DBQ trails are already on Google Maps!

In working on a google maps project for transit, I came across the google submission form for trails and bike amenities and thought that might be a good effort to encourage. When I went to google maps to see what was already available, I was surprised to find that Dubuque's trails and "bike friendly streets" are already designated and showing up on the site. To see them all you have to do is go to google, click on maps, click "get directions", and then click on the "bike" icon. The default is to provide you with car directions, but if you choose the bike, the trails and bike friendly roads show up in green!

Here's a direct link: Yay google!

Thinking of ways to connect with the community and become more relevant.  The "Bike to Work Week" project is good and I think very worthwhile.  The thing I don't like is that it has the word "Week" in it.  I would prefer to see something more ongoing and a stronger identification with the "Sustainable Dubuque" effort.  If we could make it a more prominent goal to help reduce fossil fuel usage as well as promoting healthy lifestyles, it might make more of an impact.

A possible slogan could be something like "Increasing Energy Conservation One Car Trip at a Time".  A general goal for those who have walking and biking access would be to eliminate 1 out of every 10 car trips (10%).  In my own case, now that I have some trail and hard shoulder biking accomodations, I can bike to work fairly easily.  My goal is to attain at least a 1 in 10 reduction, which would be biking to work once every 2 weeks.  I'm hoping to achieve more than that in the nice weather, knowing I will not do that in the winter.

As trail and shared access miles increase, more people could become participants.  With the emphasis on conservation, that should resonate with government agencies.  With the projected gas prices ($5/gal.?) it should be more attractive to a larger percent of the public also.

Targeted Projects from Trail Plan & Bicycle Friendly Community Comments

I reviewed the Bicycle Friendly Community comments, and the key measures that they suggest Dubuque improve upon are mainly infrastructure issues.  There suggestions are to increase bicycle parking at popular destinations, add wide shoulders or bike lanes along arterials and accommodate bicycles at intersections and mult-use path crossings (i.e. time traffic lights for bicycles).  The non-infrastructure suggestions included increasing the time the bicycle and pedestrian manager spends on bike projects, offer bicycling education to the public and promote/host more bike related events.

I went through the Tri-State Trail plan, and I tried to find infrastructure projects that would be feasible to take in the next year or two.  From the cost estimates in the plan, most of the projects that we could take on are signed-on road routes.  The list of projects I picked out are (they are in no particular order):

1)Arboretum Drive-32^nd Street to Marshall Park; signed on-road route ($1,470)

2)Pennsylvania Ave-Flora to Radford Road; signed on-road route ($3,555)

3) St. Anne Street to Flora Park; St. Anne St. from Chaney through Flora park to Pennslyvania Ave; signed on-road route ($870)

4) Wilbrich Lane-Asbury Road to Flora Park; signed on-road route ($210)

5)9^th St.-Iowa St. to Kerper Boulevard; signed on-road route ($945)

6) 11^th St-Main St to Kerper Boulevard; signed on-road route ($1,350)

7) 14^th St-Iowa Street to Audobon Overlook Trail; signed on-road route ($810)

Some ideas from the BFC comments, but not in the trail plan:

1)      Increase secure bike parking at popular destinations.  We could install bike parking at every trail head, bus stop and park for starters.

2)      Install shared lane arrows.  The trail plan does not mention the use of shared lane arrows.  On some of the streets that are currently designated as trails, but are too narrow to allow for bike lanes, we could use shared lane arrows.  In particular I am thinking of west Locust heading into the downtown, and the Heritage Trail as it passes through town.

Communications

I suggest we determine the number of newsletters we are going to provide the membership each year, perhaps two or three.  We set publication dates and article submission deadlines and be certain they are followed.  Perhaps we should pay a stipend of $25 to the newsletter editor for each issue to be certain this task is completed on schedule and that individual would be responsible to collect, not write, the articles and place them in the newsletter.

Pat Prevenas

Hi Board members-I've added your names as authors, so you should now be able to post content as well as comment.  Let me know how it works for you!

Beginning comments

Hello TSTV Members-I created this blog so that we could start clarifying our vision, mission, values and goals, outside of our monthly meetings.  I'm not exactly sure how this will work, but I think the beginning is for everyone to sign in as a member of the blog and then help develop and refine our strategic plan by posting content and other comments.The list of top opportunities that we received from Art and reordered by “votes” are:

• (8) Improved communication
• (5) Spearhead the Middle Fork Trail project-one of the last opportunities to develop a local trail while preserving/restoring  a pristine natural area
• (5) Get Asbury and Peosta into the Comprehensive Plan
• (4) Opportunity to update Plan
• (3) We have an opportunity to study economic benefit of trails, especially the Middle Fork Trail Project.
• (3) We can become the Go-To Place for discovering new places, for information about trails, trail-related activities, recreational bicycling, commuting, running, hiking, nature, etc.
• (2) Promote benefits of TSTV membership
• (2) Reframe TSTV in a broader context—economic engine, fitness, green/sustainability
• (2) Find ripe, low-hanging (easy) visible projects to get our name out there
• (2) Extend trail system to S side of Schmitt Island
• (2) Align with Safe Routes to Schools
• (1) Align with the County Health Plan’s focus on obesity, which emphasizes nutrition and physical activity
• (1) Need to regularly review progress on the Plan
• (1) We have an opportunity to more actively and visibly support the Plan
• (1) We have an opportunity to engage more members and interest by promoting the TSTV role in completing the Bee Branch part of the Trail Plan
• (1) Reengage the county Board of Supervisors
• (1) FDR Park mountain bike plan
• (1) Attend Smart Growth public hearings
• (1) Develop an annual signature fund/friendraising event (annual film festival?)
• (1) Untapped community support

Art suggested the following:

Next steps:

Review this information with all board members, especially for the benefit of those not at the earlier session.

Focus on the Top Opportunity list:

• Is anything really important missing?
• Do any of these overlap? (i.e., one is a subset of the other)  If so, combine them without losing the essence of either one.  (Caution: the tendency is to “glump” items into a broad, abstract goal.  Better to have a list of discrete goals.)
• Some of these will translate into strategies for the care and feeding of the organization; others are strategies for actually accomplishing the mission of the organization, the TSTV “deliverable”.  Maintain a balance.
• Do any of these need to be done in sequence (a true necessity, like needing to dig the basement before the concrete forms are set and before the concrete truck arrives—not just a desired, subjective preference.)
• Which of these will leverage others of these?
• Getting too long?  Whittle it down a bit.  What doesn’t seem as important now as it did earlier?  What are we still doing that we really don’t have to anymore?
• State each one into a statement that includes an action word, something that’s measurable or at least you’ll know whether or not it’s completed.  Words like “promote” or “support” aren’t good enough.  Sometimes this level of detail needs to come in multiple action steps to accomplish a “support” or “promote” goal.

Then take each item, assign it a person, committee, or task force, and also assign it a completion year, selected from the three-year planning horizon.  Try to even the work up over three years.

My thinking is that we do need to address communication this year.  But we also need to clarify our thinking and create vision and mission statements, as well as a short list of values, and then communicate these to our members.  Based on comments made by Candace, we also need to form a Bike to Work Week Committee so that we distribute the work to more people. Please let me know what you think!