Durham INC

Inter-Neighborhood Council

Making Better Neighborhoods

Http://www.rtpnet.org/durhminc

Minutes of Meeting of June 22, 2004

REPRESENTATIVES PRESENT

* Speaker

Administration and Announcements

President Cheryl Sweeney opened the meeting, and members introduced themselves.

Traffic Calming – Tony Sease gave a presentation on how to improve quality of life rather than make traffic less bad. That is, how do you make it easy for the child to cross the road? Are there ways to retro-fit places to be more walkable? You can have great human habitat next to high-capacity roads, though traffic engineers tend to think about making cars go faster instead of people being able to live around the cars going faster.

§ Speed bumps are basically hydrating a hangover. Young drivers find a way to make them “fun” to go over and if you have enough of them, you significantly affect the speed of emergency vehicles. However, Durham seems to have money only for speed bumps.

§ Narrower streets most effective – whether you do that by necking down, painting stripes to make the street look narrower, allowing more on-street parking (Maryland Avenue is no wider than its neighbors, it just has parking on only one side), dense foliage at side making feel narrower. Streets were engineered to be safe for cars to go at speed X, but cars designed better so cars go a lot faster. So part of solution is changing the design standards to recognize these changes.

§ Round-abouts are good in some places but are not easy for pedestrians to cross.

§ Two rules – cars will find the fastest route and retail will match the traffic. Traffic will cut through if the neighborhood is in the way, but a grid distributes better.

Doggie (and kitty) doo-doo – Jessie Eustice gave a report on cleaning up after pets. Our animal control doesn’t see issue but a lot of cities around country are seeing this as health issue. Pat Carstensen had a picture of a professional pooper scooper. You can get a pet waste composter on the internet. Some of the problem is practical – your dog surprises you and you don’t have enough bags. It finally is a self-policing issue and we will see about writing an op/ed story for the paper.

Duke Central Campus Re-zoning – After some discussion, Pat moved, Risa seconded, and the group passed the following:

The InterNeighborhood Council of Durham supports the Duke-Durham Neighborhood Partnership.

As the Comprehensive Plan and the Unified Development Ordinance proceed toward adoption, the INC supports the position that the new University-College District is the most appropriate zoning designation for Duke's Central Campus.

The INC also supports the list of limited retail uses that was worked out with Duke and endorsed by the partnership neighborhoods in 2003.

UDO and Comprehensive Plan – Pat Carstensen gave a brief presentation. This is the biggest change in 30 years. They are changing the framework, in ways that will let Durham do better development. However, when you have a 50x50 picture and cut it up and reassemble into a 25x100 picture, some pieces go missing. To make sure that neighborhood pieces aren’t missing, people should be looking at new zoning maps in areas of concern to them and what is allowed in those zones. The other big concern is the timing of the notification process.

Other actions / updates / items:

§ New Treasurer – Robet Larson is moving to Apex so resigned after 4 years of service. After a long wait for people to step forward, Mike Shiflett volunteered to be Interim Treasurer.

§ Nominating Committee – Bill Anderson, Randy Pickle, and John Dagenhart.

§ Minutes – May minutes were approved.

§ Treasurer’s Report – We have $1346.

§ Apex Street Bridge Reopening – Randy Pickle gave a report on what his neighborhood is doing.

§ Public Hearings – Mike Shiflett suggested that INC work with whoever we need to on the issue of making sure that citizens who show up at public hearings are heard before the decision gets made. Pat will write up a statement for next meeting.

§ Reaching out to neighborhoods that are not predominantly white – Practicality means we need to continue efforts. There have been informal links to Durham CAN, but we may want to make a new effort in that direction.

§ Neighborhood Hero Awards – Will launch next week.

§ Alston Avenue Widening – The next DOT monster.

Adjournment – The meeting adjourned with a reminder to look at the events listed at the bottom of the agenda.