BP June 6 17 meeting packet

Bicycle/Pedestrian Subcommittee Tuesday, June 6, 2017 5:00 pm – 6:00 pm Large Conference Room, City Hall Dover, DE Agenda Welcome Approval of Agenda Approval of May Meeting Minutes Old Business Items: o Bike Friendly Application Update o Walk Friendly Report Card review o May Bike Month Events – follow reports Bike To Work Day – May 17 Ride of Silence – May 17 Fun Rides Announcements Adjournment THE AGENDA ITEMS AS LISTED MAY NOT BE CONSIDERED IN SEQUENCE. PURSUANT TO 29 DEL. C. §10004(E)(2), THIS AGENDA IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE TO INCLUDE THE ADDITION OR THE DELETION OF ITEMS, INCLUDING EXECUTIVE SESSIONS, WHICH ARISE AT THE TIME OF THE MEETING.

Bicycle Pedestrian Sub‐Committee Dover City Hall Large Conference Room Dover, DE May 2, 2017 ** DRAFT ** Members Present: Others Present: Jim Hutchison, Chris Asay, Carolyn Courtney, Eddie Diaz Dave Moses, Fran Riddle, Andy Siegel John Fiori, Kate Layton CALLED TO ORDER: Meeting opened at 5:05 P.M. The meeting was called to order. AGENDA The chair opened the floor for agenda review. With no changes to the presented agenda, it was accepted without objection. APPROVAL MEETING MINUTES The chair opened the floor for minutes review. The date on the minutes presented is incorrect and will be edited to reflect April 4, 2017. With no changes the minutes will approved without objection. OLD BUSINESS ITEMS Capital School District Update Mr. Fiori noted the April 12th Bike Rodeo was a success at North Dover Elementary. Serving 88 students out of four classes. Thanks again those who came out to help. We will be working to repeating the curriculum and event in the fall at other schools in the district. He reported the teachers’ feedback was positive. It was a big hit with the students and the teachers. Some basic discussion on how to get into more schools. Mr. Moses added, thanking Kathy Doyle would be appropriate as she did a lot of the ground work, the same with the McCormick’s (John & CC). Ms. Courtney will draft a letter of appreciation for the chair to review. Restoring Central Dover – Bike Rack Update The chair opened the floor to Ms. Layton. She then shared dimensions of the bike rack as of today and noted it now has been primed, will be painted later and installed within the next few weeks. She has continued to coordinate with the City of Dover staff (Margy Cyr, Jason Lyon and Carolyn Courtney) and MasterCraft to ensure its location and viability due to size. Plan will be to “unveil” the bike rack at Bike to Work Day, May 17. Invitations will be sent out to elected officials, school district officials, students and teachers associated with the project. Ms. Courtney will coordinate the event activities and invites. Senator Bikeway Mr. Fiori noted they the State (Jeff Niezgoda) has agreed to pay for the maintenance of the green paint that will be laid in front of the funeral home area and the city has agreed to pay for the delineators along this area (after they get costs estimates) to confirm. The public meeting for an update is coming up April 11th most attendees with MPO, CSD employees, DART, etc. Comments are due back from DelDOT’s review within the month of May. There are some concerns about the path going in front of the funeral home. We have documentation on how we approached and we feel we

can satisfy the traffic department concerns. We did our due diligence and it is the way to go. We did not get a lot of private property owners at the workshops, we are reaching out to them directly to discuss the project. It is on schedule for plans for constructions bidding in the fall. Finals plans and specs are expected in November. Mrs. Riddle noted she did speak with President Clark. He is not happy about the path. Two objections, Wesley’s long term construction plans include a new center where there is some open space that would potentially close the block of Fulton to thru traffic. The other was a safety concern to pedestrian on campus. I think we could just put up a stop sign for the cross biking traffic to keep the pedestrians safe. The conservation was pleasant. I did explain some of the battle had been fought on these issues of access, he was quite so convinced. It was noted this Phase of the project is down the road. We will just have to keep this on the radar. Mr. Moses added I am frustrated I was part of the process and the Fulton Street access. It was never the agreement that the public would not be able to go thru, that only vehicular traffic was to be stopped in this area. They are taking ownership of this street. It feels like they are taking advantage of this area. Discussion on what other campuses do in similar situations. Dover Duathlon Ms. Courtney over all it went well. We did figure out the Fire Police had mixed the scheduled date. Plan will be in place to prevent this again. We had 70 participants, from 7 years to 69 years. Considering it was Easter weekend, we feel it was a good turnout. In discussion it was noted to pick a date very soon for the 2018 event. Target date will be April 14, 2018 (the second weekend of April each each, some years this will come up again Easter again, but then we’ll be more recognized). We came out on budget. May Bike Month Events Legislators Ride – May 10, information attached and on our website. There has been a slight change to the route coming up from the south due to the North Street construction. Bike to Work Day – May 17, activities are falling into place. Mr. Siegel has lined up food donations and has a route planned from Dover High School. Mr. Fiori will lead a ride in from DelDOT. It was also noted that Dover AFB will be participating in Bike To Work day, per their community relations staff member Laura Chupp. They are even hosting an event on base. We’ll be happy to acknowledge their involvement and perhaps we need to be sure to keep open communications with them. Some discussion on DAFB and biking/pedestrian inclusion. Ride of Silence – May 17, all is lined up for the event to take place at 7 pm leaving from Silver Lake Park. Fun Rides – First ride of this season will be May 25. Flyers available and information on the website. Mr. Asay noted doing an organized Fun Ride when the new connector path opens. Either on the road or trail. Mr. Fiori noted he would check with the appropriate chains at DelDOT to see what can be arranged. ANNOUNCEMENTS Bike Month Tshirts – Mr. Fiori had this year’s tshirt. You may pick your shirt up now. Emma Cote did this year’s design. Walk Friendly App – We did ok, but we did not get the designation. Per the report card that you all have tonight. We have wrestled with good pedestrian facilities, so it’s not entirely surprising that we got the score we did. We will add to the agenda for next month for discussion.

Bike Friendly Application – Staff will meet with selected members of the subcommittee to review progress. The intent will be to distribute the draft application to the members in June – July for their input and we will submit in August. Bicycle/Pedestrian Coordinator ‐ The chair noted we lost our person assigned with Ann Marie Townshend. Ms. Courtney noted she would discuss the situation with the acting director and report back to the committee. Columbia Avenue side walk issue ‐ Mr. Moses noted the complaint about the sidewalk area that his wife recently fell when running. With discussion it was noted the sidewalk, shrubbery and tree roots have become a safety issue. Mr. Moses was encouraged to send the pics and locations to Ms. Courtney. Ms. Courtney will send to the appropriate city code/inspections department staff that can review to see if this is a city issue to be resolved. ADJOURNMENT With no further business the meeting adjourned at 6:17 PM without objection.

2017 F n Ride to the & mmer Performin n The Gr en The City of Dover's Bicycle and Pedestrian Subcommittee and the Department of Transportation invite you to attend the 2017 Fun Rides by biking to the Spring & Summer Performing Arts Series on The Green. This year's fun rides are scheduled for Thursday's on May 25th, June 29th, July 27th and August 24th. Each event will feature a local band. For a complete schedule go to https://www.cityofdover.com/Parks-Recs-Home. 2 ways to join in the ride! Do you live near the south end of Dover? Meet us with your bikes at the Food Lion within the Gateway South Shopping Center on Rt. 10 at 6:00 p.m. There we will bike the Rt. 10 Bridge Connector to Isaacs Branch Trail and Capital City Trial to The Green. Or if it's more convenient to ride from The Green out to the Gateway Shopping Center, meet us on The Green at 5 pm. From there we will ride the trail to meet our friends at Rt. 10 and then return to The Green together, just in time for the show! Bring family and friends along with your own blanket, food and drinks to enjoy the night out. The concert is from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. and it is highly encouraged to ride back as a group. Make sure your riding apparel has reflective details and bikes have front and rear lights. To sign up for this fun ride please contact John T. Fiori, Bicycle Coordinator at (302) 760-2260 or e-mail at John.Fiori@state.de.us or Carolyn Courtney, Bicycle/Pedestrian Staff at (302) 736-7051 or email at ccourtney@dover.de.us. In case ofinclement weather, call the Weather Line at (302) 736-7155. Relocated events will be held at the John W Pitts Recreation Center. �-.: 9 •. 0

Community Report Card Dover On behalf of our reviewers and program staff, we want to thank you for taking the time to prepare and submit your application to be considered for a Walk Friendly Communities designation. We know you invested a great deal of time in this application, and we appreciate your hard work. Based on our review, we are unable to designate Dover as a Walk Friendly Community. We did find several programs in your application that were quite impressive, including: • Your use of red light cameras, which is an intervention that has been proven to save lives and reduce injuries. • Your growing network of sidewalks, which serve to connect critical destinations across the City. • Encouragement programs like Dover Walks and related efforts to connect community members with opportunities for physical activity and active transportation. This report card summarizes some of the comments and feedback from our reviewers within each section of your application. We would encourage you to contact us if you would like to talk more specifically about your initiatives, our findings, and what we see as opportunities to expand your programs. This remainder of this report card will provide feedback and suggestions for each section in the community assessment tool. Each section received an overall score as defined below: Walk Friendly The responses in this section indicate that your community is particularly strong in this area with great efforts being made towards improving walkability. Even so, there are always areas within this section where improvements and growth could be made. On the Right Track This score indicates that your community does not exhibit the characteristics to be truly walk friendly in this section, but that there are still good existing programs or new programs that could be expanded. Please review our suggestions on how you could improve the walkability in this area. Needs Attention This score indicates that your community does not yet demonstrate strong programs, policies, and results, characteristic of a Walk Friendly Community based on the responses in this section. Consider prioritizing these programs. www.walkfriendly.org info@walkfriendly.org

Community Report Card Dover Status of Walking On the Right Track While your walking mode share is above average for a community of your size, you have a relatively high pedestrian crash and injury rate. The crash trend appears to be headed in the wrong direction, and while your number of fatalities is relatively low, this is something to keep an eye on. • Take steps to monitor pedestrian activity using regular counts. Monitoring counts will help you better understand where people are walking so you can begin to focus safety investments in those areas – see the evaluation section for more details.. • Your pedestrian plan cites an analysis of crashes between 2011 and 2013, but for the size of your community we recommend examining at least five years of crash data to look for trends and locations where you can focus your efforts. Planning On the Right Track It’s great to see that you have a standalone pedestrian plan and an ADA transition plan to help guide your activities. As an initial step, you may want to revisit your pedestrian plan and incorporate some more specific targets and performance metrics that you can use to measure your progress. Targets for safety (like eliminating fatalities) or mode share (increasing walking trips) will give you something to shoot for and allow you to use regular measurement to determine if you activities are resulting in changes. Fort Collins, a Bronze-level Walk Friendly Community, has a comprehensive Pedestrian Plan that sets reachable targets. Developing a Complete Streets Policy would be a great way to ensure that pedestrian and bicycle features are included in your transportation projects. Complete Streets are designed to create safe and convenient access for all users, including bicyclists, pedestrians, motorists, and transit riders. The National Complete Streets Coalition provides some useful guidelines and many other resources about this initiative. We see an opportunity to move the needle on reducing vehicle trips by tightening up some of your parking policies and formalizing those in a parking plan for the entire City. Look to the Victoria Transport Policy Institute for inspiration and ideas for the sorts of parking standards (like parking maximums or absence of minimums) you can couple with parking policies and strategies to encourage more walking, biking and transit use. Creating a standalone parking plan, like this one from Denver, is a great way to formalize all of this.

Community Report Card Dover Education/Encouragement On the Right Track You have some promising programs to educate and encourage safe walking in Dover. These really stood out to us: • We really like that you’ve been able to implement some safety projects near your schools through the Federal SRTS program. • Dover Walks seems like a great program that encourages people to get out and be active – great job! Some areas where we see opportunities to grow: • We think you can expand your walk and bike to school programs and hold more events throughout the year to encourage students to walk (or bike). The program in Fort Collins is a model for other communities. The city produces an annual summary of SRTS activities and has a goal to provide in- depth SRTS programming to every K-12 school once every three years. • You have some community maps on kiosks, but we think wayfinding is a big area where you could improve by providing signs all over your downtown area identifying nearby destinations. Another area where Fort Collins serves as a model is in wayfinding. Check out their design manual. • Open Streets events are great ways to get people out and take advantage of opportunities they typically don’t have: walking and biking in the street. Though it’s a much larger City than Dover, Atlanta’s Streets Alive program is a great model if you’re looking for inspiration.. Engineering On the Right Track We see a lot of evidence of recent progress in the area of engineering and design, particularly with respect to: • Your current sidewalk coverage is fairly comprehensive, with the majority of your streets having sidewalks on both sides of the road. Despite these improvements, we see plenty of opportunity to expand your work in this area. High priorities should include the following: • To continue filling in sidewalk gaps and prioritizing repairs, we agree that your current inventory of sidewalks is a great step to be taking now. Coming up with a plan to construct new sidewalks and repair others is critical to maintaining the pedestrian network. Gold-level Corvallis, OR, uses a model program for replacing and installing needed sidewalks. Each year, the Sidewalk Safety Program surveys one of 11 districts in the city. The repair criteria are specific, to ensure consistent application in every situation. Corvallis’s Sidewalk Maintenance Fee provides an annual source of funding to do this work, and the city will repair defects each year up to the amount of funding available. • Bridges are critical pinch points in the pedestrian network, and it looks like fewer than half of your bridges have bike/ped accommodations. Check out this PBIC White Paper on the importance of bridge accommodations for peds and bikes, and learn about how these can be added during the bridge rehabilitation process.

Community Report Card Dover Enforcement On the Right Track Overall we like some aspects of your enforcement programs, including the fact that you all are using red light cameras to enforce those violations. That being said, we see law enforcement as an area where you can really expand what you’re already doing. In particular, we recommend the following: • You’re performing lots of different types of enforcement operations, but not targeted yielding enforcement. One effective method, particularly at locations with a documented crash problem, is the crosswalk sting or pedestrian decoy technique. This involves plainclothes police officers crossing in the crosswalk and observing if cars are yielding. If cars do not yield, the plainclothes officer will radio to another officer to pull over the offending vehicle. By using this enforcement type, drivers are made aware of what types of behaviors are not allowed. Using this in conjunction with progressive ticketing scheme allows officers to educate drivers more than penalize them. Check out this NHTSA guide for more details. • We would suggest that you consider opportunities to enforce speeds using automated enforcement, which has been proven to be extremely effective. Seattle explored this type of program, found success, and ended up expanding it. Coupled with other forms of speed enforcement, this would be a great way to bring law enforcement into the mix on your safety programs. Evaluation Needs Attention • Our primary recommendation develop a count program by investing in a few permanent count locations, setting up a few short-duration counters that can be moved around, and combining all of this with manual counts to make sure you’re getting the full picture. This will really help you add context to your crash data and understand where investments are needed. • For more than five years, Gold-level Somerville, Massachusetts, has been using volunteers to collect bicycle and pedestrian counts at 36 different locations. This is a good option for expanding your reach, but you also need to get some permanent and short duration counters. The latest edition of FHWA’s Traffic Monitoring Guide (TMG) includes a review of existing techniques and guidance for implementing traffic monitoring programs for non-motorized transportation (Chapter 4). • You could also check out the recently published Guidebook on Pedestrian and Bicycle Volume Data Collection. In addition to explaining different counting methods, this guide shows how count data can be used for measuring facility usage, evaluating before-and-after volumes, monitoring travel patterns, safety analysis, and project prioritization. • Conducting pre- and post-evaluations for developments and other projects is the only way to know how your efforts have improved pedestrian safety. You should begin pre- and post-evaluations for every pedestrian project in order to develop a better understanding of how it has impacted pedestrian safety and walkability—you can use positive findings to justify more investment in pedestrian projects.