Planning Board - Regular Meeting

Well, good evening everyone. I'll introduce myself. My name is Don Edinger. I work for Goro Palmer. Um we're based in South Portland. Uh we've been the lead consultant on a planning study here in the city of Auburn. And we're here tonight to present our second public meeting. Um, I will share my screen. See if I grab the right one. I think it's this one. Let's see what happens. All right. Are you guys Did I flip a page for you guys? Did you guys see it flip a page? No.

I see page one. Okay, you don't see page two. It'll stop sharing. All right, let's try this again. It looked like you opened it, but maybe the slideshow didn't start. Okay, let's try this guy. All right, so you should see page one, page two with study team. Are you guys seeing that? Yep.

Excellent. All right. All right. So, we'll get started tonight. We're here to present uh our second public meeting on this uh transportation planning study. It is worth noting that we've had some neighborhood meetings on a kind of a a twin study that's been ongoing related to land use in the Washington Street corridor. So, this isn't the the second meeting overall, but the second one related to our our transportation study. So, uh we'll get started um with introducing our study team. So, uh I've already introduced myself. I represent Goral Palmer here. where the kind of the lead consultant on this focused heavily on traffic and transportated uh transportation related aspects of this study. We teamed with Northstar Planning. Ben Smith is here on the call and he'll be presenting uh in the presentation as well. Uh Ben is focused on all things land use planning related. Uh we've also teamed with Aceto Landscape Architects. Um and Grace McNeel is with us uh tonight to present on some of the slides as it relates to kind of visualizing what the corridor might look like in a build condition. Um so uh we have actually a client team comprised of three different entities. First the the MO is ATRC and that is who our contract is direct with. Uh Larry Allen is present on the call tonight um and uh represents ATRC u from the municipality standpoint. the city of Auburn and Eric Cousins uh has been involved from start to to where we are today on this study and we also have a representation from main DOT. Claire Winter is here representing the planning aspect uh for Maine DOT. So what we'd like to do as I kind of transition into these slides, we have a presentation that we'd like to walk through for the audience. It is it is probably 40 40 slides long, so 40 minutes long probably to get through. Uh we're hoping that you guys could just stay attentive and kind of hear what we have to present. Uh but when we finish that, we certainly will open it up to to

questions and responses. Um so we're hoping we get some some feedback from the folks that are on the call. Um we also I think uh Eric might be managing uh writing questions. If you have questions through this Zoom um meeting, you might be able to to submit those. We probably won't answer them until we get through the presentation. All right. Um, so first want to discuss our study limits for this. So the graphic on the right kind of illustrates uh where we are. So um hopefully not Ben or Grace, can you nod your head if you see my cursor moving on the screen? Perfect. Okay, thank you. So um so to give everybody a bearing, this is I95 or the main turnpike here. This is exit 75 on the bottom of the graphic. Um our study begins just north of exit 75 right at Allied Road. um and where the park and ride is and we continue north all the way up to the Minadav Rotary uh where Royy's Burgerer is located. So, we'll be continuing all the way up there. Um we'll be uh considering both the northbound and southbound barrels of Washington Street or Route 202 through this area. Um and the overall length is just shy of four miles. So, pretty lengthy study. Uh the next two slides we have a lot of text here but hopefully as we move forward it'll be more visual graphics. So um what are some of the what's the purpose and need and goals and outcomes of this study. So uh what we've been kind of assigned to to look at is try to maintain mobility between the downtown Auburn area and Interstate 95 and the main turnpike. We understand that's a heavy commuter route. We also understand that it's just not the the access for to from the interstate to Lewon and Auburn is just not important, but it's points north. I think Farmington and other points will travel through this corridor. So, but what we want to do is is try to provide improved safety and accessibility for properties and businesses that exist along the original northbound section of Washington Street.

Uh you'll notice driving through there, the characteristics of of both the northbound and southbound barrels are drastically different. a lot of residential, industrial, and and uh commercial businesses that exist on the northbound corridor. The southbound corridor is is limited access with really no businesses along that section. Um also, another goal of ours is to provide accommodations for all transportation modes, including bikes, pedestrians, and transit along that northbound section of Washington Street. um provide for a limited access facility or maintain the limited access facility that focuses on vehicles and trucks on that southbound corridor of Washington Street and look at safety, access, and mobility along both of those corridors. So, diving a bit deeper into the discussion, um what are we looking to do? So, we want to identify improvements that may be necessary to convert both the northbound and southbound roadway sections of Washington Street into two-lane two-way uh roadways. So, right now we have two corridors, um two lanes in each direction, um but they're separated facilities and they're one direction. So, you have two lanes northbound, two lanes southbound. We want to introduce birectional traffic. So, um, in the the northbound corridor, we want to introduce a two-way traffic, uh, one lane in each direction. In the mobility corridor, which is currently the southbound corridor, we want to introduce similarly two-way traffic, at least one lane in each direction. Do we need two lanes or a hybrid section, something between one and two lanes? So, the we want to convert um well, we want to keep the southbound corridor of Washington Street as a controlled access highway. Convert it to two-way traffic. We want to convert the current northbound portion of Washington Street back to a local street. That's what it was at one time years ago. Um, we want to introduce lower speeds on that northbound corridor, better access to the adjacent parcels and accommodations

for all modes, bikes, peds, and transit. So, we want to kind of convert the northbound into more of a local street and the southbound corridor into our our mobility corridor. We we're going to determine the length of time that this new controlled access uh highway on that southbound corridor will operate at acceptable levels of service. How long can we do just one lane in each direction? When do we need to consider a hybrid or two lanes in each direction along that corridor? Uh we're going to provide for three connection points uh between those two corridors. Um and there we'll talk further in the slides as to where those locations are. And also we want to look at a Rodman Road connection uh to Broad Street um that currently does not exist, but we're looking at maybe east west connection across Washington Street uh to provide connections to Broad Street and potential future residential development in that Broad Street area. Um I guess I I will note on that Broad Street connection that it will require a crossing of the Little Androskagan River as well as a railroad active railroad corridor in that area. So that was in narrative form what our scope is. This is more in graphical form what we're looking to do. So this is our existing condition. We flipped the screen a little bit. North is to to the right of the page. So um I95 is located here. Exit 75 is on the left hand side of our screen and then the route 202 or Washington Street corridor goes left to right on our page. Um, city of Auburn proper is located on the right hand side of the page. So, in the existing condition, we have oneway traffic in the northbound direction and a separated facility for oneway traffic in the southbound direction. There is a Rodman road connection to that southbound corridor uh but not a direct connection to the northbound corridor. In the future condition, what we're

looking to do is to take that northbound corridor of Washington Street and make it a local street, lower speeds, um more accommodations for bikes and peds, make it more user friendly for the businesses that exist along the corridor and the resident the residential properties. Um, and then on that southbound corridor, make maintain that as our mobility corridor, but provide for two-way traffic. Um, we maintain a connection to Rodman Road, but we'd like to introduce a new connection all the way across to Broad Street um crossing the Little Anders. Okay, so let's jump into um some of some of the information that we gathered as we worked have been working on this planning study. So, first thing first, uh, roadway conditions. Uh, so it's a divided highway in the existing condition. There's two lanes in each direction. It's a corridor priority, one roadway. Um, DOT prioritizes roadways, I think, from one to five. Uh, a one is the highest priority. These would be the interstate system or major arterials. Priority five would be a local street. So, in this case here, this is a high priority corridor. It's a principal arterial. It has just shy of 20,000 cars a day. So, a lot of traffic on the corridor has relatively high speeds through this corridor with average speed limits anywhere from 45 to 55 miles an hour. Um, the southbound corridor is limited access. So, the photo on the bottom right here represents our southbound corridor. You'll see it's all wooded. No development exists through here. Whereas the photo on the top right shows our northbound corridor with businesses that exist um along the corridor. All right. Uh, one aspect that we like to look at in these planning studies is a safety review. Um, do we have any locations that are dangerous or considered high crash locations? Um, do we have either intersections or nodes

that um are are uh have higher than normal crashes or accidents. So, we looked at the whole corridor um and looking at high crash locations. I'll give you a definition of what the what high crash location means. It's having eight or more crashes in a three-year period and a critical rate factor of of 1.0 or greater. What is the critical rate factor? The best way I describe it is it compares the severity and the types of crashes at this location to other intersections throughout the state. Uh and then it ranks them. So if it's 1.0 zero or better or or higher. Um that is uh that will also be a trip uh category that needs to be met to be considered a high crash location. So we have one location within the corridor um that's a high crash location and this is for years 2021 through 2023. That's our three-year period. It's Washington Street intersection with Beach Hill and Danville Corner Road. Uh 17 crashes in that three-year period with a critical rate factor of 2.79. So um this project this intersection is actually there is mitigation um ongoing for this intersection. A traffic signal is planned and in design as we speak. So the graphics when we present our concepts to you will show that we're we're showing a signalized intersection at this location. It is also worth noting that the intersections south of our study limits, the exit 75 intersection with the main turnpike, um, as well as the Kittyhawk intersection with with Washington and Route 202. Those both are high crash locations, but outside our study limits. All right. Um, this graphic here may be hard to see on the screen, uh, but this is a speed data graphic. So ATRC was kind enough to help us out in this study and they have a a speed counter so they can go out, it's either a camera or a counter. They can go out and collect speeds of vehicles. Um so they set their

their camera out at five different locations along this corridor. Um and collected uh a ton of traffic data for every vehicle that crossed crossed through this area. Um, and what we found, generally speaking, what we found is speed of traffic is higher than the posted speed throughout the corridor. Um, some of it's quite a bit higher, but generally speaking, uh, we mentioned speed limits are 45 to 50 to 55, and we're finding speeds in excess of that on average for the for the, uh, daily traffic. All right. So, we're going to transition. We talked a little bit about safety. We're transitioning into traffic um as it relates to safety. Um I'll start with the graphic on the right here and share with you again we've rotated a little bit. So this is north south for Washington Street. So this is our Washington Street corridor. Uh city proper for Auburn is is on the top of the the graphic. Main turnpike exit 75 is on the bottom graphic. So we have some circles here and colors. I wanted to to explain what those are. The first one, the red circle is the signalized intersection with exit 75. Um, just slightly outside our study limits. The green circle that you see here is the proposed signalized intersection with uh, uh, Danville, Cornell Road, um, and Beach Hill. And then we have three pink circles. This represents the three locations where we're providing connections between our two Washington Street corridors, the local street and this mobility corridor. So we call the the the bottom uh pink circle would be our southern split. The top one would be our northern split or where they merge back together. And then in the middle is um right at Rodman Road where we have that connection um today. So uh through this area, one thing we wanted to focus in on is on that mobility corridor. We

wanted to understand levels of service and capacity based on different options and footprints. The other thing we wanted to determine was um travel time um and as it relates to mobility. Some of the comments we received from our first public meeting was hey whatever you do here don't don't impact our commute our daily commute uh getting down here. So we wanted to understand what impact uh the concepts that we're developing would have on commuter time and then we also wanted to understand safety um as it relates to our mobility corridor. Currently, it's a divided facility. So, you have two lanes in one direction, northbound, two lanes in one direction southbound. With this idea and vision that we're looking to incorporate, we're introducing two-way traffic, particularly on the mobility corridor. Um, that will increase the chances of head-on collisions. So, uh, from a safety standpoint, what what considerations can we make in the design to minimize or potentially eliminate that risk of head-on collisions? So, uh, we have a slide on on our thoughts there. So, we've we've analyzed three different options as it relates to a footprint for the mobility corridor. The first option is just a two-lane section, one lane in each direction. Uh, we understand that's different than what you have today. You have two lanes. Um, so we actually modeled how well does that operate from a levels of service delay delay aspect. Um, if we just provide one lane in each direction. Uh the second option we developed um was similarly one lane in each direction but we made improvements at each of the three intersections those those pink circles um to add additional capacity to improve our operations and levels of service. And then we also came up with a three-lane section or a hybrid section. Um we we modeled that as well. Um I'll explain what that consists of. basically at the three circles that um that we have shown here at our three intersections, we're

proposing all three of those to be signalized intersections. Um and then on approach and departure of those intersections, we're proposing basically two lanes. So as you come into the intersection or exit the intersection, you have two acceleration lanes for about 1,500 ft. So basically that allows you time to accelerate and pass the slower moving traffic before you have to merge into a single lane. So, we've kind of modeled what we call a threelane section um for the corridor to see what that told us for information. So, we'll jump to um we'll jump to the results of our traffic analysis and modeling. So, as I've described each of the options, so what we found here was uh we have pretty good levels of service even with a two-lane section, one lane in each direction um through here. So, uh, option one is just a single lane in each direction. You'll see levels of service, um, B, D, and B. Um, those represent the three pink circles. So, going from south to north, uh, the southern split had a level of service B, the Rodman Road intersection had a level of service D., the northern split had a level of service B. When we add intersection improvements, which is option two, you found we found that we improved our level of service results, particularly at the Rodman Road intersection. Um, and then when we added that threelane section or modeled that threelane section, we found that we had even better results. So, we have levels of service B and A on those in the AM and PM condition. Um, so what did this tell us? This told us we did not need to model for um for a four-lane section through this corridor because we found a two-lane or three-lane section provided acceptable results. Um, of the three options, we found option three, which was our three-lane section, gave us the best level of service results in the lowest uh delays. So, that's just one aspect or one part of the of the big picture. The next part

is mobility and travel time. So, let's we wanted to digest this and understand this because we felt this would be important for the public to hear um and understand uh what impacts this might have on the mobility corridor. So what we ended up doing, this graphic here shows that we we took a look at the existing condition which is no signals free flow through the corridor and then we we modeled and analyzed option 1, two and three um with the traffic signals. Um we looked at um northbound and southbound in the AM condition. We looked at northbound and southbound in the PM condition. What we found in the existing condition to travel through our study area which is that 3 to four miles we found it takes generally three to four minutes to travel through in the existing condition. When you look at options 1 2 and three uh that we're proposing with the signalized intersections we found that we add about a minute of travel time. So instead of 3 to four minutes it's four to five minutes. Of the options we looked at we found option three which was that threelane section gave us our best results. um in looking at that. So, and this was for year 2050. So, this is not just uh opening day. We're we're forecasting out 25 years um with growth factors in in traffic volumes as well as anticipated new development that may occur over the next 25 years in the area. So, this is this is a a future um anticipated anticipation on travel time. Then the third component we wanted to look at on this mobility corridor was how do we improve on this making it as safe as possible for two-way traffic um and minimizing head-on collisions. So uh the graphics you see here kind of illustrate what what our recommendations are for this corridor is to introduce not just a center line but basically a striped center median um to be at least four feet wide maybe maybe six feet in width um to separate the northbound and

southbound traffic by a striped median. We did consider a raised median or a big divided uh median. We felt that this was uh from a cost standpoint, this was a cost-effective solution uh to minimize the concerns. Um you'll see the graphic here on the left illustrates this this stripe center media and it actually has some delineator post shown here. Not sure we would need that on our project. Um this does show rumble strips on both stripe lines and we would recommend that as well um in in this study that we do a rumble strip. So the idea behind it is a complacent driver that might slightly traverse over the the center line stripe would be made aware of that they're traversing over it by a rumble strip. Plus there's going to be a 4ft buffer before they're even encroaching into the opposing lane of traffic. So the graphic the photo on the right is actually in Portland. Uh this is Veterans Memorial Bridge. Um and they did introduce something very similar there where they have a stripe center median um with runal strips. All right. Um so now we're going to transition to a discussion on our preliminary recommendations and concepts. So we have a lot to present um through here and I apologize if it's if it's lengthy and timeconuming but there like I said there's a lot here to present um u what we have. Um, so what I will share with you, um, on this graphic here, um, north is to our right. Um, main turnpike, Interstate 95 is located here. Exit 75 is here where my cursor is, and we're going to go from left to right on the corridor from south to north. So, we're going to start down near the main turnpike, and we're going to work our way northward into the city of Auburn. Um, we have actually, I'll say, four different sections, actually five different sections. We have, we're going to use these terms, a southern boulevard. We have a southern boulevard down near the turnpike. We have a

northern boulevard up near the city of Auburn proper near the mined rotary. We're going to have a mobility corridor which is our higher speed facility. We're also going to have a local street for Washington Street. Um and then we're going to be discussing a Rodman Road Broad Street connector as well. Um that runs east and west on our corridor. So with that said, we'll jump into the slides here and at a high level, I'll discuss what preliminary recommendations we're making for the corridor starting from south to north. So here we're at the southern boulevard. Um if you can see my cursor, this is um the park and ride facility at exit 75. Uh Allied Road is located here. So the next signal is just off our page on the left. As you travel north, what we're proposing for our southern boulevard is a four-lane section, two lanes northbound, two lanes southbound, um with it, uh separated by a landscaped median. Um not too different than what you have out there today. Um but we're going to introduce bicycle and pedestrian accommodations with separated facilities. So, we don't want the bikes and the peds interacting with the vehicles through this corridor. Anybody that drives it knows it's pretty high volume and can be high speed. Um, so we're proposing separated facilities for bikes and peds. We'll start at the top here from the park and ride. Uh, we see that park and ride as a potential trail head for accessing the shared use pathway. So, we're proposing a a 10-ft shared use pathway from the park and ride along the west side of the of the Washington Street corridor. That shared juice pathway will continue up to the signalized intersection with Danville corner route. On the bottom side of the graphic or on the east side of our graphic, we're also proposing a shared juice pathway for bikes and peds 10 foot wide paved. It will continue down to Allied Road and terminate at Allied Road. We are aware that this the state and the city of of Portland are are embarking on a Casco

Bay trail potentially from Portland up to Danville Junction. Um, if that's successful, then there will be about a onem gap between Danville Junction and Allied Road to connect a trail system from the city of Auburn all the way to the city of Portland, which would be fantastic. Uh, this pedestrian uh, this shared use trail system that we're proposing on this corridor will continue through the whole corridor all the way up to the Minadav quarter uh, uh, mined a rotary. There will be a section on the local street where we transition from a shared use trail to separated bike facilities. So you'll see that in our graphics. From a vehicle standpoint, we are proposing two safety changes along this section here on the on the slides. First is at Allied Road. Allied Road is unsalized and provides for full access, including left turns coming out of the facility. Left turns coming out and left turns turning in. Uh anybody that's watched this intersection, it's pretty dangerous for the large trucks to come in and out of here in an unsalized intersection. So, we're proposing to extend the center median through Allied Road and restrict any left turn movements. You'll see later in our slideshow presentation where we're proposing different accesses access points to Washington Street for Allied Road. Uh similarly, the next intersection as you travel north underneath the turnpike bridge, the next intersection is East Hard Scrabble Road. Uh this is unsalized, full access with a small left turn pocket here to turn left into it in the northbound direction. Um they do allow lefts coming out. Um there are sight line issues with this location. The bridge peers impact sight lines coming out of East Hart Scrabble. The bridge peers also impact the ability to have a a true a proper length left turn pocket. So as a result of those concerns, we're proposing to terminate um left turn movements at East Hart Scrabble um and provide a center median through there. So we'll be right in and right out at East Hard Scrabble. Folks that typically use that road will need to continue up to the next intersection

which will be signalized and they can and they could turn there at Beach Hill. They also coming off exit 75, they could turn right and head down to Kittyhawk to the south to get access to Hotel Road. All right, we're going to continue north. As we continue north through the corridor, the footprint for this boulevard stays the same. two lanes northbound, two lanes southbound, a landscape center median, curbing on both sides with shared use pathways, separated shared use pathways on both sides. As we come to the Beach Hill Road intersection with Danville Corner Road, this is the high crash location. Um, we are showing a proposed signal here which will be, I believe, implemented as early as this summer or next summer as an as a construction project. They'll be signalizing that. Um, at this location, we're providing for full pedestrian and bicycle accommodations here with crosswalks. Um, and this is where we'll terminate the shared use pathway on the west side of Washington Street. So, we'll come up here and then the pathway will continue on the uh on the south side or the bottom of the page and that will continue all the way up to the local street. All right, we're going to continue north. As we continue north up the uh the the southern boulevard on Washington Street, we come to a signalized intersection here. This is where we call our southern split. This is where currently the northbound and southbound uh sections of Washington Street diverge and separate. Um what we're proposing here is to do a three-way signalized intersection um with the local street which is the current northbound corridor um tying into the the mobility corridor. So the through movement will be our mobility corridor. You'll have to think about turning right or left to go into the local street. Um so uh pedestrian and bicycle accommodations will continue up to the limits of our of our southern boulevard. We'll have a crosswalk here and then all bike and pet accommodations would continue down the local street and

not on our mobility corridor heading north. All right, we're going to continue to the next slide. Um, and actually this is a visual of this intersection. I'm going to hand it over to Grace to talk about what we're looking at.

Thanks, Don. Um, so as you can see, this is a perspective image um taken from the point of view heading north um at that southern split intersection that we were just looking at. Um so we're in the northbound lane. You can see the southbound lanes on the left side. Um between the two lanes we have that um nice size uh planted median um with some street trees and planting just kind of break up the roadways there. Um right in the front you can see the um this the intersection signalized. We've got crosswalks going across. Um, and then all the way on the right we have uh another planted median that would include some other street trees as well as some pedestrian scale lighting. Um, and then our 10-foot um shared use path to accommodate both um bicycle traffic and um pedestrian traffic.

Thank you, Grace. And I would build on what Grace has said. So any place on our design where we're proposing a shared use pathway, we'll prop we'll be proposing uh not only landscaping with an espanade, but also that pedestrian scale lighting. Um so you'll see that kind of throughout our our um study limits. Okay, so we're going to continue north. This is we've kind of flipped a little bit, but this is our three-way intersection that Grace just described. Uh north is left to right on our page. So this is now our mobility corridor. And as I described earlier with our different options, option three, which we think is the best best option for um for moving forward with study recommendations, shows two lanes coming into the intersection, two lanes exiting the intersection in a northbound direction. Those two lanes will stay there for 1500 ft. That is probably a quarter of a mile in length. Should be plenty of time to accelerate past slower moving vehicles before we taper those two lanes into a single lane as we continue north. Um, and then you'll see here the yellow represents our our striped median that we talked about introducing through that mobility corridor. You'll see green here at the intersections. We flared out and we have some some landscape islands um approaching each of those three signalized intersections. As we transition down to the local street, so this is our local street here. Um, we're proposing single uh lane, 11 foot lanes, one lane northbound, one lane southbound, uh, curbing on both sides, and the shared use pathway separated as a separated facility on the east side of the corridor. Uh, and that will continue all the way across the little Anders River. So, this will be this this local street will be where we want all of our bikes and pedestrians to go. We want this to be lower speed. our commuter traffic. We want them to stay up on this mobility corridor. All right, we'll continue um further north. This is the little Androskogan

River. There are two bridge crossings, one for Washington Street northbound, one for Washington Street southbound. Um you'll see our mobility corridor does taper from two lanes down to one in the northbound direction. We have a single lane in each directions at the bridge on our mobility corridor. we are going to need to widen that bridge to accommodate that center um striped median. There's just not enough u curb to curb width on the bridge to accommodate the new footprints. So, there will be some some widening of that existing bridge to accommodate those needs. I will I will mention Chase Street is located here. It currently connects to the southbound corridor. Uh one thing in the recommendations of our study will be we're going to kind of eliminate connections with that mobility corridor. So, there are more than three connections today. We're going to limit it to just three. All of the other streets will terminate on the on the high side where it's near the the uh mobility corridor, but they'll provide for full access on the local street. Um the template for the local street, which is shown on the bottom of our of our view, is it continues with the same theme. two lanes, one lane in each direction, a five-ft shoulder with curbing, and then we have a shared use pathway separated from the road on the bottom or the east side of the corridor. If we continue further north, we cross the little Androsco in here. Um, our template for the mobility corridor is pretty consistent, one lane in each direction. You'll see on the right hand side, we actually have a three-lane section. That's because we have two lanes coming out of the Rodman Road uh intersection or traffic signal um heading southbound. We start to introduce some changes on the local street once we transition for over the little Androskagan. So speed limits we're thinking on the local street will probably be 35 miles an hour from that southern split to the little Andrew Scogginan. Once you cross over the little Androsogen, we've transition it down to 25 miles an hour. Much more of an urban setting. Um, and then we're

going to start changing our roadway template. So, once we get over the bridge, we will start introducing uh some crosswalks and some stronger facilities for bikes and pedestrians. So, with a lower speed and we want traffic calming through this section, um, we're going to introduce all crosswalks will be raised crosswalks. So, we'll introduce vertical traffic cominging and you'll see those are strategically placed along the corridor. And then at our first crosswalk, we're going to eliminate the shared use path. And we're going to introduce sidewalks and bike lanes um both sides of Washington of the Washington Street local street from this point heading into our kind of what I'll call our our our city center as it relates to the Washington Street corridor. So, um, so bike and pedestrian facilities, both sides of the street, curbing, uh, 11t travel lanes, narrow shoulders, I think maybe 3-ft shoulders, um, and then a wide esplanade. Um, the esplanade is wide enough that we can accommodate future on street parking as development occurs through the corridor. As we continue north, we get to what I'll call our city center area uh, for the local street. This would be our hub for land use development, future land use development or redevelopment. Um, you'll see on the top of the page, we have our mobility corridor connecting to a Rodman Road uh intersection that will be signalized. You'll see we have multiple lanes traveling through on the mobility corridor for to to make sure commuter traffic gets through these uh in efficient time. Um, on the local street, we have a similar template that I mentioned in the prior slide. um up to a certain point about two blocks away from um what we'll call our city center, we're going to introduce on street parking. So, we still have uh sidewalks on both sides, bike lanes likely going to be up with the sidewalk. Grace has some some visuals to share with you. The two options we're looking at, um we'll have curb extensions at each of the crosswalks with vertical raised

crosswalks to to uh introduce traffic coming through the corridor. Uh when we get to the urban center here, this will be the a new intersection with the local street and a broad streetet connector. We're proposing an all-way stop at that location. So all traffic on all approaches will will have a stop condition. Um and then we'll continue down. There's a connection here that will between the mobility and the local street. We'll talk about that and some pre uh some slides later in the presentation. I think my next slide here will transition to some slides that some visuals that Grace can can discuss as it relates to the local street. So Grace, I'll give it to you.

Thank you. Yeah. So um basically as Don said, we have two different versions that we're looking at applying the um bike lane and the sidewalks in this local street in this like sort of downtown city center, town center area that we're talking about. Um this is version A that um mo the most notable difference is that the sidewalk and the bike lane are separated by a planted median. Um again you can see our pedestrian scale lighting medians with street trees. This option doesn't allow the um larger street trees that you might see in like a town center setting um due to the proximity of the buildings. Is that right, Don?

Yeah. and the close I think the close closeness to the travel lanes.

Yeah, that was it. Thank you. Um and you can see um further down that these like more interior uh medians become the street parking further down. Um and uh we've got our two travel lanes and in the center there our raised crosswalk. The next graphic will kind of break up the view a little bit so you can see the differences a little bit better. Um so we've got our on the left our future info. I also want to say the reason you're seeing those um kind of amorphous white buildings along the edge there are because um we're talking about um in this study um what we call a complete street and that um includes infill um which would be great to see in this area. I think Ben will talk a little bit later about what that might look like. Um but just we're including them in these graphics so that you get an idea of what this street would look like when it's totally finished and functioning as a complete street. Um so this section breaks up the um orientation of the street a lot better to see. Um starting on the left with our potential future infill buildings. We've got our six-foot sidewalk, a three-foot planted median that would include that pedestrian scale lighting I'm talking about. our eight or a five foot bike lane that is also raised at the same level as a sidewalk. Um the eight foot median and um also just you can't see in this section but further down does include that street parking as well in that same area. Um our 6in curb then we've got our 11t travel lanes and then the same thing on the other side of the street. So that's version A. This is version B, which the biggest difference is that the bike lane and the sidewalk are together on the same plane. Um, and there's a lot of different ways to delineate the I guess the lanes of travel there between the bike lane and the sidewalk. We've chosen to do it with um a material change. So

looking at the sidewalk being this like brick paving material and the bike lane being asphalt the same as the street. It can be as simple as just kind of painting symbols on the ground plane as well. Um so there's lots of different ways to make that happen. Um and then another difference here is we've got one larger planted median here that is a little bit um we can have these larger street trees in this option. Um and again in that same median continuing with the um pedestrian scale lighting that would help both the bike lane and the um sidewalk area. And same thing we're showing these potential future buildings here. Um and then in the section the next graphic we can see um again the breakdown of these different lanes a little bit more easily. So starting from the left we have our potential future infill buildings here. Um then on the same plane, the 6ft sidewalk and 5ft bike lane, all one surface essentially. Um and then the 3-ft wide planted median that um can accommodate some larger trees here um due to the orientation um with the travel lanes. Um our sixoot curb and then we have the 8ft um on street parking and our 11 foot travel lanes. And then same thing happening on the right side. Thank you, Grace. Um, so what I will say is our earlier concepts as we developed them, I think we were showing concept or version A. Um, something like this. Um, the graphics we're presenting tonight, we flipped it and we're starting to show version B. Um, so we we still need to kind of do a cost comparison, not a cost comparison, but a uh an evaluation um between the two options, advantages and disadvantages before making a final recommendation on on which one to proceed with.

All right, so we'll continue further. So this is our I'll call it our city center, town center area. Um we're continuing north from the Rodman Road area here. Actually, if you can see my cursor, this is the existing intersection with Rodman Road. Uh this over here is the existing Miami A connection to that southbound corridor. So you'll see we're showing some hatches. We're proposing to deadend those connections with the mobility corridor and Rodman Road would be a realign to this intersection um to the left on the on the view. U but the mobility corridor is consistent with what we've described before. Two lanes heading northbound coming out of the signalized intersection that will stay for 1500 ft and then taper to one. you have uh one lane coming in um transitioning to two lanes at the uh at the intersection in the southbound direction. The mobility uh the local street corridor we have a similar kind of a mirrored theme here where we have for the first two blocks we provide for on street parking here. We have crosswalks uh raised crosswalks with curb extensions. We have bike and pedestrians as separated shared facilities on either side of the street. Once we get past the first two blocks, we eliminate the on street parking and introduce a wider espionade. The intent here is to design the template so that if there is future development that occurs through the corridor, there's the opportunity with minimal cost to remove the espanod and then introduce on street parking. All right. Uh we'll continue north. As we continue north, our next intersection is the northern split. Um this is where or the connection where uh the northbound and southbound barrels of Washington Street reconnect. Um it's also where Brickyard Circle is. So uh the mobility corridor is is similar theme. We mentioned two lanes southbound coming out of the signal. You end up having one lane coming in northbound into the intersection. The template for the local street is similar to what we just discussed. uh one travel lane in

each direction, curbing, wide espionods, and then separate bike and ped facilities on both sides of the street, raised crosswalk strategically placed to for traffic calming. Um and then as we get to the intersection with Brickyard Circle, we're proposing our third connection here, signalized intersection between that mobility and that local street. Um we're providing for full pedestrian and bicycle accommodations uh around the perimeter. um and providing for trail connections which I think we'll talk about in the next slide here. So the next slide here, this is Brickyard Circle today. This is our Washington Street corridor. This is what we're calling our northern boulevard. Um where both the mobility and the local street are now merging. Um so we're proposing two lanes in each direction similar to the existing condition separated by a landscape median. Um we do provide for turn lane pockets. We do provide for uh cross crossings, midblock crosswalks with rapid flashing beacons and refuge islands. Um and then sidewalk on the west side through the corridor as well as a shared use pathway on the east side or south side of the corridor. You'll see there's a a trail here shown, Taylor Brook Trail. I believe this is will be under design with the city. It's been approved to build a trail on an existing rail corridor. Um, we'll tie that into this this um transportation infrastructure, extend it down and have it cross Washington Street and it could extend to the residential neighborhoods to the to the west. Um, we are proposing uh connections on both sides of Brickyard Circle. This will be right in and right out on the northern connection. The benefit of this is to for the businesses that exist here not being able to turn left like they can today. They they can't today. They need to use Brickyard to do a U-turn. So, they'll use Brickyard Circle and then the signalized intersection to to turn around and head back into the city.

All right, we're going to continue north here. Uh, this is continues with our northern boulevard. Similar footprint, shared use pathway on the on the east side, sidewalk on the west side, separated facilities for bikes and peds. Um and then we terminate someplace here at a point close to the mined aav rotary. There is a separate planning study ongoing uh with the city of Auburn for mined a including the rotary itself. Um and it's actually the same consultant team working on that one. So we will uh be kind of um working both studies to come up with a footprint that works for both studies and we'll be referencing each study as we can complete it. Uh this study we're hoping to wrap up sooner than the minded ab study. the money to have study is just getting started. Uh we're hoping to have our first public meeting uh maybe in February. All right, a few more slides here to present up. We'll stop right here. So this is our Northern Boulevard footprint. Grace, do you want to just describe uh what we're looking at?

Sure. Uh so it should be pretty familiar from what we looked at in the other Northern Boulevard um perspective image. Again, we're in the northbound lane here. Got the southbound lane on the left side. Um we're showing planted medians. the planted median closest to us that's um just next to that white vehicle is narrower to accommodate that left turning lane into that um business over there. Um but then you can see further down the road it does widen up again um and allow for street trees like we saw on the other perspective. Um and then on the right side we've got our median again with street trees, pedestrian scale lighting, and then there's that 10-ft shared use pathway for the bikers and pedestrians. Awesome. Thank you, Grace.

All right, we're now going to transition. We got a few more slides here. We're going to transition to um our east west connection uh or west east connection. Rodman Road to Broad Street connection. So, uh this is Rodman Road here today. Uh connects to Washington Street. So, we've flipped our views. So, north is up on this graphic. This is our mobility corridor here where my cursor is. This would be our local street corridor here. Um so Rodman Road, we're proposing to realign a portion of Rodman Road and tie it into uh Washington Street. Um with two intersections, one with the mobility corridor. This will be a signalized intersection. A lot of truck traffic here. This will be heavily used, particularly this right turn movement coming off of Rodman to go south towards the the turnpike. Um so full access here. proposing a sidewalk on the side uh on the north side of Rodman Road, shoulders for bikes through here. Um as we continue across the signalized intersection, we have a connector here. This would be a brand new road facility connecting to the local street, always stop at the local street providing for sidewalks on both sides and bike accommodations. And then we'll continue um east and we'll be crossing and connecting into Broad Street. We'll be crossing little Androsken. So that would be our next slide. This is continuing east. We have a crossing here with a little Andrew Scoggin and a straight shot over here to Broad Street. So um first the crossing. So here's the little Andrew Scoggin. Here is an active rail rail line. We'd be proposing a bridge where those two are very close to each other. So we could span both um facilities with one bridge. uh proposing likely a three-span bridge through this area um to both span not only the river but the railroad u tracks. Um our roadway template would be 11 foot lanes, one lane in each direction, 5-ft shoulders for bikes and a sidewalk with curbing on the north

side of this facility. Um my last graphic on the concepts is coming full circle back to uh exit 75. So this is the main turnpike here with exit 75. Uh this is Allied Road and these are the businesses that exist on Allied Road. Um we talked about restricting left turn movements here in our previous slides. So if we're going to do that, how are we allowing for vehicles and trucks to access these businesses and turn left? So we actually show three different options here. Option one would would be to provide a basically a new allied road connector or a driveway that would be opposite exit 75. Except 75 is a is a three-lane or a three leg signalized intersection. We would introduce a fourth leg to that signalized intersection. So uh truck traffic coming out uh off the turnpike could do could run straight across to get access to these businesses. Trucks leaving these business could do straight across to the turnpike. So seems pretty pretty uh basic. There is a railroad crossing an atrade railroad crossing that would be required here. There is also an outgrade railroad crossing on the existing Allied road corridor. Our second option would be to extend Allied road to the south and have it tie into station road um which gives access to a signalized intersection on Washington Street where Kittyhawk AB is located. So that would be our second option. A third option would be to build a Allied road extension up to Danville Corner Road. Uh they could travel down Danville Corner Road to the new signalized intersection with Washington Street. of the three options, option three is probably our least preferred, but we're still going to assess advantages and disadvantages for options one and two. So, with that said, that discusses a lot of our preliminary recommendations and concepts. I'd like to transition to um discussing uh the softer side of of this design, the non-transportation side,

more land use planning um and looking at future development, future zoning, and how that might be influenced with the transportation infrastructure that that we've discussed presently. So, what I'm going to do is I'm going to stop sharing here. I'm going to hand it over to Ben. And Ben, I'm going to pull up your slideshow. Uh let's see here. slide that over here and share screen. I think if I did it properly, we should see connectivity as a catalyst.

Thank you, Don. I I see that up on the screen and appreciate you uh running the the slides here. So, as Don said, I I hadn't thought of this as the softer side of the planning effort, but uh I think that uh the way I look at it is uh everything we've really talked about so far is is kind of what's happening in the road and what's happening immediately next to the road. And uh we've got some graphics that we'll share over the next few slides that talk about this uh place in a a wider context in the city as well as uh thinking about um what it means to reimagine Washington Street from a um from the perspective of land use. What does that mean for housing, businesses, uh recreation in uh Auburn? So, one of the things that we've uh heard throughout this process, and it kind of lines up with things that I I think folks are hearing through the ongoing comprehensive planning process that's happening right now, is that this this area is a a major gateway to the city of Auburn. And um people are wanting there's there's a strong desire to have the city put their best foot forward and show uh um improvements in landscaping, show improvements in uh the the use of the land and and kind of uh see a wider diversity of things. So when we talk about unlocking new development potential, that that's really what that is, increasing the options that folks have available to them. um making sure that this the kind of place that people will want to spend time rather than drive through at some of those speeds you saw were, you know, upward of uh high double digits and a few over 100 miles an hour, which is mind-blowing for this this section of roadway and really

integrating this part of the city more into the city and and having people think of this as as another urban neighborhood like the uh very close by New Auburn neighborhood which is very close but very disconnected from from this part of the city. So, uh if you wouldn't mind, Don, uh the next slide. Um what we are are hoping to show here is um a little bit more about how zoning updates um um which include what happens on a property uh what's allowed and and how it happens how uh some additional zoning changes around design standards and the form of new development. So as it relates to uh the types of things that uh people are using when it comes to the location of buildings on the site uh the materials that are used in the buildings thinking about landscaping and lighting and and a bit more u giving that more priority in the design process um those those two together uh are really u what what we think of as the 3Ds of development. There there's the diversity of land uses, there's the density of uses and and design. And um all three of those elements, all three of those variables uh are really envisioned for some from ch for some significant change on that local Washington side of the of the study area. So in order to make that happen um additional infrastructure work and planning needs to be taking place uh as well as thinking more about that placemaking and open space. U this is a critical component in helping turn this from a drive-thru uh get through uh as fast as you can to having this local Washington street

become a new neighborhood, a place where people want to spend time, spend money uh and live and work. So, uh, next please. Density, diversity, and design. So, this is this is a graphic that, uh, will look familiar to some of those things that, um, Grace was showing a few moments ago. I I think that I wanted to include this. This is an ALA graphic um because it it shows more than just those blank walls. I think that those are important for massing and understanding what a streetscape might look like. But this, I think, is is sharing some of those eesign elements in in a bit more um realistic way and and helping people understand that this is a place um that people are going to be active, spend time, slow down, and be able to get around um with a vehicle certainly, but also have a lot more options when it comes to mobility. So we we started by thinking a little bit about what what is happening in in the vicinity of this study area. The the the study area is is kind of that that purple blob in the middle, but there's a lot happening around this area. There's not only a lot of activity and business in the corridor, but there's a lot of um existing neighborhoods um surrounding this and there's a lot of industrial and commercial uses. Uh this this very important connections to the interotal facility, the airport. Um this is the the primary lifeline connection between the interstate and and the downtown area. So we need to think about all of these things in the context of looking at uh changes to Washington Street. So next please. And and this is going to look uh

somewhat familiar to folks uh as you relate it to those uh earlier drawings that Don shared. This is a graphic that ALA put together as well. it it's starting to conceptualize those those blobs on the prior slide into pieces that fit together. So rather than you know thinking about disperate neighborhoods and and here's the industrial zone and here's the place where people live you we use this to kind of conceptualize how do these things come together around a new local Washington street as well as the potential new neighborhood on the other side of the little Andrew Scoggin. So, Don, maybe as you go to the next slide, um we started to conceptualize this this project as a reimagining uh Washington Street and we've been using um and you know, kind of the idea here we put forward on the project website is, you know, maybe this is really the little Androskagan district and and like it's it's going to have a new identity. it's going to be focused on the river and as well as focused on local uses and not just that drive-through area. So, when we talk about the 3Ds and we talk about a place that people want to be, uh this is a little bit more detail on what we're talking about. And it what we're what we're thinking is redevelopment of underutilized sites. Um there there's a lot of pavement on uh a lot of these sites uh associated with um industrial trucking distribution uses. Um those are great uses and I I know they have a home in Auburn and they they will uh for a long time, but over time uh and as um folks start think about other options for their property in the future, they'll have options that include more than just what's there today. And that's going to include uh places to um live. And you can start to see that happening

around um the the project at the northern split. Um there there's been a lot of development already approved kind of around this area, but um thinking about how to integrate that with with public spaces. Um particularly the trails and that multimodal path. Uh I'll I'll talk more about that in a moment. So uh next please. So this um you know getting even a little more granular. This is uh the existing zoning of u this part of the city today and this is not the official zoning map and and uh but it is um the zoning layers that the city has. And we wanted to kind of put these at this scale showing the study area and and give people a sense of what's happening. So I think the U on the on the right is downtown. That's Court Street you can kind of see and there's the bridge that connects to Lewon. The Androsken River is kind of in the the bottom right. And um New Auburn is uh kind of in the center right of u the image here that's in that uh orange color. Thank you, Don. And you'll you'll notice that uh there's some of that darker red that extends out um Washington Street from downtown. And that where where the the cursor is currently located is where uh a number of new residential units have been um approved. Uh right at the corner of that split. And um from that point all the way out to um exit 75 is undifferentiated um general business and industrial district. And you'll see on both sides of that there's low density suburban

zoning and uh some some neighborhood zoning. But this this whole area and I think in part it it's maybe a reflection of the existing uses has been zoned for um business and industrial use. So when we think about a change in the roadway and what that might mean for land use options going forward, um we we move from those conceptual blobs that that started to come together. And if you go to the next slide, Don, we we came up with with something that kind of fits into the existing zoning scheme of the of the city, utilizes existing zoning districts and kind of blends um Washington Street into the surrounding areas. But Washington Street and especially kind of in that bullseye which is where Rodman Road crosses Washington Street that becomes that downtown core uh that new neighborhood center uh focus on local Washington and Rodman and that node um and the red that goes around it is that twob block area where Don had showed earlier on street parking uh the sidewalk and the multi-use path kind of living together on the edge of the pavement and and those buildings that uh Grace had illustrated that were closer to the street. Um and on either side of that closer to the southern split and the northern split uh the uses taper down and um that connection to uh across the river there's a green swath right in the middle here that is representing some resource protection. Um we have another slide I'll I'll talk about in a moment that has um some vision for that particular piece. But in addition to the Washington Street work, which is really

kind of like this closer term, medium-term use, uh that connection ultimately across would would really make it much easier to envision a a less dense, more residential focused neighborhood on the other side of the Little Androskagan as well as that important connection. Don talked about the bridge, but that would mean a lot uh for the folks in New Auburn and uh the southern parts of the city when it comes to connectivity to points north as well as to exit 75 on the interstate itself. So, um this idea is meant to help inform the comprehensive planning process. um the zoning that will result I think is going to be informed as much by the comprehensive plan uh as this but I I hope our work is uh going to be an important piece in in that discussion going forward. Um next slide please. This uh slide talks about the trail. We we I wanted to have just an image here to quickly discuss the um what that means as far as this connection. Don had talked about a potential Casco Bay trail that would connect in Danville all the way to Portland. Well, this multi-use path would connect with um an existing planned uh trail extension with the existing trail that uh would go into u downtown Auburn. So, the idea here is that there there really is a missing link just like there's a missing neighborhood almost. Uh there's a missing connection here that I think this project can help uh tie together

the city and the um exit 75 area. So, um I think on the next slide and maybe maybe before we leave, uh if we go back please, the other thing on this image is um you'll see on either end all the way on the left is the park and ride lot over by exit 75 and all the way to the right is the transportation center. You'll notice over by the transportation center side there's there's a lot of little dots like this little measles map of bus stops throughout downtown Auburn and Lewon. And the the this is the me u the city bus service. And you will notice that there are zero bus stops anywhere along this Washington uh avenue Washington street connection um all the way out to the park and ride. Um, we in our design work are going to make sure that there's a space for potential bus stops on the local Washington side. As we we talked about options and we talked about mobility. Um, the bus is going to be an important part of that and being able to get a bus down to the park and ride um will help uh with the the existing bus service that goes to Portland and beyond. So, um I I think this is an important not only trail and bike connection, but it's an important transit connection as well. So, the next few slides, uh you saw a preview of these. uh we we can uh kind of get through these and come back to them if people have questions, but we wanted to reinforce um practices, policies, and and actions that the that the city can take uh that the partnerships that can be made in order to help make this happen. So there there's certainly zoning type incentives um and requirements that can take place

around impact fees, uh incentive zoning, and brownfield. These are are ways that a a city like Auburn already is working with uh businesses and developers in other parts of the city. These need to be uh adjusted for this neighborhood as well. And if if you go down uh to the next slide, Don, uh economic development uh activity can also help with this. We talked about some of these things that it's under the same umbrella. Uh the very last slide that I have is talking about financing tools. Um, again, these are things that the city needs to do, but um, the one thing that I want to make sure everyone on this call and including the city folks um, hear is that we know that DOT is a very important partner in this process, uh, the regional transportation planning folks are important partners, but additionally, there's a very strong, uh, conservation ethic in Auburn and and that's that's come through and in and what we've heard around u the committees and the committee work that are taking place around these trails, the school um and and bus advocates are important partners as well. So I think by reaching out and kind of expanding the network of um people that are pulling this, this isn't going to be a DOT project or a public works project. it's it's a city project and um that kind of uh network and mindset can assist with uh making some of these things happen not only from a uh a money and financing standpoint but also from uh policy zoning and community support and community space standpoint. So, uh, these these will be available and we can pull these up again if people have questions u about about the softer side of the project as we go forward.

Thank you, Ben. All right. Um, I've got one more slide to share and then we'll open it up to questions. I'm just going to do this on a Oh, do I still have Yeah, that's yours. All right. Um yeah, this is the last slide screen two. Um see share. If I did it correctly, you should see a slide that has schedule. All right. So we'll recap on prior work um that we've done. So the first public meeting we had was the beginning of April of last year. So we're getting close to um approaching a year since that last meeting. Um what have we done since then? Over the course of last summer, we worked on the traffic analysis, the land use planning that uh Ben has discussed, development of these concepts. We've shared that with our client team through regular check-ins. Um we presented a very similar slideshow to the Auburn City Council in October of last year. Um and then we did a very similar presentation to main DOT partners um in November of last year. So, uh, since then we've made some revisions to the concepts that you see here and some some discussions on recommendations. Um, that took place December last month and then into this month. We're here tonight for our second public meeting. Um, where do we go from here? Obviously, we're we're requesting input and feedback and comments from the public tonight. Um, we'll take that information back. We may be making more revisions to what you've seen here. Um we're looking to kind of finalize our our recommendations, incorporate revisions as needed. Uh we still have to do cost estimates. Um this will not be a cheap project uh from a transportation infrastructure standpoint. Um so we we'll pull some cost estimates together. We'll probably do it in phases or

sections of roadway. So we can kind of break out pieces um if there is a funding limitation as as this project maybe moves forward into an implementation phase. So, uh, we'd like to work on th those items as well as preparing a draft report next month. Um, and then so based on input and feedback, we'd come back with a final report a month later in March. So, in theory, we're looking to wrap up this study in the next few months. Um, and like I said, we're here tonight to present where we are uh with the information and preliminary recommendations and then open it up to questions. So, I think that completes our slideshow. I will stop sharing and uh I'll give the floor back to Eric to see if maybe he has any comments through the the chat room or questions.

Thank you, Don. Uh Don, Ben, and Grace, thank you. Um the um we are open to questions. Um we have one in the Q&A and then I think for uh anybody who wants to do that, if you hover over the screen, um you can click on the Q&A and type in a question. Um or you can uh click on the raise your hand icon and I can let people in to speak um as in the order that they they raise their hand. Uh the first question in the Q&A is uh I love the idea of separating the two types of traffic as you've done. Was there consideration given to having the cycling on the commuter portion rather than the more residential portion? something similar to the greenway between Brunswick and Bath. It would allow a more scenic ride with likely fewer interruptions. Um I know I hadn't thought of that. Um but um happy to hear any thoughts that you may have.

Yeah, Eric, from our from our study team's perspective, I don't think that question or comment came up at all through the the current progress of our study. It's a good comment. Um, I think of Brunswick, um, and Route One in Brunswick. There's a separated facility that runs parallel with the with what I consider kind of more of a limited access interstate system, also parallel with the river there in Thompson, Brunswick. Um, so it's a I think it's a good comment. No, we have not considered it. Our thought behind where we located it was to try to to provide that that pedestrian access to that local street corridor to access the businesses and restaurants and the things that may exist there both now and in the future. So uh we wanted to provide that connection and really a complete streets facility for that local street low speed accommodate all modes of transportation including bikes. Um, now with that said, could there be a separated mobility facility for bikes along the mobility corridor? I'm sure that could be uh something for consideration.

I think you mentioned it, Don, but I think one of the other big differences between this corridor and Brunswick is that the mobility corridor in Brunswick is along the river. And I think they tried to to highlight that um our local street will be backing up to the river in this case. Uh, another Q&A question. Is there concern with the on- street parking in the mobility corridor obstructing pedestrian views as they cross the street? Um, I think the the on street parking is in the the local street corridor as currently proposed. Um and it says I know for example on Court Street visibility of the crosswalks is especially difficult on the street but with the on street parking. Yeah, I think it's a great question. Um there are setback requirements for crosswalks and on street parking. Um so we would look to adhere to those requirements. I also will share that most of those crosswalks we're proposing curb extensions. So we eliminate the parking the parking stalls and we pull the curb lines in. Um so the pedestrian crossing that's at grade with the vehicles is a shorter distance. Um so they should be more visible. Also it'll be elevated crosswalks um at on the local streets. So um I think it's a good question. We would adhere to whatever standards we need to follow when when designing um crosswalks with on street parking.

It's so far there are no raised hands. Um, I know on my screen anyways, if you move your cursor onto the screen, uh, where you can see Don, Ben, Grace, and I, um, it opens up some options at the bottom of the screen. Um, raise hand is one of them, and Q&A is the other. So, give people a minute, I guess, to to sort through that. Grace, Grace, your hand is raised. Sorry, I clicked the button by accident. She was testing it out. Yeah, it works. Uh we have 32 participants. Um Awesome. have for the majority of the meeting.

Hopefully what they've heard they're they're satisfied. if they're not asking questions, hopefully what they they've heard they're satisfied with and and maybe excited about the future might do. I do have one hand hand raised uh uh at Blevens and bringing her in to ask the question.

Hi there. Can you hear me? We can.

Great. Um, thank you for the presentation. Um, I'm Itana. I'm here on like behalf of the Casco Bay Trail Alliance. I'm part of the board and like you guys mentioned, yes, we're still working our way to get to that Danville junction and finding a way to connect towards road. I just had a quick question about where you mentioned the park and ride would be. I I think that's like a very cool place to think about where it would go. I'm so happy to imagine this area being somewhere that you'd want to park and hang out and even enjoy because right now I very rarely even use like the edge of 75 park and ride to take the bus. I'd rather take the bus like from near Bates College. Um were there any other considerations like to where the put this park and ride though? I just wanted to hear like other ideas where that could have been

as it relates to the to the shared use pathway. Our objective was to provide um a separated bike facility or shared use pathway facility within our study limits. So uh we started kind of at allied in the park and ride and uh we we had some discussion should this pathway be on the east side or the west side of the corridor? parking rides on the west side, but the east side um the east side provides more of a direct connection to Danville Junction in the future. Um so there were some city officials that were pretty pretty vocal that we should put this pathway on the the east side to provide for easier connection there. As we get to the northern end, we also have that that Taylor Brook trail that the city is working on that initiative and as Bennett said that goes right into the city. Um, so that also would be on the east side. So, um, so those are some of the thoughts we put into it. I originally thought the park and ride would be a good good terminal point for a shared juice pathway, not understanding that, you know, the Casco Bay Trail may be coming in the future. So, um, the cast the the park and ride lot was more of an afterthought that we said, "Okay, we feel it's best suited to put the trail on the east side, but we saw this opportunity with the park and ride lot and we said there could be people that will travel there, park their vehicle, and try to access the trails from that location. So, we made sure we provided a trail network to get to the the trail on the east side." I don't know if that answers your question or not.

Yeah, that answers it. I I was thinking like, oh, what a great coincidence, but I wanted to make sure it's not a coincidence. You guys are thinking of that. So, thank you. Very thoughtful. Um, and I love the presentation. Thank you. Excellent. Thank you.

Sorry, I was muted. We do have a few more questions coming in on the question and answer. Um, will there be any relocation of any businesses or residents? Um I think that there there is the possibility of that over time. Um the um industrial uses along the corridor um have some challenges with the you know how they how people view the city coming in. Um they're older long-standing uses. Um that is a possibility. I think we would work with property owners on over a fairly long period of time um probably you know more than a generation um to address that but that's that is a possibility um and has there been feedback from current business owners andor residents along the corridor on this version of the study? Um I can answer that Don. I know we have reached out to a number of the businesses along the corridor and had conversations um especially those that um have potential impacts from transportation changes. Um but we would love to talk to any other business owners if we've missed anybody um and continue those conversations over time. I think there's an opportunity for all of the business owners and residents um along that corridor to see improved access, safer access, and potentially more property value over time um with with some of these proposed changes. Uh the next one is would sewer and water extension on Broad Street be a federal funded project or accomplished via TIFFs? Um and we have requested a um congressional delegated spending project that would

extend water and sewer in South Auburn. Um it's still to be determined what that would look like on Broad Street versus South Main Street um and Vicory Road. Um I think there is high likelihood um even if we get that funding um that we can't extend it as long as far as um maybe we would like to initially. I think this is a long-term project. Um but I think there could be some combination of federal uh or state funding as well as uh tax increment financing uh to achieve that o over time. Um the tax increment financing really depends on people investing in that corridor to create the revenues. Um they don't exist unless people invest and create uh new taxable revenue that could be used for further extensions. But that's a that's a long-term conversation that we'll have to have with the city council uh over time. And the last one from Elaine is great info. Thank you. And it looks like there are a couple more now. Uh Sharon asking, "How are you going to attract business if you're looking to get there with with the existing businesses here presently, salvage yards, truck companies, warehouses, trailer parks? Um I think that this gateway and we've heard this a lot whether it's in the comprehensive planning process, this uh public engagement process, um prior comprehensive plans, we've heard this for a long time that it's the corridor is not attractive in its current condition. And I think it's trying to meet high-speed transportation needs at the same time that it's trying to meet um school buses picking up kids at residences or trash trucks. uh uh solid waste pickup along the side of the road

with people going 50 plus miles an hour and a lot of cases over 60 m an hour. Um I think we're we're really trying to address that as part of this study with uh some of the land use changes, but that is a big challenge. It's not it's not our best foot foot forward as far as a corridor when you get off exit 75 and travel into Auburn. it's not uh the best image that we present as our gateway.

Can I add a comment to that, Eric? I think um part of the study is being providing for that future infrastructure that would draw those businesses. So, providing the sidewalk, providing the street parking, providing the better roadway that's going to allow businesses like that to start to fill in. without that infrastructure, it makes it harder for those businesses you're looking to attract to fill in these spaces. So, it's it's definitely a long-term process, but it's starting to put the pieces together to allow for that development to happen.

Thank you for that. And I think that's that is the goal is to create an environment where um property values are increased and there can be a transition to other uses that are more conducive to a walkable local street. And then we have two more now. Um one more Q&A. My concerns resolve around the business side that this affects since you are going through a business property to extend Rodman. Also, the city has a hard time keeping the existing sidewalks clear. So, I feel that this would just add to that problem. Um, it's a good good comment. We are challenged to keep up with um sidewalk maintenance and we will have to work with a number of property owners to kind of phase this over a long period of time. Um, but we'll continue to connect with those with those property owners. And part of the goal of this is to really create new taxable value that can share the costs of better maintenance along the corridors that are higher density and higher value that um can really help support that without impacting the existing taxpayer. Um, I don't know if anybody else has anything to to add to that. That's good. Ben,

I I was just gonna mention that, you know, as some of these uses change, it it can be hard to envision, you know, three or 4 hundred feet of sidewalk in front of a a big empty parking area right now. Um, but I think it's a lot easier to imagine a couple hundred feet of sidewalk in front of, you know, 50 or 60 apartment buildings, uh, units in an apartment building. and and that's the kind of thing that we're we're envisioning in at least in that core area, maybe not throughout the entire uh study area, but um an earlier point too is you know it right now Washington Street US 202 and it's it's really focused on moving traffic and through the area and it there's always been this tension I believe since um it became this kind of divided roadway like how how do accommodate the people who live here and work here. And uh you know over time people got used to this condition of you know cutting through and it's very much like an interstate like Don said. So, um I I think the the premise here underlying the the recommendations that you've seen is like having one side of this road continue to serve that mobility function and and being able to safely uh move people efficiently, quickly between the interstate and and downtown and kind of getting that old Washington Street back, kind of reclaiming that um for the community. And it, you know, over time, and maybe Eric's right to to think about this as, you know, you know, what is the next generation going to look like and not, you know, the next couple city budgets. Um, I think there's there's a lot of um there's a lot of opportunity in this place and I I think this plan provides the vision for it. But I also final thought is, you know, as we phase this,

there are some things that that could be happening in kind of the shorter medium term that would would make some real improvements in in that kind of time frame, too. Thank you. We have one more uh hand raised from Emily. I'm going to bring her in. Hi, can you hear me? We can.

Awesome. Um, hi, I'm Emily Pasquitz. I'm the Northern New England manager with the East Coast Greenway Alliance. So, the Casco Bay Trails route is part of our route through the state of Maine. Um, you know, so my role is to look at sort of uh regional and multi-state trail connections in Maine, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. But I'm based in Brunswick, so this is, you know, close enough that it's kind of exciting to see all of this coming together. So, first of all, just wanted to thank and, you know, congratulate the entire study team. This is a really amazing visioning plan um with a surprising amount of detail given like the size of the study area you're looking at which is really great to see and I think it's the kind of like comprehensive vision that this area deserves. Um so lots to dig into here but just two things I'll mention for now. Um kind of piggybacking off of what it was mentioning about like where the shared use path and bike and pedestrian facilities end. Um I think the park and ride is a super logical place um given you know the scope and what the study area is looking at. Um I was wondering if there was any consideration given to you know given that like there was some looking at kind of like what could be done with vehicular traffic around Allied Road like on that one slide. um like even if it's sort of maybe onroad connections along Station Road or Danville Corner Road, just something that looks at how you know that those bike and ped facilities may eventually connect um south towards where um the you know proposed Casco Bay Trail on rail line would end. Um, so curious about that and just, you know, mentioning that that would be nice to see somewhere in this plan. Um, and then just the other thing I wanted to ask about, I know that 10 ft was sort of the proposed width for most of the uh shared

juice pass that I noticed. Um, you know, that's obviously a great starting point, but I know more and more um communities are moving towards like more of an 11 to 12t standard, particularly given how popular these facilities tend to get once they are in place and starting to get used and you know how you can eventually end up with conflicts between cyclists and pedestrian non-cyclist users. Um, so just wanted to ask about those two things and see if they had been considered.

Yeah, I'll jump in. Great questions, Emily. Um, so I'll I'll share with you on the pathway width. Yes, ideally it's 12 feet. Um, we in our design experiences, we typically have limited rightaway space. Um, and so we would reduce that down to 10 feet. We feel 10 feet is our minimum acceptable width for a shared juice pathway. I know in constrained areas we can go to 8 feet, but um, so we've just been proposing 12. I think if we have the rightway space for it, I would agree with you. We've just been proposing 10 feet, but I agree with you. If we have rightaway space available, 12 feet would probably be a better solution. Um, so we can take a look at that. I think on the local street corridor, um, we might have limitations on rightway space. Um, and we actually in the urban section, we transitioned to actually se separate cycle lanes, um, parallel with the the sidewalks in that area. So, but we I think we're right up to uh the rightaway width uh in that zone, but on the outer on the periphery, we could certainly take a look at is there opportunities to have a wider path through there? Um and then to answer the question from the park and ride, I guess down to Kittyhawk, did we consider some form of of bicycle accommodations? And and the answer is is no, we didn't. Um uh should we have possibly um but our study limits were really starting at Allied. So we we focused on Allied North because we were making improvements or revisions to the entrance at Allied Road. We we were obligated to to extend our limits south for that connection of of Allied with full access, but we haven't considered uh bike improvements. That exit 75 intersections is going to be pretty gnarly um for bike traffic unless it's a separated facility. So, um, we have noted on our plans that the intent for our our pathway where it terminates at Allied Road would be a future connection

to Danville Junction separate from this study is kind of how we've indicated it. Um, but if there's an interim situation that may occur, maybe they can use the Allied road um for bike accommodations, get them off the route uh 202 section to get them down to Station Road maybe as a possibility. Um, but I think that would require input from the city and and others as to what that might be. So hopefully Casco Bay Trail happens first. Um, we didn't really talk about a schedule for implementation. I mean, this is this is a pretty grand planning study. Um, it's going to be quite expensive to for implementation. So, we would finish the the report um and document costs associated with this work. And then the next phases are, you know, is there is it supported locally by the public? Uh is it supported locally by the city officials? Is it supported by DOT? If we can get yes, yes, and yes on those three items, then you know, then the city and the DOT can partner to try to leverage maybe federal funds um via a raise grant or some other form um to pay for a portion or all of uh the recommendations of this study. um timing of that um is you know minimum three to five years um to to get something to the point where it's being designed for construction implementation. So that's that would be on an early schedule I think um on a project of this size it could it could be a longer duration before you see implementation. So I say that because Casco Bay trails may be implemented and built first uh before uh some of the recommendations of this study are are actually implemented. So, um, and you may find that knowing that those two are moving forward in design that that there's funding maybe at a state or local level to fund that that connecting piece, that missing piece that we'll have.

Yeah, absolutely. Um, and totally understand that both with sort of the timeline that this sort of study is looking at and the scope. Um, and yeah, that's that's good to hear. And I think even with the scope of this study, like you know, a crossing somewhere to access south or something that acknowledges that like this may be something that needs to be examined in the future would be plenty. So yeah, thank you for all your hard work. Um, great job everyone. Yep. And we'll we'll note this conversation in the report when we put it together, this discussion.

We have a couple more on the Q&A. Um, where are you going to find space on the northern end of Washington Street where houses are 15 or 20 ft from the road? Now, um, I know it does narrow up as we get towards the Rotary. Um, I don't think we're proposing any expansion of that right away in that area. Correct.

Yeah. The goal the goal is to try to fit uh this roadway footprint uh within the available rightway that we have through there. So when we're when we develop costs for this uh for this project, one aspect we'll look at as well is rightaway costs. Um so it won't be just construction costs, there'll be engineering costs, there'll be rightaway costs and inspection costs that we'll put together for this for this report. Um when we do the rightway costs, we'll take a harder look at where areas where um it may be tight, where we feel houses are closer to the road. We would document that in our rightway assessment. Um but uh our goal our goal is to minimize uh rightaway impacts if at all possible. Uh that comment from one of the the uh audience members earlier was okay our our Rodman Road connector to Broad Street does run across private property and and yes it does. And that would be a property impact that um or impacts that we would work with the city um to work with those property owners with on on how those impacts affect them and what the next steps might be. The next uh question is from an anonymous attendee. Um how much has this study cost the city? Um I don't have the exact numbers right in front of me. Uh we did put in through a competitive process through Andrewan transportation resource center um to access federal planning funds. Um so a majority of the study the transportation piece um is paid for through those um those funds through our municipal planning organization and then we also added on um some additional work um especially with Northstar for uh the land use planning piece but we can we can get those numbers u onto the website. Couple more coming in. Um,

I'm alarmed to hear of the consideration of a connector with Danville Corner Road to Allied. Uh, very unwise, narrow road, too much traffic already. Uh, as well as 65 new housing units going in. Bad idea. Um, I know Don, you mentioned that was a third option, not the preferred one. I don't know what else you'd like to to add to that. It won't be part of the final recommendations. So we wanted to show showcase what options do we have in play. Um it option one or two will be our preferred option. Probably option one um that provides a direct connection right opposite exit 75.

Um Brad uh chimed in u the transportation piece of this zero cost uh directly to the city through ATRC. And like I mentioned, we had a little bit of an add-on for uh the land use planning piece. Um but that'll help inform the comp plan as well. Uh Ron Lavasser uh on Brickyard Circle, that new housing complex being put in with the traffic uh to come out on Rodman Road and roads also come out out onto Bennett A leading out to Poland Road. Um, we do have a new housing complex uh going in off of Brickyard Circle. Um, it's 96 housing units. Um, there are some traffic improvements associated with that development to allow for left turns uh into it. Um it will put some additional traffic, but I think the 96 units of housing compared to the um the base sort of traffic flows along Washington Street are relatively small. Uh and please post the website we're referring to. Um, if you go to the city of Auburn website, auburn.gov, and search uh Washington Street, you should be able to find it. And I think the actual web address, I believe, is Little Andro Gateway. Um, I don't know, Ben or Don, if you recall.

Ben's gonna look it up for us. I only have one screen right now where I am, so it's hard for me to look something else up. Well, we're looking

I was I was trying to post it in the chat. Uh it's it's littleandrogateway.com is is the project team website for this and and there are links to that from the city website. littleandrogateway.com. Thank you, Ben. As of right now, we don't have any remaining questions um either as hands raised or uh Q&As's. Well, thank you. I appreciate the work of the study team and I this is a it's a major project but it's also a transformational project I think that could take a long time but it could reclaim Washington Street North as a place for people um that it hasn't been uh for quite a while and I'll just mention that uh Washington Street South um when it was built um was intended to have two-way traffic within the rightway that they acquired um but they never they ever built it. And that was in the I think the late 50s um when that when that was built.

So if nothing else for Q&A or raised hands, I think we're we're wrapping up. Yeah. Thank you everyone for attending. Thank you. Have a good night.