You are currently browsing the monthly archive for March 2010.
Happy spring break. If you’re around, there are three meetings of interest this week:
Waterfront – Monday, 3.29 @ 5:15 pm at the city-county building (note atypical time). The city commission, with help from the parks and rec team, will decide on an application for up to $500,000 from the MI Natural Resources Trust Fund. The presentation from the design team – which includes the drawings – will be available Tuesday morning on www.upnorthmedia.org.
UPDATE: The sketches of the waterfront concepts described on the post below are now on line at http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/sketches.pdf. Tonight the city commission approved an application to the trust fund for $450,000 for improvements to the east end of the old zoo property and Clinch Park beach. The amenities include the natural play area on the east end of the old zoo, a childrens water play area in the elbow of Clinch Beach, and universal access at the boat ramp, water, and beach. I want to thank Nate Elkins and the parks commission, as well as Jennifer Jaffe, Jim Carruthers, and Mike Jackson for their efforts. I hope this is the first step of many good things to come for our residents and visitors.
Wireless – Tuesday, 3.30 @ 5:15 pm at the city-county building. Traverse City Light & Power will review a business plan for in-town wireless. You can find the business plan here: http://www.tclp.org/uploaded_files/PACKET_-_Special_Meeting_03.30.10.PDF
Renewable energy – Friday, 4.2 @ 10 am at the chamber of commerce building (note atypical location). TCLP will hold a meeting with Stanley “Skip” Pruss, director of the MI Dept of Energy, Labor and Economic Growth, to discuss the 30% renewable target and potential biomass plans. Here is the info on Skip Pruss: http://www.michigan.gov/dleg/0,1607,7-154–163474–,00.html
Hope you can make it!
Tonight the design team presented the future of the TC waterfront. The presentation was video’d and will be on www.upnorthmedia.org soon (we’ll let you know), and the slides will be on-line hopefully tomorrow (again, we’ll let you know).
Until then, here is a quick summary, starting west and moving east:
West End. From Division west to M-72 the plan will be to keep the natural beach (hopefully removing invasive plants at least), and restore a pocket-size sandy beach across from Elmwood, and an enhanced pedestrian crossing at Elmwood to get there. Also, the dirt trail N of the Parkway will be improved to a combination of TART trail and boardwalk over the rock rip rap where space is really tight.
Old power plant – Smith Barney. A playground structure near the parking lot by the old Smith Barney property, as well as a restroom/changing area. The old power plant property will be left open for things like soccer, Cherry Festival, Film Festival, and open views. The E section of that property could be recessed a couple feet, and the W section raised a couple feet, so that the grade where the open space is and the new grade would provide a natural type of performance space. In the winter, the recessed area could be flooded with water from the natural artesian spring that empties near the open space, and used for ice skating. There is enough room for free skating and hockey, and the slope of the open space would partially shelter the recessed area from the wind.
Zoo property/Clinch. This would be a family-oriented park. The entrance to Con Foster would be moved to the rear (N side) of the building. The artesian spring would be used to create a small winding creek through the old zoo. Some concession structures (kayaks, bikes, snacks) could be built on the N side of the property – these won’t impact views because there aren’t any across that property now due to the marina building and Con Foster building. To the E of Con Foster could be a natural children’s play area. In the elbow of the beach and the boat parking area is room for a small splash area using water from the spring and/or the bay. There is also room for an access ramp to the beach and water for those who are mobility challenged. The old wooden wall and juniper along the edge of Clinch beach would be replaced with a more people-friendly edge.
Holiday Inn area. A fishing pier would be built on the breakwall at the river, and extended to deeper water. The parking lot could be reoriented to provide more green park and picnic space along the water to the E of the hotel.
Grandview Parkway. Eventually MDOT and the city will want to look at roundabouts, but they are not contemplated as part of this phase of waterfront improvement. Reducing the heights of the light poles, trees in the median W of Divison, some enhanced crosswalks, a tunnel at the Warehouse District are all ways that access could be improved sooner. Bridges were ruled out because they would be expensive and block the view of the water.
The next step is a public presentation and review of engineered and designed plans from May 3 to June 4. We’ll have more info on that when available. For more info on the project, see this post and comments: http://planfortc.com/2009/12/04/opera-house-waterfront-sheriff-dogs/ or this recent Record Eagle story: http://www.record-eagle.com/local/local_story_081072154.html. 9 & 10 news should have something on tonight as well.
Google is planning to build and test ultra-high speed broadband networks in a small number of trial locations across the county: 1 gigabit per second, fiber to-the-home connections. Google is requesting information from those communities who are interested in being test sites. The Traverse City area is applying.
You Can Help…. by going to: http://www.google.com/appserve/fiberrfi/ and telling Google HOW MUCH WE WANT TO BE INVOLVED IN ITS FIBER OPTIC TRIAL. To Get Involved click on “Get Involved” or if you need more information, click on “Learn more about the fiber optic trial.”See More
www.google.com
Last night at the Hagerty Center Ian Lockwood and URS proposed a re-design for Division St that removes all the traffic lights from and including 14th Street to Grandview Parkway, and replaces them with two lane roundabouts.
I will admit, when I heard about the roundabouts I thought, “oh no, here we go.” But the presentation was pretty persuasive, based on the greater capacity of those intersections to move traffic with the two-lane roundabouts than with the existing lights according to the traffic model. The examples from Vail and Clearwater and Bellingham, Washington helped make the case in my opinion. I also thought Ian Lockwood answered the questions about tractor trailers and the geometry of the roundabouts quite well.
This morning just after 5 am I drove Division from Grandview Parkway to 14th Street at 20 mph but with no stops because the lights are set to yellow blinking. Granted there was no traffic but I was just trying to get a sense of a different pace in the corridor. It was smooth and quick even though my speed was slower. This afternoon in E. Lansing I drove two lane roundabouts that handle traffic on MSU football Saturdays, and they work pretty well.
I’m not saying this is the solution, or the only solution, but it deserves some open minded consideration. John Seratelli’s comment – that if the cars keep moving they won’t have reason to cut E-W through the neighborhoods – was insightful as well.
I will get some more info on this topic when available, in the meantime you can find discussions and info on www.mywheelsareturning.com and www.facebook.com\tcchamber.
Division St - tonight at the Hagerty Center from 5 to 7 pm there will be an open house to look at re-design options for Division St. http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/division.pdf
City budget – this coming Monday night @ 7 pm the city commission will be discussing what to spend your tax dollars on (and how we can save you $) this year. Look for more discussion of this topic here in a couple days.
Waterfront – next week there will be two public sessions on the waterfront project. They’ll be at 108 E. Front St (below the City Opera House) on March 24 from noon to 7 pm and on March 25 from 5:30 to 8 pm. http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/departments/planning/BayfrontDesign.pdf
Hope to see you at one or more of these events!
Division St is back on the table for discussion. The steering committee will be working with the design team on a more people-friendly future for this important corridor. There will be a public open house to view potential design alternatives on Wednesday, March 17th in Room B of the Hagerty Center from 5 p.m. until 7 p.m.
Possible 8th St changes will be discussed at the city commission meeting this coming Monday night. The packet is here http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/agendas/Packet20100308.pdf and a picture of the changes suggested by city engineering is here: http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/8threndering.pdf (be sure to enlarge on your screen to see the details). The city may also ask Senator Levin’s office to help convince Federal Highway to let us move the curbs back a bit (they’ll be torn out anyway) and narrow the travel lanes. We have spoken to them and they are very supportive. A letter has been requested and hopefully that will get discussed Monday night too.
TCLP has been preparing an Integrated Resource Plan for meeting energy needs of the future in a way that is cost effective, diverse, environmentally progressive, and minimizes risks. They will be discussing the IRP, and the feedback from their public forums, Tuesday night at 5:15 pm at the governmental center. A summary of the IRP report is here starting on page 8 of the pdf (it’s a big file): http://www.tclp.org/uploaded_files/PACKET_-_Regular_Meeting_03.09.10.PDF.
Plan for TC is on vacation this week. We’ll get that post on city finances up when we return on 3.14, and then budget talks continue 3.22. Have a great week everyone!
Waterfront & parks – last night the city voted unanimously to go forward with the engineering of the bayfront improvements. Info on the team and the public process for this work can be found here: http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/departments/planning/bayfrontURS.pdf
8th St - Next Monday, at its regular meeting time, the city commission will be discussing a list of possible changes in design elements for 8th St. The list has to be discussed with MDOT and Federal Highway first. It will go here when it’s available.
Budget – Tonight at 5 pm at the Heritage Center on 6th St the city commission will start talking about this year’s budget priorities. We had a great meeting with COFAC last week to brainstorm ideas and I will have a detailed post on city finances here tomorrow.
Streets – Wednesday night at 7 pm the Planning Commission will review 2010 street projects for whether they conform to the Master Plan. Streets being rebuilt this year include sections of Cass, Oak, Maple, Union, Hannah, Barlow, Highland Park Drive, Third, Airport Access, Boyd/Bates, and Kelley. The info is here: http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/boards/planning/packet20100303.pdf. My opinion – these street projects could be more complete, hopefully you’ll decide for yourself and let the Planning Commission hear your views before they make a decision. Their info is here: http://www.ci.traverse-city.mi.us/boards/planningcomm.pdf
Recent Comments