Huntsville Bike Committee

Today at 2:30, two citizens approached Mayor Battle with petitions in hand containing an astounding number of signatures which were collected in a very short amount of time. Leela Pahl presented a petition with over 1400 signatures in support of Complete Streets and presented a summary of the comments that were recorded with them. Sharon Bayer also showed a short presentation for the benefit of the Mayor. Below is her report.

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Hi all,

Meeting went well.

Attendees
Mayor Battle
Rex Reynolds
Rodney Baker
Jo Somers
Marie Bostick
James Moore
Shane Davis

Leela did a fantastic job of presenting the Complete Streets petition, stressing the 1,400 signatures that were able to be gathered in a very short period of time. She summarized the comments and noted that they were from folks in all walks/ages of life. The mayor seemed impressed and interested in reading the comments. (He was also impressed with Leela’s notes on recycled paper).

I presented the Complete Streets concept, as a followup to our Green 13 Town Hall comments…The transportation planning/engineering folks seemed knowledgeable, the Mayor was somewhat. He was interested in learning more, and very interested in the Sharrows, and I mentioned the Bike Pike as a good place to use as a pilot project for them. He also seems to be on board with all aspects of Complete Streets but admitted that Huntsville has a long way to go. Some future projects, such as sidewalk bulbouts on Holmes, were discussed.

I was not happy with the reaction to expanding the Mayor’s Ride to includes walkers/runners – there was concern that we do not yet have a good venue or plan plus “there are too many runs now”. I think their major concern is traffic control/street closures, and may have to be brought around to the concept. We will have to do some major convincing and planning for this.

We did discuss Active Living by Design – incorporating exercise into part of the daily routine and a “Healthy Huntsville” concept. I mentioned that there are several breakouts at the National Mayor’s Conference in DC later this month on this and how to make cities more sustainable, however Mayor Battle is not attending.

I also challenged Mayor Battle to send some staff to the Pro Bike/Pro Walk conference in Chattanooga…I think he definitely will send some folks since it is so close.

Talked with Jo Somers briefly after the meeting, she thinks that it will definitely help get some funding moved up for Complete Streets projects.

Sharon