Grand Traverse County Complete Streets Initiative Complete Streets Coalition Meeting Thursday - May 17, 2012 4:00

- 5:30 p.m. Traverse City District Library If you have any questions or would like to assist in any of the projects in these minutes, please contact Julie Clark at julie@traversetrails.org

Meeting Notes: I. Welcome and Introductions: a. Julie Clark, of TART Trails, introduced the concept of complete streets as an approach through planning and design to build streets inclusive of all users. Complete Streets Initiative for Grand Traverse County: a. Harry Burkholder introduced the current LIAA and TART Trails collaborative effort through a Rotary Grant to ultimately increase traction for Complete Streets in northwest lower Michigan. b. The 4 main objectives are: 1) Establish community awareness of complete streets concepts, benefits and applications 2) Conduct a comprehensive community inventory of physical infrastructure, funding mechanisms, policies 3) Develop a web-based tool box for resources, outreach opportunities and activities 4) Develop an action plan for the next year. How Does Complete Streets (and Transportation) Affect Your Constituents? a. Around the room responses, and who spoke, were collected as follows. Please send additional concerns anytime. b. Don Cunkle: Recycle-a-Bicycle i. Safety ii. Lack of shoulders in rural areas iii. The carless due to financial hardship require more consideration. c. Rob Bacigalupi -Downtown Development Authority i. Balance of interests downtown's ROW. ii. Bike parking & room for people walking use sidewalk iii. On-street parking (use of parking space) iv. On-street cafes (use of parking space) d. John Bolde- Munson Medical Center i. Neighborhood concerns with amount of motorized traffic. ii. Season concerns, jumps in the summer months. iii. Encouraging employees to walk, bike and use transit. iv. Connecting Munsons 3,500 employees to other campuses with transit/downtown e. Raymond Minervini-The Village at the Grand Traverse Commons i. Connectivity of the grid is important to connect commons with rest of City. ii. Private/Public Streets--who controls? Who Designs them? iii. Silver Dr. not acting exactly way it was planned as speeds remain high. iv. Closing gaps of distances to promote active transportation, with transit. v. Interested in park & rides, incentives to get people to park for the day, garages. vi. Obstacles like Division St. (addressing perceived safety & comfort) f. Rod Lowes- TCAPS i. Safety of students on foot and bicycle ii. Lack of connectivity, even in and around neighborhood schools iii. 4,000 students in system do not take school bus, unsure how many of that number walk/bike (12,000 total students in TCAPS system) iv. Depot Stops: encouraging students to walk further to one collector stop. (Rural and city issue)

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g. Julie Olsen Goodwill Inn i. Similar concerns as Recycle-a-bicycle. ii. Goodwill serves 80 people per night and around 70 don't have cars iii. South Airport safety concern!! iv. Public transit: length of rides is too long for many constituent needs

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h. Kate Redman - Central neighborhood resident i. Sidewalk connection ii. Prefers segregation between modes i. Continued other discussion on other areas of interest in Complete Streets: i. Complete Streets Impact on Business? 1. The Commons is a strolling destination, would like to see people stroll to it as well as around it. And, cost savings achieved when less money is needed to provide for cars with things like storage. 2. Mental barriers hurt business opportunities across communities. A busy road/street will reduce trips to a certain business. 3. Character of place is connected to business strengths. ii. Goal of DDA is to get people downtown with no mode preference, but must contend with tourist seasons where 97% drive. General: How to plug-in/help. a. Keeping the coalition informed on how they can contribute to ongoing projects. i. Matt Skeels from NWMCOG raised issue of redevelopment of US-31 coming in 2015. The planning has already begun. Property owners will need to be convinced that sidewalks/connections are worth the cost, effort. ii. Grand Traverse County is updating their master plan. Objectives of Harry's policy and mapping work a. Demonstrate need by mapping gaps, needs, and where we have connections. b. Create base-line statistics, to apply to a performance dashboard (5-yr measurable areas in health, environment, safety, ridership (BATA), # of walkers downtown, vehicle miles traveled, vehicle crashes...what else? ) c. Collecting and providing complete street best practices: model resolutions/ordinances. d. Education of needs with a connection to principles that were expressed in Grand Vision.

This work needs interested people to help with: Education/outreach (writing, willing to be interviewed, profiled) Policy development Infrastructure mapping (where are sidewalks, bikelanes, trails, bus stops, etc.)

If you are interested, please email Julie Clark at julie@traversetrails.org