For Town Meeting, May 2019: not submitted---

Resolution calling for coordination to retain the integrity of
the Olmsted Bridle Path right-of-way along the median of
Beacon Street in Brookline---

By Jules Milner-Brage, Town Meeting Member, Precinct 12:
    February 15 - March 4, 2019


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To see if the Town will adopt the following resolution:

WHEREAS restoring the Olmsted Bridle Path along the median of Beacon
Street in Brookline would reestablish the street's original separation
of facilities for people outside of vehicles (for example, walking,
jogging, cycling, scooting---substantially non-motorized travel means)
from facilities for car and trolley travel, which would improve safety
and comfort for all street uses, and would reduce environmental damage
and improve public health, by better supporting person-scale (outside-
of-vehicle) travel (which naturally produces very little pollution and
often is physically active) along one of the most significant routes
for multiple means of travel in Brookline;

WHEREAS Town Meeting expressed strong support for progress toward
restoring Beacon Street's Bridle Path via a unanimous voice vote
to adopt a resolution calling for study of the feasibility of such
restoration (in Warrant Article 23 for the November 2018 meeting);

WHEREAS for the vast majority of Beacon Street's length (wherever
there are median car parking stalls), as soon as car parking in the
median is shifted outward (back) from the existing curb (for example,
by 10 to 16 feet), a condition that can be achieved without major
construction, the Bridle Path right-of-way is rendered unobstructed
(save existing street-light poles which are situated amongst the
median car parking stalls, uniformly 14 to 16 feet outset from the
existing curb);

WHEREAS the existing ability of Beacon Street's Bridle Path right-of-
way to be rendered unobstructed without major construction provides a
powerful potential means for testing and (perhaps) for incremental
implementation of the Path's restoration, using agile, low-cost
methods and materials, which could greatly support the aforementioned
feasibility study and community engagement around design (and which,
thus, holds the potential to yield both better-designed and lower-cost
Path restoration results);

WHEREAS adding more electric-car charging facilities in Brookline
would support shifting the means of power for personal and shared
(motor-)cars from internal fossil-fuel combustion to electricity,
which would reduce environmental damage and improve public health by
reducing greenhouse-gas emissions and some of the other local
pollution from car-based transportation;

WHEREAS electric-charging-enabled car parking stalls are 'anchored'
to their street positions much more strongly than parking stalls are
otherwise, due to the electrical extension cords that connect chargers
with their associated parked, charging cars;

WHEREAS if electric-car chargers were installed at the noses of the
existing car parking stalls (in other words, in-line with existing car
parking meters) in Beacon Street's median, when in use their extension
cords would straddle (obstruct) the Bridle Path right-of-way, and so,
as a new precondition to reopening the Path right-of-way (for non-car/
trolley travel), the Town would either have to prohibit use of the
chargers or have to undertake additional major construction to move
the chargers to positions outset the Path (thus undertaking needless
work, at needless cost, if the chargers could have been installed in
non-obstructing locations initially);

WHEREAS there are many existing car parking locations in Brookline,
both on and off Beacon Street, where electric-car chargers could
(or, with some planning, perhaps could) be installed that would not
add new obstructions to Beacon Street's Bridle Path right-of-way
(beyond existing street-light poles which are situated 14 to 16 feet
outset from the existing median curb);

NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that Town Meeting urges the Select
Board to ensure that no changes be made that would interfere with,
or increase the cost of, reopening or restoration of the Olmsted
Bridle Path right-of-way along the median of Beacon Street's whole
length in Brookline.

Or act on anything relative thereto.

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Explanation---

Mock-up of potential conditions: Kent/Powell St. - Hawes St. (around 7:20 AM, Sat., Dec. 1, 2018)

Current conditions: Westbourne Ter. - Marion St. (around 12:30 PM, Wed., Oct. 4, 2017)

Brookline is currently developing two intersecting large-scale
changes to the design of the stretch of Beacon Street within town:

(+) restoration of the people pathway along the street's median---
    now for cycling, scooting, jogging, etc.---within the historical
    space of the dedicated "Bridle Way", originally for horseback
    riding, in the Olmsted design for the street; and

(+) addition of electric-car chargers (and electric-car share)---
    for each (or a pair of) charging-enabled car parking stall/s,
    a charger post/cabinet and attendant extension cords---
    with some chargers slated for location in the street's median.

If/when both of these design changes are implemented, Brookline would
be maintaining car parking as a use in Beacon Street's middle zone,
along with the bidirectional electric railway there, while restoring
the bidirectional Bridle Path (non-car/trolley) right-of-way between
the trolleys and parked cars.  This spatial rearrangement would be
achieved by shifting the car parking stalls laterally outward
compared to their current positions.


Some context---

Beacon Street is a central feature of an eponymous US National
Historic District which exactly encompasses the street's whole length
within the Town of Brookline.  This Historic District was designated
in substantial part because of the street's iconic 1880s design by
Frederick Law and John Charles Olmsted---as a tree-lined boulevard
with distinct (and reasonably separated) spaces for walking, car(riage)
driving, trolley, and horseback riding travel---and because of the
considerable retention of characteristics of that design to the
present day.

Courtesy of the compact patterns of home and business development that
Beacon Street's multi-modal travel facilities have encouraged over the
past 125 or so years, it is surrounded by a substantial constituency
of people who make a portion of their daily trips via non-car/trolley
means (wholly or in part) and/or live in homes without garage parking
for their car/s (if any).

These two changes to Beacon Street's design---restoring the median
Bridle Path and adding electric-car chargers---would, in sum, improve
the safety of non-car/trolley (substantially non-motorized) travel and
support the electrification of personal and shared (motor-)cars in the
surrounding neighborhoods, providing quality-of-life and environmental
benefits all around.

However, it is important to work out how these two changes to Beacon
Street's design would be best---and, ideally, most expediently and
most cost-efficiently---coordinated, given that they are expected to
have distinct funding sources and somewhat separate design-development
processes.

A key challenge---

Design and installation of electric-car chargers on Beacon Street is
currently slated to occur before durable restoration of the median
Bridle Path.  A substantial portion of these chargers are currently
slated to be located in the street's median.  And, while precise plans
have not yet been shared (publicly), indications so far have been that
these planned median chargers are currently slated to be positioned
just inset the street's existing wide-side median curb, essentially
in-line with existing car parking meters.  (This is per in-person
communication and printed hand-outs distributed at public meetings of
the Brookline Select Board's Climate Action Committee, and its EV
Charging Subcommittee, during the period June 2018 to January 2019.)

In other words, it seems that current plans would have electric-car
chargers installed in Beacon Street's median without coordination with
restoration of the median Bridle Path.  And it is important to note
that electric-charging-enabled car parking stalls are 'anchored' to
their street positions much more strongly than parking stalls are
otherwise, due to the electrical extension cords that connect chargers
with their associated parked, charging cars.  So, this uncoordinated
addition of chargers in the median would add new obstructions to the
Bridle Path right-of-way of a type that would especially conflict with
(indeed, would effectively preclude) "pilot" / "trial" restoration/s
of the Path using agile, low-cost methods and materials.

This approach would induce conflict, potentially needlessly, given
that the alignment for Beacon Street's median Bridle Path is
essentially known and fixed for the vast majority of the street's
length: immediately outset the existing wide-side median curb in the
locations with existing median car parking stalls.  And, while the
precise design of the Path's restored form/s has not yet been decided,
engineering design guidance from MassDOT indicates that a number of
design approaches to restoring the Path could fit within a 10-to-16-
feet-wide space (outset that existing curb, inclusive of buffers).


A low-conflict way forward---

Why not preemptively position any median electric-car chargers in such
a way as to maintain Beacon Street's median Bridle Path right-of-way's
existing very-substantially-unobstructed condition (along the whole
length of the street in Brookline)?  Specifically, why not position
these median chargers 14 to 16 feet outset from the existing wide-side
median curb?

There is substantial, tangible precedent for such a 14-to-16-feet-
outset positioning of any median electric-car chargers: numerous
existing median street-light poles which are situated in a line,
outset from the existing wide-side median curb by 14 to 16 feet,
amongst the median car parking stalls along two lengthy sub-spans of
Beacon Street:

(+) between Hawes Street and Charles Street [#F1]; and
(+) between Westbourne Terrace and Marion Street [#F2].

It seems that it could be both feasible and beneficial for any
electric-car chargers installed in the near term in Beacon Street's
median to be positioned essentially in-line with the existing outset
median street-light poles, because it seems that this would:

(+) Not compromise electric-car charging function, given that chargers
    and their extension cords must already accommodate charging ports
    being located at a variety of car-body points.

    (For example: rear-side on Tesla Model S, X, and 3; front-side on
    Chevrolet Volt and Bolt; front-center on Nissan Leaf.  It seems
    that it ultimately matters little whether a charger post/cabinet
    is in front of versus beside its associated parking stall/s.)

(+) Be consistent with existing Public Works maintenance patterns for
    the street's median, especially snow clearing, which must already
    take outset street-light poles into account.

    (It seems that this could be helped by protecting any median
    electric-car charger posts/cabinets with bollards [as is common
    charger site-design practice] and, perhaps, clustering these
    chargers near the existing outset median street-light poles.)

(+) Avoid new obstruction of the median Bridle Path right-of-way as a
    result of installation of median electric-car chargers, and do so
    in such a way that would not require pre-coupling of these two
    elements' precise designs or their installation time-lines.

    (It seems that any chargers installed in the median in this way
    could be used regardless of whether cars parked beside them were
    to pull all the way in to the existing wide-side median curb
    [prior to restoration of the Path in the given block] or instead
    were positioned 10 or more feet outset from that curb [when the
    Path is in use].)

(+) Be achievable using standard electric-car charger equipment,
    provided that it is installed with attention to a few above-
    ground site-design details [#A1].

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[#A1---]

Above-ground design details for locating standard electric-car
chargers essentially in-line with Beacon Street’s existing outset
wide-side median street lights (14 to 16 feet from the existing curb):

(+) The particular charger units installed would need to be models
    with the "extended cord" option.

    (This would be to ensure the ability of the cord to reach from the
    charger post/cabinet to varied charging-port body locations on
    different makes + models of car, regardless of whether these cars
    are parked all the way in to the existing curb [charger beside
    rear side of car, when nose-in] or parked 10 or more feet outset
    from that curb [charger beside front side of car, when nose-in].)

    (However, these longer cords may well be needed regardless of
    where the chargers are positioned in the street's median---
    either in-line with existing parking meters [1 to 2 feet inset
    the existing median curb] or in-line with existing outset street
    lights [14 to 16 feet outset that curb].  If so, this would be due
    to the street's median car parking stalls being 45-degree angled
    and so not as amenable to the public safely making their own
    choice [as with 90-degree stalls] regarding whether to back in
    versus nose in to the stalls.)

(+) Each charger would likely need to be installed with three or four
    protective bollards around it.

    (This would be instead of the usual one or two bollards installed
    with a charger if it is also protected from cars by a curb, which
    would be absent---for a time---in an existing-outset-street-light-
    aligned charger positioning.  This additional curb line would be
    absent until the Bridle Path is durably restored along the given
    block---at which time anchored rubber or concrete curb segments,
    for example, could delineate the Path's separation from the then-
    durably-outset median car parking stalls.)

(+) Charging-enabled car parking stalls might need to be made modestly
    wider than the stalls are currently.

    (If actually needed, this modest widening would be to ensure that
    there is sufficient clearance between the chargers and parking /
    parked cars---clearance both for maneuvering into the stall and
    for opening side doors once parked.  This is because outset
    chargers would be beside their associated parking stalls---like
    the existing outset street lights already are.)

(+) Each group of chargers in a given block needs circuit-breakers.
    These are equipment that is generally housed in a charger-group-
    collective box positioned no further than a few hundred feet
    from its most-distant associated chargers.

    And, like the chargers themselves, these boxes are objects that
    would need to be located in the median in such a way that they
    wouldn't conflict with extant tree roots and below-ground
    utilities (and wouldn't obstruct the Bridle Path right-of-way).
    But, unlike chargers, they do not need to be directly adjacent
    to their associated parking stalls.

    (However, a good bit of the engineering detail work involved in
    siting these boxes may well be needed regardless of whether the
    Town endeavors to avoid obstructing the Bridle Path right-of-way.)