Welcome everybody to our November 10th Rochester City Council study session.

We have two agenda items today.

The first one is reimagining Sixth Avenue and reconnecting the downtown mobility network.

And then we will also have a report on our supporting transformation.

And then after that, we will also have an exec the city council will have a executive session.

So with that, I will turn it over to Steve Stampson Brown to give us a report on our first agenda item.

All right.

Good afternoon, Council President, Mayor, Council members.

We're here to talk to you this afternoon about reimagining Sixth Avenue and reconnecting the downtown mobility network.

This afternoon's conversation, we're going to ask you for direction on Sixth Avenue in its next evolution as a neighborhood Greenway Corridor.

And we're also going to ask you for some direction on the bike lane solutions we're proposing, both interim and long term.

I'll turn it over to project manager Mike Collins to lead off the presentation.

Sure.

So before we go to the next slide, I just wanted to introduce our project team.

So my name is Mike Collins.

I'm a project manager with the city.

We also have Mitzi Alex, who's our consultant with tool design.

David Gamble, who's one of our part of our consultant team.

And I will say, as part of this project, we work closely with the public works team as well.

So I can do it here.

Sure.

So as the name implies, this project has really two main goals.

So kind of think of it as two projects in one.

Really, there's the sixth uh reimagining Sixth Avenue project, which as uh Steve said at the beginning, we're trying to create kind of an urban greenway.

Um safe and uh accessible and safe and comfortable place to be, um, and a quality experience in the public realm.

Um, the second half of the project is to reconnect the downtown mobility network.

Um, and as you know, Third and Fourth Avenue were um vacated as part of the Mayo Development Agreement.

Um, so we do need to reconnect the downtown mobility network, and the goals for that side of the project are a safe reliable travel options and improved access to employment, housing, uh, restaurants, and entertainment.

Um, and then just to give uh the council an idea of kind of where these projects lie.

So I do want to kind of draw your attention to the map on screen.

Um, so the green and yellow checkered area were the three corridors that were studied for the um reconnecting the uh downtown mobility network.

Um so we analyzed Broadway Avenue South, uh North North uh sorry, First Avenue Northwest and uh Sixth Avenue Southwest and Sixth Avenue Northwest as the three corridors for reconnecting the downtown mobility network.

Um the reimagining Sixth Avenue side of the project is uh the blue line on that screen, and that is Sixth Avenue from uh 2nd Street Southwest to Civic Center Drive.

Um, so that gives you just an idea of the project scope.

Um couple things I'll point out before I hand it over to our consultant team here is um kind of the changing dynamics around Sixth Avenue.

Um, Sixth Avenue is becoming more of that transition area um between kind of the downtown core, the Mayo campus, and the neighborhoods to the west.

Um it's I've been identified as a key um uh transit corridor.

Um, so that incorporates all forms of mobility.

Um so that is that is part of the reason that this project's being brought forward before you today.

Um and then without further ado, I will hand it over to uh David Gamble to talk about streetscape um investments and kind of the the larger downtown context.

Thanks.

I did just the five things we need to change.

Thanks, Mike.

Can you hear me okay?

Uh David Gamble, I'm an architect and urban planner with Campbell Associates.

We're based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a city, by the way, that is almost exactly the same size as Rochester.

And over the last of 20 years, Cambridge has quadrupled the number of bike lanes in its city while simultaneously dropping the number of conflicts with cyclists and motorcycles and uh cars by 30 percent.

So this is a trend that you're seeing all across the country, and we had the pleasure of getting to know your great city uh a number of years ago on the small area plan.

I recognize uh some of you here uh between 2nd and 4th Street along the Zumbro uh behind the Indigo Hotel.

It's our introduction.

And it's important to note that streets are so much more than just infrastructure and transportation, they're actually great places.

The best streets in some cities are actually the best places are streets themselves.

And this uh famous book by Alan Jacobs describes some of those reasons about why that is.

They're comfortable, they're safe, they actually are public realm.

They make up people feel like they can participate.

The best streets are remembered and they leave impressions, and they also can be models for other communities.

I have to say, for as great as your institutions are, your streets can be so much more.

And in fact, Broadway has narry a street tree as I was crossing it over to walk here.

There's many streets that could be so much more.

This is a project we worked on in a medical campus in Buffalo.

It now it took five years to implement a long linear landscape.

But when you think about streets as also being sidewalks and street tree canopy and dealing with stormwater, these are the types of places that incentivize people to walk and just get out of their cars.

It doesn't take more than 200 feet of empty storefronts for someone to stop walking and turn around.

So much of your city could be made stronger if those connections are strengthened, and that's what streets can do.

Now, conflicts over road space really are nothing new, and they date back to the role that cyclists have played in originally lobbying for better roads at the turn of the last century.

So the 80s and 90s, the 1880s and 1890s.

So for centuries, cities have been dealing with how to accommodate cyclists beyond just cars.

And as we look at this project, the tool implemented just a few years ago in St.

Paul, you see a public realm interface that actually is safer because people can walk out.

You see other forms of mobility, you see buffers to to the rights of ways.

So even in a mature city like Rochester, there's a right of way to do that.

And Mitzi's gonna walk you through how that can happen in a fairly constrained right of way.

We put these two images together just to place this uh Sixth Avenue and the mobility context into the broader downtown.

Now, this is a view looking south, so it's not how the city is typically represented.

We're kind of floating up above Civic Center Drive.

But the proposed, what we're calling a proposed community greenway is what can happen along Sixth Avenue that connect destinations in your city.

There's some investments east-west, but it's really the north-south connections that need to be strengthened.

So when you think about the new development, the loom development happening right at the Civic Center in Sixth Avenue, anchored uh on the other side, very close, anchored by additional development, and of course, Mayo's expansion, so CityWalk.

That's what we're talking about here is investments in the infrastructure that leverage private investment.

And it's hard not to look at the blue tones, which essentially represents you know the mayo's uh foothold.

And the Osman building is now directly on this axis.

So we work a lot for institutions that are growing.

We also work equally for neighborhoods that are under threat of institutional expansion.

Investments in Sixth Avenue actually help to negotiate the relationship between those two.

If we look in the opposite direction, this is view of you looking north.

You also see how the open space network in the city is really mostly adjacent to the Zumbro River.

The investments over 20 million dollars in Soldiers Field, uh Silver Lake off the top of this map, but much of the green is actually happening to the east.

Well, doesn't the neighbor don't the neighborhoods and wouldn't 6th Avenue be better if there is a way to try to incorporate that into the city fabric.

Much of what gets communicated in uh streetscape investments is represented in this manner, which is to say a street section.

Uh, what you're seeing in the dark gray tone is essentially the right of way for 6th Avenue, but you also see a bike lane, you see a boulevard, you see the potential for a linear park that might actually help to create this, let's say, negotiate the relationship between what's on the right, rather large, growing institutional edges, and on the left, which are one and two family, fairly small homes.

So that relationship between the institution and the neighborhood can be negotiated with investments in 6th Avenue.

Essentially a landscape with streetscape improvements.

And uh you don't even have to blur your eyes to see how all of the green is kind of along the blue, the Zumbro, and there's this huge absence of parks, landscapes, connections uh to the west.

So the yellow vertical line that we're showing is essentially the Sixth Avenue.

And if one imagines that as connecting your anchors, the economic development opportunities in the city, it really shows a void in that network and why this makes so much sense in the context of the downtown fabric.

And with that, uh Mitzi's going to talk about the importance of the community engagements that's taken place fairly rapidly, but will continue to happen over the next couple months as this design gets advanced.

Councilmember Palmer.

So I'm looking at this photo and you're talking about green space.

Just to the left is Cusky Park, you see green, and that runs all the way to Cascade Lake and then it runs all the way to Silver Lake.

Um green, but the the green is along the river.

And in the second part of this, your slide six that you're showing this great wonderful piece of of a picture of St.

Paul.

Um if you look to the far left of that picture, slide six.

Uh that's six.

Okay.

Uh not the forward.

There you are.

Yeah, that's not six, that's five.

Uh-huh.

Uh go seven then.

I thought it was slide six.

There it is.

To your left, you see parked cars.

Yes.

I don't see anywhere on your diagram that we have parked cars in Sixth Avenue.

So how is this comparable to what you're trying to say we should do on uh Sixth Avenue?

What the slide primarily shows is preferencing pedestrian and bicycle and transportation movements as much as we preference the car.

You know, we tend to count too much about cars, levels of service, uh time waiting at lights.

We don't measure the right things.

We don't measure person throughput.

Which actually means cars, bikes, transit, those are the things that get people from destination to destination.

So you're right, uh Mr.

Palmer, we're not sort of putting parking on that side, but what's important is that the street needs to be much more than just moving vehicles and trucks.

Well, if you if you look at our numbers from the Census Bureau, and people have heard this before, but our numbers are going down on bike riders going to work.

And so we have less people going to work in the last 10 years than we did 10 years ago.

Um, and that's bike riders going to work.

That's not people on their kids riding down the road.

Um but our our multi-car people in multi-cars have gone up, our pedestrians have gone up, but yet our cars are still there.

And so I'm I'm it's escaping to me why we don't want to have parking on Sixth Avenue.

Uh I have no doubt that those numbers are true.

My answer would be that cyclists don't feel safe because the network isn't complete.

Well, I don't I don't find that to be true because um that's just a fallacy or a story that they want to say.

If but the numbers are showing you that they're not.

You know, I know you're from the Boston area.

Boston doesn't have the winters that we have, period.

I mean, that's not an argument.

And your roads were built at a time that was back in the 1800s, 1700s, it was not built, you know, in the in the 40s and the 50s.

What I would say that brought draws them together, and I know I want to return it to Mitzi is a progressive population, a large number of students and staff, a dense mixed urban fabric, and a relatively centralized location in the region.

Those are very comparable.

And as I look at Rochester's future, it embraces those alternate forms of mobility because it actually will be an attraction for people to want to live here and to get around more easily.

Uh stay where you are.

Councilmember Miller.

I guess I I would just look for clarification from Mr.

Palmer of what numbers he's talking about.

I'm talking about the 19, the um Rocock numbers from 2015 to 2021 that shows the bikes went down by 71% from the U.S.

Census Um Bureau.

I don't make them up.

So if if I'm not mistaken, that's a set of commuting data which is just incomplete as far as overall travel.

So and I if I'm not mistaken, the error bars on those numbers are quite large as well, given the small sample.

I think that's been litigated before.

I don't want to relitigate it, but I just want to mention that there's uh I don't believe that that's a complete um representation of of what our history is.

And I I would wonder for some of our our Mayo representatives in the room if they might have alternate data from their own internal commuting survey or perhaps Ms.

Steinhauser.

Looks like she'll be able to do that.

These are U.S.

Census Burral numbers.

So and then even our own public works numbers.

Councilmember, same thing.

Councilmember uh Miss Steinhauser.

Yeah, thank you, Councilman Schubring.

I was just gonna say um I I think we can go back and clarify those uh those data points because I as it came up before, I think we had uh a different understanding about uh the amount of cycling and that it hasn't decreased.

But what I was gonna say to the question about why no parking on Sixth Avenue, I think if you let us walk through the road profile that's being suggested, and uh Mitzi and her team can speak to why um the road profile doesn't include parking, and that we haven't received any objections to that um design at this point as compared to where parking uh we want to definitely preserve in our other recommendations.

So I would just without a doubt, road space is highly contested.

I just want to leave you with this thought as you look at this image.

What's been really impressionable in my few years here is seeing investments in the public realm, heart of the city, discovery walk.

You're seeing connections, and that's what that sort of brown color is in the middle, connections between destinations.

I think more of that needs to happen, and particularly in relationship to your neighborhoods that have access north and south and east and west.

That's really what this project can enable longer term.

And with that, I'm gonna turn it to Mitzi.

Thank you, David.

Uh Mitsi Alex with Tool Design.

I'm a senior principal planner with uh Tool, and I'm also here with Tom Natwick, who is the lead engineer on the project.

It's in the back.

Um, as part of this project, which we started uh, I think at the beginning of August, uh, we've gone out and actually done uh community engagement.

We did that on the front end before we really started to lay out concept designs to start to understand what the key themes were around what people were looking for.

And uh we had over 15 in community engagement activities, we did an online survey, open houses, we did door knocking, um, and we attended neighborhood uh meeting for Cutsky Park and Historic Southwest as well.

The other thing that we did to try to really respect the time that people give have given to other engagement activities is to go through and call the kind of responses that people were giving about public realm and public spaces and streets from other engagement um events to help inform this.

And the themes that we heard were that people really want more safe pedestrian crossings, they want a pedestrian first type of design.

They want to make sure that we're including accessibility for people using mobility aids, and several pointing out that the area around the clinic in the downtown might have a disproportionate number of people using mobility aids compared to other similar cities of this size, just given the context of the the visitors and patients who are coming here.

And they also want to have traffic calming measures and separate the bike lanes and separate bike users from the pedestrians and and vehicles.

David already talked a little bit about Sixth Avenue, but if we if we look at that corridor, we can think about what we've known.

That core that corridor has been in the past, but it is becoming a space that is experiencing a lot of transformation.

You can see the the BRT, the link BRT line on 2nd Street Southwest there is that magenta um series of dots.

And the Sixth Avenue corridor is going to be one of fewer north-south connections that go north of Civic Center Drive and connect the neighborhoods to the north and down to the south down to to um soldiers field.

The corridor is also gonna be linking people to the link BRT.

That there's going to be a station right there at Sixth Avenue and Center Street, and that will become a new destination of its own.

So folks who live within this immediate neighborhood or further to the north or south are going to have a new opportunity to be able to take link BRT to go out to Cascade Lake for the day, or to go down to the fairgrounds.

Umber Fredericks, just for clarification.

Isn't that on a second?

No, no, second, second.

Okay, gotcha.

Thank you.

I maybe it wasn't that clear when I said it.

Thank you.

Um the other thing that's happening on Sixth Avenue is of course it's adjacent to the bold forward and unbound investments, but you're also starting to see the private investment and redevelopment interests here.

So the magenta parcel at the north end of 6th Avenue, adjacent to sixth Civic Center Drive, is a redevelopment site.

And on the south end of that corridor, just southwest of 2nd Street, the green parcel is another future uh redevelopment site.

The vision for Sixth Avenue is to create a space that is more pleasant and safe and accessible for different users.

The idea here is that within the existing right-of-way, which is only 75 feet, but within that existing right-of-way, the two single lanes of travel, northbound, southbound are retained.

There's still northbound travel and southbound travel lanes for vehicles.

And the idea here is that you can actually create enough space to have a sidewalk, a boulevard, a traditional boulevard, but adding in a two-way bikeway with a second boulevard, then having the two-way vehicle travel, another boulevard, and then sidewalk, creating a double boulevard along the corridor, which would enhance not just the space for pedestrians and bicyclists, but it also softens that edge and helps to negotiate the relationship between the institutional buildings and a neighborhood.

To get a little closer view on what that could look like, we'll start on the left side of the screen at Civic Center Drive.

Each of these blocks might look just a little bit different on this first block.

You'll see that there are turn lanes, so that there's a little bit tighter space there, but you can still achieve the the um sidewalk, the the double boulevard, the turn lanes, uh another vehicle lane and the other boulevard with a relationship with that developer.

So the developer of that site's already been in conversation with the city and working toward a building setback in a space that would be allowing this to happen.

The next block over, going moving south is the image onto the right, and that would be what the next couple blocks would look like primarily again.

Uh two-way bikeway on the east side and the double boulevard.

When you get to the intersections, what you'll see is intersections being narrowed down with the crossings for pedestrians being shorter, improving the safety for pedestrians, and then also the idea is being um considered for raised crosswalks across uh third street there, the north-south movements.

So raising crosswalks and having higher visibility, safer, shorter crossing distances for pedestrians.

Again, that that just um responds to the themes that we heard from individuals who who would like to see better, safer pedestrian movement through here.

These two images continue to work their way south.

Can you hold a minute?

Uh council member Keene.

Yeah, I have this idea.

There might be a timely place to ask this, but I was wondering looking at these charts what the right turn, left turn capabilities were.

I see in Civic Center Drive, you have if you go back to that one, you have turn lanes on that.

Uh, would the idea the the other intersections coming through would not have left or right turn lanes?

The um so the turning movements at all these intersections is an equal, it's not the same.

So uh the volume of turning movements at Civic Center Drive much higher.

Much higher, right?

So you don't need to have that in that cross section at each block.

Um, you can still allow for turning movements at other intersections without turn lanes.

Okay, without turn lanes.

Do you there must be a traffic load uh assumption we're making?

What what are the trips on this per day?

Is this like a 4,000 trips a day street, or is this a 10,000 trips a day?

It's not 10.

I'm Steve, I don't know if you remember if you have those numbers handy.

We have looked at the prior traffic studies that were done here as part of the bold forward and unbound project.

So I don't have them memorized, but I do have them.

Uh so there was kind of the original global traffic study that was completed through both forward unbound or kind of two layers.

It started with the base minda 2016 counts.

So we're looking at four to uh two to four thousand cars per day, and then in 2022 uh WSB did some uh supplemental counts, and those rows to about 4300 cars per day on average.

Now that was during COVID or the tail end of COVID, and also they were done in the summer, which means there was no schools in sessions.

So there's a little bit of an asterisk in the traffic study, and I don't know if Dylan, if you have any other uh thoughts you want to add on that information or supplement.

Yeah, um good afternoon, Mayor, President, members of the council.

Uh those numbers Steve is touching on are you know that gives you kind of the idea of it's you know, mid thousands, it's not 10,000 vehicles a day.

Okay, I just I do I would want to note though as we think about turn lanes.

We look at turning movements, uh, we look at the volume of traffic, the speed of traffic, and then the different turning movements when we assess whether or not a turn line is necessary.

And most of these intersections just there's not enough happening that would require adding that turn lane, increasing the distance that a pedestrian is then out in the street in con you know a conflict with vehicles.

So we look at all that as we're we're assessing each individual intersection.

As long as they have public works or this um I I'm still trying to get my head around the all the redesign has a lot to do with the fact that we vacated third and fourth avenue and we'd have no way through on fifth, and we have no way through on these other streets.

So I thought part of this work was done because we expected more traffic, but I think our design right now says that no, we think this is a stable urban street carrying uh some traffic, but also but more pedestrian, uh pedestrian and um active transportation.

That's accurate.

I mean, we we know that there's gonna be a lot of additional people, just people moving throughout the space, whether walking, biking, trying to get to transit stops, driving, and the the volumes do increase when we worked with Mayo on their study, but it's not dramatic as we think about the mode shift goals we have as a city to get people out of their single occupant vehicle trips.

So um it there is an uptick, but it's not dramatic.

Uh but you're you're correct.

By severing two of those north-south routes, we definitely there's just less options for people that are moving into and or through downtown.

Moving from north to south and south to north.

Um follow-up on that.

Are you also adding the additional truck traffic that will be uh generated by the logistics building that's there?

Yes, the the design uh concept does include the turning movements and the vehicles that would be entering and exiting the West Logistics Center.

And as a matter of fact, if you look at the image on the right side of the screen here, you'll see there's an area around the the um the corner at first street and sixth avenue.

It looks kind of pinkish on that on the on the screen.

That is part of uh the need to address turning movements for large vehicles that might have to roll over a portion of the curve.

So we're looking at different ways to to address that while still managing for the speeds and pedestrian safety, but accommodating the kind of movement that that they'll need within that space.

And as you continue further south, um again, these two blocks look similar with the double boulevard, again, maintaining vehicle travel in both both directions.

But one thing I do want to point out here is that Center Street, that's the image on the you'll see that on the image on the left.

Um actually on both on the left image at the bottom of the screen is where center street sits, and you'll see that that future two late two-way bikeway is shown on that image, and we're showing how those things could tie in together at the intersection.

And then as you get all the way down to 2nd Street Southwest, that's where I uh the space gets a little tighter again.

You don't have the opportunity to have the double boulevard, but you still maintain your vehicle travel lanes, your turn lanes, and um space between the bikeway and the sidewalk.

The other thing I want to point out here is that we've also looked at the turning movements at this intersection for fire emergency ambulance and so forth, and making sure that the turning radii will work.

One of the things that you'll notice here too is just the location of the stop bars for those uh southbound travel lanes is part of what makes that turning movement work.

So as long as the vehicles are stopping at the stop bars, um that should work fine.

The idea with Sixth Avenue again is to create a space that's different from what you have today that helps to negotiate that relationship between an institutional neighbor and uh residential neighbors, and that also serves as a major community connector, our north-south corridor for neighborhoods, north of Civic Center Drive, and all the way south down to to um Soldiers Field.

And it also will be uh a major connection to that link VRT station.

So the other part of the project is really looking at how to reconnect the downtown mobility network.

And um the the with the one-way pair of bike lanes that were on third and fourth app.

Yes.

I don't see your last name there, so I just see midzi.

Councilmember apologies.

I don't mean to be interrupting, but before we went to the act of transit, I I do want to just on that whole concept, and this is more of a conceptual question than a charts, but you said we're trying this where we're tying into the neighborhood.

I I am surprised though that part of the design of this pushed the trucks to the west side of the uh the Mayo's um operations building and put the um put the entryways there, which actually pushes the downtown further into the neighborhoods.

Was there any was there any serious study doing of creating a sixth avenue that would allow the trucks to come in from that side and not push them to more the neighborhood side?

Um are you talking about the the access point for the West Logistics Center?

I I'm talking about the West Logistics Center.

We used to talk think about it that they would load off of Sixth Avenue.

Whatever was happening with the way Sixth Avenue aware of the buildings being designed, they're now on Seventh Avenue.

And that yeah, that's that's bothersome to me.

That means we're pushing more into the neighborhoods.

I think Miss Steinhauser has an answer to this.

Yes, thank you uh for the question.

So just to clarify, um, there was a concept that showed truck traffic going into the West Logistics off of Sixth Avenue with a very large driveway.

Um we we had uh significant concerns about that, thinking about this street as the transition street and having trucks turn in mid block um in between intersections and what that meant from a traffic perspective, and the traffic experts can speak to that much better than I can.

So the conversation with Mayo was to turn the building to shift it so that it's coming in off of First Street, not Seventh Avenue, but off of First Street.

Okay.

And so, and remember, a majority of the trucks coming are box trucks, which are not the large semis, but there is the occasional infrequent um large semi that um would turn on to First Avenue by turning it onto first street, pardon me, by turning it on to first street, um, and that orientation, they did some reconfiguration, were able to narrow the driveway a bit that as compared to 6th Avenue.

Um we felt like uh the pedestrian activity that would happen on First Street could happen on the north side and happen very effectively and can get you to 6th Avenue and then make your way either north or south on Sixth Avenue because likely your destination coming over was either going to be um you know getting north of to Civic Center Drive or south down to the BRT, for example.

So um we we felt when you put all of that together, it was smarter to shift.

I think that's helpful.

It's a I I probably was misunderstanding that something to do with the Sixth Avenue design pushed the but it really it really was uh just a because there's a private business there and then there's the street in there, and I they must be interacting somehow.

But the solution right now is first street southwest northwest between 6th and 7th Avenue would be the where the the box trucks would be going in.

Correct.

Uh council member Miller.

Just to follow up on that question.

I I know that it's been a concern of the neighborhood and others of just the volume of trucks, and I I've heard multiple times that box trucks would be the primary uh format entering.

When might we know from these studies how many semis per day per week at what hours?

I know that's a uh a very pressing question.

So we negotiate the neighborhoods.

Um I we can get you that data.

I we have some for some reason I was thinking it's a you know a couple of semis a week at most is my as as I recall.

The hours are during your typical business hours.

It's not at 10 o'clock at night, it's not at midnight, it's not at 6 a.m.

Um, but we can we can get those numbers for you.

Okay, great.

I know the neighborhood of them.

I don't want to quote off the top of my head.

We have a sense of them.

Okay, thank you.

I've got a follow-up on another issue that is at um at 2nd Street Southwest and 6th Avenue Northwest.

So my understanding, and Miss Steinhauser, correct me if I'm wrong, is that uh the the bold forward unbound building that uh I don't know if it's Waterman or Osman uh that there will be an emergency entrance at that corner at that uh north uh northeast corner, is that correct?

That is correct, yes, Council President Schubring.

Yes, if you look on that diagram, you see that there is a curb cut.

This is for non-emergency ambulatory transport.

So it is not you know the not the ER.

Not the emergency room, yeah, that you see down at St.

Mary's.

This is for the transfer.

So there will be a trance a lot of transport there.

Do we have a sense of how much traffic that will generate?

We do, and I can get you that number.

Okay.

We do.

Uh councilmember Wall.

And thank you.

Is this uh more than a connector uh between neighborhoods?

Is it a destination?

Uh for instance, uh, would we expect any uh restaurant retail that would uh uh draw people from other sectors of the city uh uh making walking paths and uh make it a beautiful place for the wider populace?

That's that's a great question, uh Councilman Wall.

I think that we can create a space here that is a destination all in itself, but it as you as you know this area, those land uses on the east side and the west side already include a host of destinations.

What it whether it's the medical center or it's the guest houses, the hotels, the coffee house, and so forth, um, those are already there as destinations.

The other thing that that is off the screen uh to the north is if as you cross Civic Center Drive, there are some businesses just north of there up at 7th Street too, with a a fun little node of different land uses and some businesses that draw people.

Redevelopment pressures are already showing their you know interests here, and with the redevelopment, you may end up with some mixed use land uses that include restaurant, hotel, cafes, and and so forth.

So the vision certainly would accommodate that type of additional destination.

Councilmember Palmer.

Yeah, I just want to clarify something.

Um I was at the neighborhood meeting for the um logistics building, and they said to be up to 60 vehicles, and they don't know the the mix of vehicles, and they've never I've never heard the number of vehicles or the mix.

Um you gotta remember these buildings are five years from being occupied, and and you know, if you would have thought five years ago, what would we planning?

So I wouldn't I wouldn't put a hard number on that, and I hate to have the neighborhood come back and say, I only heard there'd be two semis sometime during the week.

Um that'd be a hard hard number for us at this time to to um to plan.

So it'd be 60 vehicles is what they've been saying in five years from now when it opens, we will know more.

So I mean, so for me, this is a hard thing to talk about the whole thing because we're we're have such big changes in the next five to six years in all these corridors.

I'm not sure how traffic's gonna be and if the BRT is going to be, you know, 100% full and everybody driving to it.

And so to me, I think we're a little bit ahead of our time planning for this road, but that's my opinion.

Are you taking questions or you have more however you'd like me to proceed?

Proceed.

Okay, thank you.

Um we'll look at reconnecting the network, the the other part of this project at this time.

Um there were three corridors that we reviewed, Broadway, First Avenue, and Sixth Avenue.

The uh solid green lines on the screen are showing where there are existing uh bikeway facilities again with the public engagement.

Uh we called information from other engagement.

We also met with folks, we went out on a bike ride with a group, and when it comes to reconnecting the mobility network, some of the things that we heard specifically related to that included again wanting protected and separated bike lanes, wanting multiple north-south bike routes, the third and fourth avenue corridors were sort of centered in a little bit more in the downtown space, but but um the options that are left are much further spread apart.

So the idea that something uh closer to Broadway and something like Sixth Avenue could address the need for two.

Um there's also a desire for what's called in all ages and abilities, north-south bike route.

So AAA stands for all ages and abilities, and we did hear from some folks that they wanted um a study of second avenue through the Annenberg Plaza to be included.

That was outside of our scope, uh, but that's feedback that we did here.

So for First Avenue, uh the concept for this, and uh I will just start out by saying this does not include the segment where there was uh the shared street reconstructed between second street and center street.

So just off off the bat, one is said it's straight.

We're not looking at a redesign for that segment, but for the other segments, the proposal would be to look at the.

Can you hold a minute?

Uh Councilmember Miller.

Thank you.

Before you proceed, I just had a question about the engagement.

Um council president and I had the chance to meet with UMR uh last week and go on a tour, and they were identifying how some of the pressures of student mobility and feelings of safety on the street are a limiting factor of how they uh just plan and program and and one of the concerns that they've had.

I'm just curious if they have been engaged or would be engaged since they're a key stakeholder along particularly the first avenue stretch.

Um I don't recall personally having face-to-face conversation with UMR, but I think that's an excellent point.

Uh we did go in and talk to the the person who is at the desk of student housing.

Okay.

Um, but I think hearing from the folks who are talking to to individuals thinking about admission would be really helpful, and we'll make note to follow up.

Okay, thank you.

Um so the idea here would be to look at a two-way bikeway on the west side of the roadway.

This would all work within the existing right-of-way.

The intent of this corridor would be to stay within the the existing curb.

So minimal disruption to the existing roadway surface or curb lines.

This would fit um again between the existing curb.

The idea is to take the angled parking and transition that to parallel parking to make space for a two-way bikeway.

That would also leave some room for a buffer, and that could add some placemaking to the corridor.

What that buffer would be has not been identified, but it could take on different uh characteristics.

Some people have asked why did we look at the west side versus the east side?

We kind of looked at both as maybe options, but we did hear from the historic district uh visioning process that they're interested in looking at some different placemaking within the public realm on the east side, and the west side uh is not abutting the the historic district, so that wasn't of interest.

The other thing is the east logistics center for Mayo sits on the east side of First Avenue.

Um the idea of I have a question, and uh actually maybe Ms.

Mr.

Gamble can address this.

So I I uh kind of my ears went up when you said removing the angled parking.

My understanding is that when it comes to streetscape and pedestrian friendly and inviting livability, that angled parking is all conducive to uh that kind of uh dynamic in uh a uh neighborhood.

Is that correct, Mr.

Gamble?

What is your thoughts on yeah?

You go ahead if you'd like to answer you asking these questions.

Thanks for putting me on the spot.

I mean, because and and just to add a little bit more because we are also having a conversation in the community about going back to angled parking potentially on Broadway.

So I'm getting kind of mixed messages here.

Well, yeah, I was passing the hotel this morning and I saw a picture of Broadway when there was angled parking on both sides.

Right, the length of it, and of course, the right-of-way at 110 feet, you could easily accommodate that and move traffic even with today's loads.

Uh I think the goal here is to try to accommodate parking, allow for uh service in an appropriate fashion, but get out ahead of how people are going to use the streets.

So to Mr.

Palmer's conversation, I would say that this conversation ideally should have happened years ago because if you wait to get the counts, it's too late.

It's this notion of induced demand.

When you make a highway wider, you're gonna that's gonna become congested, and if you make it wider again, it'll continue to be congested because you're accommodating it and actually incentivizing more traffic.

So the goal paradoxically is actually to do the opposite to reduce the right-of-way to add more green space to actually allow for other modes of mobility in equal proportion to vehicular.

So I don't think that what's being proposed here is um diminishing service and movement by cars, it's actually appropriately right sizing it to other ways that students of MMO M of R and well anyone wants to be able to walk through in a safe manner.

I don't even like to walk across Broadway now because of it's there's no it's hard to get past in the amount of time that you have.

So it's called a road diet, you know, putting the roads on some diet to reduce their size, it actually amplifies movement in other ways.

Thank you.

Continue.

Okay, thank you.

All right.

So taking a look at what this looks like from Civic Center Drive, working our way down.

Um you can see how that would show two-way bikeway on the west side, some kind of space for buffer.

Again, we're at an early concept design at this point, so we're just showing that with some uh color blocking on the on the image.

And then you'd have your two-way travel lanes and including your parallel parking.

Uh we'd have to treat the intersections with some intersection uh adjustments as stated earlier.

This was designed as a shared street through Peace Plaza.

And uh the one thing that we would suggest doing with this segment between center street and 2nd Street Southwest is just to do a speed study and see if there's any uh warrant for traffic calming that might need to be done here.

But the idea being that bikes would share the lanes with uh vehicle travel lanes.

And uh on the left side of the screen at the very top, uh you see 2nd Street Southwest, all the way down to fourth street.

On the right side of the screen is that first block from second to third to give you a little bit better view of that and how that can look.

And again, the idea is to try to work within the existing curve with minimal disturbance to the road surface or the curb lines and narrowing um uh council member Doring.

Can you go back to slide 24 real quick?

Yes.

I know that that you haven't studied this segment of First Avenue uh West all that much.

I would like to make another suggestion in study, um, and this is not going to make me very popular.

Um I would also suggest that a study be done to uh limit either deliveries or um uh uh during uh peak rush hour or peak um uh traffic times uh during uh the course of the day or or something like that.

I bike that corridor um uh during the hours of 7 to uh 9 a.m.

where there's been pedestrians, um uh regular um motor car traffic deliveries happening and have almost been hit probably a half a dozen times because that street is so congested.

I actually pay attention to the law and do not bike on the sidewalks.

Um because that street is so narrow and we've taken away every possibility for that those businesses, especially um uh the restaurants uh there to take deliveries through an alleyway.

Um it just becomes very very dangerous for a cyclist to to be biking on uh on that particular block.

So uh I would I would like us to do some sort of study about what it would look like to either limit deliveries or limit traffic during those uh peak peak hours.

We'll follow up with the city um staff on that.

Great question.

Uh uh are you both looking?

Yeah.

Oh okay.

Council member uh Keene.

I I I want to go back, you made uh mention on First Avenue that the special handling between 2nd Street Southwest and Center Street, right?

This is the I I want to make sure I understood right.

You said what we might do is just have the uh the bicycles and the cars share the road.

That is the proposal is that they would share the travel lanes with vehicles, uh, but what we would recommend is doing a speed study to just check and see what the speeds are through this corridor to identify whether or not there needs to be any traffic calling.

Okay, if you don't mind, I think public work.

Mr.

Dombrowski, go ahead.

Yeah, thank you.

We actually have done that, so we can pull that data.

Um speeds are low.

I I just got a note from Sam.

I but you know, if we need to update it, we but we have collected that speed information.

So we can share that with our team.

Can you give examples of where that happens, other places where the basically there are no bike lanes?

It's I'll I'll call it 10 mile an hour traffic and traffic and uh bicycles share the same lanes and same rules.

Where there's mixed traffic, and actually, if you're okay with it, I would ask Tom uh Network to come back.

That'd be great.

He can address that is as a design.

He seemed animated back there like he wanted to talk.

Yeah, oftentimes it's uh neighborhood greenway, bike boulevard specifically designed for shared lane condition.

So I think typically you look at the amount of traffic volume, but then also speeds I I agree with public works, it's very uh like traffic controlled area, very it's uh some hotel entryways, peace plaza.

But but I my take would be we're not planning on doing any redesign work in here.

That's right.

Yeah, uh Mr.

Dombrowski think the key the key thing is how you detail transition between the two intersections okay and get bikes out in front visible vehicles.

So all right, thank you in the details of the design.

Okay.

I would add to that.

Uh we specifically designed heart of the city to be a shared space for people walking, biking, and then you know the lower vehicle counts and the lower speeds.

So it was already designed that way, and that's why we're comfortable bringing this recommendation forward for this two block segment.

Okay, thank you.

So uh council member Miller.

I have a follow-up on uh council member Doring said uh, but mostly for staff.

Would would staff say, and I'm not sure who this is for, that we have any sort of management of deliveries in the broader downtown today.

Thank you for the question.

Councilmember Miller, to my knowledge, we don't.

I guess I would look to our public okay.

So no.

Um there are certainly examples that uh I'm aware of in other communities that they work with their downtown associations too.

And would we need uh a council action to uh to council member Doring's uh point uh initiate that study?

Would it be planned as part of this larger unbound direct impact area that we'll hear about in the supporting transformation presentation next?

We can we we can look at there's a number of ways to do it, some is regulatory by ordinance, some is just through um uh you're in your business improvement district or your special service district.

So we can look at we can do some research on the different ways in which that is regulated and bring that back.

Okay.

I I would appreciate that.

And I I just I I guess I to the Councilmember Doring's point, I think that there is an importance of when where, but I was also able to attend the Center for Transportation Studies Research Symposium last week, and I think there's this question of what types of trucks, and it's this coming up too in the West Logistics Centered conversation of semis, box trucks, etc.

And I wonder if there's this question of how do we encourage some of the delivery users and businesses to consider alternate vehicle sizes that are more appropriate for an urban area versus I because to his point I've often seen semis blocking this exact stretch, and that feels like a mismatch Mayor Norton.

Thank you.

Some of what I was gonna say um was just stated, so I appreciate the comments.

Um that that um center street and um and first in that corner down there is a constant problem with truck delivery, stopping vehicles that stop in a bike lane that aren't supposed to, and they park there for hours.

I mean, that pro that corner problem almost on center more than this street that we have in the picture uh is problematic to me.

And it's we it was designed to be uh a pedestrian and bike friendly street, and it can only be that if we f if we put rules in place and then enforce those rules to keep the trucks, the parking, the inappropriate parking under control, and we have not yet to date do done that.

So I'm really hoping that we can address that at the same time we're moving ahead with this change, because it is center street in particular has become problematic, and that it then impacts the appropriate and usefulness of this street.

So just wanted to add that.

Councilmember Palmer.

Well, I I look from a safety perspective of I'm heading from center street or from um civic center drive heading south.

I'm on a four-lane road or two-lane bike road, and then I'm going to this, I'm making transitions, the speed.

I I don't care in front of the um uh central park, the speed is not that much.

We're losing all these diagonal park heats, which you know, and now you're talking about taking delivery and not taking delivery.

Um I don't know how many people have gotten the complaints in the middle of winter where the snowplows are running downtown and the residential people are complaining that we're snowplowing during the night.

So I can't imagine they would love to have semis running down the middle of the night.

Um I don't see how this is anywhere small business friendly at all, taking away two-thirds of their parking in telling them that they can't have deliveries or limiting their delivery hours.

It this this first avenue is is is hanging on by a thread.

So these proposals seem anti-business at least not to say councilmember Wall.

Without necessarily adopting uh their position, I think something needs to be said about the large segment of the community uh for whom the words road diet are really uh not a happy occurrence.

Um that uh they point to uh bike lanes to be sure, uh left-turn lanes that go nowhere, but they're just an empty spot to reduce lanes.

Uh I I think that we have to be very uh careful about how many roads go on diets with the number of cars that we currently have, whether we're planning for a future with fewer or not, I I don't know.

Uh there have been road diets suggested in other places like the elimination of Interstate 94 between Minneapolis and St.

Paul, uh downtowns, and uh that um it's getting serious uh looks to make it a boulevard.

Um forcing those cars to go on to uh city streets uh for those seven or eight miles.

Uh I imagine we could make Highway 52 between Minneapolis and Rochester, uh two-lane road, like it used to be a long time ago, and and that would certainly create a diet because people would just say I'm I'm not going to the Twin Cities anymore, or I'm not coming to Rochester anymore.

Uh I think we we need to be realistic in our planning.

Uh that not every road needs to go on a diet.

Yeah, I think I can address that with one thing here for First Avenue is that there's no reduction in the number of travelers.

Yeah.

Uh I've already been scolded for using that word, so uh thank you for reinforcing that.

What I would say is in looking at what other cities are trying to do to increase mobility and still allow for vehicular circulation, is there tends to be kind of four phases.

Initially, cities are pretty opportunistic.

Where can you intervene where there's maybe less people against it?

Uh it's a segment that's easy to translate.

You could even do it tactically.

That tends to be the first phase.

The second phase is you tether these investments with other project investments that are already happening, this notion of digging once, you know, so you don't have to do it twice.

It makes perfect sense to try to do this as Mayo is undergoing such a large expansion.

The third phase is you regulate it, you require these things to be done, and the most kind of progressive communities are are doing that.

They're legislating the need for greater mobility.

But what we're also seeing is this bike lash, not backlash, but bike lash, where there is kind of this counter ambition to say, well, wait a minute, we need to take our time here.

And I think that's important.

It's this is gonna evolve over a decade or more, and those short segments that you mentioned are because the network's not complete.

Councilmember uh Fredericks.

Thank you, President Schubring.

Um another large another large investment made in our downtown area.

Um obviously that's where most of our stuff's going on, but a big project like this, how is it funded?

Ms.

Steinhauser.

Yes, thank you for the question.

Um council member Frederick.

So the we have not um sorted all of the what funding goes where.

What we have in terms of funding available is with as part of the 38 million dollars of DMC funding that was approved by you at the last council meeting or um there is an allocation estimate for 6th Avenue.

Um we also have con in our agreement with Mayo that they um are funding up to 480,000 dollars of re-establishing the downtown mobility network.

So understanding based on what we hear today, what can feels to be like an emerging um idea that that this council is comfortable with, we would then look to say, okay, where do where is the money uh what what are the costs and how do we apply the 480,000 for Mayo and the uh allocation that we have for Sixth Avenue?

So that's the budget that we're living within.

Okay.

And then I'm not a hundred percent positive exactly how much parking is along six there, but with nexting more parking, is our goal are we are are we just gently trying to force the hand of using our ramps and using our transit?

Is that why we keep nexting parking?

Is we have these facilities we're investing in, we're investing a lot of money in link transit, all that stuff, bus rapid transit.

Uh is is the goal to basically gently force the hand of people to use it, actually make it less convenient to park downtown, so so on and so forth.

So I don't think the goal is to say, hey, we're gonna make it really hard for you to park downtown.

And so we're gonna get rid of parking so it makes it even harder.

I think what we're at we look at at each individual space, but then the collective whole.

And yes, there is a certain amount of um idea that makes it makes sense.

How do we leverage this council's investment in Link BRT?

But when it comes to Sixth Avenue, Sixth Avenue looks and feels different than other streets that that might have more parking.

First, there's less parking there.

Um there is the um, as was mentioned earlier, we've got two major residential housing developments happening on anchoring on either end of it.

Hundreds of housing units um that are gonna be on either end of it.

And so just by virtue of that, we're gonna see a lot of pedestrian activity happen.

Um, just from those two developments alone.

Um, we also looking at the profile of this street, there's not much on-street parking, and it's been much of it has been gone for the past year, 18 months because the road's been under construction or it's been closed with little to almost no complaints about the loss of parking.

So all of that is informing what might make sense as we think about Sixth Avenue and encouraging opportunities for as Mr.

Gamble put it, pushing pushing through for pedestrians, whether they're biking, walking, uh scootering in a vehicle, what makes sense when it comes to Sixth Avenue?

So that's everything that's kind of informing it.

First Avenue, um, and we can get into this because there's a slide later on.

We want to understand how quickly you want a north-south connection re-established.

We know it will be re-established with Sixth Avenue if that project goes forward based on your direction.

Uh, but we know that's out a couple of years.

If you want an interim solution, First Avenue is our quicker interim solution to establish a north-south connection with um that still preserves not all but some parking and introduces um the bike the bike connectivity.

And then as far as businesses receiving deliveries, uh we'll just take one facet of a business uh as an example.

Our food businesses, which there's plenty of downtown, they there's several of them.

They get deliveries every day.

They're on a route.

What we're saying is we want them to change their whole route schedule, these companies like US foods, Cisco, two big ones, Reinhardt, the list goes on.

All sudden you want them to change their whole schedule to fit because some people get inconvenienced.

We all get inconvenienced at different parts of our day.

Do we want to look like allies to our business district?

Or do we want to look like no, this stuff's more important?

You guys can just shift everything over here.

That that's just not that's just not a good way to come alongside them and uh look like they're equally as important as everybody else, you know.

And that's just that.

And then all of a sudden you want said small business owner, by the way, you're gonna take your deliveries at 10 at night.

Oh, okay, my when's my family time then, you know.

It's just there's there's reasons things are done the way they're done, and they've been done that way for a long time.

And I obviously I know we're living in a changing world, but I want to be I've heard a lot of comments from downtown businesses about everything going on.

There's already a word I learned here, construction fatigue, all this and that.

Add one more thing to the pile, not a good plan.

So council member Palmer.

Yeah, I'm I mean, I like our Sixth Avenue.

I'm not and that's speaking, I guess the Sixth Avenue route.

Um, I like the way that it bumps out for commute for commun people to walk.

What I don't like is this first avenue, and it's and it's beating up the the businesses so bad that that it's it's just not convenient.

It's not safe when you have bikes running one way and then popping over to the traffic.

And and Mr.

Wall, I I think you might have missed it.

They did have 31 people surveyed that responded to the survey.

So there's 31 people in Rochester that have had their their opinion note on this.

So council member Miller.

Sure, just a few comments.

Uh same research symposium, the University of Minnesota's center has been working on freight for the last year, and one of the key comments to come out of that year was involved freight early.

And so I would wonder how we also think about freight deliveries of beverages of food primarily in this process, because when we talk about vulnerable road users, those drivers who are out and loading on the street are also in that same category.

Um so I would just think of planning this in conjunction with what we want.

And I hear several of my colleagues imagining where we're preventing freight deliveries at all times of day and being very restrictive, but I I see it as an opportunity to be more cooperative uh and make sure the streets working for everybody and not as uh governments coming in and saying you can't do this, and so suddenly your business hours are later because your deliveries are at 10 o'clock.

Um I think that's a fear-based approach, and I I just imagine that we could have a more complete conversation with everybody at the table.

Uh I also wanted to ask uh because it came up and the and the key uh feedback uh and related to parking.

How many on-street spaces are there today along 2nd Avenue between Center Street and the Soldiersfield Park?

Second avenue.

Second Avenue, yes.

How many on-street parking spaces are there?

Also known as Discovery Walk.

I don't think there are any, are there on seconds?

No.

No.

I don't have an exact count.

One thing I do want to add for a layer, so just related to the disruption of construction, temporary detours, uh, the city team, both over city administration, uh, my group, along with uh Dylan and Tyler's team, we've already looked at loading zones, access to businesses.

So that conversation, not time of day, but just where space is available for trucks to get in and support local business.

We've already started that analysis.

We have more uh groundwork to do, but those thoughts have already been happening at the staff level.

Thank you.

If I could if I could just also add to that, and we will we'll pull up and someone take a look at Discovery Walk.

Um I would say the studying of loading zones and building off of what Steve is uh has indicated, uh did that in another community that I was in.

It's a much longer conversation.

It is going um it was the same problem: delivery trucks, blocking parking, double parking, um, making a lot of congestion.

There are no back doors, unfortunately, when you are in a downtown.

And so it was really understanding how much each business takes in terms of delivery, when is the peak time, how looking for some themes in terms of is there a common time that kind of stands out more than others?

So it's a much longer conversation that if we were interested in doing that, I think it lives a bit outside of this process because you really do have to uh connect with all of the businesses and the property owners and understand what their needs are.

Um are they taking it late at night?

Are they only taking it three times a week?

Are they taking it no weekends and how you build in a parking strategy and circulation strategy uh that's informed by that data set?

I I appreciate that, but I I think it is surfacing the key point of when we have this post-construction version of this entire space that that's an important piece of the programming of how does this space function because deliveries I imagine continue to be a very important part of that.

Um and what's you know notable is that most of the freight delivery is on the private side and most of the public infrastructure planning is on the public side, and it feels like that's an just a very important programmatic element of of how this infrastructure works or doesn't.

So I would just note my feeling that that's a very important component.

I realize that it might be a long process, and um to Mr.

Gamble's point earlier, many of these are long processes, and ideally we would have started a long time ago, but we have today and tomorrow.

Um but to the point of uh second avenue, I I've heard this come up at the DMCC board meeting.

I've heard it come up in public engagement sessions that I've attended.

I suspect that there is um differing feelings uh among our our table up here, but um I also heard the comment that this is out of scope to study.

So can we clarify?

Ms.

Steinhauser.

Yeah, I'm sorry, can you clarify who who's indicating it's out of scope to what's out of scope to do that?

It was mentioned that uh there was a desire for second avenue to be included as part of the project study area, but that was out of scope was the comment I heard.

Okay, sure.

Um and Steve can jump in and answer this as well.

So um when we embarked on this, we looked at what would be included, what we needed to study and understanding second avenue.

That's I think that's the the question everybody's asking is why not study second avenue uh for a couple of reasons, right?

Um we came to you last November with the street vacation that spelled out the terms of the street vacation included in that agreement was that um we formalized what uh what had been already been operating, and that was a pedestrian easement across Annenberg Plaza.

That was not official, and yet it was being used as a public plaza.

So we formalized that as a pedestrian only easement.

So that was one data set that we took in that said, okay, it's privately owned.

Um in talking with Mayo Clinic who are the owners of that um that area, understanding that their desire was to um restore that after construction, restore that back to um a plaza area that is one of respite, that is one as people are coming out of their facility with um various levels of um emotion, I guess I'll say, um, and distraction, and really wanting that to be a pedestrian first, pedestrian focused space for um for their uh their patients, their uh customers.

Um that was one um consideration.

Um the other consideration is understanding, and uh let Steve jump in as well.

That um as we understand as you make a road more activated, it's better for business, making it more activated, not only from cars but from bikes and from a pedestrian scale.

First Avenue presents that opportunity, second avenue does not.

It is there are no businesses along there until you get to 2nd Avenue and Center, and you've got Kaler, which brings um a third consideration.

The can the concern and the congestion um uh valet from Kaler fighting with um the bike traffic.

So thinking about it both from an intent of that area to be a pedestrian first uh plaza of respite, thinking about in terms of how in re-establishing that north-south connection, we create opportunity for business and commerce as is um demonstrated in different examples that we've seen across the country.

And third, ultimately if the goal is to get to center so you can get to that east-west corridor, that can be achieved on first avenue, and you're not fighting uh, for example, the valet uh parking for Kaler.

But I don't know, Steve, if you have other else you want to add.

Uh just a few other points.

So one of the things we've consistently heard for the last year, going back to the start of downtown construction getting heavy, but also through this project is most bicyclists prefer a protected facility which is behind the curb.

So considering the city just invested 20 plus million dollars in Discovery Walk, the best we would have on that section would be a slow street where you'd be riding in traffic.

So that's not what people are generally asking us for as staff as we travel about downtown.

The other thing is uh you have the valet situation at Kaler, the Kaler is not going away.

If you've driven your bike by the Hilton Hotel on East Center, uh that's a great place to get hit by a car, in my opinion, as a bicyclist who's driven by that many times.

So driving by valets are confusing.

Uh then you arrived at civic center, I'm sorry, at Center Street.

Um there's a lot of people that use the bike lane currently for pickup and drop off going into Methodist Hospital.

Uh there will be a cycle track there in the future, but I'm not sure that pickup and drop-off will all of a sudden people will comply with not parking there.

So you've got confusion there as a bicyclist, and then you have to head a block east, I'm sorry, west to Third Avenue to continue to head north.

Again, with the new arrival of the Waterman building and the North Ramp of Mail, there's a lot more traffic and congestion of traffic at that intersection to connect to Third and Fourth Avenue bike lanes going north from West Center.

So that's not a great movement either as a bicyclist.

So I don't personally think it's a very uh desirable route, but it's it's something we could study if you direct us to.

But I I guess uh yes, and I I think that's an important point.

But are you suggesting adding new curb to first avenue today?

We could uh not under the interim build, which is displayed on the screen.

Uh we could at least separate the bike lane, and then we would while we're showing paint, uh, we'd either use planters, decorative planters, or something that's creates a physical separation from the park cars uh to the bike lane.

So that could just as easily be done on 2nd Avenue.

Except it could be done except you've got narrow travel lanes already.

You don't have wide shoulders, so you have limited cross-section to work with without impacting uh the sidewalk area.

And I guess I I'll I'll look to my colleagues.

I I would just feel like you know, Discovery Walk as designed is is really already this place of respite.

I've heard Sixth Avenue with its double boulevard being described as a place of respite.

This feels like a choice though that's happening somewhere, uh not at the council level of choosing not to study second avenue.

Um so I'll just leave that there and let my colleagues weigh in.

Uh council member Palmer.

Yeah, well, first of all, I'll point out at 2nd Avenue heading south of 2nd Street.

There's very little retail um businesses, and so um I first Avenue has a huge amount of retail.

Um heading north on 2nd Avenue.

You have the the plaza, which I think is an absolutely gorgeous part of Rochester.

You have a one-block area before you had a hospital in so I'm not particularly sure why why we bike and these guys are all hell bent to do 2nd Avenue for one block in front of the Kaler.

Um you're not traveling anywhere.

And so it it's difficult for me to understand the um the attitude of of trying to go across across uh Annaburg Plaza and heading to the Methodist Hospital and stopping.

So Sixth Avenue, you could run all the way from um Seventh Street Northwest all the way to um Soldiers Field Park.

And I think that that's a nice route to go.

Um I'd be fine with losing the parking there, but um I I don't get the second avenue thing um at all.

Councilmember Keene.

Uh thank you.

Um yeah, again, I I'm just going off the you know, the what is it, uh slide 21, but page 42 shows the three options.

Um this we're we're looking at these uh the reconnecting the network because we vacated Third and Fourth Avenue just over two years ago now, I think.

Um and again that's Mayo Swan.

One year ago, just one year ago.

Um and Mayo's coming back to say, like, yeah, we'll help you with this, but they're not street designers, so they turn it over to to you guys.

Um the goal here is that you know, safe reliable travel options um and improved options to it.

It appears in this discussion that the city and Mayo have already discussed this an option.

You just did it in private instead of part of the study.

Uh if I can just jump into that, uh Councilmember Keene.

And I think we've got a few more slides to get through, Steve.

I think it just to the end and get to the interim, midterm, and long term.

So um I want to be really uh clear uh that we didn't come to this decision lightly of not to study it.

Uh in addition to what I said before, um, you know, we we came to this body and um under uh you voted on the terms of this street vacation, right?

And included in that we were clear that the um the easement across Annenberg Plaza, which is privately owned, and they've indicated their intent to um restore it as a plaza uh and an area of respite, which quite honestly is is different than what we see, which is more of a linear respite and discovery walk and what we're proposing for 6th Avenue.

Um and there was not an indication that I recall um from the the council at that time to say don't just look at that as a pedestrian easement, look at it as a pedestrian and bike easement.

Had that been the case, we would have gone back, right?

Then um, as we brought forward the contracts to say we're going to get under design for 6th Avenue and re-establishing the North South um network.

Uh I do not recall a clear direction to make sure you study 2nd Avenue.

And maybe that was a poor assumption on my part because we had just taken action a couple of months ago to approve a pedestrian only easement.

Um, and so that is the framework from which we brought forward um the planning and design work that you have in front of you.

Now, so as we said, if we want to, we can study it.

If you want us to, we have a price, we can study it and bring that back.

And um and well, again, just again, just listening to discussion, it does look like it was done.

My my sense is I mean, I'm not a traffic designer or street planner.

I I don't know if it really does make sense, but it sounds like it was studied and not included in here, because I think you guys are all answering with good reasons why it may not work.

Uh, but I would still like from a public perspective that it be understood as an option.

Um I I get the other thing that bothers me about this is I I mean I've tried to use this uh look at this as use cases.

If someone's coming from the Southeast, will they go all the way to Sixth Avenue and do this?

And and I don't know the answer to that.

But this thing with the Annaburg Plaza, I I'm not sure if you're gonna design it so bicycles can't go through it, but right now I'm looking at this as it depending on the use case, that would be the right way through.

The the one thing that protects me us a lot in this whole discussion is most of the bike traffic terminates on the same area.

It's not going through from one side to the other, it's terminating there.

And we think we have that on good facts through the traffic studies that I think it was about 85% of the traffic terminates at the this these new buildings or the other buildings for the clinic because that's where people are commuting to.

So hopefully we have a smaller bike network problem.

Um, but that idea on Sixth Avenue, I it's just I hope it works out.

I really like the way you laid out the basket the the last page with the near term and then the longer term, because I think it does set us up to think differently than what's the one thing we're gonna do.

Um so that's helped me.

But in this question about I I when I when our our our uh uh professional staff and our consultants go through this, I'd like to see it on there to say we looked at 2nd Avenue and the the hotels make it very difficult, and whatever these other reasons are, uh private property.

But to me to just take it off and not put it on there doesn't feel right in a public setting.

Mayor Norton just quickly I appreciate the the last couple comments here.

Um the community has raised concerns about this.

They've been coming to the PAC meetings.

Um it was my understanding at the last meeting that you were coming forward with a recommendation, but were willing to look at those other streets later.

That's what I thought they had been told, and now I'm hearing something a little different.

So maybe I misunderstood, but I certainly thought um that the message was that some of these while you were bringing forward recommendations, some of those other things might be studied and looked at moving ahead.

And so I'm I guess I'm curious as to the feedback we've gotten, as has been pointed out, wants they want to include second street, and there that's a priority for a lot of people, and yet we're not even having a report or a any sort of recommendation on that feels a little stale to me when we've had such interest in that.

So could you address that, please?

Sure.

Our our initial message since uh tool design started in July to the community is we had a target date of a check-in, which we're doing today, and then as uh the blue boxes here show on the schedule uh a final recommendation for both the reimagining Sixth Avenue corridor and what that cross section would look like and the second part of the project, the reconnecting the downtown bike lanes in January, and that's the consistent message we've shared with the public at every meeting, it's on our website.

We have never said at the last P BAC meeting or at this meeting that we would be making a formal recommendation again.

Even when we arrive in January, we're at 10% design completion, which is before the end of preliminary design phase.

So this is just quarter concepts that we need to do a little engineering, so they're a realistic recommendation.

If we had just done watercolors, half the stuff probably couldn't couldn't have been built, so we thought the better approach is let's include a little bit of scaled engineering to make sure it all fits before we as staff and a project team make a recommendation.

And can I just follow up and say perhaps I'm using the wrong language, but um when people come forward with concerns and come to a board and commission meeting, uh they share their concerns at that meeting, and what I heard was you were going to come forward with your choice, your selection, your whatever recommendation for the board to consider, but that there was time ahead to look at those other routes.

That's what I heard.

And so and now I'm hearing that maybe that's not the case.

So I'm just I I want I want to use our boards and commissions appropriately.

I want their recommendations to be accounted for and not dismissed, and that's just what I'm I'm raising here.

If I could just if I could just step in, I think I because I was also at the P BAC.

I think uh what our intent was just build off of everything that Steve said was we we went back and said what would it cost for you to add second avenue to the study, and the idea was to bring that, share that with you, which we have, and get direction, not to commit that second avenue is the solution because we don't own it.

There's a lot to unpack there, but that we would at least get a price to study it.

And if this body wanted us to study it, we would study it.

And if I can just add we can study it between now and January.

So I I'm just gonna weigh in here as well.

I do believe we need to be transparent about Second Avenue uh and uh the reasons why it may or may not be a uh uh a viable alternative.

Uh I've heard even this evening uh by staff that discovery walk is a natural bikeway.

So I think I don't look at second as just that one half block of the Annaberg Plaza.

There is second avenue that feeds up into downtown uh to that uh that plaza.

And I also like to see a little more creative thinking.

Here we are, you know, we're talking about street diets.

Well, we impose the street diet on fourth, third, and there seems to have to be a street diet on second.

So we have limited uh options, and we have six on the west.

So we have first, we also have parts of second.

Can we look to something of a hybrid where we have second up uh north on Discovery Walk, and then maybe you jog over.

I heard some uh folks mention alleys.

I don't know what the right-of-way are on the alleys that are on the east side of First Street, but if even in the interim we could do maybe some pilots that test those alleyways for bike lanes if uh and or uh work out the delivery issues on first uh and uh and use some of some of that as well.

There certainly would have to be some bike lane jogging uh to get across second, but I I guess I look and I say, you know, we we hired a consultant here and we're getting parallel lines, and I want some creative thinking.

out the delivery issues on first uh and uh and use some of some of that as well there certainly would have to be some bike lane jogging uh to get across second but i i guess i look and i say you know we we hired a consultant here and we're getting parallel lines and i want some creative thinking we have a nationally respected uh urbanologist here that knows uh the the uh creative ideas that happen in a place that doesn't even have the street grids that we have so i'm looking for a little more create creative thinking and using this this um interim period where we can test some ideas and uh see what works um and i did have one more point i mentioned earlier i think uh uh i we have to really seriously think about you know diagonal parking versus versus on street parking and whether as a city of rochester in our our uh our historic district and adjacent to our historic district are we really going to think about removing those historic uh uh diagonal parking so that's from my standpoint those are the ideas that I'm thinking and I don't uh council member miller uh so uh just to add on to the mayor's comments about boards and commissions uh PBAC is receiving the same presentation after us tonight is that correct correct why are they not weighing in and informing us or do you see it differently it feels like it's a little out of sequence that we're having a meeting on this first and then our board and commission that does pedestrian bicycle advisory work is seeing this after us sure um I would say one again we're not presenting a formal recommendation until January so they would get the same information uh we're doing that delicate dance of listening to people figuring out what they want which we've done we've then put some ideas on paper we're coming here tonight to ask generally are we aiming in the right direction are we going do we need to do something completely different and then we will refine the comments received both here and the feedback we've received from feedback in a prior meeting and tonight's meeting to arrive in January with a more refined and detailed uh recommendation with stronger uh points of you know there's essentially there as you consider all parts of the urban context there's no um uh great solution it's a trade-off between pros and cons and we've developed that and council president we've even worked with uh the tool team already behind the scenes and uh with Dylan's team to look at can we leverage the alley should that even be studied so we have had some of those conversations um generally what we've heard is most bike commuters want a straight shot north to south and they felt they had that in third and fourth avenue so our initial blush was to look at uh recreating those and we we chose for the bike lane reconnect uh fourth street southwest which is a primary east-west established route and uh west center which will be have that um um corridor protected cycle track behind the curb in the near future so that's why we buffered it those blocks but we can certainly look at an alternative path during our outreach uh the sixth avenue route south of second street several people in the community said well why do I have to ride to the top of the hill maybe I can just take my first left as I'm southbound on third street southwest so those other ideas we will wrap into a final recommendation sure I guess just in interest of time I just want to be very clear that I I would add my vote or had not or however staff would prefer to to count that um second avenue be included in the scope and giving our internationally recognized consultants in urban design to be able to to look at alternatives present those alternatives to us and and consider how it might work and I'll just note that I think that second avenue uh on this map is even missing public right of way from the the included gray areas because that is not an easement all the way through between center street and second street southwest and I'll just note as well that it seems that Mayo plans to open this to vehicle traffic in the interim so as far as this place of respite that is inappropriate that any vehicles move through bikes or otherwise it it seems like they've decided that a higher use is for traffic active traffic in the in the meantime uh miss steinhauser sure thank you just want to a creek just to that last comment that's a temporary situation as they have to flip and allow accommodate valet parking to for construction coordination and then it goes back to an enclosed plaza um I think it would be helpful for us to understand right now I've I've doing the math I've heard from three council members in terms of studying second avenue and I you know got to get to Florida get direction so that's that's one but the other even before we go there um it would be helpful to understand your expectation around um an interim quicker solution as opposed to longer solution we can deliver it with sixth avenue do you want something in interim and the reason I ask is because I've made I've been making notes and this has been really helpful um in terms of you know looking at other areas more some of explore other areas to get more creative prototype there is a budget implication with that right um we put together that 38 million dollar unbound asked to you with a lot of analysis of below ground and above ground work that is that is the funding source that would be

Do you want something in interim?

And the reason I ask is because I've made I've been making notes, and this has been really helpful, um, in terms of you know, looking at other areas, more some of explore other areas, get more creative prototype.

There is a budget implication with that, right?

Um we put together that $38 million unbound to ask to you with a lot of analysis of below ground and above ground work.

That is that is the funding source that would be anticipated if we're looking at something that is currently not identified in that unbound um spreadsheet, then something's not getting done, or you're having to allocate additional dollars.

And so that's I think an important thing to understand how you want us to approach that.

Councilmember Doring.

What's the approximate cost of a study of the viability of second street?

Uh less than 20,000.

Okay.

I I'm sorry, I meant in terms of uh implementing a solution.

Not this, not the tools to add to tool study.

The cost if you want us to look at other areas like second avenue, there's not money budgeted for second avenue.

If you want us to take it out of that 38 million dollars of unbound um or some other street that's not contemplated today, um, and take it out of that 38 million dollars that we have earmarked for unbound, that means something doesn't get done that was in that spreadsheet for unbound, or we have to find another funding source.

Um uh question on the interim use.

So I mentioned pilots.

Is that pilots, interim use?

How can you incorporate the both of them into in incorporating pilots into the interim use testing out uh different routes?

I can maybe start with that.

So we played around with the term pilot or interim use.

So uh to me when you say uh pilot or quick build 11th Avenue that happened this summer is what jumps into most people's minds.

So we have some paint and delineators, uh First Avenue, no removal of concrete curbs in the interim solution.

It would look a little bit nicer than what was on 11th Avenue, so that's why we chose the phrase interim, but uh we would definitely have the flexibility to lay something out, see how that block behaved and make uh tweaks or frankly pack it up and and remove it all and put it back to what it was in a relatively simple manner because we haven't uh done any concrete work that we would need to undo if we wanted to end the pilot or interim phase early.

So theoretically, you could have a interim pilot use where you go north on discovery walk, you jog over third, you go through the alley, we find out hey, these cyclists that commute to Mayo Clinic really think that's pretty cool, and maybe they're okay with that.

Absolutely.

One of the things we've challenges we've talked about as a staff with any north-south alley is now we're arriving at a mid-block crossing.

And right now there's no protection.

Uh so that and with uh future link BRT in service and only one lane eastbound and westbound, those will be heavy traffic lanes, travel lanes for vehicles.

So getting a gap to get north to south does present its own challenge when we leverage an alley corridor.

Okay.

Uh council member Keene.

Yeah, so I want to say in closing, but maybe not yet.

Um I think I did hear enough uh of a consensus of doing second avenue.

I would say we would do it out of the existing 38 million, and if it if it pushes something off the table that the staff wants to reconsider, they should come back to us.

Um I'm gonna say this again again.

This um I I really do like this interim stuff and this idea of let's get things connected up before we get into the spring um and and have something work.

And I I didn't follow the whole discussion with like pilots and all that, but I had that interim build that idea of doing something and seeing how it works, like and working with that way.

That so that's where I think we're at right now as we close.

And I really do appreciate you guys being able to bring this whole thing together, these two different topics into one thing.

I apologize if we dragged it out a little long.

I can I just get go ahead on our interim and sorry Miss Steinhauser, go ahead.

Interim volves first avenue.

You're not saying interim first avenue, come back with other interim scenarios.

Study my my take would be we're adding second avenue to think if it changes what the interim is, then come back to it.

But I I'm not sure it would.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember Palmer.

I'm unclear on your first avenue interim.

Are you removing the diagonal parking?

Yeah, so the interim solution for first avenue would be this one.

It would be from Fourth Street Southwest up through center street.

So that would be kind of this this uh section here where the parking would shift to parallel, and then uh the area through Peace Plaza.

Um and then I I did I know there was a little bit earlier discussion on deliveries.

Um Mitzi and I from Tool Design, we did knock um upwards of 40 doors along these corridors.

Um talk with businesses.

A lot of businesses through this particular stretch between 2nd Street South Southwest and Fourth Street Southwest do get their deliveries through the alleyways.

Um so deliveries during at least this particular segment um seem to seem to go through the alleyway most of the time at least.

Um and then uh this this section here at the moment um the interim build has um no changes, but I I believe the discussion today uh recommended um some kind of speed analysis and and seeing how how we might be able to navigate that a little bit better.

So your answer is yes, you're removing diagonal parking.

For the for the interim build that we're proposing, yes, that's correct.

Just yes would have been.

Yep.

I'm not in favor of that, and I'm not in favor of looking at second avenue.

Um, I think we're you're I I don't know what your plan would be to get through Methodist Hospital and get through um any of that.

That that doesn't make any sense to spend that money on that.

Um we have Sixth Avenue coming up, let's do Sixth Avenue right and let's move ahead.

Um you gotta remember bikes can ride in the traffic.

It's we're not we don't have 80 mile an hour traffic going down residentials or these business streets.

And and they can navigate hills too, which you have on Sixth Ave, but it's fairly gentle.

I I merely wanted to say that the notion of these alleyways, which are cool and interesting.

One reason that the downtown maybe isn't as vibrant as it could be, is because a lot of people are in the subway.

I mean, that's that's unique about Rochester is the underground network.

I mean, it it will always be there and it'll continue to grow.

And you've got a skyway where actually a lot of retail is up in the air, a floor.

To then think of the alleyways as some opportunity connect them, even moves people off the streets more.

It's you really need the streets to be great.

That will attract more retail, that will attract more restaurants, that'll attract more people.

So part of the reason that the downtown maybe isn't as vibrant is because people are above or below or somewhere else, and you really want them on the streets.

Councilmember Miller.

Yeah, to that point I appreciate you bringing that up because uh RT Ryback, former uh commissioner with the Destination Medical Center Corporation Board mentioned that exactly that the subway and the skyway system compete with the vibrancy of the street.

And I think that's an important point to note as we think about what vibrancy looks like on on First Avenue on Sixth Avenue on others.

And I will just reiterate, make it clear on the record that I understand uh my position to be what Councilmember Keene articulated that interim is preferred, not necessarily First Avenue, but I would like to see second um also studied in that scope.

And I I would question staff of whether or not they feel like there's a sufficient guidance, or perhaps we need to nod our heads.

I'm gonna weigh in here uh and I will leave it to staff to assess where their council is.

Uh I will also say that uh to uh reiterate what council member uh Keene said.

I did sense a feeling that second we do want more information on second to study second.

I agree with council member Palmer that I don't want to see the diagonal parking uh come out of first.

The diagonal parking is south of second, and it is parallel to Discovery Square second uh second avenue.

So I disagree with Councilmember Palmer on studying second avenue.

Councilmember Palmer, if you want to save diagonal parking, you should give a little on second avenue discovery walk.

Councilmember Palmer.

Well, it's kind of funny people bring up the skyway and what a horrible thing these are.

And and you know, there wasn't a public works guy that said it.

It was a planner.

A planner came and said, you know what we need to do?

We need to put skyways that way.

People could walk there, it'd be great, it'd be wonderful.

Now they come and say, Oh, let's take skyways down.

Um, you know, in the 30s and 40s, we had neighborhoods you could walk to the grocery store, you could walk here, you could walk there.

What did they say?

No, no, no, take the industry and throw them at the edge of the town so that the so that you have to drive your car.

This is gonna be great.

So, as much as I respect some planners, and I do respect you.

Um, they always have goofy ideas.

There's always something new over there that's shiny.

So that's just my two steps, and it irritates me because traditionally this has always happened.

They come, they say this would be great for Rochester, they leave.

I'm here for 30 more years, God willing.

Um, you know, I'm not leaving Rochester.

Um, but but that's planners, that's what they like to do is is change things.

So they they you know have ideas.

Council member Wall.

And and I think that really uh one of the great things that we can do is make the streetscape uh or uh have an opportunity for people to engage with whatever's on the street.

Last night uh I walked uh downtown Elmhurst.

Actually, it was very beautiful, it was about 29 degrees, wind blowing like crazy.

Elmhurst, Illinois.

My son lives in Elmhurst, which is in the borough of Queens.

Uh and I was I was shocked at uh five 5 30 on a Sunday evening, dark, uh, how many people were on the street because there were so many places to visit.

And uh I think we need to provide those places to visit uh whereby people uh engage with one another and uh have an opportunity to recreate and shop.

Very good.

Any further comments?

Thank you all.

I have a question since I'm supposed to understand.

Administrator Zelms.

And your question I need to collect my thoughts while I'm supposed to understand what happened, but I I'm hearing support to add second avenue to review to determine whether or not it is a viable option for a north-south connection, either partially or through Annenberg Plaza, which we do not own.

And I am hearing two people with concerns about implementing the interim solution for First Avenue in the near term, and I am hearing multiple different things about whether or not we should do interim until after winter, because if you're adding additional points of review, then uh it it seems illogical to do one as an interim and give the impression that it is going to be the permanent solution when we have it.

We've just added additional review.

So what I'm hearing is we wouldn't be moving forward with interim until after we have more final analysis, including the second avenue review.

So I just don't want anyone leaving here thinking that we're striping First Avenue with interim solutions because I didn't hear that that would be viable with the addition of reviewing second avenue.

It was my understanding that we weren't making that final decision anyway until January.

So that would be the winter anyway.

I don't think that's what staff was asking.

Miss Steinhauser, yeah.

Are you I'm in agreement?

Comfortable with where you where we're at.

Yeah, I'm in agreement with uh administrative Zelm's recap.

Uh uh originally our intent was to get your sense of are you comfortable with the interim solution so we could bring forward a you know the next step.

In that sense, we're not comfortable yet.

Yes, correct.

So we will bring bring that back.

I'm also hearing that generally we're feeling comfortable with 6th Avenue, and how we have we're approaching that design profile so we can continue to evolve and also bring that back.

One thing that we did not mention, I think actually, Mike, you did mention it is when it comes to the bike lanes on six.

We didn't get south of second uh second street on six, and there is the hill there, and there's some concern with that that I've heard within the community.

So if I may, I I know we're out of town or out of time, sorry.

So I'm I'm gonna be really quick.

That's actually the one slide we didn't get to here, and I'll I'll talk about it briefly.

It's it's right.

Um, so this is kind of the plans that we've developed, at least the you know, the concept plans for south of second street.

Um, the the kind of streetscape display looks looks maybe a little bit different than it does north of 2nd Street.

Um, but again, the the different funding sources.

This is um this would be coming out of that mail mayo agreement uh funding.

Um rather than I I just want to interrupt.

We were still sorting out funding sources.

So this I just we need to we just need to um get to the end of this.

Sorry.

Um we we've studied it when we when we talk about the bike the re-establishing the north-south connectivity, we have completely should not even be studied, so it means we have had some of those conversations.

Someone a flat path.

Neither can be achieved based on what I've heard in the discussion tonight.

This can be achieved, but it is not a flat route.

But that doesn't mean that there isn't an all ages and abil all abilities route to head north-south.

And we will we will review that and bring back what this means from an all ages and abilities and what uh alternative solution interim solution means from an all ages and abilities.

Sounds good.

All right.

Um why don't we take a five-minute break okay?

Umpporting transformation.

Ms.

Steinhauser.

That's good.

Yes, great.

Um thank you.

Uh Council President Schubert and Mary Norton, members of City Council, Cindy Steinhauser, Deputy City Administrator.

So want to here to provide an update around our supporting transformation work.

And I thought actually, I was giving a presentation about uh two months ago, and the feedback I got said, you know, that's it's a good, there's some good content there, and and maybe that would be good and helpful for our next um update to you on what's all going on with supporting transformation and a little bit of it's helping to ground ourselves again, right?

We I don't know about you, but um, we are in the throes of transformation work every single day, and you get kind of down into the weeds, and it's kind of nice to just take a step back and do a reset of like okay, where what's the context?

So, this is a little bit of context setting again, thinking about where we are in our current environment environment and what's driving it, and really what's driving it is unprecedented and accelerated growth.

Um, it's not only the five billion dollars investment from Mayo over the next five years, but it's your CIP, which is a billion dollars over the next six years.

There is private investment.

Um, I don't want to take the credit because I certainly can't.

This is Ryan's team, but we hit a new record uh this year in total perm building permit valuation, getting one billion dollars.

Our six largest years have been since 2018.

Uh, and so that is the environment in which we are in.

Um it also means we have a reality, right?

We have a reality of trying to both remove silos but create a culture of innovation and collaboration, and how are we doing that in an environment regulatory environment?

How are we doing with finite resources?

But thinking about what our desired outcomes are, not only during these five years, but at the end of these five years, right?

That how we emerge from this a stronger and more vibrant community.

Um we also have um uh city work in this space, and the next few slides are really going to speak to that.

Uh, not only your recent approval of and the DMCC board's approval of a 38 million dollar investment, really leveraging the opportunity to be in these streets as the same time that Mayo is going to be in these streets, do some really important and necessary upgrades to infrastructure to support future growth, as well as to preserve and enhance connections in and around downtown and to neighborhoods that are impacted.

And as you can see from this graphic, which I know you've seen before, we're talking about a condensed area of investment.

It's 30 square blocks where we're going to see massive transformation over the next five years.

But it's also a lot of other projects.

I believe these have been sent to you before, but it's really helpful to understand and for the public to understand.

We've got five pages of charts here that show the projects and the sequencing and timing of these projects over the next 30 years, so you can see across all of them, whether it's a strategic redevelopment or or streets or both order and bound or mayo's improvements, or what we're going to be doing with infrastructure.

26, 27, and 28 are going to be really, really intense construction happening.

And I I want to talk a little bit about that with some things that we're doing at the end.

This is, of course, a slide that represents the unbound infrastructure that anticipated 38 million dollars of investment, and how many streets are touched, which ones are both city and mayo, which ones are are more just Mayo's in, or ones that we're just in.

Um, and again, it's not just about what's happening in downtown.

Your investment across this community, across our 53 square miles.

Is it 53 or is it almost 54 now?

53 square miles.

You're doing a lot of investment in this community to support transformation, and that work happens across our teams, not only um at RPU and public works, it's across all the teams.

It's the support that we get from HR and from IT and from finance and legal council.

Um we embarked on this journey.

We said we have we can't do it alone.

Our partners in on this with are in with us on this, and it's not just about um public realm and placemaking, it's not just about having the right staff for delivery, but it's thinking about these other things.

It's about sustainability and energy, it's about mobility, it's about um communication and engagement, and those are the things that are driving our conversations every single day.

We developed as partners these guiding principles, in particular with uh DMC and Mayo, and I want to talk specifically about the two guiding principles that I've highlighted, and that is about providing the best experience possible throughout construction and specifically thinking about intuitive wayfinding and approach to movement around construction.

I'm going to talk about that a little bit.

That's the main portion of my presentation today.

But it's also thinking about elevated experience in and around this development.

But uh all of the guiding principles that dig once approached, making sure that we're not creating disruption immediately after disruption already happened, not having to go back into a street two years after something was put in.

It's being very intentional about our investment.

You helped uh provide the staffing delivery for this work by uh creating the strategic strategic transformations and partnership impact team.

This is how that team that lives under me, the positions that are DMC funded positions, the positions that are funded with the additional building permit revenue.

This is not all of them, but this is the core of the relationship between not only public works, sorry, development services infrastructure, our team, but even our diversity equity inclusion coordinator Cham Matwala.

We have two positions funded that support workforce compliance related to not only our work but also private investment.

But as you can see, the team that we've built out and how we're working together with other departments.

Um we are focusing on this is really thinking about three main buckets.

How we work particularly closely with the development services impact team because it's not only public works, it's community development and it's parking and transit.

We have a lot of synergy with Ryan's team, and it's a really great teamwork, and we're uh and we're continuing to figure out how we get more efficient in our processes, how we get creative, how we create clarity and alignment across our work.

Um that's expanding out into other uh other teammates, not only at RPU, but GIS also lives under community development.

They're becoming a really important part of this work.

Uh communications team has been really, really important, especially as we think about how we keep the public informed.

But our partners too, right?

We meet very regularly with Destination Medical Center, with Mayo, with Rochester Downtown Alliance in particular, as we think about how our partnership work aligns, where they lead, we support, we lead, they support, but then also thinking about regulatory and process improvement.

I'm gonna give example when I talk about wayfinding in a few minutes, but looking at what are the processes that we currently use, what is the regulatory environment right now that's either creating opportunity or creating barriers.

That's an evaluation process that we go through nearly daily as we think about the challenges in front of us.

What does it mean in terms of how we deliver solutions?

It's things like business forward, it's things like co-design, it's things bringing people along with the very robust communication and engagement strategy.

Uh, the the previous presentation, a lot of really great energetic discussion, and I hope you really saw from that one slide.

We went under contract with tool design at the end of July, beginning of August, and in September and October, the intensity of engagement that happened because they prioritized doing outreach and more to have more to come, is really just an example of our belief that engage early and often.

Yes, there's also engagement fatigue as much as there is construction fatigue, but it's still really really important to inform our work.

Um, really quickly project updates.

I will run through these and then I want to get to talking about wayfinding and navigating through construction as the larger part of my presentation today.

Uh link rapid transit.

Hopefully, some of you were able to go out and tour the bus.

We had, knowing that we had this presentation, um, Rachel Fauch from Parking and Transit made possible for the our first EV bus of the 12 EV buses that we are purchasing for the Link Rapid Transit was on display for you prior to the study session.

Um we're really excited.

Uh we we will continue to take delivery on those buses through next year.

We are 20% through construction.

We have let all but one construction contract, the only construction contract remaining, is for the driver bathrooms at West Transit Village.

That is we are nearing completion of design for that, anticipate going out for bid early next year for that project or for that contract.

Um we are also in procurement phase.

There's a number of things to procure, particularly technology is a key procurement component for uh Link BRT.

That work is already underway and not only involving parking and transit but also our IT department and our project managers that are working on BRT.

Um, FTA compliance.

We continue to meet with FTA on a regular basis.

We have monthly meetings.

We had an in-depth on-site visit about two months ago from our project management oversight consultant.

This is a consultant that FTA hires.

They come on site, they take a look at all of our information, they look at our contracts, they look at our schedule, they go on site, they talk with our contractors, and they do an assessment of our readiness and how we are mitigating any risks.

Really, really positive feedback coming from the PMOC as well as FTA.

We have also begun drawdown on our federal funding, and so we have knock on wood, have been fortunate to be able to secure reimbursements for those dollars.

Talk about Sixth Street Bridge, Riverfront, and neighborhood connectivity.

We are nearing 90% design for that project, more engagement still underway, not final design.

So for neighbors that might be listening, yes, if there's still things that we have to talk about in terms of trees or what it looks like in front of your on your block or in front of your house, still uh lots of opportunity to inform those design decisions.

But we are nearing 90% design.

Our goal will be to submit to MINDAT very soon, within the next I would say two months, generally for that.

Our goal is to be able to bid that project in 2026 and be under construction by the fall of 2026.

We do have federal funding in that project, and so we need to get under con we need to get under construction by next year.

We will also, you're going to be seeing at the next council meeting.

Excuse me.

Um, we are coming to you for uh your uh request for you to approve a resolution for us to submit.

I'm gonna so I don't get this wrong.

Submit a request for a design variance for that project.

That is so that we it is a state road, if I'm not mistaken.

Um, and so we want to do raised crosswalks as part of the design as part of a traffic calming feature.

Heard a lot of feedback from the neighbors, really like the idea of race crosswalks.

That requires a design variance uh to be granted by MINDAT.

So to do so, we need a resolution from the city council to submit that.

So that's coming to you next month, uh Monday the 17th.

Um agreements, lots of work underway.

I think provided a couple of months ago a recap of the various agreements that we have completed with Mayo.

More are coming.

You're going to be seeing one on the first meeting in December.

It is called a campus site development agreement.

It says November there, but we've actually are asking for some more exhibits to attach to that agreement.

So we'll be bringing it to the first meeting in December.

This is an agreement that in short in order to keep on time with the schedule and that completion year of 2030 for Mayo's project.

We need to be issuing building permits.

However, uh the site development plan is not fully complete.

And so this will be an agreement that puts in protection for us to be able to issue the necessary permits so that the work can continue so we are not running into 2032 and 2033 because we have to wait until final approval of the site development plan.

So this puts in some protections, and I'll get into greater detail in the information that comes to you on December.

But this is an agreement we are we've negotiated.

It's related to four projects.

It's related to West the West Logistics, the North Arrival Parking, the South Parking, and the Osman Waterman building.

Two agreements will be coming to you December 1st.

That will be related to the North Arrival and the South Parking.

And then by February 2nd, the other two agreements, West or West Logistics and Osman and Waterman will be coming to you.

Again, this will allow us to keep the permit process flowing, but still have accountability and guarantee that what we want to see in the site development plan actually gets built and some protections.

Then onbound infrastructure, as I mentioned, you've approved 38 million dollars of funding.

The utility improvements, that was the 1.6 million, 5 or 6 million that was approved last November.

That work and that design is already underway.

That's around the North Arrival building.

But we are obviously in the design discussion around 6th Avenue.

Depending on your direction related to 6th Avenue, it would be our intent to go into final design through 26 and go out for bids for that to be constructed in 27.

We also anticipate coming forward to you in early 26 RFPs to get proposals from consultants to do design along Third and Fourth Avenue.

Again, so that work can be designed in 26 and constructed and constructed in 27 and 28.

Why we need to do these three streets, they are important north-south corridor connections that need to be done in this time frame because they also are when Mayo is doing underground work.

So at a minimum, we need to do the underground work as we've talked internally, still understanding when we need to do the above ground work.

There's a when do we need to have it done by when does it make sense?

And we haven't sorted through all of that, but um certainly the underground work needs to happen at the same time that Mayo is doing that work.

That's why you're gonna be seeing um RPs come forward to you in tw to do design in 26 so we construct in 27 and 28.

And to be clear, though that's third and fourth going north to uh civic center dry.

Yes, that is correct.

Thank you.

Um and as we think about these improvements, not to say that everything that exists in this graphic is going to end up on every single street, but it's meant to convey the kinds of things that we're looking at when we think about the um above ground improvements.

Not every as I said, not everything is necessarily gonna have um a protected bike lane or a um uh a wider than normal sidewalk beyond what the design standards are for DMC district, but it's to say that we will look at it and incorporate as much as we can.

Council member uh Fredericks caught my attention here.

Oh tell me about tell me about innovative utilities and snow melt system.

Sure.

So uh the snow snowmelt system is pretty straightforward.

Like does it make sense for us to put a below ground so snowmelt system in um high pedestrian areas like we have on Discovery Walk, like we have on Peace Plaza?

So that's a pretty straightforward one.

The innovative utilities, we're trying one of the one of the um uh some of the feedback that and and direction that the DMC board gave us as a condition of this funding is to look at where does it make sense to innovate in the infrastructure that we're in installing and we're trying to look at what does that mean?

Does that mean um that we're using the latest of materials that are uh uh have a smaller uh uh carbon footprint, right?

Just be in through production, or are we looking at um AI technology as we think about people moving through the space and so AI technology in our traffic signalization or pedestrian counters?

So it's um it's not um prescriptive and defined yet, but rather for us to explore what does it is there an opportunity to innovate in the infrastructure that we're putting in place?

Tell me about intuitive signage too.

Intuitive signage, yes, that's great.

And wow, that's um a feeder into what I'm gonna talk about.

Um this is really about how do you navigate in and around um downtown and our neighborhoods post-construction, right?

So, what you're gonna be seeing is um an interim wayfinding strategy, but ultimately we're thinking about what does a permanent wayfinding program look like.

And when I say intuitive signage, it could be things like um uh BRT station, two-minute walk, one-minute bike ride, or and at an average speed of this and how that yeah.

Whenever it says like 10-minute walk, it's usually five minutes for me because I'm a fast worker.

But uh, that's what we mean in terms of intuitive signage.

Okay.

Councilmember Miller.

Just a quick question because I think this brings up a point that's come up in a few places, including the uh neighborhood information meeting for West Logistics.

Um we have the Gell report, we have the DMC money, but not all places that feel public are public projects.

And I think about like the park next to West Logistics, that that is a private Mayo development, is that correct?

Correct, yes.

So will there be engagement with the neighborhood or with others in the design of that park, or is this just something that's totally approved at the staff level?

So there will uh there will be additional neighborhood information meetings as they bring forward that uh we will and we would encourage that, but the Gill report, which is not an adopted report, but a good, a good um uh a good thing for us to reference because it's really robust neighborhood engagement, as are us going to the neighborhood meetings, um, as are the design guidelines that we have in the DMC district.

So that's everything that forms it.

So Mayo's Linear Park at its foundation, it's what are the design guidelines that they must adhere to as a baseline, and then where do we go from there?

And we're actually in those conversations, and part of that is is evolving through the um the uh campus site development plan agreement, getting that in place, and then um what's what I'm trying to say?

We we meet with them regularly to try and communicate what we think we here are hearing from the neighbors and having Mayo translate that into the design programming.

Okay, thank you.

Because I I feel like it's it's just we mentioned subways and skyways, those feel like public places, they're not really um and I think that people don't necessarily perceive where public space ends and private space begins, it's open to the public.

And I think it's just an awkward place to have to navigate, but as we talked about our foundational principles and strategic priorities, including a lot of robust engagement.

I would just hope that we find ways to bring the public in, even if it's not I don't know, just an awkward place to navigate, but I hope we can find ways to bring public engagement into those too.

And I think of that park particularly as an important place.

Yeah, I appreciate that.

And I I will say I'm I don't believe she's here, she might be online, but uh Brooke Carlson who uh works for DMC and led all the Gale report work.

Uh she is probably the neighbor's biggest advocate because there isn't a meeting that she doesn't bring up neighborhood feedback and the Gail report uh as a reminder to us and to our consultants.

Um so I want to talk a little bit about one of the uh conversations that we've been having, not only internally but with our partners, but thinking about what do we need collectively to create an elevated experience during construct during construction, right?

How do we can turn construction zones into welcoming spaces?

And one of the things I'm gonna focus on tonight is uh the wayfinding program and construction navigation.

So these are just some images we did uh my and Ryan's team, leadership team did a walk about about two months ago, and we just tried to look with fresh eyes.

What are we seeing?

What are we experiencing?

And how do we reimagine the pedestrian experience?

This is very much pedestrian focused.

How do we rethink our signage program and how do we think about regular maintenance monitoring?

So I really want to just call your attention to the the images on the top half because this is what we see right now.

We see a lot of orange and black signs in sandbags, and is this what we want to see for the next five years?

And I think collectively we all agreed and said, no, we don't want to see this.

And it was a really great conversation.

I would say um, I can't can I point to uh in the it's not showing up in the monitor, but on that uh on the top line on the right-hand side where you see the left lane must turn left with sandbags, and then you see the yellow sign next to it with the with the black base.

We're saying, like maybe we look for a sign base like that instead of sandbags and rusted metal posts, right?

So, what does this experience look like?

So it really led to a wonderful conversation of do we need all of these orange and black signs, or is it really more about creating a wayfinding program?

So we are under contract, uh, we have money in the um DMC budget for wayfinding, and so we are under contract with uh a firm gigantic, and they've been helping us walk through and develop a wayfinding program for that we want to roll out in a couple of phases, and I'll I'll explain that.

But really, what this is about this is meant to be an interim wayfinding program that can pivot very quickly, literally in a day, if necessary, depending on roads that close, sidewalks that close, etc.

And so it's really trying to create an unifying tagline.

I will also say that Mayo's working on a wayfinding program for their campus.

RDA has been working on a wayfinding program, particularly for skyways and subways and getting to districts, and all of this work we are doing together.

We are we just met this morning about how do we have a cohesive look and feel and reduce the visual noise that currently exists through the construction experience.

So our theme is detours lead to discoveries.

They, as the consultant said, we really tried to put a hole in that tagline and we couldn't, and so we're gonna we're gonna go with it.

And so uh this is what we're talking about in terms of a wayfinding program.

So the sign on the left is what we would call like your trailblazer sign.

This is a more permanent permanent interim sign that at key intersections, and we're still evaluating which signs are so critical that they need a trailblazer sign that says go this way for this, go this way for this, go this way for this.

Using uh iconic um imagery, right?

Uh images are easier than text in a wayfinding program, particularly when you have multiple languages.

And then all of the other signs to the right are just an example of the different types of temporary signs that we intend to deploy depending on the need.

Uh when we talk about um sidewalks being closed, here is the latest version of what we're talking about.

This is the signpost or something similar that they would use, not the sandbags that exist throughout downtown.

Uh and um, but also maybe there's a map component to it, right?

So that okay, you're here and you want to get to spy house coffee, right?

But the next two blocks are closed.

Go left, go right, go right, go left, and you're back on the street that you were once on.

And um the QR code is a QR that will take you to the full pedestrian navigation map that is currently used by Experience Rochester, RDA, it's handed out to every Mayo um uh patient that is part of their concierge package, it's at the Mayo Information Booth so that there's consistency across the map.

We do need to update that map, but that is a later, uh we want to get these signs deployed.

So here's a close-up of what that means.

And this is just one example, and um our goal is to get we've we've identified three or four intersections that we want to get this out there.

We want to prototype, and by prototype, I mean we want to not only say does this kind of design work, but also the materials that we're using.

If it's a sign uh that say is less than two weeks, we can use that corrugated plastic that you often seen with um you know realtor signs or whatever.

If it's something that's needed for much longer, if it's gonna be up there for three months, it's gonna be campaign signs, yeah.

Campaign signs.

If it's something that's gonna be up there longer, maybe it's a metal material that um we can repurpose and and revinyl as needed.

So this is can I ask a question?

Yeah, uh, and I think it's a beautiful design, and what I would worry about, and I I would look to maybe Mr.

Dombrowski to give his thoughts that when it they do if did you discuss whether or not they will look temporary?

Because if you're a driver or pedestrian or cyclist, you're kind of looking for those detour signs and you're used to orange.

And so how will you make sure that those that are moving through the space know that it's temporary or that this is the sign you look to because it's a detour?

Sure.

And let me clarify, it's not for vehicles.

We are focused uh so the the road detour signs will still exist.

This is really a will still be orange.

Those will still be orange, yes.

Um, this is about navigating the sidewalks, and I I don't want to put Mr.

Don Frosky in the spot, but he it was actually him that's saying is there was one example that we literally came to a corner and it said pedestrian detour and pedestrian detour.

And he said this maybe is why we need to replace all these with the wayfinding program, but I don't know.

Uh council member, oh Mr.

Dombrowski, were you gonna say I don't think I have anything more to add?

It's just can we be consistent and and we have a little more flexibility with the the pedestrian signage and the wayfinding?

Thank you.

Uh council member Fredericks.

First of all, President Schuberg told me four meetings ago that blue was always a good choice of color.

So you're doing good there.

You did say that.

I did not say periwinkle blue, which I think that is.

I don't even know what periwinkle blue.

I know that.

Okay.

So if you go back one slide, I I am uh this is my my world I live in.

Does that post come out of that base?

Yes, that is a portable post.

Okay, that post comes out of that base.

Does that base hollowed out on the bottom so you can stack those things?

I'm not sure I under it's got wheels.

I understand it has wheels, but that still doesn't mean you couldn't stack them.

Can you stack them on top each other?

I'm just thinking storage because you're gonna have thousands of these things, I imagine.

Yeah, council member Fredericks.

Um, I believe those are either meant are meant for uh water or sand, and so they wouldn't blow over, so I don't believe they are stackable.

Where do we store all these when we're done?

We will we will never be done.

We won't you're I I should.

I mean, I don't want to speak for public works, but I think this is also a prototype for us to understand.

Is this could these be reused as we think about construction in the rest of the community, right?

On other city projects.

President here understands periwinkle blue, and I just understand the pain in the neck, it would be all the logistics of trying to handle these, where you stack them, where you put them, move them around.

I like the wheels, but I'm just just saying they might be salvageable at the end of five years.

I figured out where the color comes from.

It's a a part of our logo there.

It's Rochester logo blue, and with the orange wayfinding, you get linked BRT.

I think it is a good question.

We've not talked about it.

It's a good, it's a good question.

Yep, it's a it's a good question, and I'll make note of that.

We also said, how do we um how do we think about creating the brand?

And so as we were actually walking outside to put one of the trailblazer signs out there, we started talking about the work that RDA is doing to do a side a skyway and subway program and wayfinding.

And honestly, we just started um brainstorming and we said, you know, skyways lead to discoveries too.

And how do we encourage people to stop and get out and not only navigate around downtown but navigate in the skyways because there's a lot of commerce that happens in Skyways.

So as part of the brand of wayfinding, we'll be installing.

We want to install these skyways lead to discoveries, and um this theme of connect, wander, explore.

So that is also rolling out, and then looking at the current bus stops that are boarded up, using those, and I actually have updated images actually.

Um connect, engage, explore.

So this is uh there's a on the street side, they'll be simpler.

There actually is not as many words here, and there's more graphic than there are words because you're on the road, but on the sidewalk side, it's uh there's more words there, and the middle, the middle piece of plywood will actually be the large downtown map.

So for there's five of these uh stations that are boarded up that will have this brand.

We've also done a version for uh the Jersey barriers or bike racks that uh will again build the brand of detours leader discoveries, wayfinding, and um in our conversations with Mayo, for example, and all their construction signs that they've got up, you know, maybe it makes sense instead of some of the signs that they have that some of our signs go on there as well, so that we're again eliminating that visual noise of all of the different kinds of signs, and that there's some really good synergy across.

Um I would say in this work, there's been a lot of lessons learned and we continue to learn.

And here I just tried to capture things that I've heard over the last six months, um, not only from our team, but from our partners.

And um, I think this is the kind of language that lifts us up, right?

It's cultures matter, people matter in this, not only the our relationship as departments, our relationship to you, our relationship to our partners, but our relationship to the community, and so that we're thinking about community when we bring these things forward.

We do it with a community in mind, not to the community, but with the community, um, not lose our identity as we grow, um, that we recognize that there will be disruptions.

How do we embrace them?

How do we think about them as complementary rather than disruptors?

And um come with that kind of mindset as opposed to a half-empty mindset, and then also thinking about future considerations and how things get repurposed.

So, to your question, is there an opportunity to repurpose those signs?

Uh are there signs in the parks that that need to be redone and could those be uh an opportunity to repurpose those bases, or can they be repurposed for street closure for special events that um farmers market sets up or Thursdays downtown sets up, just trying to be creative in our thoughts around that.

So I think that was my yeah, I think that was my last slide with um where right, council member Keene.

Yeah, um, I I do appreciate you kind of pulling this together.

I know it's not like the end of the year, but we're getting close to the end of the year.

Um, I know when we did our strategic priorities early in the year, I tried to get one in there, and it was this transformational capital projects.

In my mind, I was talking about we had to like stay focused and stability you know, stability, not changing them, uh, not be in the way.

We had some early things that were uh pricing things that cause us trouble at the beginning of the year, but I've been really been happy with our execution in the last two quarters.

We seem to be on our game.

Um, and I think some of that things, the moves we did earlier in the year with the idea of like, do we need to separate some of the staffing?

Do we need to step up on this stuff?

Really seems to be serving us well.

Um, but I do want to go back to that transformational capital leadership when I think of my peers up here.

There's always the problem with a uh council like ours that we're always like, what's next?

What do we want to do?

And and I my goal is to stay focused on execution for at least the next two years and not what's the next big idea.

Because I think we are our our the way we'll be judged is by staying to be a good partner and to be able to keep on top of these major things going on.

Um so I wanted to say that as far as wayfinding, this this is fascinating to me because I I believe the wayfinding construction is almost like feels like emergency communications.

You got to be quick with it, you got to be accurate, but it's it's one of these things that it's very much like the situation room.

When you start talking about wayfinding and branding for the future, that's a very different, very different game.

It's very much like stability and consistency.

Um and like anytime you change it, you should figure that's you're making a mistake.

It's got to be stable.

Um, but I also think it's got to have flair, and it's got to have that like um, I I want to say the marketing side, but also more the artistic side of it too.

And I hope as we get into that sort of branding that we keep those things in mind.

But um I I main message here as far as as far as the like where are we with transformation?

Um, I I'm feeling good about how we're ending 2025.

Yeah, thank you.

If I may, I forgot to mention a couple things as it relates to the wayfinding.

So the the the skyways and the bus stops will roll out by December, and the four intersect three or four intersections that were prototyping, and while we're watching and understanding how people are using that space, say for like a week and how effective the signs are, do they hold up to weather?

Do they we are also plotting out where all the corners that things need to go on, and we need to work through what's the smooth cadence that we have with the public works right-of-way team, so that as when Kelly and Justin get a request for a sidewalk closure, road closure, you know, there is a good connection over to this wayfinding program, like okay, what's the graphic we need to produce, what needs to move where, so that we are being highly responsive, and that we're not sitting out there with with um dated signs that aren't aren't uh true representation.

And then at the same time, so this is what it's gonna be like, right for the next four or five years, but using that as an opportunity to say then when we think about a more permanent program.

I mean, you I've done a number of wayfinding programs, and you know, you district and you're on point, like it's uh there's a brand, there's an artistic component, there's an information component, and so learning from this and what does that mean in developing then a more permanent wayfinding program post 2030.

So just to be clear, so you mentioned the partners, Mayo Clinic and uh and RDA.

Uh is this their brand too, or do will they have a uh a complementary brand of signs?

So we have not seen Mayos yet, and Mayo is actually their program is uh they're thinking more long-term.

Um so we expect we have a follow-up meeting, they expect to be able to have some of their graphics by I think January.

So we have a follow-up meeting scheduled.

This is done with RDA's uh brand in mind.

So the colors are complementary, we're not gonna overlap spaces.

We want to be very clear in that regard.

Councilmember Miller.

Yeah, thank you.

And I I just want to say to reiterate council member Keene's point, but also more specifically, I think we're doing a really good job, and especially with some of the business engagement.

Um, the flexibility is some of the second street full closures went into place and isolated businesses being able to be reconnected to the network and signs pop up.

I I think that that's been a really good showing of how much staff are engaged and building the relationships that matter through this next five years.

I I just want to keep bringing up UMR as like a key partner.

I saw them rolling out new uh skyway dots as I was going to get coffee today.

I know that they're very active in this, maybe just beyond or on the threshold of the direct impact into the broader impact area, thinking about transportation.

And then what I don't necessarily see here, I hear you talking about um sort of data gathering and seeing how these patterns are working.

But I think specifically like looking at the measurable data that we can get for pedestrians for bikes, for cars, really that transportation data, so that we can have robust pieces of information to make decisions on this post-construction phase, because even this past weekend I was at an event, somebody came up to me and said, Hey, I love the the patient shuttles that are available now.

And I said, Well, that's uh kind of a mayo thing, but it's really good feedback.

And they said, Yeah, I love not having to drive anywhere downtown.

I love that I can get on somebody else knows how to navigate this, and it just gets me to where I need to go.

And so I think where we pull data as the city where we interface data from Mayo Clinic and how we have a downtown transportation and otherwise branded space that works in this public, private, and the intersections of the spaces is just really important.

So thank you.

If I could just um comment to that, I should have also mentioned so we agree data's really important.

Um, our partners at DMC are purchasing PED counters.

Okay.

We will purchase the software licensing so that we can deploy them and they're they're mobile, so we can deploy them to study areas.

We also purchased, is it called Street Light?

I think is the data streetlight.

So that's um a very that's uh I think is that every 15 minutes or I mean it's much more frequent than the software that we have used in the past.

So Streetlight is helping us understand will help us understand traffic patterns as well.

So you're saying we'll have a better data source soon than the uh national household commuter survey from a few years ago.

We certainly hope so.

Okay, great.

Councilmember Doring.

Sorry, I was pressing the old button.

I just I uh I agree with my colleagues that I think we're in good in good shape uh for the future and to proceed as uh as we continue to um grow as a community.

I also appreciated the outreach that happened uh during the the link uh trick or treating event uh that uh though those uh businesses on second street were approached to provide the catering for that event.

I thought that was a great touch.

Uh I'm kind of curious about wayfinding for those who are visually impaired in the interim.

Um how we are keeping uh a wayfinding option for those folks up to date uh with with those closures and and and the changing environment downtown.

Yeah, that's a really great question.

That is one of the um uh challenges that we gave to our consultants that these these need to pass an ADA you know um uh criteria, but but if you're severely visually impaired, what does that look like?

And um we have done a little bit of research.

We uh Steve has um Steve Sampson Brown, our director of construction has done some research on some audible portable um devices.

We need to understand that more, um, not only cost, but I'm not sure how um deployed they have been in other cities, or would we be prototyping early technology?

Um and so it is something that is on our radar, but we're still in the early stages of investigating.

I I appreciate that.

I just uh I appreciate you even looking into it.

So thank you for that.

Great, thank you.

Great work.

Oh, council member Fredericks.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

My first thought tonight was well, great administrator Steinhouse and was uh as a magician, she's gonna make a construction site enjoyable.

But uh as I watched and listened tonight, I really appreciate the work and seeing the visuals on it.

Obviously, my brain don't work that way because you you made me do an about face on that.

I mean, really changed my mind.

Uh looks nice, so thanks for your work on that.

And uh now my uh I've had a steady diet of acronyms since I started in this position, and uh my favorite acronym was tonight, your FAIL acronym.

I've never heard that before.

Maybe I've just been living under a rock, but I gotta give that credit to I learned it from Mr.

Parrish.

It is very good, and uh I appreciate that.

So thanks for your uh work on this.

Yeah, council member Miller.

Just final comment uh again to plug the U, the Center for Transportation Studies.

They have researchers um who work with low vision patients.

Um and this may be an opportunity to engage both with our local campus of UMR from a public health perspective, but also the broader university system, so that we don't just gather data that helps inform our decision making, but is useful um in communicating that out through research to other communities who are maybe not as well resourced as we are to be able to consider these solutions and learn from them.

Thank you very much.

Yeah, thank you.

Great uh great work and uh great overview of the transformational projects that uh is one of our strategic of an initiatives uh thanks to council member Keene, and uh so it's good for us to see that and and see the scope and breadth of all of those and keep keep us on track, keep us informed on um track, and then this project, just the uh the ability to be flexible and and implement quickly is uh look we're looking forward to seeing it.

So thank you.

Thank you.

And if I could just say there's a whole bunch of people, it's not just thanks to me, whole bunch of people, including people in this room and many others that are the reason we're we're where we're at today.

So thank you.

Absolutely, thank you.

Uh administrators elms study session schedule.

We have also reached a milestone in our study session schedule.

We will have the final study session of the year, umless you surprise us with an idea on the 24th of November.

So um update on communication and engagement strategies surrounding the conversation about natural gas franchise fees.

Um pretty final update from DMC on their five-year update, and then the piece de resistance, another closed session.

So thank you very much.

On to Thanksgiving.

We've kind of had a little uh council member Fredericks, go ahead.

Thank you, President Schubring.

We've had a little discussion about our uh schedule in December for meetings, and I've got I've got a little lost back there.

What is exactly each Monday in December?

What is our schedule for meetings in December?

Certainly, um Council President, Councilmember Fredericks, uh Mayor Norton.

The um schedule for December, you have two regular council meetings, one on December 1st, 6 o'clock, one on December 8th, 6 o'clock.

You do not have any rest of the month, and then you don't have any more meetings the rest of the month.

Thank you.

Okay, great.

Well, at this point, we will uh move into a close, we will move to uh room uh council conference room 104, and we will have a closed uh executive session uh uh considering the evaluation of the real property identified at in the property identification numbers that are in our our our RCA and they are all located near uh 611 40th Street Southeast Rochester.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Uh if if you would just uh invite a motion to move into that closed session.

I uh a motion to move into the closed session and moved by uh council member Fredericks, seconded by council member miller.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed say nay.

Thank you.