Halls Road Sidewalk Committee - Regular Meeting

So call the meeting to order at 634. And. The let's just. Do introductions just formally. And then member Tim Griswold, Chris Curse, Brent Meruli, Paul Vittoria, Mark Comstock, Aaron Mortensen and engineer. Yeah, Aaron Mortensen from Jacobson. Okay, so the first item we will consider are the minutes from the 8th of April, which is the ones Martha took and sent out. I hope you've all been able to look at them. And if we can get a motion to approve, we'll consider it. And second will be Frank. All right. Is there any discussions on the minutes, changes, edits, whatever? Hearing none, all in favor? Good robust aye. Okay, so the minutes are passed. Thank you very much. The next item is just a general discussion with Aaron. Some of us were on a site walk along Halls Road, pretty much in the vicinity of the the old Lime Shopping Center, Andy's in Hideaway. And we walked nearly down to the bridge coming from the Art Association. We walked up not as far as, I guess, the Citizens Bank, looking at the conditions and so forth. And so I reported that, you know, a couple of members had voiced that we consider having a sidewalk, not on the north side, but on the south side, the opposite side. And obviously, as you come from town here, you would cross Paul's Road and then go, and we'd have to deal with that big slope at the Art Association. And then you get down by the Citizens, yeah, Citizens Bank. Webster. Webster, excuse me. Yeah. And then you'd get to the bridge. And then as you get past the bridge, again, the ground slopes down into the low wetlands area. And then once you get up pretty much to where the Bandy's Deli is, it's more smooth sailing. As you proceed up the right side, north side, there are a number of curb cuts being roads, driveways, etc., There are phone poles with those great big wires that go over the Connecticut River. And then as you get up toward Huntley Road, there's a pole that holds some electronics for that intersection. And there'd be some work to be done to get around that pole and everything. And probably after that, it's pretty much of a straight shot past the gas station and then Treasures and stock farm. And then it would end at Essex Bank. The other side, I guess if you came up one street, you'd make a left and you're walking along the highway. You wouldn't have to cross Halls Road. And that's pretty smooth sailing until you get to the bridge. And then because the bituminous walk is on the right side, The bridge is concrete the whole way across, but there'd be some finagling to have a sidewalk along the south side of the bridge because you'd probably have to move the road slightly to the north to create enough space for pedestrians to go across the bridge. And similarly, there are low areas once you get over the bridge until you get to the post office. And pretty much from the post office to the big Y stoplight, let's call it, it's pretty smooth sailing there. And then going past that, you have the truck entrance to the shopping center, and then you have the sandwich place, and then Halls Road. 100 Halls Road. So we talked about that whole thing, and it's hard to quantify the cost, the differential. And Aaron did mention that there's going to be some surveying that will start probably in June. So we will probably have to caucus and decide if we have a recommendation, we don't have a lot of facts to go on. I, um, I don't think Aaron's going to say that the South side would be 75% of the cost of the North side and like that, you know, it's all gotta be worked out. Uh, so I, I guess we could, for those of you who were not on the sidewalk, uh, here and see some of that stuff, but it will be, um, if this matter needs to be resolved, probably within a month, wouldn't you say? I'd say a couple weeks, actually.

So, Tim, on the last meeting, you said that somebody from the state is going to be coming to meet us? I haven't heard that. I thought that was said in the last meeting, that somebody from the state was going to come here.

We could attempt, I don't know if it's in the minutes, if if there is a state contact, we could perhaps ask them to come and then have a special meeting to consider what they did. And we could even do a similar walk so we could hear what they have to say. The plans that we have are not survey plans. There are concept plans and, um, Martha also mentioned at one time that the new owners of the shopping center, I don't know what they might be up to along that stretch. If the right-of-way is the right-of-way, it really doesn't matter, I suppose, what we do.

They would have to go to the state to do anything to the right-of-way. If they were going to change entrances, that would have to have state approval. Yes, yes. Which I would think the town would have a say in.

I think it would be the entrances, because you've got the hill there. Yeah, the state. I don't see any problem. I can't see them having any issues going along the sidewalk.

Robin Breeding is not here, but... She has a similar viewpoint as Bob has about all the obstacles and curb cuts and so forth on the north side versus the south side. Probably the rest of us just took this walk today and focused on it. You work there, so you see it and you do too. Do you guys have any particular opinion about the sidewalk location?

I think the Southside makes a good deal more sense because there are a total of five cuts from end of the street to end of the street. I think the question of sidewalks actually begins with who uses them and for what purpose. And the sentiment seems to be that the kids from the high school are the ones most advocated for and they're going to be coming from the high school, which turns the corner on the south side, there is already a sidewalk from the post office all the way to what used to be Fleet Bank. That entire plaza has a covered walkway. And I don't necessarily, in 35 years of being there, see anyone walking it. So the concept of sidewalk to convey people from one end of the street safely to the other is... is an issue I haven't fully reconciled in terms of its merit versus its expense. This sidewalk you're speaking of is where? There's a private sidewalk from the post office. All the way along the buildings? Underneath the covered walk. The canopies and stuff. Yeah, yeah. So if anyone wanted to walk from the post office to the Big Y, as is commonly advocated for and espoused, there it is. And this safe passage... Which, logically, by anyone choosing one side of the street or the other, always be on the south side of the street. The north side of the street has many more vehicles coming and going than does the south side, from a great many more points than does the south side.

In terms of the public accessing your business, probably not many people come on foot, but Would you want a sidewalk just to attract pedestrians if they were more numerous?

I can't see that that would be a benefit. So you own treasures? They're going to wreck your parking lot. You know that. They're going to put bollards all the way down there to protect the people because you don't have enough parking, enough distance there. And it's going to look horrible.

You've probably seen the schematic, right? I'm not because they've not seen anything. There's no budget. There's no schematic.

Well, it's just what they did before. You've seen that, I guess. Correct. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

Mark, do you have any? I agree with most of what Brent said. I think it's really an issue for the kids coming and going from school after school, having safe passage to get to the big white plaza.

Mm-hmm.

I don't think that extra pedestrians are going to be a great benefit to a business like mine or Treasurer's where you're carrying large items with you when you leave. I need to think a lot more about this before I really make any decisions on how I feel.

Yeah. I just think Southside will be a lot cheaper and more, you know. Once you get residents. Yes. That stretch, which is constantly going to stretch. North or south side is going to be the same. Yes. The same distance. On the south side, over by the Art Academy, we won't have to do the little cantilever or whatever. We can just cut right into the bank of the slope, not the bank. On the south side, and bring it right to the river and the bridge there.

Yeah.

And it makes all the sense in the world, I think. It keeps all the kids just coming right down Lyme Street, where the sidewalk is, and just curls around. They don't have to cross the road. They can get down there. It's a big lie. They're not going to go walk to the gas station. They're not going to walk to Treasurer's. They're not going to walk to your place. They're going to continue that way.

Do many people, anybody have a feel whether many people walk to the Hangry Goose area, you know, for the restaurant.

Well, we can put a crosswalk there, but I don't see a lot of people. Yeah.

I mean, you go by there, it's packed with cars. I don't hear everybody walking.

Mostly see kids walking.

And I think also the big vision might be you'd have the Lime Street sidewalk that would ultimately go all the way up to the bridge. You'd make a left, go down Hall's Road, make a left, go down 156 under the highway and turn into Ferry Road. So it would be sort of a consistent loop instead of having to cross and cross at each end. I guess we could ask the merchants how they feel about it, such as Andy's Deli or the

Dunkin Donuts you know there's so many cars I don't know how many people walk there well I don't think there's a ton of walkers as it is but the walkers that are use it you know they do cross over back and forth to get to the other side yeah I think it would be safer to keep them on one side and if they do walk down to Andy's or you know Big Y or whatever but I mean, any of those businesses do not have walk-in traffic off Hall's Road. Not much.

And again, we would be talking about putting a crosswalk to the online shopping center. So if somebody did want to walk downtown and go... Probably at the post office.

Yeah. So they can go to Andy's and get an ice cream or something like that or a taco or whatever. But I would think 90% of it make sense to keep it on the south side for ease of traffic, to keep people from crossing the road as least as possible.

How many crosswalks are there with the flashing button on the main street of Saybrook, by your estimation?

Six or eight or ten? I would say probably six.

So it would not be unreasonable to have the by the length three of those on Halls Road. With an on-demand push-the-button yellow light flashes, makes it significantly better than a traffic light that clogs everything up.

Well, isn't it by the new gas station? Didn't they already set it up? Yes, that's set up for a crosswalk.

It's already set up there. So we're really talking about one more. The old line shopping area.

Yeah, if you're on foot from town, you could cross there, and you'd access a lot of stuff before you get to the big Y entrance, and then that's a crosswalk, and that'd take you all the way to the bank if you were inclined.

Kids are going to the bank.

We talked about, just for the benefit of some of the people that weren't in the walk, if we were... In as much as the pedestrian walk across the bridge on the north side, you have the, I guess, bicycle lane plus the bituminous. So if we wanted to shift the thing so there'd be a little more room to have a straight line across the bridge on the south side, is that something that you guys, engineers, have seen happen without too much fault at all?

not not that big a shift i don't like um like i said i talked about the crown the crown would be kind of dislocated with the new lanes um but did you notice much of a crown there no no i didn't um actually just west of that i didn't yeah i noticed it pretty um the crown was more significant there at least the way i perceived it um So I don't know that that's a big issue. I think if that's the consideration, I think you, the next step would want to get the state in to make, you know, if, if we're talking about the South side, um, you'd want to get the district in to talk that through with them to see. And then also just, so when I, when I talk from here on out, I'm not persuading you one way or another. I'm just going to give you what I know. Um, but, uh, um, I lost track of what I was going to say. Oh, the other thing is the funding application was for the north side. That doesn't mean you can't move to the south side. It just means that's another hurdle to move it to the south side.

Right, but you can apply to the grant to change it, correct?

Well, the commitment to funds has already been issued for a project on the north side, but that means you just have to go to the state and say the town would like to put it If that's the decision, if there's change, that has to be another level of approval. You know, there may be a reason the state, they may have approved that application because a lot of people put in an application, not all of them got approved. So they may have approved that application for some reason that it was because it was on the north side. I don't know that, but just throwing that out there. And so then obviously meet with the district to kind of to see if changing that lane is

over is is it feasible to them uh they they may just say no you know it is their own um so if we do change the lane excuse me we'd more likely abandon that little three foot paved i would imagine yeah just rip that out so it gives us more room to go to the north correct yes yeah okay and the other thought uh i uh

On the south side, on the far east side, is there a big... Isn't the grade climb... Are we cutting into a hill like that?

Yeah, cutting into a small rotating wall. You mean on 95? Towards... Yeah, isn't that the abutment?

The embankment to 95? Just near the bridge here. Yeah, near the bridge. Yeah, from the bridge to the...

I think if you wrap around the corner, you would have to excavate some. But I don't think we'd have to have it be a five-foot wall or anything. I think it's not too bad. I was looking at it, and it didn't seem like that area there has a fair amount of space. Now, people do make two lanes at that intersection to go to Lime Street South and Lime Street North. But there is the pedestrian crosswalk there with the light and the whole thing. So I think you could make that turn and just dig out some of the slope and make making a way to the bridge.

And if I could make one other comment, I've been doing sidewalks for a really long time, and there's always the comment that you never see pedestrian traffic here. I don't want to use that adage, but when you build it, people will use it. So just because you haven't, and a lot of residents sometimes aren't that welcoming to sidewalks, and one of the reasons is their biggest argument is I never see people walking there. Why are we putting a sidewalk there? But I've seen enough sidewalks. When you put it in, people start walking on it.

There are plenty of people that walk from Lyme Street. So I live off of one the other way. Not a lot of people walking the other way. Mostly people exercising, but not like a lot of foot traffic. You can actually see herds of kids and stuff walking from Lyme Street.

Walking from Lime Street to where? To Halls Road. Okay.

And they cross the road right there.

Okay. I think it'll get more use once it's built. That was the point of what I was saying.

Now, what's their destination, the kids? Would it be Chuck and Donuts or AMG? I'm not a stalker.

Yeah, I don't know. Package store. Probably Andy's. Big Y. You know, I'm guessing Subway.

Is there a distinction to be made between the constituency which currently exists, which would potentially use a sidewalk, the ones we know about, the kids from the high school, either going for an ice cream or going for a job, versus... a future use by a constituency not in evidence, as might be conveyed by the bus and the kiosks, which were on a previous incarnation of this on the south side? And to what degree is what we're talking about for uses we know about versus uses that we haven't yet considered? Follow?

I guess when we all drive there, you might see an occasional pedestrian. I guess if there was a walk, maybe that would attract more.

Sorry, I guess what I meant was if there are bus kiosks on one or another iteration of this, and those are on the south side.

Well, I know that the Estuary Transit goes into the Big Y to deliver patrons at the grocery store, and I suppose they probably come in the light and then come out The post office.

Ideally, I can see that a municipal conveyance, whatever the proper term for it would be, would not necessarily want to be beholden to the permission of a private property owner as to whether or not they could do that. So if you put a kiosk on the sidewalk, on the state road, you have a different thing than if you have someone, than if you have a transit system which relies on private property. But that's already... drawn into the south side.

One would think that not the north side. Big Y, the shopping center would probably welcome the bus through there. They dropped off customers. And I suppose that you might not be able to have a bus stop with a shelter and stuff.

But I don't think there was anything. I didn't notice any bus stops.

In one incarnation or iteration of this or another, there was a, you know, your typical sort of big-as-this-table, glass-roof kiosk, all thrown into the space near the post office.

And I don't know, you see a bus stop, you think you'd be residential nearby. Well, I think that's what people walk to get the bus, but there's not much residence on that bus.

It was put in for the future, what the initial people wanted was the future house.

Yeah, on the south side, just before the bridge. There may be more of those. Oh, this is two?

Two of them, yeah, both on north and south. So this iteration of this diagram, which we realize is only for scale and whatever, has kiosks outside of Andy's at the end of the treeline to the east of the driveway into the Old Life Shopping Center and immediately across the street in the front yard of the post office.

And when you say kiosk, is that a shelter or is that just a bus stop? It's drawn in as a shelter. Shelter, like the one in Sunview. I'm not familiar with the one in Sunview. Yeah, it's a glass enclosure with a bench and a bike rack or whatever. So the Estuary Transit District can supply that if there's proper sight lines and all that stuff.

So I wasn't necessarily advocating for one nor pejorative of the topic. It was simply that a sidewalk with a limited number of pedestrians at this point, which will grow to the greater number of pedestrians at some point in the future.

Mm-hmm.

is includes, but is not limited to high school kids. So if it's also, if sidewalks are advocated for by a group, which also advocates for community transit, then their assessment of this is something that would be germane to the conversation. That's fine.

I'm on the board of the Estuary Transit District, so I can pose the question. They probably have statistics on generally how many people wait for the bus at certain places. And we have a number of signs throughout town. They're actually putting signs for stops as opposed to flying. And Soundview is an example of how that looks, but I could see if they have any information about Halls Road, whether they have a lot of customers getting on and off. Certainly for retail, they might, like the grocery store.

But are you familiar enough with the, and I'll drop this particular tack after a moment. Are you familiar enough with the route that they take? They come off the highway from the bridge and necessarily travel east on Halls Road, which would be doors open to the south side, I mean, which would be an element supporting a south side sidewalk, as opposed to a bus coming from the post road, Florence Griswold going the other way, or does it just work in circles constantly?

Well, I think they go to the big Y, but I know they also go down 156. So I'd have to get the route, whether they come up off the ramp from Saybrook come to the shopping area and then go back down. I could find that out, what the pattern is.

It seems, I guess, the long drawn out point to even that constituency would seem to favor the use of the south side rather than the north, would be my thought.

Mm-hmm. Well, also, if you're coming from, say, over the bridge, the crosswalk is on the south side.

Mm-hmm.

So how do we go about contacting whoever wrote the grant just to see if we have any options?

I think we could maybe see if we can get a hold of the contact at DOT. You happen to know that, do you?

Yeah. His name is Colin Horan. Colin? Colin. Let me see if I can pull that up. Okay. So that's the funding representative. So we have to contact him also, right? Yeah, you would want to start there to make sure that the funding would apply for the South. Yeah, my thing isn't going to update on me.

Now, is there anything sacrosanct about your surveying stuff? I mean, if we get into a it's going to be pretty tough to turn around a complete recommendation in two weeks. So if we... Oh, I see.

As far as is it locked in? No, I can... If you want more time, I can, you know, just tell them to push it off a couple weeks. But I, you know, like, yeah.

Colin, do you have the other part?

Yes. Horan. H-O-R-A-N. Let's see if I got a contact information. I got his phone number if you'd like. 860-594-594-2461. I can also talk to Martha, but there may be another person that works on the actual street stuff.

I don't know. So then providing that, let's say

Yeah, we don't care what either side works. Who do we contact about the bridge?

About the bridge? I would start with probably Daniel McBride. Who's that? That's Daniel McBride. I forgot his title, but he's the head of District 2. Dana, D-A-N-A? D-A-N-I-E-L, or Daniel McBride. Daniel McBride, yeah. Okay. And he at least puts you in contact with who needs to know about that.

He's District 2. Yeah. Do you know whether or not this grant, I don't know when it was actually physically awarded, but I remember with some of you, I think they're timelines. Now, when we did a steep grant for Ferry Road, you had to go through a process to extend it if you weren't going to start the work within that window. So they didn't seem to be overly difficult about a, an extension, but I don't know what, what the start date is when you're supposed to start the project and all that.

Yeah. The commitment fund was, was issued February of this year. I, um, I don't know the exact February 26th, February.

Yes. Um, Probably a year or something.

Yeah, usually these things go on for three years. To really start construction and everything like that. It's nothing immediate. If this gets bounced back and forth for a year, then maybe that's something to reach out to him about. About extending it, I mean.

We have six out of nine. I know Robin is for the south side. I spoke with her And as far as, let's see, Don Bureau and Glenn, James Glenn, he was supposed to be on the call. So I guess if the committee feels strongly that it should be on the south side, that's at least... you know, we're not all fragmented. If it's pretty strong that we think the South Side's preferable, then, you know, I can talk to Martha and say that it seems like there's a real move to consider changing it. Because ultimately, we would make a recommendation to the Board of Selectmen, but I think the due diligence would be to talk to these DOT folks and say, can I be selected? Maybe talk to technical guys saying, if we shifted to the south, the bridge and that stuff, can you move the road a little bit and create more room on the south for the walk? And what do you think? And then talk to the other guy and say, can the grant be switched from the north to the south? And if they say, great.

I think the money person is the one to talk to first. The money person is the one to talk to first. Because if they say no, then it's all, why are we wasting the state's time saying about the bridge?

Well, even so, I think, unless the engineers have a real plan for what they're going to do with the Art Association and all this, you know, there's a lot of unknowns. You go behind a pole, in front of the pole, you go the walk along the O-Line Shopping Center's stone wall through their flower bed and all that. There's a lot of stuff before they start.

I think it's a lot safer for pedestrians on the south side.

I agree. Aaron, would you be able to get the DOT right-of-way map for Halls Road?

All we have now is the GIS, the official thing, would come with a survey. So I'm trying to think. I guess why are you asking?

Well, I mean, you know, we might run into something or this committee might be able to see something that will keep us from going to the south side or the north side. So if we have a right-of-way map and maybe a cross-section of a typical state roadway that mirrors Hall Road. And, you know, with the dimensions on it, we could take a look at it for ourselves and see what the feasibility is, rather than just guessing and going to the state office and saying, hey, can we do this? And leave it to them to say yes or no. I mean, it would be, uh, uh, an advantage to know that, you know, things can be done. I mean, we're just guessing we have no right away information. And I know the right away map is, um, right away maps are accessible. Oh, right. Yeah. And, you know, uh, and I'm sure there's a standard in, uh, DOT's library for, um, a state road, you know, and, you know, how wide it needs to be, what the, where the white line goes and how far beyond that before you can go to curbs and that type of thing. Sure.

Yeah. So from GIS, one thing you could take away from the right-of-ways, which is pretty accurate, is the width of it. It's just kind of where that falls, and so why the survey is so important is really more involved with when we're on somebody else's property. So I'm just looking at this, and...

What was that?

Yeah, this I think is this line. I don't know what happens here. So right now, if I didn't tell our surveyor to do anything different, he would get the street line and the property line, the perpendicular property lines along the north side only. So that's all he's been directed to do. the thing that you're asking for is to get that information on the south side or on both sides. I'm trying to figure out if maybe I split that up and I just have him do his research and develop a map just showing the property lines and maybe edge of road or something. At least we would know where it is. The GIS line, does that

show a fair, quite a width between the edge of pavement and where the GIS line is?

It's a very awkward, it kind of tapers in to where the edge of the road is.

There may be areas that we're not seeing that never meet the requirements for the state to approve something like that. We can make that assessment just as we look at this map and we go back to the roads, we might be able to discover what the feasibility is to go on the south side. And it's just as simple. The right-of-way maps are something that are attainable. I just don't feel that I need to go looking for them, but I can. But, you know, they're Reliable documents, right? And then all you need is a standard cross section for that type of road. And, you know, we could kind of look at this a little bit more closely.

Yeah, I can reach out to the district, see if they have any state maps. Well, you'd be surprised what they don't have. Or at least, I say this differently, you'd be surprised what they don't give you. They're not quick to just turn around and give you their information. But I can reach out to them and see what I can pull up.

Would they be on some file, electronic file somewhere? No.

think they would have a digital you would think so yeah i mean what this is probably based off of is the town gis which would be based off of you know um just a collection of property information um or your your assessment maps um because i know our town roads some of them are huge right away and others are tight so and the other issue with the dot ones they are typically very old not the dot right away has changed very frequently but they're they're typically probably was done before the road or, you know, they could typically, they're very, very, very old. At least the last times I've dealt with them is in Marlborough and they were still showing like a 12 foot wide concrete road as you know. So, and that's another reason why it's difficult to really place that.

I mean, I know that they define their boundaries.

Yeah, the boundaries, but how that relates to the road that you're looking at. I'll just say when I've dealt with it, it hasn't been as clear as you'd think it would be.

So as the document that you were talking about for the north side of the road, is that part of this? Is that complete? That has not been completed yet. So we don't at this moment know whether the sidewalks we're talking about constructing are necessarily on state property versus private property.

I believe for the whole length, I'll say no. For this, I don't know if we're talking about the bridge specifically. I'll just say no. Yeah, I'll just say no. We don't know.

And we would agree. If that would be something that would be important.

Yes, yeah.

I can look online.

I was supporting your point that no opinion in this room is valid unless we also have a document which attests to the validity of whatever it is we're advocating for. You need to find those sticking points before you... In your estimation, and I know you'd be reluctant to say, above and beyond the $800,000 grant of which we've been speaking, Is there any estimate as to what this actually costs in dollars above and beyond $800,000?

Yeah, we did an estimate for the... Yeah, that's another item.

Sorry to jump the agenda. Well, that's all right. I guess we... So we can move to that. I'll just ask, is there any public comment? Hearing none. What I have... Let's see. I believe that the budget for this fiscal 27 includes $200,000 for basically the engineering part of it. And subject to getting it refined, I think in the current budget, there might be in the neighborhood of 79,000 that would be available I was talking with Martha, and she's, you know, I was looking at the financial person and stuff, and it's not easy to pinpoint it. So let's say there's approximately 280,000, and the estimate from Jacobson is 173,250. So, you know, that would be basically 100 grand more than, the estimate. And of course, there's always additional work or unforeseen things. So, you know, this is not...

But that's for a fully actualized vision is in the neighborhood of a million dollars.

Well, yeah, if the road cost, you know, once they do all the stuff, then they'd get an estimate of probable cost for the road. And so we're not there, but Somebody developed an 800 number.

I'm not sure. That was the funding. The connectivity grant was $100,000 up to $800,000. So that was the max grant amount.

So in addition to that, I suppose if this estimate of probable cost, once you've got all your design work completed, if that were to be insufficient, then you'd have to either use town money or find an additional grant source. You could get maybe a steep loan, small town economic assistance, which we did on Ferry Road. I'm not sure what the max is on that, but those have been helpful to the town in the past. So it's kind of hard to say what the order of magnitude might be. Sorry. So just the

The $800,000 is expected to cover the bulk of the costs of this particular project. Is that accurate? I don't know that anybody with an engineering background... So we have no idea whether $800,000... That's just the max of the grant. So we're chasing that number on a timeline because that's the thing with the expiration date. But we don't, at this moment, no one can say whether that represents 20% of the project budget or 100% of the project budget. Would that be accurate? Not until we get involved.

Correct. And the $800,000, if I'm understanding this correctly, is really $680,000. Is that correct? So there's $800,000, but Jacobson... No, no, no.

They're paying the Jacobson down to the $280,000 that we already have.

We have $280,000 now, and the $8 goes on top of that.

We have $1,080,000 to play with. but we're not gonna know any construction costs until we finish where we want the road, et cetera. So it's kind of a... We have to do this first, we're still gonna spend money before we can even spend money.

Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah, at this point we can't say what is the probable cost of the construction. And if we change sides, that even makes it more obtuse. That's going to make it cheaper. One would think, but we don't think.

I know. Hello. What's that?

You have a meeting at 7?

We'll be out of here. We'll be sure.

Okay. And then I guess this money stuff right now seems like we have about a little over a million dollars that could be for the whole project. And hopefully the engineering part of it is still more than enough for what you guys would do. And if we change horses, it might You haven't gotten that far into it, though, yet.

No. Yeah, survey is the first thing to go. I mean, other than.

You said that your survey group will go out there and do property lines, right? Yes. That's what the survey will be. But DOT is going to want to see the right-of-way.

Yeah, yeah. The street line. I said street line and property line. So the street line would be the right-of-way line. Am I answering your question?

Not really. I mean, you know, it can be eight feet from the curb line or it could be 30 feet from the curb line. The right-of-way just, you know, I mean, it doesn't have to necessarily follow the geometry of the road. No, I understand. Yeah, it's not going to – it's going to be – Right, so if we're looking to move things, we need to know where – Understood.

Yeah, the map that they're going to develop will be – will delineate the right-of-way line. I use street line and right-of-way line synonymous. What do you think the difference in cost would be to survey both sides? Oh, you're thinking the edge of the street. No, I'm thinking what DOT owns. Yeah, the survey would define that. There will be a line. There will be the edge of the road. There will show driveways. There will be topographic surveys. There will be utility poles. There will be everything that's out there. And then there will be this imaginary line that shows this is the limits of the state right away. I'm confused.

I don't understand what's... They can... Like I said, the DOT right away could be six feet from the edge of the...

There's documents that support this. The survey is going to research that and then they're going to locate monuments and pins and basically... And then... do whatever magic they do, and a licensed surveyor is going to put a stamp on it and say, this is the edge of the state right way.

Okay. And O-Line stores likely has a survey of their property, so that should match, too.

It should be, yeah. Sometimes surveyors disagree with what they define as the edge of the road, but pretty much, yeah, pretty close.

So what do you think the difference in cost would be to survey both sides of the road?

Right now, the cost we have is 40 grand for the north side, so I'd say 80 grand for the entire thing.

So if there's talk... Well, I think we've got to see which side we can do first. Well, if there's... Can we do the south?

If there's talk of doing both sides at some point, then the survey would already be done.

I don't know whether the townspeople would say, hey, great, let's do sidewalks on both sides. Right.

But for future, if they're doing it, it shouldn't double the cost to do both sides. I agree.

And the other downside of that is time and things change. So all of a sudden, it's amazing how quickly a survey will become out of date. You know, just the property owner of Big Y, they start changing their – and then you get to the point where, oh, you just patch it, and then it's almost cheaper just to redo the whole thing. So I don't want to waste the town's money, but if – Appreciate that. Yeah. So things do change surprisingly fast when it comes to a survey.

What I might say with the time remaining here, which is about six minutes, I can report back to Martha that I would say this group, are you in favor of one side or the other?

Yeah, no, I'm just here because, you know, I'm trying to help you guys.

Would you rather have it on the south side or the north side?

It makes no difference to me.

So you're ambivalent. Okay. And I can, or I guess then there's just one other person. But, you know, if we have a heavy weight of pushing for the south side, then I can say to Martha, look, this is the committee's feeling right now. So let's talk about what we have to do to see if that's feasible and talk to DRT and so forth. It sounds like a plan.

Yeah, I would say it's definitely south side. I just, this table here, you know, a couple votes as it is. Yeah, yeah. So I think, in my opinion, we've got to call those two numbers and see if it's even feasible to do it on the south side. Otherwise, we're wasting our time. Okay. And then we can go back to you and say, survey the south side. Absolutely, yeah.

And I'll speak with Martha. She may have, you know, contact with the DOT folks, then we could get right put on that. Okay? So a motion to adjourn.

Motion adjourned. I'm going to sit here for four minutes.

Mr. Morelli. The next meeting, as you know, will be the 10th of June, but we, you know, depending on how the mop flops, we may have to do a special.