 Yeah, I'd like to call them Town Services and Outreach Committee meeting of the Amherstown Council to order at 10 a.m. on March 28, 2024. And we have the forum present for five members of the committee are currently here. Along with our superintendent of public works who's going to be assisting us with all of the agenda items and the work of the council. So with that said, I think that I just want to note that the meeting is being conducted by a remote means members of the public have access to the meeting via zoom and by telephone. There's no in-person attendance of this meeting because it is entirely virtual, but we've made efforts to make sure that the public is able to participate and we will be reaching out to the public in a minute to start with public comment as the first item of the day. After we finish convening the meeting, I do need to remind everybody on the committee and in the who are attending the meeting that this meeting is being recorded for both visual and audio purposes. So, please be aware of that notice. And with that, let me make sure that all of our committee members can hear and be heard. And I'll check also with our staff, Bob Hagnar and Councilor Ryan and Jennifer. Present. I'm here. We're waiting to see if Hallow will be, Hallow Lord is the additional member of the committee. Paul, you're able to participate and we, can you hear us? Yes, I can. And Guilford, Guilford Boring. Yes, I can hear you. Okay, so with that, what we were going to do, hoping everybody has seen the posting, we'll decide on the agenda after public comment. If you are interested in public comment, I know that they're hands up already from these five people, six. So I'm going to begin with public comment for the person on the telephone. I think it is, if you dial star nine, that raises your hand. And then we know that you would like to participate in public comment. So public comment can be on any matter that is relevant to the work of this committee and the ask that you try and confine your comments to three minutes. And with that said, let me, Andy, Councilor Lorde just joined. If we could just confirm that she can hear and be here before we begin public comment, please. Okay. Thank you for pointing that out. Councilor Lorde, can you hear us? Just a new friend. I can hear you. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you. Thank you. So all members of the committee are now present. And I think that our first person who has to be recognized is Becco Watkins. Becco Watkins. So would you just introduce yourself and you don't have to give your exact address, but if you can at least let us know if you're an Amherst resident and approximately where you live. That would be sufficient, but please do that. And then please offer your comment. Yes. Hi. I live on Heatherstone Road in Echo Hill. I am doing this comment on behalf of myself and my children. I actually offered for them to stay home today to participate in this because they actually feel pretty strongly, but they were too nervous to One, I appreciate that some time and attention is getting put into repaving our street and putting in some traffic calming measures. But I am on this call today to ask if you would consider partaking in legislation that would allow you to reduce the speed limit to 25 miles per hour. It's under sections 193 and 194 of chapter 218 of the acts of 2016, which would allow you to reduce the speed limit from 30 to 25 without partaking in any traffic studies. My kids have often said as we are biking or walking on the street as cars are going by that they don't understand why the town hasn't done anything to make them safer as we go around our neighborhood. And I understand that it often takes a traffic study to reduce the speed limit, but it seems like this might be a good option to avoid a study. I do understand that this has been brought up for years and people in our very own neighborhood are part of the speeding problem, but right now they legally can go 30 to 35 miles per hour. Heatherstone feels like a small neighborhood road to me so it just it seems like a no brainer to reduce the speed limit because right now a lot of kids aren't even allowed to be on Heatherstone on their own because of the speed limit. I am so nervous that once the streets get repaved that people will go even faster because right now all of our beautiful potholes are the only thing that that slows anyone down. So while I appreciate they are getting redone I am also very nervous for the safety of my kids. So I'm just asking that you consider opting into this legislation that we have in Massachusetts so that we can reduce the speed limit and keep our kids safer. Okay, thank you very much. Appreciate you. Appreciate your comment. The next person has name of just listed as Howard so please let us know who you are and approximately approximate address if you so that we can place you don't have to give an exact address. Hi my name is Howard Hannah I'm a resident here in Echo Hill neighborhood right next to who I live right next to the median on Heatherstone Road. And like the previous speaker I also have children who walk up and down the road. And we have had we have made a humble request before for the safety of our pedestrians and cyclists that this neighborhood be provided with reduced speed limit and measures for to enforce traffic calming such as keeping the median in place. We've reached out to the town before multiple times with the request to keep the median strip in place as we know that to be an effective means of slowing traffic. I live right at the end of the median strip so I watch daily as traffic as cars driving slow down as they're entering that median strip and are going slow as they exit that median. In past emails to the town about this the about we're keeping the median strip to slow traffic the response has been that the town believes traffic slows in that in the median stretch because of the condition of the road with all those potholes. However, I've responded before that the US DOT Federal Highway Administration supports the use of medians to slow traffic. The Federal Highway Administration uses middle medians slow traffic parts traffic provide safety for pedestrians and provides decoration. It provides safety and value to our neighborhood. Likewise, the mass DOT speed management guidelines proposed using medians to physically stroke slow traffic by narrowing roadways. The median's decorative gardening acts as a visual cue to drivers that the roadway changes from a pass through like Pelham Road to a neighborhood like Heatherstone Road. Per US DOT Federal Highway Engineering standards roadways are used to slow traffic and reduce pedestrian fatality and serious injury. In addition, the current sidewalk plan only covers half the length of the road. As opposed to the full length of the road. It does not attend to speed control and it was not a part of any original request regarding repaving the road only repaving was requested. Regardless, Heatherstone has ample width in the roadway alone to provide space for pedestrians and cyclists without the need of a half length sidewalk. Furthermore, it's unclear why three roundabouts would be used as a pilot as a pilot for speed control when we've asked repeatedly for speed reduction and to keep the the one speed control that we have, which is that median. So, from a layman's perspective, I just seem to have several questions about this. We just need the road repaved. We need the speed reduced. And we'd like to keep the median in place because we know that to be an effective speed control. Thank you for your time. I hope you reconsider. Okay, thank you. The next person is Patricia Applebaum. And again, same request. Please let us know approximately where you live. And introduce yourself and proceed with your comment. Thank you. Can you hear me all right? Yes, we can. My name is Patricia Applebaum. I live on Auburn Wood Road, not near the intersection with Heatherstone. I am speaking here for myself only. And I recognize my neighbor's concerns about traffic speed. I am primarily concerned about the proposed roundabouts. The memo that we're considering today indicates that many roundabouts would typically have a diameter of 50 to 90 feet. 50 feet might possibly fit within the existing intersections, but anything larger would not, would require expansion. The roundabouts will also need to accommodate sidewalks. This plan, as far as I can see, therefore adds a good deal of paving to the existing landscape. Echo Hill was designed to retain as much as possible of the natural landscape, and that feature is what some of us like best about living here. Moreover, more paving is yet another contribution to climate change. Granted, a relatively small one, but at this point, everything counts. So I object to expanding the area of paving in this way. The design also seems odd. What's proposed is three roundabouts within a relatively short stretch and then a long and open stretch of road with no obstructions. I'm told that nothing new will be built on that long stretch until it's repaved, but the current design does not look like effective speed control. Now some questions. First and most important, what will be the effects of installing roundabouts with respect to land takings, encroachment on individual properties, and required infrastructure such as foundations and retaining walls, especially at the intersection with Auburn Wood and further along Heatherstone Road, where the land slopes on both sides of Heatherstone. Second question, are the roundabouts intended to be permanent? The memo does refer to permanent changes, but one of the attached documents describe temporary pop-up roundabouts. Some of my neighbors are under the impression that the roundabouts will be removed if the pilot project shows they're not effective. Please clarify this. Third, why a roundabout? Why not speed bumps? We have been told many times that speed bumps are very expensive to install, but I would guess that a roundabout is even more expensive. And finally, what is the rationale for installing three roundabouts within a short distance? Would one roundabout work just as well? Finally, as pilot projects, how will they be evaluated? What will happen if the roundabouts are not found to be effective? Thank you. Thank you very much. Appreciate your comments. The next person, I guess, is Myra Ross. And Myra, I don't know if you're speaking on- Do you hear me? Yes. Okay. You're speaking on behalf of DAAC? No. Okay. I'm speaking on behalf of myself because the topic that I'm going to discuss hasn't yet been discussed by DAAC, of which I'm the chair for those who don't know. DAAC is disability, oh my God. Disability Access Advisory Committee. Okay. We will meet next in April and we will discuss this, but I've become aware that you are doing some work on Route 9 by the intersection with Southeast Street, pertaining to sidewalk installation and pertaining to changing, you know, using that project to create bicycle and sidewalks and bus stops. And I, to tell you the truth, think this is a fabulous idea. We need sidewalks. I guess they don't want them in Echo Hill, but we need them in many places in town to keep pedestrians safe, especially now that there are so many cyclists and e-cyclists. As a blind person, I can tell you that cyclists are often very problematic, quite frequently they don't follow the rules of the road. People on e-bikes particularly are, you know, frankly quite frightening to a lot of blind people because they are on sidewalks and they go incredibly fast. So there have been standards that have been developed. I don't know specifically what they are, but I know that there are people who are working very hard to keep pedestrians safe, to keep cyclists safe, and to make sure that the traffic doesn't go fast but that it can actually get through. So there are all kinds of questions about building intersections. Where do you put the pedestrian pathways? Where do you put the cycle pathways? Where do you put the bus stops? And how does all that integrate so that pedestrians, particularly people with visual impairments or frankly people who are quite elderly and don't walk very quickly or for other reasons don't walk very quickly can be safe? I don't know the answer, but I know that it's a quite complex question and just going in there and, you know, saying, oh, this will be a bike lane. Oh yeah, well, you know, people will share the sidewalk. Oh well, we'll have people go out into the middle of the street to get onto the bus, which is done in a lot of places is not the way to do it. It has to be thought about very carefully and people who know about how to work these things out so that everybody's safe need to be consulted by the town. That's not the current practice of the town when they build things like this. So I would urge people to talk to people. We're going to talk to people on Mass Office of Disability. And I'm sure there are other people that have made a life study of trying to make sure that people are safe and they walk around. So that's what I would really like you to do. I don't know the specifics. I don't know how far along you are. And the other thing is that Route 9, this we have discussed at the DAAC, the Route 9 project that was done on, excuse me, on North Hampton Road, has some problems with the way that the curb cuts were put in. And they are not conforming all the time to the way that it should be done to make sure that people can go off the sidewalks safely. Those corners with the truncated domes need to be perpendicular. They need to not angle off at the corners. So I think it's very important that this next one be done right. I think the town will be hearing a little more about the other one. Anyway, so I'm sorry I'm a little distracted by this telephone call that I can't get rid of. But it's very important for the town to do it right. And I'm thrilled that you are working on sidewalks. And I hope that you put a lot more money into more sidewalks because that's the safest way for people to walk around. Thanks. Okay, thank you, Mara. Next person that I think is named Pippa C. So again, requested to give us at least an approximate idea of where you live. You don't have to give an exact address and please offer your comment. Can you, Pippa, can you hear me? Can you hear me? Yes, thank you. I'm so sorry. So my name is Pippa Comfort. I have been a resident on Heather Stone Road in Echo Hill for 16 years and raised my children here. And I have been concerned about safety on the street for my 16 years here. I am in full support of a speed limit reduction to 25. I am also in support of the proposed plan that Mr. Bachman shared with our neighborhood that includes repaving sidewalks and these three temporary or pilot roundabouts. I trust that the professionals have done their homework and that the roundabouts would fit in the space. While the median is a beautiful addition to our neighborhood, when I am walking that strip of the road, I have to step up into the woods to avoid the risk of being hit by passing cars, which I have to do at several points along Heather Stone Road, literally stepping into people's yards or into the bushes as cars pass. It feels very unsafe to me. The section that has not been addressed is up where I live, where Heather Stone meets Stony Hill. It is a throughway for people traveling to places like Hampshire Athletic Club, and that section is also perilous. I live on a blind curve and I am nervous coming out of my driveway, which I know many people have faced that situation. But if there are measures that we can take to address that end of Heather Stone as well, I realize that this project is kind of a once in a lifetime and I don't want to see it done halfway. At the same time, I do not want to see debate holding up something being done. I am working on this as a neighborhood for years and years and years and have approached the town many times in writing and on the phone and through email. We have taken measures into our own hands by devising signs, our children made signs years ago, please slow down. This is a topic that has been on the table for a very long time and I'm thrilled to see the proposal that's on the table, and I am in full support of it and again I trust the professionals have done their homework about what type of temporary roundabout will fit or or or not. And I thank you so much for your time and considering this. Thank you so much for your comment for joining our meeting. So I think the next is Elizabeth lingo, same request. Let us know approximately where you live don't have to be exact address and please talk to your comment. Thank you so much for offering the space for comments. I'm Heather stone road right in the middle. And I flipped here for 11 years and have also raised my children who are now in high school and sophomore and college. So their entire time of being free children with bikes and walking to friends house which was the kind of goal of moving to this neighborhood has been trotters. Like Pippa, I have been working literally for the last 10 years with the town to advance the key goal of pedestrian safety for children, for the many seniors who still live here who are walking around in walkers who are trying to navigate and now getting out of there and also teens who are trying to get out of their driveways another stone. And I just want to say, first of all, I love this plan because it's about pedestrian safety. That is the main goal. I have, I just want to honor I walked the streets of Heather stone with evil goal and just want to honor her incredible work that she did around the transportation and pedestrian safety. I've been working with Guilford over the years. Everyone has been shocked that Heather stone does not have sidewalks. It was actually created as a neighborhood it was one of the first neighborhoods before the ideas like that sidewalks had to be included. That is why we don't have sidewalks every other neighborhood that has been developed has sidewalks. And yet it's designed where people are going you know 45 miles an hour literally we've clocked it on working with the police to clock people on Heather stone. People go fast. So the sidewalks idea has long long and is a best practice around pedestrian safety so I'm delighted that it's actually getting implemented. As several people have echoed the, we all want sidewalks to go all the long Heather stone, so that there's a safe way for our children to walk to Fort River. Regardless of where you live on Heather stone, if where people lives on that far side and on the corner. There are multiple families now who have moved in with small children. There is no way for them to go to Fort River, walk to their school without being on Heather stone. And it's true, with the potholes with people, you know, speeding, there's literally kids have to jump out of the way to get avoid being splashed, avoid getting hit. People are in their cell phones now. So I just want to honor that stretch of Heather stone needs some attention. That corner of where ovenwood stony hill and Heather stone come together as another ripe spot we all feel for having another another little mini round about. If not one summer along the long stretch of Heather stone to try to slow traffic. I've been in conversation with Eve and with Guilford about this for a long time and we've talked about, you know, medians are fine. I know my cop my fellow neighbor loves the median for, you know, speed reduction but speed reduction is not the only goal here. It's pedestrian safety. And I just want to emphasize that there's no safe pedestrian way with that median as Pippa noted you're jumping off. Now isn't it, you know, as a fully with an adult in my dogs I mean we have to jump into people's yards and into the bushes when cars are coming through there because there's nowhere to walk it's more narrow than anywhere else in Heather stone. I also just want to know in all the conversations it's a multi prong solution so absolutely what Becca Watkins pointed out about the opportunity to reduce the speed to 25 without a traffic study. Yes, that has to be a priority and making that happen. That's an easy win for our neighborhood and for the town sidewalks please I encourage you to put them all along Heather stone as soon as you can. I know Paul and members of our neighborhood have complained about the level of pot holes on the side that's being improved. It's kind of like epic. But there's equal. I mean the corner that people lives on around when you come right on to Heather stone that blind curve. There are so many pot holes there that literally people Korean around because they don't see the pot holes yet. And then to avoid them they literally go on the side of the road. So that people it's not safe for other side of the road so it's you know there's been multiple times where people are literally and the other lane because the pot holes are so bad there so that I feel like just pushing Heather stone up for like further redoing and adding sidewalks is key. I just want to know there has been discussion about speed bumps. There is a unique aspect of Echo Hill that I just want to put out there that Echo Hill is built on a stone shelf a granite shelf and so speed bumps actually create excessive vibration and sound for everybody who lives on Echo Hill. So I would just say speed bumps are not a viable option for the people who live here on Heather stone. That's why Guilford was trying to experiment with this idea of the mini roundabouts to see if that's a way to do that traffic calming to stop the straight ways. So I'm kind of in favor of experimenting with this pilot and see how it works with the roundabouts. Do I have anything else? I think that's it. So thank you so much. And I appreciate everyone's efforts around this. Okay, thank you for sharing. This is Axelson Barry. Hi, can you hear me. Yes, we can. Great. I kitty Axelson Barry. I live on 89 stony Hill Road, which is in Echo Hill South, but I walk through Echo Hill North, which is where Heather stone is quite frequently to get mostly to get out to either the bus or to Amethyst Brook and Andy. Please stop me when my three minutes are up. Please feel free to do that. Okay, because I know. Okay. That's needed. So I think that this idea of roundabouts and also sidewalks are really creating new problems, rather than fixing actual problems. The road currently is very nice and white, except in the area of the median, which is beautiful. And even though the precursor previous speaker says she always has to like get go on to people's property. And I don't know whether that's just a difference in perception or I don't know what. But I walk there and sometimes we can walk to people, three people abreast, I mean, always. And it's really very beautiful people with wheelchairs have easy access to the streets, which they wouldn't have otherwise kids on bikes have access to the streets which they wouldn't have if they had sidewalks. Sidewalks to narrow the road and if they're not beautifully maintained and as we know, the town has a lot of problems keeping up with maintenance of sidewalks, as well as roads. If a sidewalk is not well maintained it's really impassable so I don't know what people are talking about when they love sidewalk so much. I've been on the board by the way of Echo Hill South Association for more than 10 years and every now and then this question comes up usually with people who are just moving here, saying oh we should have sidewalks we shouldn't have sidewalks but then after we've come to love the beauty of being able to like talk to somebody on a nice, nice wide area that isn't limited to a sidewalk. I would go along with painting, painting, you know, a strip along the road. I think we should keep the maintenance, the median. We should not have sidewalks. The idea of having rotary is seems pretty ludicrous to me to go to all that expense and then. I mean, I just, I just can't understand why we would do that. And I think I have said all that I need to say. So thank you very much. Just to repeat maintenance is the important thing along gatehouse road. Also, it's a really bad maintenance problem. Thank you. No, thank you, Katie. Next person is a C is identified, but please tell us who you are and approximately where you live. And it's off your comment. Okay, great. Can you hear me okay. Yes, I can. Great. Thanks. Hi, this is Christopher Budnick. I live on Auburn Wood Road with my wife, Anjali and our two kids that are two and four. You know, I've come to think of the potholes as a safety measure because otherwise cars just go so fast in the areas that there aren't potholes. And I want to like say it's horrible to have to think of them that way, that there are not other traffic calming measures. So my heart is warmed that y'all are taking up this this consideration. I know people have been working on this for all we've only lived here for three years, but I can't take my kids on Heatherstone. We have a stroller and there's no room, especially where that median is when cars come like we're launching into people's properties. We're getting covered in snow and sleep. It's, it's, it's terrible. We can't walk to the farm. We can't do a lot of things that we should be able to do in the neighborhood because of the median and because of how fast cars go. I want to echo the suggestions of other people who spoke before remove the median, please. It's terrible. Hate it. It makes life dangerous for us. Add sidewalks if you can. Yes, love that. Pave if these other things are done. Sounds great. Traffic calming measures like the mini roundabouts as an experiment. Totally in favor. Thank you so much. I think the important thing for us is that that this is an opportunity to have something happen. And if the speed limit can be taken down to 25 as quickly as possible, that would be great. And I really encourage you guys to look look at other temporary measures like putting in something that would show people the speed they're going putting in. We know a lot about the vibrations and how that works. But if there are like dampening speed bumps that can be put in would be very much in favor of that too. We can't ride our bikes. We can't walk on a beautiful road. And we don't get to see all of our neighbors on Heather stone. So thank you for taking this up and thank you for the chance to speak today. Thank you for joining us. Next, I think is Helen Sternheim. Yes. So please identify yourself and give us an approximately where you live. I live at 72 Heather stone. I'm probably one of the older members of this neighborhood. I've lived here for almost 59 years since this house was built when Bill Orbin built the area. My daughter who lives with me and I don't see any need for sidewalks. We live in front of the median is in front of our house. I agree that it may be a little dangerous to walk there. But I certainly I slow down for people when I see them there. The rest of Heather stone road and we do not need sidewalks. Many roundabout seem like overkill. I don't know about speed bumps. Now all these people with young children claim that they and their young children are out walking. Certainly on weekends, I may see a few of them. Most of these children are overbooked with activities and are not around the neighborhood. I barely see them. I do occasionally see them on weekends. And certainly we read one of the reasons we moved to this neighborhood was the trees and the country feel of the neighborhood and sidewalks certainly would eliminate that country feel to the neighborhood, which is what many of us moved here for. So, yes, I would like to see how the stone road paved it has not been paved at all, except for pothole repairs which don't last in the 59 years I've lived here. I don't see any need for sidewalks, and I certainly don't see, see any need for roundabouts, which will need construction will last on the roundabouts for a year because I've never seen a roundabout built in less than a year around here. And there certainly seem like overkill. So thank you. I'm not in favor, I'm in favor of paving. I'm not in favor of sidewalks, and I'm not in favor of roundabouts. Thank you. I appreciate your comments. Michael, I see that you're with us. Same request as for big mothers. Let us know. Approximately where you live and for your comment. Thank you for this hearing. I'm in Echo Hill. And I live on Oak Knoll. It's right off of Heather stone. And I've lived here for over 30 years and I just want to I'll be brief. I want to support the comments of a number of the speakers. Number one, it would be really wonderful if you could reduce the speed limit to 25. That would be the well, aside from paving. That would be the most wonderful thing you could do. The paving is what slows people down where the median strips are right now. Because there's so many potholes that people cars have to slow down. I'm a senior. I'm a lifelong runner bicyclist and I walk a big dog. I will say as a matter of safety that when I go through that median section. I need to step into the wooded area off of the roads to be sure that my dog and I are safe. I disagree with those who believe it's safe as it is. And the easiest solution would be to put sidewalks in. But and I also think sidewalks could be done in a way that enhances or supports the the forested atmosphere of our neighborhood. But it's kind of a. I scratch my head about how the sidewalks will end at the. At the near Albinwood intersection, it'd be great if they went all the way through. And it would be great to have speed bumps if you could do that. The idea of 3 mini roundabouts, it seems awfully busy awfully construction oriented awfully. Taking away from the natural beauty of our neighborhood so I'm in favor of others calming measures than than many roundabouts but. We need to do something and I would listen to the parents of children in this neighborhood, especially on that street. Because there are times when you see children run into the street yesterday, I saw a child run into the street after a soccer ball. Luckily, there were no cars. But if there was a car and there was a car speeding that child might have been in danger. So I ask you to think about those issues as you go through this process. And I thank you very much for your service. That's it. And thank you for your comment. Lisa Martinez, I believe is next. So Lisa. Yes, thank you. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you so much. And thanks for the hearing. I was alerted to it by my neighbor. We live on Alpine Drive. I live at the corner of Alpine and Heatherstone. At 17 Alpine. So just in the middle of the medians and at the beginning of that straight away. I apologize. I missed the beginning of the hearing and so I will educate myself about the placement of these proposed roundabouts. But that is my primary concern. I like the big roundabouts in town. I think they've been really helpful, but the small roundabouts on a residential street seem pretty intrusive and disruptive as others have mentioned. I raised my son at my house and I 100% agree that sidewalks will be an improvement on Heatherstone Road. Paving will be an improvement, but that'll speed traffic. The median is not pedestrian friendly. It's aesthetic, but it's not pedestrian friendly. So take that space, put it on the side of the road. You know, as the previous speaker said, there are ways to make them beautiful without heavily taxing town resources, plant some trees, and you'll have a walking space. You'll have a navigable road that's payable, easily payable and maintainable. So I think that that's what I would hope to see. Again, I have driven the stretch from, you know, from Main Street, Pelham Road all the way down to the hack. The dangerous parts are not the straight away in my mind, because you can see clearly, I mean, in terms of driving. A driver can see far down the road where on the end where I live, the dangerous parts are where we curve. And so if we're doing sidewalks, you know, where I get nervous driving and where I slow myself down is as I hit those curves. Down past Albany Wood, down towards Stony Hill. So if it's possible to extend the sidewalks in that direction, then that would be great. I hope I've not been too confusing and I appreciate your time. Thanks. Thank you. The next person is Jason. Jason Dornie. Jason, welcome. Please let us know approximately where you live. And please talk to your comment. Thanks for the hearing. Thank you for allowing us to speak. I live on Hickory Lane and Echo Hill South right near the intersection of Heather Stone, Albany Wood and Stony Hill. And I would just like to echo a lot of the comments that have already been made. But I would like to state that reducing the speed limit would be great, but that doesn't do anything unless there's any kind of enforcement of the speed limit. People drive pretty fast in this neighborhood from, you know, Pelham Road coming down. Heather Stone to Stony Hill to the hack. Especially coming down Stony Hill. I know we're talking about Heather Stone now, but Stony Hill, that, that hill. Those two hills coming down to Gatehouse Road. People speed down those hills pretty frequently. We are a young family. We have two young kids. We have friends that live over off of Heather Stone Road and in Echo Hill North. And we do not like walking to anybody's houses over there. We won't let our kids walk on that street or ride their bikes on that street. It is dangerous. And the median, I do not believe does anything to help. As other speakers have already said, it seems to be the potholes that are the thing that slow people down in that area and not the median. I am completely in favor of the roundabouts. I think that they are a great traffic calming solution. And I would also like to say that narrowing the lanes would also help if you're going to pave the roads. I think it would be beneficial to also stripe them with narrower lanes. That is just a visual deterrent to speeding. And I would also like to bring up the notion or the idea of instead of speed bumps using things like speed tables that can be found in front of Amherst colleges cafeteria there on nine. I think that those are a good alternative to a traditional speed bump. They do cause people to slow down, but they don't. They don't require them to go as slow as they might if there was a speed bump. I am concerned with people speeding on the streets after they're paved right now. People drive fast on the parts of the streets that are. That are paved well or, you know, not full of potholes. So that is a concern of mine. I think a lot of people cut from Pelham Road over to Belcher Town Road or go to the gym using those streets. We have a lot of rentals in the neighborhood either fortunately or unfortunately depending on who you talk to. And there's a lot of people coming to and from classes on the weekends. There's people speeding at night. I walk my dogs that night generally. And even with a headlamp and a collar lit up on my dog. I still feel like people fly past me in cars and give me barely the requisite amount of space as they drive past me fast. At night time when it's hard to see. I will agree that the curves are areas where it is hard to see people walking. Especially at night, the neighborhoods are not particularly well lit. So somebody is walking at night without any kind of flashlight or any kind of light to let people know that they're there. It can be hard to see them even in that area where the median is you're coming off of up a pound road and there could be people there. And it's really hard to see because it's not well lit. So those are my concerns. I do think sidewalks would probably be one of the better things to do. I think you can put sidewalks in and it will in no way ruin the aesthetic of the neighborhood. A sidewalk is similar to a street. I don't think the streets ruin the aesthetic of the neighborhood. We have lots of trails. We have lots of woods. And I don't think you need to put sidewalks on both sides of the street. You can put one a sidewalk in on one side of the street. And that would be a good solution. So those are my comments. I appreciate you all listening and taking the time to get some feedback and thank everybody for joining the call. Thank you. Thank you very much. And I think the last person we have is very clear Griffin. Hi. Hi, welcome. Thank you. So I live at 270 Alpine. Thank you for giving us this opportunity to provide feedback. Unfortunately, I do want to start my comments with just a little bit of a complaint that that I understand the constraints around timing these meetings. But the timing of this meeting just makes it really hard for people who have full-time jobs to attend. I fortunately am faculty and have a flexible schedule and I'm not teaching at this time. But the parents of young children are disproportionately working people and it is unfortunate that it's harder for them to be here. Okay. Otherwise, I just wanted to say as a child as a parent of a two-year-old, I, you know, she can hardly walk now, but I would not feel safe as she gets older with her walking on Heather Stone. I just unequivocally favor sidewalks. I don't care if the median stays or not. I just want a sidewalk. And if having a sidewalk requires the median go, I think the median should go. I felt even strongly even more strongly about this yesterday. I was driving home and even on Alpine where cars go slower. I almost hit someone because we don't have sidewalks and they were walking after dark and all black. This is not the first time this has happened. If there were a sidewalk, that wouldn't happen. I also unequivocally favor a lower speed limit, but I also want to echo what someone else said about how a speed limit will not ensure that people go slower. So a 25-mile-an-hour speed limit on Heather Stone would be amazing, but between the fact that there's tons of delivery vehicles now, that's something that's really different than it may have been when people originally moved here 20 or 30 years ago. They're unwieldy, they drive fast, and they don't abide by the speed limit necessarily. I also know that, you know, even, you know, home-owning individuals such as my husband who is not on this call do not abide by the speed limit even when they think they do. So I don't think a lower speed limit is enough, and I really enthusiastically favor the many roundabouts. I think they're fantastic. I lived in Seattle, and they had a lot of many roundabouts in those neighborhoods, and they were very effective. They also offered a nice place to have trees and plantings, and just actually really enhanced the cozy feel of a neighborhood. So that's all I have to say. Thank you for this opportunity. And that's all. Well, thank you very much. Appreciate it. And I think we had one more person who's asked to be recognized. And it's Annalisa. It's Annalisa Kittrell. Hi. We are at 218 Heatherstone on the corner of Pebble Ridge in Heatherstone. And I apologize, but as Meg just announced, it is very difficult to get onto a meeting at this time. And it's really unfortunate because so many parents that live on Heatherstone have small children and would probably echo so much of what has already been said. You know, I'm currently in the middle of some responsibilities and pulled over in my car just to make sure that, you know, this is heard. But I certainly am in favor of these roundabouts. If something slows it down, I'm also in favor of a slower speed limit. And on Heatherstone in our driveway, we have a steep driveway. So naturally anything from chalk, a ball, or anything that our children are playing with, if they're playing in the front yard at all, are going to naturally go towards the street. I personally, as an adult, have been almost hit just checking my mailbox. You come around the corner, people are speeding through, not, you know, looking at their phones or whatever. And really it's actually been a laughable joke that nothing's, you know, the speed limit has been an issue for years and years and years. My husband grew up in this house, and he said that that it was an issue, you know, 30 and 40 years ago, but nothing's been done. And it's, it's shocking. In a neighborhood that is full of children and young families and people that like to run and walk and participate outside that nothing's been done up until this point. So I certainly support anything that slows it down. But as many others have said, a speed limit just doesn't do anything unless we're going to enforce it. Thank you. Appreciate it. There's a person who's now asked to be recognized and I hope that we can get on to having the committee here from Guilford, but we will have. Point of order. Andy, this, the person who's raised their hand had already spoken today. Okay. Just, just a note, if it's up to you, if you'd like to call on them. I think that I know that circumstance. Thank you for pointing that out. I appreciate it. Mr. Thank you very much for being present. But I think we do need to get on to letting the town manager and Mr. Moring. State their. What, what their recommendations are and how they have reached the. Recommendation that they presented through the time council to the committee. Paul, do you want to start or do you want to have Guilford start. And did you want to begin with, with Heather stone road? Yes, out of order. So out of order of the agenda items. I just wanted to clarify that. Yes, we will start with Heather stone road because of the large number of people. I was, I thank you for mentioning that. What thought had been that we would respond. If there was a large number of people on a single item. We would try and get to that item first. But we do have an extensive agenda. So we're not going to be able to complete the discussion on how this stone today, but it's fresh on everybody's mind because we've heard from all of the people who have offered public comment on the subject. Back again, Paul, do you want to start text, but I think I'll just go straight to Guilford. Andy. Thank you. Guilford. Good morning. Good morning. So you pretty much, if we're going to start with Heather stone, you've pretty much heard everything we were proposing to do. Take out the median out of sidewalk. The reason the sidewalk stops at Auburn would drive is is that's where our paving project stops. We'd be happy to continue it on but we're just keeping it within the paving project all the improvements we're doing now. We've, we did look at raised speed humps. There's a traffic calming measure in this route in this area, but we typically don't like to use them on a main road that serves transit and serves, serves transit and serves the emergency response vehicles on college street. There's a road parallel to mainstream parallel to college street and it allows the emergency vehicles that we need to to go down mainstream to the raised speed home. Sorry, right there raised crosswalks there. Got it. So that allows that to happen. There's also no transit buses that go down college street. UMass has a different view on raised, raised crosswalk speed humps they put them everywhere. And yes, they, if you put them everywhere and put them very close together, you can slow traffic and have effect on traffic. But so we don't really like to put speed humps where we have transit and the primary response route for emergency vehicles. So that's why they weren't chosen here. So we chose the mini roundabout it's a horizontal deflection versus a vertical deflection makes you have to slow down and go right and then back left as you go around them. That is that does have some traffic calming ability. It's we use those on college street, not college street South Pleasant Street by the college. We have those there where you have the splitter islands in the middle of the road that make you diverge out and diverge back in. We did not leave the median in place because one the median really wasn't constructed very well to begin with. If we want to put the median back we need to do a lot of work putting it back in. We also believe we can be better to have narrow lanes and a sidewalk on the side of the road to get people to visually see that there are pedestrians and slow the traffic down. I'm happy to paint a yellow line down the road if they want to do that. A yellow line sometimes painting does make people have a visual that's smaller but then again we actually have studies that say when you're on a painted road. You tend to drive faster because you think you're on a more urban collector than on a rule or side road where you should be driving slower. This is a project so Heather so this is before you. That's kind of what we come up with. If you want us to take a pause and have a public hearing with more people and let them talk and have a more say and what's going on and have more discussion with them. We have time to do that. So we don't have to approve it today. A question came up. Are there any land takings required for any of this paving project? At this time there's not when we start moving into. When we start moving further into the road and trying to connect with gate house there will be some by some takings along that route. But for the project before the council, there are no land takings. There's no new land takings. There may be an issue we have to clean up at the corner with Pelham Road which looks like we off the road on top of somebody's property when it was first bill. But we've got this most of the sidewalks and we think most even with the roundabouts many roundabouts were off everybody's property except for property. There's actually probably one maybe at Alpine that we might have to take a little corner of property. But it looks like they all fit. Thank you. One question I had that I want to turn it over to the committee to ask questions. I don't think we have any neighborhoods where neighborhood streets have roundabouts right now the roundabouts are on. Larger roadways. Is that correct? We have been slow to put many roundabouts into the neighborhoods because we haven't found good places to try them and had time to try them. We have the smallest roundabout we have is actually on Snell Street University. That little one there that is the smallest when we have what we propose for this neighborhood actually be smaller than that. Do you know of any neighborhood communities that have one that people could look at either from the neighborhood or from the committee? I would have to look in the western part of the state. I'm not sure of many. There's several in the eastern part of the state. It looks like Andy froze. So I'm going to call on George Ryan. Thank you Paul. You go for one question was raised was if these mini run, which I like the idea of the mini roundabouts. I like the idea of traffic coming. I like the idea of taking steps to actually trying to get people to slow down. I certainly agree that if we could lower the speed limit, that would be great. But I think it's also true that that by itself doesn't really often accomplish much. So some kind of traffic coming measures are really valuable. And so I like this idea. But the question was raised. I think during public comment. Are they easy to remove if you find that for some reason these aren't working. Is this a big, big problem. No, it should be very easy to take out if we decide not to do it. Or not to keep it. Jennifer. Can I just jump in there for a second and so just to clarify, while the request is permanent changes to the public way, what Gilford is proposing is a pilot program for these mini roundabouts where it. They can be removed and there's no because it because they are built there to be temporary and see how they work. So. Thank you. So I guess a couple of questions, a few questions. So if it's a pilot, do we know how long is there a time that you'll be evaluating it over a certain period of time. We would like to do it over a year. Okay. Okay. Thank you. And the sidewalks quit that you had said that the sidewalks were going as long for the portion of the road. Excuse me that was being repaved. I know that there were come at some residents favor sidewalks. Some don't, but there were several that seem to want requested that sidewalks go all the way down. I think is it to Stoney Hill. If to gatehouse possible. Yeah. It would be another, it would require another prop. I mean, we'd have to design it and put it together. We haven't done that yet. So that would be like a phase two. That would be part of this. So if slowing the speed limit is something we can do under the chapter that was cited of state law. Could couldn't. I mean, what would it take to do that is it couldn't hurt. So I believe the chapter they quoted is the old default speed limit rule. And that would actually are newer changes that were, we've been given that allows us to do it in a different way. And that's probably the way we should do it if we want to look at it. We've been looking at this in the Cushman neighborhood and we have the report back on that. So I would actually propose waiting and doing it. We find out we can actually say we do the Cushman one and see if we can do it there. That would give us a better guidance on how we can do it. I believe what they're quoting in the 2016 rule is the de facto speed limit, which actually makes it harder for the police to write a ticket. You can lower the speed limit, but the police have restrictions on how they can enforce. But I'm not sure. I think I thought that was a little older in 2016. So what you're suggesting is the lower the speed limit at Cushman. Neighbor area and see how effective that is and then look at imposing that, you know, making that change on Heather stone. No, no, just going through that process and seeing how the process works. And then we can use the same process on this one, I believe. And how would we would this committee sort of put that on our calendar to revisit that. I mean, how do we with the neighbors kind of. I think it's been brought to the attention. It'll probably be once we once Cushman goes through, I believe we'll get a lot of people requesting to do. Speed zones and so forth in neighborhoods. Okay, thank you. Yeah, I also, I support the reduced speed limit. I think that would help and I think sidewalks will help as well. I do think we should look into phase two as quickly as possible. I recognize, you know, there's limits on the resources that everyone has, but it seems like we shouldn't just do one end of a thoroughfare. When there's going to be obvious improvements there, but not improvements further down the street. I think it would be helpful to get to phase two as soon as we can. I agree that reducing speed limits doesn't help much, but we should maybe talk to the police department about enforcing the speed limits as they are. And putting those signs up that you're speeding and slow down, which do actually come traffic. I have seen that in my neighborhood. So if that that seems like if we could install that for some period of time, that would help. That's it. Thanks a lot. Thank you. I'm really excited about this pilot program and moving towards permanent and getting a lot of information that's how it might impact other neighborhoods. And I know you said it wouldn't be a big issue here, but I'm not sure I'm familiar with land take or taking land. Is that taking, you know, buying it from residents? Is that usually, could somebody please explain to me what that means? Follow up. So most of the time when we take land and emersely, it's very small piece of land and it's its value is very, very small. So what we usually end up is we end up negotiating with the property owner to. Donate the land as either an easement, which means they still own the land and we have the right to use it or we do a fee taking where we outright take the land and it becomes part of the town layout. And usually there's some type of compensation that comes in and because it's usually such a small piece of property, it's usually a small piece of compensation. Thank you. Jennifer. Yeah, more curiosity. Um, if they donate the land, they get a tax deduction or is there any. They're like, it's in the town. They're like, it's smaller. So it's less the tax. But it's a small small. Okay. So I guess what we need to do as a committee is is. Identify for this particular proposal. Whether we need additional information. And so that we can give a list to. I think we certainly have enough information to proceed, but I would like to provide the, the people living there with a more robust chance to provide public comment. So if we can have a public hearing in the evening when people are more available, I think that could help just to broaden the perspectives that we, we've seen. But I mean, I can, I can, I'm prepared to vote now if we, if we, if that makes sense. Jennifer. Actually, I think George's hand went up first and come back to me. George. Definitely public hearing probably would, would be appropriate. Given the level of interest. You might also mention to folks who are still listening. That they can also just send us written comments. That can be a way you can deal with the difficulty of meeting times. But I think customarily, I've not been on this committee for a while, but we customarily, I would think do that. Customarily, I would think do public hearings for these sorts of requests. We've got a bunch of them on our plate at the moment. So I would think that this would be a natural thing to do. The other is perhaps more controversial. But again, when I was on the committee in the past, we would reach out to to attack. And we'd also reach out to DAC. We would like their input. They would notify them, they'd look at the materials we've been given and they would offer us a written comment. So I would also think that it would be appropriate for us to reach out to them. Good points. Jennifer, do you have anything else you're going to. No, I just wanted to support I will I spoke with George just suggested and having a public hearing. Because, you know, we want also everyone in the audience to know that we heard you. It's I'm always torn. You know, as a council member when when people offer, you know, very almost diametrically opposed public comment. And I don't live on this, you know, in that neighborhood to know. So I don't want people to feel that they haven't been heard. So I think having a public comment or having a hearing where more people could participate. But I'm always torn when I hear, you know, some people say we want sidewalks. We don't want sidewalks. It's a hard call. Our policy, I believe, does that require public hearing Athena? That's exactly what I was going to say that the town council policy on control and regulation of the public ways doesn't require hearing on. Permanent changes to the public way. And there are, we've, we've deliberately tried not to, if a committee wants to hold an additional listening session, we've, we've tried not to call it a public hearing to avoid confusion with the public hearings that are required by the charter. So I would advise if the committee wants to go that route, not to call it a public hearing, but to call it a listening session. So, you know, it was an interesting group of comments that I appreciated all that we heard from, but I was in total agreement. I think that in the end, so such to making a decision. Is everybody on the committee familiar with that neighborhood, have you driven other stuff the Stony Hill gatehouse to understand the connection. I've driven it. It's been a while since I've gone that way. So I plan to go that way and pay more attention to the issues that have been raised. But I certainly know the bottles are there. I drove high when it was on the council agenda. A couple of weeks ago. I've driven it and walked it. So, is there anything else that anybody would like to offer in the case then. I think we have to reach a conclusion as to whether we want to do a listening session is what, which is the title suggested and what other in contact DAC in tact to see if they have any comments, which probably is true of the other. Street proposals that we have before us that we should not just limited to this one, but council lord. Is it bound together, like can paving be moved forward ahead of the many roundabouts or they kind of a package deal. And when were you thinking that you need a decision and when were you thinking that you were going to do the work. It's a package deal. We don't want to have the contractor move in and then move out. And they have to come back in and work over stuff he's already worked on. But this road is probably at the end of the list of roads we're going to pave this year. Or the first group of roads we're going to pave is at the end of that list. There's a little cul-de-sac. And this neighborhood that gets paved that we have to replace the water line on before we pave it this year. So, we have a couple months to think about it and discuss it. This, this project we do. Okay. Well, yeah, so I think if the council is the TSO committee is going to vote to. Request the opinions of the DAC and the intact that you are explicit about what you're requesting them to a pine on in terms of the areas of expertise. And then also provide a deadline so you have time to reconsider and then make a recommendation to the full council. And in time for go for to be able to do the paving under this contract that we already have in place. Yeah, so I think that what would be helpful. If you can do it today, that'd be great. If you can't do it today that you could send them out to the committee to about what are the dates for each of the projects that are listed. What are the ones that need decisions from the committee that soonest and what is, do you have any approximate schedules on any of them? Belch Town Road is the only one we need a decision on rather quickly. Okay. That's helpful to know is maybe we should take that up as our second item then. So, is it a committee consensus that somebody wants to make a motion they're always welcome to, but committee consensus is that we're going to try and let the DAC and TAC know and if there are specific questions as was mentioned by Paul. Are there specific issues that we're looking for input on. I think with TAC has done a lot of good work and. And George you've worked with TAC also on things like. Speed limits and traffic calming devices and what's effective. Because I think that was where a lot of this was coming down as this. We're getting disagreements is that there was uncertainty about. Whether. Just on their own traffic speed limit reduction will work because unless you have enforcement. We just have a limited capacity of our police department and being on a residential street. It's going to be a big ask on a regular basis. So Ryan. So, I'm echoing Paul, I think we want to be very specific about what we're asking of these two committees. I think we should ask them, I get the feeling there's a consensus that we should, but perhaps we need a motion, but we should be very specific. We should also give them a fairly strict time limit. You know, two weeks or, you know, whatever something so we can get it back in good time. I personally have found it very helpful when TAC is weighed in. I realize it takes more time. It's another layer. But I find that they often bring it a level of understanding and knowledge, especially with bike safety, pedestrian safety. Also, they might have some thoughts on the mini round mini roundabouts that might be interesting to for us to hear. So we should be very specific. We're asking them about this specific project and I take it these four specific or five specific changes. And give them a time limit. And if they get back to us in time grade, if they don't, then we move ahead. Okay. Is there any objection to turning to the belcher town road? Our question because that was the one that it seemed when we asked what was. Most needed Athena. I think for members of the audience, it would be helpful if the committee indicated that you're planning on holding a public listening session. And when you might take this up again. I think the next step would be to see if we can get any. Give a short turnaround input from DAC disability access advisory committee. And from. The transportation advisory committee see if and then have that input available before we do the listening session. And so council Ryan's recommendation that we give a very specific time limit. I think really needs to be built around the listening session. And when. The committee is meeting next on April 11 and April 25. So did you want to include a request for opinions from the transportation advisory committee and disability access advisory committee by the 11th or the 25th. And then move forward with scheduling a listening session. I think we really have to do it the 25th only because we have to give respect to the committees that they would need to have time to organize their own meetings and schedule their own meetings at a time that work for their members. Including here is that the members agreed to request opinions from the disability access advisory committee and the transportation advisory committee on bike pedestrian and disabled resident safety for the proposed project by April 25. And then the committee will move forward with scheduling a listening session. Is that accurate. Yes. And I think go ahead and look for a date for the for a listening session. If we want to try and do that in the evening, we have to hold a committee to find what's an available date that all members of the committee would be available. So there's a series of steps there. I think that the first one is that maybe I'll work with the vice chair of the committee. Councilor Ryan and we will draft a request and circulated to the committee. Just as it will be a public document because it circulated to the committee. But we propose to ask and see if there any comments and get that request off to those committees as quickly as we can. And sorry, one more thing that the committee will look for a listening session time that will be. Easier for working people to attend in the evening. Is that correct. I think so. Unless there's disagreement. Raise hands and let me know, but I think that's probably. What would be helpful to. As was suggested by several commenters today. Thank you. And then for members in the audience, if and when the committee schedules a listening session, it'll be posted on the board, a committee calendar on the town website. Thank you. I just want to note that the DAAC is meeting on April 9th so we can alert them that this will be coming their way if they're able to add it to their agenda or not as a. We'll give it up to the chair. Okay. Jennifer. I'm just happy next. I don't know if they have a posted meeting yet. Okay. They usually meet once a month. I believe. Jennifer, do you know in tech, just tech have a meeting that you're aware of tax next meeting is on the 4th of April. Okay, that's. So we'll try and pass a Ryan. So, yeah, you can just also just share the material with them. And hopefully they could take it up at their next meeting, but certainly the following 1. Just send them the files that we have. I assume you would, but that just seems to pass. Thanks. They have to go find them. So I think that what we're at, what we want to do is we can send that we can let them know about all of the things that have been referred to the committee. But emphasize that the ones that we are giving priority to or Belcher town road. And Heatherstone road. At this time, because they. Belcher town road is the one that we have been alerted needs a prompt decision. And I'm going to turn to feel for to make a presentation on that. And then Heatherstone, we want to do it because we want to try and get a public listening session. So, Gilbert. When can you tell us a little bit about more about Belcher town road and then see if there are questions. We do have the information that was provided, of course. To the council. Do you want to bring up the page with the shows the map. Or we'll do that 1 second, please. Thank you. So we've, I'll just go ahead and start. We've been working on Belcher town road for many years on a plan to improve the road. The plan, because we were approaching this as being a funded by the state. Transportation improvement plan. We actually had to add bike lanes to this. So we've been working on it as a bike lane project with the upgrade sidewalks. All along. What happened is while we were discussing this, the We applied for a mass works grant for sidewalk improvements from what the properties, the town purchase, which are the ones. Can I move them cursor or can only you Athena. I think I can. The three properties that town bought. They're the ones just across from Belcher town. Yes, the town bought these three properties and they're going to be developed into affordable housing. So we applied for a mass works grant and then we got a $750,000 grant from the state to actually do the sidewalks from this area back towards the intersection with southeast street. And that's why this project has moved has been kind of broken out from the entire Belcher town road project. So the project is is to add the bike lane or the changes that are there now is add the bike lanes and then we're putting a crosswalk in at the driveway to colonial village which will cross over to the properties the town bought to allow this new development to access the bus stops on both sides of the road. The village actually have the bus stop inside the development so they don't need this but this will allow the people on the north side of Belcher town road to cross over. After they get off the bus coming home and how a crosswalk there so the two changes are adding bike lanes the entire length from the driveway of colonial village back to college street. And to add the crosswalk at colonial village drive driveway as that's the two changes that require approval. Can you tell us what the sidewalk situation is currently just to give us a context. There, there are existing sidewalks there they are in this repair needs maintenance. So this will just this will actually push them back and make new sidewalks were making new sidewalks and put a bike lane in. The bike lane would be on the road or on the sidewalk on the road. Okay, so Ryan. No, but could you say something about the time constraints you had said that this is something that's more pressing. Again, we have we have a mass works grant now so the mass works grant has to we have to kind of finish this this year. That's why it's more pressing. Okay. I raise that only because again, our normal procedure is least. I assume is our normal procedure is to get the advice again. Attack and D. A. C. And to consider having some kind of. Public meeting listening session or whatever. Point has been made that this is not not required. At least the listening session part. So that's something we have to make a decision about. These are fairly specific and I wouldn't say small, but you know, very specific changes related to a larger project that's ongoing. So that might be effective for us in thinking about whether a listening session is required or not. But I would think normally we reach out to attack and to D. A. C. And is there time for that? I guess is the question from your perspective. Just time. As long as we are, as long as we are. I mean, yes, there's time to do it. We definitely have committed to doing bike lanes. So you can call them bike lanes, you can call them shoulders. If you call bike lanes, they fall in. They fall in your the town council's guidance document for changes to the public way they call it a shoulder. It doesn't really fall in the. Guidance in the town way, but the crosswalk clearly, if we're running a crosswalk, we clearly have to get permission is what the guidance says. And so I guess the issue for us, if I may speak, is whether the crosswalk by itself merits that level of input. And I don't. I don't know what the rest of my colleagues think, but that would be the question. Yeah. Of course, timing is a question too, because. The other thing I'm going to point out real quickly and then I know that. Bob Higners, you're calling in just second attack from the work that I did with them is liaison and during the last year. And is they are very concerned and very attentive to what they refer to because it has there's. Pieces that go with it. It's called safe routes to schools. And it's about being conscious of what is a safe walking route to a school when they're in walking distance. And the number of children who may live in colonial village who we anticipate living in the housing that we're built, we want to see built on the land that the town acquired on Belcher town road. And possible other residences that may have children, I think that it is worth getting tax view also on the safe routes to school question. Bob. Yeah, I just wanted to say that I'm very familiar with this road I drive it every day. And it is very dangerous in this area. I think I mentioned that in a finance committee meeting. A year or two ago. I think one question I have, Gilford, are you planning to make the pavement wider. So to accommodate the bike lanes. Yes, the payment, the payment does have to get wider. And then so, so then the sidewalks would then be pushed further back. Is that correct. I think we're going all the way back to the property line, which we don't do now. Okay. Because I know that further down the street. You're going to run into some fire hydrants that are right next, right next to the existing sidewalks. And not, I don't think you'll, you're going to hit any here, but I think it's a great idea. I think the crosswalk is a great idea. I've been very concerned about the development of this area. Particularly the, the, the property that we, we plan to develop for a low income housing. Because it's, as I say, it's, it's in, and I think Myra Ross's comments are, we should take into account. It's a very dangerous place. I've walked it. It's very dangerous for right now for pedestrians. It's, I biked it. It's very dangerous for bikers. And it's, I think this would be a very, a vast improvement. I think if, you know, children walking from colonial village to Fort River. I think that they could cross safely and think across safely at the crosswalk. It would then make it give them a broader sidewalk to walk on. It's not great to walk through there, but it's better than nothing. And I really think it's a great improvement. Thank you. Paul. Yeah, I just, I just want to credit give credit to Guilford in the DPW in the conservation development team for getting this significant grant to do this work. I mean, as Bob said, it combines, you know, heavily populated. Low and moderate income area, new development by the town for affordable housing. Our community gardens across the street and the new construction of Fort River for safe routes to school. You've hit on all this sort of key things. Why a couple of years ago, the town staff had prioritized that to seek grants, a grant for this area. Yeah, so, but credit to the town staff for conceptualizing it and then getting it sold, you know, getting an application that was seen as being valuable by the state $750,000 a significant amount of money. Okay, so I think the word we're at is that we want to. Give our friends attack and DAC opportunity to offer comments. I think that the one thing that we did hear from Myra already is. Concern about sidewalks and mixing sidewalks and bicycles. I think she mentioned deep bikes if I recall. I don't know if Guilford, if you've had any thoughts about that. But she said there. Myra said a miss Ross said a lot of things. We have to, we have to abide by the rules that are. promulgated by the state and the federal government for ADA, and we follow those rules. The issues she was bringing up on North Hampton Road or state issues. We did not do that project. Yeah, and I'm thinking more about how to fix this particular section that we're dealing with now. We, I mean, we followed all the rules were required to follow and doing this section. So we're looking at all that. And the proposal is that we put in our the wreck rectangular rapid rectangular fashion beacons the RFBs for enhanced visibility because of the speeds on the road. But we do look at all that even though she doesn't think we do or the committee, maybe the DACC doesn't think we do. But that is part of what we do though. George, that's right. Just a timing issue, maybe premature here. It sounds like we're going to send this to as we did with heavy stone road this will go in that packet with the request that it. They act on it as quickly as they possibly can. Do we want to have a maybe are we ready to think about whether we want a listening session for this? Maybe maybe that's something we can decide later. My actual reason for raising my hand is that we did hope to get to the RFI this morning. Waste holler that's something that I think some people are interested in hearing about. And it's now 1141. I was aware of that. Not sure what that I can do about that or you can do about that. It just in terms of timing, I would encourage the committee to conduct its work so you can get a recommendation back to the town council by May 6th. If that's at all possible for all four of these projects, I think that's doable given the timeframe, but that's the next council meeting after the 8th. And I think you can't you're not going to have time to get by the 8th April 8th, but you could get it by May 6th. I think that's there's with this one in particular, there's some time urgency to spend the grant. We just want to clarify what you when you were just saying cause that because we talked about identifying the highest priorities. You know, picked on two of the projects for highest priorities and that seems like you're encouraging. All of them to be just those two. Okay. Um, Paul to clarify the council meetings in May or May 6 and 20. Did, did, or are you asking the committee for a recommendation to the council for council action on the 6th or the 20th? May 6. Thank you. Yeah, for particularly for Belcher town road, I assume that that's essential. And as far as. If we're going to have a listening session, it may be hard to make it for the 6th, but it didn't sound like that was as essential for the date. As the Belcher town road is. I'm just saying that just to give you an opportunity to disagree. So I guess what I would like to do, we have some other road projects, but I think we do want to. Have a little bit of time to talk about the art. The RFI and also. Recognize that we have what are the Pomeroy. Lane proposal and the roundabout. Is there any with the with the. The work on the roundabout that would be on amity street. The university drive. Is there a timeline on that? So, actually, I can quickly do the next 2 if you want to. There is a proposal that's going forward for a grant possibly later this spring and summer. So there's no funding. There's no funding for this roundabout this time. So this is this can be discussed and talked about in great and a great a lot more detail, greater detail. But this is the concept that is being proposed that by the town and UMass UMass and the town both worked on this one. The other project on West street is the installation of 2 crosswalks and some splitter islands. And a bike lane there as well. And that project is, if we get around to it, we'll get around to it at the end of the construction season, which is October or November. If it gets moved to next year, it'd be fine if it gets moved to next year. I'm sure the residents in that area would like us to move faster. Everybody wants to go faster, including the drivers. Okay. So, the RFI. That's that the Does everybody had a chance to read it I assume. Yeah. So maybe I just open it up for see if there are questions. Bob. Yeah, I just had a question about what is organics. Is that like yard waste or leafs or what, what is organics. It's the compostables. It really is. It could be. It could be added to some communities actually put your compost and your yard waste together. It's basically the same thing. So it's kind of got in the title of organics. So we, we asked. Yes, we asked about that. So nobody has it. So it's kind of moved at this point. Some people do yard waste, but they don't do the food waste with it. Right. Okay. There are some communities in eastern Massachusetts. We know from zero waste hours that are doing it though. But just that these companies are. At least in their response or saying that they don't. Correct. The three companies that responded said they don't currently do it. One company says they have a pilot program going on, but they didn't say whether they would. Expand it. May I ask a question relative to that. Jennifer. I'm sorry. Oh, you can go ahead, George, if you want. I was a customer of USA waste and they did provide compostables. And I paid for it. It's like $60 a month. Now, maybe they've stopped that program. But at least in my experience, what this says is not true. They did have a compostables and I paid for it. And then I finally decided to use the transfer station. And that was in the last probably year or two years ago. And I'm sorry. And then I finally decided to use the transfer station and that was in the last probably year to year and a half at the most probably last year. So maybe they stopped it or maybe they're not telling us the truth. I think that's the pilot program they were talking about. And they've decided they're not going to pursue it. I think they still offer it if you're willing to pay that. They for it. Okay. Right. Thank you. Sorry, Jennifer. That's fine. I was also. I'm sorry, I wouldn't unmute. So will can one or more of the companies, will they provide if we want the curbside compost pickup? Every, every responder said they would provide it if we ask for it. Okay. But they wouldn't. There's no comparable pricing to know what that is. So the pricing. So the pricing we've kind of put together is just for trash pickup and recycling pickup. So that's sort of all part of what that would be. So the compost, we wouldn't know what that price would be until the, if we issued an RFP and the responses came back. Correct. We're kind of in a chicken and an egg situation. We'd like to know how much it's going to cost us, but we can't really find out how much it's going to truly know how much it's going to cost us until we do the RFP. We only have this little, we have a range because not all the services we're going to ask for there. We also in reviewing contracts with other communities found out that there's a wide range and services the vendors provide as far as managing the program. Most of the communities seem to manage the program themselves. So there's a cost to the community for doing that, but it's not found by looking just at the haulers contract. So that means that the other communities, would they still be considered contracting it out or would it be considered doing it themselves? They contract out the service of collection, but they manage the contract and the customers in house. And do we have a sense of what, if Amherst were to consider that, what kind of staffing? Would you have, I'm assuming additional staff would have to be retained? We would have to. I mean, what kind of people power is that? I think now that's a question. If we're going to keep moving forward, we need to kind of push forward the question of what are the, what does other communities do and how are they pricing it? Okay. So if we wanted to do research with other communities, is that something. That's easy to do. So members could do, or would staff do that? No, we, we can, we can, we can get that information very easily. We definitely need more information. We'll stream. If you could elaborate on that. That the cup, you're saying that the three respondents are moving to single stream. The three companies are moving to automated collection. And when you look at the contracts, they have automated collection. Everybody who has automated collection right now for their, for their recyclables, it's a single stream system. It's not a dual stream. The dual stream communities have not, they don't, they have the totes like we have, not the bends that are automatically picked up. So every vendor said pretty much if they come into Amherst, they want to do everything automated. So that probably means we're going to have to go to a single stream recycling program. And we'll have to have totes for just about everything. A large roll off bends with the wheels. Well, that's what I have. I mean, isn't that what everyone has with USA? If you, if you're with USA, you have that now, but if you're going to do comp, if you're going to do compost bowls, then you are organic. She may have a third one to go for the compost bowls or organics. That that would be part of the new contract to have the compulsibles would go in that. That's right. That's how I would see it going. Yes. Is it your understanding that the trucks that are doing the automatic pickup, would not have the capacity to take on a third pickup at the same time? It depends on how they bought their trucks, but most of the trucks that are dual capacity are actually manual trucks that are not automated trucks. So when USA is coming through, they're actually coming through twice. And if you have compost bowls, a weekly compostable pickup or organic pickup, that'll be the third truck weekly. Unless you do, unless we say it's organics every other week and recycling every other week, then you could cut it down to, but I'm not sure that would work for us. Because what you said then. We, we, some of our, some of our customers are already a lot of waste. If you just see the waste bins outside, if you went every other week, you may not, it would be a lot of waste that would be on the curb every other week. The rental properties next to our house, they fill their recycling tub every week. Every week it's full. So you couldn't, you'd have a hard time telling them they have to wait every other week, get your recyclables picked up. Yeah, yeah, space. I was just curious because South Hadley, I think is every other week. It is. Jennifer. No, I mean, our recyclables are picked up every other week. By you. By USA. My USA contract was every week they took both. Wow. Trash is every week and recycling is every other week that we have. Maybe that's just our content. It must be different contracts they have for different people right now. But our neighbors next door, it's every, they get the same thing every week. And I got the same, when I had them, I got the same every week. Are they doing something different than Hadley than the Amherst? Well, the two, our two neighbors next door here in Amherst, the two rental properties next door, they are every week. Does anybody else have every other week for recycle? USA, USA didn't provide a lot of really in depth detail of how they do their things and they didn't provide. So that was something else we had to work around. That's the right. Can I ask about what I've heard is that pay as you throw is sort of the ideal sort of the gold standard. And what you say in your report is that this move would make pay as you throw possible only through the size and number of carts. So if I understand that, and I probably don't, if you're going to an automated system, you know, you can't have bags that people are going to jump out of the truck and pick up. It's got to be in a tote. It's got to be in some kind of container. And so I guess the question is, will this work? You seem to suggest that it could work. I need, I'm obviously new to some of this. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm scrambling a bit, but I'd like to retain pay as you throw if that were possible, but is it possible? And yeah, it's, I think it's going to be, yeah, I, my personal opinion is it's going to be hard to do, to do bags to sell bags and you buy a bag and you put it in the trash and that's how you do pay as you throw. Working with Susan Wade, she thinks you can still do it. South Hadley is about to venture into the realm of doing bags, selling bags and putting it into the cart for automatic delivery. So there's a community ahead of us trying to do it. I really think once it goes into that tote, there's not going to be a person who's going to get out and look in the tote. The person is sitting in a truck. He's actually going to drive up, grab the tote, dump it. He won't be able to see very well while he's dumping. And then he's going to drive away after he sets the tote down. So it could work. Is it really going to work? It may just be that the, if you want to pay as you throw, you get a 32 gallon, if you have a small amount and you get a 65 gallon, if you have a medium amount and you get the 92 gallon totes, if you have a lot, and then if you need to have two of them, you have two of them. And that's, that's kind of how I'm thinking that the vendors are going to want to set up, pay as you throw. Although South Hadley, like I said, is going to try it. Anything else? Anything else? Go ahead. Yeah, I just want to point out that I have an issue with compostables. Not that I don't want to do it, but there's certain times a year when it gets to be warm, I can't do it because ants get in the house and ants get in the garage where I leave it. I don't put it outside because we've got, you know, bears and other critters running around. So it's, I, it's great in the winter, but I can't do it in the summer. And so if I'm forced to do it, I think it'll be, I think a lot of people will have some problems with it. Just because, you know, you, you, when you have ants, it means you've got to deal with the ants and it's not always easy to deal with the ants in the house or in the garage, even when they come in. So, um, which means you might have to leave it outside, which means then once the bears figure out how to do it, it's game over. So how to open them up, it's game over. So anyway, I, I, I support the idea, but I can't, I don't know how it's going to work in the warm weather. Uh, when, when, you know, ants and other critters are running around. It's a good point. And, uh, one that I think we can talk to zero waste hammers to see if they have any information that would help to answer that question. Uh, Jennifer. Yeah. I'm just thinking back to the MMA, uh, seminar, you know, session and like long meadow, they, I have to find it. They sent me their contract, but the person speaking, the panelists from long meadow said, I'm sorry that, that the pay-as-you-throw had absolutely resulted in, they had achieved waste reduction that there was a, they thought very sizable reduction in waste with the pay-as-you-throw and other of the municipalities that spoke or were on the panel said the same thing. So I'm just trying to think of the next steps. I mean, I do think zero waste hammers has, they've done some extensive surveys. We'd want to invite a couple of representatives to come meet with the committee of what, where does the committee kind of go from here? I know we can't have subcommittees because then that would be subject to the meeting law, but how we get more information and some of our questions answered. What, what could be the next steps this committee would do? I don't know if it's maybe inviting Susan wait to come with some representative from zero waste hammers to have, you know, some of our questions answered and how to, you know, further evaluate. So if I could ask Jennifer, if I could ask you just one question. They said they reduced trash, but do they have actual numbers because we don't have numbers of what we produce for trash. We just, the numbers we report to DEP are the numbers from the transfer station. We do not report numbers from the private haulers. So how do they truly know they reduced? There's always my question. I asked them. Yeah, I mean, I don't know what I can go. I can't answer that for long meadow because they do contract out Paul might remember, do they do handle trash collection themselves? Because if they do it themselves, then they probably would know, wouldn't, wouldn't they then keep track of how much trash is being. So I think that I think that they, it's an in house service, but they have a pay as you throw fee structure. I can, I can do a little more research on that. But they, they, they felt pretty confident in making that statement. So I'm thinking that's how I think, I'm thinking they do it themselves. So I've been trying to get the meeting to get them in the stun and give us adjourned as quickly as possible. Cancelor Ryan, do you have anything else to add at this point? Of course I do. I'm sorry, I know it's afternoon and you can tell me Andy to stop and I don't mind. But again, in my experience speaking personally, I do pay as you throw. And I know from my own experience that I have reduced my waste by an enormous amount. I hear Gilford, we can find, we'll go to Long Meadow, we'll reach out to Sarah Waste Amherst. We do need some data. We need to know that what's behind this. But speaking from personal experience, because the kind of composting that, that, that these outfits do is not just organics. It's, it's soil paper. It's just about, you know, I basically almost everything that I don't put into recycling goes into my compost. And then there's this trash, basically plastic. And so I use like one town of Amherst blue bag a month. And that's for about five adults. So it is, you know, that's my, you know, that's anecdotal personals, what it's worth. We need some numbers. But that's the argument behind the compostables. I hear Bob's concern. What I do is I just bought myself a, you know, a modest container with a strong lid and I put a brick on top of it and it lives outside. But I realized in the summer it can get a little smelly and you have to secure it. And we do have beers in our neighborhood too. The Bob probably has more than we do. But it's, it's a small, I think it's a small price to pay because in my experience you can reduce your waste output enormously. I think that's a good point. Anyway, that's my two cents. And it's afternoon. For anything else. No, I just want to ask. We just keep this on the agenda. I don't even know that Gilbert, I don't want to take Gilford's time next meeting if we don't have to, but just for us to discuss next steps. I think so. I think that our plan for the next meeting was we were going to meet with the community participation. I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to talk about it. But I was thinking that this needs to go back on the agenda. For our discussion purposes. And I'll just note that I. Do the. Take my trash to the transfer. Station. And we have backyard composting. And so we don't have a compost problem in the house because it goes straight into the. Been in the backyard. We've never had a bear problem, but I've always been concerned that it might happen. We certainly. Find it with recycling. We also can very much limit our trash. A cup. We have three sets of minutes February 1st, February 15th and March 14. I had one question about March 14. Is anybody have any questions about our. Changes that they want to propose on March. First, our on February 1st, February 15. I have one question for George. In the. One, the March 14th minutes. We're talking about. The college average college sign. You said you're quoted in there saying. Ryan stated that he is not concerned. With the amount of signage at the corner. But it was. But that was a concern. Raised by committee members. In my recollection was I wasn't. A member of the committee was other counselors when we discussed it. And so that the only change that I came up with. Out of all three minutes was to change the words. Committee members to counselors. I have no objection. Got it. That was what I was trying to say. I was reporting what a counselor had raised as a concern. It was one counselor. That's my memory. Yes, it's one. It may have been more, but at least one. I think. There's two. Jennifer said too. So. One added concern about safety and the other just visual. But it was two that during the meeting that raised. So. That's the proposed that that's the change I would propose is to put it counselors instead of committee members. Bob. Yeah, under the North pleasant street pedestrian improvements. I did raise the issue of raising the crosswalks and Guilford gave the same answer he gave today, which was that's an emergency route. You know, emergency vehicles travel there. So they don't want to use that. But I think the meeting. The minute notes should reflect that. So. Let's see which minutes are we on now? This is the 14th. It's under three North pleasant street improvements on the second page. There's a whole bunch of comments in there and then, but that isn't in there. And I specifically did raise that issue. Or asked about that issue. So do you have a specific language that Athena. You can go to Athena. Yeah, I could say something like, you know, Hegner asked about raised crosswords. Crosswalks. And Mr. Moring noted that the policy is not to put. Speed bumps on through routes or routes that are used by. Emergency vehicles. And council lord. Okay. Will we be voting on all three of these as one? And if so, do I need to abstain since I missed the March 14th meeting? Okay. I can, we can take them. Take February 1st, 15 separately. Because actually. What the motion would be. To answer counselor lord's question. You, you can vote on minutes when you weren't a participant at the meeting. But if you want to take them up separately so that you can abstain or. Or whatever for. Meetings that you weren't present. That's fine. And I would just ask that members who have changes to minutes, please send me the wording because I don't think I'm capturing. All of the exact language. I'd appreciate that. Thank you. I'll do that. Okay. Okay. That's pretty easy, but I can do that too. So why don't we take it as two separate motions. Let's just vote on them because it'll go quick with the small number of members. Ready. And then I think that. We're probably ready to adjourn. So I'm going to move to adopt the. To accept the minutes. For February 1st and February 15, 2024. As presented. Second. The motion made and seconded. So. We'll start with counselor lord. Lord I. And. Counselor Hegner. I. And. I. I. I. And I'm an eye and. I. So it's unanimous and then. The second. Is to. Accept the minutes of. March. 14, 2024. As amended. Second. The motion and seconded. To accept the minutes of the meeting. So I'm going to move to the second motion. Just real quickly. Bob Hegner. I. And. Councilor Lord. And. And. I'm an eye. Okay. So. We have two separate motions. We've taken care of all of the minutes. Is there anything else we need to do? I don't think so. But. I think our new practices. Somebody needs to make a motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. Okay. Motion made second. And. Castle Lord. Lord. I. I. Counselor Hegner. I. I. I. I'm an eye and council top. I. It's. Yeah. We are adjourned. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. of us. We are adjourned. Thank you very much. Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you.