Portland Committee Backs Forest Avenue Redesign, Red Light Camera Push

[0:01] Troy Moon: All right, are you ready to go, Councillor? [0:05] Regina Phillips: Well, good evening, everybody. My name is Councillor Regina Phillips. I represent District 3, and I'm the chair of the Sustainability and Transportation Committee meeting of the Portland City Council. We appreciate all of you being here. We're going to go ahead and start with introductions. First, I'll have my fellow councillors introduce themselves, and then I'm going to turn it over to Troy to navigate introducing all those folks from the city. And then we'll go ahead and stop with the agenda. Go ahead, Councilor. Oh, did Mike has a hand up? He put it down. [0:40] Anna Bullett: He put it down? Okay. All right. Council Bullitt. Good evening, everyone. Thanks so much for being here. My name is Anna Bullett. I represent District 4 and I'm a member of this committee. [0:52] Regina Phillips: Troy, I'm going to turn it over to you so that you can maneuver through city staff. [0:57] Troy Moon: Great. I'll start. Thank you, Councilor. I'm Troy Moon. I'm the director of sustainability for the city and the staff liaison for the sustainability and transportation committee and I'm going to pass it over to our new team member Zoe who can then [1:10] Zoe Coleman: select the next person go ahead Zoe hi everyone my name is Zoe Coleman and I'm the new sustainability associate working alongside Troy and I will pass it over to Greg Jordan thank you Zoe and welcome [1:23] Greg Jordan: Greg Jordan assistant city manager I'll pass it over to Kevin hi everyone Kevin Craft I'm the [1:29] Bruce Hyman: director of planning urban development I'm going to pass it to Bruce good evening I'm Bruce Hyman the transportation program manager in the planning and urban development department I'll pass it off [1:40] Jeremiah Bartlett: to Jeremiah hello Jeremiah Bartlett transportation systems engineer with the department of public works and I'll pass it over to Mike Murray good evening Mike Murray director of public works and [1:56] Tony Warkus: And yes, I raised my hand by mistake, but I'll pass it over to Tony Warkus at this point. Good evening. I'm Tony Warkus. I'm the Parking Division Director, and I will pass it to Nell. [2:08] Nell Donaldson: Hi, I'm Nell Donaldson. I work in the Planning Department as well. I will pass it to Zach Leonard. [2:15] Zachary Lenhardt: I feel like a little bit like I'm getting picked last, that playground here. My name is Zachary Lenhardt. I'm the Licensing and Housing Safety Manager in the Permanent Inspections Department. [2:26] Troy Moon: And we do have some guests, and I'll pass it over to Lauren and Bruce. [2:33] Lauren Fleming: I'm Lauren Fleming, Engineering Program Manager at the Maine Turnpike Authority. [2:38] Bruce Van Note: Hi, I'm Bruce Van Notte. I'm a Senior Executive for Community Engagement at the Turnpike. [2:44] Regina Phillips: Terrific. Thank you. [2:45] Troy Moon: And we'll say Councilor Lee has joined us. Councilor Phillips? [2:48] Regina Phillips: Thank you for that, Director. Hey, good evening, Councilor. We just did a round of introductions. Would you like to introduce yourself? [2:58] Pious Ali: Yes. Hello, everyone. My name is Pius Ali. I am a counselor at large and a member of this committee. [3:08] Regina Phillips: Thank you. Thank you, everyone. You're welcome. Thank you for joining us. So we're going to we have a heavy agenda tonight and we're going to get right to it. But before we get to the agenda, I just want to acknowledge that it's been a very difficult week for not only the citizens of Portland and the city staff, but for several families. One, several in particular, I think everybody at this point knows about the fatality and the terrible accident that happened on Warnav over the weekend. And so truly our thoughts and our prayers go out to all three of those families during this very, difficult time. We will get updates through the Vision Zero policy because I know there are a lot of people that are concerned about what's happening on our streets in the city of Portland, as this has been our third fatality in the last four months. And so I know Assistant City Manager Greg Jordan will give us a real good rundown on what we're doing to truly provide some safety in the city. And we also have Director Murray here who can also just talk about some of the things that we're trying to do. So I do want to acknowledge that it has been very difficult for all of us. I also want to acknowledge the family of the young man yesterday, the nine-year-old, who also got hurt. And so our thoughts and prayers go out to that family as well. And so, excuse me, as both of these accidents are under investigation, there really isn't much more we can say about what is going on with any of those. The police department will do their investigation and I'm sure they will keep us informed as to what is happening and again I am looking forward probably just like our attendees on an update from the assistant city manager Greg Jordan on the Vision Zero policy. One last thing really quickly to let you know, Council Bullitt did reach out to me as the chair and asked that we put Vision zero policy on the agenda for every single month. We pretty much do that now. And so in my conversations with the assistant city manager, Greg Jordan, that shouldn't be a problem for us to do come for. So we'll go ahead and make sure that 's on the agenda, even if it's just a really quick update. So I think our,, our hats are heavy. And, we just want to acknowledge that for this evening and also just to try to figure out how we can get through this by giving folks an update and letting you know how hard we're all, every single one of us, how hard we're all trying to work to make all of the streets in the city of Portland safer. So with that, so with that, I'm going to go ahead and go on to our agenda. The next thing on the agenda is for us to approve the minutes of July 8. As many you know, we didn't meet in the month of August. We don't usually have committee meetings in August, and so I need a motion to approve the minutes. So moved. Second. I always get this messed up. Not first it did. But I can never remember the name. What's the name? It's not. Motion. Cheese and coat all the time. Motion by Council Bullet and seconded by Councilor Ali. We'll go ahead and take the vote to approve the minutes. Council Bullet? Yes. Councilor Ali? So please let the record show that the minutes have been approved. The next item on our agenda is the sustainability program update. And so I'm going to turn it over to Director Moon. Great. Thank you, Councillor. [7:14] Troy Moon: Just to be brief, we have a few updates we wanted to mention. So one of the major things we've done since the last meeting is we've launched our Grow Wild program, which we're encouraging Portland residents, whether they be an urban dweller or someone who lives in a place with a yard, to plant native plants. We want to restore habitat to the urban environment so we can support insects and birds and other wildlife, kind of like a homegrown national park approach. So we've done a bunch of things. We kicked it off with a webinar with Maine Audubon. We are having a film in collaboration with the Friends of Congress Square on October 9th. We hope people can come join that. We have a great panel after the film to learn about the importance of native plants. If you go to our website at portlandmain.gov grow wild, you can learn more and join the community, online community, when we'll be providing a lot of resources to help people learn more about growing native plants. More coming on that for sure. We've also had our last coffee and climate, which was about and timely because energy costs are rising, so it's energy efficiency resources for homeowners, so some tips people can learn to reduce their energy costs. Let's see, our next Coffee and Climate will be focused on Grow Wild. That will be on October 9th. We held a really great workshop on Great Diamond Island back in August focused on waterfront resilience and how we can protect the shoreline through proper land care and proper land management that reduces erosion. We had representatives from all of our Casco Bay Islands, including Long Island and Shebeag Island, as well as some other coastal communities in greater Portland. We had great workshops with Anne Machado talking about how to do zoning on the shoreline. We had folks from Maine Geological Survey and the DEP just, like, helping educate homeowners and property owners about taking care of their property to protect the shore. We have a few programs coming up before the next meeting. We are having a waterfront summit on September 30th. We'll make sure that all the counselors get an invitation to that. It's on September 30th. We'll have a panel discussion with Matt from planning department will be there talking about the comp plan and how that waterfront stakeholders can engage in that process. So we're going to have a really interesting presentation from Libby Bischoff, who's the director of the Osher map library, and she'll be talking about the history of the waterfront from pre-colonial time to now through maps, which would be very interesting to see the how waterfronts developed over time and then how that might, you know, implications of that as we think about sea level rise. And let's see, I think that's covers a lot of ground. I'll leave it there, but we'll make sure that the counselors know about the important stakeholder events on the waterfront in case you [10:12] Regina Phillips: want to participate in that. Thank you director, appreciate that report. Any questions from counselors? No, I don't see any. Thanks again, Director, for that thorough report. We really appreciate it. We're now going to go on to the next agenda item, and that is a rental golf cart report on Peaks Island. So I'm going to turn this over to Zach. [10:44] Zachary Lenhardt: No? Yeah, sure. Is it Zachary or Zach, should I call? Everyone, because Zach is fine. Yeah, so I'm here to answer any questions on the rental golf cart report. The ordinance kind of states that the Sustainability and Transportation Committee will review an annual report. And so this is the report right now. The manager's rules state the cap on rental carts on Peaks Island is 45. The report you see is the 45 carts that are rented and registered. And I'm here to answer any questions. [11:33] Regina Phillips: Thank you very much for that. Any questions from anybody? Just so the public knows, this is a communication. And so therefore, we don't take public comment on this because it's basically an update and a report regarding the golf carts. But given that, does any counselors have any questions for Zachary? Seeing none, I think that we are all set. Thank you for the report. Have a nice evening. Yeah, thanks. The next thing on our agenda is to talk about the Forest Avenue redesign project. And I'm going to turn that over to Kevin Kraft. This is something that we will take public comment on, but we'll let Director Kraft give his comments and review the project, and then we'll take public comment. [12:31] Bruce Hyman: Great. Thank you, Councillor Phillips. I'm actually going to turn it over to our Transportation Program Manager, Bruce Hyman, who's going to walk you through a presentation. Thanks. [12:40] Regina Phillips: Thank you. It's all yours, Bruce. [12:43] Bruce Hyman: Thanks. I'm going to try and navigate this Zoom world, so please bear with me for a moment. I'm not doing it successfully. I'm going to try again real quickly. It's all right, Bruce. I didn't know how to make it. There we go. All right. Is that working well? [13:38] Troy Moon: Yeah, we see it fine. Thank you, Bruce. [13:40] Bruce Hyman: Thank you very much, and thanks for bearing with me. I'm pleased to present the project background and demonstration phase street design. the Forest Avenue redesign project. The project study area extends from exit 6 Bedford-Baxter streets to Woodford's Corner. The study phase began in August 2023 and was completed in February 2025 with the final report. Since then, we've worked through translating the recommended concept coming out of the study into a demonstration phase design, which I'll present to you tonight. The purpose and need for the project is really kind of the north star of a project, against which we gauge whether we were successful at the end of the project, whether we've accomplished the goal. It reinforces and reflects the city's Vision Zero commitment as well as the Complete Streets Policy. This section of Forest Avenue is identified for its high crash, high injury rates in the region's Vision Zero plan. For the five years preceding the study, there were over 500 crashes, with nine pedestrian involved crashes all resulting in injuries, and 10 bicycle crashes, with nine of those 10 resulting in injuries, just over 20 percent, by contrast, of the vehicle on vehicle crashes resulted in injuries. The current design with four lanes of traffic has a much higher risk of crashes, as long distances between pedestrian crossings, and as a gap in the bike lane network that are present in much of the rest of Forest Avenue elsewhere. Similar to our current Franklin Street effort, there were two prior planning studies, including this section of Forest Avenue. A key change since those two studies were completed is that the peak hour traffic fell by approximately 20% since that 2018 Smart Corridor study, the study that's shown on the right, which really affected the feasibility of a road diet option, which we'll be describing a little bit more. That 2018 study, before there was the reduction in peak hour traffic, ended with a hybrid or a partial road diet, for instance, that really wasn't able to accomplish as much of the, wouldn't have been able to accomplish as much of the safety benefits that we expect from the current design. main takeaways from the studies remain fairly consistent across the three studies for instance residents living nearby on either side of forest avenue see it as a barrier many say they avoided they avoid forest avenue and its businesses altogether and or drove what was otherwise an easy walking distance because of safety concerns the forest avenue redesign study developed eight evaluation criteria against which different design options were rated it. Survey results from our public engagement process, which included a November 2024 public event, show that three of those eight criteria were rated as the most important by those that took the survey as well as attended the public meeting. Safety and then walking and biking environment, improving those and the safety for those were the primary, were the most important criteria. As to the four design options that were considered of the road diet options with bike lanes were strongly preferred, which is shown in the bottom right corner. Two stakeholder meetings were held with pedestrian bicycle advocates and business owners this past spring to review and receive feedback on the draft street design. We evaluated four alternative street concepts against the eight criteria. The recommended street concept that is being advanced in the demonstration phase street design includes a road diet from four lanes to three, buffered bike lanes, and consolidates parking to one side of the street. The ratings for each of the eight evaluation criteria for the recommended concept are shown on the right. All of them are high to medium in terms of rated, in terms of accomplishing as set forth in the evaluation criteria. Implementation of a lane reduction or road diet on a significant regional street like Forest Avenue requires careful consideration. Consideration. Because of the lane reduction and other changes, Maine DOT has requested that the proposed redesign be tested through a demonstration project phase that includes an evaluation to assess the design's effectiveness before it's made more permanent. This recommended street concept does include all of those features that I described before, road diet, buffered bike lanes, parking on one side of the street and new and enhanced pedestrian crossings. The city will continue to coordinate with Maine DOT and PACS on a final implementation for the demonstration project. The following slides focus on details of the proposed demonstration phase design. A road diet from four lanes to three has many safety benefits for all modes. They have been proven to reduce speeding and weaving or changing lanes to pass other vehicles. Pedestrians gain by having to cross only a single lane of traffic in each direction, eliminating the so-called double threat that pedestrians face when they're crossing a two-lane street. And pedestrian refuge islands can be created within the center turn lane area. Typical crash reduction of road diets are 38% crashes overall and an overall 60% reduction in fatal and serious injury crashes of all types. That's one of the main focuses of our Vision Zero plan. The buffered bike lanes in the street concept close a gap in the bikeway network on Forest Avenue. The design provides bike lane buffers next to on-street parking and the traffic lanes. The configuration provides advantages for year-round maintenance and usability. In terms of on-street parking, the design consolidates the on-street parking to one side of the street and retains a large percentage of the overall existing supply. The design looks to retain the parking supply to the extent practicable, considering parking use that was documented during the study phase. In response to comments received at the Business Stakeholders Meeting, we took another look for opportunities to retain more parking than presented in the draft plan presented to them. In that process, 16 on-street parking spaces were added into the plan. We also found opportunities for new or reconfigured parking near Forest Avenue on side streets. Currently, there's 140 existing on-street spaces on Forest Avenue, from Woodford Street, Deering Avenue, to Bedford Baxter. 117 are proposed in the design, 83% of the existing total. At the north end, Woodford Street to Dartmouth, there are 68 existing spaces, with 48 proposed in the design, or 70%. At the south end, Dartmouth Street to Bedford-Baxter, there are 72 existing spaces, with 69 in the design, retaining 96% of the parking in that stretch. As shown in the drawing, the parking does transition from the side of the street several times to be responsive to the demand that we documented during the study, and also to remain larger segments of parking that do exist on Forest Avenue. With regards to pedestrian crossings, the design enhances two existing crosswalks at unsignalized intersections and adds two more. It also adds a fourth crosswalk at the Ashmont-Belmont signalized intersection. The two new crosswalks are located at Noy Street and at Deerfield Street. These new and enhanced crosswalks will provide safer and better access to businesses that don't have off-street parking or on-street parking along their frontage in the design, and to better access to parking on side streets. Right now, I'm going to run through four sheets that provide a snapshot of the demonstration phase design plans. To orient you to the plans, the proposed on-street parking locations are showed in yellow with the numbers there indicating the number of parking spaces. The bike lanes are shaded in green for illustrative purposes with conflict zone pavement markings that are proposed to be added across intersections. Those would be actually marked on the pavement. Bus stops are shown in red and are better defined than they currently are and would be marked as such. The yellow and hollow circles within the diagram are proposed to be vertical flex posts to primarily define islands in the center turn lane and refuge islands, and also some locations with the bike lane buffers. The top left in this first of four drawings starts at Revere Street, the northern end of the road diet. Along the bottom, the design is shown to the Ashmont-Belmont intersection at the bottom right. The rest of the plans progress similarly. In this part of the project, parking remains essentially the same from Arlington Street to Woodford Street. Bike lane buffers are included next to on-street parking and also the general-purpose traffic lanes. As mentioned before, there are transitions from side to side of the street where parking is proposed. The two existing crosswalks at Arlington and Coyle Streets get refuge islands and pedestrian-activated rectangular rapid flashing beacons, or RRFBs. From Ashmont-Belmont, now at the top left, to William Street-Forest Avenue on the bottom right, the design follows a similar template. A new pedestrian crossing and refuge island with RRFBs is added at Noyes Street, approximately having the existing current 850 feet between pedestrian crossings now. A good rule of thumb is that you don't want pedestrian crossings greater than 400 feet away, so we're getting within that target range at this location and subsequent locations that you'll see. For the section from Forest Avenue Plaza to Oakhurst Dairy, on the bottom right, the Forest Avenue Plaza now at the top left. The second new crosswalk is proposed near Deerfield Street, reducing the current distance approximately 800 feet between crosswalks from William Street to Fountain with Preble Street. You see center turn lanes, you see the bike lanes, you see the transitions between the locations of on-street parking within these diagrams, and I'll move to the last drawing. From Oakhurst area to Falmouth Preble, the road diet begins in the northbound direction, dropping from four lanes to three lanes. The exit six vicinity remains generally unchanged. I'll be able to come back to these drawings, hopefully, if I can navigate the sharing again. For next steps, tonight we're seeking the committee's endorsement of the demonstration phase street design to show support to Maine DOT for advancing and implementing this demonstration phase. Other steps include finalizing the implementation plan with PACS and DOT, implementing the demonstration project and going through the evaluation and assessment phases, and then move on to a second phase should the demonstration prove to be successful to make permanent the safety improvements that the that the design includes. So with that, I'm going to stop sharing my screen and come back to you all and look for questions from counselors and then anticipate public comment. [26:42] Regina Phillips: Bruce, thank you so much for that. That was very, clear. I love the diagrams. You did a great job counselors any questions before we take public comment oh let's do i'm included with public comment first counselor ali does that work for you yeah okay so we will take public comment on the forest every design project and so if you have any questions raise your hand and what we'll do oh see i just did a mike murray let me lower my hand sorry mike if you have any questions oh i'd see that we do have several questions so just [27:34] Anna Bullett: a reminder to the public that you'll have three minutes just like as if we were in city hall and we have troy and zoe who will help us keep track so are you ready counselor for a couple [27:45] Bruce Van Note: of comment go ahead and transfer the first person thank you our first person is julie [27:53] Regina Phillips: Good evening, Julie. Go ahead with your comment, please. [27:56] Speaker P (unidentified): Hi, good evening, and thank you for the opportunity to speak on this. And I apologize, my five-year-old is participating as well. I just wanted to express strong support for this plan. It has moved a lot since it came to, you know, Friends of Woodford's Corners, Active Transportation Committee, and the community. And I thank you so much for your hard work on this. I just wanted to note, and this is from my professionally a planner in another municipality, but I have many years of street advocacy and used to work for New York City DOT. RFBs are great, but they're only as good as the humans driving the cars who see the bright yellow lights and stop. So I would say, and this is in tandem with the Vision Zero, on the next agenda item is just strong support for lowering the speed limit so the humans have more time to react to the RFBs, as well as considering support for speed enforcement and a ban on red light turns, because that has been one of the biggest factors in either turning conflicts. And I think this plan is great and certainly helps with those conflict zone. And I look forward to biking to Girl Scouts right above Batco Books once these improvements are made. So thank you so much. Thanks, Julie. [29:13] Troy Moon: Next, we have Margaret. [29:17] Regina Phillips: Good evening, Margaret. Go ahead. [29:20] Nell Donaldson: One, thank you. I appreciate all the efforts to make our streets safer. A couple of very quick comments, especially any reduction in parking, and particularly where you're going from one side of Forest Ave to the other, I would like to strongly encourage, not just for this project, but all projects, considering adding the percentage of handicapped spots. I know just from when I had handicap on either side of 2017 hip replacement and the past two years when I've needed handicap parking, it has gotten harder. I also know that after the second time it took me three trips through Woodford's Corner and I still couldn't park on the right side to go to Big Sky, I told my shut-in friend that she's going to have to eat bread from Rosemont because I wasn't going to try to park it, you know. And despite the fact I'm driving through Woodford's Corner. The other thing which actually probably impacts not just this, but everybody, if Woodford Street becomes more bike friendly, I think it's critical not to adjust driver speeding, ignoring red lights and stop signs. But bicyclists, I have found, are actually worse. A couple of Sundays ago, between the Baxter-Vanna interchange and the Vanna-Clifton interchange, I had five of five bicyclists run the lights. lights. Two of them passed me when I was the next car to go. One passed me on the left correctly before making a right in front of my car, just as the light was turning green. The other one that passed me at the, at the Vanna Clifton passed me on the right again, just as I was starting to go. And in both cases, neither of them were six feet in my car, and all I could do is, you know, wait. But I think bicyclists doing, and I'm also complaining, and as I said, this is certainly not directed to this design plan in general, but I think anything that makes, and I am in favor of making it a more bicycle-friendly city. But I think anything that does also has to consider the importance of educating our bicyclists into obeying the traffic signs. I mean, I was hit years ago when I was very mobile in an intersection because I made the mistake as a pedestrian of not assuming a bicyclist would stop at a light, and they didn't. I have also been t-boned at an intersection by a bicyclist that did not honor the right of way. So, anyway, thank you very much and I appreciate your work. [32:21] Regina Phillips: Thank you very much for your comments. Troy, Director, I'm noticing that Councilor Pelletier is on the attendee side. Have we, Councilor, thank you. [32:34] Troy Moon: Thank you thank you very much and up next for speaking is Miles. [32:43] Regina Phillips: Good evening Mr. Smith would you like to give your comment yeah thanks counselors. [32:51] Christian Milne: Thanks for having us also want to strong strongly endorse this project the design is good it is a clear big step in the right direction I live right off of Forest Avenue I'm terrified to let my kids cross the end of the street to go to the store by themselves because of the four lanes of traffic and the blindside for the oncoming cars. So this is a clear improvement. I think it will save lives. It will reduce injuries. I'm glad you are pushing it. And I continue to be disappointed that we cannot get the lane widths reduced to the specifications of the National Association of City Transportation Officials for urban areas. Maine DOT seems to insist that these lanes be wider than they need to be, which promotes faster speeds than we need to have. And I continue to be disappointed that we cannot get this lane reduction to go under 295, where we're seeing extremely fast speeds. It's very dangerous to walk or bike from the peninsula to off peninsula through that area it's one of the few places where you can do it 's six lanes wide that's ridiculous it's absolutely unnecessary and i hope that this demonstration project shows that this can work that we need to do more of this that we can do it without years-long processes to get them approved but my big message is that i think you guys have done a good job and I'm very happy about it. I also hope that in the future iteration that we can widen the sidewalks, put in some more street trees, maybe put in protected bike lanes just to make the street a lot calmer experience. But I know that 's the bigger spend and that this is the demonstration. So I have high hopes that we will demonstrate that this can work in Portland. So thank you to Bruce and the whole team for their hard work on this. I do have two questions. One is, will the speed limit be reduced to 25 miles an hour when this demonstration project happens? And two would be the parking areas. Are you going to delineate with paint individual parking spaces? Because we know that helps to maximize the actual use of space, the efficient use of space. Those would be my two big questions. [35:14] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Mr. Smith. As you know, when we give public comment, we typically don't answer questions, but I'm sure at the end of public comment, we can probably have Bruce answer those two questions for you. Our next person is Liz Trice. Good evening, Liz. [35:34] Liz Trice: Hi. Thank you for having me. Yeah, I've been really upset about the recent pedestrian deaths, especially the children. And this fits into a lot of other things I've been thinking about. Namely, that I think the number one thing we need to do in our city for all purposes, economic development, housing, affordability, equity, everything, is completely redesign how we think about our roads. [36:00] Regina Phillips: Liz, I'm so sorry. I appreciate your comments. We're taking public comment on the Forest Avenue redesign. Absolutely. Absolutely. [36:10] Liz Trice: So I agree with Miles that we need to be reducing the lane width, that we need to be getting down to 20 miles an hour. The difference between 20 miles an hour versus 25 miles an hour increases a 30% chance of death if a person is hit by a car. Also, something I didn't see in this design is tree coverage. We're trying to get to canopy. We have this tree process going and we know now that tree planning for tree canopy needs to happen when the road is being redesigned. So when I saw this design, I was like, I don't see the trees. And honestly, the best place to put the trees and are slowing down the traffic and also to provide enough space underground is where those center lane turn lanes are. We see in Brighton Avenue those lanes are usually empty, and then people go faster because they perceive that they have separation from anything that would make them slow down. So my suggestion is to plant, plan for mature trees, both under the ground and over the ground in those middle turn lanes instead, and only have bits of middle turn lanes where you need them. You can alternate them with trees and all, because often the wires, overhead wires are like over where the bike lanes or the sidewalks are. So it's harder to do street trees there. And they don't have as much room to spread out in terms of canopy. I was very happy to see the expanded bike lanes and also the more frequent crosswalks. And also I will say that I believe that building really good roads is going to allow us to build more housing because people will want to live next to them as opposed to need to live 20 minutes out of town where they want to speed into town then. If we build great roads, families will be happy to live in a fourth floor apartment with a balcony facing the road because they'll be looking at trees and their kids will be able to bike the two miles to school. So it's really hits a lot of angles and it's not just, and it hits our water collection. It's everything. So these roads, we need to be thinking about everything that matters to the city as we design them. Thank you. [38:12] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Ms. Trice. We have next Portland resident. Go ahead. [38:19] Jim Hamilton: Hey, how's it going? So I just want to make sure, you know, I'm jumping into this kind of late, but I live off of Forest Ave myself, and I actually own a business on Forest Ave as well. But I want to make sure it's obviously being done sensibly. Obviously, safety is first and foremost, and anything that's going to make it more safe, I am 100% for. But something that I'd like to bring to your attention that I've been, you know, knowing this, it makes me wonder how many other situations are similar is, you know, on, early March, there was footage in front of my business of one of the fatalities. And that fatality was actually, it was a mental health crisis. The person wanted to be hit, you know, they were actually laying in the road. So I definitely want to make sure that there's, you know, there's not similar things that are happening and we're tallying up people they're you know maybe doing things that there's nothing that could prevent those accidents i think there's a lot of i just asked you a question do [39:33] Regina Phillips: you do you have anything to add about the forest staff redesign do you have a do you have [39:37] Jim Hamilton: a comment about that because that's well yeah i want you to take this into consideration about for the forest staff redesign exactly yeah i guess i just want you to take into consideration maybe not slowing down traffic too much because I live down Forest Ave and it's already quite difficult to deal with as all of you know so I guess I would say I just want to make sure that it's it's not slowing down traffic too much if there's a lot of these situations that are maybe there's more than the public knows about like the situation I have on camera [40:13] Regina Phillips: room and that's all thank you very much i see we also have a handout from jory brunel go ahead mr brunel [40:27] Speaker T (unidentified): hello can you hear me now yes we can great sorry i'm i'm ironically in my car right now just a quick thing we didn't get the name of the previous caller as is customary but so i like miles is i'm in support of this project i think it's a big leap forward. I think we need to be doing more to prevent pedestrian and cyclist injuries and deaths in Portland across the board, especially on these highways that go through basically our downtown. I do want to call attention to two little things. I'm going to get in the details here as I want to do. I apologize. One is that there was mention of the flashing lights for pedestrians. It's sort of been a fad in the last 30, 40 years in the United States that, you know, adding more flashing lights and gadgets can help make things safer. And while that may be true, I strongly suspect it is more effective and cheaper in terms of maintenance to apply some pavement and concrete to the problem, to structurally make the streets more safe, instead of relying on drivers' good judgments. I go down to Boston pretty frequently for work, and so I walk from the West End to the train station, and there are a couple of those flashing crossings over 295 off-ramps on the way, and I can't tell you how many times people just blow right through them, and they just ignore them completely and go 50 miles an hour on that stretch of road. So that's one thing. And then secondly, about someone mentioned bicyclists and bicyclists being part of traffic and needing to be educated on good traffic laws. In other countries and other places, they have fully separated bike lanes so that bicyclists can traffic rarely share space and rarely can get into those sorts of situations. Again, that's a solution of just pavement and concrete. So I would just encourage more focus on those two solutions going forward. But again, I am fully in support of this plan. [42:40] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Mr. Pernaut. Anyone else wishing to... I did it again. [Troy Moon: Yeah, Mr. Craddock.] Oh, sorry. Mr. Craddock, go ahead. Hey, thanks. Can you hear me? Yep. [42:56] Speaker U (unidentified): Great. I'm going to nod. I'm just calling. I live off of forest, between Woodford's and morals. I, bike around the city a lot, commuting exercise. My son does 14. so I guess we're both experienced bicyclists, although it's always a chore to get him to wear a helmet. but he does, and we, always avoid forest, cause it's just, even for experienced bicyclists, it's just, It's not a great and safe ride. I mean, particularly if we're going downtown from Woodford's down to the Cloverleaf and the Peninsula. I think the work that's been done so far is great. Going from four to three lanes, seconding miles. It'd be great to have the travel lanes be more towards 10 feet. versus 11 the bike lanes i guess second thing joey separated bike lanes for safety for experienced bicyclists for kids on bikes you know with a kid a child on a on a buffered bike lane they're riding next to you know he's my son will be biking next to a car that ostensibly would be going 30 miles an hour but i mean realistically we know everybody drives much, faster on forests than 30, you know, 40 plus. So I think protected bike lanes would be good. But I think this is a start. This demonstration is a start to really show what can be done and to build on. So I absolutely support it as well. [44:40] Regina Phillips: Terrific. Thank you so much for your comments. I think we have next is Christian Milnell. I might have spelled that wrong. Sorry about that. [44:50] Christian Milne: That's close enough. Thanks, Councillor Phillips. Christian Milneal, I'm an East Bayside resident. I'm also the parent of two young kids. Also just wanted to weigh in and thank the city for working on this design and bringing Maine DOT on board, strongly in favor of this plan. And I'm hopeful that it can lead to safety improvements the way we've seen similar road diets work on Outer Congress Street and Outer Washington and Outer Brighton Avenue over the past two decades. This is sort of, you know, this is a the four lane cross section is a known hazard. It's a high risk design. It's become like sort of a discredited design, sort of a relic of the 20th century. And Forest Avenue is one of the last places in the city where we still have it. So appreciate, you know, the city's efforts in making us safer. Also, you know, I think I'll just mention there are lots of businesses along Forest Avenue that I patronize and I would definitely, the four lane configuration is a huge barrier. I definitely go places along Forest Avenue less than I would just because it feels so unsafe to cross the street when I'm riding the bus there or taking my kids on the back of our bike. Like, my kids used to go to Casco Bay Movers, and to be honest, we stopped going just because it felt so risky every time I had to pick up or drop them off on that block. One final point I just want to make is that, you know, one of the only other streets we have this four-lane dangerous design in Portland is on Franklin Street. And the city's draft design that came out last week actually proposes to widen Franklin Street between Cumberland and Congress to a five-lane cross-section, and we know that's [46:36] Regina Phillips: going to be dangerous. Christian, we're only taking public comment on the Forest Street. [46:42] Christian Milne: This is related, if you'll just bear with me. Sure, okay. Yeah, so I just wanted to encourage the council to consider that if this three-lane design is going to work on Forest Ave, it would also work on Franklin Street, and I think the city should advocate for that. Thank you. [46:57] Regina Phillips: Thank you. Thank you. Jamie Parker. [47:09] Jamie Parker: Hi, thanks. Jamie Parker with Portland Trails. I too, you know, want to support the plan and appreciate the work that's gone into it. Portland Trails has been, you know, following this closely, and it's definitely a step in the right direction. And a couple things I like about it, that we like about it, is one, that it's a demonstration project and it can happen quickly and relatively cheaply. And so I think, I hope this will, you know, we've been doing a few more of these around town, but I hope this will be, you know, evidence that we can, that we can do things, sort of test them out and do them on a much quicker timeline than a lot of our big projects. So I think that's one of the great things about this, is that we can hopefully see this implemented fairly quickly. And we need, you know, because we need fast action right now in light of the recent deaths and the uptick in, you know, injuries and crashes, you know, this type of something that we can implement on the sooner side is obviously preferable. One of my, you know, smaller detail, we had talked in an earlier meeting about this, about the concept of sort of a rumble strip at the edge of the bicycle lane, because when it's just paint, it's not obviously physical protection. And for a lot of cyclists, a lot of people aren't going to feel comfortable with paint. And the concept of sort of a rumble strip ground into the pavement along that buffer line would alert drivers if they depart from the lane and veer into the bike lane. So just wondering if that concept was explored at all, if it's still being considered, or just thrown in a pitch for that. But thank you for all the work and look forward to seeing this on the ground. [49:04] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Mr. Parker. Anyone else looking to make public comment? I don't think I saw anybody else's hand up. Anyone else at all? Oh, terrific. At this point in time, public comment is closed. We appreciate all of the comments that we received. Before we go any further, I do want to acknowledge Councilor Michniewicz. Somehow she snuck in and I did not see her. So, Councilor Michniewicz, would you like to introduce yourselves? And then I'll have Councilor Pelletier introduce himself. [49:39] Sarah Michniewicz: Yes, thank you, Chair. Councilor Sarah Michniewicz, District 1. Just sitting in and thanks for having the conversation. [49:46] Regina Phillips: Yeah. Well, thank you for joining us. Councilor Pelletier? [49:53] Wesley Pelletier: Sorry, Councilor Pelletier, District 2. Thank you all. Go ahead. [50:01] Regina Phillips: Thank you for joining us as well, Councilor. We really appreciate it. And so now, Bruce, are you comfortable with answering the two questions that Mr. Smith asked? [50:16] Bruce Hyman: Yes, I think the first one was related to speed limit and the second one was marking on street parking spaces. So we have had discussions with the main DOT throughout the project generally about speed limits. That's going to be one of the kind of measures of effectiveness as part of the demonstration. We do data collection before in terms of documenting the crash data before, collecting average speed data, pedestrian conflicts. So as part of that evaluation phase, kind of a before and after, we'll compare all of those before metrics to the after and speed will be one of those things. In terms of DOT and setting speed limits, somewhat a little archaic in terms of mimicking the speeds that are out there now in terms of a consideration, not the defining aspect of setting the current speed limit. But if we can demonstrate that the road diet does have effect on lowering speeds, then we will have a much better chance of getting the speed limit reduced from its current 30-mile-per-hour speed limit than it is for much of the stretch of Forest Avenue. The second one is marking parking spaces. spaces. As part of a demonstration project, it hasn't been part of the plan currently. That might be something that we could do, kind of mark some of the spaces, not mark some of the other spaces and test out whether they're making more efficient use of the space or not. So we can certainly consider something of that. But typically, as a demonstration project, we would not be doing that sort of thing as part of the project. I think that was, [52:27] Regina Phillips: was there another? I think that was it. Yeah. Thanks a lot, Bruce. Kevin, did you have anything to add or you're good. Okay, great. any questions from, counselors, [52:42] Anna Bullett: council bullet. first I want to acknowledge all the public that is here tonight. 25 attendees is pretty good for a committee meeting for us. So thanks so much for taking the time. this is where a lot of the work happens. And so this is a really great place to be, for the public. And it's so great to hear so many passionate, people talk about this important subject. So Bruce, awesome job. I love the presentation. I'm going to screenshot it later and I'll share it on my socials because the public loves to see these technical documents. I want to highlight the comment about street trees. I agree that if there's any way to eke out any more street trees, like I'll help write the grant, like whatever it takes. But I do think that makes a huge difference. And then I had a question about, all right, again, I'm not a traffic engineer, I just want to be one when I grow up, but buffered bike lanes, the cast in place concrete, I heard Jamie Parker mention rumble strips, and like I want to take it one step further. I was recently in Brooklyn, and they have much more in the neighborhood I was in with like Gowanus. They've put these, I don't know what they are, but I think they might be this, the buffered bike lane, and it just seemed a lot safer, you know. I'm someone that bikes with my kid, and even Ocean Ave scares me even though there's a bike lane because the cars are right there. I would never ride with him on Forest even if there was a bike lane, ever, like I won't do it. And so I do wonder if there's any way to add in any separation, and just, I guess, wondering if buffered bike lanes, cast in place concrete barriers, if this could be part of this demonstration project, because they get like poured on top of the street, right, it's not like we're putting up some huge barrier. All right, I'll stop talking, I [54:27] Regina Phillips: don't know who wants to take that. Bruce, I don't know, we [54:32] Bruce Hyman: can certainly, that hasn't been part of our, the palette that we've been looking at for the demonstration project so far. I mentioned in the, on our next step slides that when should the road diet prove successful in terms of the three-lane section working, the bike lanes and the pedestrian crossings and such. We'll be looking at a subsequent phase that would harden the features of many aspects of the project, the refuge islands, curb extensions, changing curb alignments. And my sense is that some of those hardening features as part of the bike lane improvements might be part of that. There are some, maybe less, but there are some other things in a, in a bike lane buffering palette that we might be able to consider as part of the demonstration phase, and we will take a look at that. So yeah, and I would just add, I think we certainly would agree and recognize the comments we heard from the public. I think looking at this as a demonstration project and trying to get something into place is really important here in terms of the limited budget we have, but we have been taking those advances in other more substantial projects like Libby Town and Franklin Street, where we are showing those kind of grade-separated hardened infrastructure cycle tracks. And I think this is an area where it would certainly warrant that. And I think, as Bruce mentioned, getting that data collected and seeking that funding to advance a more significant project in the future is something we'd be certainly looking at. [56:16] Regina Phillips: Councilor Bullett, any other questions? Councilor Pelletier? [56:22] Wesley Pelletier: Sorry if my camera is on while this is in my pocket. Yeah, I would basically just say the exact same thing as Councilor Bullett. And really, you know, looking for the second phase of this, like really getting separated, hardened bike lanes, I think is something we really need to start doing. It would have saved a life very recently, so would really push for that. And but outside of that, I'm very happy with where this is and I'm very excited to make forest have a little less nightmarish. Thank [57:00] Regina Phillips: you counselor any other questions regarding this i'm just going to make a comment i'm going to highlight the woman who spoke about handicap accessible parking spots. I recently had a conversation with Director Murray and I think Assistant City Manager Greg Jordan. We just don't have enough handicap spots, especially those that with folks who have a van where you have to, you know, you have a wheelchair. And so I'm just going to blanket, put it out there that I really do. I'm glad that she brought it up because it is a concern and we should continue to have conversations about it. I'm not saying to try to add it to force that. Maybe we can. I don't know. But I'm just saying across the city, I just think we really need to look more closely at handicapped spots. And I know that to some degree, we don't have a say on that. I'm still confused on what's the local and the state and the business owners' responsibility of that regarding parking spaces. faces. But again, I think that 's something that we need to take a look at. Anything else? Bruce, do you have anything else to add? Do you want to add anything else? I know there's no more questions. So anything, any last minute words? No, thank you very much for the opportunity [58:27] Bruce Hyman: and appreciate all the comments and look forward to action on the item. [58:35] Regina Phillips: Terrific. Well, again, thank you for all of your work on that. Can I get a motion to approve the forest staff redesign? And, Kevin, that's got to go to council, right? [58:49] Bruce Hyman: It will not. This will just be at the S&T committee at this stage. Okay. [58:53] Regina Phillips: So can I get a motion to approve the forest redesign? [Sarah Michniewicz: So moved. Second.] Moved by Council Bullitt, seconded by Councilor Ali. Let's go ahead and take the vote. Council Bullitt? [59:05] Anna Bullett: Yes. Councilor Ali? Yes. [59:09] Regina Phillips: And I am a yes. And so this passes. Congratulations once again, Bruce, for all your hard work on this and anybody else that had a hand in it. You're more than willing to stay for the rest of the agenda. I don't know if you're on it, but I'm more than willing to stay. And if not, we completely understand. And we hope you have a good night. Thanks so much. Moving right along to our next agenda item, we're going to be getting an update from Assistant City Manager Greg Jordan and also the possibility of taking some action on citywide speed limits and red light cameras. So I am going to turn it over to the Assistant City Manager. After he gives his presentation, we will be taking public comment on this. And then we'll get questions from the counselors. Go ahead, Assistant City Manager Jordan. [1:00:03] Greg Jordan: Thank you, Chair Phillips, and thanks to everybody for being here tonight, especially members of the public. We do appreciate it. I'm gonna share my screen here, and we do have a number of things to go through. Is that coming through? Okay, good. Okay, just to orient us a little bit, I'm going to give a brief progress report on our Vision Zero action plan work, mostly focused on some of the work that's taken place over the last quarter of time. Obviously we've been working on aspects of this since 2025 after the Council approved a resolution and sort of helped set us in this direction of pursuing our Vision Zero objectives. From there, again I'm going to highlight a couple of things from the action plan progress report that is in the packet in the agenda materials. I'm not going to cover everything that's in there, just things that have maybe a relevant update or something to note, but happy to take any questions on that document if anybody wants to dive into it. From there, we're going to go into a discussion or a continuation of a discussion on the matter of red light cameras as an enforcement tool. That was first brought to the committee back in July, and so this is a continuation of that and possible direction from the committee. And then after that, we're going to have a discussion about and hear from Jeremiah Bartlett from our Public Works Department around speed limit setting in Portland, and so we'll talk about that a little bit, and there may be an opportunity for committee direction on that as well. And also taking public comment on both of these matters. So I will start and just again giving a kind of an overview of where we are with Vision Zero and our action plan. I want to highlight the work being done by the Planning Department, which you just heard a lot of work going on as it relates to the corridor work on Forest Avenue. As you well know, they're doing amazing work to try to advance the Franklin Street reimagined Franklin Street project, as well as we're continuing to try to get the Libby Town project, which would transform Park and other Congress as well, that's awaiting a grant, a federal grant decision as we speak. So we're hopeful that is going to come forward. But I, but I want to highlight where we are with our Comprehensive Transportation Plan, again, an initiative that the Council did fund out of the 2026 CIP, again, also in response to our efforts around Vision Zero. And where we are now is we've had our consultant on board. This graphic is just giving you a sense of the timeline. We went through goal setting over the summer. They're in the middle of doing our needs assessment now. It'll proceed toward getting recommendations and hopefully a final plan by the spring of 2027, doing public engagement through all of these stages. We have a very robust stakeholder committee that's helping advise us on that, representing various aspects of the community, from transit to active transportation, bike ped advocates, ADA community and others, to make sure that we really hit all of the areas here. The importance of this plan is that it really will give us a roadmap for the projects that we need to advance over the next five or ten years. It'll help us prioritize our capital improvement program. It'll help us understand where the funding needs to come from and how much we need to allocate. It really is critical to advance our Vision Zero goals across the city. We're very aware and working very hard to make sure that we are taking as swift action as we can on things we can do now within our existing staffing capacity, within our budget capacity, and within the various governmental sort of layers that exist in terms of working with PACS, GPCOG, and of course the main Department of Transportation. So I wanted to sort of help put that in a little bit of context. Moving forward here to things that we are working on very concertedly now. One of the things you'll see in our action plan is an effort to improve what we call daylighting at intersections. This is a scenario in which you know there can be parking or other obstacles to sort of visibility for both pedestrians and automobiles automobile users near intersections. The graphic there on the right kind of gives you a sense of you got two parked cars there that limit the visibility of the oncoming vehicle, and then if those parked cars are not there that visibility widens. We have in city code a variety of requirements that call for setbacks as we call them from either crosswalks or driveways or intersections anywhere from 15 to 25 feet. We're going through our public works department is going through an effort to evaluate areas across the city where maybe we are in violation of those setback requirements. And I'm happy to report and thankful to DPW for their work in identifying ten intersections so far this year and bringing 41 non-compliant parking spaces into compliance, so improving the visibility for pedestrians and automobiles at those intersections. So a very concrete thing that we're working on and making progress on the matter of citywide street lighting this was another important issue that came out of vision zero discussions over the past year and we put into our capital improvement program for 2027 the current year, about $300,000 to complete a citywide lighting study to address areas of the city where there are corridors or segments or intersections or crosswalks that are not well lit enough. It's a complicated piece of work, and this is an effort to begin to make progress on that, and again, draft a plan for us that we can cost out and phase in over a number of years. I will say that Public Works also has recently added more streetlights to Riverside. Actually, that was back in 2025 and they're right now working on more short-range immediate efforts to quickly examine where we have very clear dark areas and areas of the city and trying to make some improvements on that within our available budget capacity. So concrete movement on this, that RFP for that work on the citywide lighting study will go out for competitive procurement in the next week. So that is moving forward. Public works also, a credit to them, working hard to expand traffic calming as best we can across the city. We had some recent announcements on the addition of speed humps to Ocean Avenue in connection with sidewalk improvements. We also had three speed humps added to the Payson Park area related to a parks project that they're working on to bring traffic calming to the interior of Payson Park. So some good work there. Also in the area of traffic calming, I'm happy that Deering Avenue along with Woodford's was recently the subject of some resurfacing and in connection with that we had a pretty, I would say, decent effort to bring speed humps to Deering Avenue along with one raised pedestrian crosswalk as well as the introduction or the improvement of ADA curb ramps across the entire corridor and as you can see from the image the various humps along with the more clear bike lanes and striping along with should help to make Deering Avenue safer than it had been before. Also want to credit public works and in particular Jeremiah Bartlett for his work on continuing to look at our traffic signal systems and bringing new technologies into that system including things that we call like leading pedestrian intervals. This basically gives pedestrians a little bit of a lead when they enter the crosswalk before the opposing movement at the intersection gets going. We're now up to, of our 126 signalized intersections across the city, about 31 now have so-called LPIs, about 26%. And he is working with a consultant as we speak to scope out and understand what it will take to get to as close to 100% at these intersections that we can in terms of either leading pedestrian intervals or even in some cases exclusion, exclusive pedestrian zones, I'm not getting that acronym right, and other treatments that give priority to the pedestrian at particular intersections. So that's moving forward also in terms of the study but also making concrete real world improvements this summer There's been some conversation around the rectangular rapid flashing beacons in the conversation tonight, and we brought a few more of those into the city in the last couple of months. Two were recently installed at these locations you see here on the screen, and then the bottom four are scheduled for installation in the next month or so. So working to make sure those are in place. Moving on to an update on traffic enforcement. Certainly enforcement is a big piece of a Vision Zero effort, and as we have talked about before, our police department staffing capacity is below where it needs to be, and we don't have enough officers to do the level of traffic enforcement that we really need across the city. However, they have been working very hard to prioritize it, and the numbers that you see here or the images you see here on the screen, left side is traffic stops by year going back to 2017 and showing the progress we made in 2025 and then year to date 2026. And so year to date 2026 in terms of traffic stops is already exceeding the number of traffic stops last year, and we project that we will be at a higher number of stops than we have been in the last six years. So thankful to the police department under the leadership of Chief Dubois to prioritize this and to figure out some innovative ways to get better traffic enforcement details out there, and we think it's having an effect on the same trend along actual citations, and you see the uptick in citations from 25 through the current year, and we project that we'll have the number of citations will be again the highest it's been in six years. So we're working hard on the enforcement side also. A key part of the Vision Zero effort is making sure that we're monitoring our trends and evaluating crashes when they do happen and getting an understanding of where the most important interventions need to be made to try to mitigate the risks that are out there. And so this is a snapshot from a report that is in your packet. It is a quarterly report that we're grateful to GPCOG helping us to create every quarter to report on the number of crashes that have happened including the serious injuries, the fatalities, some mapping to see where the high injury network is and some other trend information. So I just want to pull a few things from the current quarterly report. This is only through June of the current year, and so very mindful of the fact that we've had several crashes and fatalities in the last month or two. So that's not captured here, and so just want to make sure we note that. But on the matter of trends, we certainly see that most crashes that are causing the most serious impacts are occurring during the evening or night, about 63%, about 30 out of our 35. And I'll come to a map on this in a few minutes. 30 out of our 35 crashes in 2025 occurred on state roads, and again I'll, I'll have a graphic on that because I think there's sometimes a misunderstanding about how many roads across the city are actually under the jurisdiction of the state versus the city of Portland. In fact, only two incidents across the city were on local roads, so about 6%. Chair, I think we have someone who's got their mic on. I think it's gone. Okay. A slight majority of crashes occurred at our major intersections or intersections, 3, 4, and 5 leg, and about 31% occurred on straight roads, so a little bit in balance there, but certainly more occurring at the intersections, and so that gives us a sense of where we should be focusing. And then our most serious crashes are occurring at roads posted at 30 miles per hour or higher. Just want to note in the graphic, of course, that's not meant to be compared to 2025 as a full year, it's only covering the first two quarters of the year, and as we again, as we know, we've had some serious injuries and fatalities in the last, just to last month. Also included in that crash report in our, in your packets is again a graphic that shows what we call the high injury, high risk network along with a heat map. It's giving you an indication of where the highest risk is across the city, and here I also want to emphasize, and you can probably see that the entire network actually is on roads that are under the state's jurisdiction, so we do have to work with our partners at the state to make more serious changes there. And so that's always an effort that has to be undertaken. And just to put not too fine a point on it, this is a map I grabbed from the state of Maine database. It gives you a graphic. It illustrates the state roads across the city. And as you can see, it certainly is the major arterials, certainly the highways. The arterials, which are in red, what I might call a sort of a tier one collector like maybe I shouldn't say that 's not proper terms but the collectors are either in purple or green there and the streets that are have no highlighting or in white represent the streets that are totally under the city of Portland's control and so I think that's an important thing to keep in mind as we're talking about certainly projects where we have to partner with the state and also this will bear on the on the discussion will happen a few minutes regarding speed limits across the city. So from there I want to transition to the red light camera issue, and after I go through some comments on this, Chair, we can move the public comment on this topic or take questions from the, from the committee if you like. As I mentioned, this were, this was discussed at the committee back in July, and so we're bringing it back for further review and public comment. I'll just cover a few high points here, I won't go through the entire memo, which is also in your packets, I think it's attachment C, I think again reviewed by the committee in July. I'll just note that this technology can offset the police department staffing constraints, which I just sort of referred to. The potential effect here that your memo in the packet makes pretty clear is that it has been shown to reduce red light violations, it's been demonstrated to reduce injury crashes, fatalities, and also has what we call spillover benefits to other sort of non-equipped intersections. That basically means that when this technology is in place, it sort of creates a, for lack of a better word, a vibe that we better adhere to the red lights or the yellow lights when we see them. The research also does point to an increase in less severe rear-end crashes, and we can probably understand why that might be, but they've generally been determined to be less severe than certain and a trade-off of the more severe crashes if they're not in place. I also want to emphasize very clearly that this technology certainly will generate, I'm sure, concern over surveillance, civil liberties. I want to make clear that this kind of technology is event-driven. And so the image or the citation does not get triggered unless sensors in the pavement and on the camera are actually triggered by a vehicle being over a certain line. It is not passive surveillance. There's been a lot of discussion and reporting in the local, regional, national media about camera systems out there that are more passive surveillance that are just sort of recording all the time and are linked to sort of other databases. This is not that. So I want to make that clear. However, advancing this initiative if the committee wanted to go in this direction does have a bit of an uphill battle. This kind of technology is currently prohibited by Maine State law, and so if we wanted to move forward with this, we would need to refer it to the Legislative Nominating Committee to pursue a legislative change or possibly a pilot project. We also want to point out, if we want to go in this direction too, there will be work for us to do to have the proper supporting policies and procedures to make sure we protect civil liberties that we have accountability built into the system and that we are being responsible with its use and being transparent about its use there also do need to be you know more worked on the level of staff capacity that we have or maybe we need to add in order to implement it and also the budget capacity in terms of acquiring the technology and also operating it on a year-to-year. So those important questions are still out there to be addressed, but we felt that if there was an interest in moving this forward, the first step would be to refer to the legislative committee within the city to consider this and to consider whether it made sense for us to pursue either a carve-out in the state law or some sort of allowance of a pilot project. And so that's where I will leave it, and I'll turn it back to the chair for committee questions, or you can go to public comment on this item if you'd like to do that, too. [1:17:35] Regina Phillips: Thank you very much for all of this. Really and truly appreciate all the information that you've given us. I see that there is a hand from Councilor Bullett. [1:17:44] Anna Bullett: It yeah sorry Greg can you go back to the map that had the colors of the streets there wasn't a key to which color was watch which and my brain wasn't going as fast as you're speaking so I was just wondering if you could say that again sure let me just say that was zero judgment it was my it was my bad is that coming up yeah so wait can you remind us which color is which okay so [1:18:15] Greg Jordan: Everything that's colored is state jurisdiction, so red, green, and purple, and certainly the blue, the highways, are all under state control. Everything else, the white streets you see across the map, that's all under the jurisdiction of the city of Portland. And Jeremiah can tell me I got it wrong, or did I get it right? And [1:18:37] Anna Bullett: So the colors just indicate like how big or how intense the [1:18:40] Jeremiah Bartlett: road is, Jeremiah? Those are the, those are the different classifications of state aid roads. But I can also tell you that you can almost unilaterally draw a line between the classification, the volume, and the amount of crash activity that takes place. [1:18:59] Anna Bullett: Oh, yes. I figured as much. I just, I really love this map. And if you, no rush, but if like in the future at some point we can get this with maybe some labels on the colorful ones just sent out to us, that would be super helpful. Yeah. [1:19:19] Regina Phillips: Assistant city manager, can you just remind the public of what we're taking public comment on? This is to move the idea of traffic cameras to legislation nominee, correct? [1:19:37] Greg Jordan: Yeah, in short, we staff are seeking the committee's direction on whether or not we want to continue on this pathway, and so that's the action we're looking for tonight, and the next step would be to refer to legislative nominating. And given how important this topic is from a variety of perspectives, I think we all felt public comment at this point made sense. [1:19:58] Regina Phillips: Yep, I would agree. And so we are going to open this up for public comment. And so just a reminder that we need your name and your address. You can then say you're from Portland. And you have three minutes. And we would really like for you to, if you can, to stick to the matter at hand. And so again, we want to open this up for public comment. I did it again. I always go to raise hand instead of going to participant. It drives me insane. So it looks like we have a few people who would like to make a comment. Christian, go ahead. [1:20:37] Christian Milne: Thank you, councillors. Again, my name is Christian Milneal. I'm a resident of East Bayside. I just want to thank you, the city, for doing so much work on Vision Zero. I really appreciate the new city manager, assistant city manager, this presentation. It's really, you know, I've lived here in the city, I've been coming to city council meetings for 20 years, and I feel like we're actually making some strong progress right now, even though they're, they're still like terrible things happening on our streets, but I really appreciate the council's taking this so seriously. And I do want to strongly support the city to lobby for legislation for enforcement cameras, not just for red lights, but for steel as well. I think the civil liberties concerns are important, but I would encourage the council to remember that cameras are considerably safer than armed police officers conducting traffic stops. You know, unfortunately, we have police in Portland who have killed innocent people during traffic stops and traffic cameras could be a way to avoid that. So, you know, if we agree we need enforcement of traffic laws, doing it with cameras and mailing fines in the mail is considerably safer and less expensive than having armed police do the same work. work. So I just would encourage the council to remember that. I also think that there's some really good model legislation that the state of Massachusetts is considering right now. In fact, ACLU has endorsed Massachusetts's bill for speed and red light enforcement cameras because it has very strong privacy guardrails. And I would go one step further and say that in addition to legalizing traffic enforcement cameras, we also need legislation that regulates It's completely unregulated cameras like Flock right now. And ideally, we could do both in the same bill to say, these are the cameras we want, and these are the privacy guardrails. And also, these are the privacy guardrails that we need to have for other cameras that are mounted by tech companies. And those are pretty much unregulated right now. One final suggestion I'd like to make for regulation is asking the state to let the city of Portland have more control over those. some of those minor arterials and collector roadways like Cumberland Avenue and Congress Street. We don't really need Augusta's meddling in telling the city of Portland how to manage some of those streets. And I think what Greg was saying about how the worst crashes happen on those state roads where they have higher speed limits. So I think there's a strong safety argument to be made to say Augustus should be less involved in some of these decisions, too. And I think that would also be helpful. And I think that's also going to require state legislation, unfortunately, but worth asking for. Thanks very much for all your work. [1:23:34] Regina Phillips: Thank you. We'll go to the next person wishing to make public comment. Mr. Brunel. [1:23:41] Speaker T (unidentified): Hello, can you hear me? We can hear you. Great. Currently driving back from Gorham. So I, first of all, just want to echo everything my friend Christian just said, very astute points there. I want to go back to the point I made earlier about us looking to gadgets to fix road safety problems. And I don't doubt that there is evidence that red light cameras increase safety. I've seen it in other cities, but I've also seen in other cities how the installation of red light cameras, the city just sort of then thinks they're done and leaves urban highways because they just think the red light cameras will fix it. And there's still more to do on the actual road geometry and the actual built environment. And so the cameras themselves don't come without a cost. You need to pay for the devices. You need to pay for maintenance. You need to pay for the sensors in the roads. They're not totally free, and again, concrete is cheap, but thanks for having this discussion tonight. [1:24:46] Regina Phillips: thank you Mr. Brunel thank you for being here providing public comment we're going to go to Miles Smith good [1:24:58] Christian Milne: evening again thanks for the opportunity I just want to echo what was said particularly by Christian I didn't quite understand are we commenting only on the red light cameras issue or on the entire vision zero initiative just to just the red light in order to move it to like yeah i agree with everything christian said i won't belabor it i'll only add that i was just recently in new york city i lived for a long time in washington dc i grew up in portland the difference is stark in dc in new york last week as soon as i got off the highway there was a posted speed limit 25 miles per hour sign there are cameras and in places where you think, well, if it were in Portland, people would be going 45, there they are going 25 because they are afraid of the cameras, unlike here where they don't seem to be. So just want to endorse it. And I would help our city get this passed in Augusta. I'd happily help you out on that. So thank you for being here. [1:25:59] Regina Phillips: Thank you for your comment. We appreciate you coming. The next caller, please. Please, go ahead, Ms. Trice. [1:26:12] Troy Moon: Can you unmute, Liz? [1:26:13] Regina Phillips: Yeah, we can't hear you. [1:26:19] Liz Trice: Liz? Hi, Liz Trice here, 297 Brackett Street. I want to agree with the others to support strongly the idea of red light cameras. And just to say also, with Vision Zero, this is actually an emergency, and we could have an emergency resolution that we're going to go to 20 miles an hour until we have time to implement all the other things that take a lot of time. Because this could be very quick, and we're already losing people every month, including children. So I want to thank staff for the work they're doing, but also encourage the council to see this as an emergency issue where we could take immediate action and have immediate safety. But all those state roads, 30 miles an hour, that's where all the deaths and injuries are coming from. And if we do that all by 20 miles an hour, we would drop immediately in deaths and injuries by probably 40% immediately. And that's one more kid that won't die. And you guys have that power. Thank you. [1:27:18] Regina Phillips: Next caller, please. Go ahead. [1:27:23] Nell Donaldson: Yes. One, thank you. I do favor having traffic monitoring cameras. I have concerns about how they're implemented. I know you don't necessarily answering questions I guess would it be like the turnpike cameras that just capture the license plate or would they actually be capturing the surrounding area I don't mind someone photographing my car I do know when the leaves are down the Baxter Vanna I can tell if my shades aren't closed at night. I know when the red light is down [1:28:03] Liz Trice: without looking out the window, [1:28:05] Nell Donaldson: just cause I get red light in my living room. And unfortunately I'd rather not people, I mean, I'm not that private, but I don't like the world looking in on me. The other thing is I have some concerns about where the data is concerned and if it's stored out of state. And again, thank you very much. [1:28:27] Regina Phillips: Thank you, appreciate the comments. The next caller, Jim Hamilton. [1:28:32] Jim Hamilton: Hey, my name's Jim Hamilton. Wanted to comment on this. And to make it clear, I think the bigger point I was trying to drive home is I think the issue is inattention from both the drivers as well as pedestrians in a lot of situations, but mostly the drivers. But I don't, I'm not in support of a red light camera. Camera, I think definitely the way to, in my opinion, to really get people to pay attention is put a cop, put a cop with, you know, their blues on, you know, obviously not flashing, but people would see a cop and they're going to slow down. They're, they're not going to slow down because they see a traffic camera. I think with the questions of where the data is going, I think you give up some rights and you lose a lot, but I think what you should be focusing on overall, is what's going to protect people even when the drivers and the pedestrians are inattentive. Maybe it's even bollards that come out of the ground when people are crossing the street, you know, because if a driver kept going, they would hit some concrete bollards. You know, I don't have the answers, but increasing oversight due to some tragedies [1:29:49] Regina Phillips: is not the answer. And I appreciate your time. Thank you. Next caller, Emma Schroeder. Did I say your name right? Sorry. Go ahead, Emma. Unfortunately, we can't hear you, Emma. [1:30:19] Troy Moon: Let's come. I'll go to the next person. We'll come back to Emma. [1:30:22] Regina Phillips: Okay. Sounds good. Thank you. The next person is Zoe Miller. Hi. Can you hear me okay? Yes, we can. [1:30:34] Kate O'Brien: Okay, great. Thank you so much. And I would just reiterate what's been said about the appreciation for how seriously you're all taking these issues and moving this along. And I think I want, and sorry, I'm Zoe Miller. I live on 4 Abbott Street in Portland. I'm the coordinator of a, community group called Friends of Allen's Corner. So I'm, I'm speaking on behalf of, that group, in support of better enforcement. We have Allen's Corner, which is the intersection of Allen and Washington Ave. And it's honestly terrifying to watch people who are speeding to make it through the light, you know, through the yellow light, you know, running red lights, you know, on what are state routes, but are also routes to school for children of all grades. And so I think, you know, using the technology, using it judiciously, you know, it's heartening that ACLU is getting on board with these efforts. And I certainly do have concerns about making sure our data, you know, we don't just assume that the data is being kept private, but we really are thoughtful about it. The other thing I want, I guess this maybe is a comment slash question, is that I think that, you know, it's really it's a fraction of the people who are speeding and running red lights. And so I think there's efforts in other places to show that when you use increment or graduated ticket amounts that you really do get a behavior change. And so I guess I'm wondering how we as a city plan to implement that part of it, and if that requires any legislative, you know, state level rule changes, because, you know, I think the kind of the super speeder ticketing approach seems to be really effective that, you know, somebody thinks they're going to get a really high priced ticket. it does change their behavior, sadly, you know, that 's what it takes. But I guess that's what I wanted to say. I'm really appreciative of all you're doing. [1:32:55] Regina Phillips: Thank you. Next caller, we're going to try Emma again. Hi, can you hear me? We can hear you now. Yes. Great. Thank you. [1:33:03] Tony Warkus: My name is Emma Scudder. I live on Bolton Street in Portland. And I was compelled to join the meeting tonight and comment actually because of a comment that my son made earlier. He's three years old he's sitting here with me right now and we had we went for a walk earlier across bright nav and later when we got home he said mom remember that car that stopped for us they should get a medal and it made me really sad because he's routinely sees 10 15 20 sometimes cars speed by him while we wait to cross the street and the fact that one stopping is such a big deal it makes me sad it obviously makes me worried as well when we cross the street so i would be in favor of red Light cameras but i also would echo some comments made earlier by others that in the meantime i would love to see more traffic calming that can pop up more quickly whether that's bollards or you know concrete i'm not sure you know depending on the cost, but I hope there was some Legos go. So I also want to thank the Department of Public Works, I think, who came out a few weeks ago and added some bollards near the intersection that I'm speaking of. It's helped cars not pass on the right, which is a really dangerous thing. Once we're in the crosswalk, many times cars will pass on the right and speed by. I would love to see more of that traffic calming at intersections that do not have traffic lights at them throughout the city. Thank you very much for all that you're doing. [1:34:40] Regina Phillips: Thank you. Kate O'Brien. I don't see her. Didn't she have her hand up? Oh, there she is. [1:34:58] Kate O'Brien: Sorry, I lowered my hand a little bit early. Sorry about that. Thank you, counselors, for the opportunity to make public comment, and thank you for taking the issue seriously. Also city staff. Kate O'Brien, I live on Woodford Street, and I was disheartened but also not surprised to see that street lit up on that map as being part of state jurisdiction. My heart sunk because I know that means there's a lot more advocacy and work ahead. I wanted to speak about the red light cameras and say, I have mixed feelings about it. And I think some of the comments that have been discussed earlier, I want to just lift up. One thing is, you know, the really compelling thing about Vision Zero is that it's the Swiss cheese approach, right? Much like the way we learned from COVID-19 with masking and six feet apart, and right, that there are multiple strategies to help minimize exposure and risk level. And that's the case with Vision Zero. And so the taxpayer in me is really curious to know if we're going to spend all this money on red light cameras, what aren't we spending on hardscape improvements and protections like bollards and hardscape crosswalks and rumble strips and things that have been highlighted tonight to calm traffic and to signal to drivers that they're not the only ones. I think that I have lived through her 18 months, the resurfacing and the sidewalk improvements and the curb cut improvements to promote accessibility and walkability along Woodford Street. It has also made it very smooth and very wide and very attractive to speeding. I work from home, but day and night, there are cars going in excess of 50 to 60 miles an hour. When it's very dark late at night, there are cars zipping through that. I would guess they're going highway speeds. And we can't do anything about that, and I'm not sure a red light camera is going to make a difference in that case, so it makes me think about enforcement. And so I guess to kind of wrap up my comments, I want to say that, you know, what are the things that the city is going to invest in meaningfully as it relates to a systems approach to traffic calming, to vision zero, to promoting pedestrian safety? And I don't want to get into this either or thing, but I guess I don't really have a sense of what is The budget for Vision Zero, what, how many dollars are we talking? And I don't want one thing to come at the expense of the other, so that's my hesitance about saying yes to red light cameras. Is my god, we've been trying for years to get a crosswalk on Ludlow Street, which is just parallel to Woodford's, and it just seems like we have to move heaven and earth to get these kinds of things to happen. And I know you all are doing so much, and we just can't keep seeing these, you know, kids getting hit. Especially kids using crosswalks, especially in between those lights, you know, those roadways need to be safer. Thank you, thank. [1:38:00] Regina Phillips: You, we have one more caller, Sarah Cushman. Hey everybody, thank you so much. [1:38:08] Lauren Fleming: Counselors and staff, so much work is going into this, and we are in a crisis in our community. So I really appreciate your work. I also encourage us to all work harder, faster, whatever we need to do. I am in support of the red light cameras with all of the cautions that everyone else has raised, including Kate's point about making sure we don't just focus on this and nothing else, which I don't think we're, you're suggesting that, but just to be super clear. And I walk and bike and take the bus. I drive, I live on the East end. Sorry. I didn't say that Sarah Fishman. I live on the East end. And, I think we should be clear. I 'll speak for myself, but there are so many of us, I think, who try to squeak through that yellow, almost red, or I've gotten much better at not trying to speed up to an intersection. But I do think the research is pretty clear that these can be incredibly helpful. And yeah, I think I'll just stop there. Thank you [1:39:30] Regina Phillips: So much, thank you. Anyone else wishing to make public comment? I don't think I see anybody else's hand. Okay, public comment is closed. Any questions for Assistant City Manager Jordan from the council before we take any kind of vote? Council Palatine, thank. [1:39:59] Wesley Pelletier: You, Cher. I got to go soon, so I will keep it brief. But on the subject of traffic cameras, I definitely share the mixed feelings. Mr. Van Leel's comment about the ACLU endorsing Massachusetts sounds great, so we should definitely be investigating that and really lock the data down. But I do agree that it would be a good way to put the fear of God in some speeders. As to the rest of the presentation, Greg, I know we talked about buffing our traffic calming, both in terms of letting DPW take the lead on some of the more complex projects and putting a program together that would allow for some funding and enabling of community-driven projects. Do you have any updates on where that might go and when we might hear more about that? [1:40:58] Greg Jordan: Yeah, that's on the issue of the transportation demonstration projects. A program that's been in place for a couple of years. It's run by Jeremiah. We're going to be doing an evaluation of that program over the course of the fall. And if we think, and we're going to be talking with neighborhood groups and the others that have participated in that program,. If we make any adjustments to make it, you know, hopefully easier for good projects to come forward and get built quickly or installed quickly, we want to be able to make those before the next season, which really begins, what, Jeremiah, February is when we start taking applications or proposals. [1:41:35] Jeremiah Bartlett: Yeah, that's one of the things I'm going to be getting tightened up is the schedule. We're going to be trying to get those in earlier in the year to make sure there's appropriate time for review. [1:41:49] Wesley Pelletier: Great. And I'll just add, just because I've solely said this in private meetings, but yeah, I really think like there is a space to have the community involved. I think it's exciting to get out there and paint and then just watch cars just roll on by. And it lets people think about this, lets people get together. And then also the more complex ones, You know, I have been out there with Jamie and Greg Ferrino doing the intersection of Pine and Bracket and Pine and Bracket, yeah, Pine and Bracket and, you know, that's a four-way intersection and trying to manage that traffic is probably not something I'm qualified to be doing, but I did anyway. And if the city could do it, that'd be great. So, thanks. [1:42:36] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Councilor. Councilor Bullett? [1:42:40] Anna Bullett: Thanks so much. And thanks again to everyone who made public comment. For those of you who have been putting up with me for the last three years, you know that this is something I keep trying. Red light cameras, I mean. And I'm excited to, you know, I'm like a dog with a bone, so I'm glad that we're continuing to try it. I agree with every caveat, of course. Like, I do want to know where the data is going to get stored. I'm really interested in graduated ticket amounts. I actually recently got a graduated ticket from a red light camera in another state, and it was only like 50 bucks because it wasn't speeding that bad, but because it was by a city bus or something, it was like a special zone. And yeah, so we got a ticket for 50 bucks because we were going 30 and a 25, like seriously. So I do want to like investigate that, like where the price of the ticket, I would love to know. So mostly I want to know sister cities, like I want to know what other cities are doing who do this. And so I'm going to support this, but then as you move forward, let's try to get some data from other cities, of course the cost data, and then creative ways to pay for it. And then with regard to legislative and nominating, I fear I actually don't know when like the session is or anything, so or cloture date is this fall, so we might need to move really fast, but I'm sure that you will make sure that happens. And I guess yeah, and just to go back to like the overall presentation, thank you so much for all the daylighting intersection data. That was actually really great to see. There was so much in that presentation. I know we were just focusing on the cameras, but I want to reiterate that presentation was really great. And like Counselor Pelletier, I want to know how Massachusetts that's got the ACLU on board, because that's what we're going to need to do. Thank you. Thank you. [1:44:32] Regina Phillips: Counselor. Counselor. [1:44:37] Pious Ali: Ali, go ahead. Constantly. Oh, thank you, Madam Chair. Greg, thank you for working on this, and not just you, anyone else who work on this. I sorry about that. Yeah. From the comment that we heard from the public, it seems like people support either or. Is it possible to do both? [1:45:11] Greg Jordan: Sorry, Councillor, when you say do both, I'm not sure what you mean. [1:45:15] Pious Ali: I'm talking about the speeding, controlling all the tools that we have available to us that we can use to calm down speeding in the city. [1:45:27] Greg Jordan: Oh, you mean using the technology as a speed detector as well as a red light violation? That technology certainly exists. At this point, we're just providing you information on the red light version of that. I think the speed module is sort of the same, but we're not advancing that right now for you. [1:45:55] Pious Ali: Okay, thank you. Thank you for the presentation and the work that you and your team put into this. [1:46:04] Regina Phillips: Any other questions? Council McNavidge. [1:46:10] Sarah Michniewicz: Great. Thank you, Chair. Yeah, I also want to chime in and just say thank you to everybody who commented and for sharing your concerns and your thoughts and how this has affected you personally. It's a tough one. The civil liberties piece is real. Real. But the results of the red light cameras seem like it's a very compelling argument with the level of issues that we're experiencing in Portland. And I just really also appreciate the committee for taking up this work and the staff for the amount that they've put into the due diligence. This is, I think, would be a big step forward for us and the advocacy on a state level. Absolutely willing to be there and engage in that, so thanks to everyone, thank [1:47:00] Regina Phillips: you, counselor. Oh, it is again, I don't have my hand up, geez, and crow, it's gonna drive me nuts. Counselor Lee, you still have your hand up. Did you have anything else that you would like to ask or any comment you wanted to make? It's an old hand. Okay, that's okay. A couple things here. One, first of all, I want to thank Assistant City Manager Greg Jordan for all of the work on Vision Zero. I know that this is an actual city plan, and so really and truly want to thank all the staff who I know as many who has a hand in making sure that we try our hardest to make sure our cities streets are safe. It is a lot of work and I think the city is doing a good job under the Vision Zero policy to make sure that we're adhering to things under the policy and also So looking at any suggestions going forward to actually add, because I know a couple of months ago, we added a couple of things to the Vision Zero policy. So I think that 's a fluid document. And again, I just want to give some kudos out to Greg and the rest of the city staff for doing all of that. A second thing is, before I get to the red light cameras, I also, is Mike Murray still here? Director Murray still here? I do also want to echo somebody mentioned the streets and the paving. Woodford's looks beautiful. It just looks gorgeous. I don't know anything about whether it's cutting down on the speed or whatever. I just know that is my route to get to my mother's, and it looks absolutely, it looks great, along with some other several projects. There's one on Daring Ave. I know there's still some things happening on Ocean Ave, and I know that we just started doing some paving, or there's a project on Brighton Ave, so, and that's the corridor I have to go all the way down Brighton, so kudos to you, and Jeremiah, and anybody else that is helping to move those projects along, so those two things I definitely want to acknowledge. I truly have mixed feelings about the red light cameras. I don't know that much about them. I have been in very,, I haven't been in lots of meetings that where we have talked about this. So that's the homework that I need to do. I have in the, from the information that I have, I've heard they're good. I've heard they're not so good because of the data and where it's stored and whatever that looks like. And again, I've also heard some really good things, some of the things that people have mentioned here tonight. So for me, the jury's still out on that. I do support this going to legislation we're nominating for it to get some more, for us to get more information and do a little bit more research. So I will be voting yes on that. that. And other than that, Assistant City Manager Jordan, do you need anything else from us? And I could because I think we might be ready to take a vote. No, on this particular item, before we get to the speed limits, that's all we need for this one. Okay. So can I have a motion to move the red light cameras conversation to legislative and nominating? So moved. Second. Councilor Bullett, again, I want to say first is it, but first is it is not a word. Moved by Councilor Bullett, seconded by Councilor Ali. We'll go ahead and take a vote. Councilor Bullett. [1:50:42] Pious Ali: Madam Chair, I think there's a hand up. I don't know if it's left over, but the hand has been up for some time from Jim Hamilton. [1:50:52] Troy Moon: Comments over, unfortunately. Okay. [1:50:56] Regina Phillips: Yep council bullet how do you vote yes that's raleigh yes and i'm a yes and so we'll go ahead and i'm sure we'll get a lot more information on that with more of the research and that when it gets to legislation on it so thanks a lot for all the hard work on that, Assistant Manager Jordan. The next thing on our agenda is the Jewel Box Bus Stop. Actually, Chair. Oh, that's not what's next on the agenda? [1:51:34] Greg Jordan: Sorry, we're still on the Vision Zero agenda. We just have to get through the speed limit discussion. [1:51:39] Regina Phillips: Oh my God, you just said that. Sorry. I'm trying, I'm like, let's try to move forward. So Ari, sorry. I will go back to you for that conversation. [1:51:52] Greg Jordan: Okay. So also on this agenda item is a conversation and possible direction around setting speed limits in the city. And as before, there's a memo in your packet, issue brief on this matter. And Jeremiah Bartlett is going to help me out here. I'll just start by saying, and this will get back to that map we looked at around what roads and streets across the city are under the jurisdiction of MaineDOT. And as you saw from that map, it is many, and it certainly is most, if not all of the areas where we have the most significant risk across the city. However, and in terms of setting speed limits, you know, there is a very prescribed statutory process where main dot goes about setting speed limits in communities across the state as jeremiah will talk about in just a minute there is a pathway for municipalities to assume jurisdiction over the local roads so again if you remember that map it was all the non-highlighted roads across the city that the city of portland could theoretically assume control over, and assume speed limit setting authority over those streets. There is a bit of process to go through in that, and so I'm going to ask Jeremiah to, as best he can, summarize kind of three big buckets around this. And one is, what is the current process today for the city of Portland in terms of having speed limits set on both state and local roads in the city, because as I said, the state controls everything right now. He'll then talk about how Portland could go about assuming control of local roads and setting speeds locally. And then lastly, we'll speak directly to the proposal kind of around the 20 is plenty concept for local roads in the city. So with that, I'll turn it over to Jeremiah, Maya, and we'll try to be as efficient as we can. [1:54:01] Jeremiah Bartlett: Thank you very much. And I'm going to put up a very, brief slideshow so we can speak to this a little bit better. This is the super abbreviated version of the action brief that you folks have received this evening. I'm going to try to go through what is a complicated topic relatively expeditiously. so certainly as we've talked about right now, Maine DOT is in charge of controlling speed limits on all streets, soup to nuts, the smallest street to the largest street. They, call the shots on that. State law does allow municipalities such as Portland that can consider themselves qualified for this to, assume speed setting over local roads or town ways. I think, you know, there's a couple of questions here about how the process plays out, how we administer it, and you know, how does that weigh in with regards to 20, what 20 is plenty. So right now, say we want to change or we would like to see a speed limit change on a street somewhere in Portland. There's state law that governs this. We as the city submit requests to the region traffic engineer. They then put it in a hopper to complete a study, which is based on a number of different inputs. It is increasingly a context-based process. However, that context is determined by main DOT. And, you know, this process applies to everything. In theory, we could ask them to do a study of something that is not a state aid road,. But that is not something we have asked in the past. You know, if we as a city were to take on assuming the work of maintaining speeds for local streets, there's six steps that are outlined in the brief. Long story short, you know, we confirm as a municipality that we have legal authority and road eligibility it's safe to say that we already meet those criteria many cities actually do we would then notify main DoT of our intent of doing that and then we would proceed to looking at how we would do traffic investigations for each street and the speeding information using context based factors. Would we do it exactly like DOT or not? That is related to step four, and this is where we still have some open questions, which is resolving the scope of required engineering studies by the city. In other words, what level of effort is going to be required of us to make these posting adjustments, and how will that impact city staffing, city capital, city needs in general. Step five, you adopt the speed limits through the local ordinance. And once you've gone through all these steps, then certainly at the end of the day, we would need to do sign installations and make sure that the Department of Transportation is aware that we've done all of this work and go from there. So, you know, we have quite a few questions, unfortunately, still at this time because we've gotten a little bit of unclear information from Maine DOT. Really it's going to be a question of what would the administrative burden for doing all of this work be. Would Maine DOT allow us to do sort of aggregated studies for multiple sections of streets, multiple streets for the same speed limit, or would they require us to essentially do a full comprehensive speed study for every single local street in Portland. We have several hundred of them. If each of those were to take, say, a day or two to go through the process and go through some sort of approvals, then you factor in, you know, signage installation, you know, then becomes the question of what are those impacts looking like. There's a couple of other important questions with regards to things like 20 is plenty. We have certainly done some local data collection on a number of our local streets. We have also begun accessing information from the software I've briefed folks on before as part of Vision Zero, which is Urban SDK, which allows us to start looking at actual streets. streets. Interestingly enough, a lot of our local streets already have average and 85th percentile speeds near 20 miles an hour. So certainly the question would be, what would the actual net impact be there? And then certainly from a Vision Zero standpoint, you know, looking at where we're seeing crashes, particularly, and this is important, you know, where are we seeing crashes for pedestrians and cyclists? Those are the things we're really worried about here. These are the things we're talking about and are focused on. And based on a review we've done of data hosted by Maine DOT, about 95% of both bike and pet injuries are on the state aid roadways. So certainly, if we have control over the local streets, that speaks to part of the equation, but then there's sort of the rest of that equation. [1:59:45] Regina Phillips: Jeremiah, can I interrupt you for just a second? I see that City Manager is on the participant side. I don't know if she wants to come over if she was quietly listening to us, but I don't know what she wants to do. I just know that she's on the participant side. [1:59:59] Troy Moon: She's okay to stay on the participant side for now. [2:00:03] Regina Phillips: Terrific. Thank you, Director. Thanks, City Manager Danielle West, for being here. Sorry, Jeremiah. Go ahead. [2:00:10] Jeremiah Bartlett: Yeah, so, I mean, so sort of large scale, you know, there's several questions here we want to ask ourselves. One of the questions certainly is, where do we want to focus our attention and resources based on the information already available to us? Ultimately, what level of information is the Department of Transportation comfortable with the city providing? If, for example, it was as simple as we go to this resource, an urban SDK application, and say, well, look, you know, while these streets are already in this vicinity, you know, why do we need to do additional studies? That's sort of like one level of effort, whereas, you know, is the level of effort all the way up to we need to do significant field work for each individual local street. So that's certainly a piece of it. And then obviously another piece is, you know, there's the big 95% of everything that's happening on these non-local streets, which unfortunately, whether or not we elect to do this, we still don't have any control over. We can make recommendations to Maine DOT. We can ask them to prioritize certain roadway segments. But that, even at the end of the day, is still based on context mapping that they've compiled. And if their context mapping suggests a higher speed than what we might be asking for, it doesn't necessarily mean that we would get the outcome we're looking at. So, ultimately, I think there's a few important topics here to hit on. One is, do we talk about doing the status quo? Another option is, do we look at local control? And I think, again, based on our ability to get those answers nailed down by the main Department of Transportation. And then option three, you know, we're still talking about these larger questions of how to do these local postings. Do we need to have the conversation with possible legislative reform so that, you know, we could set a broader authority over these local speed limits? is one, to simplify the process, but two, would it open up any other opportunities for us to discuss some of these other streets? You know, I will note that on a state aid road basis, typically the main Department of Transportation will allow us two to three studies per year. We have given them two to three years of street requests. That's a pretty slow level of effort. And, you know, when we're talking about some of the things we're talking about right now in the city and the urgency and the concern that's taking place is that is that really what we're looking for so I would say those are some of the outstanding questions I don't know if assistant city manager Jordan has some other thoughts on that matter but you know those are the things that are available to us and we've been kind of marinating this in a while for a while so there's a lot more in my head so If there are questions about any of this, I've also done research in other communities. I will say that other communities, both not just in the United States, but in North America, all of them have had successes with broader localized control of these street neighborhood limit changes. I will also note that many of them have done this work with additional efforts, such as traffic calming and street changes to make the streets more appropriate for low speeds. So I'm I'm happy to go into any of this in more detail if we have additional questions. I'm happy to answer [2:03:57] Regina Phillips: them Jeremiah. Thank you so much for going through all of that. Very clear. Really appreciate that. Director, do you have any, I mean director, sorry, assistant city manager Jordan, do you have anything to add? [2:04:13] Greg Jordan: No, Jeremiah did a great job summarizing that. And I think the only thing I would note is we don't have to take any action on this tonight. As Jeremiah mentioned, there are still, I think, some material open questions, particularly on the option where we do assume local control of the local roads. What Jeremiah is pointing out is that we don't have a good sense on the level of effort yet that we need to go through to administer a speed limit change. Change. And if it's on the higher end, meaning doing studies on each individual street, that's a level of cost and staff capacity that may be substantial. If it's more, if it can be more aggregated, that may be an easier lift for us. So I think we need answer, a more definitive answer to that question before we can, before I would suggest that we take any action, I guess, [2:05:02] Regina Phillips: on this at this point. So given that, do you want to go back and do more homework on this and then bring it back to us? Since there's nothing for us to vote on this, correct? [2:05:19] Greg Jordan: Given that, I mean, this was listed for possible action and given the fact that it was discussed at the last meeting and we brought it back for this one. Also, we did list it for public comment. And given the broader context going on, we do want to give an opportunity for the public to weigh in at maybe a little bit more of an early stage before we were at an action point. But to your core question, I think we do need to answer some material questions before we take any firm action on it. [2:05:47] Regina Phillips: Okay, so two questions before I get to Council Bullitt. Do we want to table this and not take public comment or go ahead and go through it and take public comment and then bring it back? [2:05:59] Greg Jordan: Is that for me or the committee? Probably for both. [2:06:02] Regina Phillips: I know, Council, so maybe we'll just mull over that question. And, Council Bullitt, I see your hand is up. [2:06:11] Anna Bullett: Yeah, I think that the public probably came prepared to make public comment on this. I think they might be rethinking their public comment right now and what they're going to say based on what they've probably learned by watching this tonight. So, I think we could take public comment. I mean, I'm fine with that. I don't mind staying a little bit later tonight. I have, like, a priority list in my head assistant city manager of like when I think about where I want to spend money but we could do public comment first and then I could tell you my little my little personal priority wish list afterwards that [2:06:44] Regina Phillips: Sounds terrific so we will take public comment on the city-wide speed limit conversation and so if you have public comment please raise your I see Jim Hamilton go ahead hey I appreciate you taking me again on this so yeah I think [2:07:06] Jim Hamilton: Just like I wanted to drive home before I think I am all for safety and I think you guys have some big hearts like myself but I think everybody can probably agree I think driver inattentiveness is one of the biggest issues here I think everybody's staring at their phones if you're paying any attention driving, that's what you're seeing. So I think we need to make sure that the changes that we're proposing are actually going to affect what we're looking for. I've actually had, I've been rear-ended twice on Forest Ave on both ends. Again, driver inattentiveness. I was at a stoplight for over 15 seconds both times. The other person must have been looking at their phone but what I'll say about the you know the speed the speed limits and everything is going back to bullets comment about getting a ticket for five over I think you all need to ask yourself is that fair you know 50 bucks for five over is it 40 for four over and then why don't we have this on every street because every street has a speed limit that should be obeyed correct. I think we can all agree we've sped before. So I think we need to focus on keeping the pedestrians safe. And I think what we should be talking about is putting more police in that area to make sure people aren't speeding. And also police contact is a great thing. How many times have police taken bad people off the streets by pulling them over on Forest Ave? Are we going to reduce police contact on Forest Ave now because, you know, nobody's speeding there, but, you know, it's just not fair to ticket people for going five over and sending you 50 bucks, and I feel bad that happened to you, so I appreciate your time, thank you. Our, let's see, our next [2:09:01] Christian Milne: Mr. Smith did it again. Hello again, thank you counselors for working on this. I'm, I'm a little confused and somewhat frustrated in our presentation to you in July, to this committee. My reading of the law, which I presented to you and sent some analysis over, was that the state did not, could choose not to do this speed study, and that there was another path where if the city were to request a lower speed limit, the commissioner could approve it with a letter. I believe the commissioner had to get the support of the director of public safety for the state. And my ask of this city would be to put them on record, force them to go public with their inability to work faster and to follow the wishes of their constituents, of the people of the city who are asking for swifter action. Three years to lower the speed limit in front of a school is not good enough. And they are hiding behind their ridiculous process, their unscientific, at best 1990s level reform that they did in the last two years to update their speed setting context classifications. I mean, I was able to look at how other cities have done this. I know that the state of Washington changed the law in order to allow for municipalities in urban areas to lower the speed limits to 20 or 25 miles an hour without a speed study, just following the guidance of the National Association of City Transportation Officials, with this city says they use as their street design guidance. So there is no reason for the state to be overruling the city's wishes on this issue. And I want to see the city force them to tell us no on something concrete and something public so that we can go back to them and say, this is not good enough. Because in Augusta, they proudly say no one takes on local control of speed limit setting. In 50 years, no one has done it because they make it so onerous and ridiculous for any municipality to manage it with their other requirements that no one would bother doing it. And I agree with what is being suggested here, that lowering speed limits on our locally controlled streets is probably not worth the level of effort, especially if we have to do the ridiculous amount of work that Maine DOT seems to be suggesting that we need to do. The focus should be on the arterial streets. Those speeds need to be lower. We need to tell them what we want the speed limit to be. We set the speed limit at that speed, and we tell them to tell us that we can't do it publicly and clearly. That would be my ask of this council and our city leadership. Thank you. I appreciate that you guys are working on this. I know it's frustrating. I'm frustrated from other directions about this, but that would be my ass of the city at this point. [2:12:05] Regina Phillips: Thank you, Mr. Smith. Anyone else wishing? Oh, yep. Kate O'Brien. [2:12:13] Kate O'Brien: Hi there. This is Kate again. As a resident of Woodford Street, I want to plus one what Miles just said. Thank you very much. And thank you for all your work. Appreciate you. [2:12:27] Regina Phillips: Next caller, Zoe Miller. [2:12:36] Kate O'Brien: Yeah. So, again, Abbott Street, right by Allen's Corner, of Allen and Washington. And I have so much appreciation for the staff and just Jeremiah. I'm a big Jeremiah fan. Now, a couple years ago, many of us worked in the legislature to get the DOT to change their policy. And through our process, I feel proud that we got them to, you know, our building passed because they said it wasn't necessary because they were already doing it. You may have heard that a few times. But they announced about two and a half years ago that they were changing the way speed setting happened. They put up a slide on the screen at the main DOT conference that said the 85th percentile rule is dead. Literally, I can email it to you if you want to see it. So everybody was very excited. The process had changed. My neighborhood group put in a request to lower the speed limit on Allen Ave, the section that fronts Casco Bay High School and paths. And, you know, Jeremiah worked with us, put in a request to the state. They came back. And even though their context map said it shouldn't be higher than 30, they said, well, we're going to need to study it. We're going to need traffic calming. So, you know, here we are stuck. Duck, it's been two and a half years and I am viscerally terror terrified that one of my kids who walks on that road every single school day among with many other children who we know kids, you know, teenage kids, they are not, you know, they're busy bodies and they want to move and so maybe they're gonna, you know, they're they're they're there shouldn't the stakes shouldn't be so high that they're on a roadway where people are going, you know, everybody knows you look at the speed limit sign and you add five and you say, I'm good. Sorry, Anna, that you got a ticket for the five. But I think everybody knows that they can add five. They say, I'm going to add 10. And then, you know, data shows that people who think they're really good drivers say they can add 20. And so that's what we got. We've been out there with a speed gun that we borrowed from Bicycle Coalition of Maine we've been measuring and it's not everybody but there are people they're going 45 they're going 50 they're trying to make the light they're going through the school zone I witnessed a road rage incident one morning when I was out at the school in the morning so I mean you know two and a half years goes by we're patiently waiting to make it safer there you know, do we have to have somebody die? I mean, that honestly, I hate to say it that way. But I feel like that is, you know, that's, that's where we are. And I think we've got to be brave. And we've got to push back and just tell, our DOT that these changes need to happen faster. Thank you. [2:15:44] Regina Phillips: Thank you. Let's see. I know there's probably somebody next. Oh, go ahead, Heather. [2:15:51] Zoe Coleman: Hi, everybody. My name is Heather Stewart Harvey. I live at 21 Runnells Street in Portland. I, as everyone, as many people have said, I just want to thank city staffers. I think of you guys as the white blood cells out there, like correcting like terrible urban planning that has been in the city in its history. And so I'm grateful to all of you often for answering my questions and being here and doing such great presentations. I was at the last sustainability and transportation meeting where this, you know, was raised. And I feel a real gutting sense of disappointment at the air of ambivalence that's kind of whiffing through here as we're talking about speed limit stuff. And, you know, I see the context. I see that we're working in this state infrastructure that's not making it easy for your guys. But I want more fight. I'm here as a parent of a kiddo who was hit on Woodford Avenue last spring in May, which is not a road that is a state-aid road. I want you guys to fight for that road to be safer. I want you to fight for our, you know, miners to be okay when bad things happen. And it seems pretty, you know, indisputable that lowering speed limits is, again, it's obviously, this is not a zero-sum game. This is one of the many things that we can do. And I don't want to leave this meeting wondering if we're doing something in this area. So I feel really passionately that, again, you know, part of me is like, it's not my job to tell you guys whether it's legislative reform or try to see if you can get away with not doing speed studies. I want you to say, we are going to make it happen. We are not going to tire until this is a lever that we have turned. And again, as a parent of a kiddo who was struck by a car, this recent news has been utterly gutting, and the worst thing has happened. It's, it's happening, and I just really want you guys to fight for this and various other things that have been discussed tonight. Thank you. Thank [2:17:58] Regina Phillips: you. Our next person, go ahead, Sarah. Sorry. [2:18:06] Lauren Fleming: Hey, everybody. Sarah Cushman. I live on the East End. I am a member of Portland Friends Meeting, which is on 4Sav. And we had a terrible death outside our meeting house last month, pedestrian death. Us, a woman who visited our grounds regularly, who we offered hospitality to, who I think was huge part of a larger network of folks locally and in Riverton area. And it is so depressing that we're like back here yet again, saying we have no where to go with Maine DOT's control of state aid roads. And I think we are many. There's the few folks on this call who are commenting. I think we could get tons of people to help you out and make a big stink with Maine DOT. I don't think that would be hard at all. And I know staff have done so much. I love you all so much for everything you've done and everything you continue to do. Same counselors, like it's just a breath of fresh air after 20 years or 25 years of plugging away at this stuff. But yes, I agree, we've got to fight harder, and we, like, we can be behind you, and we can bring as much testimony as you need, but we've got to fight harder. So thank you. Thank [2:19:43] Regina Phillips: you. I appreciate everybody make for making some comments. I do not see anybody else's hand up. Greg, did you want to comment? [2:19:56] Greg Jordan: Before we close public comment, or, yeah, I think I just wanted to make a general comment. I, some of the comments that we just heard really resonated, I think, with all of us on staff, and I'm certain, I'm certain with all of you. And I think I want to clarify that the intention around this work at this stage for us was really more about educating ourselves as well as you in the public about the law as it relates to this and the regulatory infrastructure with Main Dot that has been in place around this. And to begin to get clarity around the pathways that we have that could include, and there's even a bullet in the, in the, in the memo, one of your options that we may decide to come to is that we do pursue legislative change to give the city some or a lot more control over speeds, even on the state roads. I mean, I'm not going to say that is likely in the end, but it certainly is a pathway. And so I think at this point, that was what we felt our obligation is at this point, to give you the information you need to understand the pathways that you could elect to take. And we're not quite finished with that yet. [2:21:09] Regina Phillips: Thank you for that clarification. Any questions from counselors, council bullet? [2:21:17] Anna Bullett: Do you want to officially for the record close public comment? I don't know who's taking the [2:21:20] Regina Phillips: minutes, probably Troy. Ah, thank you, totally forgot. I do not see anybody else's hand up wishing to make public comment, so public comment is closed. Thank you. Great, so okay, and here I [2:21:34] Anna Bullett: I go with my priority list. First of all, I need to clear up the record. I was happy to pay the ticket. Turns out it was a school zone and I got the ticket because it was on a bus camera, which I will remind everybody there's a carve out in the Maine state law that we can have traffic enforcement cameras on easy pass and on school buses. So I don't know. I think there might be some wiggle room there for a pilot program where we put the red light cameras on the buses. But this is my priority list. I don't want to spend a whole bunch of money to do, listen, 20. Yes. I wish everyone would go 20. I wish they would get off their phones. Like I scream at people to get off their phones. But we clearly know where the fatalities are happening are in the state aid roads. And I would rather spend our money on traffic calming on our residential roads, on our local roads than on figuring out how to get down to 20 miles an hour. So the first thing I need is an answer to the aggregate question, because if we can do the aggregate and it's like effective and efficient, then let's try to do it. So let's get an answer to that question, because, you know, if for whatever, for $50,000, if we can get the study we need to submit and to then get local control and lower to 20, then that's like $50,000 well spent. If it's 5 million, then that's silly. We could go do a million different traffic calming projects with 5 million. So that's the first thing, answer to the aggregate question, and then I just want to go so hard on these state aid roadways, and I want to do it as legislative reform. And when I think the legislative reform, I mean we'll need, obviously, the, I assume corporation council's office to go get into this and like see what the options are, and the, are people at Bernstein, but changing that request-based process, because Jeremiah, like, that just sounds like you're probably like wanting, I, well, I won't, I won't whatever, I'll leave it at that. This sounds very frustrating. So we need to change the request-based process, and when we need some overall legislative reforms to force, you know, DOT to do state aid roadways. Yeah, so those are my priorities, aggregate, legislative reform with the changing the request-based process, and then just like giving us control so that we can lower the speeds. And the other thing I wanna say is that Allen, Washington, and Auburn should be top of the list. [2:24:06] Regina Phillips: And Woodford. Thank you, councillor. Any other questions or comments from any other councillors? I'll just say, Jeremiah, that was, again, a really good overview. I agree with Councillor Bullett. The whole process seems frustrating, and no matter what we do, the whole process seems frustrating. And I hear the public when they say that we need to be stronger advocates. I think we do the best that we can when we, when we have partners, you know, it's not easy to change a state rule or a state law, not at all, and it takes, as Jeremiah pointed out, it takes an ungodly amount of time. I also agree with Counselor Bullitt that, you know, we don't know what we don't know, right? And so in looking at this, we're doing a little bit more research on this, in looking at, you know, the financial aspect of this, we might be able to get a bigger bang from our buck if we did something else as opposed to this. We don't know. And please believe me, I'm not saying that we have to do it that way. I just think that there's a lot of information out there that we don't have that we need to get. I think Jeremiah did a great job of outlining, you know, what it looks like if we decided to go down this road. And there's quite a few options. So I think at this point in time, We are planning, correct me if I'm wrong, Assistant City Manager Jordan, we're going to table this issue to gather some more information. When we have more information, we'll bring it back to the public, we'll bring it back to this committee, and we'll figure out what we want to do with it then. And so we will not be taking a vote on this. Councilor Bullett. [2:25:45] Anna Bullett: I just wanted to add, because, you know, there are some high profile elections coming up and there is a new Portland, some new Portland representatives who will be in the state house. I think it's really I appreciate everyone here tonight. I love that you're here. And I love the advocacy, the public commenter who said that they're ready to like also advocate in Augusta. Like that's the kind of energy that we really need. And, you know, it's not too early. Right. There's people running for governor and there's certain things that have gotten on those candidates promise list that maybe weren't there six months ago, but are there now because of lots of advocacy. So don't be shy about getting up into those candidates emails with some safe, [2:26:25] Regina Phillips: streets commitments that's my little plug thank you for that commercial council bullet okay so i think that we are ready to move on is that correct assistant city manager i think you guys know what we're what okay terrific so next on the agenda is the jewel box bus stop and i'm going to turn that over to director craft [2:26:54] Bruce Hyman: Thank you, Chair. And I'm going to ask Councilor Bullett to confirm that my screen looks good this time because last time I was here I had some issues. I'll be brief. I know you've had a long night already, but just wanted to provide a brief update on the Jewel Box Bus Shelter and highlight the recent Public Art Committee's discussions regarding its future. You may know the Jewel Box Bus Shelter is located on Congress Street. It's near Monument Square, shown here on the slide. And it's actually part of the city's public art collection. It was constructed in 2004 through the city's public art program. There was an RFQ process and it replaced an older bus shelter at that location. Since its installation, the Jewel Box has required more than $35,000 in maintenance and conservation investment and that includes more than $8,500 related to vandalism such as graffiti and broken and glass replacement in the last couple of years. So given those ongoing maintenance and needs and costs, the Public Art Committee really identified the jewel box as something they wanted staff to look into further, and they wanted to consider the potential for relocation or removal of the shelter from the city's public art collection. So that was included in their most recent work plan that was adopted by the city council. And earlier this month, After several workshops and discussions, the committee just recently voted unanimously to recommend removal of the jewel box from the public art collection. So this is an item that's going to be moving forward to the city council next month for their consideration and final authority. Removal of the shelter from the public art collection really enables the city and Metro to begin coordinating on potential replacement options. So this is not a plan to remove the shelter and not replace it. It is ultimately to retire a two-decade-old public art piece and work with Metro to replace it with new shelters, and also to really start re-envisioning this area of downtown in the Arts District. district. As you may recall, this is the highest frequently used bus stop in the city. It's also along a high frequency corridor for Metro and is also part of the future bus rapid transit route that's being studied now by Metro. So there's really opportunities here for future investments in what a bus shelter looks like. And this is something that we want to make sure that there's room for that exploration. In terms of next steps, so as I mentioned, the committee made a recommendation earlier this month and it's going to be going to the city council next month for their review and consideration in terms of a vote tonight again was just a communication we want to share this due to its relationship with the public transit network but just to let you know that we have been working directly in coordination with metro throughout this process for almost a year now they have metro came to actually some of the public art committees to talk. And I think both staff, Metro, and the Public Art Committee have also recognized that it's really important to integrate art with transit hubs, and that I think there is a mutual sense of exploring potential opportunities to integrate art into a future bus stop again in the future, but that the shelter currently has really kind of run its course and has resulted in significant maintenance costs to the committee over the last two decades. Happy to take any questions. [2:30:32] Regina Phillips: that director any questions for director craft this item we're not taking any public comment on it's really just kind of communication oh council bullet yeah no question just [2:30:50] Anna Bullett: make sure to tell kat that we really appreciate how hard they worked on this in the public art committee. I know that this was not an easy decision for them and they did their due diligence and that report was just so good. It was like the best public art committee report I think I've seen in my time on council and the other thing I'll say is like while this is a beautiful piece of art I don't think that public art is forever. I mean you know we saw that with the egrets right that was installed as temporary we do temporary art all the time and so we can think of this as just a really long temporary piece and I try not to let nostalgia like get in the way of really important progress and safety and ADA, you know. So I'm glad that we're doing this and yeah, we can take a really nice picture of it from its heyday and we can frame it and put it up somewhere so we can remember what it looks like. We can put it in the new Bush filter. So thanks for bringing this and we'll see you when it comes to council. [2:31:43] Regina Phillips: Thanks a lot, Council Bullitt. Yeah, I don't have anything to add. I will piggyback on what Council Bullitt said. said, it's too bad. It just seems like it's always been there. And so it's going to be hard to see it go. But I agree with Councilor Bullett. Unfortunately, not everything lasts forever. And it makes sense to change it due to the reasons you had mentioned. Any other last comments before we move on? Terrific. Well, Director, did you have something, Counselor Ali? No, okay. Thank you, Director, for hanging in there. No, I said let's move on. Oh, thank you, Director, for hanging on. We're sorry we kept you so low late. Appreciate your work and appreciate you bringing this to us and have a good night. Moving right along, we next we're going to be talking about amending the parking schedule on Lancaster Street regret regarding commercial zone. So I'm going to turn it over to Director Work, the parking director, Tony Warkus, to take us through this. [2:33:02] Tony Warkus: Good evening, thanks for taking the time to let me present to you this evening. So this first item is a suggestion for considering the traffic change schedule on Lancaster Street. So there's currently a commercial loading zone, and let me share my screen briefly. There's currently a commercial loading zone on Lancaster that's approximately 130 feet long. Long. It's underutilized. There used to be a business across the street. That is my understanding for why the commercial loading zone previously was at this location. So we've received feedback and also observed that this space is really underutilized. So I'd like to suggest changing that to a one-hour designation. This would allow additional residential parking. It would be included in the residential zone that already exists in that area. I've spoken to the building manager of that adjacent apartment building. There was no opposition to making this change. [2:34:04] Regina Phillips: So happy to ask answer any specific questions about this. Thank you, Director. Any questions before we go? I think we need to do public comment. Any questions before we go to public comment? No. Anybody wishing to make public comment on this item regarding parking changing the parking from commercial to one-hour zoning on Chestnut Street. I'll say it one more time in case anybody has any comments. Six parking spaces. Correct. One correction. It's on Lancaster. [2:34:43] Tony Warkus: It's near Chestnut Street. [2:34:47] Regina Phillips: Sorry about that. It does not look like there's any public comment, so I will close public comment. Council Bullitt. [2:35:00] Anna Bullett: Yes. So, no, I'm glad to hear about this. My only question is, well, two questions. What are you thinking? Did you say two hour, one hour, all day? [2:35:10] Tony Warkus: One hour was my initial thought. So if it's one or two hour, it would be included in the residential zone. So it's just making it not unrestricted parking. Okay. [2:35:18] Anna Bullett: And what, sorry that I don't know this, but what happens with Portland High School students? Do they get some sort of pass where they can park in one hour or two hours? [2:35:26] Tony Warkus: So there are some designated areas nearby where they are able to park in the time zones as well. So it's similar to the residential parking permit program. Can this be? It could be included in that. Again, my main suggestion would be to add it as a time zone spot rather than make it unrestricted parking to anyone parked there for up to 10 days. [2:35:51] Anna Bullett: Right, no, I definitely don't want to do that. I was trying to find if there was a happy medium for the for the students and the staff of Portland High School, just because a lot of the parking is really disappearing in that area and as everything's in flux. So what I'm what I'm hearing you say is if they have a resident sticker they'll be okay, this area could be included, so [2:36:13] Tony Warkus: So directly west of this is part of that high school zone where they're able to park. So it could be included in that area as well. [2:36:22] Anna Bullett: Do we have to, like, amend this somehow to do that? [2:36:27] Tony Warkus: Yes, I think it would be when we draft the actual order. It would just be to clarify that is included in the high school zone. [2:36:35] Anna Bullett: All right, not to steamroll this. I don't know how my colleagues feel. I mean, I'll ask Councilor Lee and Councilor Phillips if they feel that would be appropriate. [2:36:44] Regina Phillips: That's really any comments on that [2:36:48] Pious Ali: Giving the students a tag to park [2:36:53] Regina Phillips: Yeah, this would be another option along with the either the one hour or two hour, it would be also included in their map of where they could park. I think that would be good because I have [2:37:03] Pious Ali: Seen kids leave classes so that they come, if they can't afford to put it in a garage, leave classes [2:37:08] Regina Phillips: Is to go move the cost, so yeah, well, I don't, I'm gonna take the director first word, it doesn't look like we need an amendment, but I'm assuming if we do, we even need, yeah, we need to run on this, does this have to go to the full council because if for some reason then we have to make it, does, okay, so if you can put, if you can add that to your ask that would be terrific. So I'm going to ask for a motion to change this zone from commercial to a regular parking zone with the caveat that it will also be added to the map where some Portland High students can park. And this property is located, or these parking spaces are located on Lancaster, the street. And so that is the motion. Can I get a first and a second? Moved by Council Bullet, seconded by Council Ali. Council Bullet, how do you vote? Yes. And I'm also yes. So, Director, thank you so much for sticking with us. I know it's been a really long night. We appreciate you hanging around, bringing this forward to us, and we look forward to voting on it when it gets to the full council. And so the next item on our agenda, sorry, we still have two items. I'm sure we can. Oh, sorry. [2:38:41] Tony Warkus: Sorry. Sorry, Director. I didn't realize. You're still stuck with me for a little bit. [2:38:46] Regina Phillips: I'm so sorry. Sorry. And I've been looking at this agenda all night. The next item on our agenda, and when I will turn it over to the Director, is setting Ocean Gateway parking fees. So take it away, Director. [2:39:08] Tony Warkus: And I will share my screen again. Give me one second. Okay. Can everyone see that fine? Yes. Okay. So just to give you a general overview of the Ocean Gateway parking lot, this is where the First Light Commons Park is currently being constructed. So the lot previously had approximately 245 spaces in the parking lot, and it had a rate of $25 per day. There was no hourly rate associated with this parking lot. It was used as an impound lot during winter months, and when the park construction began, we changed the snowman process so that there was no longer an impound lot that was run by the city. When construction of the park is completed, there will be approximately 115 spaces that are returns. There will be significantly less spaces and we have no plans to switch back to the old model of the impound lot because that wouldn't be feasible with the new size of the parking lot. So we regularly receive feedback in this area from a number of different user groups that there's not enough parking available. One thing I would like to specifically point out is that there's three different residential zones that are directly nearby this parking lot. So you have the Old Port Zone, which is considered Zone 0. You have Zone 3, which is on both sides of the Old Port Zone. And then you have Zone 11, which is part of the Island Residence Zone. So the Zone 0 and 3 are on the left-hand side map, and then Zone 11 is the right map. You'll notice the little blue highlighted areas are what are included on Zone 11. With the chart below the maps, I included that because I think it's important to realize that all residents in this area are competing for a very small number of on-street parking spaces that are available. So we don't have any specific data that says the number of vehicles that residents have, but the data that we are able to pull is the number of people who are applying and are eligible for an on-street residential permit, comparing it to the number of spaces that are actually available to them to look at the allocation we have. So again, you see that there are more people that hold these permits then there's actually spaces available. That's relying on some turnover parking. Some individuals are going to find unrestricted parking. Some people may have off-street parking that they can find. But again, this is a common theme in this area is there is a lot of competition for these spaces available. Also, it's important to note that there's 60 unrestricted spaces available on Commercial Street. They're not pictured on this map. So again, when you're looking at where people might be overflowing to, those unrestricted spaces are not accounted for and might be a common place where someone would choose to park their vehicle. One thing to also note is that there's a variety of different private parking options available even though there is not the on-street parking available. So the distance to the Casco Bay Lines terminal is the far right column and that's just to demonstrate again that's right next to this parking lot that we're discussing. So it kind of gives an idea of how far you were walking away as you move away from this parking lot. The Casco Bay Garage is currently at capacity for the year-long monthly parking pass. However, there is an off-season parking pass that's available. That's available starting September 1st. It's normally available until April 30th. So again, that's operated by MHR and Laz Parking. So that allows someone to purchase monthly parking from September to April. But again, during the summer months, the garage exceeds its capacity from a yearly basis, so there's not space available. That being said, the Custom House Garage, which is also a private garage, is eight hundred and fifty feet away from this location and does have monthly parking available year-round. And then again, there's other options as you spread further and further away with some of those private options. I didn't include individual parking lots because again, there's going to be carve outs where someone might be able to make a deal with a private operator that we don't necessarily have a record of because it's not a large facility that has published rates. So with this proposal, what I would like to ask the committee for feedback on and consideration is looking at changing how we structure parking in this area. It's very sought after. There's a lot of competition. There's a lot of users that could benefit from this parking lot. Previously, the old model of $25 per day was really catering more to long-term parking, and it didn't help the city maximize parking in this area where there's not a lot of resources that the city has. There's the Tame Street lot, which is about a block away. That's roughly 50 parking spaces, but again, that's also an area that has a lot of competition. That parking lot is also priced on a daily basis for 24 hours rather than on an hourly basis. In this area, there is a lot of private options available. And one of the challenges with some of those private options, as you may have experienced, is that they have a higher cost. So a lot of those lots have the dynamic pricing where you're going to pay at least nine dollars an hour for maybe the first two hours, you're probably going to be paying up to fifty dollars an hour just to park overnight. night, but that's not also on a 24-hour basis. So what we try to do is get together all of the different potential user groups and consider what all their requests would be, knowing that simply that we needed to try to balance all the different users. Those potential users could be island residents, island visitors, overnight visitors in the area, residents in the area, individuals patronizing businesses. So there's a lot of different people we need to consider. And the newest user group is also going to be individuals that are seeking to go to that park. So we try to divide up all those interests and find a way to again maximize the parking so that we're taking full advantage of this resource and we're providing as much access as possible. So this is a rendering of the new First Light Commons Park. The parking lot is in existence already on the left hand side, which is actually your west, so that's why it's not part of the rendering because that's not being redone as part of the park. And the parking lot on the left side of the park is the east lot, so on the east side of the park, that's where there is the Ocean Gateway Terminal. So there is some need for some operational spaces there. In the past, if there's events going on, they may utilize some of those spaces. During the winter months, it's again a little bit underutilized with that current daily rate. On the west side lot, that is where we think there will be more demand for going to the ferry terminal. Also there's an area for food trucks on that side, so you're going to have more turnover parking that's needed so that way individuals can access the park. So I'll start with the west lot because that's a little bit more complicated. So this proposal is to have 10 metered spaces that would have a two hour maximum, so that would be similar to the turnover spaces you would have on any other city street. You're able to park for two hours, it caps at two hours. After that time, you would either need to leave or find a new parking spot somewhere on the street, but ultimately if you stayed over time, that would be prolonged parking. In addition to those ten spaces, there would be another 45 spaces that would not have that time limit parking, so you would still have to pay an hourly rate. Under this proposal, that hourly rate would be four dollars an hour, which matches all of our parking garages, and that would max out at forty dollars per day. And then the last zone would be one hour free time zones, and so those would be again no cost, would be marked as one hour zones, and those potentially could be included in zone 11, which would allow island residents to park there with their residential parking pass. So in this area, we're trying to account for overnight visitors, whether that's to the islands, whether it's to any of the local areas establishments, hotels, they're in the area. We're trying to account for the turnover parking of someone who might be making a quicker trip to that area. Someone who is going to the park as well as island residents as well. Previously there was about 50 spaces reserved for an island lottery. Again, that was, they were paying the same rate as in the nearby parking garage. But at the same time, again, when you're carving out one specific user group like that, you're not maximizing the parking because vehicles will leave during the day. So when a vehicle is gone during the day, the way you can maximize it is by trying to backfill that. So you have a daytime user, you have an evening user, and again just keep that lot as busy as we possibly can. So in addition to the fact that keeping the lot busy generates revenue, I think it also would be very beneficial because it helps create some competition in that area. So as I mentioned, there's a lot of private lots that have dynamic pricing that have higher hourly rates. If we're being competitive in that market and we're offering a $4 rate instead of $22 for the first two hours, that really can, I think, make those areas more accessible. So moving the west lot and going over to the east lot, that would be a similar rate where there would be $4 per hour. It would cap at $40 per day. There would be 50 spaces in that lot approximately. During some events, whether it's cruise ships, anything like that, we'd continue to carve out about 10 spaces or so for operational needs, and the other spaces would remain open. And then also, I think one important thing to note is there has always been event parking in that area. That would not change. However, that would only be the spaces available. So if you showed up two days before an event and you parked your car in that lot and you paid for, say, four days, if we allowed that amount of time, there'd be no expectation that you would move your vehicle. You got there first, so you were able to move. It wouldn't be like an emergency no parking posting or anything like that. They would just be the spaces that are left in the lot the day before the event, or that, you know, the few hours before the event would potentially be used for that event, and that covers it. I know there's a lot, a lot of detail there, so I'm happy to take any questions and hear any feedback as well as far as kind of how the allocation of this space is. [2:49:51] Regina Phillips: Outlined well, Director, thank you so much. Really appreciate all of that information. Any questions? Oh, we will take public comment and then we'll go to the counselors, Councilors. Anybody wishing to make public comment? I do not see anybody's hand raised, and so we will close public comment. Any questions or comments from Councilors? [2:50:22] Anna Bullett: Councilor Bullett? Sorry for making this go even longer. Tony, this was a really great presentation. Thank you so much. Like, really, the map was great. Okay, so, well, and it also made me remember that in my second term, we need to figure out how to regulate predatory parking. Lot of companies, but that's, and that's for another day, for the event parking. Can you just clarify, so like if I'm having a wedding there, we're not, they're still paying for it, right? Correct, so [2:50:53] Tony Warkus: in the past it's been that people just naturally don't gravitate over to that side, so that's more of a, there's usually an event rate similar to what we'll do with the parking garages, where if there's an event that we expect to last three hours, we'll create an event or it'll be parks, parking facilities will create an event rate that captures what would be that three hours, not requiring going to the meter, but it's usually staffed with someone there selling that event rate, so yes, it's not just free parking because you happen to have something going on down there. [2:51:20] Anna Bullett: Right, great. This, you know what this is reminding me of, this is reminding me of how Cape Elizabeth did the parking over by like the soccer fields past Fort Williams. This, I would recommend you go over there if you haven't seen, if you don't have a kid that plays travel soccer, so you don't have to go over there, you wouldn't know, but they're, this is kind, I think this is like the vibe that they have going on, and it seems to work, so kudos to them. I, yeah, I'm okay with this. Thank you for keeping it at the 40 max. I think that's appropriate. This is like a prime area, but we still want to make it, you know, achievable, and then thanks for making sure that some of them were one hour free spots. I think that's really important. Whenever we can, let's try to make sure that some of the, some of the melee, milieu is those one hour free spots, so great. I'm cool with this. I don't have any requested changes, so I'll see what the [2:52:15] Regina Phillips: chair terrific thank you counselor i see counselor lee is coming off speaker no [2:52:24] Pious Ali: i 'm just going to thank Tony for all the presentation that he's done tonight and yeah terrific [2:52:36] Bruce Hyman: Sorry, I'm going to speak [2:52:38] Pious Ali: in diet tonight. Okay. [2:52:46] Regina Phillips: Well, without further ado, I don't have any comments, Tony. I just really want to thank you for hanging in there and, like Councilman said, giving us some really great presentations. And so I need to have a motion on changing the parking rates and the designation of parking spaces in order to accommodate First Light Commons. So moved. Second. Moved by Councilor Ali, seconded by Councilor Bullett. Councilor Bullett, how do you vote? Yes. Councillor Lee? Yes. And I am a yes. Director, thank you again for your great presentations and hanging in there. Dare I say, I am so sorry to our guest this evening, because the next item on our agenda is the Main Turnpike Phase 2 project. Project. There are no words. There are no words. I don't know what happened when Troy and Greg and I were trying to put this agenda together, how it got off the rails, and it's already eight o'clock. We so appreciate you hanging in. I'm going to turn it over to you. [2:54:05] Bruce Van Note: Well, thank you, Chair Phillips. My name is Bruce Van Notte, and I want to introduce the brains of the outfit. [2:54:12] Lauren Fleming: I'm Lauren Fleming. I'm the engineering program manager at [2:54:15] Bruce Van Note: the Turnpike with a transportation background. Yep. I am Bruce Van Note. I got 30 odd years of transportation experience at the state. I've been at the DOT for a while, a long while, including his deputy and his commissioner, and I'm now the senior executive for community engagement. Why they had to put my age right in the title, I don't really know, but there you go. Don't worry at all. I was actually very engaged on everything that you were talking about. Before I was a five-year-old and all, I lived on Fairmont Street. I remember walking to Longfellow of school and pushing the little button and trying to cross things and then when I went to school right in Portland I rode a bike from north of Morals Corner down Forest so I was I was soaking up everything so I thank you I really appreciate the passion and the zeal of the council especially in light of recent events about doing stuff for pedestrians bicyclists so I have the lift here, Lauren and I, of providing information on a very different kind of project that I hope I can show is actually good for the things that you're working for as well as for regional and interstate vehicular travel. You really can't get much further apart than what we're talking about between local streets and slowing everything down and this project on an interstate highway. I'm very cognizant of the time. I'm going to really zip along quickly because the item that Troy gave us was discuss the letter. I'm just going to place a little context, go through, and let you just know where we are. And if there are more questions, we'd be glad to get them in writing and answer again and keep the process going because we want to be open with that. So the first thing I'm using, we've given seven public meeting slides. So that's what you're seeing is the slides. This arose from a informational update that the executive director provided the council on July 20th. That led to some questions. We were on a process of renewed public engagement and analysis throughout this summer. And thanks for the invitation, Chair Phillips, to come here. We thought it was going to be in August. We missed August, so we sent you the letter, and now we're here. A little bit, just what is this project? The basic purpose of the project is to improve safety and reliability of the turnpike basically between exits 48 and 53. It's also to remedy some infrastructure condition deficiencies. We got some bad bridges and some inadequate shoulders. It's also to enhance the regional transportation system. And that's something that should be very important to Portland. The argument, we embrace everything you were talking about tonight, about city streets and human scale and slowing things down. We don't think that's mutually exclusive from this project. In fact, we think it's complimentary. And we'll try to explain that. And we are looking to mitigate traffic noise in accordance with state policy, state MTA and national standards. Those are the basic things. Those purposes will be important. Why don't we just show them quickly the map of where this is. I've heard councilors say like the maps. By the way, all this information, if you just go to main turnpike PAM phase two, you'll find so many videos and PowerPoints with maps, including this one, which came from a meeting we just had last night. With the public, you can see the map here going from 44 to just north of 48, right by DJ's. That is actually completed. This, that's why this is called phase two. And I'm about to give you the history of the public process. So why don't we head to the previous slide, five. This kind of gives you the timeline. There was legislation dated back 2007 that relates to this project. It really got serious in 2017 when we put together a very big public advisory committee with a diverse set of stakeholders. By the way, noteworthy people on that were Greg Jordan. Hey, Greg, good to see you again. Mark Dion, Bicycle Coalition of Maine, GBCOG. It had 19 members, studied it for over a year, and the results of that, obviously this was a long process, a lot going on. We considered 19 alternatives. The results of that were multifaceted, saying yes, for safety and mobility, we need a third lane from some place near 44 to some place near 53. And it also had recommendations about transit, TDM, land use. We've been working on those other ones. We have a slide all on that. I'd be glad to go over it, but I'm trying to rifle through as fast as I can. From that, gives you the overall thing. So even though we completed phase one in 2024, obviously we had, after the 2018 study, we had COVID. It's like, okay, let's reassess. I took a pause. And then this year said, okay, well, it's been 2018. We're not just going to go 2018, even though I guess we technically could have said, okay, we already have a study. We've already got this. So let's get new data, brush off the data. Let's get new public input and go through a new process. Why don't you go to the, I think, slide nine. This is what we've been doing this year. You'll see that there's five public, there have been five public meetings. We've been very busy this year and met with city staff, both in Portland and Falmouth, had the update with you, sent you the letter, just continuing through just last night. We had a public informational meeting, some of the people that have been on this call were there, and here we are on the 16th. And so, it's been a robust process. Let's go to the next slide. We have sent out a lot of mailers to people within 1,000 feet of the interstate. We've been knocking on doors near the neighborhoods where the sound walls discussion were happening, putting on door hangers. We've been doing everything we do to get the word out to have this discussion. So there are the letter focused on safety and other considerations of what we're doing. Those were the questions that we got. I can tell you that they're going back to the project purpose. If we skip to, what is it, 27, I think. Yeah, this goes back to the project purpose again, and just trying to show how the two options we considered, which was a bridge-only option, which was focused on bridges, approaches, and shoulders, versus a full safety option, which did add noise walls and a third travel lane, as was originally supported in 2018. So just kind of going over those purposes very quickly. Go to the next slide. This kind of shows you the two various options. I can show maps of these options that people want, but I'm cognizant of the time. I'm just really doing my best to get through it so I can listen, answer questions rather than talk. Both have a concrete median barrier to set safety. I think both have a wider right shoulder. We'll have a paid left shoulder. The full safety option, which includes the noise walls and the third travel lane, allow us to redo the ramp at 52. It allows us to take care of the highest crash segment on the turnpike, eliminating a whole bunch of weaving, increasing reliability, reducing congestion related crashes. We have 20 years of experience that graph at the bottom of the third lane in certain locations has had a sustained 20 percent less crash rate reduction, and so that's what we're looking for here. And I, 'm totally dialed into what I was listening to tonight about how, you know, the fatality is, feels like a real failure. And I call, I call it actually feel, we feel the same way. There's things we can do to work together. I think that we can help each other. But I totally get a fatality to us and a fatality on yours. It's just a gut punch. And so we're here to do what we can to help. Next one, the next purpose of it, second purpose was infrastructure deficiencies. This is pretty simple. We got four bad bridges on this stretch that need to be replaced. This is going to take care of them. It also replaces a bridge in Falmouth, the Blackstrap Road Bridge, because to take care of the highest crash location on the turnpike, the piers are in the way when you have to move that. It's aging. It's not quite aged out, but it probably has 10 or 15 years left. But to get the safety, we have to do that with a full safety scope. Next one. One. Here's the thing that is the system aspect of this. You can see the turnpike on the map on the left, both in the phase one that's already done in the green and the yellow that's proposed, the Falmouth Spur, and 295 going right through Portland, which is DOT's responsibility. Everyone agrees the first step in trying to increase safety of roads is getting traffic off them that don't need to be there. So GPCOG, everybody would deal with the idea of trying to get traffic off 295 over to the Turnpike is a good thing. It doesn't help just 295. We all know about challenges on 295. It also helps related city streets because if they start getting gummed up on 295, you know what they do. These wayfinding things, they take you on streets where they shouldn't be on and you're getting down to actual those red road arterial type things where just not good you don't want the traffic there what this does will increase the reliability make the turnpike more reliable three lanes will take traffic that is going through 295 that really shouldn't be there through traffic estimates vary from a low of 10 to a high of 20 something but it's very significant, and so this will have the effect Of getting traffic off 295 and city streets. That will become very important because this DOT has 25 aging bridges on three miles through Portland proper through the peninsula coming up. It's about 15 to 20 years of work. You've all seen the joy north of Exit 11 from there up through Yarmouth,, Freeport, that is coming to Portland. That's going to start in the early 2030s. And that's why the commissioner DOT has said, please do the full safety option, get the traffic off there as soon as possible, because that's going to become even more important. So that's the enhanced the regional transportation system. And the last purpose, but not the least, and all it's mitigating traffic noise the main turf bike has never built a noise wall before but we knew last fall when we went out there to do some unscheduled repairs on the forest avenue overpass bridges that just doing that work and we've had ongoing communications with the neighborhoods on both sides about noise and they're densely developed right next to the road we suspected that a noise wall might be justified so we did a noise study last fall we engaged with the neighborhood we've had two meetings with them and the long and the short of is we did the assessment of what you see here and with the noise walls that are proposed with the full safety scope no one in those box should notice any appreciable increase in noise in fact, behind the noise walls, it could be a decrease in noise. Again, that's a big deal. And I can tell you from actually walking the streets, knocking on doors there, the support for those noise walls, as you would expect, is overwhelming. So we look forward to doing that. Next, let's just, that's photos of the noise walls. All. Let's continue down. That's the roadway cross section. Be glad to talk about that. Let's talk about money briefly. This is 100% toll funded, no tax dollars, local, state, federal. It's paid by the users of the turnpike. Two out of three dollars comes from out-of-staters. That's not a bad value for the state of Maine. Looking at the cost between the two options, we look on straight eight bridges and shoulders, that was 121. To do the full safety scope with the Blackstrap Road replacement and the noise walls at over $12 million and the relatively small amount to fill gaps between the two, it's an additional $31 million or $152 million. The construction schedules, as you see, are 29 to 34. That's what we were doing during our presentations. I will tell you we've gotten feedback from people saying, what are you waiting for? We'd like those noise walls earlier and also from people worried about the bridge work, make sure you are done before DOT is starting to do bridge work on 295, so if anything we may be trying to move that up a little bit. So next slide, just to wrap up, that's kind of a summary of the two options that we did today, again for the basic reasons that in 2018 this diverse group over a course of a year recommended this. We didn't rely on that alone. What is the recent traffic data we can show a graph of That the traffic has exceeded, you know where that slide is right there? Yeah, you can see when we did the study in 2018, that was based on 2017 data. You can see what the assumed rate of growth was, and you can see what's actual since then. No question COVID was a big dip, but we have blown past that. And so traffic is back. We feel this is a good project that will make things safer, get traffic out of 295. that honestly or off city streets that don't belong there let us build our first northern walls and make quality of life in these neighborhoods better and help us and allow us obviously take care of bridges that we need to take care of anyway so that's where we are the mta's preferred alternative is to do the full safety option for the benefits that So we just talked open to lots of questions time or however the chair wants to handle it, but just wanted to, that's the best I can do and Sorry, it was probably 12 minutes. [3:11:24] Regina Phillips: So that was, that was absolutely fabulous. Thank you. And thanks Lauren. Again, I still feel bad that we had to go last. I think next time when we have guests, we'll make sure that they go first, as opposed to last, because we just don't know what we'll get into when we get into the meeting. So appreciate it. Truly appreciate it. [3:11:46] Bruce Van Note: No, apologies here. I found it. I found it very interesting. So [3:11:52] Greg Jordan: Good. Well, thank you. I made Bruce go last on purpose. Let's just say it out loud. [3:11:59] Regina Phillips: Yeah, this was fabulous. Thank you. I, you know, it's all coming back to me, because I remember that you were with us in July. So any questions or comments from councillors? [3:12:14] Anna Bullett: Councillor Bullett. And just so the public knows, this is a communication, so there's no action, so we won't be taking public comment. But we do appreciate that you're still here, and we would like you to stay and continue to watch the happenings. Thanks so much for being here. Commissioner, you know, appreciate all the background, and if this is not in our packet, can we get this full presentation, Greg? [3:12:42] Bruce Van Note: Yes. It's right online. We'll make sure we give you a link to it. Yep. Okay, fantastic. We'll get it for you. [3:12:50] Anna Bullett: So I just, I respectfully, I still really, question if we are using the right data. I just think that the computer modeling is inaccurate when we're looking at gas costing $5 a gallon, and we are looking at an urban population that increasingly either only has one car per family or no cars. And so I really, I just have to disagree that the full safety option includes a third lane. I mean, I'm all for the shoulders. I want the shoulders. I want the sound barriers. I do not think we need a third lane. And I just I don't believe that the data is it's like has full fidelity. I would so much rather that this money be invested in bus rapid transit and an express bus from Lewiston to Portland that would give people another option so that we just have fewer cars. I mean, I just I think public transit, when we're talking that this isn't even done by 2034, we're even going to have gas. Like, I don't know. You know, I just transit is the future. And I would maybe be for a third lane if it was a bus lane, like, you know, in the middle that went one way in the morning and the other way at night. But I just, so that's my, you know, I think you've done your due diligence with the public meetings for sure. I don't think that the highway authority has done their due diligence by changing anything in the plan based on what information is being received from the public. The other thing that's happening for us is that we don't know yet what the time frame or the cost estimate is for the 295 project. And so it's really hard to say like, oh, we absolutely need this because 295 is happening when we haven't heard from MDOT yet about what that is going to look like. And so I'm struggling, you know, I don't have a crystal ball here, but I really am struggling to justify why we should agree that this is a critical project when we don't have any details on the 295 project yet and when half of our community would love to see 295 taken down maybe not half but some people so I just like respectfully, you know, this is not my district so I will defer to the district counselor who's not here she's not on this committee but I just I know that the public a lot of the public does not want a third lane and I just don't believe that the future is ours I think it's I think it's public transit and I wish we could be pushing our resources there so well that's my 25 cents tonight no I totally respect that [3:15:25] Bruce Van Note: Out of the interest of time, we didn't talk about, we don't think it's either or. We have put 3.5 million dollars to start a new metro route from Scarborough. We are talking with DOT about supporting the lap from Lewiston offering to Fortland long term. Those are more, we respectfully back, we do stand behind this data and we have to make long-term decisions and we're very comfortable with it both in 2018 and today and the updates. But I respect a different point of view, I do. You couldn't sit through tonight and not respect the point of view, so but we don't see it as either or. We do work with the city on the designs, things when we do the overpasses and stuff like that, we how do we make sure there's enough pedestrian room underneath. We've already been talking about what can we do about lighting. We always have, we always will. And so I think there's opportunities where we can work together and I honestly think this is a right, you know, rising time floats multiple boats here. That's honestly how we feel, but I respect, I respect your position, Counselor. [3:16:36] Pious Ali: Counselor Ali. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the presentation. I, too, agree with my colleague. I think we should look into putting more money in. You're already doing that, but if you can do more of that instead of a third lane, I think that will benefit whether I cannot speak to the communities that want this. But for our community, I believe this will be more beneficial to us than a third lane. [3:17:15] Regina Phillips: Anything else, Councilor Lee? Well, I'm not sure where I stand on this. I'm a car hog. If I could drive a different car to different places every single day, I would do it. So even if you were to put more money into any kind of transportation, I would still be getting myself in my car traveling probably even just a block away if I could. So although I hear Council Bullitt and Councilor Ali and certainly understand that we need more bus transit, I'm a car hog. So I'll just put it out there. There. So with that, you know, I don't know, I'm not sure how I feel about a third lane. I do travel a lot on the highway. I have two grandchildren in Rhode Island who, if I could see them every single day, would. So, you know, for me, a third lane, I'm okay with it, but I don't have the data, right? There's still some data around, and I appreciate you sticking by and going through it. You know, I need to learn more about the data, more about crashes. You know, I'm only, you know, thinking about this selfishly, and so need to think about it more for the public eye, and that kind of thing. So I do really appreciate you coming this evening. I appreciate you hanging around. I appreciate you staying for our meeting, and being involved in our meeting. I don't know if any does Greg do you have anything else to add is there anything that we need to do [3:18:52] Greg Jordan: with no and to be I think if we've said in prior communications too that there 's actually there's no formal role for the council in this decision making MTA's decision making process. I mean rightfully and to their credit they're taking wide-ranging public comment, you know, from councils and communities all along the alignment, so they're doing their due diligence and doing a great job and collecting all that and they have to make their own [3:19:18] Regina Phillips: decisions in the end. Well we appreciate you coming by and meeting with us again and giving and going through this and giving us all of those details. I think we have a little bit of a clearer mind now. I know there was a bunch of questions the last time that was all over the place, so we do really and truly appreciate you taking the time to come. We do, we value your relationship with us, with the city of Portland. And so I know we'll be hearing more about this project as you go forward and as maybe we have more questions. So thank you again for coming. If there are no other questions or comments for you, we will take a vote to [3:20:04] Bruce Van Note: to adjourn. I just wanted to thank you for your public service. I was on a planning board for 10 years. I've been at the 11 o'clock. I've, I can feel your, I can feel you. And so thank you for [3:20:18] Regina Phillips: all you do. Well, we appreciate that. Thank you as well. And so I will take a motion. If there's is nothing else, Troy, to adjourn. So moved. And I will second that. And so we'll take a vote. Councilor Ali? Yay. Councilor Bullett? Yes. And I am a yes. Thank you. Thank you, the entire public for coming and giving public comment. Thank you, MTA, for sticking around and all of the presentations that we had this evening. We look forward to seeing you in October. Good night.