Bicycle Board Members,
Yesterday, I had a very positive meeting with Jeff Mikorski, Assistant
City Manager about bike parking and shared lane markings after which we
met with Jeff Harpold, WVDOH Transportation Ehancement Coordinator on
the Effective Cycling Education Program grant.
Bike Parking
- The City considered bike parking on the High Street Streetscape
but didn't develop any plans because they didn't have sufficient budget.
- I reviewed with Mikorski the Streetscape map that we marked up
showing recommended locations for 30 bike racks. It made sense to
him. His specific comments:
- Design: City had considered post-and-loop. I described Chip's
recommended flair rack. Jeff's OK with it.
- Location: Concern for bicycle orientation (i.e. parallel or
perpendicular to walkway) to minimize interference with pedestrians and
parking motor vehicles.
- The curbs around the trees were recently installed to keep
water from flooding the tree boxes. City doesn't consider them a
tripping hazard.
- Watch out for vaults under the rack locations because you can't
drill down there. Jeff favored putting racks between tree and curb.
(I indicated maintenance risk.)
- The prevailing color for streetscape hardware is black.
- Maintenance: If private property owners agree to have the City
put bike racks on their property, maintenance responsibility will have
to be defined.
- Abandoned bikes: policy? Who gets rid of abandoned bikes and
how.
Shared Lane Markings
- We reviewed Derek's maps and I asked Jeff if the City would pay
for future printing. He said that the City has a new part-time
engineer, Damian, who's GIS-savvy and using ESRI software. Jeff will
check with Terry Hough to see if Damian can work with Derek to get
future maps printed at City hall.
- The City is building a geo database and having GPS points for
things like SLMs, BMUFL signs and bike racks is the way they want to go.
Effective Cycling Education Program
Harpold came up to Morgantown to meet with Mikorski, me and
Nick Hein to review our application. Nick didn't show. Highlights:
- We have 2 years from authorization to proceed to complete the
work.
- Authorization may not come for 4-6 months.
- We will produce monthly deliverables (for example, number of
course deliveries, PSAs produced, ads run, effectiveness data
collected) that show that we're accomplishing what we proposed and that
will justify reimbursing our expenses.
- The contract between the City and Positive Spin must have a
not-to-exceed limit.
- Harpold and Mikorski need to resolve whether we'll have to go
out for bids for work to be done.
- There are probably state and federal regulations that determine
the allowable salary ranges that we will need to learn before we can
pay people.
- Harpold will make an agreement between the City and the State
that specifies scope, funding, deliverables and schedule.
- The agreement must be reviewed by WVDOH legal, historic
preservation, Greater Morgantown Metropolitan Planning Organization
(the MPO can kill the project), Statewide Transportation Improvement
Plan.
- The total grant is $54,417 state + $13,605 City = $68,022.
Action Items
- Bicycle Board reorganize the Education Committee.
- Education Committee develop a project plan.
- Positive Spin and the City make a contract.
Frank