Stevens Avenue Project: Kane Letters
Thomas Kane was Mayor of Portland at the projects inception, a Portland City Councilor, and Democrat. Big friend of Paula Craighead, Charlie Harlow, and Fellow Councilor James Cloutier, soon to be mayor when Kane stepped down.
KANE LETTER FOLLOWS, with the ITE GUIDELINES
Department
of Public Works
William
J. Bray, Director
CITY OF PORTLAND
October 29, 1999
Mr. Brian Peterson
Thank
you for your letter of October 19, 1999. In response to your inquiries I have
the
following comments.
The
City will continue to monitor/study the Stevens Avenue project. Should any
intersection, portion of Stevens Ave or all of Stevens Ave warrant a review, the
City
will make that determination as it deems necessary.
I
am attaching with this memo a letter to you of December 4,
1998 from then Mayor
Tom Kane which addresses your concerns regarding accidents, air quality, etc.
All of his
comments are quite applicable, pertinent and relevant to your most recent
questionaire.
Finally,
I would say that as traffic engineer I would be your first point of contact
on
questions related to the Stevens Avenue Project. However, as you are certainly
aware,
you may contact any of your elected or appointed officials at any time. Please
call me
as you feel necessary.
Sincerely,
Larry Ash
Cc: Tom Kane, City Council, District 3
John Dorrity, MDOT
John Duncan, PACTS
____________________________________________________________________________
This
following was enclosed by Mr.
The "editorial comment" is mine.
There are so many mistakes in this.....Of course, it was at the start of the whole mess, and we
have learned a lot since.
Original
letter is in black; ITE sections are in BOLD;
my comments are in blue.
Department of
Public Works
William J. Bray, P. E.
CITY OF PORTLAND
December 4, 1998
Mr. Brian Peterson
Dear Brian:
Thank
you for your letter of concern and interest regarding the
Stevens Avenue Project
(SAP). I shall address my answers to your questions in the order in which they
were presented.
Questions
1, 2, 3: With respect to speeds and accidents I will quote the following
resource:
Guidelines for the Design and Application of Speed Humps, prepared by the
Institute of
Transportation Engineers (ITE) Traffic Engineering Council on Speed Humps, Task
Force
TENC-STF-01, page 2.
Where
designed and installed with proper planning and engineering review, speed
humps
have generally been found to be effective at reducing vehicle speeds without
increasing
accident rates. In fact, some studies indicate that speed hump installations
have actually
reduced accident rates on residential streets. Additionally, there is no
evidence in the
source materials reviewed for this report indicating that properly designed and
installed
speed humps have caused or contributed to accidents or increased accident rates.
Looks like he missed a few things by not reading a little further than page 2! Page 6 of the Guidelines:
Guidelines for Speed Hump Use
Section
2.01: "Speed humps should only be installed to address documented safety or
traffic
concerns supported by traffic engineering studies".....sorry,
that support's not there: The study
said that the proponents thought cars were speeding, but the 85th%ile
refuted that. The Phase I Study
presented NO incidences of speeding causing either vehicle or pedestrian
accidents.
Section 2.02: "Speed humps should only be installed on those roadway
facilities functionally
classified as 'local' streets......"
Stevens is a major arterial, "minor
arterial", according to the city
itself, which is wrong anyway. 16,000 cars a day make it a major arterial. Just 5,000
would qualify it for the majors.
Stevens was a major arterial until downgraded in 1992.
Section 2.03: Speed humps should only be used on streets with
no more than two travel lanes,
or where the overall pavement width is not greater than 40 feet."
Well,
they got one right: it is just two lanes,
but it is also 43 feet wide!
Section 2.08:"Speed humps should typically be installed
only on streets with an average daily
traffic volume of 3,000 cars or less" Stevens had
16,000. It's still at 14,500 after the humps.
Section 2.09: "When installed to address documented or
anticipated vehicle or pedestrian accidents,
the causes of those accidents should be susceptible to correction by speed
humps." Accidents
were caused
by people
slowing down, stopping, or backing according to the Phase I Study.
If he had bothered to read the original report, he would
have known this.
Section 2.10: "Speed humps should not normally be
installed on streets that carry significant volumes
(greater than 5 percent) of long wheel-based vehicles unless there is a
reasonable alternative route for
those vehicles...." Well, according to the city, long
wheel-based vehicles make up 7.5% of the traffic, and
there isn't really any reasonable alternative route, unless you want to clog up
Forest Ave. more than it is already.
According to the 1994 CMAQ application to the Feds for funding, the humps were
to divert truck traffic to
"less congested streets". The City has said they really don't want
that truck traffic using the local side streets. So:
they don't want it on the locals, or the connectors, or Stevens, and there is no
"reasonable" less congested alternative.
Section
2.11: My favorite, in its entirety:
"Speed
humps should not be installed on streets that are
defined or used as primary or routine emergency vehicle access routes.
Is
there anything we don't understand about this?
Section 2.12: "Speed humps should generally not be installed
along streets with established transit routes."
Those big boxy things running back and forth on Stevens are called "busses",
Mayor.
Section 2.13: And lastly, "When speed humps are
installed in response to citizen requests, a
documented majority of the residents along the affected portion of that street
should ideally support their
installation."
We must be on the old Superman's "Bizarro
World": about 30 people wanted humps. 526 were on petition
against them, including every single business and house on Stevens. Obviously the
"people" wanted
them! Or
maybe it was just the members of the Deering Center Neighborhood Association,
who didn't have to live with
them out in front of their homes.....
and who had
friends in City Hall.
Further,
page 3 states that "Speed humps have not been found to pose a traffic
safety
when designed and installed at appropriate locations. In fact, accident
experience generally
remains stable or decreases due to reduced speeds and volume, thereby improving
the
inherent safety of a particular street or residential area."
Stevens is not an "appropriate location" (see
above), and considering that the problem was traffic slowing
or stopping, this is contradictory.
Remember too that this was 1998 --in 1999 the FHWA / ITE came out with a year-long
study of traffic
calming: "Traffic Calming, State of the Art" by Reid Ewing. Reid
loves humps.
He looked at TC projects all over the U.S. , looked at all the statistics,
and guess what!: there is no change
in the accident rate! Any difference gets lost in the statistical
"noise" from year to year.
In
2000, "The Effects of traffic Calming on Motorist and Pedestrian
Behavior" was published. That said traffic
calming created no decrease in accidents, or increase in pedestrian
safety.
In 2003 FHWA did another survey of calming, to replicate the 1999 study, with the same results: no change in accidents.
MDOT records report that accidents immediately increased 58%, even with 2,500 fewer cars per day on the road!
As
the Stevens Avenue Monitoring Report stated: "Valid conclusions cannot be
reached
from this data since accident statistics generally are derived for longer
periods." It has
long been my understanding from many engineering consultants as well as
the DPW that
at least 3 years of accident data are used to investigate and evaluate accident
history
before any conclusions may be arrived at.
It's a good thing that we don't have to have 2-3 years of
new experience with house fires to know they
are dangerous! Seeing that we have learned over the last 4 years that accidents
have gone up,
this might need to be rethought.
In
view of the above reference and the short time (5 months) for which data has
been
available, I do not believe it constructive to draw conclusions correlating
speed and accidents.
Maybe hitting yourself over the head with a hammer will
feel better the longer you do it, too.
Question
4-9: With regard to air quality, vehicle emissions, air pollution, etc.,
again it
may be premature to draw any conclusions about the SAP so soon after
implementation.
Only in Portland- every other source known thought it was
going to be a big problem.
Actually, on page 29 of the Final Monitoring report,
the city's own calculations spell out the increase in
pollution output, so they knew it was there.
That number is wrong in itself, as they used 35MPH
as the base speed for the calculation, when they
wanted people doing 15-20 mph!
The
true benefits and long term impacts may not be available for years and the
project
should not be abandoned hastily. It should be evaluated carefully and properly
studied over
time.
The "long term impacts and true benefits (?)"
have been known in other cities for a long time.
The models allegedly contacted by the city told them this. The
city ignored what they didn't want to hear.
The "careful evaluations and proper studies" are not happening, and will not be,
according to
City Traffic Engineer Larry Ash, MDOT, and the Federal Highway Administration. (Jan
2003-
and never have, even now.)
In
the reference cited above, page 4, it states that "the need to reduce
speeds for speed
humps tends to have a negative impact on air quality and energy consumption
assuming
traffic volumes remain the same. For
comparison purposes, this impact is typically less
than the effects of a stop sign installation." This suggests there are
not "massive"
amounts of air pollution occurring due to the SAP.
Once again, we have learned differently since, haven't we?
(Maybe not: You can lead an official horse
to informational water, but...) DPW itself says that pollution has increased a
minimum of 47%, while the
Federal High Administration says increases due to the constant braking and acceleration
are more like 400-800%, which equates to 125-400 extra tons of pollution a year.
Question_10 (a-c)
I
do not intend to speak for Chief Thomas. I fully respect his dedication,
professionalism and
devotion to his job and the City of Portland.
The Mayor forgot to mention the Chief's devotion to the
City Council, too
(Oct. 2000- not to mention his easy slide into retirement at the state fire planning office this year)
If
you have specific questions for Chief Thomas, I suggest you address them to him
directly.
Did so. Got ignored.
Question
11-14:
The
City Traffic Engineer, Larry Ash, is investigating what impacts or consequences
would be
involved should traffic calming occur on any principal arterial in
Portland.
Uhhh, no he is not, other than finding out
that if the city takes a street out of the the National Highway
System, the city then forfeits all future federal monies for street
improvements.
If they had done this to Rte.77--State St.--before the new bridge was built to
South Portland, then the city
would have been responsible for half the tab for the bridge: $30,000,000! Think
it would have been built
at that point?
In
conclusion, I refer to the Test Program Questionnaire that was conducted as part
of the
Stevens Avenue Monitoring Report. This questionnaire indicated that those who
"strongly
support/support the SAP clearly outweigh those who are "opposed/strongly
opposed" by a
2 to 1 margin. (92 to 47), and that the environment as a whole is much safer.
Based on
the positive responses I received at the public meeting at Catherine McAuley
High School
in May, I agree with the monitoring report that the SAP has had an overall
positive effect.
The questionaire was handed out by supporters of the
project. This is a bit "iffy", if you ask me.
They got to pick who they gave them to. I sure didn't get one.
As for the McAuley meeting, the crowd ran about 25-1 against the project,
but like he says,
he based his opinions on the positive responses he got--ignoring the negatives--which makes sense,
considering later events.
Again,
thank you for your concerns and inquiries.
Sincerely,
CITY OF
PORTLAND
Tom V. Kane, Mayor
cc: City Council Robert
B. Ganley, City Manager
Nadeen
M. Daniels, Assistant City Manager
Gary
Wood, Corporation Counsel
Joe
Thomas, Fire Chief
Michael
Chitwood, Chief of Police
William
J. Bray, P.E., Director of Public Works
(ghost writer
extraordinaire, I think! Why would the Mayor
be writing on a DPW letterhead?!)