Public Infrastructure Committee - Regular Meeting

Yeah. So this is for the Jeff Fogel had requested removing or moving a stop sign at 14th in New York, which is an alleyway. And after looking at it and a lot of other alleys, We have an ordinance that says alley ordinance. And when I look at that, open it up, there was only one in there. And it's all over the place.

Like up in this area, I think some of the alleys on New York had stop signs, but nothing on Michigan. And I didn't look all at of them, but they're all over the place. And so I kind of googled just about alley stopping and learned that we're supposed to stop drivers exiting an alley driveway or private road must come to a complete stop before entering a street or crossing a sidewalk. So after looking at that, that's kind of just rules of the road where I don't know that we'd have to have a stop sign there at all. I'm guessing that there were complaints in the past and somebody said, yeah, put one up.

They went up and there's no ordinance. So, so I don't know. It's either that or you would move em but the problem there is with the embankment and what they want to do. I'm not sure you would see it. You'd have to put up two of them. You'd have to put one on the post on the utility pole on the left side and move the other one out maybe into the right away, but it would be offset from where it is now. So it's I don't know. I guess my recommendation would be after reading that that that's kinda just the rules of the road and many of them don't have them that they would just take it down actually.

So So is there no objection to removing the sign?

No, they were asking it to either be

From staff.

No, yeah, I think I'm okay with it.

I think one of the reasons we are saying maybe pull it as if we were to move it maybe into

the right of way off to

the side. Based on what your plan is, if there was a larger pickup truck or something parked there, you wouldn't be able to see it. It would be obstructed.

Car stopping there?

Not that I know of offhand. Guess I didn't check any accident data on it. But otherwise, I guess recommend probably moving it and also putting one on the poll as well and just have two of them there I guess.

Have no problem with pulling it down.

Certainly I guess that's kind of what I'm recommending is just not have it.

You actually need a motion since the ordinance doesn't say that it should be there?

I think we would like direction. Well,

make a motion to remove the

sign. Second.

Motion by Alder Sitkowitz, second by Alder Bray for removal. Next agenda. There's no discussion on the motion. Sorry. That was a second. Discussion? And all in favor? Aye. That passes unanimous. Next agenda is 20 six-four zero five. Request the to So

guess I know if Eric wants to speak on it. Think he's familiar with the neighborhood. Does that same area where we did the ditch project back in 2023. And I guess we thought we had that solved with getting all the culverts crossing the roads and through driveways to the right elevation. And I guess I kind of thought we were done with it.

And now, you know, this property owner, had already put some rock around the, existing end wall that's by his property, which I don't think is causing a problem. And now he's asking to put similar type rock for pretty much in front of his whole frontage and maybe some flat rock right before the neighbor's culvert. And if it's done right at the right grade, it it probably works. You know, he's having trouble maintaining that area that's wet sinking in when you're trying to cut, which unfortunately, that's kind of a problem with the rural areas. I have the same thing.

Budding Rapids Road, where there's a ditch and it's wet at times. And so I guess the reason I'm bringing it here was because we already did that project three years ago. And I kind of thought, hey, we're done. That's it. Because I guess I get concerned, like, could potentially block water future? Could there be weed growth? He moves out and somebody else moves in, do they say, well, I don't want that rock there. City should take it, you know, take it out. So I guess I kinda was wanting the committee to, you know, weigh in on it, I guess, or support doing it or not doing it, I guess.

Alder Sudkirk?

Yeah. I know

it's a question. You

want to come on up and state your name and your address for the record please. Yep, by the mic. By the microphone please.

My name is Steve Andegrift and I live at 116 Cary Lane bordered by Harvest Circle. And I know it's been since '23, but there's so much that's happened in there. They put plastic with grass seed in it and that washed away. In the fall it was fine. In the spring it just I have a picture of it, it just washed away.

And then I took all kinds of grass seed and put it in there hoping it would start. And some started one year and then in the spring it all just disappeared. And on top of those cement culverts, there's only about this much ground down there that you'd have to make even with surrounding and grass won't grow on that. I think I had grass growing and it just disappeared. The neighbor had the same problem.

Anyway, we have that culvert coming from the north side where most of the water comes. And then we got another cement culvert going from the east side. So we had a double whammy. And then we don't have much grade as far as pitch, which is a problem because we have standing water. We had standing water today. And trying to mow that grass in there a little bit, most of it's weeds, it's pretty hard to do because it comes down so steep. And you can't turn around. You have to back out. And if you're in mud, then you're backing it out. And I'm 76.

And that's too much for me to do that. Almost 4,000 weeks old. So anyway, I was asking if I could put rock in there. And then like I did on top, because I to get a little bit

Thank you. Greg, yeah, you're right. You're very

familiar of with this. We talked about that ditching three years ago. It's just a unique area with how the water runs. When we look at it, wouldn't think the water runs the way it does back and then across under the harvest circle there and then down, which I think actually runs into your property and then down out to the county. But there's hardly any pitch. You're right. The water sits there. Then you're I don't think if they ever really dry out.

There's some pumps in there because there's no other place. You can't have a storm sewer.

Right. Yeah, there's no storm sewer. That's what everything is ditched out there. When I first saw this request, I thought it's unique because we don't typically one, we don't have a lot of ditches, so it's unique. But two, we usually don't have people place things in the ditch for that reason.

And I thought back to a request we had a while ago about a new street that they wanted paved or actually black topped. And we didn't count that towards the paving that if they ever wanted it paved, they would pay the assessment towards the paving because the blacktop wouldn't count as that paving. And I thought, well, if they were going to put the rock in, they would be responsible if it ever had to get reditched for the rock removal. If we were able to somehow incorporate that into any ability to have them allowed to put the rock in, that they would be responsible for the removal of the rock if we ever had to go back in and there was sediment buildup or anything that required reditching, that they would be responsible for that And that way, I mean, it's unique. We don't have many ditches, but it kind of solves their problem.

Mean, you take a look at how often that was been reditched, it probably was once? Yeah, there's

a little time in what we just did. Especially

since it's at the end of the line of the ditch versus in the middle of the line of the ditches, right?

Say that again, I'm sorry.

He's at the end of where the water flows. It's not like he's at the middle of where the water would collect. He's at the essentially I mean it's not a pipe at the end of the pipeline.

On the other side of the road there's 40 Five-fourteen and 40 Five-sixteen. And that's Troy and Carrie and Amanda. And that water flows from on top, comes down, then it goes east, and then it comes across to me. Yep. The other one comes across from the east. So I got a double whammy there.

Yep. I know them both and I hear about the water from them too.

Oh, okay.

Yeah. No doubt you're getting virtually all the water from that area.

Comes up behind them and flows down.

And I guess I understand the request and the difficulty and stuff and at least he's not asking to pipe it. And I think really be adamant because he just can't have that's why it's a rural section is you don't have that availability of storm sewer and curb and gutter. That piping, it would be very bad. At least this is a lesser invasive or it keeps the ditch grade there. As long as it's done matching the grade, it'll be done right. And it was more just about precedent setting. I'll somebody else come in and wanna do the same thing. Is that okay? You know, if everybody start to I mean, I don't think everybody wants to pay a bundle of money. You know, like like he's willing to do.

You know, he's not asking us to put it in. He just wants permission to do it and pay for it himself. So I guess

I don't know when I'd get it done, but it would be expensive. I'd do it eventually.

Yes. Just one comment that like you had just talked about, this is kind of the low point. So you've got water coming from other places. When if you're allowed to put that rock in there, have to ensure that you're not just going go put it on top of here. You're going have to put the top of the rock at the same elevation, which means it might have to be dug in. Otherwise, you're going to be backing that water up or It's causing the bottom

not going be that high. I didn't plan on putting it high because rock is expensive just above that.

Right. But because it's so flat, you don't have the pitch like you had mentioned. So any little bit that's sticking up is going to cause problems for the people upstream of you. So you got to make sure that you get that I same flow

have enough pitch. I mean, it's not much pitch, but it wouldn't affect that because it's a long way. It's not like you're doing a short section. You're doing a long section.

I guess that would be the caveat that it doesn't cause any issues to the pitch and that he would be responsible to replace or repair if it does and then any reditching that would need to be done.

It's actually illegal to cause water to back up. Right. Correct. We wouldn't

do that. And those are just the safeguards that we would have to protect ourselves from.

I got weed problems in there. I'm trying to use something that's not glyphosate, something that's organic. Because I'm concerned about the water too and the animals that drink it. Yeah, that's all I want to do. I know if something happened, I'd have to call a landscaper. And like you said, I'd have to take that rock out of there. That'd be expensive too.

Probably more expensive than putting it in.

So, yes.

Yes, I would think that you're going to have to probably maybe take off the top three inches of that top soil, right? I don't know if you did that on another spot or No, that I never kind of just

thought of that, yes.

You know what I mean? So that, yes, probably. That could Otherwise, you just set it on top of what's there, right? Then that's going You could landscape jam it

it we could take a little of that, shave a little of that Yeah.

Think you'd have to and then set it in there. So I think if that's done right, I think it works. It's just kind of like I say, just worried about setting our precedence. But don't if anybody else wants to spend the money to do that. But other people in that neighborhood or on the North Leg have buried pipe, some with permits, some without. So that's kind of unique and all over the place up there. And that's kind of why I wanted to bring it here, I guess, just to be aware of that situation.

As long as I know that if I take a layer off that it's okay and make the right grade on it. I'll do that. So

if we were to grant approval, how would you see approval going? Just if we would make a motion to approve the request with the understanding from the public works department on acceptance of the plan or like you'd have to have some sign off on giving him permission to do it with his site plan I guess or some type of.

Yeah I mean technically it's kind of be like a rollaway permit like almost like an excavation permit or right away use permit or something. But, you know, we could potentially assist too with, like, you know, a surveyor, maybe shoot some grades too or try to help just to make sure we get it right. You know, wanna do that. It helped to make sure that we're keeping drainage, positive drainage.

So I guess maybe the motion for you to make it would be to work with the engineering department to ensure the correct grades are maintained. Think they've done some things like that in the past.

Well, I'll make a motion to approve the request per the guidance of the public works department to ensure proper drainage.

So before I do this, if I have a contractor who's a northbound, landscaping, I call up the, public works department and tell them what's going on so that they can watch what's going on. Or you do it, I don't know.

This passes, Daniel and Greg will get in contact with you on on how to work out the details of

the project. Okay.

So, this based on approval of Dan and Greg and they have the proper drainage then based on those caveats we would approve that.

That's my motion.

Alright. Second.

Second.

Alright. Second by honorable.

Alright. Thank you.

Moving on to the next one. All in favor. Aye. Thank you. Now moving on to item board.

Case. And

policy for regulating intersections. That's

the what it looks like to me.

Yeah. So this is related to I think it was all the Reckleburg had wanted public safety or create kind of an ad hoc committee to study all the intersections, but a lot of the intersections in the city. And particularly, we had the area of rash accidents in that area of, like, 12th And Columbus, I think it was. So we focused a lot on that area and then also a couple of North Side areas, Wisconsin and then 6th or 5th, 6th, 7th Street coming north south from, like, Huron all the way to downtown. And so we've come up with a recommendation on stop signs that we're gonna recommend to public safety.

But then there was also the a policy for regulating those intersections, was I think Reckleberg had did some of it, and then her city attorney, Eric, had worked on getting a lot of that in order too. So, what's before you as I guess stuff we've looked at and thought look good?

Yes. So, like Greg was saying, this is if you recall the discussions before and how many times we've had requests come in controlled versus uncontrolled intersections. So the ad hoc committee, which consisted of the mayor, Elder Reckberg, started off as Chief Primer, ended up as Chief Musil, Greg, myself, Billy and City Attorney, Eric. Basically, what we're looking to get is a consistent method for determining if science would go in or not. So what you've got attached is that policy. There's a there'll be

a

form similar to the one we had before, but this is more of an improved version. So a citizen making the request would complete the form. It would come to us. We would look at it for the guidelines on here, which include population density, land use, length of continued uncontrolled travel, presence of schools, parks or sensitive uses, traffic volumes, crash history, speed limits, maintenance operation consideration, street width cross section, site visibility, pedestrian and bicycle activity and to a lesser extent cost, where like maybe there'll be a project going on much like the downtown beautification thing where we could throw it in with that. But any rate, so we would determine it by all those, and then we would give the person making the request, we would either grant or deny.

If we were to deny it and they didn't agree with it, there would still be the opportunity for them to appeal it to the Public Safety Committee. So our recommendation would be to adopt the policy. And then as a result of adopting the policy that would cause what Greg was talking about, the maps that would cause us to make those changes. So if you were to adopt this, it passes counsel, we would make these changes over the course of the summer. We would want to definitely make sure that all these were done because they're new before the roads get slippery, So people get used to them.

It seems obvious, but and then for some of you newer people, when we put up a new sign, we'll put up like orange flags on it to draw attention to them as well. Yes, so that in a nutshell.

Pretty straightforward. You're looking for approval for the new policy which would in turn we see what it would affect on those maps.

Correct. Yep. 100%.

Don't have any questions. Alder Sushkwitz.

Thank you. A couple of questions.

When

this comes somebody fills out the form. Let's say it passes and everything is good. When they fill out the form, how many people review the form to make a decision on if it's going forward or back or approved or not approved?

So it would come back to that ad hoc committee. And then we would review it kind of for the look through all of these basically, it would be Greg and I doing the bulk And of then we would come to a recommendation for that committee. And then much like the way the special events committee worked before, we would have a vote on it. And then the tally of the vote would go to the person making the request. Does that make sense?

Yes. Okay.

Just so there's some checks and We've got different people looking at it. We're looking at it from the engineering standpoint. The police chief is looking at it from the public safety standpoint. Of course, we've got an elder and the mayor on there for any political ramifications.

So that's going to be kind of like its version of COG for signs?

Kind of. Yeah. But I mean, we'll be able like like I said, Greg and I will put together a memo, a recommendation, and then we'll email it around. So the bulk of it will be done via email unless there's, like, a really sensitive area or something we get we could call it together On to meet in

the third page of the policy, under in general stop sign installation may be recommended if the following warrants are met. How do you determine if a

Here's what I found.

Oh, hate what I

do. How

would you determine if an accident would have been avoided by the installation of an all way stop or an installation of a two way stop?

Quickly I guess like when you look at accidents like let's say it's maybe just trying to think like a rear ender, I mean, might be caused by having a stop sign, I guess, Or like, right, somebody skidded on ice maybe trying to slow down for an intersection. So it's like I guess, typically, if you're seeing a lot of the T bone type crashes, I would think that would be an indicator. But if you have something else like somebody sideswiped the car as they came through or so, I don't know. I guess it's

That's what I didn't understand is how do you determine if it would have been avoided by a two way stop or a four way stop?

There's data that comes along with the crash reports and say kind of how it happened. But then there's also guidelines through the MUTCD where you look at traffic counts and things like that. And a lot of honestly is kind of a

Flip the coin.

Familiarity and a little bit of a gut feeling. SWAG, we call it in the industry. You know what that stands for? Scientific wild guess? Yeah. But it is based on data. Okay. Yeah.

Did anybody look at how many accidents happened at controlled intersections?

We on some of them we pulled and we looked at the data. But I mean we had the police chief the former chief and the current police chief. So they were very familiar with a lot of the problem areas.

Okay. I'm just not a fan of adding stop signs. You can

tell. Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah. We tried to at one point, think we had well, that's what when it first started, I thought maybe we wanted to do like every intersection, which would be crazy. You get to some of the lesser travel, let's say, subdivisions and there's just no need to have that. And at one point, we had some of this area with more of them too and we backed off. And as you

know, data shows that if you put up a sign where it's not warranted, it could actually cause accidents. Right.

Well, it's interesting. The first agenda item, we took down a stop sign because the rules of the road say you have to stop. And the rules of the road also say that you have to yield to your right. But that one, we ignore. So that's just my $02 It seems overly subjective to me that if we have different people in the committee over time with the same request, you'll get different answers.

And I just have a hard time being able to defend the policy when I see that versus some black and white criteria for that, especially when it was hard for me to define how a two way stop or a four way stop can reduce how you can determine if it would be reduced by a two way stop or a four way stop or that aspect of it. We'll let public safety have their crack at it.

Yeah. As far as two versus four way, a lot of that is spelled out by traffic counts in the MUTCD. MUTCD is ual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, which is a federal highway administration document. That's basically the bible for how you put signs up or why you put signs up.

Yeah. Well,

the only way an accident doesn't happen is by actually stopping or being attentive. The stop sign doesn't make you stop. Thank you.

I guess, yeah, like with the four way stop, typically the recommendations in the MUTCD are having similar And just know like sometimes with the accident, like let's say there's deer crashes, they don't count those. I mean, occasionally, I don't know that that applies to intersection exactly. But I mean, there are certain ones that could potentially be pulled out and then they say, okay. That's why I say the T bones are usually the ones that, okay, if there was a two way stop, it likely would have. But you're right.

I mean, that's no different than signalized intersections. There's still a ton of accidents at signalized intersections too. So it's like, yeah, they don't prevent everything. We tried to limit it. We're looking at, for example, the one that we're recommending, 14th Of Wisconsin, there's a house that's like almost right to the back of sidewalk there. So definitely

Signalized intersections are more for traffic flow than actually stop and go.

And that's what all of those are for is to sign who has the right of way. Yeah. Yep. What it's doing, I guess.

Okay. I'm good.

So currently what are we using to determine where stop signs get put up? Do we have a policy? Are we looking to make this implement this as a brand new policy? Do we have something currently in place that we use when there's a request come in?

I thought we had something, but I don't know whether or not we were following it because it kind of comes in with that knee jerk. There's a couple accidents at the one intersection and what spoke is blowing up and like, oh, you got to do something. The policy currently is like can be public safety committee or whatever, say, well, we should put it up there because, yes, there's been accidents. So there must be a problem. We got to put it up.

But we try to look at stuff and, over the years, typically have been pretty good at just not putting them up everywhere just because somebody requests one. So, trying to follow policy, trying to follow the manual and guidance on some of those. But yes, it's kind of been sometimes they get put up because of someone that's requesting them, I guess, and that they get approved. So hopefully, that's what we're trying to hopefully limit or hopefully make that issue less hopefully and have some better standards hopefully.

I think the impetus for this was whenever somebody requested there was never an actual document that we could point them in the direction to look to see if it actually met requirements that they should proceed with it.

Sort of fill

Are you looking for approval for this us to go to counsel? Or has this been to the Public Safety Committee? Or do you want it referred there?

I think refer it there. I think that's what attorney Eric Nitsch had said was that wanted to bring it to as many of the committees, I guess, we could to make you guys aware of it. And that yeah I think the goal was to bring it here first and then you guys I guess refer it I guess recommend I guess moving forward with it and referring it to public safety.

And you mentioned if this is approved then all the signs on the maps will go in as a result of that. Is that correct?

Correct. Yeah. I guess

the changes that are reflected in there some of them are removed some of them.

The changes.

So if you look at the legend, it has. What I'm just looking for now. We've got it on the I was just saying.

Did we not remove or

maybe that was an earlier version. What was that? It has been revised several times. It removed existing. Nothing is showing to be removed, is it? Yes. It must have a carrier because, like

I said, there's been several versions. It was removed. But actually, I thought Eric was saying we wanted

He's just going keep repeating it to somebody else. I

thought what Attorney Nitsch was saying we wanted to get these approved first and then the policy would Or is it the other way?

The policy is approved first and that would cause these to happen.

Do we to do alignment stuff besides or not? Yeah.

There would have to be public safety. I kind of already drafted those for them or kind of told them what the language would be assuming it's approved, which isn't too bad.

So the one that gets before other committees, do we need to make a motion to send it over to public safety?

So move. Second.

Motion by Alder Bray, second by Alder I forget the name. Benzinger.

Just for clarification on the motion, it's just to refer. It's not to Yeah, we're not taking any No action on it.

No action on it. We're just sending it Perfect. For another committee. Okay. Yeah. And we don't need to make a vote on this either since we're not making a motion on that.

It is a motion

to approve. So, yeah. Alright. All in favor. Aye.

Aye.

Alright. We'll send that over to public safety. And next on our agenda is twenty six zero four one

we're get the to we're that next to at it or think about it. But, I guess the I'm thinking that the reason is that whoever whoever adopted the highway, so Rapids Road from, I think, Calumet to Waldo. I don't know if the county has stopped picking up, like, say, when they go and collect garbage. I don't if the county is not picking that up anymore because we have the jurisdiction now. And so I guess, you know, was asking us what we plan to do with that, and it's kinda like from what I looked at, the Adopt A Highway program is mostly state and then counties.

Usually, the counties kinda run it. I don't know if there could be some cities. Was trying to look, but I don't know if there's a ton of cities because I guess that in city, the if we were gonna do that, where would we I don't think you'd be having somebody adopt, like, 8th And 10th Street or 18th or you know? It would be more maybe of Ivan, Hector, maybe Maritime Memorial or something. But, you know, so in lieu of that, I don't know.

I think the only one that's come to light so far as I wrap is Road 1. And if they wanna continue with that, maybe we would just have some kind of agreement with them, perhaps, some kind of memorandum of understanding or agreement as to continuing. But then we'll because my understanding is that the county or whoever, you know, running it would supply, like, the safety equipment and the bags, and then the city would pick up that garbage that they collect from the side of the road. And so I don't know. I guess we're just wondering, yeah, how we wanted to proceed with that. So it's

Yeah. I mean, we've done agreements like that with different volunteer groups. Like, you might remember the Lakeside Boulevard group that So we think that might work better than Adaptive Highway program. Yes.

I'm not sure that we want to start an entire program for the city, I don't think. I mean, unless you guys feel different, I'm just not sure what streets you would say, Hey, let's clean these, I guess. Because all the ones are curb and gutter. All of our streets were really sweeping. Street sweeping weekly typically. So

it sounded like they already had individuals assigned to the section of the road

in Prior to jurisdictional transfer.

Oh, so they don't currently? Sounds like a phone call would maybe change that. And they do it twice a year? Up to I or three times a don't know why we wouldn't have them just continue it and us pick up the garbage. Mean, one, takes care of the issue and it's only an inconvenience for us. Maybe not even an inconvenience isn't the right word, but it's a thing that we'd have to do three times up to three times a year. I'd make a motion to work with the county on a MOU to continually that.

I think we're

to to

to continue. So, it wouldn't be with the county. It would be with the group themselves. Kinda like the Lakeshore Boulevard.

Why not just have the county do it?

Because it I don't

I think. Well, just because it's well, yeah, I suppose because it's no longer their highway. Suppose they feel like they shouldn't be picking up the garbage, I suppose. I guess, I don't know.

I guess we could I mean, if they would be willing for us to work it through them, that'd be fine.

I mean, I think that'd be best. We could ask them.

Yeah. Yeah. We could talk to them some more, I guess. Let's see.

If not, I mean, one, that would be my ideal situation. But two, if not, the motion or work through a private group to set up a similar situation. That'd be my motion. Good luck, Sonia.

You lost

me. Right now, according to his email, I think it's Carrie Red Arrow that has adopted that, Saul, and that lady that had written him about it, I suppose. I don't know what had happened or if they didn't pick up or what. I don't know exactly what transpired there.

Again, the motion would be to work with the county on MOU or private group on continuing the similar operation. It needs a second though. Second?

Yes, second. Just waiting for him to finish writing it

down. Motion by I'm

to going

committee meeting to the first Thursday of every month at 05:30. Myself. Do we have any motion to accept that?

And it works for everybody? Yeah.

Do we need a motion to accept that? No, okay. Let me just simply change it then. Alrighty. And that exhausts our agenda for tonight. So, I need a motion for adjournment. Make a motion.

Yeah. And a second.

We are adjourned.