June 3rd meeting Questions

Hello All,

Here is a list of questions received so far for our upcoming meeting. I invite all of you to add to this in the comment section. If you're quick I can get it out this evening, otherwise I will keep track of them and bring them up at the discussion.

Remember, June 3rd, 6:30, Sibley Park Community Center


Questions for June 3rd meeting:

-What type of a road is Cedar Ave; what are the defining features of that grade of road (arterial, collector etc)?

-What is the current timeline for maintenance on Cedar Ave.?

-Does this take into consideration the changing conditions created by over capacity traffic and heavy MNdot traffic?

-What sorts of things have been done to Cedar to control traffic?

-What sorts of things can be done about vehicle safety

-What sorts of things can be done about vehicle noise (leq 71+)

-Can improvements be made in the name of the newly adopted complete streets policy

-What sorts of devices (speed tables, bump/bulb-outs etc) are being used elsewhere in Hennepin County?

-Where does the county stand on using roundabouts?

-Could temporary solutions be used until permanent work can be done (i.e. temporary rubber curb bumpouts, etc).

-Can studies be done to determine the environmental impact of overcapacity traffic on Cedar Ave?

-Who does environmental studies in this situation? (Noise, etc)

-Who does traffic studies in this situation?

-Who enforces state roadway noise standards on county roads

-Can the dedicated parking lane be delineated between Minnehaha Parkway and 42nd Street?

-How can pedestrian crossings be made safer for neighborhoods without stop lights

-Why is the speed limit by the park 35 when all other roads on park are 25?

-Who enforces speed laws on county roads?

-Can we increase enforcement?

-Do we know of any plans for a left turn arrow at 42nd & Cedar with the addition of a left turn lane on Cedar ?

Hey everyone, Check out what they are working on up on Franklin Ave! Pretty good idea. Maybe we should look into this some time.

Will

They're Here!

I have fliers available for door to door distribution!! A great BIG box of them thanks to John at Spillane Printing!!!

For those of you interested in getting a few just e-mail me at Cedartraffic@gmail.com. There are certainly enough to go around, just make sure to let me know where you want to cover so we don't get an overlap in distribution.

Only a little over a week to go until the next meeting (the one with the county and city represented)

Hope to hear from a bunch of you!

Will

4500 Cedar

Short Article, worth a look

Here' an interesting post. It's not just about jaywalking, it's about the development of traffic vs pedestrian laws from the dawn of the auto age. It's a well cited look at how streets went from multi-modal by design to cars only. It's a good one to think about. Worth a read on this pre-holiday Friday:

Jaywalking crackdown: What’s the goal?

Another RSVP

I just received an RSVP from Council member Sandra Colvin-Roy. We will look forward to her joining in our conversation on June 3rd! Thank you!

Distribution

Just a note: a printable version of the brochure is up on the website www.cedaraveunited.org under 'Taking Action". Or just follow this link. Feel free to print and distribute to people you think (or know) would be interested supporting our cause!

Thanks Steve for putting this together!

Weekend Update

an update of sorts, for those interested.

We're awaiting our printed material for door to door distribution. I will put out an announcement when it's ready, we could use a few more volunteers to hand stuff out. I'll buy everyone who volunteers coffee at Sister Sludge! (that goes for everyone at the meeting that already signed up)

So far for the next meeting I have confirmations from Hennepin Co. Public Works, Katie Hatt (for Com. McLaughlin - she has been a great participant!) Scott Benson, Elizabeth Glidden, and John Quincy.

I have NOT heard from, but have attempted to contact Sandy Colvin Roy and Gary Schiff. I would love to have everyone there, but I understand the logistic involved. Since I don't live in their districts, I may not hold as much political oomph as I need, but I encourage anyone that IS in their area to contact them and invite them again.

For weekend interest, here is a blog that I have been reading. It's been pretty interesting and influential in the way that I feel about planning and development:

http://hubandspokes.blogspot.com/

it's a local blog with national (and international) coverage. Well worth going through past posts.

Also, I like the streetsblog: http://www.streetsblog.org/ It's a bit removed from Mpls/St. Paul, but relevant and worth a read.

and a few more I found today (this is what I will be looking at until it's warmer :)

http://carfreempls.blogspot.com/ (though our project is not a carfree project by ANY means)
http://netdensityblog.slotterback.net/


Anyone have any other suggestions for further reading??

Will

Here's a quick list of potential talking point for our MEETING WITH PUBLIC WORKS ON JUNE 3RD, WHICH IS OPEN TO ALL THAT ARE INTERESTED. The idea of the following list is to explore what is wrong, how it can be fixed (possibly) and other examples of this issue around the cities.


One example of where devices for traffic taming are being actively installed into retrofitted roadways is Richfield. 66th Street, which runs East/West near the Target/Home Depot complex, carries about the same traffic load as Cedar and is being fitted with roundabouts. Roundabouts have been proposed in the past for Edgwater Blvd. Roundabout have been also been implemented at the intersection of Portland and 66th where the traffic load is roughly 15,000 from Portland and 13,000 from 66th.

The average (based on pre redesign MNDot numbers) on Cedar is 16,250 with a high/low ranging from 19,400 to 14,300. Lyndale, by comparison is 14,075 ranging from 17,000 to 11,100

Marshall and Lexington Avenues in St Paul have undergone some serious, though more conventional, calming measures. Lane reductions, protected parking, bike lanes and street painting are among the improvements.


Franklin Ave too is undergoing a major facelift in order to revive its local commercial nodes. Changes include protected street parking, pavement painting, signage and bike lanes.


As far as other examples of freeway to residential shifts the only other example in our area (that I can locate) is Lyndale Avenue. Lyndale Avenue, according to MNDot traffic volume numbers, carries slightly LESS traffic on a larger roadbed than Cedar Ave. prior to the redesign.


Compared to Cedar, Hiawatha Ave, which is a wide, multilane 45 mph thoroughfare, carries only 35% more traffic than the 1 lane portion of Cedar Avenue, a residential and light commercial corridor.


Of the former trunk highways within Hennepin county, almost all have undergone major infrastructure transformation since their days as a state route. With the redesign of Lyndale all are now either low to medium capacity city streets or freeways.

For reference, historic Summit Ave in St. Paul was once a trunk highway.

Editorial/disclaimer:
As always it is important to note that the goal of this project is NOT to reduce cars on Cedar Ave. The idea is to tame out of control traffic through different means. Cedar is, always has been and always will be a main South Minneapolis street. It should not, however, be an unregulated and unplanned freeway through a series of residential, recreational and park areas. All previous planning has stated this fact, though none have ever gone far enough to actually control the variables.

The original planning documents for the Mpls freeway system states that the function of roads such as Cedar is to allow local traffic to access nearby destinations and allow for freeway access. The later design connecting a 55 mph, 4 lane freeway directly to a 30mph, 2 lane City Street did not seem to take this into consideration.

So ADD YOUR THOUGHTS HERE. Questions collected over the next month can be presented at the meeting. The answers will be posted on our website www.cedaraveunited.org . Feel free to submit by comment OR join our list serve at: http://cedaraveunited.onlinegroups.net/

Wednesday's meeting was a productive one. When minutes are available they will be posted at the website www.cedaraveunited.org

Next month we will have the opportunity to hear from the Hennepin County Public Works Department on issues relating to Cedar Ave. We are currently collection questions from resident and business/property owners through our online discussion page http://www.cedaraveunited.org/joinus.html Community members are invited to join the conversation by signing up to the page and submitting questions. Big Special Thanks to Katie Hatt from Peter McLaughlin's office for setting this meeting up for us!

If people do plan to attend it would be FABULOUS (recommended but not required) if they would e-mail me at cedartraffic@gmail.com so I can make sure that we have a large enough meeting space.

Also, if you are on Facebook, you might want to join our group! Isn't the internet neat?

Borrow $$ from Big Brother?

Wow, here's one way to make up the budget deficit! Take a look at the amount of $$ generated by these things!

http://www.wtop.com/?nid=30&sid=1655198

Revenue like that would pay for a total redesign of Cedar in a couple years or less... leaving the rest as financial gravy! Delicious, delicious gravy.

Another Meeting Worth Attending:

I like how Standish-Ericsson has paired business development with transportation. In our area they are so closely linked! I hope that we are able to include more of our Cedar Corridor Businesses.

Got this from Shirley Yeoman just now:


The BDT (Business Development-Transportation) committee will meet this Thursday at 6:30 at the SENA office.

Agenda items include:

• Update on bike racks
  
• Update on RiverLake Greenway
  
• Update on neighborhood development issues
  
• Great Streets Business Support Grant - Discussion and beginning work on scope of services to contract SENA NPR funds that will provide our commitment to the project with Redesign
  

See you on Thursday!

-- shirley

--
Shirley Yeoman : SENA - Standish-Ericsson Neighborhood Association 612-721-1601

Hennepin Co. Complete Streets! May Meeting!!

This has been bouncing around the city in a number of different forums, but it's worth repeating.

Hennepin county is adopting a complete street policy. Here is a link to the actual language

This is extremely encouraging since the complete street policy basically advocates for all the changes-updates-planning that we have been discussing since September 2008. I found this at the Transit for Livable Communities page... and remembered hearing about this earlier from Katie Hatt at Peter McLaughlin's office. Katie has been present at a few of our meetings. I sure hope that we can keep her attention :)

My question now is: can we apply this to all streets?? or just the new ones...

Tomorrow is our May meeting. Please join us at the Sibley Park Community Center at 6:30:

View Larger Map


Hope to see y'all there!

Will
4500 Cedar