Questioning City Staff’s Commitment to Fifth Street Redesign

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Back in March, the Vanguard asked whether the city was “Slow-Playing the Fifth Street Redesign.”  Since then, the amount of notable progress on the subject is rather invisible.

The Vanguard learned that KD Anderson and Associates has been commissioned as transportation engineers.  How much has occurred?  Hard to say, though it does mention on their website, “Our firm has been involved in the development of General Plan documents for many northern California communities. Representative projects include the Circulation Elements of the Grass Valley, Los Banos, Hanford, Chowchilla, Corcoran, Davis, Orland and Yuba County GPU/DEIR’s.”

Residents of the surrounding neighborhood have become increasingly concerned about the lack of progress, combined with the continued high rate of accidents.

Resident John Lofland, for instance, on the Old North Davis Chat blog noted yesterday that Fifth Street Safety Troubles are not new and pulled up a 1982 Fifth and D car collision showing a resident with an overturned vehicle.

Last weekend, Mr. Lofland, a Professor Emeritus and notable Davis History expert, noted, “About a year ago, I noticed I had accumulated 15 of these ‘photo-essays.’ Most are at the 5th and E intersection, but a few are at 5th & F and 5th & D.”

Davis Patch noted a few weeks ago that 5th Street was among the areas with most traffic accidents, particularly at the intersections of E, F, G and J, where there were 15 accidents in 2009 alone on those four intersections.

Not only does the city appear to be dragging its feet, we note that some of the photos on the KD Anderson page are less than encouraging.

KDA

While obviously these photos are not the entire extent of the KD Anderson portfolio, it does lead one to wonder their commitment to smart street design and multimodal usage.  They seem to be focused on automobiles, highways and traffic congestions, and have no photos of bikes, pedestrians or buses.

nelson

Contrast it to the depiction of Nelson Nygaard showing multimodal transportation in an urban setting.  That company won an award for the San Francisco Better Streets Plan.

We do not, unfortunately, know much more about what is happening than we did in March, just over five months ago.

Back then we reported that there is increasing concern that city staff is slow-playing the Fifth Street Redesign, even as the public safety threat continues to mount in the form of new accidents each day.  At some point, one of these accidents is likely to produce a fatality and the city may well have a lawsuit on its hands, having acknowledged the dangers of this road but not having acted soon enough to prevent them.

Residents are now threatening to protest.

As we reported in March, 2012 appears to be the target date as reported to the Vanguard by Roxanne Namazi, the Senior Civil Engineer with the city’s public works department.  That is, provided that the council approves advance funding for the project.

When council approved this pilot project in April of 2010, the council had announced they had been awarded a grant by SACOG (Sacramento Area Council of Governments) to undertake this project.  That grant will cover only a portion of the initial expense.  Moreover, it begins in the 2013-14 fiscal year.

At that time, the Vanguard reported that the city was hopeful about finding some funding to be able to start sooner.

That was a Community Design grant, in the amount of $836,000, which was approved for the project last February, with funding allocated for the Federal Fiscal Year 2014.

According to Ms. Namazi, Caltrans has approved the Preliminary Environmental Study (PES) that the city submitted last year.

“We have completed the Phase I Environmental Report, as requested by Caltrans,” Ms. Namazi informed the Vanguard. “[The] Consultant will be submitting Scope of Work for the Phase II shortly.  We will take a recommendation to the Council on this.”

She had also told the Vanguard they were in the process of preparing a report to the city council authorizing issuance of an RFQ (Request for Qualifications) for design/engineering services for the corridor, for either late March or early April of this year.

The city had also filed a Request for Authorization to Proceed with Preliminary Engineering to Caltrans in November of 2010.  The city expected to hear from Caltrans soon thereafter, and if approved, any project expenditure after that approval date would be eligible for reimbursement.

At this point, the city seems to be set on going forth with a consulting firm that does not appear to specialize in this particular type of work.

At some point, hopefully, the council will take the reins back and put their foot down.  After all, this is the sort of stuff that the mayor, among others, stake their election bids upon.

—David M. Greenwald reporting

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About The Author

David Greenwald is the founder, editor, and executive director of the Davis Vanguard. He founded the Vanguard in 2006. David Greenwald moved to Davis in 1996 to attend Graduate School at UC Davis in Political Science. He lives in South Davis with his wife Cecilia Escamilla Greenwald and three children.

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25 thoughts on “Questioning City Staff’s Commitment to Fifth Street Redesign”

  1. Dr. Wu

    Given that salaries are already a matter of public record its seems clear to me that these salaries ought to be available and possibly posted online. There is some staff time/expense involved here but it should not be too high given that human resources has these records anyway.

    Archiving old CC meetings also should be easy. The costs of data storage has dropped dramatically and I find it hard to believe that this would be a big expense. Its all to easy to forget what people said. Personally, I don’t think this archive should be used for gottcha moments where a CC members says something they may later regret–but as a record of a debate in the past it would be useful.

  2. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]At some point, hopefully, the council will take the reins back and put their foot down. After all, this is the sort of stuff that the mayor, among others, stake their election bids upon.[/quote]

    “Take the reins back and put their foot down” about what exactly? It is unclear to me what you are advocating for here.

    [quote]As we reported in March, 2012 appears to be the target date as reported to the Vanguard by Roxanne Namazi, the Senior Civil Engineer with the city’s public works department. That is, provided that the council approves advance funding for the project.[/quote]

    March 2012 is not here yet – it is 7 months away. What is it that you think the City Council should be doing now that they are not doing on the 5th St redesign?

  3. Phil Coleman

    Showing a 40-year-old picture of an accident scene and saying that accidents are happening every day is the most recent example of the hyperbole associated with this particular project.

    With the most optimistic projection of costs by proponents, there is still need for the City to kick in some considerable money to make it work. Figures vary on what the City has to pay and the source for this City contribution have not been conclusively stated.

    Before we commit to a design study–and all it associated costs–let’s make sure we can pay for it. It light of the current economic crisis generally, the financial future of this project is highly suspect.

  4. Don Shor

    [i]Most are at the 5th and E intersection[/i]
    Then they should put a 4-Way Stop at 5th and E. That could happen immediately if the right officials said the word.
    The way I read the timeline here, this project is at least two years out.

  5. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]Showing a 40-year-old picture of an accident scene and saying that accidents are happening every day is the most recent example of the hyperbole associated with this particular project. [/quote]

    Especially bc protected left turn signals have been installed since the 40 year old picture. By the way, there are other places that are accident prone that could use some minor changes like Don Shor has suggested – with 4 way stops, e.g. Russell Blvd. and Lake Blvd (which wd be a 3 way stop).

  6. odd man out

    From the city website (http://cityofdavis.org/pw/CIP/cip.cfm?cip=14536B3D-0297-46F6-8ADC0EDFE1369B24). Last updated June 7, 2011:

    Fifth Street Corridor Improvement Project

    Description: City Council endorsed the road reconfiguration (road diet) on 9/8/09. The 4-lane road will be reconfigured to two travel lanes, bike lanes and turn lanes. Traffic signals at F and G will be replaced with standard 8-phase signals. ADA ramps will be installed at all corners throughout the corridor. Crosswalk marking will be installed at all intersections. Pedestrian activated lighting may be installed at the intersections of D and J Streets.

    Additional Info: SACOG approved $836,000 Community Design grant for the first phase of the project, allocated for the Federal Fiscal Year 2014. RFQ’s for design were received on June 3, 2011 with the intent to have the design consultant on board in September 2011 and construction summer 2012.

    ******

    Furthermore, it would not surprise me that that KD Assoc., if they get the contract, subcontracts with Fehr & Peers, Alta Planning or some other firm with more experience with bicycle infrastructure projects. FWIW, a quick look at the KD website beyond a kneejerk reaction to its graphics reveals that one of the company’s civil/traffic engineers is Jonathan Flecker, formerly with city of Davis Public Works with experience “particularly in the areas of neighborhood traffic control and traffic calming.”

  7. Phil Coleman

    Confession. I’m the guy who computed the total comp package for the new city manager. The above mentioned photograph is 30 years old, not 40. Even taking off my shoes, my accuracy of counting peaks at 20.

  8. Rifkin

    PHIL: [i]”Showing a [s]40-year-old[/s] [b]30-year-old[/b] picture of an accident scene and saying that accidents are happening every day is the most recent example of the hyperbole associated with this particular project.”[/i]

    Phil, your comments are normally very insightful, but you missed the point on this one. David showed that old photo just to note that there have been serious accident troubles on 5th Street for a long time. That’s a legitimate point to make in the context of this article.

    Moreover, David referenced an article which appeared last week in the Davis Patch ([url]http://davis.patch.com/articles/the-most-dangerous-intersections-in-davis-interactive-map[/url]). It showed the intersections in Davis which have had the most vehicular accidents in 2009. What caught my attention when I read that piece 10 days ago in the Davis Patch was 4 of the 9 worst intersections are on 5th Street, all in the zone which is supposed to be redesigned for improved safety:

    4 accidents — [b]5th & E [/b]
    4 accidents — [b]5th & G[/b]
    4 accidents — [b]5th & J[/b]
    4 accidents — Anderson & Villanova
    4 accidents — W Covell & F
    3 accidents — [b]5th & F [/b]
    3 accidents — Anderson & Alverado
    3 accidents — Sycamore & Alvarado
    3 accidents — E Covell & Pole Line

  9. JustSaying

    [quote]“How much has occurred? Hard to say, though it does mention on their website….We do not, unfortunately, know much more about what is happening than we did in March, just over five months ago.” [/quote]It seems as though the other two news blogs have covered this history and the need. You’ve suggested some possible reasons for and questions about the time it’s taking and claimed that the job went to an unqualified company.

    Did you interview anyone for this story from the city staff, or the company we hired, about your speculations and questions? Or a city council member? If so, it would be good to know who’s doing the complaining here. If you didn’t, it looks like this story isn’t researched enough to post yet.

    When you’re questioning the city staff’s (or any civil servant’s) commitment to their positions and their competency or ethics (re. selecting KD Anderson & Assoc.), I’d hope to see more involved than scanning a few
    websites.[quote]“At this point, the city seems to be set on going forth with a consulting firm that does not appear to specialize in this particular type of work. At some point, hopefully, the council will take the reins back and put their foot down. After all, this is the sort of stuff that the mayor, among others, stake their election bids upon.”[/quote]Facts in your story give the impression the project is moving along the timeline that the city established–need to time approvals, funding sources, environmental requirements–with construction still a couple years away.

    I’m for Don’s idea of a temporary solution in the meantime. At least the lower speed factor should reduce the horrible rollovers.

  10. SODA

    I remember bringing the 5th and F intersection accidents to the city traffic engineer in the early 2000s. She was surprised and looked into it. I had an office at that corner and screeching brakes and collisions seemed a regular occurrence. I had hoped and think I suggested that the lights at F and G be staggered green lights E/W to allow left hand turns at the beginning and end of green light but rather the city put in absolute greens so only one side goes at a time. This has greatly slowed traffic IMHO.

  11. stracy

    This exact road diet design for 5th Street has been in the Davis General Plan Mobility Element since the early ’90s. Nearly ten years ago community members involved in the creation of that Element and residents of neighborhoods adjacent to 5th Street began asking for this component of the General Plan to be implemented.

    In the seven years since our efforts were formalized with City Council testimony and a concerted effort to garner support, there have been over 300 accidents on 5th Street. Over half of those were injury accidents, sending nearly 200 people for medical care.

    So it’s true, the accidents haven’t been daily, but the risk of a serious tragedy is there every minute of every day. Accidents have occurred in the corridor nearly once a week on average. Coincidentally, the John Lofland photograph that David chose to put at the header of this story was a three car accident that happened at 5th and E Streets in the evening of October 19th last fall. The brand new Toyota with its bottom side displayed would have been on its roof except it bumped up against a parked car and stopped rolling. That was the second of three accidents that happened at that intersection directly in front of the fire station in less than 24 hours.

    There are 162 miles of streets in Davis, but 11% of the accidents in the entire city happen on just the two-thirds of a mile of the 5th Street Corridor. 20% of all reported accidents in the 5th Street corridor involve pedestrians and bicyclists, but their injury rate is much higher than it is for vehicle occupants. 41% of the over 180 people injured in the last seven years on 5th Street were NOT in a car! It is a miracle that none of these pedestrians and bicyclists have been killed. (All but two of the over 60 pedestrians and cyclists hit by cars were injured.)

    So let’s hire a firm to do this, and quickly, that has extensive experience in this type of street makeover. We can not afford to create a situation where inexperience leads to imperfect design. We have already spent time and money with a year of studies to determine among other things if toxic groundwater will be exposed by digging to set forms for new curbs in the corridor. Do we really think none of us who live near this street should dig in our gardens or consume our own produce?

    It is long past time to correct this blemish on Davis’ reputation as a bicycle and pedestrian friendly place with a firm commitment to improving low-carbon access for everyone. We need to correct 5th Street now, and build the entire project. Not just a test design with only temporary paint marks instead of the full crosswalk, pedestrian refuge, and raised median treatments that are in the General Plan.

  12. stracy

    I would also like to address the accident figures that appeared recently in the Davis Patch. There has been some confusion and inconsistent data reporting in the past, so I have stayed with the standard that can be found for Corridor Studies like that conducted for 5th Street in the [i]Manual of Transportation Engineering Studies[/i]. This is a “how to” guide for budding traffic engineers.

    At times when we inquired about accident statistics, we were given reports that only included accidents that occurred [i]inside[/i] the box of the crosswalks at an intersection. This ignores accidents that happen between intersections on the primary street or just beyond the intersections on side streets. For example, this methodology would miss the accident that was caused by a driver who made a rushed left turn from 5th Street onto southbound C Street during crowded Farmers Market hours on Saturday, May 17th, 2008 and hit 4 parked cars. Fortunately, without injury.

    To facilitate balanced evaluation of the before and after conditions, the manual I cited above suggests engineers use a standard that includes all accidents that occur anywhere on the primary street in the corridor, 100 feet in either direction on all the side streets, and 100 feet beyond the end points of the study area. The purpose is to avoid arbitrary boundaries or excluding accidents from consideration based on personal bias. Define a boundary, and use it consistently for all the accident studies before and after a change to streets in a corridor. All accident data reported by the Old North Davis Neighborhood Association and Davis Bicycles! from the beginning of this effort nearly ten years ago have conformed to that standard and used the 100 foot boundary.

    That said, here are the accident numbers for the 5th Street Corridor in 2009 taken from the full citywide accident data provided by the Davis Police Department. These are coded to the nearest intersection, as reported by the officers at the scenes.

    A Street – 5 Accidents
    University Ave – 0
    B St – 5
    C St – 5
    D St – 1
    E St – 6
    F St – 7
    G St – 5
    Rowe Place – 1
    I St – 2
    J St – 4
    K St – 2
    L St – 3
    On 5th but not coded to a side street – 1
    TOTAL – 47
    (Including 12 bicycle hits and 4 pedestrians)

    As you can see, these numbers are different and generally higher than the Patch reported. Also, the “fix” put in place at the F and G Street signals in February of 2005 did not solve everything and those locations.

    I am offering this information this just for clarification. I will happily provide this data to anyone else who wants to suffer the visual strain of sorting through all the big and small tragedies and verify or correct our numbers.

  13. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]It is long past time to correct this blemish on Davis’ reputation as a bicycle and pedestrian friendly place with a firm commitment to improving low-carbon access for everyone. We need to correct 5th Street now, and build the entire project. Not just a test design with only temporary paint marks instead of the full crosswalk, pedestrian refuge, and raised median treatments that are in the General Plan.[/quote]

    I am a huge proponent of this project, just for the record. But I will ask you the same questions I asked dmg, to wit:
    [quote]“Take the reins back and put their [City Council’s] foot down” about what exactly? It is unclear to me what you are advocating for here.

    March 2012 is not here yet – it is 7 months away. What is it that you think the City Council should be doing now that they are not doing on the 5th St redesign?[/quote]

    Are you advocating for all 4-way stops at each intersection downtown until the Fifth Street Redesign is finished? I am really trying to understand where you are coming from here…

  14. Don Shor

    One of the most dramatic accidents I’ve ever witnessed was in front of Hibbert Lumber at the intersection of 5th and G, when a driver completely failed to stop at the G stoplight. She broadsided a VW bug, which then went two complete 360 degree circles across the intersection–with the driver side door open and the unbuckled driver clinging to the steering wheel while her body was dragged along on the street. Amazingly, she was completely uninjured, as was the other driver.

    It’s hard to tell from this article. Is this entire project paid for by grants? Or is some general fund money involved?

  15. stracy

    Don. This is approximately half the desired project. Let’s call it an IN-Complete Street for around one million dollars even, with $840,000 from the SACOG/Caltrans grant. The rest is from the road fund and RDA.

    What we need is another million to actually give us the Complete Street. That would include the full complement of ADA ramps, resurfacing 5th Street, raised medians to give us landscaping and mid-crossing pedestrian refuges, bus shelters, and some street lights and such (less critical to traffic calming, but nice to have)

    How about we eliminate 20 of the $50,000 parking spaces in the proposed parking structure? Then switch that million dollars to this project to make 5th Street safer for everyone who uses or crosses it. That still leaves 14 million dollars for the rest of you to find better uses for than making our downtown more congested and less customer-friendly. Bike racks, building facade improvements, wider sidewalks, more cafe seating, residential development, etc. Let’s start a wish list.

  16. medwoman

    Since I am quite new to following the parking and downtown traffic safety issues, this may have been thoroughly reviewed in the past. Can someone tell me why we are considering the current location for a parking structure rather than locating it for example at the train station where it would provide more commuter parking, perhaps easing some of the parking overflow into the old east Davis neighborhood, and if combined with an overpass could also provide safe bike and pedestrian passage between south Davis and downtown? If feasible this would have the safety advantage of keeping the cars on the periphery while addressing another major safety issue while still fulfilling the need (if it exists) for more parking.

  17. Don Shor

    Because the main concern of the downtown merchants is providing parking for downtown shoppers, close to the stores they are visiting. Shoppers want to park within close walking distance of the stores.

  18. medwoman

    Don,

    I guess this is an example of difference in perception. I consider the station “close to downtown shopping”. Seriously, how many blocks exactly, is considered “close”, and by what information?

  19. E Roberts Musser

    [quote]How about we eliminate 20 of the $50,000 parking spaces in the proposed parking structure? Then switch that million dollars to this project to make 5th Street safer for everyone who uses or crosses it. That still leaves 14 million dollars for the rest of you to find better uses for than making our downtown more congested and less customer-friendly. Bike racks, building facade improvements, wider sidewalks, more cafe seating, residential development, etc. Let’s start a wish list.[/quote]

    So what you are really advocating for is to spend more RDA funding on the Fifth Street Redesign rather than on the parking structure? On the face of it, sounds good to me, but I’d have to know more about the issues specifically…

    [quote]Can someone tell me why we are considering the current location for a parking structure rather than locating it for example at the train station where it would provide more commuter parking, perhaps easing some of the parking overflow into the old east Davis neighborhood, and if combined with an overpass could also provide safe bike and pedestrian passage between south Davis and downtown? If feasible this would have the safety advantage of keeping the cars on the periphery while addressing another major safety issue while still fulfilling the need (if it exists) for more parking.[/quote]

    I actually think this is not an unreasonable suggestion…

  20. Pingback: My View: Fifth Street Finally Fixed | .:Davis Vanguard:.

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