Newton Centre
Lisa
Dear Friend of Newton of Centre:
Please find below a letter from David F. Turocy, Commissioner of Public Works, concerning the work done in Newton Centre--especially around Cypress and Centre Street. Vicki Danberg sent this out--so you may have received already--but if you haven't please have a look.
Additionally, I will be sending along a letter from a resident asking the Commissioner of Public Works to reconsider.
Best,
Lisa
Honorable
Board of Aldermen,
As
you are aware, this Summer we have modified the intersection of Parker and
Cypress Streets at Centre Street in Newton Centre, giving priority to vehicles
on Centre Street by adding a stop sign on Cypress Street. We have also narrowed
this intersection to reduce the crossing distance for pedestrians. This work
was undertaken in an attempt to address long-standing vehicular and pedestrian
concerns at this intersection, and was funded through the Mass Works program
associated with the Chestnut Hill Square development project. This project was
proposed by Public Works, and approved by both the Traffic Council and Board of
Aldermen, through the Public Facilities Committee.
Although
we have not yet completed all the construction work associated with this
project, it is apparent that this new configuration has created significant
traffic congestion on Cypress Street. Many of the initial delays were due to
the construction process itself, as well as driver confusion and hesitancy in
heeding the changes. While the delays have been reduced due to increased driver
familiarity (and, of course, less summer traffic), I believe the intersection
will continue to operate in a failing manner, particularly when students return
to Bowen, Day and Oak Hill schools in the fall and more typical traffic volumes
resume. Furthermore, the Real Property Reuse Committee recently began
review of the former Health Department building which, along with possible
changes to the Cypress Street parking lot, could effect traffic patterns in
this vicinity and should be evaluated further. For these reasons, DPW
will be removing the recently installed curbing and restoring the intersection
back to its original configuration. I intend to begin these changes within
the next week. Before the current Board Order authorizing the current
work is fully implemented, I believe it is in the best interest of the city to
restore the original configuration immediately. We will then work with
the Board, and Traffic Council, to develop a recommended plan going forward.
We
will continue with our other scheduled work in Newton Centre, including the
revised pedestrian signals with concurrent crossing with traffic, as well as
pedestrian bump-outs at Centre and Pleasant/Pelham Streets and the Centre
Green, to be followed by re-surfacing on Centre, Beacon and Lyman Streets later
this summer. I would like to stress to the Board that public safety is a
priority for the DPW and we will continue to examine this site to seek
alternate methods to address the concerns we have there and throughout Newton
Centre.
Thank
you for your input and understanding during this process. If you have any
further questions regarding this work, please feel free to contact me.
David
Turocy
DPW
Commissioner
David
F. Turocy
Commissioner
of Public Works
1000
Commonwealth Avenue
Newton,
MA 02459
Phone:
(617)
796-1000
Fax:
(617)
796-1050
Rick Kovalcik
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-RKOV
Rick Kovalcik
kova...@alum.mit.edu, r...@mit.edu, et. al.
+1-508-259-6819 (worldwide cell phone)