Cambridge Civic Journal Forum

April 27, 2010

New author, topic: bicycling; Concord Avenue

Filed under: Cambridge government,cycling,planning — Tags: , , , , , , , , , — jsallen @ 11:29 am

Hello, I’m John Allen, and I thank Bob Winters for welcoming me as an author on this blog.

My topic is bicycling. I am an active bicyclist; I ride both for transportation and for recreation. I lived in Cambridge from 1971 through 1979, and I have lived in the Boston area ever since. I have been active in bicycling advocacy since the founding of the Boston Area Bicycle Coalition in the late 1970s. I was a founding member of the Cambridge Bicycle Committee in the early 1990s. Over the years, I have paid a lot of attention to bicycling developments in Cambridge.

My opinions about the Cambridge bicycle program may confound your expectations, unless you have been reading my writings on other Web sites. While there are many good things that Cambridge has done, there are others which I find to have serious flaws. My work takes me to cities all around the USA and abroad, so I have had many opportunities to compare bicycle accommodations. There are cities I could hold up as examples — San Francisco, Albuquerque, Madison. In my opinion, Cambridge is not one of the more shining examples.

I will be posting later about developments over the years, but my present concern is with a construction project which has now started on Concord Avenue between Alewife Brook Parkway and Blanchard Road. Details of my concerns are explained on my own blog.

The City’s before-and-after cross-section diagram of the Concord Avenue project

I have several general areas of concern:

  • The plan is to narrow the roadway, replacing the present bike lanes — whose installation I applauded — with sidewalk-level bikeways. The north-side (westbound) bikeway, like the present bike lane, will cross 7 streets and 24 driveways into an industrial area — so there will be very many turning and crossing movements. Most car-bike collisions involve turning and crossing movements. I only consider the westbound bike lane suitable for bicyclists who know how to avoid the conflicts. The raised bikeway will not resolve these conflicts, but it will create a false expectation of safety for child and novice bicyclists.
  • The bikeway is to slant down to street level at each of the streets and driveways, but only where it reaches one — not before, so there is no way for either bicyclists or motorists to negotiate lane position.  The presumption is that westbound motorists will always look back to the right and yield to bicyclists overtaking on their right, and that left-turning eastbound motorists will yield to bicyclists — who can be entirely hidden behind westbound vehicles. The so-called “right hook” and “left cross” collisions are already the two most common types of fatal car-bike collisions in the Boston area. The proposed design offers a wealth of opportunities for these collisions to occur.
  • Bikeways behind 6-inch-high curbs at sidewalk level make it inconvenient and unsafe for bicyclists to cross Concord Avenue — and in particular, to reach the eastbound bikeway from most of the streets and driveways on the north side. In this way, the design encourages wrong-way bicycling — which is much more hazardous than right-way bicycling, because the wrong-way bicyclists are where motorists do not expect them and where they are in conflict with right-way bicyclists.
  • The high curbs also pose the risk of bicyclists’ toppling into the street.
  • The present bike lanes drain and are plowed along with the rest of the street. The proposed bikeways, just behind the curbs, are where gutter splash will target bicyclists and where snow will be plowed from the street. The City claims that it will plow the bikeways, but I don’t expect that they will be cleared anywhere near as soon or as well as the roadway.
  • Creating a separate, narrow bikeway can not account for changes in the traffic mix, some of which are already underway.  Cargo tricycles, bicycle trailers and pedicabs will block the bikeway; mopeds aren’t allowed; electrically-assisted bicycles are faster than others and more likely to get into trouble on the bikeways, but slower than motor vehicles. Who knows what else the future will bring?
  • The turning and crossing conflicts between motorists and bicyclists will increase congestion of motor traffic on Concord Avenue, and particularly in the single westbound travel lane.
  • The south side of Concord Avenue is adjacent to Fresh Pond Reservation and has only a single driveway crossing in the project area — at a signalized intersection.  There is already a path extending part of the way along the south side of Concord Avenue; there is a sidewalk the entire way, and many bicyclists already use these westbound to avoid crossing all the streets and driveways. A  bikeway on the south side properly designed for two-way travel would accommodate child and novice cyclists safely and comfortably, and avoid creating congestion.
  • The project does not conform to the specifications in the award-winning Massachusetts Project Development And Design Guide, 2006 edition, (2023 edition not the same) widely regarded as the best in the nation. I understand that the project is funded by the Commonwealth. Nonetheless, the project somehow slipped through the review process. Though City officials claim otherwise, neither does the project correspond to good European practice.  It is a weak imitation of European practice.

The City makes the indirect claim of “safety in numbers” for this project. That is, when there are more bicyclists, motorists become more attentive and better at avoiding collisions. I agree that this happens, but I don’t agree with it as the justification for an all-around poor design. When bicyclists are placed where motorists can’t see them, safety is only achieved when everyone slows way down — same way as when pulling out of a blind driveway. This type of situation leads to frustration and animosity, because transportation is about people wanting to go places — both bicyclists and motorists. And the planned westbound bikeway is so inherently hazardous that I don’t expect either safety or numbers!

My recommendations? Leave the bike lanes as they are. Install a two-way bikeway on the south side, if that is practical. Provide a couple more signalized crossings, with signals timed so traffic flows smoothly and/or median refuge islands. Also look to other east-west through routes. One is already rideable, and funded for improvement, the Fitchburg Cutoff path between Alewife Station and Blanchard Road, north of the commuter rail tracks.  The City’s Concord-Alewife Plan describes another route to be developed south of the tracks.

Bicycling advocates learned of the Concord Avenue project rather late. Construction has already begun, and I’m not very hopeful that the project can be changed. But whether or not it is changed, I consider public discussion and awareness important. I welcome comments. Thank you for your attention!

February 25, 2010

Nominating a Cambridge Election Commissioner

Filed under: Cambridge government — Tags: , — Robert Winters @ 12:58 pm

Thursday, Feb 25 – The Cambridge Democratic City Committee (CDCC) will meet tonight at 7:00pm at the Central Square YMCA (820 Mass. Ave.) to nominate three people for one of the two Democratic seats on the Cambridge Election Commission. There are five candidates seeking this position (see below). The practice of each of the two major political party committees has been to rank their three nominees, but there is nothing in the law that either requires this or even suggests this practice. It’s only purpose is to pressure the City Manager to abide by the preferred choice of the political committee, and this choice is often dictated by which candidate is able to pack the meeting when the nominations are determined. There is also a history of using an exclusionary strategy to nominate three candidates as a group solely to ensure that one of the other candidates is not among the three nominees. (This is exactly what occurred last year with the Republican City Committee.) The City Manager is under no obligation to pay any attention to the pecking order of these political committees (nor should he). It’s unfortunate that he is restricted to only these three nominees, but this restriction dates back to the establishment of the Cambridge Election Commission in response to claims made about 90 years ago that the Democratic mayor at that time (long before Plan E) was nominating “Republicans in name only” to the Board of Registrars, the predecessor of the Election Commission.

While I have a long-standing practice of never endorsing individual candidates for public office, the choice of an election commissioner is an appointment to a City board and is not a public election (only City Committee members may vote). Because my interest in the Cambridge elections (for both civic and academic reasons) is significant, I will say that the best choice by far for this position is Tom Stohlman. He was a candidate in the recent municipal election and has been actively involved in the campaigns of other candidates over the years. He is not only one of the most likable and agreeable people I’ve met during my 32 years in Cambridge, he also has a lot of expertise in the mechanics of the Cambridge elections. He would also be the perfect choice to move the Election Commission in the direction of improved public information about our local elections. In terms of the interpersonal relations of the 4-person Election Commission and how the Commission will work with its soon-to-be-appointed new Executive Director, there is no doubt that Tom would be the ideal choice. This is not meant as a negative statement about any of the other four candidates, but only as an affirmation of just how good a choice Tom would be for this position.

Unfortunately, though I am a CDCC member, I teach a class every Thursday night and cannot attend this meeting. If you are a voting member and can attend this meeting, please cast a vote tonight for Tom Stohlman – preferably the top choice, but please make sure he’s on the list of three nominees and that the City Manager chooses wisely from these three nominees. — Robert Winters

Update: Not unexpectedly, Linda Pinti, Mushtaque Mirza, and Martha Older collaborated in a partially successful preclusionary strategy to box out the competition. They were able to get Linda Pinti nominated as 1st choice and Mushtaque Mirza as 3rd choice with Poly Cobb getting the 2nd choice. These are the same results as last time and there’s no reason to believe the City Manager’s appointment will be any different this time, so congratulations goes to Poly Cobb for successfully fending off the competition and virtually assuring her reappointment!

Unfortunately, the best candidate of all, Tom Stohlman, was not included among the three nominees to be sent to the City Manager. I once characterized the Cambridge Democratic City Committee as political hospice. I believe the shoe still fits. For those who might actually care, here’s how the vote went:

Round 1: Pinti 59, Cobb 46, Stohlman 5, Mirza 1 (Older withdrew from Round 1). Pinti has majority, so gets #1 nomination.
Round 2A: Cobb 51, Mirza 46, Stohlman 9 (Older withdrew from Round 2). No majority, drop lowest candidate (Stohlman).
Round 2B: Cobb 51, Mirza 51 (tie). After much debate, decide to revote.
Round 2C: Cobb 54, Mirza 47. Cobb gets #2 nomination.
Round 3: Mirza 63, Stohlman 25 (Older withdrew from Round 3). Mirza gets #3 nomination.

Had I been able to attend this meeting, I might have told the CDCC, all of its officers, and most of its members what I really think of them. Instead, I taught a great Linear Algebra class at the Harvard Extension School and had a greater impact in one evening than the CDCC has made all year. – RW

Attention Cambridge Democrats! Want to be an Election Commissioner? Fill out the questionnaire and submit it no later than 5:00pm on Monday, February 1. The Cambridge Democratic City Committee will have a public forum with all candidates for the three nominations on Thursday, February 11 at 7:00pm and a vote on Thursday, February 25 at 7:00pm (Central Square YMCA). [A Candidate is Qualified if s/he has completed and submitted a Questionnaire to the City Committee and has been present and responded to questions at a public hearing.]

Candidates who Submitted Questionnaires by the Feb 1 deadline are:
Polyxane S. (Poly) Cobb – Questionnaire & Resume
Mushtaque Alikhan Mirza – Questionnaire & Resume
Martha J. Older – Questionnaire & Resume
Linda Sophia Pinti – Questionnaire & Resume
Thomas J. Stohlman, Jr. – Questionnaire & Resume

January 3, 2010

On the Eve of the City Council Inauguration and Mayoral Vote

Filed under: 2009 Election,Cambridge government,City Council — Tags: , , — Robert Winters @ 6:51 pm

On the Eve of the City Council Inauguration and Mayoral Vote

On Monday, January 4, 2010 at 10:00am the newly elected Cambridge City Council will be sworn in at City Hall. Once City Clerk Margaret Drury takes care of all the swearing-in, the new Council will take up their first order of business – the election of a Mayor. If a majority is able to elect a Mayor, they will then proceed to the election of the Vice-Chair of the City Council (commonly known as Vice-Mayor).

The elected councillors have been meeting in pairs and threesomes and foursomes ever since the election results were known in November as the various mayoral contenders have been trying to convince and bargain their way into the Mayor’s Office. Much of the convincing is based on things like philosophy, committee appointments, and who might be well-suited to chair the School Committee. On the other hand, there is a history of some not-so-above-board deal-making that also takes place in this process, e.g. the introduction of personal aides for all city councillors that grew out of the January 2006 deal-making.

As most voting Cantabrigians know, the Mayor of Cambridge is not popularly elected. It’s really more like the election of a City Council President as in Boston and many other places. There is a certain logic in allowing an elected body to choose its own Chair, especially in a city governed by the Plan E Charter in which the City Council chooses a city manager as chief executive officer of the City. However, there is also a point of view that city councillors should act as representatives of the electorate and that they have some duty to act on behalf of those who elected them. If this is the case, what criteria should guide the election?

Criterion #1 – Showing Up for Work

Based on who has attended City Council committee meetings during the 2008-2009 term, the nod might go to Sam Seidel or Henrietta Davis (see chart at http://rwinters.com), though a strong case could be made for David Maher who chaired more meetings than any of his colleagues. Of course, outgoing Mayor Denise Simmons would also have to be included among the contenders for all the City Council and School Committee meetings she chaired during her term.

Criterion #2 – Let the People Decide – Instant Runoff

We could use the ballot data from the November election to see who would be elected if a series of runoffs were to be held using the ballots that elected the city councillors. Based of this, the nod would go to Henrietta Davis (with Denise Simmons as the last eliminated and Tim Toomey before her). However, the notion that voter preferences should factor into the mayoral election exposes a paradox. After the 2005 and 2007 elections, the person elected Mayor was the least preferred by the voters among the nine elected and would have been the first eliminated in an Instant Runoff election. Specifically, in 2005 and 2007 the Instant Runoff winner was Henrietta Davis, but Kenneth E. Reeves was chosen in January 2006 and Denise Simmons in January 2008 as Mayor. The likely reason for this reversal of fortune is that Council colleagues often do not wish to strengthen the hand of a popular colleague. If the pattern of 2005 and 2007 is repeated this year, we’ll be greeting Mayor Leland Cheung on Monday morning.

I made a chart of these Instant Runoff Simulations for the 2009, 2007, 2005, 2003, 2001, 1999, 1997, and 1991 elections (the ones for which ballot data is available). It’s worth noting that the last times the Instant Runoff winners were actually elected Mayor were in 1997 (Frank Duehay) and 1999 (Anthony Galluccio).

Criterion #3 – Let the People Decide – Look at the Rankings

There are quite a few ways of measuring popularity based on ballot rankings. One rather simplistic approach is to look only at the #1 rankings – a criterion often promoted in years past. The “#1 vote-getter” would make the case that this is what the people demand. Of course, this ignores the phenomenon of vote-splitting – the very thing that preferential ballots are designed to mitigate. Perhaps a more fair way to measure popularity based on ballot rankings would be to count the number of ballots on which each candidate appears with a high ranking, e.g. somewhere in the top 3 or top 5 or top 9 rankings. Henrietta Davis wins according to this criteria in all scenarios except the “Top 3” criterion in which she is eclipsed by 1 vote by Denise Simmons, 5015 to 5014. It’s worth noting that according to these criteria, some elected councillors fare worse than some candidates who were not even elected. For example, using a “Top 3” criterion, Marjorie Decker and Leland Cheung are eclipsed by Eddie Sullivan and Larry Ward. In all criteria using 5 or more rankings, Marjorie Decker actually finishes 12th, though one can certainly argue that this may be a by-product of being a write-in candidate.

Criterion #4 – School Committee Experience

There are four councillors who have been previously elected to the Cambridge School Committee – Tim Toomey, Henrietta Davis, David Maher, and Denise Simmons. Of course, all those who have previously served as Mayor have also served in this capacity.

Criterion #5 – The Rotation Principle

There is something of a tradition of passing the torch among City Council colleagues so that various mayoral styles and priorities can be sampled. Based on this, the nod would go to Tim Toomey and Henrietta Davis for having waited their turn the longest. Needless to say, this criterion is most often quoted in order to dissuade councillors from reelecting a Mayor to a 2nd consecutive term. The Rotation Principle generally goes hand-in-hand with the Exclusion Principle, i.e. the fact that there are some elected councillors whose behavior has been such that they couldn’t get majority support under virtually any circumstance. In short, some measure of acceptability is a prerequisite for consideration under the Rotation Principle. Though there is a temptation to name the Excluded here, I shall resist. In any case, every councillor’s vote weighs as much as any other.

We’ll see what Monday brings. Perhaps a deck of cards or some dice will prove handy in determining the outcome. – Robert Winters

Jan 4, 4:00pm update: The newly inaugurated Cambridge City Council failed to elect Mayor at its opening meeting. Their next opportunity will be at their regular January 11 meeting next Monday. Here’s how the vote went:

Leland Cheung voted for Marjorie Decker
Henrietta Davis voted for Henrietta Davis
Marjorie Decker voted for Marjorie Decker
Craig Kelley voted for Ken Reeves
David Maher voted for David Maher
Ken Reeves voted for Ken Reeves
Sam Seidel voted for David Maher
Denise Simmons voted for Denise Simmons
Tim Toomey voted for David Maher

It takes 5 votes to elect a Mayor, so there’s a way to go. The School Committee will be inaugurated at 6:00pm tonight with Councillor Reeves standing in as Chair in the absence of an elected Mayor. It is not clear whether they will vote to elect their Vice-Chair at this meeting or if they will wait until the election of a Mayor and 7th voting member of the School Committee.

December 21, 2009

Dec 21, 2009 City Council Agenda Highlights

Filed under: Cambridge government,City Council — Tags: , , — Robert Winters @ 11:20 am

Dec 21, 2009 City Council Agenda Highlights

This is the last meeting of the 2008-09 City Council term and the last one for Councillor Larry Ward who was not reelected in the November election. As much as I look forward to the arrival of newly-elected Leland Cheung to the City Council, I would have preferred to see someone other than my neighbor and friend Larry Ward vacate the seat to make room for the new guy. Life goes on and Larry will continue to be a bigger-than-life presence in the neighborhood as he has always been. I know that his Council colleagues and the City administration appreciated his time on the City Council.

There are 10 responses by the City Manager to Council requests for information on tonight’s agenda. This leaves only 22 out of 305 such requests from this Council term – not a bad response rate. The remaining requests cover truck traffic, traffic at two major intersections, tenant representation on the Housing Authority Board and stimulus money for CHA projects, the Walden Street cattle pass, hoarding, security cameras, library hours of operation, a Women’s Commission report, smoking in parks and outdoor seating areas, noisy rooftop mechanicals, dark sky zoning amendments, a 311 alert system, middle schools, damaged overhead wires, videos for Mac users, playgroups, Lakeview Avenue construction, rodents, and raising chickens.

One notable item on the City Manager’s Agenda is this:

City Manager’s Agenda #3. Transmitting communication from Robert W. Healy, City Manager, relative to the acceptance of M.G.L. Chapter 32B, Section 20, which will establish an Other Post Employment Liability Trust Fund. This irrevocable trust fund will provide the City a vehicle to make contributions to meet the unfunded liability; and the transfer of $2.0 million from the City’s Health Insurance Claims Trust Fund, which has a balance of $17.7 million to the Other Post Employment Liability Trust Fund. This initial allocation will begin the process of providing future allocations from this and/or other funding sources to the OPEB Trust Fund based on an annual review.

This initiative is part of a long-term change in the way states and cities handle the accounting of these obligations. As reported by the Manager, these recommendations have been in the works since 2007 and “the City has positioned itself to address the OPEB liability in an orderly and planned manner in the future, which has been recognized by the rating agencies as part of its positive credit rating.”

There’s also this procedural Order regarding the forwarding of items not yet acted on to the 2010-2011 City Council.

Order #1. That all items pending before the City Council and not acted upon by the end of the 2009 Legislative Session be placed in the files of the City Clerk without prejudice provided that those proposed ordinances which have been passed to a second reading, advertised and listed under “Unfinished Business” during the 2008-2009 City Council term shall be forwarded to the next City Council and further provided that any items pending in committee may, at the discretion of the committee, be forwarded to the next City Council.   Mayor Simmons

Not that it matters all that much to anyone, but I really wish the City Council would dispose of the following item one way or another:

Unfinished Business #5. A communication was received from D. Margaret Drury, City Clerk, transmitting a report from Councillor Timothy J. Toomey, Jr., Co-Chair of the Ordinance Committee, for a meeting held on Nov 18, 2004 for the purpose of considering proposed amendments to Chapter 2.74 of the Cambridge Municipal Code, the Police Review and Advisory Board (PRAB) Ordinance. The question comes on passing to be ordained on or after Feb 14, 2005. [Four sections of the proposed amendment were passed to be ordained as amended. Ordinance #1284. The remaining proposed amendments to chapter 2.74 remain on Unfinished Business.]

It’s embarrassing to have items over five years old lingering on the agenda week after week and year after year. There is an ongoing review of police and PRAB matters. If the Council cannot resolve this now, they should refer it to the ongoing review and start fresh in the new Council term. Even proposed amendments to ordinances have a shelf life.

Meanwhile, the speculation continues as to who will be chosen as Chair of the City Council and School Committee in two weeks, i.e. the new mayor. It matters little to most residents, but these two higher salary years can make a big difference in the pension of a city councillor. The selection is something of a strategic contradiction – councillors who do well in the November election are often disadvantaged by the fact that their colleagues don’t want to strengthen their hand by giving them the increased visibility of being mayor. Some people get all worked up about this short period of conflict among councillors, but this usually (and hopefully) passes quickly. It is, after all, not really that big a deal. – RW

September 21, 2009

Sept 21, 2009 City Council Agenda Highlights

Filed under: Cambridge government,City Council — Tags: , — Robert Winters @ 3:13 pm

Sept 21, 2009 City Council Agenda Highlights

Tonight’s Big Item is the series of votes necessary to seek the Massachusetts Department of Revenue approval for the tax rate for FY2010. As Bob Healy reminds the councillors every year, the City Council does not set the tax rate. They adopt a budget in the spring and then take the required votes on tax classification, allocations from Free Cash and reserves, and on a variety of statutory exemptions. The Mass. Department of Revenue then determines and approves the tax rates based on what was sent by the City, but the end result in usually entirely predicable to the penny. There is a 6:30pm hearing during the meeting to discuss the property tax rate classification.

Every Cambridge resident should read the message submitted by the City Manager for this meeting. There are many lessons contained within. There are other agenda items of note, but everything else pales in comparison. — Robert Winters

August 21, 2009

Open Forum – Proportional Representation

Filed under: Cambridge government — Robert Winters @ 6:41 pm

When Cambridge adopted the Plan E Charter in 1940, it included the use of proportional representation as the method of election for City Council and School Committee. This election method is designed to ensure majority rule while at the same time guaranteeing minority representation. At its inception, the concept was the representation of political minorities, but this has naturally extended to include ethnic minorities and other constituencies as defined by the voters.

Proportional representation is much more general than the specific method used in Cambridge. Most democracies throughout the world use some form of proportional representation, primarily in parliamentary systems of government.

The origins of the PR method used in Cambridge, the single transferable vote (STV), date back to 1821, but the method is often associated with Thomas Hare who promoted the method during the mid-19th century. The “Hare System” was popularized by John Stuart Mill and, with some modification after the ideas of Henry Richmond Droop, this system is essentially what is used in Cambridge today. Basically, every 10+% of voters who can galvanize around an issue or other definable quality among candidates will likely elect a representative on the City Council. For the School Committee, it takes slightly more than one-seventh of voters to earn a seat.

The topic of this Open Forum is the concept of proportional representation, not the mechanics of the PR elections. We’ll save the mechanics for the next topic.

Specific questions:
1. How important is proportional representation of a range of viewpoints and backgrounds on the City Council and School Committee today? Is this true in practice as well as in theory? How does representation in Cambridge compare to other cities, the state legislature, or the U.S. Congress?

2. How would things differ if we elected councillors and school committee members by wards using winner-take-all plurality elections (and possibly gerrymandered districts)?

3. Has the use of candidate slates been effective over the years in our PR elections? Have some constituencies benefited more from PR than others?

August 10, 2009

Open Forum – The Plan E Charter

Filed under: Cambridge government — Tags: , — Robert Winters @ 8:37 am

There have been some people lately challenging the Plan E Charter under which the City of Cambridge operates. This includes some local candidates and their handlers. Those who have lived in Cambridge long enough will recall that this criticism tends to be cyclical with several candidates raising the issue perhaps every decade.

The primary claims are that the City Manager has too much authority or that the system is somehow not democratic. Others argue that because the City Manager “serves at the pleasure of the City Council” there is actually greater accountability than in a “strong mayor” system where the mayor is all-powerful and the City Council is impotent (as in the City of Boston). It’s worth noting that public process in Cambridge (as well as public comment at City Council meetings) tends to be far greater than in most other communities – which usually leads to City-funded projects costing far more than original estimates.

Discussion of the Plan E Charter generally doesn’t draw much of a crowd, especially in light of the fact that Cambridge’s residential property tax rates are among the lowest in the Commonwealth and the City’s fiscal position is the envy of every municipality in Massachusetts. Nonetheless, Plan E does have its critics.

So, what are your thoughts on the Plan E Charter? You can read the Charter here: http://rwinters.com/docs/PlanE.htm

We’ll take up the issue of proportional representation (PR) elections in another week or so.

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