This conference will now be recorded Okay, I would like to call to order the South Burlington City Council meeting of Monday, July 17th, 2023. Our first item of business is the Pledge of Allegiance. Who hasn't led us for a while? Megan, why don't you lead us? Thank you. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Instructions on exiting the building in case of emergency? So thank you to those who are joining us in the room. If there's an emergency, you can go out to left or right at the rear of the auditorium and then turn left or right and exit the building for those participating remotely. Thank you for joining us. If you would like to speak on any issue you can turn your camera on and the chair will call on you or you can indicate your interest in speaking in the chat. Other than that, we are not monitoring the chat for content. Thank you. Okay, agenda review. Are there any additions, deletions or changes in order of agenda items? I have one. Okay. Under other business, I would like us to discuss a recognition event for committee members who have stepped down. Okay. For other business, there's a resident of South Village has brought up some suggestions for improving traffic flow in Dorset Street. So just briefly, let's talk about that. Okay. Who's responsible for some of that stuff? Okay. Comments and questions from the public not related to the agenda? Please come forward and Barb, you want to speak too. So we'll have, there's a person in here, would you make sure that the light on the speaker is bright?  I think it's on now. It is. Kayla Moore. South Burlington. I'm here to follow up on prior commentary I provided at this meeting in the fall regarding the ban proposed ban in the cap for gas powered leaf blowers and string trimmers. Based on my prior comments, I had hoped and perhaps naively thought that we would be spending the fall without the noise and the pollution that these things cause. But I am following up now because I understand that there may be some reluctance to move forward with this ordinance due in part to the lack of ability to enforce it. And I just wanted to speak to that and see if there might be some willingness to to consider again the importance of this. First of all, my, my personal vision for this ordinance and I think for many other people, although I'm only speaking for myself, is not that people would be calling the police to report on their neighbors for using a gas powered leaf blower or string trimmer. I certainly don't think that's a good use of police time or city resources. However, I think that there are a lot of ordinances in place already that on the books, give the public the ability to speak to their neighbors and to say, Hey, there's an ordinance on the book. Can you do the right thing because we all know that, you know, scoop the poop is in place because of the harm that it causes to the lake to the environment to our health. This is very similar to that. I think that gas powered leaf blowers and string trimmers are horribly polluting. I mean, that is a fact. They are major contributors to greenhouse gases. They're very much under looked and it's really low hanging fruit on the climate action plan. There are hundreds of other cities. The entire state of California, as I'm sure you're well aware, has banned these things. They are not essential devices. It's not like a snow blower where somebody really needs to clear their driveway to get the snow off the driveway. Nobody really needs to use a gas powered leaf blower. They can either leave the leaves or they can get an electric one. They're not that expensive. It's really not putting anybody out, but without an ordinance in place, people are not going to make the transition. They will not do the right thing unless there is an ordinance in place. So that's why I think it's really important that the city council really consider this. It's on the climate action plan, which you have adopted. And to not take action, to not move forward with this is just sending the wrong message that you passed this climate action plan and then something like this that's really low hanging fruit. You just decide not to act on. I understand there's a lot of bigger actions out there and a lot more work to be done on that. But the pollution that these things cause and the noise, you know, many towns previously passed ordinances against these just because of the noise. Burlington being one of them. But now more and more as we see the effects of global warming, cities and towns across the U.S. are saying actually this isn't just a noise issue. It's not a nuisance. It's really a public health. It's an environmental issue. It's always real. And the the leaves on the lawn are really not that big a deal. So I just don't see how we can justify continuing to allow the use of these machines, given the harm that they cause. So I really urge you to reconsider that. And then second, the other point related to that is we don't need to strive for 100% compliance. Of course, that would be that would be my goal, but with many ordinances, it's not about 100% compliance. It's about telling the public what the expectation is to do the right thing to make the change to transition to electric. And and many people will then just make that change on their own. And if they don't, then they can say to one another, they can say to their neighbors, they can say to their landscaping company. Hey, there's an ordinance in place. Can you can you please, you know, make sure you're complying with this? It's not about calling the police and using city resources to enforce it. So I really hope that that's not what's standing in the way. And then I have one other item, which I wanted to just comment on quickly regarding the Hubbard Park bike path. Well, that's on our agenda. We will take public comment when we get to that and it's pretty quick. Okay. Okay. Which sounds like it's a long way away, but the step in between is pretty quick. Okay. Well, I'll hold off for that then. Thank you. Helen. Yes. Could I just say something? At our retreat, we all had spoken about how our counselor corners could be used for these kinds of directives to the public and setting an example to the public about things that we can't necessarily put into law because of enforcement issues. And this is not the only issue. There are others. And I would welcome the idea of all five of us signing a letter or a counselor corner with regard to using electric leaf blowers. I'm sorry. I'm August. Okay. So we've got the counselor. I didn't have time for the fall when the leaves are coming. Yeah. Well, mostly they're not used for leaves or used for grass. Oh. Cut grass. Grass clippings. That's what it's used mostly for. But I have other issues. Other rants.  Well, you can do the outdoor rants. I can't. One. Yeah. A soft rant. So I think we need further discussion on this. I don't think a counselor corner is sufficient as you know, but. That could be a start. It could be a start. That could be, you know, this is actually on your agenda under the climate under. Um, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Item 10 update on the implementation plans for climate action. So maybe we'll, maybe you'll want to stay till item 10. Okay. Any other. Oh, Barb service. She's on the. Screen, the big screen. So you would like to say something. Yes. Thanks, Helen. For those of you that don't know me, I am Barb service. I live in summer woods off patch and road. I was out of town. Now remote access allows me to attend most of your meetings, but I don't often speak. However, I've been listening to the discussions about ARPA and city priorities and know there will be more in the coming weeks. And Alas, an ailing family member out of town needs my help. And that needs to be my focus. And even tonight, 9,000 Girl Scouts are expecting me to join them in about 20 minutes. And I'm going to be here to be able to, to share a couple of thoughts. The ARPA funds have created a new conversation in South Burlington. And the decision about their use could have significant impact on our city. In the past, we've had lively discussions about a variety of topics that affect our city of late. That balanced perspective seems to have been lost. The talk is most often about climate change. The reason flooding across our beloved state is yet another issue of the impact of climate change. And I agree that we need to be concerned about the future for your children and your grandchildren. However, I also think the council has lost sight of the fact today's children and families need help too. The housing crunch is not going to be solved by more $750,000 homes purchased mostly by out-of-staters. Maybe there are a few modest units included, but even the definition of $319,000 as affordable doesn't affect our many South Burlington families. Then again, who said South Burlington has to be responsible to solve the housing problem for the entire state? In mind of my past generation, the American dream was a college education and home ownership. Much as it saddens me as a retired college president to say so, a college education is not necessarily required for everybody. I think both of those goals have been moderated. We need to live productive, enjoyable lives without a college degree or owning a home. And rather than a dream, there's a basic need for food and housing security and good physical and mental health. Is there some reason we can't consider nice apartment options at reasonable prices? All too often lately, I've actually heard people say, I like the idea of renting. If there's a problem, I can call somebody else who has to come and fix it. At the same time, I think we've already lost the city center that included open space. Had I understood form-based code, I would have been among the vocal opponents. Now we have a city center this beginning to look like a major environment with Vermont's concept of high rises and little open space for people to be outdoors or for children to play. Yes, there is open space in the SEQ, but what about the rest of our city? What about the parts of the city where middle income folks live, much less those with housing subsidy? South Burlington, I think, is losing its concept of community by listening only to the loud voices. And I'm asking the city council to take a step back, to think about the many who cannot afford to live in the SEQ. And while the voices of those in the SEQ are correct about the protection of open space, at least to me, some of them sound self-serving and nimbyish, even though I know that's not what they are. Mine is the voice of one who doesn't live there. And I support the protection of Hubbard Park. And I wish I could stay tonight to voice that support, but I can't. I do not support the continued covering of the little open space outside of the SEQ. I don't support eight-story high-rise housing, nor I just support more expensive homes with a modest allocation for a few. Morrisville was recently in the news. They came up with something that worked. We have something like that. Can we do some more? Let's do our part, but we don't have to do all of it. So yes, climate change is real, but so is the need for modest housing and spaces to play. Yes, even a recreation center for children and adults to recreate in the cold of winter, or like recently inside from the unsafe air created by fires in our neighbors to the north. And I did listen to the discussion with the school board and I know the dynamics of some of that, but I still want to say let's not lose sight of the potential for a recreation center. So I want to be proud of my city. Right now quite honestly, I'm not so sure. I will watch and listen and decide if I continue to be an active member or if it's time to find other places to invest my energy. And that sounds like a threat and it's not. I want to be really clear about that. It's simply a statement of my frustration and my concern. I'm asking you to consider a more balanced approach in planning for today and for the future. Consider a broader perspective behind your own personal passions. Consider all of South Burlington and the needs of the many right now as well as the generations of the future. Thank you. Thank you. Could I respond? I wish people would read the minutes that are in the packet for today because we have as a council agreed on agreeing for city center. So I just want that to be very clear that is in the public record and it's in the minutes for today. And I think that many of the things that you discussed, Barb, we are doing and I invite you to give me a call. Okay. Now I, I, Megan, I don't, I don't want to get this to go on long. I just am concerned that sometimes, not always, but sometimes it sounds like we are, we are losing that perspective that I am so used to hearing from this city council. And I have great respect for the dialogue, but I just sort of felt like I needed to say something. Okay. Well, thank you. I appreciate that.  Oh, I'm sorry. Are there other comments from the public? Someone who put their camera. I know someone put their camera on, but they, maybe they didn't realize that meant. I think it was just when they were coming. Okay. Oh, no. Colin. Larsen. Welcome. What do you have to share with us? Okay. Hi. Yeah. I live in Burlington. Um, I just wanted to come speak in support of the Hubbard Park path. Oh, that's later on in our, um, Agenda. Yes, you should wait. Thank you. Okay. This is for topics not on the agenda. Okay. Thank you. Gotcha. I was a little late. My apologies. That's okay. Any other. Commenters. Okay. Before we move on to counselors. Um, Announcements and reports and we are going to hear from the city manager. I just wanted to, um, recognize that, um, how lucky this community is to have avoided. Some of the horrific flooding and consequences of, um, several days of intense rain. And, um, Um, I was very pleased and, um, Jesse will share with the public how, uh, this community's, um, civil servants have stepped up and really provided, uh, some important, uh, support to those other communities. I mean, my heart goes out to them. This is going to be, um, probably a decade long, um, to bring people's homes and businesses and kind of understand, um, the consequences of flooding and intense rain that seems to be more common. And I also would just like to recognize the fact that this community has, um, provided a lot of, um, infrastructure for rainwater and, um, and I think, and, and the open space that we have bought and invested in. And I think that has helped contribute to being a place that isn't, um, making some of the flooding worse, but rather is an example of a community that has been working on trying to make a difference and, um, mitigating some of that. I mean, clearly we can't mitigate it all and we don't have a major river going right through our community. So we're lucky. Um, but I think we've also put in place, um, a lot of, um, zoning and development rules that help mitigate that and, and have better consequences for our community. Um, so I just wanted to say that and I, I hope everyone, um, can contribute in whatever way they're able to, um, help some of the other Romaners who, um, there's their city councils or select boards aren't sitting around a table right now, um, and they're going to be talking about, um, um, they're going to be talking about an audience talking about, um, all the things we're going to be talking about in a, um, new building that has had no, uh, consequences from the flooding or even the rain. So we're really pretty lucky. Yeah. Okay. So moving on to number five, councilor's announcements and reports on committee assignments. I'm going to start. I attended an energy committee meeting. Um, energy community is going to be hosting an event at the end of September, the energy festival. Um, they have lots of folks already signed up to, to exhibit. I think it should be, um, a really good educational event, um, for the community. Um, continue the committee continued going through the comp plan and I think made some really good comments and, um, um, um, and we'll see more from them, um, on that front. I attended the planet commission meeting as they continue to go through the comp plan. I thought that was a good meeting. Um, I attended a, um, an event at common roots where common roots has a vision to provide housing, affordable housing for farmers and, um, you know, personnel to manage our seven, seven hundred acres of farms in South Burlington, to provide childcare, to provide, to provide a, you know, a place where all those farms can, can sell their goods, uh, four seasons of farm stand. Um, I thought it was a really powerful vision and if they can accomplish all of that, um, dovetails with a lot of important city goals. And I'd love to start a dialogue. Um, as to whether we, you know, we can partner with them, whether we should partner with them. So I think, I think it's an interesting opportunity. And, and it was more to be said on that front. Okay. Great. Thank you. Tim. Yes, thanks. Um, I attended the pension advisory committee meeting last Tuesday. Um, just a couple of quick things to report. Um, we had a year to date increase in the balance of the pension, about, by about three, 3.1 million to a balance of around 43 million as of last Tuesday. The second quarter gain was around 3.5%. Um, based upon their recommendation, we decided to make some very small changes. Uh, we ended up moving a 2% from the emerging markets, equity and frontier to world equity. And we decided to liquidate all the diversified short-term fixed income into the limited duration fixed income, which was about 5% of the entire portfolio. And we voted unanimously to take those actions. And Dave Cappell is pretty much permanently taken over the representation by a CI of our portfolio from Pat Blizzard, who is moving on to other positions. So I was, Pat's pretty much his last visit here to, to Burlington, unfortunately, so. But, um, yeah, it was a good meeting. So. Thank you. Markets doing well, portfolios doing well. Knock on wood. Keep going. This isn't wood though. Well, it's been here, right? No, maybe it's not. Okay. How about this? Okay. Thank you. Megan. Yeah. And I might be missing alerts from other members of our delegation to Montpelier, but I just wanted to recognize that we have representatives and a senator representing our community who have been very, very active in the flood relief. So I wanted to recognize Senator Keisha Ram as well as representative Noah Hyman and representative Emily Krasnov, who have been, I think, very, very active in collecting goods from many people here in our community wanting to help out. And I know many of us have also donated, which is really badly needed and appreciated. I know as far as the, the work I've done, I am the liaison to the charter review committee and there was a meeting last Wednesday and they came to two big conclusions with regard to the city council and the school board. They will be advancing the recommendation to us to consider expanding the numbers from five to seven on both boards. As far as wards, they were not able to come to a consensus and so that will also be part of their report to the city council. They have been very mindful of the increasing diversity in our city and wanting to encourage people to have the ability to run and to represent the various, I guess, the people that make us up and we're a very diverse community and so there was a very good discussion about that. They're also very concerned about the amount of money that is being poured into council elections. I share that concern as well as the concern about diversity. So it was a really, I would say excellent discussion this last week. It lasted two hours and I give Peter Taylor a lot of credit for running what turned out to be a really various discussion as well as the committee members who have my utmost respect and the people in the audience. I was glad to see several people in the audience. Thanks. Okay. Tyler. I don't have a whole lot in terms of updates. I've been distracted with last week I was traveling for work and then on top of that was trying to pursue some grassroots efforts to help with fundraising for the flooding and the areas affected and I've been working to put together a fundraising event to support the Main Street Foundation organized by Mike Pichek and so we'll be running that on Thursday. But that and a lot of work on the Hubbard discussion, but we'll talk about that shortly. Okay. Thank you. I've been on vacation with my family. I've been cooking a lot. Take a care of babies. They've been about 13 to 15 of us every meal. So it's been, I haven't done all the cooking, but so I've been busy doing that. But tonight's a reprieve. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Steped away. They're on their own. And I'm here. Thank you. Can I just say two things real quick? I just remind everybody that in 2019, right? Was it muddy brook, right? Destroyed the Kimball Avenue Bridge, right? And we went through a couple of years of temporary bridges. And so that has been built back in. And I don't think we had any problems during the storm event. And then installing some resilience in the community. That was a, that was really important for us. Right. And the other thing is that if you didn't know a meter, mayor Pete, Pete Buttigieg was here today in the state with our congressional reps. So that was really great for him to be here. Thanks. Oh, and I would note, we're at the lake and we saw the one in two days, the water come up two feet. Wow. Yeah. Six inches, six feet. The first day and then six inches during the day. And the next night it was six more inches. So it's just amazing to me because Lake Champlain is huge. And to have it come up a whole foot. Or no, two feet, a foot and then two, six inches. So two feet in a matter of days is pretty remarkable. And it's just, it's just incredible. It's just incredible. And it's just incredible. There was a tide moving out of the cut. At the, at the Colchester causeway, cause the lamoille spills into there. And water was rushing out of the cut into the broad lake, which I've never seen before ever. Yeah, no, it's the power of water is remarkable. Now that Cambridge and Johnson have been, and Jeffersonville had been hard hit by the lamoille. Yeah. Just as much as the new ski. Yes. Yes. Okay. Our city manager, thing. We are at Councilor Emery's request staff is starting to work on a walking tour of City Center so we are targeting the late afternoon before your April August 7th or August 21st meeting so if one of those is better or worse for the rest of the council I would love to know that this week so we can schedule that tour and I'll send an email around about that. Also wanted to remind the council that effective July 1st the school impact fee ordinance is in effect so that is starting to collect half of the school impact fees the second half will be added January 1st. So in terms of flood response, echoing the council's comments, a lot of the infrastructure investment that this community has in the last 10 years led primarily by Tom DiPetro in Stormwater really did help protect our city and we're very thankful for that. As a result we were able to dispatch some of our experts to help our neighbouring communities and I wanted to highlight that today not only to thank the staff for their willingness to do that but also thank the community for the support to do that. These are professionals that we've invested in that we've trained equipment we've purchased and it meant a lot to the crews to be able to go and help their neighbours and bring that expertise to them. So on July 12th and 13th we had our street sweepers down in Montpelier with a crew moving the mud and debris off of the public right of way helping to move the debris off the public right of way. On July 12th and 14th we had our water quality superintendent and some of our wastewater treatment plant operators bring what turned out to be about 60,000 gallons of sludge from the South Burlington Airport Parkway water treatment plant down to Montpelier. This is one of my personal favourite municipal stories of the year but kind of gross. Basically the bacteria in the Montpelier wastewater treatment plant got so diluted as a result of so much water flowing through the plant that we receded that treatment plant with bacteria from South Burlington. Yogurt starter. Yeah, so we're doing a starter. I think it's great. Very helpful for them because it doesn't work without the bacteria in the plant. Additionally on July 13th and 15th we had a crew of about eight down in Berry City helping to remove debris from downtown and get that city operational again and then on the 14th we had a crew of two with our vector truck in Waterbury helping to get mud out of basements as well as one of our new firefighters down working with a crew from St. John's Berry pumping out basements. So we're really thankful for the community support to be able to use our treatment and equipment in that way and a huge thanks to the crews who did that work and helped our neighbours. That's all I have. OK, thank you. Moving on then to the consent agenda we have three items. Disbursements, approval of minutes from June 19th and June 26th City Council meetings and approval of the energy committee's application for municipal energy resilience program. I move that we approve. Second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all those in favour signify by saying aye. We have approved the consent agenda. So moving on to item seven we interview and consider appointing a candidate to the energy committee. And I was unable because I had terrible internet so I don't know who this person is. Oh, Fred Kuznicki. OK. For the three year. Yes. So just a reminder to the council, the energy committee did not actually have enough applicants for seats this year. So we have two vacancies currently for two three year seats on the energy committee and Fred has applied. And I don't know if he is here. He indicated that he would be here, but I don't see him. Are we ahead of schedule? Seven o'clock? No. No, we're right on. Let's just appoint him anyway. OK, so I have a motion again to appoint for the three year session. Thank you, Fred. All in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. So we have filled one more of the vacancies for the energy committee. And Fred had been on the committee. Yes, yes, he comes with a lot of a lot of experience, a lot of experience. That we know.  Sorry, it took so long. OK, so next item eight is probably why there are people in the audience. This is a discussion of Hubbard Park Path connectivity and materials to be used for that and provide direction to the staff. And Erica Klaylin, who is the DPW deputy director capital projects is here to give us the update. We certainly and I've heard from a lot of residents. And I suspect we'll hear from a few more tonight. But we'll start with our staff. Great. Thank you. Again, I'm Erica Klaylin, DPW deputy director of projects, big mouthful. Thanks for having me back. I was here on May 15th. There were some questions following up and given a lot of public interest. And I am back to open that up, answer some of those questions and any others that come up tonight. So I just want to first go over the project area again. We're looking at Hubbard Park here and north is going to be to the left of your screen here, so Spear Street is at the bottom and Nolan Farm Road is the S to the north to the left of Hubbard Park. And this path that we're talking about tonight is just on the Hubbard parcel. It is not going beyond it on either direction. We're just talking about within the property lines on the city owned property. So this is just a very condensed version of a few slides from last time public outreach to date and how we've gotten to the point that we're at today. The parcel was purchased 2013 or 14 in 2015. There was a visioning process that was led by the Underwood parcel task force, formerly Underwood, now Hubbard that then led into a 2018 master plan, which started to kind of hone some of those ideas coming out of the visioning process. The design for this path and viewing area started in September of 2020 or January of 2021. And there was a public workshop in September. And then, like I said, I was here in May. So in May, this was the design that you had all been shown. It shows the parking area, the path and overlooked viewing area and a public art installation. And this design, the parking area and shared use path are both paved. The other pieces are stone dust, crush gravel and some mode areas in the viewing area. And given that this project started a few years back and was in the previous land development regulations, the lines on this map only represented a 50-foot wetland buffer. But we have adjusted that to accommodate a 100-foot wetland buffer where it would have encroached. So on the next slide here, this shows an updated design. The southern end of the path would stay the same. And it's all the same design elements. This is just a very rough sketch. It would be flushed out to the level that the other one was and then continue with this, if that is the plan moving forward. So what this does, you can see the previous design is shaded in the background. The path actually comes over to the west side of the parking area and the crosswalk is on the other side. Going to Pinnacle and Nolan Farm goes across on the opposite side and goes along the west side of the parking area. And the parking area is also curved slightly. It would still have the same capacity and there would still be that hedge buffer so that lights or anything wouldn't go towards the homes that are just to the west here. But like I said, the southern end of the project would stay the same. None of that crossed into the wetland buffer. So the big question that came out of the May meeting was to explore options between a pavement surface and a gravel or aggregate surface. So pavement has been the planned surface based on those processes I had described. And so a gravel or aggregate would be a diversion from that, which would require a few steps back, but is possible. And so I just wanted to lay out a few other components that go into kind of the thought process, some of which was why we landed on pavement initially and other things are just things to consider as you look at this. So underneath the pavement, there is 18 inches of different surfaces, compacted gravel to make sure that it is stable. And all of that is still needed for the gravel and aggregate. So it would be the exact same minus that couple inches of pavement on the top. So you can see here, oh, I see a typo. That's a sub base and asphalt, but the 21 and a half and the 18 inches are the correct numbers of how deep materials would have to be introduced. The pavement accessibility has a big conversation. Pavement stays accessible for a very long time while aggregate, when properly compacted, is technically ADA compliant. It can run really easily from water or from frequent use. So it would have to go through quite a bit of maintenance to maintain that accessibility and some of it is also perception of folks if they want to use gravel or not. But when it is newly constructed, it does technically ADA guidelines there. Like I mentioned, the gravel or aggregate requires a bit more frequent maintenance to introduce new material and regrading it to keep that level compacted surface. Whereas pavement is a bit more low maintenance over its initial lifetime. It does require some heavier lifts when it needs to be replaced, of course. But on the yearly basis, it's a lower maintenance option. Pavement would be consistent with the path network that is planned off alignment of Spear Street. And gravel or aggregate is a bit more consistent with some of the other open space areas. But again, looking at this as the path and also part of the network. So those are some things to consider there. Both are considered impervious, requires the same amount of stormwater treatment and pavement, as Tom has mentioned before, and he's here to answer maintenance questions. They come up also. Pavement can be plowed, so it would be a four season use and gravel and aggregate can't be paved. So the construction cost is a bit cheaper up front for gravel, a gravel path. So that is the same exact cost minus the cost of the asphalt itself. And so this is just the up front construction cost, 175,000 for the pavement and 140,000 for the gravel. I know this is lower than the cost we showed before, but this is just for the path section. This does not include the other elements and does not include the parking area also in this calculation. So just lastly, probably should have put a QR code here on there also. But the project website has been updated with recordings from the May meeting, recordings of the public forum from 2021 and some history about the project and all of the different studies and visioning processes that have happened. They are all on the South Brillington website. You can go through the Rackin Parks website, go into the directory of parks and go to Hubbard and you can get a lot of information there. And just one last thing we had. Stormwater has been a big question also. So I got some answers for everyone today. They did some digging through. So stormwater is still in design and as things, the alignments have been shifting. Stormwater needs to be placed strategically. But given that there's agricultural land and some residences quite close by, I went back and looked at some conceptual stormwater plans. And so just to the west of the parking area is a planned stormwater treatment area so that it wouldn't reach those two residences. And any overflow from that there would likely be a swale that would bring it back to the roads collection system. And it's pretty much the same situation down at the viewing area, which is directly east of the common roots field right there. And it would be the same process, a stormwater treatment facility with overflow going into a disconnect or a swale that would bring water around the fields rather than going right through them. So I got those answers today for you. So they're not in the slides, but I wanted to make sure I had that for you. Do you have a cost estimate for? The stormwater we do not have a cost estimate for. I think there was just a single estimated line item in the previous estimate for that total cost. But I'm not sure exactly what that number was. So the figures you gave us are just the material to create the path. Yes, the 175 and 140 are just the path, but the numbers I brought last time were for the entire project of parking area, a path, viewing area, and the public art installation. Okay. Any other questions? Yes. Thanks for this update. Does the cost... Is it just for the path within Hubbard or does it include penetrating into the South Point area to the edge of the Bellavance property? It does not include that section. It includes the crosswalk to get across Nolan Farm and the curb work that would happen there, but it does not go outside of the park property line going south. Do you have an estimate for that yet? We do not. That hasn't been part of this project. This project is only in the park for now. That would involve, right now, there's a somewhat of a bridge, bridge through there, so it would be a bit more of an involved design going over the wetlands through there. Do you know if we have all the easements that we need to get from Hubbard to the edge of South Point? Anybody know? I believe we have an easement. Okay, yeah. Oh, just asking, yeah, okay. Yeah, since it was on the comprehensive plan and on the official map when that went in, I am quite certain we have it, but don't, I won't put it at 100%. Thank you. Okay, any other questions? I just had a question. Could you just address what thought was given to Cement, which pollutes less. I know it's more expensive and it's much more CO2 in production, which is something that everybody in this room is aware of, but it is, it's better with regard to the heat that's generated in addition to the leaching that asphalt. At this point, we hadn't explored Cement through this area. I'm looking at it kind of like a concrete sidewalk, the same way that it would be poured there. It has not been explored. A lot of that is due to the cost. And do our materials allow for one continuous slab, our equipment, I mean, allow for one continuous slab, like on a highway, for instance, or would it be the blocks like we see on our sidewalks? Do you know the answer to this? I'm not, I don't even think highways are one continuous. They're blocked too, but they're bigger blocks. Yeah, they're larger blocks, I'm not sure. Okay, like the floor of this building. Like a foundation of this building, for instance. I mean, technically it's possible because we have examples of that, but I'm not sure. It wouldn't be our crew and equipment that would do it. We would contract this out anyway. But yeah, thank you. Yeah, thank you. Other comments or questions from the council? Andrew? Well, I have comments, but are we gonna hear from the public first? Well, if you have some questions for Erica, then that would be good to do now. If not, we can open it to public comment. Could we ask Erica questions before she leaves? Well, I guess that makes sense. I was going to stick up here through public comment, if specific questions arise. I'm happy to, I don't know if you would prefer it go through council. Go through us, but yes, happy to stay up here and answer questions. Important questions. I would also just like to let the public know that we have had, I didn't count them, but we had about 150 pages. Okay, 150 plus or minus comments from individuals. I suspect all of us have read all of them. Some I received several times. And so in terms of the public comment tonight, can I have a show of hands? Who would like to make a comment? I understand that. I just wanna get a sense of how we, okay. So there's quite a few and there's some on, okay. So I would like to limit your comments to three minutes and also try to avoid, I would encourage you to try to avoid saying the exact same thing that someone else said. You can certainly come up and you're welcome to say, I agree with X and this is Y, but to go through all of it multiple times is probably not time well spent for the council because we've read it all. So we've heard it once in that format, but we're happy to have the public hear that as well. Although I guess all the emails have been included in tonight's information for the council, the packet. So why don't we start in, Michael, do you wanna ask your questions from Erica first?  Please tell us who you are. So the audience knows. Michael Mitter, I live just off Swift Street between Dorset and Spear and I've lived there for some 22 years. Is the bright green light on? It is. Okay, maybe get it. I'm not close enough. Now you are. There you go. My question for Erica was why do we need a stormwater facility in the park? Yes, why do we need one? The stormwater improvements were planned as part of the master planning and visioning process already without the path. It was proposed to do some improvements in that area with the introduction of any new impervious surface will make sure to treat any of the runoff from the new impervious, but it was called out in those two, the 2015 and 2018 plan to improve it anyway. Given the steep slope, it's gone down towards Spear Street in the past. So this would be an opportunity to add it and it would be right sized for accommodating the new impervious as well. So that impervious is only about four and a half thousand square feet for the whole thing. Is it really need a whole stormwater facility to handle that? It does cross the threshold that would require state stormwater permits and stormwater treatment for both the local and state level. And when we're collecting the stormwater we'll be wanting to treat it. And like I mentioned, the agricultural field and the residences downstream, we'd want to make sure it doesn't impact them. So Erica, is part of that requirement a result of including the paved parking lot? Does that, if the only pavement or impervious surface that was added to this site was the 10 foot walkway? Maybe Tom has an answer to that. Would that require the stormwater mitigation? That is my question. Okay. Good evening, everybody. Tom DiPietro, Director of Public Works, former city stormwater guy and the person responsible for putting stormwater treatment system in that master plan. That is there, Michael, because Bartlett Brook is one of our stormwater impaired watersheds. And so we've had issues in the past where water coming down the hill, that steep slope has caused washouts in the neighborhoods downstream. So when the city purchased that area, I pointed out that it would be great to have a detention facility to slow that water from coming down the hill and larger storms. So that was sort of the origin of that. Since that time, we learned that we can't put it there because of the wetland down by Spear Street. So with a large system, we had envisioned originally with changing wetland rules sort of is not possible any longer. So now the stormwater treatment system, such as it is designed, will be right sized for the parking area and the path. Okay, thank you. One last, I'm gonna be doing less than three minutes, probably one minute, and then I'm finished for the evening. Okay. But I'd like to say that I cannot think of an issue in the 22 years that I've lived here that has been so controversial and so divisive for this community. And it's a very, very sad state of affairs for South Burlington, putting neighbors against neighbor and neighborhoods against neighborhoods. It's really sad. I've already made my feelings about the path known to all in sundry. So I won't bore you with that again. Suffice it to say that I'd rather have it would remain in its natural state. Clearly there's a lot of support for this path and a lot of opposition to it. And I really don't envy you trying to balance the wants of all your constituents. And I hope you will be able to find the middle ground tonight. It's gonna be a hard task for you. I really don't envy you, but I thank you for the effort. Well, just for the record, I think another very divisive issue that we managed was the basing of the F-35s. That was pitted people against each other and was... And goes on to this day. I hope this one won't last this long. I hope so too. Thank you. I just want to know, we have a little experience with that. I just have a quick question for Eric as a follow-up. So will the runoff from the path, you said it would go downstream to the four acres? I couldn't quite tell from looking at the proposal and the topo lines. When I went to the park where the existing path is, it actually looks like it would run east. But do you know? So part of it is it wouldn't be exactly where the current path is. It would be slightly farther west because of the wetland buffers, especially now with the hundred feet, pushing it that much farther. And so it would go towards the slope and then continue down that steep slope. And so the two stormwater treatment practice proposed locations that are being explored right now are to catch the water and divert it, one between the parking lot and the residences, and then the other one between the viewing area and the common roots field so that it wouldn't reach it. It would be caught, treated, and anything remaining would be diverted. Okay, thank you. Okay. Someone else? Bob? No? Okay, yes. Yes, yes. Yes, I'm with Pinnacles. And I had a question on have you considered something such as deconstructed granite for the pathway which is payable and semi-permeable? And my other question was, this is a proposal for a mixed-use path, and we're very concerned about the pedestrian and bicycle accidents occurring. There are studies that have looked at this. The shared-use path, the rate of accidents is about 8.6 accidents per 100,000 bicycle hours. If you looked at a devoted bike path separate from the road, it drops down to about 5.8 accidents per 100,000 hours, and then on an asphalt road itself, it drops even further down to 5.7. We would like to make it as safe as possible and to separate, because the people who live in those neighbors tend to be more on elderly, and the health department and other groups want people to walk out as much as possible, get exercise, it's good for them. Having a path that is solely for pedestrian traffic would be preferable since nationally, nationwide there's about 100,000 bicycle pedestrian accidents occur resulting in hospital visits. They estimate it's about 50 times for near-collisions between pedestrians and bicycles. So we're very concerned about that. So just for me to be clear, you're representing just yourself, is that right? Well, actually I'm on the board at Pinnacle, so I kind of know what they're doing. Yes, the board would prefer that a separate, probably prefer not to have the proposed bike path be asphalt at all and have a semi-porous kind of construction even though it would be more expensive without a doubt because you'd have to have stabilizers with decomposed granite. But whatever the surface is, your position is that it should be exclusively for pedestrians? Yes, as opposed to bicycles, since it'd be much safer and all the neighborhoods could use it, it'd be for all and it's mainly a safety issue. Can I ask what survey are you referencing, what data are you referencing when you say it's safer? No, this is from Australia and they did a large study of the 100,000, excuse me, the 1,000 bicycle accidents is from our country and that's the National Institute of Health. Do you know when that was conducted? The National Institute of Health was in 2018, 2019. That's where the data came from. I'm not sure when the Australian, the Australian study came out at a similar time, but I'm not sure what time period it entails to get their data. So is that a policy that you would like embraced throughout all of our paths? Because as I understand it, most of the paths, if not all of them in the city, are mixed pedestrian and bicycles.  No, I'm just giving you the information for your knowledge about the shared path, but since this is a specific area, we'd like to keep it as natural as possible and we would like people to be able to use it. And there are other ways for people to get from South Village. I mean, there is a proposed part of the bike path from Nowland Farm Road down Dorsey Street to Midland Avenue, that's a blue dotted line that's part of your master plan. It makes more sense to put it there and not ruin the natural area. Okay, thank you. Okay. Someone else? Raise your hand. Yes. Hi, thanks. Beth Ziegmund, 338 Golf Course Road. So I felt like I should come up next because I'm a physician over at the hospital and I am 100% in favor of this path because I can tell you from where I sit as a radiologist every day, the risks to cyclists on the road are far, far greater than any risk of a pedestrian being on a path with a bicycle.  The number of accidents that I see every day, well, maybe hopefully not every day, but the accidents that I see are not bicycle versus pedestrian, they are bicycle versus car. So I just wanna start with that. I also wanna just make a couple of other comments. You all received my letters, so I'm gonna be very brief. I think that when we look around today outside, there's fog outside at 7.30 in the evening because there are wildfires raging in Canada. There are people in the state that are reeling from the effects of catastrophic flooding. There are heatwaves scorching the planet, all corners of the planet. We have to, we must, must, must stop burning fossil fuels. And one of the best ways to do that in South Burlington where 65% of our emissions are from vehicles is to get out of our cars and ride our bicycles. I know people personally who live south of Hubbard Park who will not ride their bikes to work. I work at the hospital, they will not ride their bicycles into town or to the hospital because they're afraid of getting killed. So I will leave it at that. I think you all got the gist of it from my letter. I would also say that I have a lot of respect for a lot of the folks who are coming out in opposition to this path. But on this one, I think they're absolutely wrong. I would ask them to just do a quick accounting of the carbon dioxide emissions savings from riding a bicycle versus driving a car, say five miles in each direction, 10 miles round trip, tune from the hospital, say six months out of the year on workdays and balance that number, which is hundreds of kilograms of carbon dioxide per person, per vehicle balanced against the impacts of a single bike path through Hubbard Park, the environmental impacts of a single bike path through Hubbard Park. So I'll leave it at that. Thank you. Thank you. Someone else? Yes, Mike. And then the gentleman with the orange. Oh, maybe it would be helpful if people wanted to just line up. Thank you.  And you can sit down if you decide you're against it. Yes, we do. Okay. Did you introduce that concurrent with me appearing here at the podium? So, Mike Semino, I currently chair the Recreation and Parks Committee and I was on the task force after Unsworth at the time, now Hubbard was acquired, as were you, Mike, I think. So, our Recreation and Parks Committee supports this path being paved. We support the parking area being paved as well. We feel that parks are for people and this asset, which was acquired approximately 10 years ago, has been very underutilized. And I think it's great that we're in the process of finding ways of starting to use it and plan for its use and getting more folks out there to do so. The original plan that was approved, and I know most of the people in this room are familiar with it, was a lot more ambitious and actually included a venue for people to gather. Since then, things have changed a lot and right now, the use is probably a practical one, but our committee would actually like to, you know, see other uses find their way into the park. So, Recreation Park supports the paving of the path and the parking lot in the park. Is it 30 new slots that you do support that? We support it. The other stuff, the art and the...  I mean, we're always willing to talk. I mean, it's a process, but we like the plan and we support it. Okay, thank you very much. Yeah? Two minutes and 17 seconds for the record. Yeah, did you hear that, Mike? Two minutes, two, 17, so. Yeah, okay. I'm Francis McDonald and my resident of South Point neighborhood and I live on Upswept Lane. Hold on a minute, we can't hear. Would you start again? I'm sorry. Okay, Francis McDonald, I'm a resident of South Point neighborhood and I live on Upswept Lane. I agree that Hubbard is a very valuable asset for our city as a natural area. I would like to see a paved path through Hubbard as shown on the Recreation and Parks proposal. I think that extends the South Burlington Recreation Path Network and it partially completes a missing link between South Village and the remaining network. I would like to see it paved all the way to Parkside. The drawings for our neighborhood show that there is a city right of way between the end of the paved part of Parkside Drive and the property line at Hubbard. So I believe that there is a right of way there that can be used to extend that path all the way to Parkside Drive. I also support retaining all of the existing grass paths within Hubbard and I really would like to see that the path that's partly being replaced by the paved path to remain grass so that we could have grass for the people that would like to cross country ski in the winter, snow shoe, whatever, so that they have a path to walk across and then have a paved path next to it or nearby for bicycles and to make it easy for people that need firm footing to walk through Hubbard. I would support a small parking area for maybe six or eight for handicapped only but not the full parking area. I think a much smaller parking area would help maintain the natural area of the park and I do not support further development of the viewing area or the artwork area so that summarized my comments. Thank you. Thank you. 222 for the record. Good evening, my name is Don Cummings. I live on Spear Street. Many of the points that I made in my note to you which I don't think made it into the packet but I'm gonna paraphrase a couple of those things, particularly the climate change emphasis. I think we need to find alternate ways for people to get to work, to get to play, to get to services, to get to shopping and this is clearly one of the missing links in the North-South Avenue from South Village to the North. You've recently authorized the widening or the adjustment in Spear Street which I think is excellent because it aligns with the bike paths from Shelburne so that the brave and the capable can bike all the way to the end of Spear to Swift now. I don't think I would want if I had young kids and I do have grandkids. I think I'd be very careful when my wife walks our little grand kid but she's scared to death to walk our little grand kid on that street. So alternate use paths I think are key. And particularly they need to be paid so that they're accessible and usable. Echoing a point about the parks, the park was acquired I think with taxes that we all authorized for recreation and conservation. The park name includes the word recreation. You can't recreate on a park unless you can get to it. So a paved path and paved parking. You've authorized DRB development review, excuse me, land use regulations that allow for more people to live in South Burlington. It would be nice if they had a place to play too. Lastly, I think the developers around town would think it very odd if you require them to pave paths but you won't pave one of your own. So I think a paved path, if you're gonna require paved paths elsewhere, you should be putting in a paved path here too. There's been some discussion that this is gonna adversely affect climate change. To the contrary, if we increase alternate forms of transportation getting into Burlington, South Burlington, it will reduce climate change. Thank you. Thank you. Everybody, Linda. Nice to see all of you. My name is Linda Norris and I've lived in South Burlington off of Bezant Way off of Deerfield by Overlook Park for 28 years now. And I first wanna say thank you to all of you because I know how many hours and how many meetings, how many evenings you guys have been doing this and I really applaud it and I know we all appreciate it. So thank you for all your time. End your leadership on this city for years, some of you. Thank you. I have so much to say and I know there's a time limit. The main thing that I have a problem with and I know a lot of people do who have been around here for a while is that we all want bike path connectivity in the city. Definitely. I applaud Bob and all of the bike pad committee on what they've done so far. But we want those two things, the second thing being open space. I went to one of these hearings the gentleman who did the facilitation for all of the quadrants around the city and I think we're called the Southwest Quadrant if you're west of Spear Street and go down to Queen City Park. We had the biggest turnout, the most input and the facilitator who I can't remember his name said for this comprehensive plan input, the biggest of any input was keep open space in South Burlington. That's what we need. We certainly have a lot of pavement. There's no doubt about it. And I find that this field that we spent $1.7 million on is a rural field. It's called the Tom Hubbard natural, it's called the Tom Hubbard Park and natural area. So we have this natural area that you don't get back after you pave it and you change its use and you put in 30 paved parking lots. We've not had bikes in Red Rocks. We've not had bikes in Wheeler. We have 11 parks around our city which we're very lucky to have around our city but you can't have bikes in the natural area and not change what's going on. I've had, I've biggest ambassador for our parks. I mean them every day, one of them every day. And people, I've saw someone biking in Red Rocks a couple of times but you have to stop them. And if we do this in Hubbard, it's gonna change the whole environment in that field. It is open right now with the beautiful, beautiful additions that were made when the park was bought. You guys put in a beautiful parking lot. It has never been filled to capacity. Have I ever seen more than five cars at a time? I'd be surprised. So while we're looking at 30 and rushing to that, I really can't understand and rectify my mind. So I'd take your time on doing that whether you pave it or not. The other part I wanted to get through to you on is on pavement. I bike an awful lot. I'm a crazy lady that likes to be outside all the time since I retired. I bike Spear Street a lot. I did a lot through COVID with my family and our daughters. We'd go do the loop down Spear Street through South Village and back across Nolan Farm almost every night. It is not safe. What we're trying here to avoid and what we're all trying to fix is Spear Street. And when you dissect the whole thing, you know what we're trying to fix? About 300 yards between Nolan Farm Road, going down Spear Street to try and get into South Point. It's about that amount of space. We're trying to pave a bike path through a field to solve 300 yards. Let me give you, because in the business I was in, you always had to cover the solution somehow. The solution, we have paved paths going from Nolan Farm across Spear down Deer Field right now, down Deer Field and you go down Pheasant Way over to Baycrest and you're back up on Allen Road and you're right there at South Village, even beyond South Point. You have not had to go on Spear Street. So you have an alternative already that you can ride on a paved path to get around and you don't have to create a new one. Okay. I also want to just before I close, I'm hoping people, I tried to get ahold of Carol McQuillen of Common Roots who have the four acres for least there. And I know that she's out of town, couldn't come and said that she provides, you know, 6,000 pounds of food to this food, South Burlington food shelf. That was this year. She said, and you know to me that she's gonna have to provide about 8,000 pounds of food. So I want to make sure we're considering all that she's doing there, whether she might need expansion for acreage there or not. That to me is a better use of this field and what we have done for integrated land management that she's tried to provide for us and climate change before you go forward with another plan that is developing this beyond, I think where we need to go just for that section of a bike path. I could go on and on. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. Who's next? Hi, I'm Havilah Gange. I live at 81 Butler Farron. I am standing on my own opinions, but I'm also the chair of the bike path committee. And so I just want to bring up a few things that I didn't feel like had quite been highlighted. One of them is that this path system, it's not actually just for South Burlington. South Burlington, we're kind of known as the cut through because we have all the streets that cut through from the surrounding communities into Burlington. And the same is true for our path network. We are a connection for Shelburne residents to get into Burlington. I know people from Hinesburg that will bike into work on Spear Street. They don't love it. They would love an off Spear Street option. I said, and we're also really connected to Williston and we're connected to other communities. And so part of our plan, and I think the way the communities are going forward is trying to make a more interconnected bike route. And this is a portion of that because it is part of the Southern access point into Burlington. And I didn't really feel like those things had been in the other letters as much. The next thing was I do support the paved parking. And part of that's access. And I think they might find more people who if they realize that actually is a park, I didn't even realize that that was public. And I thought it was somebody's field that I shouldn't be walking on because I'm going to mess up their hang at some point. It's also a bit of a tick farm, frankly. And so I think a lot of people would not use it. Who should have access? It was purchased with public money. It should have public access. Part of that is parking and not parallel parking all over Nolan Farm Road. I wasn't sure what 30 parking spaces looked like. And I was kind of wondering. So I went out yesterday to JC Park because I thought that's probably about the same. And JC Park has 40 spaces plus two spaces for handicap. So it wouldn't even be as big as that parking lot. And it may not get as much use. That parking lot also services a playground and two ball fields. Those, I think everything else I had to say was already in my letter and it's in the bike pad. So that's all I wanted to say. Thank you. Hi. Musical chairs. You gotta move down. I'm Jennifer Cohen and I just speak for myself and maybe for the earth. I'm reading a couple sentences from the famous Japanese philosopher and farmer Masanobu Fukuoka who says, we must realize that both in the past and today there's only one sustainable course available to us. We must find our way back to true nature. We must set ourselves to the task of revitalizing the earth, regaining the earth. That is the path society must follow. The greatest gift we can give future generations is to keep as much land as possible, natural and wild.  There's so much development and just I feel it needs to stop. Thanks. Who's next? Linda? Hello, I'm Linda Bailey and I live over in Chamberlain, maybe a couple hundred yards from JC Park. I suspect that some people are worried what a busier park near where they live would be like. I can tell you it's actually great. Hearing the sounds of the kids playing and JC Park is lucky enough to have softball fields. All of those things make much more of a feel of community in our area. I do believe that we need a paved path through Hubbard Park. I know that I have stroller age grandchildren. I have a friend in a wheelchair. I have grandchildren that would ride bikes if they lived there. I would never dare let any of those people be on Spearsbury even if it is only for 300 yards. So paved is needed. I do believe that people need access to open and green spaces. A 10 foot path and a few picnic tables will give people access to the green space. I'm trying to touch on some of the different things I've heard people say on the note of having a parking area back before this all became raised to the surface and I was out looking for parks in the city. I got to Hubbard Park and the muddy parking area I didn't dare go into. I wasn't even sure if that was a place where I should take a car. I think that a paved parking area with suitable bushes to keep down the lighting and all of that will make it much more accessible and more people in our community will be able to enjoy our green and open spaces. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. My name is Bill McMeacon. I live at 74 Nolan Farm Road, which is one of the residences that shares a boundary with the park. Let me start by saying it's the first time I've heard anything said publicly about stormwater treatment since, I guess, back in 2021 when we had your original hearing. So I'm glad to hear that that hasn't died and that my house has been had a really nice dry basement for 25 years and I want it to stay that way. So thank you. I just wanted to, I have a short, I sent a short letter to you, but I just wanted to touch on a couple of things that have come on tonight. Obviously, I'm concerned, and I know there are others concerned about safety, security and privacy as the park has developed. And I heard mentioned earlier that someone, I think it was Parks and Rec. I don't know if Mike is still here, but said he would encourage further uses of the park and had a former meeting that I was at. Someone said maybe we could have events at the park because it might be a moneymaker. Well, the first thing that came to my mind was why don't we have a wedding for 200 people down by the viewing area? What would that do for us? Well, we'd probably tie up the whole park for three or four days while they brought in the tents and the port of parties and two days to set up, one day to have the wedding and a day to clean up. So I would just caution you in the future about what sort of events you're going to allow and how large they can be. Because if you got three or four days for a wedding, that's three or four days that the public can't enjoy the openness and natural amenities of the park. I'm a biker myself, I'm getting a lot older and I'm almost to the EV. So I used to complain about hills and I still do, but I'm sure the EVs will cure that. I'm a little concerned about the speed of electric bikes I do a lot of biking on the Burlington Bike Path and I can tell you at 20 miles an hour, an EV comes by, it gets in your way real fast. So I hope that that doesn't occur here, but I'm afraid it will because more people will use the hills to get to this path and they'll use them because they have an EV and they can get up all those hills and you'll have a lot more traffic. I think that's about all I have. I did send you a letter and I know you have that in your hand. Thank you. Thank you. Next, Bob. Hey there, my name is Bob Britt. I live at Three Adams Court near the park. I'm on the Bicycle and Ped Committee, but I'm speaking as a resident and neighbor tonight. First I'd like to thank everyone for this important dialogue. It's a great dialogue for the city to have. I've submitted my comments, so I'll try to be brief. I won't try to repeat them unless someone has a question from my write up. The big picture for me is the shared use path. I think it's critical to have a North, South, safe bike route for vulnerable users. Yes, there's going to be aggressive bicyclists who are gonna continue to ride on spear, but to have a path that people can use heading North and South for commuting, for going shopping, visiting neighbors, doing errands if there's ends up being a convenience store down at South Village at some point on the corner there or I guess the soccer fields off, but now there's talk about some kind of a playground or some other facility. So I think it's important. The shared use path also provides a safe connection for neighbors who live in South Village, South Point. All the streets along Nolan Farm, spear meadows for people to get together for kids to go to see their friends without having to go out on Spear Street. So I think it's perfect. I think that people are gonna be very happy when we finally, when they're able to go from say spear meadow over to common roots store and purchase some farm goods. Hubbard Park as we know was purchased with open space funds that does not mean that it was conserved. It's a passive park, which the definition from the city allows a paved bike path and paved parking. So under that definition, to me it's an equity issue to allow people to get to the park and people who are disabled, elderly, et cetera. So I think that what the right number of parking spaces is, I don't know, 10 to 15 at least, a paved parking would be great. And does it have to be paved? I don't know, it would be up to the DPW to say whether the maintenance costs were ridiculously high for it not being paved. I think we need three or four benches in the viewing area and I even would love to see one or two benches near the parking so that when I go to the cross, or excuse me, snowshoe, I have a bench to sit on because I'm getting old and putting on the snowshoes while standing is getting harder and harder. One thing that hasn't been, sorry, is a wooden bridge, that was taken out of the plan, but down on the eastern part, before you get into the forest, there was originally a wooden bridge because even in the winter, you gotta go through almost through water and freeze up your snowshoes or skis to get over that. So please think about putting that back in to the plan. Bob, can you wrap up please? Sure. I just, please note with all this flooding, I don't know if you've seen the kingdom trails and other things, but they've been wiped out, all the bike trails that are not paved. So there probably is some that have paved that got damage, but please do that. And finally, I just wanna do a public apology for in my letter to the council, I said that the DPW missed an opportunity to widen Spear Street when it repaved between Swift Street and Pinnacle. Well, I was away in Wisconsin at a family wedding and so I really didn't see it all. And from Elm Street where Spear Meadows comes out, it's now Elm Street, South all the way to Allen Road, it was, the center double line was centered. We got two more feet on the east side for a bike lane expansion or walking lane expansion. I'm a running lane expansion. So I do really appreciate that from the DPW and the end by Swift Street needs a little tuning still, but we made a lot of progress going from two to four feet. Great, thank you very much. Can I just point out that on Saturday the governor was supposed to ride a 90 plus mile route from the rail to trails that have been completed in St. Johnsbury and of course that had to be postponed not only because he was working diligently with the flood victims, but also because a lot of the paths were damaged. Which is incredible because they were railroad trails that are, I don't know how many feet of rock and stuff they put them on, but they're not, they're like a real road. They're not a little path. Well, the rails have been derailed. We have hundreds of miles of rails derailed. Yes, and how many other people in the audience do you want to speak? Okay. We got two more. Okay. And then, or three more, and then, pardon me? Then there are some people online. Yeah, four on. No, they've already, and then there's, yeah, online, there's four online. Yeah, I got two, I got your names. I just wanted to take care of the personal ones. Hi. So please, hi. My name is Jean Branna. I live at Pinnacle Drive and I've been in South Burlington for about 25 years. And this just is a broad comment in that in 25 years in the last decade, I am shocked at the rampant development in South Burlington. And when I look at that field, at the end of that neighborhood, in its beauty, and I just cannot imagine that this one last place probably in South Burlington has the potential to be degraded in a way where we put up artificial lighting, parking, impervious surfaces, parking 30 cars. It's just unconscionable. I just, you look outside the air we're breathing today. My eyes are burning. You can't see the mountains on the other side of the lake. Wildfires are burning 120 degrees across the Southwest. Floods just in our own state. I mean, to add any more impervious surfaces to this earth is really old thinking. And I think we have to be more progressive in our thinking. When we say getting more people off the road, I'm for that, I'm a biker. I travel spear street every day to go to work at the hospital and I can count on one hand the number of bikers I see on spear street commuting to work in the morning. And I wanted to know, do we have like some sort of statistical study done for how many cars do we expect to get off of the road during peak rush out, peak commuting times? How many more bicycles do we think we will add to the roads and cars off the road? Have we really studied that? Like it all sounds good in principle, but have we really studied it enough to the point where we want to bring in the tar trucks and make a 30 car parking lot and put up lighting and put the bike path out there just to get that one stretch of spear street that's got to be another solution. I don't know what it is, but maybe somebody else does. But anyway, that's all I want to say. See Roseanne? Yeah. Good evening, my name is Roseanne Greco. I live on Four Sisters Road, which is pretty opposite where the Hubbard Natural area is. I'm going to read my comments in order to keep my speaking time under three minutes. I'm delivering to you a petition with signatures from 129 people on behalf of the majority of those who live closest to the Hubbard Natural area. I also signed the petition. These medals are very special to many people and to me personally. Walking on them, especially when no one is there and it is quiet, helped me heal emotionally and spiritually during a very difficult time. I am grateful to these lands and I feel a sense of responsibility to protect them. I sincerely hope our voices matter to you. Unfortunately, in years past, other councils frequently ignored the voices of those who live closest to areas where there were proposed plans which affected their part of the city. In the majority of instances, and I can recall over 10, the council disregarded what the close by residents wanted. We can talk about the F-35 if you want. In favor of what special interest groups wanted or what individual counselors wanted. I hope this council is different than past ones in that you will listen to the people living closest to this land as well as to the science. Saving this land and other lands in our city from human encroachment is an imperative for climate mitigation. Experts advise that technical fixes without preserving nature are half measures. Every bit of our natural world is important. We have lost much of nature because of the false reasoning that protecting small areas won't matter in the long run. I remember sitting in the audience a few years ago when the council was told by Vermont experts that our area harbors the most unique natural communities in the entire state of Vermont and that areas like ours are critical for maintaining the biodiversity of the state. We just witnessed another climate disaster in Vermont. Future disasters are baked in at this point. It's no longer if it's a matter of when. The science is crystal clear. Carbon reach soils store water and mitigate the consequences of flash floods. Nature is our best ally in fighting climate change. But if we don't take proper measures to let it thrive, we will be ditching the best chance to survive the coming climate impacts. Most of you have expressed a belief in human-caused climate change and a commitment to taking action. You even established a climate action plan task force and adopted its recommendations. One of the recommendations is, and I quote, protect our remaining meadows, forests, grasslands and farmlands from further encroachment, end quote. Please abide by the climate plan you adopted. Thank you. Thank you. Do you want to speak? And then we'll go to those at home. Hi, my name is Ryan Doyle. It's been really interesting to read about the past plans and all the effort that went into getting to a large master plan and then cutting back to a very modest path proposal. It's interesting because when people talk about sprawl or our developed lands, I think it's really interesting because when you look at places like Pinnacle Drive or Four Sisters Road, those are once places just like Hubbard Park that were then quote, degraded by suburban sprawl. Yeah, hypocrisy. Yeah, so when we look at what actually really happens, just the paved area on Pinnacle Drive that services the first six homes is more asphalt than what we're talking about for a path that connects across the entire property to the south village. That's a lot of impervious surface, but compared to what people use just to get out of their own driveways, it's not that much and it allows people to actually commute quite far on bike. I wonder how many people talked about how important climate change is, but drove here. I think when we talk about having spread out spaces, the narrow area of a bike path sheds water pretty quickly and with a large area of grass around it, that water can be absorbed very fast as well. That's opposed to about the 2,500 square feet of impervious surface that runs off of Roseanne's property directly into the storm drain and then without a retention basin goes directly into a wetland. I wanna make sure that we're very clear that we're being fair in the way we balance our discussion of use and our commitment to the environment. There's a couple of things that people haven't mentioned, although I'm very happy that people have talked about using impervious surfaces for the parking or not having parking there, especially what Francis said about making sure that there is safe parking, like handicap parking spaces there, it's possible to incorporate handicapped spaces that are asphalt or concrete and have the rest of the spaces be impervious, sorry, pervious surfaces like gravel. Also, if you look at Overlook Park, which is home of a view, a lot of white pines blocking the view, if you've been there recently, it's possible that that can be used as part of the parking for Hubbard Park because certainly during much of the day, there isn't a lot of cars parked at Overlook Park, but to do something like that, we would really need to make a much safer crossing. Obviously, Spear Street is really fast, but if we implement good crosswalk strategies, like having a median so that there is a buffer for pedestrians to cross the street and some bump-outs to sort of inhibit the feeling of speed, that would both be safer for people trying to drive out of that intersection, as well as the people visiting both parks. So while I know that there's a lot of debate over gravel or pave for the bike path, I think the obvious answer is paved, but when we look at the other ways to utilize parking and guess you aren't using their feet or pedals to get there, that there are some other ways we can approach that use of pervious or impervious surface and also the safety. Thank you. Thank you. Nobody else here? Okay, we'll go online. Loretta, Marriott. Hello, my name is Loretta Marriott and I also wrote so that I would go quick. I wholeheartedly support bike-ped infrastructure and like to see more, especially in the Chamberlain neighborhood. Here's a practical, interesting question. Would the bike-ped infrastructure be cleared in winter to the same degree as streets are? For example, generally dry for commuting with plowing and salting. Perhaps winter maintenance, yes or no, makes a difference in the paved versus pervious decision, perhaps not. It would be wise to clearly stay on the record that paved versus pervious decisions can vary from area to area so that we don't have to worry about precedent. Building infrastructure is great, but what about the budget for maintenance? The bridge at Lewis Crossing has needed repair for several years. Further, it needs to be changed on the official city map from a planned road back to its original and current use of bike-ped infrastructure. The Red Rocks trail down to an overlooked, sustained major erosion in the Halloween storm years ago and has been washed away little by little every year since then. The trees along Market Street whack me in the face as I ride my bike along the south side. I've asked a variety of city staff at all levels who will deal with preserving what we already have and when. They say, yes, maybe. I say soon, I hope. Thank you. Thank you, Mary, Loretta, okay. Laurie Smith. Good evening, Laurie Smith. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Okay. I live in Queen City Park and I am a planning commissioner, but I am speaking for myself tonight. And I just wanna say first thank you to all of you for going through this whole process. As we've been working on the comprehensive plan, there have been two very big issues that are being addressed. One is preserving open space and natural land and the other is CO2 or green house gas emissions. And I think that the path as it's planned can provide a great connector for transportation and for recreation. And I think that if South Burlington's 20 plus miles of disconnected bike paths can end up being connected, we can have a recreation and transportation network that rivals the city of Burlington's bike path. And in terms of Hubbard Park, I think that doing the bare minimum amount to make it so that this transportation corridor works. And I don't see a need for building infrastructure for a viewing area. The whole park is a viewing area. I think it would be great to have some benches scattered throughout the park. And perhaps for a parking area, think about starting small with the opportunity to grow. And if there are 15 parking spaces or 10 parking spaces and they end up being full every day or a significant portion, then it can be added to, but let's minimize the impacts that we balance the concerns of, as someone said earlier, both sides of this debate moving forward. So that's what I have to say tonight and thank you again so much. Thank you. Colin Larson. Hi everyone. So I live in Burlington. I'm a primarily a bike user. That's how I get around pretty much everywhere, which is great, but it means that in your lovely community of South Burlington, I'm often very limited of where I can go for excursions and events if I want to attend. So I would favor a bike path in Hubbard Park, particularly a paved one as it's more durable over time and it's easier to use for a variety of users. The most best way that we can reduce carbon emissions is to get cars off the road, which means that we need a connected safe bicycle network. My understanding is that building protected bicycle infrastructure on Spear Street is not on the table due to cost and timeline. If that's not the case, I'd support that too, but this seems like the solution that's being put forth at the time. So I think it's important in terms of the parking lot. You know, I'll just echo what other people said, car infrastructure is kind of a, if you build it, they will come situation.  So, you know, parking should really be carefully considered whether that's necessary at all. Thank you. Thank you. And Kayla Moore. Hi everyone. Hi. I just want to reiterate some of the comments. I'll be very brief. I think the Hubbard natural area is just a pristine natural area. It's really a gem. I think it's a very unique environment and I would hate to see it paved or any kind of impervious surface put through there. In addition to more traffic, I think that it should be left for wildlife and really as a natural area with as little human traffic as possible. I'm an avid biker. I have been a bike commuter for much of my life. I've biked in cities without having owned a car for many, many years. So I absolutely support bike infrastructure. And I also, my understanding was that the Dorset gap bike path was to be prioritized over this, which I suspect would be much less controversial. It's a, it's about a 0.75 mile gap in the bike path along Dorset street that has been approved. I believe there's even federal funding for it. And so I'm just not, I'm not clear why this Hubbard bike path has somehow become prioritized over that, which I feel like is more critical and less controversial. So thank you. Okay, thank you. Are there any other commenters? All right. I have an email from the H.O.A. South Village. If I could just read the first paragraph. Sure. So the South Village H.O.A. Board and residents of South Village fully support the proposed paved recreational path from South Point to Hubbard Park. We also would encourage the city to work with the new owners of the long property, Bellavance property, secure right away from South Village to South Point. And the region is primarily for safe alternative travel in South Burlington. There's more, but that's the paraphrasing. Thank you. Okay. All right. So now it's, Oh, we got some. Oh, okay. Thank you. I think Noah Hyman wants to speak. It's south of no one farmer. So there's a path from Old Cross north to Stady Lane that has been being worked on for two years since we started it. And it's finally going to get built this coming. The project is being finalized in terms of right-of-way needs before we can go through any conversations with property owners and then it would move into the final plans to go to construction phase. But it goes from Old Cross to Stady Lane to complete that one of the few remaining gaps on Dorset Street. Okay. This isn't a conversation with the public, but we got some additional hands. We get Noah Hyman is on the, and then you two want to speak. Is that? Okay. Well, let's let Noah speak. And then you can ask your question. Okay. So you can come up to the mic if you want to get ready. Noah. Thank you, Chair. I spent a lot of time thinking about the benefits and the cost of this proposal. Ultimately, I came to the conclusion for myself is that I don't see the real need. There's plenty of state funding, there's plenty of federal money, and we have the pennies for pets. Putting a impervious surplus over a park land that really should be kind of designated, and I believe it, please correct me if I'm wrong. I believe it was designated to be NRP or Natural Research Protection, or sometimes there's a protection for this land. I understand that the one that people may have for more bike paths, I mean, I get it. I mean, I love going for a bike ride with my family, but given what we are going through and what we have decided as a town already and what we've designated as finance, even though I understand how it can affect people and it would be able to have it as a bike path, I think we've already decided it shouldn't be. And that's why I am asking you to uphold that. I believe it's best served as wildlife. We don't need any more impervious services in certain areas. And I thank you very much for listening to me and I hope you have a wonderful evening. Thank you. Thank you, Noah. Okay, yes. I have one comment. I'm in the area. What's that? Identify yourself. Albert Gross, I live on Holbrook, which is in the same area. My concern would be, and we walk part of our exercise is to walk on Nolan Farm, which passes the beautiful areas on Nolan Farm. The fields that was saved just off of Dorset and the area we're discussing today. It would be my concern that if this is done, it doesn't lead to massive additions in the future. Passing it now in some form, the idea that there's a barn, there's gonna be other things area, other things added to the area, I find totally objectionable. It's a beautiful area. It was designed to also foster the wildlife of the area. I don't mind any of the proposals that have been made, but if it leads to addition of additional construction and filling in the field, I would be opposed to any of it. Okay. So, thank you. That should be in consideration too, and not that this is a stepping stone for further development. Thank you. And I'm sorry, you had a question. I apologize. I have a question, but I really have three points. Please tell us who you are. Robin Hall, I live downstream from the field, actually on the other side of Spear Street. We do get water that comes on Whaley Road and Deerfield. There's an ice slick. You can do a 360 in really quickly in the winter. Not water's coming right off of Spear Street. Anyway, in our neighborhood is also implementing a store expensive stormwater system in part because of the development up the hill. But my question was we talk about dialogue and I just don't know where you came up, where the council came up with or the planners came up with 35 parking spaces because I use the path all the time. I know we wanna get more people there, but it's 35 and it's impervious surface really the best choice. I'd like to have a here conversation on that from you. My second point is if you're gonna have a path for wheelchairs, bikes, whatever, could you also add into the equation a path that's just mode for people that wanna walk their dogs and don't wanna be on a path with electric bikes and so maybe that could be part of the maintenance of the park. So we could still continue to use it just in a natural pathway. The park is very wet all the time except for maybe high July. If you haven't gone there, you should because that 10 feet will probably be the only dry or certainly the driest part of the park and we still wanna use the park. So I've never seen, anyway, I see a lot of people parking using the park. I don't think we need the parking space and I think we could perhaps still continue with a mode path. And lastly, a suggestion of somebody earlier, could we also incorporate into the development of this going forward an easement so that it's preserved and no continued development occurs so that when you all do or don't get re-elected, there won't be another plan to add a bandstand which we have at Veterans Park or consider that maybe as part of the development to make it a finite project. And don't forget we have another park right nearby with all that parking. That's all. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, so council, it's your time to talk. Oh, I'm sorry. Pardon me, we all got it. Yes, we did. No, we got it. And I suspect everyone read it. Thank you very much. Okay, Andrew, do you wanna, Andrew? Thank you. So there's been a lot of community feedback that I feel I need to make some extended remarks and I apologize in advance, because I'm usually brief, but there's a lot to talk about. I'm in favor of the paved bike path. I wasn't originally. So a key aspect of our climate action plan is to reduce transportation emissions. We have a goal to reduce our vehicle miles traveled two and a half percent a year. That's a really, really ambitious goal and it's gonna be terribly difficult to meet. To do that, we have to get people out of the car. And safe for the bike and pedestrian infrastructure is integral to that. Presently, there's no safe way for people south of Noam Farm Drive near Spare to bike north. Only very experienced riders truly feel safe on the shoulder of Spare. My wife and daughter don't feel safe riding the roads and they won't ride the roads. I wouldn't send a young person to a friend or to school on the road, no matter how wide the shoulder is. I was originally against a path. I'd hope the city would be able to construct a safe, separate, shared-use path along Spare Street. But after many discussions, I now understand that would be enormously expensive, given the utility poles, the right-of-way issues and that would take money away from other important shared-use initiatives. I also hoped a shared-use path could be constructed on the foot of the meadow, parallel to Spare, but that option is foreclosed because of the presence of wetlands. The proposed path through Hubbard is a vital piece to our bike-ped puzzle that will connect north to Vale Drive, proceed through Spare Meadows to Swiss Street, where we'll join the current path on Swiss Street and then eventually connect to the existing path on Spare for safe riding into Burlington. It will provide the connectivity that our Climate Action Plan requires. There's a question of whether the path should be paved with some other permanent material. My perspective is a path needs to be usable for a season. It needs to be kept free of snow and ice. We see all around the world examples of infrastructure being built and people using that infrastructure for a season. I ride my bike in the winter. That's what we need to do and we need to have the infrastructure for people to be able to do it. The city and the engineers we hired investigated whether we can do this with permeable and crushed stone service and they said we can't. The maintenance would be too extensive and we can't maintain that kind of path in the winter. So it's not a viable option. We can't do it that way. We need to pave a path like we have in the rest of the city. The amount of impervious service is so trivial, compared to all the impervious service in the city. It won't have any impact on the ecological function of our wetlands or on that meadow. That meadow alone is 60 acres. It drains into surrounding forests and surrounding meadows is gonna be a storm water basin. The notion that that trivial strip of asphalt will have an impact on the ecological function of that meadow is ridiculous. It just won't. I hike in Hubbard all the time. I live right up the road. Out of Dorset Meadows controversy which I was integral involved in, my family purchased the 10 acre parcel that adjoins that meadow for conservation. I know how beautiful the area is. I know how important the area is. And I know the path will detract from the aesthetics of the meadow. And as many of you know, addressing climate change has been my life's passion. I'm heartened that so many people tonight that spoke and favored the paved path are also passionately dedicated to addressing climate change. I prefer the path doesn't have to be built. But I'm certain that to do our part to address climate change, we need to. That's on the path. I'd like to see a mowed path parallel to the shared youth path so people can continue to walk and bike without fear of being struck by an e-bike. I'm sorry, people can walk and snowshoe and hike in the winter. As Bob Britt mentioned, I think it makes sense to have some wooden, little wooden bridges and some really wet areas there that people sometimes just trounce through really ruining the reeds and things. It makes sense to have some wooden bridges to prevent that. I don't think we need to pay the parking lot. I'd like to see the existing area cleaned up, a little split rail fence around it. I don't think we need more impervious surface in a parking lot. I don't think we need to install lighting in that lot. The park is supposed to be closed at dusk. So I'm not sure why we need lighting there. It's gonna disturb your neighbors. I'm not in favor of that. We should have good landscape screening, not just to protect the houses to the west, but to protect the neighbors to the north from also being disturbed from the headlights. And I think we need some bike racks and maybe some some balliards at the end of the path so people don't ride their ATVs or other things on the path. I wanna address the large group of neighbors who submitted the petition, forcefully arguing for no development on the property at all. I think it's important for us all to reflect on where we've been and where we are now. This land was purchased in 13 with open space funds and at the time those funds were to acquire lands for conservation or for recreation. And immediately at the time in 2013, that was the law for open space for conservation or recreation. That's what was in place when it was purchased. Immediately the city set about implementing a recreation vision for that parcel. In 2015, a task force was created. There were members of the city's natural resource committee, the bike pad committee, the sustainable agriculture subcommittee, the planning commission, the recreation and artificial committee. There were five task force meetings. Each meeting was attended by the public. Out of that came a really extensive development proposal with barns and soccer fields and restrooms, 120 car parking lot, two entrances and exits from the field. Something that compared to what we're looking at today, right, a creative proposal. In 2017, there was another workshop which I attended. Folks may remember there was an air balloon. There were stations all around the park. People came and they gave input on what they want, what they don't want. Got all the feedback. There was a public survey. From that feedback, the parking area was reduced. The fields were eliminated. There was some more natural elements, but there was still the event barn. There was still lots of other things that are not in their proposal today. In 2021, there was a third plan that further scaled back a little bit more, gone with the event barn and the restrooms. We finally get to the plan we have today. We're talking about a strip of pavement for bikers. I don't understand the vitriol. I just don't understand it. I don't get it. I don't get it. Compared to where we are now, it's so trivial. And it's so important. I hope the neighbors will be able to appreciate that. I see this current vision as a win-win for the entire community. As someone said, I don't want this plan to be phase one of more development. I don't want some future council to say, we've got a bike path. Now let's do this. Now let's do that. I would love for us to agree as a council that as a prerequisite to doing anything on this parcel, we at the same time put a conservation easement on the rest of the parcel that we all know and we all agree this is what we're doing and this is the only thing we're doing. Thank you. Thank you, Megan. Thank you, Helen. I also have extensive remarks. And I just want you to know that I too have been at this beautiful piece of land. And actually one of the times I brought my parents and they're aged. They're in now late 70s and early 80s. And- Careful, careful. Well, I know. But my father wanted to take a picture of the Adirondacks and he lifted his arms and he fell. And we discover at that moment that he had a heart condition potentially, all right? He had no place to sit down and we helped him back to the car, all right? And this is a guy who doesn't want to be helped. So he's not aged. I want him to be clear. But for his daughter who loves him, I didn't want him to fall, okay? So I understand the beauty and the value of this land. I have on many occasions voted to conserve land. And I do hope that you can understand the merit of my reasons as I explain why I have concluded that we need to have a paved shared use path at Hubbard, I'm totally in line with the mode walking path. That's fine, that's fine with me. So here's the question that I asked my husband who happens to be the chair of the conservation and the rec, what is it? I can't remember. Natural resources and conservation committee, all right? We disagree, okay? And we had lunch on my birthday on Saturday. We were in Brattleboro and we argued in this restaurant. And then I said to him, I said, when you're old, older. Thank you. And maybe you'll be in a wheelchair, maybe you have a cane, maybe you have a walker. Would you want to go see the mountains? Would you want me to take you there? And he said yes. And I said, I would like you to do that for me too. And you can't do that at Red Rocks. The overlooks are too far. You can't do that wheeler, it's not set up for that. You can't do it at Overlook. I have to climb up on the wall. Those trees don't belong to us. This is the one place that I can take my father. Well, now he has a pacemaker. Sorry, dad, he hates it. It's the one place I think that many people, including you all, as old as we hope to become, will want to go until the last day of your lives. As we heard, Kayla said, this is a gem. And our residents have paid for that gem. And let's make it available to all of those residents. Now, how did I get to this, okay? I visited wonderful national parks out in California. My son moved out there. And I paid attention. And when it's on slope near water, it's paved, all right? So I saw that in Oregon. I saw it in one of the Redwood forests that we visited. And that's Sequoia National Park and Sequoia National Forest. And what I noticed in addition to the slope where there's water runoff, those are the biggest sequoias in the world. That's where General Sherman is. That's where General Grant is, all right? There's a handicap parking lot paved. There's a paved parking lot. There are paved, you know, very smooth surfaces, even for those who didn't park in the handicapped spot to get to the biggest sequoias in the world, the gems of our Redwood forests. And every American, every resident, everybody in the world who gets there can go see them and they're amazing. Let us not deny that right to everybody who wants to go see those mountains. That's what I have to say to you. There's much more, the questions I have. All right, clearly the cost is something that we have to take into consideration. I would like us to consider cement. I know it's more expensive. I know you haven't considered it. I did a very quick unprofessional Google, okay? But this is from paving companies. Concrete deteriorates with salt use. Let's keep that in mind. But asphalt absorbs heat from the sun, which will cause snow and ice to melt faster than it would on a concrete driveway. That's good too. And yet it causes heat in the summer. So just keep that in mind. Asphalt is less expensive, but concrete lasts longer in colder climates and needs less maintenance over time. I leave that to the professionals. I trust you, okay? Clearly, concrete leaches less asphalt. I don't want it either. I want us to stop the fossil fuel uses. I think everybody here would agree to that, most people. What I wanna say, in addition to that, a couple of questions. So in addition to accessibility and the cost of upkeep, which if we had gravel, if we had fine stone, we'd have to go back and back and back and schlep all those materials there. Imagine the exhaust. Just imagine the exhaust, okay? Okay, let me just scroll down here. So just my questions regarding parking. I wanna know more about the water table, Erica. Is it the same as the path? Is that a high water table where if we put in gravel or crushed stone that we would have to go back because of the water table? I haven't looked at the soil testing results in that area. That's something I can absolutely take a look at. Okay, and again, I do want us to think about the people like my father who's still hearty as an ox, all right? But people like I will be perhaps someday, like you will be someday. Getting out of their cars and wanting to go see those mountains. How close can they get to that paved path, right?  Should we actually give them a parking spot? Perhaps this is someone who drives themself but needs to use their cane to get onto that path, all right? And to go hopefully sit on a bench and see those mountains, okay? I would like us to at least have some places, parking spots that are paved, ideally cement. I would love for us to have less COT emissions but I know that it's limited and I'm just thinking about the common roots and I'm thinking about the natural meadows there with regard to the leaching. I leave it to the professionals but if we could have some kind of hybrid where if it makes sense, most of the areas are unpaved. Okay, it could be gravel, so it could be pervious which would be ideal, I think. And, but I'm not a professional, okay? And I think that the on-street parking which I had considered, my husband and I also had a back forth about it, that all of the people who are concerned about parking on their street where they live and their homes, you want there to be a lot. You don't want people parking on the streets because they're gonna turn right, they're gonna turn left on to Pinnacle. They're gonna go there. So just think about making the park, a public park and your street, your street.  With regard to the split wood fence, I'm all for it, let's keep it as natural looking. I think we have a beautiful dog park that has that split wood. I think that makes sense. All our parks close at dusk. So I read very carefully the comments about wanting to see stars at night. If you live there, you have your blessed backyards that you can stand in. I want us to know if any low light I would assume with cover so that the light would be directed at the foot level, right? That that would not impact the night sky for all of the people in their backyards looking at these heavenly bodies, okay? Because it is magical. So we can pay attention to that. If it does not impact it, and this can be an incremental thing too, I'm all for that. I'm all for, again, leaving it to the professionals. Can we start with 15 spaces and grow to 30 if needed so that we don't have people parking on no land and on pinnacle? Can we start with no lighting and then move up to lighting? I don't know, so that. But I really want to respect the night sky because I think that that is a value and a real asset for people in the area, just like quiet is in my neighborhood, which is Chamberlain, all right? So when the planes aren't flying, it's blessed to be in my backyard as well. I think those were my questions and just leaving it to the engineers. Yeah. And there we go. Who else wants to say anything, Tim? Tyler? Go for it. I'll be last. Okay. I won't, I'll try not to retrain over around that Megan and Andrew have already covered, but I would like to thank each of you for giving this careful consideration because again, I recognize it's not an easy decision and I know that, particularly for Andrew, I know this is a change of heart so I really appreciate you giving the time and consideration that the issue, not that you wouldn't, but that the issue deserves and I really appreciate you being willing to keep, both of you being willing to keep an open mind. Megan, I echo your sentiments about accessibility. My father was Parkinson's and he lived for many years in Dorset Park and it was really hard to watch him try and navigate the terrain at Wheeler. It was heartbreaking and I am not comfortable for a number of reasons. Introducing, taking land that was purchased with tax payer dollars and saying that it's okay to make it accessible for some, but not for all. I'm just not. So thank you for bringing that to the forefront. And yeah, I'll pause there. On the, Andrew, you mentioned safety. One of the proposals that was going back and forth was again, can we repurpose more of Spear Street for a dedicated bike lane? And this was something as a former professional cyclist, someone who is I think probably on the spectrum of comfort in terms of riding on Spear Street is definitely more on the aggressive rather than the conservative end. This is something that I was possibly open to until I started really digging into doing the research. And it's, I think, I'll spare everyone the details, but a 2019 study pretty conclusively, proved how in major metro markets, specifically Denver, which is one of the more bike-friendly cities in the United States, that this process is markedly more dangerous for cyclists and for path users, cyclists, commuters, than dedicated standalone separate bike paths. And interestingly enough, the problem is made markedly worse the harder you work at it. If you introduce a median, if you introduce visual elements that divide the bike lane from the road, it makes the cyclist harder to see, it makes the rider harder to see, and it causes more lethal accidents. All that aside, I think the most convincing argument for not going down this road, excuse me, sorry, bad pun, was from, what is his name? Dave's, I think arguably fewer people in the United States have done more to advance bicycle infrastructure than a gentleman named Dave Snyder. He's arguably the nation's foremost expert on bicycle infrastructure. He's currently the director of Infrastructure Policy for People for Bikes, which is the largest lobbying group for bicycles and pedestrian walkways in the United States. Dave spent the last 25 years fighting, first in California, and then in other parts of the country for shared use bike lanes and for proposals similar to what we would do on Spear Street if we were to go down that road. And in this, this January, after he started a different role with People for Bikes, after 25 years of doing, advancing this work, he reflected on all of those efforts. And I think this sums it up more than anything that any of us could say. I was wrong. The efforts to try and use dual-purpose paths on the side of a city street is not the right approach. And that the research has validated that and that standalone paths are the way to go. Climate change, Michael, you're correct. We've identified climate change as one of the, if not the most important issue that we as a city need to tackle. And the largest contributing factor for greenhouse emissions is transportation. I feel strongly that we should address that issue head-on. And the best way to do that is to, as a passionate cyclist, it is hard to get people to change how they transport one themselves and how they locomote. It's damn near impossible. And if we're going to do it and we're gonna do it right, we need to take every single possible barrier to adoption that we can out of the equation. So I don't feel that this is an area, if this is something we truly wanna do and this is an issue we truly wanna take seriously, I think we need to take a serious approach. And that's why I'm voting for paving the path. I'm open to other discussions around how else we could help mitigate some of the objections, but accessibility and, accessibility and minimizing barriers to adoption for alternative means of transport are my two top priorities. And the last thing I'll say is, again, I don't think any of us, I don't wanna speak for anyone else in the council, but I don't think any of us have come to this decision lightly. Rosanne, your voices have been heard. Truly. It's just, it's a difficult decision and it's, but that's the job. Okay, thank you. Tim. Yeah, when I went to college, I graduated in 81, I got there in 77 and they have this huge quadrangle in the middle of the school with all these nice large granite buildings around the edges, beautiful. And I noticed walking between classes that it was amazing that all the students were walking right on the sidewalks. And there's weird angles of sidewalks going across this quadrangle. There's a reason for my story. And I asked somebody, somebody was like, it's amazing how the students actually stayed at the sidewalks and don't tread on the grass. And somebody said, no. When they finished redoing the whole quad, they planted grass and then they waited for all the cow paths to appear of all the students treading between classes and then they poured the sidewalks where they traveled so that they got the paths right. And I'm like, that's incredible. So when I discovered that I could go up Midland and then go up North Jefferson and then cross over what was then the long property through this little tiny wet footpath which sometimes is dry and then cross over to South Point and this is on a run that starts at Cybermill and then ends up at Nolan Farm Road and goes back then in my house and then ended up at the Hubbard property and then again, there would be these like puddles that you'd have to walk around and deep grass to get around. I felt like one of those cows that found the shortest distance to doing two points and I'm thinking, well, this would be a great opportunity to establish this path because this links South Village, Sovi to the long property or the Bellamance property to Sopo, which is South Point, right? To the Hubbard property, to the Pinnacle property to now the Spermenos property. And which would then link up to other neighborhoods as well. So for that reason, and this is the only thing in that park that I really support right now besides the current parking lot and we're gonna have to talk about that later on. I don't want to expand it, but that path represents a really good network interconnection for all the other paths that are in the city. And after hearing public works talk about the difference between just putting down sure pack or putting down pavement, the difference is three and a half inches of pavement and the cost is not that much different. So in terms of the wintertime being able to maintain it and plow it, which I think is important for a lot of people to be able to use it. And it really is, Councilor Chalonic said, it's a very small amount of impervious surface and I'm not even sure how pervious the surface is on that path anyway right now where the way of water doesn't drain anywhere. So I think that I obviously support it and you've got to keep in mind this trade-off between our comprehensive plan objectives, right? Lowering CO2 by having alternative transportation methods versus the, a lot of people would love to see that park just left totally natural. And I think that that is a great goal to have but you've got to let some people get into that park. You've got to have some respect for the equity equation here for people to be able to get in the park and then get across it and get to other neighborhoods. The one thing that I worry about is our ability to convince the Bellavances and then be able to get an engineering assessment done on what it would take to connect North Jefferson across South Point to the Hubbard Park. So, and until I think we have that ability, we, I don't think we should really do anything until we have a better kind of, you know, across the engineering work and the plan across all the properties. Cause I don't think it makes sense to do the Hubbard Park and then kind of have it stopped cause we don't have the money for the, for the South Point. And then we have grass and sidewalk and street. And then we have a muddy path across the Bellavance property to North Jefferson. So, but I do support the path and I support paving it. I think it's the best way to go. Okay. Well, being last in line, I don't think I can add a whole lot and I'm not going to give a long speech. What I am going to say is this is what I thought I heard as a consensus of the group and the direction that we'd like to give the staff. It appears that let's pave it. Maybe you can look at cement for some parking for handicap, but some kind of hard path, you know, hard path. So that seems to be yes for everyone. It sounded like for most the benches, you know, maybe wooden benches, but some kind of benches so you can sit, maybe to put on your snow shoes at one end and sit and watch the view at another. And depending on how long the path goes, maybe another bench on the south end. Helen implicit in what you're saying is no constructive viewing area, just benches, right? Right, yes. I'll get to that, yep. It seemed as if everyone was certainly found a mode path to be an acceptable way for people who don't need to walk on a paved path that might want a snow shoe or cross country ski or just like to walk on grass. They don't want to walk where there's bikes going by. It sounds like a small parking area. Let's start little. And if we need to expand it, I think there was no clarity in my mind that yeah, it needs to be paved. Could it be, you know, again, I think it's really up to our professionals in many ways, but we got a couple of people and I agree with a split rail fence. I am not sure lights are needed. And again, I think Megan said maybe we get to that at some point, but I think the thoughts of not having light pollution when one of the nice aspects of that area is perhaps to see the stars or at least for the neighbors to appreciate the stars. And then I also heard from a couple of people, I would like to pursue personally what it would take to conserve the park. So we do the bike path. We do some kind of parking with the fence around it. At this point, no lights, a couple of benches. And then I feel, I put more than a couple. Well, whatever, I don't know how many benches. Some benches, some bike benches, some bike things too. And put your snow shoes on. I thought Bob's- Yes, no, I mentioned that. I think that sounds great. At the entrance. And I also, you know, I think it's important to consider or pursue conserving the rest. Because I do believe that this is a natural park area. I mean, maybe at some point, we have some bridges that will go over wet places in Wheeler. I think the youth conservation punchins, the youth conservation, Vermont youth conservation, built those and you can get grants to do that. It doesn't have to be done now. And I do think Tim has a point about working with the neighbors to the south to see, can we really make this a connected bike path? So if I've missed anything, does that sound like most people would feel that that's a reasonable approach to this? Yes, can I ask one question? Hello, sorry. We're all kids at heart. Yes. So just a question about the width of the path, right? So the width of, I think most of the sheer news are 10 feet or eight feet. Or eight feet, seven feet. So what? Our standard is 10 feet and they usually have a one to two foot gravel shoulder on the outside that often gets grown in with grass but that helps stabilize the path. Okay, so that explains it. Cause I mean, I went and measured a lot of the paths and they're all eight, but you're saying that's because there was a foot on each side that's now you can't see anymore. Well, oftentimes the pavement itself is 10 feet. There are some sections where they had to go down to eight. I mean, it's not. I measured a lot of paths. No, I'm talking about the South Brownington paths. They're all eight. Andrew, the DOT's guidelines for design standards are 10 feet of paved. And that's relatively new, but that is the best. Presumably, that's to allow pedestrians and bikes to pass each other safely. But if we're gonna have like a mode which I think we should path for pedestrians parallel to the bike path.  That's an access issue. Paved is shared use. You just have to be careful with bikes. And I would agree that e-bikes may be an issue in the future. And that's another thing that the city might have to respond to.  And he's not. And he's not. But my fault, well. Mine is. Over his dead body. Somebody told me, okay. Walking along with my water. No, you're not. And had, you know, an electric bike go whizzing by at 30 miles an hour. That would be disconcerting to me. So that's an issue to look to the future. So I, does that give you direction, Sarah? Can I add one thing that really is relevant? Sure. Thank you very much. I'm Sarah Dopp, the president of the South Wellington Land Trust and a resident on Cheese Factory Road. I purposely didn't speak before because you had received our South Wellington Land Trust statement. And I knew you had read it. And I wanted to leave time for other people. And I heard such a variety of points made on all sides of this issue. It was truly illuminating. The one thing I wanted to say was in regard to the idea of a possible conservation easement for this in the future, the South Wellington Land Trust in the last couple of weeks did reach out to the Lake Champlain Land Trust just to discuss this whole thing, get their thoughts and their expertise. And I certainly can't speak for them. They haven't taken it to their board, but their director and their executive director and their chair of their board did walk up on Hubbard in the last week and said, this would be a great easement for us to hold. So, well, you know, that's not a promise. That's not anything. They'd have their process. But I just wanted you to know that it could get real. And there is somebody who's got some real interest in it. Great. Thank you. Jessie, you wanted to make a few comments. Sure. I feel like we do need to revisit the path width because our standard is 10. So if you're giving us a direction to change that standard, I just want to check it. I don't think you are. I was asking a question. Okay. Okay. No, 10. 10 it is. Great. Helen and Megan's comments, it was addressed. Excellent. So I guess three additional questions or one request and three additional questions, it would really help staff if you all could vote. It sounds like you're a unanimous, but I would love a vote just for the record. But before you do that, I do, I think the lighting is going to be very hard for our public safety professionals. So I would like us to be able to bring you back a proposal for a very low directed single or two lights on either side of the paving for your consideration. I think our public safety folks, even though, yes, our parks close at dusk, we don't gate them, we don't keep people out. If there is no light whatsoever, there's going to be a lot of, there could be a lot of public safety issues in the future. So that's one small request. The second question is, are you eliminating with the proposal that Helen outlined the public art from the project? Okay. Yes, yes. And the bench thing, the fancy bench thing. Okay. So just so the council is aware that is a commissioned piece that the public art committee has been working on? I know it's on our agenda. I saw it for the next month or something, right? Yeah. It's hard on her. So we can obviously redirect that somewhere. I just wanted you to know that your committee had been working on that. And so I would request that you take a vote on this. And then I think the follow up question is, this is kind of an unusual way. We don't usually design parks this way. So with that vote, we have authority to go forward with final design bidding, whatnot. So I'll make that motion to give final authority to city staff to go forward with bidding design and whatnot. I'm sounding like my sons and... I'll second that. Okay. I just have a question about the lighting. I understand that that would be public safety. I'm trying to think of another bike path that the city has that has low lighting. I mean, some of them certainly have street lighting. You have light going over the path on the street. We don't have any lighting at Hubbard, do we? There's no lighting in Farrell Park on the bike path that I know of. I don't think the lighting is a reference to the path so much as it is the parking area. Yeah, I was gonna bring that up. The lighting is the parking area. The lighting, they're currently, it's proposed for six fixtures that are not full parking light height. They're more of the 15 foot range rather than the 30, 35 foot. You would see in a typical parking lot. And so there's only about six of them and they all... Are there shorter ones? Can you do short, 15 feet seems, I don't know, two of Tim. That's tall. We can look at lower. You know, I think it's some of the national parks that have like very low lighting at a two, three foot level. Just so you can see your feet, like very dim low lighting. So you can see your feet. There are certain things we had gone back and forth on this. There was some talk about being able to see someone's face, being able to recognize someone's face in terms of the public safety. And so it could, there are options to go lower. We typically don't go too much lower because when a parking lot would be paved during the winter, we don't wanna be knocking over low ballards. So something just a little bit taller but still very minimal. That's something about the fence too, right? So could we think the, because the fence could be knocked by a plow, could it be a fence along Nolan Road? The current plan had a stone wall around the entrance that you would be able to see from Nolan Farm when you turned in a short stone wall on either side of the driveway. I think a split rail is the one we're gonna have. But I'm sorry, but we not really maybe fully discussed the nature of the lot. Maybe we punted that a little bit. Helen, when Helen was speaking, I thought Helen was articulating support for not an asphalt lot, maybe a couple of asphalt spots that are 80 accessible. So I don't, you know. I'm not thinking the whole lot would need to be plowed. Oh, but you still need to plow the gravel. The gravel can be plowed according to what I read. And so I think we should plow that lot in the winter. Most definitely. We want people to come and go snowshoeing and go cross-country skiing and, right? People do. Right. They can't travel there today. But the idea is, again, that it's accessible to our entire city and not just the folks that live adjacent to it. Lot by the dog park plowed by Wheeler? There's no lot. Yes. Yes, it is. The Wheeler was plowed? Yes, it is plowed. But there's no lights. The lights. Yeah. Let's not pay a view. And there aren't lights at Red Rock. Right. Where the parking is. Where the parking is. Like halfway there. Right. Well, yeah. And there's street lights. But there's no lights inside the park at all. Right. No, right. I wasn't suggesting. Well, we aren't talking about lights inside. Yeah. Yeah. My? We have. I'm sorry. Did you have some other? I would like a vote. I had a point of clear. Yeah, we had a motion on the table. In a second. In a second. There's a second. You can make a comment. I mean, let other people. I saw them again. Come up so the people online can hear you. Up so you can hear, please.  I had a point of clarification also on the motion after Mike speaks. Pardon me? I had a question, a clarifying question. Oh, okay. Sounds like he's taking. Oh, go ahead. I'll go after Mike. Okay. Mike's in Manoga. So I'm curious about how this motion will read and most particularly whether you are saying that we'll pave it only if we put a conservation easement on the park. That's not part of the motion, Mike. Okay. I just, I just wanted to. Make sure that that linkage wasn't there, that we weren't going to hold paving hostage until we got a conservation easement. I think that's a big discussion. I know how much we went through with Wheeler. I was on the task force for that one too.  So anyway, that was my question. Thank you for your answer. So Mike, I think this conservation easement would be a lot simpler. And I moved to amend the motion that we don't do anything on the park unless there's also a conservation easement in place. I don't think that's a friendly amendment. I would ask that it not hold up what is I think an important improvement because I've been on the council a long time and conservation easements take years. And so. Let's do it quicker. I would say, if we could move so many things quicker, we would believe me, this is not where there's a will, there's a way. Some things move slowly. So I would consider another friendly amendment that has to do with conservation easement that could be on a future agenda that would not be a condition, however. I agree with Megan. Yeah, I won't second that.  Okay. But before you take the vote, I do have another question. Okay. So the question is, can the work that gets done to analyze how this will be built, can it include South Point? I mean, and tell us how much it's gonna cost to do South Point. So the pre-design work, can you please, is it feasible to add that in at this time? On the existing easement, on the section of the existing easement to get to South Point Upswept, we could do a quick cost estimate to see what it would entail and permitting implications. I don't feel comfortable saying, yes, we can add it to the project, but we can explore what it would take and what it might add to the project. I wanna know, right. Yeah. And Eric. I think that's important. And something that makes me feel confident, and I just want to, you know, I'm thinking about Andrew and, you did come a far away in your thinking as well as the people in the audience. Erica, could you please outline what the stormwater studies suggested about the original 2015 plan? Yeah, so the 2015 study, it was a multi-site assessment around the city. And this was one of the areas that at the time wasn't actually moved forward. All of the other ones had larger packets. This one did not move forward at the time. I