Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board - Nov. 7th, 2007

My meeting notes from the Seattle Bicycle Advisory Board meeting on Nov. 7th, 2007.

The required quorum of board members was not present to approve the minutes from the previous meeting.

The meeting started with introductions. There was one guest from the Pedestrian board, one guest from the eastside, and at least 3 other guests including myself. The chair of the board was not present and the person who I believe is the vice-chair ran the meeting. From my recollection, there were between 5 and 7 board members present.

There was a discussion of the minutes, which haven’t been posted on the website since 2003, and that a common format was needed, a static note-taker (secretary) needed to be selected for the new year and that the board needed to start the new year right by posting the minutes online.

Then there was a brief Bicycle Master Plan update:
The bicycle facility installation on Yestler Ave. S. is now complete.
SDOT has come up with a scoring system to prioritize the projects listed on the Bicycle Master Plan and select which 35 miles of facilities they intend to implement in 2008. The list of work planned for 2008 will be presented at the next meeting.

There is a plan to sign the bicycle route in the Dexter corridor and through the arboretum this winter.
A new bicycle map will be produced this winter and another in August. Both will be printed in small batches and will contain updates to show the work on the Bicycle Master Plan that has been completed.

Dexter Ave. N. will be re-channelized sometime in the near future.
Much of the work will be by Starbucks including:
Remove the center turn lane.
Change the parking lane width.
Change the allowed parking times.
Add “Watch for Bikes” signs targeted toward car drivers parking on Dexter.
The remainder of the work will be to add a curb bulb at Dexter Ave and Dexter Way by Crockett St. to eliminate the free right that folks take when exiting from Aurora and heading southbound onto Dexter Way.

Some of the Bicycle Master Plan educational work is being contracted out to Cascade Bicycle Club.

On all of the arterials slated for repaving in 2008 that have loop detectors to control the signal lights, bicycles will be painted on the loop detector. If I understood it correctly this would be used instead of the “T” that had previously been used as a paint indicator for cyclists. One major caveat – 5th Ave does not use loop detectors and thus will not be painted.
There was a guest suggestion that SDOT publish some common source-destination wayfaring route lists. The discussion meandered from Bikely and other route mapping sites to google earth KML exports. Some members may work on this over time and Monica from SDOT is going to look into what she can do to provide some basic routes like “UW to Downtown”, or “Downtown to Ballard”.

After the Bicycle Master Plan report, the board gave a lengthy PowerPoint presentation with photos and questions/comments that resulted from their recent tour of the Chief Sealth Trail. The points I noted are as follows:

The mayor talked about it at a boards and commissions Wine & Cheese event and about how it was a neat way to use existing right of way from power lines for additional uses.
The trail is 4 miles long and doesn’t extend to the city limits.
Beacon Hill is poorly connected to downtown and access needs to be added.
Jefferson Park area offers a road diet opportunity that should be looked at.
The board noticed some effective usage of new signs.
There are additional opportunities to add signs to/from area sound transit connections.
The trail needs some (maybe 5) additional information kiosks and more signage.
On Beacon (ave?), except from 2-7 on weekdays, the sharrows have cars parked on top of them. This situation is similar to Pender St. in Portland and Portland uses two sets of sharrows. SDOT is considering new signage for this area.
The New Holly Community Center and new Library are accessible from the trail via a gravel path, but there is no signage.

Myrtle Street is problematic with cars running stop signs. SDOT is upgrading this intersection from (previously) no traffic control to (soon) a full stop light.

The crossing at Martin Luther King & Henderson has a signal that is always flashing. SDOT explained that this is due to a purchasing decision by Sound Transit without consultation and the sensor doesn’t work so they put it into constant flash mode while they try to fix the design.


Other reports:

Letter to Seattle Police Department: (SPD has been requested to send a representative to both the Bicycle and Pedestrian advisory boards and has failed to do so. Ajoint letter was proposed to add a little pressure to SPD.) On hold because the board member who accepted this task hasn’t had enough time to make more progress on it.

Board Retreat: A yearly half-day get-together to plan longer term work, is suggested to be held at the Beacon Hill Library this year sometime in January. The exact date and details are still in flux and this is normally a board-only event.

New board members: The mayor needs to pick three. So far he has only picked two and the city council needs to approve the appointees.
For the next meeting:

Pete Lagaway will have approximately 50 minutes of presentation on the Bicycle Master Plan work planned for 2008.

The Department of Public Development is slated to visit the board early in 2008 and the board needs to prepare a list of questions for them so they can appropriately prepare for the meeting.

Other new action:

One board member took on a new task of writing a letter on the South Lake Union Streetcar tracks which are in a dangerous configuration for cyclists.