Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Project Overview topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Maplewood outlines Parker Avenue Complete Streets plan, schedules follow-up meetings
Summary
Town officials presented a Parker Avenue Complete Streets concept including 5-foot bike lanes, refreshed crosswalks and targeted traffic-calming, and scheduled two more neighborhood meetings and an April committee review before any final decision.
Vic DeLuca, chair of the township engineering, public works and planning subcommittee, opened a community meeting on a proposed Parker Avenue Complete Streets project and said the first of three neighborhood meetings will focus on the section between Maplewood Avenue and Prospect Street.
"I'm Vic DeLuca. I'm a member of the Maplewood Township Committee, and, I chair the engineering public works and planning committee, which is, the committee that will be discussing and working on this, potential bike lane project," DeLuca said. He asked residents for respectful feedback and explained the process: two more meetings on March 10 and March 24, an April 9 subcommittee discussion and an April 15 full township committee meeting where the public can comment again.
Township engineer Paul Kittner provided a local history of multimodal planning, noting Maplewood's bike plan (2010), a local Complete Streets policy (2012), municipal aid projects in 2016–2017 and school-safety upgrades in 2018–2019. Kittner said the current effort is to work within existing pavement where possible and stressed that many corridor improvements aim to improve safety for pedestrians and bicyclists while balancing parking and operational impacts.
"This is a community meeting," Kittner said. "We know that there are opinions on both sides, and then there's just some people who wanna find out what we're talking about." He and other officials emphasized that the process is ongoing and no final action will be taken at the community meeting.
The township noted capital-budget timing: a preliminary budget that currently includes money for bike lanes is expected to be considered in May; construction would follow if the project is approved and bid in summer with work completed in fall 2025 under the current plan.
