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Mount Desert planners begin mobility review, prioritizing multimodal connections and parking management
Summary
Committee started the transportation chapter review, endorsing a multimodal goal that addresses seasonality, parking and regional coordination. Members favored mapping existing pedestrian and bike infrastructure, creating a mobility plan, and developing a parking‑management plan for high‑demand areas rather than one‑off road widening.
The committee opened the transportation portion of the meeting by listing five core issues: seasonal peaks and visitor congestion; parking demand; multimodal needs (bikes, buses, ferries, pedestrian access); climate resilience for infrastructure; and the need for regional coordination with entities such as Acadia National Park and MDOT.
Members supported an aspirational multimodal goal and suggested a clear first task: inventory and map existing sidewalks, trails and bike paths. They recommended producing a mobility or multimodal master plan that would use that inventory to identify prioritized connections between village centers, neighborhoods and key destinations, and to identify responsible parties for implementation.
Committee members stressed opportunistic implementation: when the town repaves or upgrades a road, planners and public works should add sidewalks, crosswalks or bike facilities where feasible, rather than retrofitting expensive projects later. Public works and police were identified as natural partners for safety improvements and for implementing parking and signage changes.
Discussion also covered parking management. Members proposed a short‑term task to inventory high‑demand parking areas (village centers, trailheads) and to develop a parking‑management plan that balances resident, visitor and workforce needs. The committee suggested forming a short‑term parking or traffic working group to deliver recommendations.
On regional transit, members recommended working with established providers (Island Explorer, Down East Transportation) to expand year‑round service or improve seasonal connections, but they agreed the town should not expect to build a regional ride‑share network alone; coordination through a mobility plan and with partners will be essential.
Other transportation items raised included local access management standards for curb cuts (to coordinate with MDOT) and continued prioritization of road upgrades that improve resilience to flooding and erosion. The committee asked staff to refine goal and strategy language and to identify which tasks should be short‑term (plan/inventory) versus ongoing (implementation and opportunistic upgrades).
Next steps: staff will produce a short list of priority tasks (inventory, mobility plan scoping, parking inventory) and identify likely leads for each. The committee will review the recommended scope at a future meeting.
