requestor and item 3 should have included contacting Hennepin County. Chair Janovy asked that the intersection at Vernon Ave and Interlachen Blvd be added to a future agenda for discussion. Member Nelson said it is being reviewed as part of the Grandview Small Area Study and chair Janovy added that it was looked at as part of NEETS. Section D. 2. Revised to say ‘Seven traffic counts were conducted.’ COMMUNITY COMMENT None. REPORTS/RECOMMENDATIONS Safe Routes to School Conference and Funding Update Member Bass said Safe Routes to School is a federally funded program for infrastructure and non-infrastructure to create safe routes for students to school. She said their goal was to make a connection between safe routes and livable communities. Workshop tracks included the 5 “E”s – education, enforcement, engineering, encouragement, and evaluation; as well as building partnership; youth engagement; policies, etc. She said attendees from Edina included a parent from one of the elementary schools, couple ETC and BETF members, and the City Engineer, and overall attendance was approximately 600. Member Bass said since not everyone attended the conference, she has a contact that could attend an ETC meeting to give a presentation. This will be added to the October agenda. Mr. Sullivan said the South View Middle School campus sidewalk funding application was not approved. Of 82 applications, 16 were approved and he will be reviewing the ones that were approved. 3 Transit for Livable Communities – Bike Boulevard Schedule Update Mr. Sullivan said the city manager sent a letter to TLC expressing the City’s commitment to the project. He said the timeline for the project is to hold an open house on October 6 and a public hearing in November. For clarification, chair Janovy said the ETC’s October meeting will not be a public hearing but residents can attend and comment on the project. Commission Recommendation Process Mr. Sullivan said the form was reviewed and approved by city manager Neal and assistant city manager Kurt. Chair Janovy said the form would be completed by members who would volunteer to write the summary of information. Motion made by member Bonneville and seconded by member Schold Davis that the ETC approves this form as the document which is used for forwarding information to the City Council of the ETC’s position with procedures. All voted aye. Motion carried. Living Streets RFP Update Mr. Sullivan said staff continues to work on the proposals for Living Streets and France Avenue Corridor, and they will be routed to the ETC for review. Transportation Options Committee Member Schold Davis said she spoke with Sue Weigle, Senior Center, who is willing participate and suggested including Susan Howl. She said Sue said there is a lot of history of looking at transportation options and asked about compiling the documents for review. Three people have applied so far with experience on health commission, steering committee and planning commission (Dan Gieske, Andy Brown and Hope Melton). Other participants would be Human Rights and Relation (Susan), Senior Center (Sue), and Planning Commission (Arlene). Motion made by member Schold Davis and seconded by member Braden for approval of the six members. All voted aye. Motion carried. 2012 Proposed Street Reconstruction Update – Residential and State Aid Mr. Sullivan said residents were invited to an open house for the 2012 assessable projects and 103 residents attended. 2013 open house is also scheduled. The next step will be mailing a questionnaire to 2012 residents, followed by individual neighborhood informational meetings. A map of the State Aid street projects was handed out. Mr. Sullivan was asked how Complete Streets fits in and he said reviewing for possible addition of sidewalk. Additionally, he said he anticipates having the feasibility reports to the ETC in November for review and feedback. Discussion ensued about when the ETC should give input or become involved in this process. Is it before the public hearing? Should input be given to Council or to staff? Member McKlveen said plans can change by only a few people getting others to sign a petition. Chair Janovy said they need a policy in place and if there is pressure to go in a different direction, evaluate the pressure. She said further that if the plans adhere to policy document, maybe there should be procedures for handling a challenge. Member Thompson said if sidewalk is part of the Comp Plan a couple residents should not be able to toss it out and Member Schold Davis said Complete Streets will never be implemented in this way. Member McKlveen said he attended the 2012 open house and he said Mr. Sullivan did a good job addressing concerns before they were expressed. He said why the work was being done and how the process works were clearly stated which made the Q&A session easier. He said further that he drove all four neighborhoods and 3 of the 4 clearly need to be reconstructed. Student Update 4 Student member Schweiger said he is a junior at Edina High and have been taking engineering classes at the high school and had a civil engineering internship at MnDOT this past summer. He said his interest is engineering. Student member Housh said she is interested in Safe Routes to School because they’ve just built a round-about at her school because of traffic issues. She said it is working but some people do not know how to drive it properly. Her school is in Mendota Heights. Bike Edina Task Force Update Chair Janovy said Edina Police Chief Jeff Long visited to talk about bicyclist not stopping at stop signs and the BETF said to issue them tickets. Grandview Small Area Study Update Member Nelson said people were selected from different companies to form the consulting team and they will be meeting with them on 9/21. Some issues are multi-modal access to and thru the district; multi-modal circulation within the district; park and ride role; rail and/or mass transit options; connections across TH-100 and reconfiguration of the highway ramps; bus garage alternatives; and infrastructure issues. Chair Janovy said she sent the chair a copy of the Living Streets policy because they are planning on using this approach. 44th and 70th Streets Update Both projects are on schedule and should be completed by mid-October. W. 70th is in phase 3 which is West shore to TH- 100; it is open to local traffic; pedestrian flasher going up at West Shore; and half of the signal is up at Wooddale. CORRESPONDENCE AND PETITIONS None CHAIR AND COMMISSION MEMBER COMMENTS Chair Janovy welcomed new student members Housh and Schweiger. Member Bass suggested adding an item to the agenda to hear from student members. Consensus was reached to add this as an agenda item under Reports/Recommendations. Member Nelson noted that the Southwest LRT was moved into preliminary engineering; and that at crosstown and France there is a new sign that conflicts with the old sign which is still in place. Mr. Sullivan will pass this on to MnDOT. Member Bonneville passed around a concept plan for crosstown where Valley View goes underneath for review and feedback, relative to the bike lane. Member McKlveen requested that the timing of the traffic signal at E. Bush Lake and & 78th be looked at because the left turn only lets about three cars through at a time. Mr. Sullivan will pass this on to the City of Bloomington. Member Schold Davis has information on AARP Report for Planning Complete Streets for Aging in America. Chair Janovy asked about Complete Streets workshop and Mr. Sullivan said he is still working on scheduling it. She asked if a flasher is warranted for the crosswalk at 50th next to City Hall. Mr. Sullivan said he did not know offhand and would look into it. STAFF COMMENTS None. ADJOURNMENT Meeting adjourned.