[WEC-Env] Summary of WEC LUT 11/7 meeting; next steps; old homework

[Rob Zako]

Dear WEC Land Use and Transportation Committee members (and Environment and
Coordinating Committee members),

I didn¹t take detailed minutes of the recent WEC LUT meeting but rather took
very rough notes. Here, aided by my imperfect memory, I¹ll try to synthesize
these into an organized outline of what what said, albeit not necessarily in
the order it was said.

Please consider the following as a very rough draft summary and offer any
corrections or additions.

Thanks,
Rob Z


WEC LAND USE AND TRANSPORTATION COMMITTEE

SUMMARY OF 11/7 MEETING

Present were Larry, Emily, Mary, Sue, Rob Inerfeld, Kevin and Rob Zako. Rick
Duncan arrived late.

Rob Inerfeld and Emily described the City of Eugene¹s West 11th Corridor
Study, using the 2-page yellow sheet and the 6-page green sheet distributed
at the last full WEC meeting.

The presentation morphed into a lively discussion, generating ideas for:
    1) the scope of the West 11th Corridor Study;
    2) existing condition information to gather;
    3) opportunities for improving West 11th, and also nearby areas;
    4) related efforts.


1) Scope of the West 11th Corridor Study

It was suggested that the West 11th Corridor study is a relatively narrow
study looking for specific, short-term (next five years?) improvements along
West 11th Avenue, generally from Garfield to Greenhill, possibly going as
far east as Chambers.

Insofar as the West 11th Corridor Study meshes with LTD¹s West Eugene EmX
Extension Study, the former like the latter should extend to downtown
Eugene. But it was felt that the issues between downtown and
Chambers/Garfield are fundamentally different from the issues west of
Chambers/Garfield and should not draw attention away from the major issues
to west of Garfield.

The group also discussed NOT extending the West 11th Corridor Study north
along Chambers/Garfield to West 6th/7th or south to West 13th.

The group also discussed that the West 11th Corridor Study explicitly NOT
try to tackle all the issues in west Eugene, but rather should leave other
issues to related efforts (see below) and to the larger scope of the WEC
itself.

It was also suggested that the West 11th Corridor Study needs to get very
clear on the PROBLEMS along West 11th before generally looking for ways to
make things better.


2) Existing Conditions

At the meeting, the discussion around West 11th was hampered by a lack of
maps and other objective readily available information. Happily, a first
step in the West 11th Corridor Study is to develop an ³Existing Conditions²
report, optimistically by December 2007. As it happens, the WEC work plan
calls for developing an ³Existing Conditions² report (and also a ³Goals,
Principles and Evaluations Measures² report) by December 2007. Thus the
narrower work of the City of Eugene can inform broader work of the WEC.

Specifically, the following ideas for an ³Existing Conditions² report were
discussed, if not necessarily agreed to:

a) Descriptions
    * Map
    * Aerial photo
    * Division into segments with different rights-of-way, lane
configurations and/or development patterns, for example:
        - Willamette to Chambers
        - Chambers to Garfield
        - Garfield to Bailey Hill
        - Bailey Hill to Beltline
        - Beltline to Terry Street
        - Terry Street to Greenhill
    * Typical cross sections for each segment, including presence or lack of
sidewalks
    * Representative streetscape photos for each segment
    * Transit service and stops
    * Nearby bicycle paths and connections to West 11th

b) Traffic / Mobility
    * Traffic flow (average daily traffic, or equivalent)
    * Mobility (Level of Service or Volume-to-Capacity Ratio)
    * Transit traffic
    * Bike/ped traffic

c) Safety
    * Accident reports

d) Nearby Land Uses
    * Emphasis on different types of trip generators and level of trip
generation
    * Emphasis on near-term (next five years) redevelopment opportunities
along West 11th

e) Regulatory and Other Constraints
    * Setback requirements in Eugene¹s land use code, parking requirements,
etc.


3) Opportunities for improving west Eugene

Several good ideas were generated, which I unfortunately did not capture in
detail. In general, these included the use of the existing right-of-way of
the WEP, the use of Roosevelt, opportunities for bus pullouts, etc.


4) Related Efforts

In the course of the discussion, it became apparent that there are several
efforts of interest to the WEC:
    a) West Eugene EmX Extension Study (LTD)
    b) West 11th Corridor Study (Eugene Public Works)
    c) Beltline Phase 3: Roosevelt to West 11th (Eugene Public Works)
    d) Roosevelt study (Eugene Public Works)
    e) Highway 99 improvement project: Barger to Washington-Jefferson
(Eugene Public Works)
    f) city-wide access management project (Eugene Public Works)
    g) West 11th Multi-way Boulevard study (Mark Gillem, Lane County Farm
Bureau)

The idea of intersecting circles (LTD and City of Eugene studies)
surrounding by a single encompassing circle (WEC) was expanded to include
these other related efforts. There was concern that the various efforts are
going on in parallel, but perhaps not in coordination with each other. The
WEC can help to provide coordination between these various efforts and also
a broader perspective, while at the same time benefiting from these efforts.

There was also a concern that Eugene Public Works is engaged in many of
these efforts, and the Eugene Planning and Development Department (and the
Eugene Planning Commission) are nowhere to be seen.


NEXT STEPS

1) Time was reserved for a possible next meeting, pending the outcome of the
Coordinating Committee meeting:

    Wednesday, November 14, 3:30-5:30 pm
    Eugene Public Works

2) There was some concern that a full WEC meeting on November 20 could be
premature, or at least that the WEC LUT Committee would have a hard time
preparing much for another full WEC meeting so soon. There was perhaps a
sense of wanting to have more time to better prepare for full WEC meetings.
That said, the value of having all the members of the WEC meet face-to-face
more rather than less frequently, even if without much assistance from
technical committees, was recognized.

3) Rob Inerfeld and Emily will continue working on the West 11th Corridor
Study, perhaps assisted by ideas from the WEC LUT Committee.

4) Rob Inerfeld and Emily will gather brief, scope of work information about
a) city-wide access management project and b) Mark Gilem¹s project for the
benefit of the WEC LUT Committee at some future meeting.

5) Rob Zako will participate in the Coordinating Committee meeting and then
suggest an agenda for the next WEC LUT Committee meeting.


OLD HOMEWORK

Tom S: Determine: 1) When the public comment period for the WEEE scoping
phase will end. 2) The status of any comments received after that time.

Rob I/Emily/Tom S: Get information from Tri-Met about how they evaluate the
redevelopment potential of proposed light rail routes. See the South
Corridor Draft (?).

Rick D/Emily: Using notes from Emily, Rick will produce a few bullet points
of issues, opportunities, threats, etc. based on his review of parcels in
west Eugene.

Rick D/Rob Z/Kevin: Coordinate Rick¹s map of parcels near West 11th with the
work of the Mapping Committee.

Emily/Larry: Finalize the white paper from the former City/LTD Studies Task
Force and distribute.

Emily/Rob Z: Gather together brainstorming ideas from the previous ³WE²
group in January, along with ideas from Larry (and Rick?) into some useful
starting point for talking about values, vision, goals and issues for west
Eugene.

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