At its next meeting on Monday, Dec. 6, the Healdsburg City Council will select the mayor and vice mayor for 2022. The council will also consider approving the local road safety plan and will hear the first reading of an ordinance that proposes to reduce the speed limits by 5 mph on Front Street and Healdsburg Avenue.
Additionally, the council will revisit the open streets program and the parklet program and receive an update and provide direction on an ongoing parklet program framework and on the open streets program.
The meeting starts at 6 p.m. and will be held in person at city hall and over Zoom. Those who wish to attend in-person must provide proof of vaccination and wear a mask at all times.
Announcements and presentations
City employees Dave Jahns and Jose Vasquez will be recognized for their respective employee anniversaries and employee David Hambly, who serves as the city’s wastewater foreman, will be honored with the “Pride in Public Service Award.”
Healdsburg City Manager Jeff Kay will provide a COVID-19 report and a drought and water supply update.
Old business: Parklet program and open streets
The city of Healdsburg implemented the open streets program in the summer of 2020 to provide additional space for social distancing during the early days of the pandemic and increase pedestrian and cyclist access in the downtown area.
The program included the closure of Plaza Street between Healdsburg Avenue and Center Street. Tents and tables were set up to support outdoor dining and social distancing. Later, that portion of Plaza Street reopened and the portion of Plaza between Center Street and East Street was closed and is currently closed.
Now that social distancing requirements have been reduced and businesses have reopened there’s no longer a need for additional space.
According to the agenda item report, “Staff is recommending that we discontinue the Open Streets road closure on Jan. 3, 2022. The street would reopen to two-way traffic. Two businesses on Plaza Street currently hold Temporary Outdoor Activities Permits that will expire on Dec. 31, 2021. Both businesses have expressed interest in keeping their outdoor parklets under the extended parklet program but would need to reconfigure their existing parklet footprint if the roadway were to reopen to vehicular traffic.”
The open streets program has cost the city approximately $126,000 in maintenance, rental equipment, staffing, lighting and cleaning supplies.
City staff will seek direction from council on whether they want to follow staff recommendation or if they want to continue to work on the open streets concept, which would include investing additional staff time and potentially funding the development of a longer-term strategy.
The council will also consider the future of the parklet program. The program has three varying components: a temporary outdoor activities permit for parklets, sidewalk use or for loading and pick up zones and a temporary parklet permit option.
The temporary outdoor activities permit is set to expire at the end of this month and the temporary parklet permit program is set to expire on Jan. 17, 2023.
The city council has previously expressed interest in establishing an ongoing parklet program for the long term.
“In following-up on city council direction to develop criteria for an ongoing parklet program that will last beyond the pandemic emergency, staff and the community have identified additional program elements that should be considered and incorporated into the program guidelines for an ongoing program,” states the agenda item report. “While some businesses need to make modifications to continue in the ongoing program, many of the current businesses already incorporate these considerations, and some of the proposed solutions came from collaborative discussions with the community. The goal of the following recommendations is to obtain direction on the parameters of an ongoing parklet program that would supersede the current program, which is authorized by city’s emergency authority due to the COVID-19 pandemic.”
In part, considerations for implementing a long-term parklet program include design and maintenance, location and equity, future roadwork, weather events, existing code preclusions, program fees and program administration.
To view the staff’s proposed recommendations on addressing these issues, view the agenda item report.
Speed limit change consideration
Based on updated engineering and traffic surveys, city staff is recommending that the 30 mph speed limit at Front Street between Mason Street and at Healdsburg Avenue and Healdsburg Avenue between Exchange Street and Front Street be changed to 25 mph.
If the change is later approved by council, there will be no major fiscal impacts to the city’s general fund in implementing the change. There would be a few minor expenses to the city streets fund to purchase and install new speed limit signs as well as signs that note the changed conditions.
New business: Local road safety plan
The Healdsburg council is slated to consider adopting a resolution approving the city’s new local road safety plan.
In January 2020, the city was awarded a $72,000 Local Road Safety Plan Grant (LRSP) from Caltrans in order to create a LRSP that would comply with new state and federal requirements related to the Highway Safety Improvement Program.
In order to create a LRSP and recommendations for improving road safety, the past five years of collision data — 2015 to 2019 — for city roadways was collected and evaluated. 2020 collision data was separate from the five-year data set due to potential COVID-19 affected travel patterns.
“Based on the collision data analysis and the stakeholder working group input, the LRSP addresses multiple Strategic Highway Safety Plan (SHSP) challenge areas such as bicyclists, intersections, pedestrians, distracted driving, and aggressive driving. The LRSP provides a list of countermeasures for priority intersections and roadways segments based on collision analysis and the feedback from city staff, other stakeholders, and the public,” according to the agenda item report.
Some of the primary roads discussed in the plan include Healdsburg Avenue, Sherman Street, Dry Creek Road, Matheson Street and several others around the downtown core. In part, some of the recommendations to improve road safety in those areas include paving improvements, median improvements, installing yellow school crosswalks, improving signal hardware and improving and installing curb ramps.
To read the LRSP in its entirety, view the agenda item report and scroll down to item “9A.”
