7.17.2024 Traffic Board

call this meeting to order before we get started soon as the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible roll call do police

department Stephanie MacArthur recording secretary Natalie Meo shall we then meet John will Point okay um have a motion to approve the minutes from last month's meeting June 26 uh 2024 second second second John any opposed see none that's approved uh is there anybody here who's not on tonight's agenda that's Hef for citizen inut or did everyone already fill up their package and they're on the agenda

okay get into curb Cuts first first one is 71 Ash Street uh engineer Department found no issues or objections with this location I make a motion to approve second any opposed none pass second want be 680 Bay Street uh again engineer oh this is also uh 1342 County Street it looks like uh no issues or objections found by the engineer Department motion approve second any opposed um and location of curve removal zero

highest in Street applicant is 6 uh 363 H motion to approve second any opposed none okay miscellaneous requests traffic improvements with additional parking in the area of government center if you guys look at your uh little picture you Steph has here you're great thank you this is a request for parking on the north side of Sullivan drive from 3rd to 4th along with the west side of Fourth

Street and Sullivan drive to Henry sen Drive currently parking is prohibited on both sides this is additional parking also there be kiosk parking uh just bre out a separate issue right yeah that's a separate issue oh yeah how's it going good for the record my name is Dan agier I'm the director of engineering and planning here for the city of Fall River um over the last year or two we've taken a look at a few

different locations throughout the downtown area as well other locations in the city to make some relatively inexpensive improvements with just striping um lanes and the potential for some additional parking so the petition that you have or the item that we're discussing now which is Sullivan drive there was an accident maybe two months ago um where a vehicle through the intersection hit the god rail I got the

god rail saved him from going over into Route 195 um the planning department has also initiated a Downtown parking study that we're in the middle of for looking at things just like this um where can we add on street parking throughout the downtown area as we see increased businesses increased residential uses coming into the area every parking space is important you know you guys deal with

it with the atg grade lots and Pearl Street Garage and Third Street Garage every space is valuable so when we look at this street as you know in particular I walk it every day because I park on the little overpass over there um the pavement with through Sullivan Drive is is very wide actually wider than it is on the Westerly side of the Third Street and on that side of third along long

City Hall we know we do have on street parking and then the two dedicated Lanes um that come through there is also you'll see in the hatched area on Sullivan Drive the post office has their um drop box there as well so we've proposed to accommodate leaving uh almost two spaces open for them so that that box can stay add some uh parking on that interior side vehicle doors exiting driver side would be on the concrete

sidewalks um and then create two narrower Lanes through the remainder of Sullivan drive with the appropriate striping getting us up to the intersection of fourth and traffic can go either right or left so right now after the gas company came through um they didn't go back and put in even the Chevron striping up at the island that they were supposed to do so this would also clean that up as well so we think

it's an opportunity to one add some parking two make it safer for everyone both pedestrian and vehicular traffic and while we were at that and striping it bringing people away from that curb line it kind of made sense to utilize what's an already hatched area on Fourth um and add some additional spaces as well now whether we hatch that entire area and label it Municipal parking only or leave it wide open and be kiosk

parking of course we'd be up to to discuss that in whatever form or fashion you would see fit we did send this out to um police fire uh traffic only got positive responses um but this is definitely the place to come to First and let's see where we're at and see if we can move this forward so you're looking at what is it about six new spots on Sullivan and then

2 four or so on the Fourth Street side exactly yep anyone on the board have any questions no it's uh it will certainly accommodate it as uh Dan stated so uh it's a perfect place for it Mr AER you said the on the on the Fourth Street overpass possibly Municipal spots there you would designate those possibly for that so right now it's hatched out entirely it's faded but there is a width of about I I

think if you look at the color photo you can see it a little bit underlying so outside of the three traveled lanes that are currently there the rest of it hatched out in yellow so were there spots there before no no nothing they' they it's been hatched I don't know when the last time it was hatched but it's it's faded pretty well so it would be my first recommendation or thought would be

just to leave it open and leave it kiosk um unless we don't have the ability to add other kiosks M um I don't know where the next closest one to that would be but what my my thought is we have a bunch of kiosk spots in and around the building that are being occupied by Municipal Vehicles so if we wanted to because we have kiosks already installed maybe we allow the city workers that are using

those spaces to utilize these and it can be signed that same way you know Municipal parking only during a certain amount of hours open at night for whoever residentially needs the spaces once the business is closed um in this Corridor as as you know as you get down over even in front of Heartwell we have individual businesses that are renting spaces on the street with with bags over

the meters um so there's definitely a need for additional spaces in this vicinity but again I know we're not adding new meters but is there an appetite for adding another kiosk so we don't want to create another problem by instituting this one so it may be striping it's one thing what we label and how we use it could be something else so for for for tonight's purpose uh we're just going to go on if we'd like

the addition of these parking spaces how they're utilized it will something we can deal with later so any other questions from any board members I don't know people drive crazy so yeah so the whole intention is not when you when you create narrower lanes and you guide people through a street rather than leaving 36 ft of asphalt WI open with no striping that's how people drive crazy U so I that

theory I've also seen a one lane with a cruiser with lights on and an officer in bright yellow standing in front right set closed I mean um yeah it's it's well thought out in my opinion I think you did a great job with your presentation here um I don't vote I'm here to facilitate the meeting so if there's a motion the board members I'll make a motion to accept motion to accept I have a

second put the the Motions there so well I mean do we still have questions I just I was wondering uh the mailbox from the post office has to be there well we we can look at that yeah that's probably two spaces when we had just redone That Sidewalk um we had left it where it was dealing with the post office and the federal government were trying to relocate one is not always the easiest

thing but if it was if the board wishes and we could potentially relocate that then yeah we could potentially gain at least another I I like the uh the idea on that street I'm a little lary on Fourth Street to be honest with you yeah I mean and if you want to cut it in half you then cut it in half I mean any little bit yeah we see how it works and

then if if we see the need to add it I mean you would almost I I had thought you know if we got rid of the the post office box and put the post office box on Fourth what suggest you're talking maybe 100 yard worth of displacement and then repositioning that um that frees up the entirety of Sullivan my concern would be Fourth Street as you guys know that I've driven over there everyone is

hard angled looking back over their right shoulder just the way that corner is designed uh I just wouldn't want to see someone creeping out doing that hard press and rolling into a park car cuz they're not used to one being there I see you have that hatched out around the corner yeah that would be the only area I'd be nervous about uh maybe making that one space longer but adding the

two from Sullivan and moving that um yeah I like that idea mailbox on to Fourth but again I I don't know what that processes no but but but if that's your recommendation that you would prefer that then we'll go down that Avenue and and we'll see what that process is and then if for some reason it's going to be an act of Congress then we'll come back and tell you it's an act

of Congress and then you can vote differently but if your initial review is you don't like Fourth Street you're you're positive with you like Sullivan but you would prefer for's a nice wide straight shot you know what I mean so it's it be hard for anybody to say oh well I didn't see the car there uh like I said coming on from Sullivan on to Fourth that angle there you're creeping out cuz you got two

and as they're star roll forward veing towards the the curbed part there that would be my only area of concern farther down on that side I don't see it being a problem there's two or three spaces there what we got Charlie your motion stands as is oh you would if you'd like to amend it it's it's your motion my brother y well I I would I I stated that motion okay so for both salivan drive

and Henry I'm sorry salivan drive and Street as yep so this stays as is correct and the post no no J's motion is to accept the proposal as is for both parking on both both streets the way it's presented here well I'm going to go by what you say s because you're the one that's out there seeing the accident and all that I'm not safe because it's horrible when

I drive down this way I'm sorry to say it's just horrible people have no no concern for no one else people have no not they just crazy even stop signs nowadays it doesn't stop people from going um out of control but I will go with your suggest suggestion because you're out there I'm not I I I like the fact that uh moving the mailbox there because like the sergeant said before

when you're coming down um Sol and drive your tendency is to look right and there's a is a stop sign at that at that island and uh the Old Fall River Roll comes through people are looking right they're not looking left and now you have to to pay attention for pedestrians that are getting out of their cars there whether it be the the workers city workers or the uh or the uh people just

visiting or or parking in there so I'm not opposing to you tabling the matter and let me go deal with the post office and see okay and then maybe come back with a revised plan yeah that would be that's fine they automatically frees up those two spots if that's something that they're going to be agreeable to um did they have any opposition Mr Agia for the post box to be moved no not

don't have any oh I did the post office I don't know well that's what I'm saying so this wasn't this wasn't this hasn't been vetted through them yet so that would be and again it's not like it's it's relocating to a anywhere absurd because they're literally going to travel that same corner and it would be set on that because the other drop off is right around the corner on third

already exactly um so if we if we need to find another place for that and leave that entire Fourth Street area dedicated and hatched out for them then it would also make it safer for when they're picking up males too so agree I don't have an issue with if you Charlie wants to withdraw his motion to make a motion to table the matter until we can get an answer from the post

office I'll withdraw my motion so that way okay so uh motion to table motion to table second seconded any oppose excellent thank you thank you very much to the next one yeah you're on your next on the agenda so um so similarly and actually this this was done probably two years ago we had put together a a sketch of of what the intersection of Bradford and South Main could potentially look like so we

have we have looked at do we reconstruct the roads completely with Curbing and the light then we had floated this sketch around of just making some pavement markings and adding some stop signs to make this intersection flow it's never going to be perfect unless you signalize it and and really drag all the curb lines in together but this was an attempt to make some uh inexpensive

modifications to try and handle some of the traffic kind of sat on the table it was just an idea then um there was one of the groups I believe it was Frack one of the art groups had received a grant from Bloomberg for what they call pavement art um where they come in and they actually paint intersections um with different murals on the ground and to work as traffic calming measures as

well so they had initially started at Bradford and Broadway um but didn't work well there they actually wanted to paint the interior of the streets put up the um what do they call Stephanie the uh the little pedestals there The Pedestrian Crossing pedestals the little plastic 3 foot yeah and so they wanted to run through Bradford and through Broadway narrowing up to 10 two 10ft lanes utilizing these and I just I

said what's going to happen when you have a fire engine coming through they're going to have to run through these things and so we got them to agree to if we take a look at something like this and we see the very large hatched out area near the internal Circle that there were some larger locations that they could provide their mural space and not need to put these impediments in the

traveled way so they decided I we think it's something that that we can think about Stephanie had stated that that would require coming here for a discussion about adding now stops to this intersection which aren't out there now right um I mean at first glance on on this this diagram I I see that you have you know the Lane's clearly marked up but you also have stop bars y are you looking to add stop

signage I would I would think so again it it had never progressed to that level yet so yes if there was a stop line yes there would be an Associated stop sign of course looking southbound yep on South Main that would be you know not no no major issues looking at this uh the stop bars with a stop sign on the corner I'm pretty sure that would be visible enough my concern

would be going eastbound from Bradford a um where would we be placing this sign that would be placed within the hatched area so it would not be over standing in the roadway correct like that y so this is the oh you have the paint one yeah okay yeah this way so this is where the AR mural but this is roadway so this isad no this is Bradford at this is like Russ Gibson

it's like through Park wide like right around the par water so basically all this area would be a painted mural and then within that would be a freestanding y stop so they want to put a stop sign mural and roadway this could still be muraled and painted without the stop lines yeah and just with the with the right turn Lanes left lanes and just some arrows um we can we can try that as well I really

um I'm not a big fan of having this design freestanding well I'm not either because they when they want to to put literally 40 that's that's 48 hours before that's clipped by somebody um so without the stop signs I think your your stop bars on the road way would be a move point that would be hard to yeah no I I don't think you would have one you need to have either both or necessarily opposed

to stop sign traveling south at this intersection um but this gets really tight as we all know um is that going to right around the corner yeah but this it this is a wide enough strip I guess what would cause the conjection uh conenction yeah trying to get in and out there that'd be the only problem I mean it is kind of a messy wide open intersection but statistically it's not bad it's not the

worst intersection or close to um and that's surprising without any without any stop signs or yield signs it's not not a problem 35 years ago the first thing you learned in in traffic design school is that when you put a signal in an intersection accidents are going to increase um so when you when you leave everything entirely open sometimes the majority of people travel a little more cautiously they

sorry um painted up and uh these Lanes marked out everything shy of the stop signs um I think that would that would help out a lot what what are the murals supposed to do just beauy it's it's it's one it's combining art with traffic calming measures so rather than just having it entirely hatched yeah then they rather than hatch they'll be putting me in instead so in a location like this it's you know it's wide open

enough we're not putting you know impediments in um and what I would say is you know if we're not dealing with if we're going to remove the stops what I would say is wait for the true plan from the consultant dealing with the art before you make any votes on it but we can at least advise them that there will be no stop signs or or stop bars yeah I don't think as is

um going be too beneficial so this this are is it going to be like they're going to have this every year they're going to renew it it's one year Grant so to get PA where just like everything else in fora it's going to fade it's not going to come back it'll end up being hatched happens from there it'll end up being hatched I like the great it's good idea is about upkeep isn't that's the problem

everywhere right we don't want to be everywhere we no no no no no I'm saying no I'm saying everywhere here you know we're great at building things chario he spends his days fixing them and maintaining them and keeping up with them it's not easy just regular striping it's impossible to keep up with that right yeah never mind we are because I remember them doing in front of City Hall La was here this has going back

many years it look beautiful goes because this is all through a grant what was my my two sents on this matter regarding the uh stop signs um I don't I'm not a big proponent of it being on Bradford a facing Eastbound And I think we're just going to create more of a problem although I mean it could work but looking at the parking I think we're just going to end up making an

issue where one doesn't typically exist but you guys got for questions other places can do this that what's that is there other places that they can do this to like do AR this is definitely um yeah they've done it they've done it in a lot of places I think a province actually has I'm saying like in our area is there other places that it can do where there's not so much

traffic well this is it has to serve a purpose for traffic calming so there has to be an intersection that warrants spending the money um and this was the one down on Broadway in Bradford they just they were going to be they were going to be impeding traffic too much that we we just said we couldn't do it so they don't want to do it on the on the side street and something that

nobody's going to see or that it doesn't need the traffic so it's generated by being a traffic cing measure I like the fact that you're identifying the lanes you know because how many times you pull up and you want to turn right and another car pulls on the side of you he's going to turn right so at least you identify the lane that's that's better that's an improvement and of course trying to get

you know you've got that I don't know probably 50 to 60 feet of pavement where the large hatching is at the end of the park you know everything all kinds of stuff happens in that big so just we had contemplated actually constructing the curb and dragging that you know radius out yeah um but this what this does is it gives us a a good test of vehicles making its way through and then of

course when you're only hatching emergency vehicles can drive over pain you know we don't want to have to start impeding curb lines and find out if we've got an issue with whether it's going to the hospital whether we've got you know Med flight coming into the park and narrowing that up too much I think would be a difficult thing so i' say we're almost there but don't quite like this well no but it but

it can it directs us back to the the consultant and have them come before you because I'm I'm assuming any any painting on the street for traffic purposes still comes back here right for review so y let's have them yeah and honestly even if the mural does fade out over a year or two and it goes to hatching uh like John says um identifying these Lanes is already a step in the right direction that's going

to be a big help um I think uh and it still leaves all this staging area without having throw an island up there yeah I mean it actually gives you know at the Feast for instance right that's a great spot for you guys to be able to park cres you know all the all the time but it make puts you in a safer environment as well so even after it

fades nothing to say that we just can't paint it all one color doesn't have to be hatched the traffic department can take it upon itself to find some colored paint and keep it updated we have a motion regarding this issue motion to table have the Consulting for come back yeah second any opposed great thank you all very much thank you m thank

you uh is there someone here from Mount hoav requesting stop sign on Atlantic Boulevard of course

hi my name is Pat Casey and uh I think all of you know me and I won't take much of your time and I'll try to make sure that I hit all the points that uh to explain to you uh why I'm here and I'll make it short and sweet I'm looking for having a stop sign on the North and on the south side of Atlantic Boulevard in Mount Hope Avenue right now there is a

sign a stop sign on Mount Hope Avenue headed um West and um on Atlantic Boulevard it would be north and south and the reason for it is that uh a lot of cars making the corner uh don't really they don't stop when they're traveling on the boulevard there's no stop time so they don't stop they go right by we have a lot of children in our area that ride bikes and it scares me when I

hear the brakes slammed on now by creating the stop sign on Atlantic Boulevard it would make it a three-way stop which means that it would stop the cars from taking a clear fast T onto Mount Avenue Mount ta Avenue is the only exit that is there for all the homes that are on the other side of the tracks all the other streets to the left and to the right of all dead end streets

so it also would eliminate people not knowing what street to take to get out of there but having the stop signs would really make it much safer for everyone in the neighborhood and it would make it much safer for me not hearing screeching breaks breaks someone uh recently lost their break coming down Mount Hope Avenue and they went right across right down to the Bay into the water now if there was a car

coming on Atlantic Boulevard it would not have turned out as nice as it did no one was hurt but if there was a car coming without a stop sign someone would have got hit um I've spoken to the neighbors the neighbors are all in favor of this there was no one in the neighborhood that was against having this done so what I'm here to is to ask you to please support this and make our

neighborhood safe we try to keep it nice down there we cut the grass we keep it nice for everybody to enjoy and it makes my heart happy when I see people from other neighborhoods coming down and enjoying the Mount Hope Bay I get to see it every day of the week and I love to see other people enjoy especially the children and with that I think if you have any questions I'm more than glad to

try to answer them any board member have any questions I have no questions motion approve second any oppos seeing n thank you all very much and you're doing a great job uh Omaha Street and Detroit Street yeah Frank teron uh 35 Wind Court I'll make it brief my wife says I talk too much so um what I'm requesting is one two or three stop signs um at the corner of Omaha and Detroit um Omaha you

know ends at that intersection um there's really not a clear line of sight to the left back onto Detroit Street um there's also there's trees there there's a sign and usually people park right near that corner because there's nothing to prohibit them from that um there's a lot of businesses at the end of Omaha Street around the Times they're getting out coming in whatever there's a

lot of traffic going through there it's all vehicular intensive right it's traffic there's a taxi company there's a Auto Parts delivery there's tractor trailer traffic from the modular home company back there um so I think you know it really serve the neighborhood there's no no uh there's no clear line of sight particularly to the left even one stop sign on Detroit coming from Omaha yeah coming from Omaha right so

even one stop sign I think even though everybody's supposed to look right that would help quite a bit so you think this a stop sign on Omaha had you approach Detroit is all that would be needed I think it would certainly help um you know a normal three-way I think would be acceptable too you know maybe that be the safest thing um but if you know expense was a consideration i' I'd

say that that would help uh even just the one most of the traffic float on Detroit right yeah so that's alaha yeah Detroit coming from Jefferson so there's nothing there currently and then that goes down to Omaha and there is no signage on Detroit at all nothing nothing on Detroit nothing yeah actually I don't that at all yeah any questions there's nothing there now right nothing nothing on neither Detroit

or Omaha right so we have options here for for you guys to make a motion you can go single stop sign on Omaha as you approach Detroit or we also have um Detroit a three-way stop sign north and south on Detroit and then uh at the end of Omaha as well what your suest both of you both on that street honestly I have no problem going with the threeway St

man it's not like Detroit is uh stopping go all the way through and it's nice to have a quick checkpoint make a motion for a three-way stop second and two on Detroit one on Omaha that that would benefit everybody anyos okay okay thanks very much guys I appreciate it uh tables request 282 Barnaby Street should not be here this evening correct 282 Barnaby okay motion to uh drop this this was already

tabled motion to drop second second any opposed dropped okay 24 pekham Street you can stay there sir uh does Drive is a dri

okay um you do have a driveway yes sir what is the issue with your driveway my wife is uh that driveway she's also been on this ability for 10 years uh the reason that's that's that just had I ran into this issue y I had the driveway next door and that's what I wrote and I use that for until now guy wants to use his own Drive which is his driveway sure

but he let me park there for so when I put that house there he let me park this whole time and just recently July 1st actually he said he needs to drive so now understood um well let me just this will go for anybody else here um as we go through handicap requests okay there are certain things that are prerequisites you must have these check the box if you will items um and then there are also

some automatic disqualifiers some of them being if the applicant um doesn't drive for one right obviously you don't drive you don't have a no no no I'm I'm just giving you examples of automatic disqualified originally the email was sent said I didn't drive right now if if you have no license or no car we're not going to give you a parking spot on the street as you just heard parking is a hot

commodity that being said one of the other um pre- disqualifiers are is if you do have off street parking available to you the way they look at it is well you already have off street parking um and you can utilize that I know what you're saying your wife is also handicapped you're vehicle home I get it but then they'll turn around with okay yeah I understand your handicapped your

wife's handicapped you each have a car well what if you want to get uh uh a sports car as well do we have to give you a third handicap spot no I I know that's not the case I'm just so that's that's where we're at um that being said there's always exceptions again um the the board here can want to see it that what I have and you yeah all you check all the boxes

like I said the only thing that I can possibly see that uh would be a disqualifiers the fact if I if I could walk and I could I'd PO on South Main Street to walk home I I don't have an issue it's just I totally understand again um these rules weren't estblished it's not you I know I understand but uh does anybody have any question that's why I'm that's why I'm asking sure yeah

you got to apply you got probably the end of this year or early next year so absolutely is there uh any questions from the board members here no is there a motion on to motion to deny is there a second second motion to deny any opposed see n all right so like I said based on the fact that you do already have off street parking I get your wife is utilizing thank you uh 141 18th

Street Drive

no issues with this application no issues there a motion motion accept second by charie any opposed seeing none give it about 12 weeks sir they'll be out there and um it will be directly in front of the closest entrance to that property thank you very much you 98 Grant Street hello

how long have you lived on Grant Street five months now five months

no issues any motion on motion accept second second any opposed seeing none all set man we like 12 weeks okay thank you 585 Cherry Street 585 Cherry once one twice there motion to table wasn't it table before Cherry Street no that was bar the B one oh good motion to table motion to table is there a second second oppose 585 Cherry Street is TBL for next month 136 John hello

Mo there a motion motion second seconded any opposed seeing none all set sir once you renew that registration if you could just either mail me a copy email it to me the registration expires at the end of July oh why you get that you already did it okay so I'll just need a copy of that oh I need a copy of it I I don't need it right now because I don't have I don't

have access to a printer right now um but if you could either mail me a copy or bring it in have somebody bring it in okay address right correct y okay okay perfect welcome 77 aium sir m

I see issues with this but I do want to hear him say his whole name how do you say your name we just want to make sure we're saying you're right maros outstanding okay is there a motion Mo accept Johnny second second any opposed say none I'll set sir I'll about 12 weeks you're welcome 577 War

again no issues no issues motion approve second second by Charlie any opposed seeing none you need a copy of his updated was July same thing once he renews it when you renew your registration I just got it in the mail so I'll make copy and bring it over awesome very good okay thank you thank you 74 Turtle Street don't see anybody once twice so motion to table motion to table second second by sure on any

opposed none awesome I will read through the resented handicap spots we got Hope Street Baker Street Osborne Street and Bay View motion to accept motion accept I will seconded any oppos see none we are adjourned sure sweet good job everybody