On October 12, 2007, the Town Manager and DPW Director met with District 4 Highway Engineer, Patricia Levenworth and Project Manager, Mark Cain regarding the Summer Street Project. The following issues were discussed:
Project schedule: What is the schedule for completion of the work?
Within the last week, the State has finally approved the two outstanding change orders and has ordered the contractor to proceed with the work. It is realistic to expect the project to be done by early next summer.
Audible pedestrian-button locator beep: Why can’t the volume be turned down to meet Federal guidelines?
The manufacturer has been given an order to modify the equipment to automatically turn down the volume at quiet times to meet the Federal guidelines. Without modifications the equipment is not able to adjust low enough. The State Highway department has agreed to not turn on this beep unless they can be proved to meet the guidelines. They will consider turning off the locator beep if the problem can’t be resolve soon.
Lights at Summer St & Hospital Road: There are long delays for east and west bound traffic.
The new signals are activated here, but the traffic detection loops are not in yet. Upon activation, this controller will self adjust to the volume of traffic from all four directions. The timing is on a manual setting now and the State will evaluate it and make adjustments. The traffic loops are expected to be in and activated in the next 3 weeks.
McClennan Park: Wasn’t additional curbside parking and signage planned?
Curbside parking, traffic signage and a crosswalk are included in the construction plans and will be installed next spring, after the main roadway is rebuilt.
Traffic signals at Park Ave. Ext. and Summer Street: The westbound signals are mounted overhead on the east side of the interaction, directly above where cars stop.
A change order has been approved and the contractor has been instructed to add one additional signal head for westbound traffic. Once final paving is done, the stop bar will be placed back from where traffic is currently stopping.
Traffic signal at Summer St & Ronald Road/Vets Rink: There is a lack of synchronization between this signal and the one at Forest & Summer.
The replacement traffic signals and controller have not been activated yet. This will be corrected when these signals are converted over.
Summer Street Baseball Field Mitigation: Didn’t the State agree to replace the backstop and bleachers at this field?
There was a land taking here that widened Forest St. but the State maintains that there was no agreement to replace the bleachers or backstop. We can find no documentation of any such agreement. The only documentation that we could find was comments that sports groups were consulted and that they had no objections because it did not interfere with the ballfield.
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