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HomeMy WebLinkAboutBicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee 2024-06-05 Agenda Packet1 AGENDA BICYCLE AND PEDESTRIAN ADVISORY COMMITTEE (BPAC) WEDNESDAY, JUNE 5, 2024, AT 6:00 P.M. San Rafael City Hall, Third Floor Conference Room 1400 Fifth Avenue, San Rafael, CA 94901 Watch Online: Watch on Zoom Webinar: https://cityofsanrafael-org.zoom.us/j/87021602392 Listen by phone: (669) 444-9171 ID: 870 2160 2392 One Tap Mobile: +16694449171,,87021602392# US CALL TO ORDER MINUTES 1. Approve regular meeting minutes of April 3, 2024. Recommended Action – Approve as submitted SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS No Special Presentations OTHER AGENDA ITEMS If necessary to ensure completion of the following items, the Chairperson may establish time limits for the presentations by individual speakers. 2. Other Agenda Items a. Active Transportation Program (ATP) Cycle 7 grant – Application Concept Plan What: Complete connections from recently completed and planned Class IV bikeways through downtown Location: North-South greenway on Tamalpais Avenue and 4th Street to Mission Avenue and Fourth Street from Grand Avenue to the North-South greenway Recommended Action – Receive and Comment b. Draft Capital Improvement Program Budget & Work Plan Recommended Action – Receive and Comment STAFF LIAISON REPORT 3. Staff Liaison Report: Project and Funding Updates COMMISSIONER REPORTS 4. Other brief reports on any meetings, conferences, and/or seminars attended by the Committee members. The meeting will be held in person. The meeting is being streamed live via Zoom. How to participate in the meeting: •You are welcome to come to the meeting and provide public comments in person. Each speaker will have 3 minutes to provide public comments. •Submit your comment by email to TrafficEng@cityofsanrafael.org. by 4:00 p.m. the day of the meeting. •If you experience technical difficulties during the meeting, contact TrafficEng@cityofsanrafael.org. 2 OPEN TIME FOR PUBLIC EXPRESSION The public is welcome to address the Committee at this time on matters not on the agenda that are within its jurisdiction. Comments may be no longer than three minutes and should be respectful to the community. ADJOURNMENT •Next scheduled meeting will be held on Wednesday, August 7, 2024, at 6:00 P.M. Any records relating to an agenda item, received by a majority or more of the board or commission less than 72 hours before the meeting, shall be available for inspection online and in the City Hall Third Floor Conference Room placed with other agenda-related materials on the table when you first walk into the room prior to the meeting. Sign Language interpreters may be requested by calling (415) 485-3066 (voice), emailing city.clerk@cityofsanrafael.org or using the California Telecommunications Relay Service by dialing “711”, at least 72 hours in advance of the meeting. Copies of documents are available in accessible formats upon request. To request Spanish language interpretation, please submit an online form at https://www.cityofsanrafael.org/request-for-interpretation/. Public Works Liaison: Joanna Kwok, Assistant Director/City Engineer, 111 Morphew Street, San Rafael, CA 94901 Email: TrafficEng@cityofsanrafael.org (email if you have any questions related to the agenda, projects, or issues getting into the meeting) 1 BICYCLE AND PEDESTRIAN ADVISORY COMMITTEE (BPAC) WEDNESDAY, APRIL 3, 2024 AT 6:00 P.M. REGULAR MEETING MINUTES CALL TO ORDER •Chair Mooney called the meeting to order at 6:02 P.M. ROLL CALL Commissioners Present:Chair Mooney, Vice Chair Kyle, Member Barry Bergman, Member (Alternate) Anne Coyne Commissioners Absent: Staff Present: Joanna Kwok (BPAC liaison and Assistant Public Works Director), Mayor Kate Colin Nhat Phan (Transporation Engineer), and April Miller (Director of Public Works) APPROVAL MINUTES Minutes for February 7, 2024 and March 12, 2024 BPAC Meetings were approved. SPECIAL PRESENTATIONS No special presentations. OTHER AGENDA ITEMS TRAFFIC SIGNAL IMPROVEMENT UPDATES PRESENTATION BY ADVANCE MOBILITY GROUP Advance Mobility Group (AMG) has conducted pre and post traffic movement counts to perform an analysis of vehicular flow through City of San Rafael Downtown area. The City has high volume traffic of cyclist and pedestrians. AMG has utilized San Rafael Centracs Management System to resolve crossing conflicts by increasing the pedestrian crossing time at crosswalks. In addition, Leading Pedestrian Interval (LPI) of 5 second head starts for pedestrians have been programmed at key traffic intersections. Evaluations of data collected through MioVision SMART City cameras and Centracs have helped improve signal timing for pedestrians and vehicle movements. Safety analysis of Manuel T. Freitas Parkway/Las Gallinas Avenue and Mission Avenue/Irwin Street intersections has been completed. A list of traffic calming safety measures have been proposed at the following intersections for both cyclists and pedestrians. Listed below are comments from BPAC Members and the public. Vice Chair Kyle – MioVision signal performance measures looked at a lot of different metrics. Were any of those examples automatically or random data gathering? Does the system provide which segment should be given priority? Who prioritizes the data? Response – There are a lot of different features within the system. It would vary based on what you would like to be filtered out. In most cases, complaints are what drives the City to evaluate an intersection. It would be both reactive or proactive to do some signal checks to make sure that everything is running smoothly. 2 Vice Chair Kyle – There has been completed studies in other countries like Europe that show they have a decrease in numbers of collisions and fatalities. New York is showing that our numbers in the States are increasing. Member Barry Bergman – Would we be able to pull up more impact data for cyclists and pedestrian data? Response - Yes. Chair Mooney – Can the City make available the data that we collect to the public? Can we post maps of where pedestrians and cyclists travel? Response – The City will investigate what type of information can provide to the public. Generating reports to share the information is available. Mayor Kate – Do we share the data with SMART Train. Response – Yes, we do coordinate with SMART when it comes to improving the traffic signal timing along the corridors. Public Comment No. 1 - Can we post a link of all the intersections with MioVision? When approaching Bayview and D Street intersection, it is hard to see the traffic signal light. There is a sign along 3rd and A Street that informs drivers to stop here at red. A lot of drivers do not stop at the limit line. Can we make the sign bigger? Public Comment No. 2 – Does this data collect and gets shared with Police Department? Response – Yes, the Police Department has access to a lot of the SMART City system components. They are utilized for investigations. Public Comment No. 3 – Are Police Department providing data with the public on accident reports? Response – We both analyze the data to make evaluations internally with Police Department. Post accidents, traffic team committee, and we go over safety concerns with the data. Member Barry Bergman – Getting the data will be critical with developing our future plans for pedestrians and bicyclists. It would be interesting to monitor and flag troubled areas. Vice Chair Kyle – Believes it would be a good idea if the committee would formulate a list of questions and thoughts to share with Public Works and Police Department. Member Anne Coyne- Believes sharing the data would be very important. Chair Mooney – Invite motion to receive and file Traffic Signal Improvement Presentation. Committee unanimously vote to approve and file this presentation. MANUEL T. FREITAS PARKWAY AND MONTECILLO ROAD SLIP LANE CLOSURE PILOT UPDATE BY STAFF APRIL MILLER Area has been closed since October with the installation of orange barriers and white delineators at the slip lane. Most of the feedback that was received was in October and 90 percent of comments recently have been very positive. Some concerns at first consisted of making a right turn from Manuel T. Freitas Parkway. Fire Department performed a turning radius test with a fire engine at the intersection of Montecillo Road and Manuel T. Freitas Parkway and were able to perform the turn safely. Future development would be to remove orange barriers, add new curb ramps and a new crosswalk. There were other questions about whether we could make this a pocket park. As part of the Citywide Parks and Recreation Master Plan, the community conveyed that they preferred that the city fixes what we currently have before tackling new areas. This is not a high priority area to put a park at this location. 3 Listed below are comments from BPAC Members and the public. Member Anne Coyne – What type of pavement would we keep this area? Response – Asphalt. Intent is to keep the area as is for now. Public Comment No. 4 – Thank you for making this happen. Kids who walk along this area really appreciate the safety improvements. Main concern moving forward is once everything is done, what will we do with the following area? Aesthetics would be an issue. Neighbors have been using it as a park lately and moving furniture into the area. Area would get funky after a while. Can we come up with a plan for the area? Public Comment No. 5 – It would be a good step to share information on the City website and community members. Community is defending the comments from people against it. Sometimes don’t have all the information on what the next steps are. Share new updates with Nextdoor and timeline to when the improvements will be completed. People were jaywalking a lot at the slip lanes, but now with closing the lanes, it’s been a lot safer these days. Orange barricades have been graffiti over recently. The crosswalk was removed along the area. New crosswalk was added and a non-ada one was removed. Petition of 400 signatures have been collected. Funds have been raised to help remove mulch or bark to cover the asphalt. Would be happy to walk the slip lane and work with the City to help look at improving the Slip Lane Area. Chair Mooney – Acknowledgement of comments from community members supporting closure. Staff April Miller – Public Works Department will maintain the area in the meantime as the City plans on what next action plan or improvement will be made in the area. Information will be updated and shared with the public. Will recommend as part of the CIP to install crosswalk and sidewalk improvements. Member Anne Coyne – Frustrated as a citizen to look at an eye sore on what has been done to date. Even though half of the Pilot Study helped make it safer, we should complete the job. Member Barry Bergman – Would like to see the Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan to really consider and looking at simple and quick build projects that don’t cost a lot of money. There’s tons of approaches and chances here where the community and City could collaborate. Mayor Kate – We appreciate the feedback and communication efforts on this Project. We as a City have done a lot of planning. Parks and Recreational team has done a great job addressing multiple areas throughout the City. We currently don’t have a mechanism to received public funds to help fix areas in the City. There is a conversation that needs to continue in order to see what we can do with the area. Chair Mooney – Believe this project was done correctly. It was brought up by the community, brought forward to Public Works, and then turned into a CIP Project. The movement in such a short time frame has been nice. Public Comment No. 6 – Corner of Bamboo Terrace, students are traveling across Montecillo Road unsafely. Not a crosswalk there. Can the City evaluate and see if a mid-block crossing would be possible? Chair Mooney – Invite motion to receive and file Manuel T. Freitas Parkway Slip Lane Closure Pilot Study Presentation. Committee unanimously vote to approve and file this presentation. STAFF LIAISON REPORT Staff Joanna Kwok presented on Transportation Projects that have been completed in FY 23-24 and what projects are starting construction, and recent grants received. The Local Road Safety Plan for City of San Rafael was adopted on April 2, 2024. Reference was made to webpage that will help the 4 city collect information from community for the Citywide Bicycle and Pedestrian Plan. We are looking to gather potential project locations the community would like to see improved. https://www.cityofsanrafael.org/citywide-bicycle-and-pedestrian-plan/ Staff Nhat Phan present on e-bike share program and safety. E-Bike Share Program for Marin and Sonoma County was delayed due to the pandemic. In October 2023, Drop Mobility was selected as the provider and developer of the E-Bike Share Program. Each Jurisdiction will have a total number of E-Bikes allocated to their City. Currently a name selection for the E-Bikes and bike rack HUB locations is being proposed. During this process, it may be a great opportunity to get BPAC Members involved with selection of location areas. Vice Chair Kyle – 300 E-Bikes is not enough. We should consider obtaining additional grants. Great idea to learn an area using an E-Bike to get around. Member Anne Coyne - Branding suggest that the name may not be that great and appealing. How would payment and pricing occur? Response – Pricing and Program itself is still being developed and will be shared at a later date with the BPAC Committee. Mayor Kate – How will we address with equity areas having access? Response – Installation of E-Bike HUBS are placed in locations to help get users to SMART and Transit. Chair Mooney – Los Gamos Striping Improvements include any bike facilities? Response – Bike facilities have not been added yet. Class II paths will be installed. Did the City apply for any SS4A Grants? Response – City will apply for the SS4A Grant at a later date. Will consider May and August deadlines. Public Comment No. 7 – Are there any more policies or details that you can share about the E-Bike share program and development? Response – No. It is all being reviewed and discussed currently. Public Comment No. 8 – How much further down is the staff? Response - Park staff is down 3 out of 12 personnel, street staff is fully staff, admin is fully staff, engineers just placed out 3 new hires that will start in June. Chair Mooney – I appreciate the Las Gallinas Road Bike Lane Stripping Installation Project. Chair Mooney – Invite motion to receive and file Staff Liaison Report. Committee unanimously vote to approve and file this presentation. COMMISIONER REPORTS Mayor Kate – Met with Point San Pedro Road Coalition leadership to discuss about how to improve safety along the roadway. City, County, and Community met to discuss potential improvements. Next step will be for the City and County to collaborate on a resurfacing project next spring/summer that could include restriping the whole roadway and potentially narrowing the lanes to 11 feet on Point San Pedro Road. The extra space would be allocated to the bike lanes, parking, or possibly a bike buffer. Will reconvene in the summer or fall of 2024 to discuss the striping design. OPEN TIME FOR PUBLIC EXPRESSION Public Comment No. 9 – Love that the City is working with the Point San Pedro Road Coalition. In front of the school and a few other areas. It’s a high-volume area that would need to be looked at. 5 Public Comment No. 10 – Consider rumble strips to alert vehicles heading into bike lanes? Thank you for the 3 foot passing bike lanes along Point San Pedro Road. Public Comment No. 11 – Started biking into the sidewalk because vehicles drive too close to bike lane. Public Comment No. 12 – City needs to look at evacuation areas at bike lanes where the bollards have been installed. Parking lot for Walgreens is ridiculous. Hard to get around. Need to look at access and evacuation routes. Public Comment No. 13 – How active has the City been with development of the Northgate Project for making improvements for bicyclists and pedestrians? ADJOURNMENT Meeting adjourned at 7:40 P.M. Next scheduled meeting will be June 5, 2024 at 6:00 P.M.