City Council, April 12 - part I

Our discussion of Monday night's City Council agenda will probably fall into two pieces. We need to learn more about street and park project for the former Battlecreek golf course.

Pretty straight-forward, however, is the project list for the "pedestrian crossing safety" category of the Keep Salem Moving road bond.

Public Works is recommending $431,000 be allocated to the project list and $150,000 assigned to a six-year traffic calming program.

Here is the project list (the full staff report contains a map labeled with the ID numbers).


The major one with bicycle implications is the median at the six-legged intersection of Fairgrounds, Winter, and Jefferson NE. Winter street is an important north-south low-traffic bikeway, and crossing Fairgrounds there is difficult. This will assist bicyclists in addition to pedestrians and contribute to the development of Winter Street NE as a major low-traffic bikeway in Salem.

As the staff report indicates, the City anticipates funding the "recommended" projects as well as the first three (the numbered ones) "alternate" projects. While they sum to more than $431,000, it is anticipated that one or more of the projects will be bid under the estimates and that savings will allow additional projects to be funded.

At the April 29th the Citizens Advisory Traffic Commission will meet to discuss the sidewalk and bike lane projects.