Salem Bicycling Advisory Committee
Approved Meeting Minutes
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
A meeting of the Salem Bicycling Advisory Committee was held on Wednesday, January 14th, 2015 at 7:00 PM in Meeting Room 312 at Salem City Hall Annex, 120 Washington Street.
Members Present: Chairman Jeff Bellin, Bruce Mabbott, Brad Sandler, Ernie DeMaio, Will Peck, David Bowie, Kristin Anderson
Also Present: Jeff Elie, Energy and Sustainability Manager, City of Salem; John Pelletier, City of Salem Mass-in-Motion Coordinator
Members Absent: None
Invited Guests: John Hendrickson and Gary Hebert (Fay, Spofford and Thorndike)
Public in Attendance: None
Chairman Bellin called the meeting to order at 7:01 PM. He acknowledged those members absent and present for the record.
Chairman Bellin asked if there were any comments or edits for the December 10th draft meeting minutes. No changes or additions were made. Motion was made by D. Bowie motioned, E. DeMaio seconded, all approved.
Chairman Bellin asked if there were any public comments at this time. There was no public comment.
Complete Streets Working Group
Complete Streets meeting was held at Salem City Hall Annex on December 17th. Bruce Mabbott could not attend meeting so J. Pelletier who led the meeting, updated the Committee on Bicycle related issues that were brought up. He noted that there was not much that came up related to bicycling but they are still waiting on the road paving schedule from DPW and Engineering and he is working with Dominick Pangallo in the Mayor’s office to coordinate with the MBTA about allowing access to the locked bicycle parking cage in the garage. Currently the construction workers still finishing work at the site are using the cage to lock up tools and other related items. Access will be granted to the public soon.
Access to the MBTA bicycle parking cage will require that users procure an MBTA Charlie Card, register their card online, and use it to access the locked cage at the garage. Free cards can be obtained at Salem Cycle, City Hall, City Hall Annex (Planning Department Desk and Mass-in-Motion office), and the Salem Chamber of Commerce.
Bike Circulation Master Plan
John Hendrickson and Gary Hebert of Fay, Spofford, and Thorndike (FST) both attended the meeting to begin discussing goals and scope for the update to the Bicycle Circulation Master Plan that was last updated in 2015. In light of the accomplishments of the first Master Plan, and new goals in the Vision 2020 Plan, the Committee has requested that FST, who had completed the last Master Plan, begin working with City Staff and the SBAC to brainstorm about what the Committee hoped to accomplish with the update.
While the City has resources to pay FST for the update via executing a Task Order on their existing on-call Engineering contract with the City, additional technical services and potentially pilot-project infrastructure implementation funding have been offered by Mass-in-Motion and the Metropolitan Area Planning Council. The Committee was not originally involved in developing the preliminary draft scope of how the MAPC will help with the update so what the Committee has decided to do is move forward as originally conceived to update the Master Plan using FST and have MAPC coordinate with FST, City Staff, and the SBAC to maximize use of their technical assistance so not to produce duplicate or contradictory work. The Committee agreed that MAPC’s strengths lie in community building and coordination amongst multiple parties, a broader
approach to master planning and technical assistance so allowing FST to handle the nuts and bolts engineering design, site selection, and other more technical aspects of the report will better maximize resources.
J. Pelletier and J. Elie will be attending a MAPC meeting at 60 Temple Place, Boston, MA on January 22 at 10am, to begin discussing how MAPC will fit into the whole update process. FST offered to attend meeting as well as D. Cooper since he works in downtown Boston.
FST predicted that the process to update the plan would take 4-5 months and could be completed by June 2015.
Discussion of new member for committee
J.~Elie sent Tess DeMatteo and Tracy Ware,~interested to join the SBAC,~emails to inform them that they need to submit a letter to the Mayor's office that they are interested in joining.~
Tracy Ware is a biology professor at SSU,~on the Sustainability Committee at SSU,~lives downtown and commutes to SSU by bike
Action Item – J. Elie to reach out to two interested parties to see if they are still interested in joining or if they have any questions; also reach out to Mayor’s office to check on this
New Logo for SBAC
The Committee motioned to table the major discussion about the Logo for next meeting but did suggest J. Elie to reach out to local Salem graphic designers to work on a new logo.
E. DeMaio suggested Glen Kennedy, a graphic designer, and member of the Salem Design Review Board.
J. Bellin suggested Cave Dog Studios
Action Item: J. Elie to reach out to both graphic designers and open dialogue about designing a new logo for the Committee. Bring some potential designs to the next meeting for feedback.
Miscellaneous Business
B.~Mabbott
Clarify the Canal St.~bike path extension timeline – J. Elie informed the Committee that design for the new path would begin in Fiscal Year 2016. Currently the Engineering and Planning Department are planning their FY16 budgets for approval later in Spring 2015 so the hope is to have this work begin in the Summer 2015.
Design status Domino's to Riley Plaza connection – J. Elie informed the Committee that this would be included in the design of the Bike Path Extension and in conversations with the Mayor, making the connection from behind Domino’s where the path will end, there is a safe and easily accessible connection through Riley Plaza and into the Downtown corridor, allowing bicyclists to easily access Washington St.
Summary of Action Items
J. Elie – Follow up with the Mayor’s office whether prospective SBAC members had submitted letters of interest for joining Committee.
J.~Elie - Reach out to both graphic designers and open dialogue about designing a new logo for the Committee. Bring some potential designs to the next meeting for feedback.
Chairman Bellin asked if there were any further items to discuss tonight. There being none, D. Bowie asked for a motion to adjourn. B. Sandler seconded the motion. All approved. The meeting was adjourned at 8:43 PM.
Respectfully submitted by:
Jeffrey Elie,
Energy and Sustainability Manager
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