2015-0319 Regular City Commission Meeting

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Summary Minutes:Regular City Commission Meeting March 19,2015 City of Sunny Isles Beach.Florida was, there was supposed to be a demarcation line to show bikes here and walkers over there. With the Commission's approval, we can add that to this walkway. As you know. 174'h Street is to be redesigned, the medians and the roadway for the Drainage Project. We will work on a way to bring people from North Bay Road to 174'h Street and back out to Collins Avenue until the Pedestrian/Emergency Bridge is completed. Once you are back on Collins Avenue you are going to have to go two blocks to 172' Street, here you are going to be on the road, and we will mark the road because the sidewalk is not big enough. This will take you down 172nd Street to North Bay Road and this will brine you to Sunny Isles Boulevard. This area on the map where the little red lines are is where we are going to add some signage, put the surface markings on there to show an area where you can then go under the Sunny Isles Boulevard Bridge to come back out south and then you will have to go east again to Collins Avenue, and it is Collins Avenue the rest of the way. The map we have here is what we can do.short term, and have it done by September 30, 2015 if that is the direction that the Commission are giving us. The final map will be our final Bike Path Map. The red hash mark those dots are what is proposed for the future and one of them is the Pedestrian/Emergency Bridge from 174`h Street to 172nd Street that we already talked about. On the north side between 185'h and 183`d Streets is that Bay Walk, when that property gets redeveloped, we hope to have a Bay Walk there, and that would get people off from Collins Avenue for that little stretch. There is a small portion by where Bella Vista Bay Park was that will get people off from Sunny Isles Boulevard when that is complete. Speakers: None Commissioner Aelion said minimizing the exposure on Collins Avenue is the main goal,and that is achieved by this. Commissioner Levin said she thinks it looks great as that was the whole point to get people off from Collins Avenue and get them around safely and this makes perfect sense. Vice Mayor Gatto said she is going to talk about 170 Street, we just had a discussion earlier about traffic turning into Winston Towers, making U-turns in front of Building 600, we are getting traffic through the backend, and she knows people use it as an alternative to Collins Avenue. They come alone 174'h Street to go north or south adding to their traffic on 174th Street. She cannot imagine on top of all of that,competing with bicycles on 174`h Street, she is really worried about that. She just cannot imagine how they would manage something like that on 174'h Street. She cannot see it, and she feels very strongly about this. They are competing with a lot of traffic right now,a lot of pedestrians on North Bay Road. even going north to Publix when the school is open. and when the school closes, kids are coming down North Bay Road on their skateboards, and they are coming along 174'h Street,there is a lot of competition, a lot of activity going on along there. Mayor Scholl said the alternative is on Collins Avenue. Commissioner Aelion said that he does feel what Vice Mayor Gatto said and she has a very valid point but the question is, what is the lesser of the two evils. Commissioner Levin asked the City Manager, when we spoke about this did you say that it would be possible to make the sidewalks wider on 174`h Street? City Manager Russo said yes, we have to go and measure this but yes that is exactly right because we can take that grass area that is along the sidewalk now. He does not know if it becomes as wide as we have on North Bay Road, and Ms. Simpson said it is not, it will be short. City Manager Russo said how short would it be? If we pave, like the sidewalk on the south side of 174`h 15