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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2011-07-05 Public hearingNOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING Notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held by the City Council of Iowa City, Iowa, at 7:00 p.m. on the 5th day of July, 2011, in Emma Harvat Hall, City Hall, 410 E. Washington Street, Iowa City, Iowa, or if said meeting is cancelled, at the next meeting of the City Council thereafter as posted by the City Clerk; at which hearing the Council will consider: AN ORDINANCE AMENDING THE IOWA CITY ZONING CODE, ARTICLES 14 -4A, USE CATEGORIES, AND 14 -9A, GENERAL DEFINITIONS, TO ADD A DEFINITION OF PARENTAL GROUP HOME. Copies of the proposed ordinances are on file for public examination in the office of the City Clerk, City Hall, Iowa City, Iowa. Persons wishing to make their views known for Council consideration are encouraged to appear at the above - mentioned time and place. MARIAN K. KARR, CITY CLERK Publish 6/28 NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING ON ORDINANCE AMENDMENTS MOPED PERMIT PARKING IN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, IOWA TO ALL TAXPAYERS OF THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, IOWA, AND TO OTHER INTERESTED PERSONS: Public notice is hereby given that the City Council of the City of Iowa City, Iowa, will conduct a public hearing on ordinance amendments for moped permit . parking in said city at 7:00 p.m. on the 51h day of July, 2011, said meeting to be held in the Emma J. Harvat Hall in City Hall, 410 E. Washington Street in said city, or if said meeting is cancelled, at the next meeting of the City Council thereafter as posted by the City Clerk. Said ordinance amendments are now on file in the office of the City Clerk in City Hall in Iowa City, Iowa, and may be inspected by any interested persons. Any interested persons may appear at said meeting of the City Council for the purpose of making objections to and comments concerning said plans, specifications, contract or the cost of making said improvement. This notice is given by order of the City Council of the City of Iowa City, Iowa and as provided by law. MARIAN K. KARR, CITY CLERK r CITY OF IOWA CITY =U1_6 MEMORANDUM Date: June 24, 2011 To: City Manager From: Chris O'Brien, Transportation Services John Yapp, Transportation Planner Re: Proposed moped /motorcycle parking areas — June 21 Council Meeting Introduction Due to new transportation trends, last fall you requested a strategy to reduce the number of mopeds parked on downtown sidewalks without discouraging the use of this fuel efficient mode of transportation. This memo outlines a strategy for your consideration. Background In recent years the number of residents parking mopeds in the downtown area has increased significantly. Last fall, staff counted an average of eighty mopeds parked on sidewalks during daytime business hours. Cyclists and downtown patrons have submitted complaints about this practice. City Code prohibits parking mopeds with engines larger than 50 cubic centimeters on sidewalks but manufacturers do not label the size of the engines, which makes parking enforcement difficult. Solution alternatives Staff identified four potential solutions for this issue: 1. Implement permit parking for moped and motorcycles in designated parking areas (estimated cost: $1,000 for striping new parking areas) 2. Implement designated moped and motorcycle parking areas with free, two hour parking (implementation cost: $1,000 for striping new parking areas; parking ticket income will offset cost); or 3. Require mopeds to park in metered parking stalls (estimated cost: $50 for informational stickers at bike racks); 4. Maintain existing parking regulations (estimated cost: $0); Recommendation Alternative 1: Implement permit parking areas for mopeds/motorcycles — For on- street locations, staff recommends issuing annual and semi - annual permits to moped /motorcycle owners for $50 and $25, respectively. The attached map illustrates fourteen locations (both on- street and inside parking ramps) where dedicated moped /motorcycle parking areas are in high demand, based on our survey of where mopeds currently park in bike racks. These locations would create approximately 93 dedicated moped /motorcycle spaces; the number and /or locations can be expanded or reduced over time, as needed. To discourage long -term storage, the existing 2 a.m. to 6 a.m. downtown parking prohibition would also apply to these new moped /motorcycles parking areas. The City's adopted parking violation fee schedule will apply to the new permit areas — violators will receive one $15 fine per infraction. In addition to the new permit parking areas, mopeds and motorcycles may continue parking at any metered space and in paid parking structures. However, the existing free parking for motorcycles and mopeds in parking structures will be expanded and converted to permit parking areas (map enclosed). Approximately four loading zone parking spaces and five metered spaces would be displaced, for a net gain of approximately 93 moped /motorcycle parking spaces. Conclusion Upon adoption of the attached ordinance amendment that will restrict motorized vehicles from parking on sidewalks and in bike racks and creating a permit fee schedule, staff will implement permit parking areas for mopeds and motorcycles in select downtown locations (see map enclosed). Our goal is to implement this project over the summer before the fall semester. Please contact us anytime with questions or comments at John- YappCc!-)Iowa- City.org and Chris - Obrien(a�lowa- CitV.org, or by phone at 356 -5252 and 356 -5156, respectively. Cc: Nick Arnold, Downtown Association Jeff Davidson Wendy Ford Mark Rummel Mark Fay Marian Karr From: ROBERT PETERSON <robertpeterson56 @yahoo.com> Sent: Thursday, June 30, 2011 6:57 PM To: Council Subject: downtown moped parking I'm glad the council is finally addressing the moped parking issue. As a bicycle commuter I am often blocked from using bicycle parking by mopeds. I'm not opposed to mopeds parking on the sidewalk but using the space designed for bicycle parking is problematic. Mopeds are pretty small and our downtown sidewalks are wide so I think they can be accommodated separately from the bicycles without much of a problem. Bye the way, the racks in front Prairie Lights are mounted is such a way as to effectively half the number of spaces. The racks need to be approachable from both sides to use them efficiently. Regards, Robert Peterson Iowa City, IA Marian Karr From: jazbl058 @inabc.net Sent: Tuesday, July 05, 2011 8:54 AM To: Council Subject: In regards to moped and scooter parking down town Attachments: waterfront june 28 2011.jpg In regards to moped and scooter parking down town. All I can say is Good heavens.... in a town that likes to promote Green initiatives..... We should be welcoming people who ride scooters rather than drive cars. Just because they choose not to peddle a bicycle or can't they shouldn't be discriminated against. That is what this amounts to.... If the city keeps doing this they will kill all traffic downtown and then it will be beautiful for those who bicycle because there will be no one down there and they can have it all to themselves. Thank You Joyce Barker 2018 Waterfront Dr Iowa City Marian Karr From: Steve Goetzelman <sgoetzelman @hotmail.com> Sent: Tuesday, July 05, 2011 4:35 PM To: Council Subject: Moped Parking Greetings! Just wanted to let you know I support the idea of regulating moped parking in Iowa City. As a commuting cyclist I am sometimes frustrated at finding a bike rack totally blocked by 2 to 3 motor scooters. Also, it hurts to see cyclists being ticketed for riding their bicycles on downtown sidewalks when often the folks driving them scooters fire them up right at the rack so they can ramp out into the street off the curb. As bicycle and motor scooter use increases it makes sense to take a look at the issue and find a policy that will work for everyone. Thanks for looking at the issue, Steve Goetzelman Iowa City PUBLISH 6/28 NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING ON PLANS, SPECIFICATIONS, FORM OF CONTRACT AND ESTIMATED COST FOR THE COLLEGE GREEN PARK LIGHTING REPLACEMENT PROJECT IN THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, IOWA TO ALL TAXPAYERS OF THE CITY OF IOWA CITY, IOWA, AND TO OTHER INTERESTED PERSONS: Public notice is hereby given that the City Council of the City of Iowa City, Iowa, will conduct a public hearing on plans, specifications, form of contract and estimated cost for the construction of the College Green Park Lighting Replacement Project in said city at 7:00 p.m. on the 5th day of July, 2011, said meeting to be held in the Emma J. Harvat Hall in the City Hall, 410 E. Washington Street in said city, or if said meeting is cancelled, at the next meeting of the City Council thereafter as posted by the City Clerk. Said plans, specifications, form of contract and estimated cost are now on file in the office of the City Clerk in the City Hall in Iowa City, Iowa, and may be inspected by any interested persons. Any interested persons may appear at said meeting of the City Council for the purpose of making objections to and comments concerning said plans, specifications, contract or the cost of making said improvement. This notice is given by order of the City Council of the City of Iowa City, Iowa and as provided by law. MARIAN K. KARR, CITY CLERK CITY OF IOWA CITY 7 MEMORANDUM -. ®��� ,_ Date: June 29, 2011 To: Tom Markus, City Manager From: Terry Robinson Re: College Green Lighting Project INTRODUCTION: Please find below the background regarding replacement of the College Green lights with energy efficient, Dark Sky compliant fixtures. HISTORY /BACKGROUND: The current system was installed as part of a major renovation to the park in 1992. The fiberglass poles and fixture heads were chosen to follow the period lighting of the late 1800's to early 1900's reminiscent of that period in Iowa City's history. The system at the time of installation was state of the art but we have found is prone to vandalism and has become very maintenance intensive. Over the past ten years Park's staff has replaced $18,694 worth of lenses, globes, bulbs, and pole sections. There have been frequently outages of numerous lights during this time. During the 2006 tornado two fixtures were destroyed and the west sidewalk lights stopped functioning. One of the two fixtures were replaced out of existing inventory and attempts were made to repair the remainder of the system. After numerous temporary fixes and failures a complete inspection of the system was conducted in 2008. It was determined that most of the wiring system required replacement. It was decided at that time to wait until a completely new system could be installed which would include new poles /fixtures. DISCUSSION OF SOLUTION: This request is to replace the lighting system with new poles /fixtures and LED arrays mounted in highly stable luminaires to provide down cast lighting and comply with dark sky requirements. The pole and luminaire design is very similar to the current fixtures. The poles are made of cast aluminum instead of fiberglass to be more stable and less prone to vandalism and the luminaires will be fabricated of high strength polycarbonate. The LED arrays are much less prone to failure from the bumping, jostling and shaking that frequently occurs in this park. There will be six less poles in the new system. Even with the fewer poles the foot candles of light to the ground will be improved with significantly less light spillage into the surrounding residential area. RECOMMENDATION: The engineers estimate for the project is $114,200. The budgeted amount in the CIP 4172 is $90,000. Additional funds for the project will be supplied from the Parks Annual Improvements fund 4130. The difference between the budgeted amount and the estimate is due to the upgrade from nickel metal halide bulbs to LED arrays and from fiberglass to cast aluminum poles. During the formation of the budget these two upgrades were not anticipated. If you have any questions, please contact me at 356 -5107.