And I will start pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions that open me law general law chapter 30 a section 18 this meeting of the tack is conducted via remote participation roll call to check. Oh, is that what I have to do. I don't say that I actually do that. Oh, everyone, make sure everyone's video and audio is working properly. This meeting is being recorded to the web and could be shown on Amherst media and broadcast on the town of Amherst YouTube channel. And this is being recorded to the cloud is that right amber. Yeah, you should. Yes. So this calling the April 1 meeting of the tack to order. And is there anyone on the participating remotely or on the phone amber I don't know if I can see that. I don't see anybody on the phone. Yeah, I made a host yep so you should see an attendee now the attendees you can keep them as an attendee or you can bring them as a panelist. Okay, up to you you can allow them to speak as an attendee so okay so I, I'm just click on participants, you should be able to see everybody. Okay, now I see everyone but I don't see anyone. Oh attendee. Okay, we hi, we can allow Holden. Holden what's your last name I just don't see it all here. Yeah, my last name is Spiracino. Great. Thank you. Welcome you all. Okay. Okay, and so the first order of business if is if there are any announcements, which I have none. Okay. The second is public comment so hold in. Did you have anything that you did you are you attending for a specific topic. Would you like to speak and say anything at this moment. Yeah, I don't, I don't have a public comment I was just attending to learn more about the committee I'm, I'm moving to Amherst in April and was just curious about the type of work you do. Great. Thank you. So are you like a, some kind of expert in, in, in public transportation, do you bike are you a walker. Yeah, yeah, I guess I, I bike and walk and drive. I think I think I bike more than most people I would say, but yeah, yeah, no expertise in specific in particular. Most of us, some of us have expertise but most of us are just here because we care about the transportation network in town and making it accessible to all so thanks for your participation. So, the, really, the, the thing that we're going to most work on today is our. I'm going to give Tracy the floor in just a moment and she's going to share with us the results of the results of the, the survey that we all took about the topics that we're going to discuss and possibly include in our letter. To the TSO about the Pomeroy intersection and the kind of pluses and minuses of, of kind of the two is signalized intersection and around about so Tracy do you want to, I do you want to tell us the results of that. Hi, I'll just go ahead and share my screen. Can you. Yep. Okay, can you guys see that. So, um, so what happened was after the last meeting Aaron and sent around his list of the 11 priorities that he felt came out of the last meeting and and he asked in his email he asked people to make any comments they had about those 11 priorities to Kim. Before this meeting. So then Kim only heard from one person. Yay, Bruce. And I had missed that part of the email so I didn't say anything. But then also I just thought it would be a kind of quick and easy way just to do this quick survey. To see of those 11 items that Aaron listed, you know what were people's top priorities, just to help frame our letter a little it seemed, you know, one that some of his categories were overlapping but then also, I think 11 points maybe like too many for us to just focus on in terms of our priorities. So on this screen you can see so we did get everybody to fill out the survey thank you. And you can so it's just that you know the top column should priority one priority to priority three priority four. I mean I could have picked more priorities. And I thought we could just kind of go through them quickly and then also just talk about, you know, if we are going to pull out a few key points we want to emphasize in our letter to the TSO and to the council. You know where we want to focus so in terms of the top priority. I think it's the same that almost everybody identified that the pedestrian crosswalk safety and access was like their top priority right so five of the six of us said that. And that. So that was by far the biggest. So something I mean in terms of the pedestrian access like every presentation I've seen on the project and as staff talk about it. From Chris Bessip to billford boring to Jason skills like everybody's emphasizing about all the pedestrian improvements that will be there including the sidewalk and crosswalks and just access in general. And the next one, you know the next one one of the next ones that came up in terms of the top four I just, I just tried to group them and just kind of count how many people mentioned so you know people did mention the accessibility for the visually and mobility impaired. And then like half of us also talked about admissions, you know intersection efficiency and Tracy to me that the accessibility. Yes, was, you know, part and parcel of the pedestrian safety right. Yeah, I don't think we want to give them comments that have been made publicly on this. I think we kind of want to bring that up it's just like, we're not ignoring that that's just it is what it is the same with efficiency and the green aspects of it. Yeah, absolutely. I mean I think that you know one thing is on your first comment in terms of. So I think there are a few differences, you know in terms of the pedestrian safety and the accessibility and safety for like visually and mobility impaired people because you know if you look at the research a lot of people will say that they are safer for pedestrians like generally speaking, just because you know as you have around about the traffic speed has to slow down and you can have like high speed crashes. And, you know, for example, like at the, at the one of the forums the other day, like the Saturday forum there was a former and response story teacher who talked about how she had been like hit really badly crossing the street at that intersection.  She had, you know, medical issues for a long time. But I think that one thing is that I mean as much as the literature and studies will show that it's really it's safer for pedestrians in general. I mean there are some questions about how safe it is for visually and visually impaired people. Yeah. Yeah, it just it goes to how you address the implementation right now of course. It is safer. You wanted to make it, I wouldn't say more safe but you need to target the safety for specific. No, right. And so, yeah, and so one thing is I sent around in the email today, like one thing that Guilford had mentioned at the Saturday forum is that the town is considering, you know, considering that if there is around about put at that intersection that's a preferred alternative that they would look at some kind of flashing lights or signals such as the rapid. Right, yeah. Like flashing beacons and stuff just to make it safer. Yeah, and it's just the fact that to counter they will stop lights stop people when it's green people zoom through so it's in fact that the roundabout continually keeps traffic at a speed that is indicative of a more of a more safe environment, you know, kind of like swing away from that because yes, sure. A specific points in time you do get safer areas but across a day it is not that way. Yeah. I've also read some stuff about right turn on red being hazardous for folks with low vision. Oh yeah. Oh yeah right turn on red is definitely hazardous. So if you have a signaled intersection and you have right turn on red you, you also have that that you have to consider. But you could say you could recommend that there be no right turn on red right so like for example I remember it even came up I guess before the public works committee when that still existed at East Hadley Road in 116. Like right near graph park that people some people are saying wow I'm so annoyed and irritated by this right turn on red band. And I remember they went to the public works committee and the public works committee said well you know it's near graph park and there's a lot of, you know, children and families and things crossing from East Hadley Road to graph park and we're going to keep the right turn on red restriction. As much as it displeased the person who had made the comment and brought it to the public works committee so. You know it's kind of gets the thing that more Guilford was saying last week about people turning down or two weeks ago she technically requesting that the oral alarms for alerts for the intersections be turned down, you know, or turned off. So Marcus what point were you making about that. I can't remember now it's too long. I mean I guess. No I sorry I think it was the fact that yes we have these specific areas but in effect, a lot of them, you know build off another one. They aren't exactly separate, you know so we can't say that by saying looking at pedestrian crosswalk safety. We're ignoring any of the visual impairment side or by looking for traffic efficiency we're ignoring the environmental considerations. Yeah, actually so I mean Bernie when you brought the right turn no right turn on red I mean I guess that could be one question like if we wanted as a committee to say in our letter. In the interest of pedestrian safety, like we do not support like allowing right turns on red, or something would that make sense for us to do that is one of the things that we would include in our comments to the TSO and the council. I think you just have to. That goes in the mix is to cautions. No absolutely. Yeah, I mean I really like to think in terms as best I can think in terms of universal design. Absolutely. How many people can use this as opposed to I sort of cringe every time people tell me that they have to be handicapped accessible, having a handicap father, you know I cringe at that I mean if it's universal design and anybody can use it. And that's, that's the level of safety, you should start to, we should start to look at it right just caution because standard intersection with right turn on red, you haven't done folks who are visually impaired or be with some hearing difficulties any necessarily any failures. Right, so I mean I think one thing is like my Ross, and I know from the disability access advisory committees as well as the people who spoken from the Massachusetts Council for the blind. So they have a preference for the like the four way signalized intersections, you know with pedestrian signals over roundabouts just because there's always appear like with those there's always a period where the traffic is like completely stopped. And also it's easier if it's a four way intersection it's easier to orient yourself in terms of how you cross. I mean one question I would have for the committee is, and you know in this question, an issue, a concern with this was mentioned at one of the forums is that, you know if you have a roundabout. You can have these flashing lights and people can slow down and yield just, and they're already yielding and slowing down because of the trap, the, because they're going around the circle. But how do we feel as a committee do we have any opinion about the fact that there will never be like a period of time when there's no traffic. Like for and I had heard to. So I mean some people were concerned about that from a pedestrian crossing standpoint, you know just as some of the visually impaired people are concerned about it but some people have been concerned about that just as, you know, a parent with children, but then also some of the business owners and that vicinity were also concerned that say, you know it's just a certain time of day where there's a lot of traffic coming through like how will cars leaving say one of their businesses it's on 116 and has to have to turn left across the traffic. Like will there be here, unlike a traffic light where the traffic will have been flow like will there be periods of time when it's safe for the exiting vehicles to turn left. Yeah, and it's that's going to be there'll be a problem with that'll be a that's going to be a problem at that heavy drive times, regardless of what you have for an intersection there. And I guess that's I mean I guess that's a question is. I mean is that something like we would mention as a concern to. I think it's a legitimate concern particularly as you said it had me drive periods. You just have to the extreme example in my mind is is the end of the school day at the Chinese language school on route nine and people are trying to barrel out into that traffic. And, and it's, you know, it's it's scary trying to get on route nine at that point in time. And I have miniature versions of that because you've got several stores and businesses there and people are going to be coming in and out and there will be those times of the day is probably going to be two hours out of out of 24. When it's going to be really difficult. Yeah, I mean, can you hold on. Guilford has his hands up. So there's only three corners of the intersection where you can't go to an opposite exit and make a right turn instead of making a left turn. So the intersect the little section that has the school, the daycare now, they only have one entrance and one exit that's out onto Pomeroy, right, so they have to enter and exit at Pomeroy. Mission Cantina, the for lack of a better term Valley transporter and the gas station, you can always go to another exit and get make a right turn out so having to make a left turn across traffic, and then go through the intersection and redirect yourself. So that's just something to keep in mind when you're saying that is it's not.  But Guilford I think that I mean what some of the people who were making those comments were not businesses right at the intersection they were businesses say, you know, going south or north on like the liquor store like for yeah like the liquor store or like say for example, the Amherst office park, or things like that, so that they, I guess their their question was at certain times a day. You know, if there's like a heavy flow of traffic, and there's no gap because it's around about like is that going to be a problem for like their people leaving to I think I mean naturally with a roundabout there are gaps as people take, you know, pomeroy in either direction, depending on the time of day which will bring it a natural gap to the traffic. Because the same thing happens with the triangle street one right in the mornings everyone's kind of coming in from the, I don't know, the wherever. Well, where they used to cross that intersection just straight to get onto North Pleasant I forgot. triangle. Yeah, that intersect that. Yeah, oh from trying to North Pleasant right and, but they're, you know, there is there does become a gap because cars are coming from, you know, downtown, for example. And people freak out when they see a roundabout and they slow down and they make a gap that way too. Yes, and that's a benefit brings another point that, you know, roundabouts also, you know, if someone's not familiar with it right they will slow down a lot and you pay a lot more I pay a lot more attention as a driver at a roundabout than in a even a regular intersection so you know there's that surprise kind of aspect of roundabouts and so drivers are a little less less sure and they'll slow down and check out the whole intersection. So this was the thing I thought was, I mean one of the some of the comments, you know when people say that they don't like roundabouts or rotaries and they talk about, you know, rotaries and Holyoke or wherever that really don't aren't even similar. Atkins and you know people are saying well people are going you know 40 or 50 miles around the Atkins roundabouts I really don't think they are. Because I mean even though those roundabouts are larger, I think than the one that would be at this intersection go for it is that right, right. They're pretty large, but you can't actually go around around about that fact. Now you can't. You have to slow down. The diameter and Atkins is bigger. It's actually, we designed it it was a very early roundabout and the standards were very conservative. So it's actually designed as a two lane roundabout and the internal, the internal lane is actually the truck apron. The external lane is what you drive in right now. So we were required to make it a two lane one for the future. That's why you have a bigger radius on those two. But then I mean another big difference I see is that this project at Pomeroy is going to have all these crosswalks and things and if you look at those Atkins roundabouts. There's only the one crosswalk that goes from like the multi use path on the west side of West street, like to cross to Atkins. That's right.  You're just crossing at that one point. And so, like this is a much different like this is designed as a village center and I mean I don't recall what was at Atkins before but was it was it just stop signs before or something. It was. Yeah, so like that's crazy. I'm really glad that we have something safer there now because I can't imagine trying to go through that complicated intersection. There is, you know, a lot of people do take that there. I mean, you have the same access issues that you were talking about. Guilford with coming out of Atkins and, you know, sometimes I come out and take a left in there, you know, towards the towards the roundabout. But there are two entrances there I forgot you know you could go either direction but people. Yeah. I think it's because of an issue, because there are two exits. That makes sense. So, so I'm sorry we kind of got off track we can keep going through.  Yeah, yeah, I think it's the key, the key fact here is that the fact that this roundabout would be in an urban situation so you should be going slower anyway atkins is in a rural place. I mean, they are wide. You're not going to get just because of the geometry of it you're not going to go around that fast. No, of course, but that's what people but that's what people say oh we're round about it must be this giant thing. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean you can, you know, if you put a roundabout on a ring road you can go around it at 40 or 50 miles if you want to but we're not in that situation. You know, absolutely not. We're designing it to make traffic much, much, much, you know, so, yeah. Is that something that's stressed in these meetings, Guilford, and Tracy I guess you've been to them, you know that they are small, you know, smaller and well and would it would it be more comparable to suggest that it would look more like the triangle street one rather than the Atkins ones. I mean, once you say triangle street you start a whole another group of people complain and they don't like it. I would go to the university one right. Yeah, yeah, I mean there is this. I mean there are some issues I think with the triangle and just because it's way more complicated it's not just like the straight forward like four legs.  So, there are two of the legs at triangle and my perception are there as you like a traveling a median a traveling that's it that's nice and simple like the one the east pleasant and and the university north pleasant ends. But the other two sides. I mean there are like five legs it is a little complicated and particularly the one going across triangle. The triangle like, yeah, it has to do with the skew, because there's not a 90 degree intersection there's more of a skew there. That's what causes those things to happen. Yeah, so maybe, maybe don't want to, but I mean have like Guilford so in meetings like have, because I really do think that people, you know, because they say oh that's around about that I don't like, or, you know, not triangle but even say actions like that's the cars are faster and things like that like, it does seem like it would, it would help people to understand, like that the footprint is smaller of this even though they should, but people are just afraid of it. And that's what I was thinking just like giving a size estimate because the size also like the Atkins ones they don't feel like it doesn't feel like homey because it's just as big empty space in the middle and cars seem to just be zooming around whereas perhaps that one at the end of the company now you know it feels a lot more intimate and because you mean fearing fearing yeah yeah yeah and you know that one feels like nicer and just, I don't know. So related to the size go for it so how I mean you probably you probably don't know exactly but like in terms of, like if there was a roundabout there like how much taking land takings would be needed. We're taking, regardless of what intersection you do, you're going to take land.  Well the sides that have the most impact from a parking perspective is really the gas station gas station is going to lose part of the little parking lot and part of their little area they'll lose a lot more pavement than anybody else will. If you look at the one if you look at what's there at. Well I transporter. It's just grass in between the parking spaces and most of that grass is going to go away and you'll probably keep their spaces, although they may lose one or two of their spaces. It looks like right now, just in the preliminary work world that Mission Cantina won't lose anything that's parking. They'll lose grass. Everything's parking there though. I know right. People park on the grass right. They're going to, they're going to lose some grass, but they're not going to lose any of the pavement area they have. Okay, that's good. That address is one of the comments. I'm sorry, speaking of the Amherst engage website. Right. Well, and yeah.  I mean, where, where does the overflow parking go or where can they get transported. Right. They go that way. I personally parked across the street. Yeah. I was going to suggest that if, if we are recommending around about as one of the options to say to make it as narrow as possible and make it appropriate for an urban setting. There could be a sign for a primary village in the center of it that could be illuminated at night, perhaps. Ooh. Yeah, to give a sense of place. Yeah, that's a question for you. So Chris Bress have said, I mean, there are people talking about, you know, signage and things like place signage that that that might not be in this project right now as the project's focusing on the transportation infrastructure more. It's money issue. No, I understand. So Guilford, do you know if there are any plans for that bit of land behind Valley Transporter between them and the landscaping guys kind of just in limbo right now. There's no, there's no plan. Yeah. So Tracy, are we giving you enough fodder for. I mean, I think so. Your comments. Okay. I mean, we could, you know, I can write some stuff up and we could talk about.  Yeah, I mean, I think we're, I think we're on the right track. Right. So I mean one question I have, and I guess it would be to go for is, you know, when I've heard Jason talk about the project, he has talked about how, for example, there's like bike lanes and that there's also likely to be like a path on the west side, a multi use path on the west side of West Street, which would also, so that would be accessible to bicyclists who don't want to be in the road. And then also some of this improved sidewalks can. So, I mean one of the concerns I had is, well, I'd like to know a little bit more about where the multi use path is but then also just like what happens when you get to like the end of the improvement area. Like for example, like say you're going north from the intersection on West Street. And so is a multi use path going to be on that section or is it going to be on the south section. It's going to be on the west side of the road. Right. And it goes, it'll be on both sides of, okay, but it's not going to go very far. There's a book called where the sidewalk ends. Right, yes, that's kind of what you should think. But see that's what I worry about a little is just, you know, when, like, for example, if you're going north, then you're going to hit Plumbrook, right where the pedestrian bridges still closed and so I mean, some of those, you know, sidewalks and paths and things are nice in general. But then like they when they end so abruptly, and that pedestrian bridge is a narrow point and you're crossing the wetlands and things. So I'm assuming the multi use path like wouldn't go. There's not enough room for it to go like past north of the bridge is it. It's not the, it's not room it's money. There's not enough money. Okay. Yeah. And so, and what's happening with that bridge is that can is going to be reopened sooner. someday. So what are what are pedestrians they're supposed to do now. At the bridge. Walking south. When they get to the bridge or the intersection. No, and again, I'm just, I mean, because that pedestrian bridge has been closed like since the summer. We made a little lane in the road for it. Okay. Yeah. We actually, we had an accident there when we put those barriers out there, some driver hit one of those barriers, their car. Oops. Okay. Pretty big comic should be able to see. The barriers. Yeah. And they have a lot of reflection. So now, so go for it as you're saying so in terms of like some like the sidewalks and things too because like currently right there's only the sidewalk, like the sidewalk on the west side of west street like extends from the intersection like all the way basically all the way to Akins.  But for this project. So there would be some improvement of that in the sidewalk, but it wouldn't extend very far beyond the intersection right is that what you're saying. Right now it's pretty limited to what will happen.  And so will, will there be sidewalks on the, like south of the intersection on West Street whether the street. There are sidewalks on what on West Street, going south of the intersection now, right on both sides. It stops when you get to the second condominium to the condos doesn't go much past the condos right there. Yeah, wait south of the intersection there said. Yes. Okay. And then there's a, there's not much of a sidewalk north of the intersection on the east side because it's all parking lot. Okay, there's no parking there really and then it just, and then there's the mailbox and it just kind of ends right there's no sidewalks there. Yeah, so right now there's only sidewalk on one side so there will be more sidewalk, but it's not really going to go very far as the problem. Okay. But the bus stop that's there kind of near the moan and dove right that will that become a drop you know like a pull in bus like there'll be improvements to the bus stops to right. There will be. I mean there's pull offs for the bus stops now but they're not very, they're not very wide. No. Okay. I could bring up something that I was watching a planning board meeting the other night and somebody brought up in terms of this intersection that if it would remain a four way intersection without a roundabout. If you have a lot of turning lanes that are added. Suddenly that becomes a huge amount of pavement for a pedestrian to cross that seems intimidating and even if you have a signal and a bell that would ring, you still have a very little bit of time to get across a lot of lanes of traffic. And I remember that as a pedestrian of the triangle intersection as it used to be. There was a lot of pavement to cross. And then when there would be. And sometimes people don't stop for the red light or they kind of are getting their engines to get started once the light turns green so it might be something to think about that if they go with a conventional intersection to think about how many turning lanes to have because that is a problem for pedestrians. So, if there are additional turning. So, at that intersection. There's basically like the one on West Street there's a traveling one traveling each direction right so then if you add a turning lane and then there's like a second lane but just for the turning. And then there's the LL one in the other direction. And so, I mean sometimes like if there's if it's many multi lanes right then you can add like some kind of meeting or something but I mean how, how long would the turning lane be. Well, so you have 50 feet, you have 50 feet across Pomeroy Lane, West Pomeroy and Pomeroy is 50 feet. And then, if you want a five foot sidewalk on each side that's 10 feet of that 50 feet. And then if you want a turn lane and there are two travel lanes and they make them 11s at the intersection. That's 22 feet, and then the turn lane in the middle it can be as small as 10 feet. So that's how much room you're using up there and I lost track already but I think I'm at 42 feet. Yeah. Yeah, okay. So there's four feet of grass on each side of the of the road right now, after we have to add the turn lanes in. And at the current time there's do you have a map if you could bring it up I can stop. Yeah, you ready. Sure. Can everybody see this. Oh yeah, cool. Okay, yeah. So I'm not paying attention to you I'm over here on my other screen drawing things. So what is your red. Now we know your, what is the red circle. The red circle is basically how much space is, that's what the space that takes up the, there's the roundabout, the travel lanes at the roundabout at North Pleasant, and Governor's Drive and Eastman Lane. Oh, right. That's how that's how that's the diameter that circle. And you'd have sidewalks outside that diameter so you can see that actually my series school gets a little or the little school to the little school down here gets a little bit of space or two but the sidewalks will be outside that circle. Oh, got it. And then talking about traveling so this is 50 feet all the way across here. Right now you have basically 10 to 11 feet, 10 feet on this side. And you have 14 feet roughly on this side of grass. So you're going to end up having only four feet on each side so you do increase the pavement you're walking across for the crosswalk by having that 1122 and 10 is 32. And then that would be 32 feet to get across without any bike lanes or shoulder on the road. And if you want a shoulder on the road for bike lanes, you've used up the four feet, the other four feet grass that was left over. I think that should be emphasized because that. I think that people would be surprised to see how much space is going to be taken up by pavement. If it's a conventional intersection. The usually are, but the roundabout right it's not going to be super small either. The roundabout right it's still. So, I mean, the roundabout your pavement, your pavement is going to be to 11 foot lanes are 12 foot lanes that come into the roundabout, then an island in between them. And then your shoulders. Because you actually make the bike lanes merge into the into the right lanes to go in the roundabout. So you actually will have less traffic or less pavement in there. Okay. Then we got 62 feet on West Street. It's probably 60 feet is really what it is. But it says it's probably 70 on the other side. So you'll have a little more space for grass and other amenities on West Street going through with a regular intersection, but you're still going to have 42 feet. Right. Now, yeah, 42 feet of pavement in there. If you want a bike show, you want shoulders and right, you want turn lane, a turn lane and so forth. Now, at one meeting, I think you mentioned that there's like the possibility that you could end up having to do turn lanes on the Pomeroy Lane or West Pomeroy Lane. Is that very likely or do you think the counts are going to come out that it says that you should have turned lanes on Pomeroy? Not both of them though, right? Just from from South Amherst on Pomeroy Lane. On both of them. Oh, okay. It was, we went back and talked to the mass DOT guy and he pulled up the old traffic study and they were on the edge of having to put lanes in on West Pomeroy when they did this back 20 years ago. Yeah, I was going to say. 20 some years ago, they were on the edge of having to put turn lanes on all four approaches. Okay. I see. So, sorry. The plan that the mass DOT had many, many millions of years ago. Was that for a roundabout then? No, it wasn't. It was just for an intersection but bigger. The Akins roundabouts were the, were pretty much the first roundabouts built in the state. Oh, okay, cool. Really? It was like pulling teeth. Well, what year were they built? We started design for them in 2002 or. Oh, okay. I think we started design 2003 and then we constructed at about 2007, eight, or eight, nine, 10. Yeah, I think it's an interesting comparison just for the land issue for when you start putting in the turn lanes and how much bigger of an intersection it will make it compared to today. I think people don't realize that. So I do have a question for fellow attack members that also a little bit for Guilford, but I mean currently there's no bike lanes. Like on any of these legs, is that correct? But I keep hearing bike lanes being described as part of this project, but I mean I do wonder, I mean both Guilford as you're saying for the width that that involves, but then also doesn't make sense to have bike lanes that if they're not going to go very far. Like in some ways, isn't it better just to have, you know, people bicycling the way they are now, sort of. Well, right now there's enough on West Street there's enough of a shoulder that people bike and bike in that shoulder, and that shoulder extends pretty far. It benches down at Shea Street that benches down. Well benches on Shea Street. Going north. So people aren't but it's not really like marked as a bike lane per se. You know, it's never really been marked but right, you can see the old paint here. This is a cursor there and then that's the curb basically right there. And this is a better one that's the paint and there's a curb right there. So that's about five. That's six feet there, roughly. So that's going south right now. Well that will be the line lane going north. Okay. But, I mean, I do this by, I bike through this a lot. I mean, it's not, I mean, but I am a fearless bike cyclist. So, but certainly this that road that you're pointing right this part of the West Street is just not not. I would not have my children bike there. It's not safe. You need to be really confident. Jason is talking about like a multi use path. Where is that located. Right now it's on the West side. And so it's south of the intersection. No, it's on both sides. The West side. The West side right now. That's where you are. Yeah. And he's saying it's like eight feet but that is the it's not that wide right now right. So to do eight feet you would lose grass. When you when you talk about this intersection. Let me get a, just a cleaner map. So this is the center of the village center but you know the village center kind of starts down here this is pot wine where we were talking about trying to do something to slow traffic down here right. So you start here and you work your way up north and work your way down you have a little area where you can add a couple little roundabouts or type of thing devices to slow people down through the whole whole intersection and center. I mean if you if you think one thing is going to do it. It's not you need to kind of line them up. Yeah. If you didn't have, if you didn't have a roundabout there. Like, are there, are there other ways that the traffic can like other other ways to narrow or calm the traffic. Well, you're looking at things like that are on by Amherst college which are basically splitter islands. And they do slow traffic down but they don't slow it down as much as we'd like. They also damage surrounding buildings to right with the seismic. They can I mean that's at least at home in the UK, they used to put what we call sleeping policemen everywhere, until they realize they actually damaged the buildings nearby. And so they've moved away from that. That was the raise, raise crosswalk or raise bomb. Yeah, that sort of stuff. Yeah.  But you can put in like rumble strips and you could visually play things down but then once people start getting used to it they just don't take any take that into account. Yeah, with rumble strips. I mean, because some people refer to like somebody in some comment like it talks about from this intersection like all the way to Crocker farm that they feel like it's pretty straight and that people really speed. We talked about trying to make the whole corridor slower. And is that likely to happen at pot wine. Do you feel for where there's some kind of roundabout or something there. Yeah, I mean our concept here is to put a roundabout eventually here. Well you're back at Pomeroy. This is pot wine. Oh, sorry I think there was. It's much bigger sorry I can zoom in a bit. That makes sense. There we go. Alright so this is Pomeroy and this is pot wine so this is pretty much. It's like a lag. It's not matching up for me on your screen. Oh, sorry. No it's like a lag of it. Okay. And you considering putting many roundabouts into the entrances to the neighborhoods there too. I mean that's what you would do. I mean you could put one here. You might skip this one. Yeah, you could do this one. And then you put one here. That's for. If you wanted to do something in here you could probably put one at this driveway for this development. But there's not enough traffic there. It would be maybe at Shay. To slow things down. Well and Shay can definitely use something that's pretty like wide there. That's huge. But you're trying to slow, you're trying to create, you're trying to create an impression on people that you just can't zip around. But right, right. Well, can't I mean you, I mean I feel like you can do some of that with like signage and like visual, you know, visually making the road just seem narrower and things too. You can, you can do some of that with paint signage in mind. I think so. It gets ignored. Yeah, it's probably time. I mean you can do a lot with paint but once you figure out paint doesn't hurt your car you keep going right over it. Would you put one around about outside of Crocker to you. Well you have a whole me have a whole. Yeah, you actually do have a whole lot of options here how you want to do this. I mean I think something that Shay Street would be good and well and also you're working on at Mill Lane, right. Like Mill Lane and Mill Lane may not get around about because of the traffic light. No, but just like in terms of you know better access and crossings and right. Traffic lights close to roundabouts don't work well. Right now. So if you were to do the rectangular rapid flashing beacons at that intersection with roundabouts so would they be with each of the crosswalks or how would that work. Yes, so I think I lost my circle though. If you're my circle so if I'm crossing the crosswalk here, you push it these two rapid beacons one facing east one facing west. When you push the button and either one of those those will activate. And then this like those two will activate and then these two over here and then these two here. They're talking about some sign which I don't think is very good but I think just having the rapid flashing beacons. We can talk to our supplier and he can actually make the beacon, the button beep so if you're visually impaired you can follow the beep. And it'll also tell you once the buttons pushed it'll tell you the lights have been activated. You can't tell you the cars have stopped though. Right. Holden has his hand up. Holden would you like to speak. Yeah, I just had a quick comment. And again I'm going into this knowing a lot less than all of you on this on this. This plan but it seems like if there's a possibility of adding multiple roundabouts on that section or or multiple areas, like the conversation about maybe adding a bike lane or a sidewalk but it doesn't go very far. If there's a possibility of adding several of them across a section it seems worth it to me because then in five years maybe the conversation becomes. Oh, we have all these intersections with little bits of sidewalk and little bits of connectivity could we get a grant to just link them all up. And that seems like a, you know, and then in five years you're not like well we could build a sidewalk on the street but there's no connection between these intersections, you kind of restart the conversation. Yeah, I agree. I, and I also think I think even adding these little bits of sidewalk, even if they don't extend very far from these intersections I mean they get to our bike, or you know this is part of our bike pad plan right street is right on there. And you know so then the priority becomes connecting, you know, absolutely those bits of sidewalk with the next village center so. And having the curb cuts, I think is huge to right because currently there's no curb cuts like on the, that Amherst Montessori school side where Amherst Montessori school used to be there's some sidewalk there but there's like no way. You know if you're, if you're on that sidewalk except for like walking through the grass and so on to get down to the intersection. So go for it so in terms of sidewalks on West Pomeroy and Pomeroy then would there be. There would be sidewalks on both sides like through the extent of the intersection like through Speedway and would there be sidewalks on the West Pomeroy section or not really. There will probably be sidewalks that go a little ways but not to the to the business. Yeah. Yeah. And then there will be a sidewalk which runs at least on this side by the gas station, at least to where the bus stop is. Okay. And then. So that would be good too because like currently, like if you don't, and it will be significantly differentiated from like the driving section because currently right the pedestrians are sort of walking in the driveway or the right the car travel lane, like at the gas station or wherever they don't have like a safe pedestrian spot space. You have to go on the other side. Yeah. And then, and on Pomeroy, Pomeroy lane itself so it would extend like to the Speedway too. Well Pomeroy has a sidewalk on this side. Right. So there will probably be something there might be something that goes like a couple or this just might be one also there's like the residential in the back like that big development that 20 C. Yeah. Yeah. You could run a sidewalk like to there or something. Possibly something. Tracy, how are we doing on your list. I think it, I mean, I think it's pretty good. I mean, do I feel like we've covered. I mean, it seems like we support like a lot of the concepts of the project and we could. I mean, do people have like any specific concerns I want to bring up. I think so long as we kind of address the big gorillas in the room that everyone keeps bringing up. I mean, so, so for me, I still, I still do have some concerns about if it's, I mean, having a roundabout here just with all of these businesses like right at this intersection as well. Like when I think about other roundabouts in the area. I don't, or even the ones that we're talking about like pot wine or something like that, they don't have so many driveways and like access and tree points like so close to the intersection. So, I think you could argue that that might make people drive more slowly. Yeah, there is a concentration of activity and businesses, and it does look more urban than it than a roundabout, say at Atkins where there's all this open space around it. Anyway, I would also say that, you know, as to Guilford's point, these are not individual access points right now of course. There are multiple access points for single businesses. So it is not like it's like, you know, one office for one thing. Well I mean I, and I guess that would be a question to like would, would some of them, like with the traffic be directed to like, go in one way go out another way, or something like for example, I think about a university drive now there's like the new. There's a new entrance to the medical building across from Big Y. That's on route nine now. But it says, I was a little surprised it's there but that it says it right you can only enter that way, or you can't, and you can't do any like big left turn across path out of that, and out of that exit. And so just like having the traffic flow in a certain direction. Right, because if people are trying to like say for example, like mission containers or people are trying to go in and out like different ways. And if we're talking about like a peak time of day, it seems to me the roundabout seems more complicated than a signalized intersection, not that a signalized intersection isn't as well. Can I share that the peak. So, please. I got the green light. I mean, it might be new here but it's certainly not new. Anywhere else. Need to sanitize my screen better. So, I mean this is where I'm from right and this is a mini mini roundabout that that's just like a race. So, we have street, you know business street home. The street street police station, you know, like all of these in this area, and it works just fine.  This is this is coming into town this is going away from town so you know you already had a slow speed coming in. It really isn't that big of an issue, especially when you have multiple entry and exit points. Sure. Do you have crosswalk to that intersection out see them. No, but I mean, in the UK, you kind of just go wherever you want to. Okay. I mean, there are technically crosswalks like up here and everything but and these will be these will be beacons that effectively the same way as Guilford was saying. Right, yeah. Belisha beacon and then you know into town and everything but just just this isn't just a random example that I thought about like an intersection with multiple points of entry very fairly close by so yeah. Yeah, G walking is an American thing. It is. Yes. Yeah. Over those automobile companies are car car culture prevails. Kim, you used to you still have a quorum. I'm going to. Thank you everybody. Thanks. Thank you. Bye. Thank you. One thing I was going to, I was wondering, actually, I guess if we want to get into this letter. You know, there's, we don't have to do this, but I'm wondering if we want to state our committee's preference. And put that in the letter. We don't, you know, we don't have to. Sure. I think we should stand on a position. I don't think we should just put it in a wishy washy letter. Yeah, I think we need to, you know, this isn't anything to one comment that's been previously made. This isn't anything new. This isn't the latest trend. I mean, right. It's a definitely been some comments. Yeah. And I, it's really interesting listening to, you know, not listening, reading those, you know, Kim, when you wrote your reply and crazy, thank you for putting your stuff in the indie because just kind of the immediate reaction to that is very interesting, you know, and Well, every time I hear somebody say, and it's a rotary, I'm like, no, but then also, like, you know, even when, like, actually, I Catherine Bell, who's from England, she's like, well, I'm from England and, and round about your anti traffic calming. I was like, uh, yeah. Well, I feel as layer. She says roundabouts are terrible. That's the way you put it. I mean, anyway, yeah, but you get a tap like him. Actually, let me like a. So, I mean, so there is this question. I mean, I do like a lot of what roundabouts are doing.  And as I presented last time too, I really do feel that either of these options will really greatly improve the intersection. Because it's actually, I mean, I don't, I don't go that way very often as a pedestrian and when I actually looks closely at it, it is really terrible. Yeah, it is like so bad. And how it's been so bad for so long. It's, I mean, I'm so glad that we're fixing it. So I think we could even leave her a letter to like thank you like thank the town for its like commitment to making this like accessible because it's terrible. Um, yeah, and we have the, you know, the option that opportunity now with buying Hickory Ridge to promote a lot more walking and a lot more activities there. So we need to make it more accessible for everybody.  We're talking about a very, you know, accessible right urban area roundabout that will just help to calm the traffic. Yeah, I mean I do have concerns to the people who, I mean I can see where like for, you know, as a parent or, I mean I worry about this little bit of triangle to like the playground is right there and I mean say you did have a younger person or who was, you know, visually impaired or something and they did want to cross like the fact. I mean I still feel a little uncomfortable even with the flashing signals and so on that there is never any time like when the traffic stops completely. And it's not the same as any interst, any crosswalk to right. No, but like if you had a four way intersection right you can have all the traffic goes one way and all the traffic goes another way and one of the things that people like my Ross was explaining to me. Like when you're and actually she was actually saying it's not actually that great like downtown. And then you have all the traffic stop all the car stop, and that it's all pedestrians, because like if you are like she's completely blind. And so you actually need those cues of, you know where the traffic is and where they're going for you to realize where you are walking. You know, it actually helps it helps her if the traffic goes in one direction. She knows like where the traffic is and then it stops and then the traffic goes in the other direction. And I mean I do, I do still hear that concern from people. Just because I think, I mean it is, you know it is true that because the speeds are slower, like there's less say like fatalities and less like serious crashes but I can still see, you know people getting hit and and one thing I worry about with roundabouts to I worry about this summit intersections is that, you know for drivers. And I work on this with driver training a lot is like where drivers looking you know when they're entering intersection. And so at a roundabout you're looking in the direction of the like where the other traffic is coming from that you need to yield and merge into.  That driver is initially going to see you like they're going to be focused in the roundabout they're going to be looking left as a merge in right.  Somebody I know brought this up at fearing, and that person suggested that instead of a yield sign at fearing as fearing as you're merging into the University Drive roundabout that instead of a yield that you actually have a stop sign because like the University Drive. I'm just that's what the, because, because the University Drive path is right there. And so you're going to have a lot of traffic coming from the right, like while the drivers are. But that's where the flashing lights come in right I mean that's the attraction get her as you coming in if somebody actually wants to cross the road. Right, get you across because that you know as you're approaching you're visually scanning the area to understand your direction of travel to start with right to understand you understand the direction of travel so you need to understand how you need to get around the thing, and then you go and look to see whether traffic is coming or not. So in that initial scan, people are using the, the flashing lights, you will pick that up. The flashing lights are in the picture that you're using to do like 10 feet tall you're not going to see it but if they put them at the right level, you know, well and I think to they, I mean some of the, the beacons are like as you're approaching you're seeing stuff flashing so you know you have to like slow down before the crosswalk. But, but I mean, even as a pedestrian around town like there's intersections like where if I'm walking in the opposite direction from the traffic like I've had people hit me. Does it, you know, just crossing a minor street, because the, because the drivers focus on the traffic that they have to merge into and not me walking from the opposite direction so. I think one of the keys is if you can pull the crosswalk away somewhat from to get more space for the driver to enter. Yeah. There's only that line that the driver is looking ahead. Right. I don't know if this is from brought up in any of the meetings but as a biker and pedestrian I find the roundabout outside of look park in Florence to be a really excellent one. I've used it many, many times and I've never felt that a driver was going too fast or that they didn't see me. There's something about the layout of that one that seems particularly safe to me. And I have a question that is a comment you could say I love the look park intersections.  Okay. Okay. Yeah, I don't, I don't, I don't go into the traffic that intimidates me anywhere I am. I always try to stay on a path. Yeah. I'm just curious that's all. Just one second. Hold in. Did you have a comment. I actually have to go so I just wanted to say thanks for having me. Also, I did notice on the website it looks like there might be a vacancy I didn't know what the process for filling that would be and or if like I guess if there was a description of duties for members of the committee. I didn't know who I would contact about more information about that. So there is an application I think you can just apply. Yeah, isn't that am I am I think I'm saying the truth right go for it. Yeah, on on the Amherst dot gov site and you can say specifically that you're interested in the tack and yes there is a, at least one vacancy and there's a it's called a citizen activity forum, and you use the same forum and applying to like any of the town committees and you just express that you're interested in being on the committee and now you can serve on the committee I think once you're a resident. I don't think you're eligible until you are a resident. Makes sense. And there has been a vacancy for a while, but like hopefully. So this committee falls under the town manager. So the town manager would be the person who would review. And there's a committee that helps with this that would review applications and then interview and fill the vacancies and a lot of the, a lot of these committees have terms that end in June, because like that's when the fiscal year ends. And so, like there will be some additional vacancies on this committee in June. Yeah. Okay, and, and I did see the vision statement and kind of like committee charge, would there be more specific documentation for the, the tasks for committee members in particular or. So I think one thing is that that's a little bit of a question for the town manager because the current charge was created when we had a select born form of government and now we have a town council. And so the tack, this committee has been working on revising the charge to sort of reflect that the council, which is now the executive body for the town, that they are the keepers of the public way. And they're, they're taking that role in like a very proactive way and so some of our original charge had to do with things with the public way and sort of giving some of that up and our primary role as advisory. The advisory to the council and to the town manager. Sounds good. Well, I'll read more on that and thanks again for having me have a good night. Thank you for your interest. I'd like to just bring up something if we would say in this letter that we would recommend around about. You might also be helpful to say, but if we go, if the decision is made to go with the conventional intersection. Are there any particular points we want to make if we go on that in that direction. That's a great. I first of all, I think we should probably, you know, vote, like, you know, I assume it's in an unanimous vote that we vote, but we should do that nonetheless. I mean, it's not like Aaron isn't here. I mean, no, and, but we can only do it with those of us that are here right now. So could we also just say that like a majority of the, the majority of the tax supports it. I mean, well, that's what we could say, I guess. Yeah, I think I would say that, especially because, you know, Aaron was talking about it too. Right. But, but we can only do with what's here right now I think so. Yeah. I think that is saying at our April 1 meeting. The vote was four to zero to support a preference for a roundabout. Since we don't know which way Aaron would vote. I don't know if you need to say majority I think you just say, yeah, what the vote was. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. So I think that we recommend a roundabout with a caveat that if they choose another type of intersection we will list some things that we think are important. Can we say, can I move to amend that slightly. Just to say that we would recognize the town's choice. If it is. Right. So we're not just like we're any sticking to roundabouts. We strongly recommend a roundabout but we recognize the town's provocative to choose a different one and here are our recommendations. Yes, I think that's a very good day of warning. Yes. Yes. And maybe we want to, we can talk about specifics as Bruce suggested. I don't know. I think I would abstain from that. I just, I still do have questions so I don't feel like, okay, so we can commit to three to one. I'm abstaining or one zero one. Okay. Can we to Bruce's point, you know, as we're drafting this letter, can we like if there is a signalized intersection, what would we was specifically do we have any specific recommendations. I would recommend some sort of a median is possible, so that when you're crossing you're not crossing so much pavement at one time. I would suggest turn lanes. Well, that's in the plan already right go for it. I know but we would recommend. I mean the technically the roundabouts in the plan to so. I would suggest that the, the removing of the turn on red, right turn off course right. Yes, exactly. Yeah. Well and of course like you'd still want the enhanced like crosswalks and the curb cuts and like all those other things. Yes, I mean would we say I mean to the point about there being such a large width of pavement would we be saying anything about like on road bike lanes or, you know, anything in terms of like trying to decrease I mean I would love it if there if there is a signalized intersection like some way to calm, just the intersection in more narrowly and the intersection is another way of calming traffic or could there be like other measures as you're approaching the intersection that would calm traffic and encourage people to. Well, we could, we could say that that's what we would suggest right because we still want people to have to slow down traffic calming measures such as you know islands or, or the bike lanes if you have bike lanes and you're you're narrowing the roads to right. The bike lanes are like if they're flush with the pavement it just looks like more pavement. You know it looks like a road pavement. How about painted bike lanes during the approaches and through the intersection. There's some like so on University Drive there's actually like a buffer area or something. Oh yeah that's right that like and it's painted. I mean the other thing that like, I mean some intersections what you do is you make the curve like you kind of pull the curbing a little bit to like make it less. I would say that we, we would support some kind of traffic calming road narrowing point as as the as the inner you approach the intersection on I guess on both directions with West right so also to just indicate that it's still a village centering you still need to slow down. Yes. I think it's that we need to basically say that a signalized intersection alone is not the answer. You need to have additional traffic calming along with a signal. Well and safer safer because of that yeah right, but just putting a signal that doesn't do what we wanted to do. Well, right so the signalized intersection and if you have a left turn lane. You don't want to address the queuing and things like that but it wouldn't wouldn't get to your say it wouldn't get to the safety part. It wouldn't, it wouldn't permanently slow down traffic you don't know of course on the red and additional things where we're looking to try and create this more harmonious play. No of course. So a signalized intersection alone doesn't call the traffic, which is true. So what that's what's so fascinating about like it's so many of these meetings and people are like the signal only the civilized intersection is, you know that flows traffic down and I mean, it stops some traffic but then. I mean to Kim's point about when you know at other trafficking drive really fast. Yeah. This might be outside the scope of this current project but I also think whatever is done there. It would really be helpful to have enhanced lighting street lighting. Yes, for sure. Yeah, when you see brighter lights. You automatically think it's a more built up area. That's a good point Bruce yeah. So regardless of what type we suggest. There are urban street lamps instead of the tall highway lamp lights. During that little section, if they could put in some new street lamps so it would be close to saying more like village center type. Yes, I mean, Guilford is their budget in the project to do things related to like kind of intersection aesthetics with lamp lights and all that. Really sure. Yeah. Okay. Alright, well I think so I can, I can try to put something together with like the main points and so we want to submit it so TSO is meeting on Thursday, the eighth. Right. And I would suggest that we send them a final draft by Wednesday, just so that it's in their packet and they get a chance to review it. So in that case, I mean, I guess if I send out a draft, hopefully on the weekend, but if I send something out on Monday and people got back to. Yep. Or Kim, I don't know, would you like, would you like to be like the keeper of the edits or something if you can edit and people can send you edits and. Sure, or yeah, we can get, we can rip Aaron back into it. And we just do like a Google Docs or something where we can just share. I think there's like limits with like, yeah, open. So it is really cumbersome, but I know I can, I can be the keeper of the edits and I will be the keeper of the edits, that's.  So you need to like have one person and then go back and. That's fine. That's fine. Okay. Sorry about that. So when do we, so you're, you will, you will make sure I mean I'll try to do something sooner, but I would make sure that it was done before the end of the weekend and then. Okay. And then you'd send it out and we would need to have that people would get their edits to me by like Monday night Monday. Yeah, Monday PM. Yeah. Okay. And we'll write that on the document or whatever. Yeah, has it. And then you would transmit it then too. Sure. Yeah. So, okay. Thank you for all your work with this. Thank you. Thank you so much. Before we go, I, there's what I, because, you know, it's 623 I was hoping to get through the approving the minutes. Let's do that. I think we lost Amber already. I think we lost Amber already. All four of us were at all three of these meetings. Do you all have the, the three, so it's from March 18, March 4 and February 18. I've looked through these already. And I don't have any significant comments. So, I'll move to accept them the three minutes as provided by Amber. Yeah. Second. Great. Yeah. Well, okay. So, you know, we're all good. Yeah. You didn't have any edits or anything you said. No, I did not. But what I did, did notice while I was looking through these was that I, and I guess this kind of goes to, you know, kind of our committee comments. Committee comments, perhaps at this moment. Someone from the public contacted me. And I forgotten this individual's name, but they were wondering about sidewalk priorities because apparently they had heard Gilford say that the priorities for sidewalks included north pleasant, and I forgot the other one, but the others. I don't know what I don't use pleasant, pleasant. Yeah. And, and, you know, this is something we've, we've talked about extensively in these meetings. And, you know, so I, I, Guilford was right in saying those saying these things that whatever public meeting Guilford was at. This person was asking about a priority list or project list or something and, and I think I was looking at the February 18th notes and I said, one thing we had had on there was a project list being put on the website. And I don't think that that has been done. And I would like to know it has not. Correct. Yeah. I think it would be really nice just to put put that so that people can access that information, you know, it's because I don't think this is like see it's not see confidential information it should be out there. And that would alleviate the, the concerns of, you know, because they're worried that we have some prioritization list that we're not sharing. And I, I think, you know, we should share what we can. So, so Guilford, there was a meeting where Aaron said that it was going to go up on the website that he had shared it with somebody to go on the website and is that, is that a big deal to get it on the website or Aaron wanted to take that page which had all the people who kind of called in. Okay, all the little requests you want to put that that list on the website. That's not the list we want. No, it's not the list you want. You want my list. Yeah, that's what we want your list put both lists, but I think that the primary is your list is my list. Yeah, right. Well, I mean, you know, at least maybe our top 10 projects or something. I feel like we should just put something up there. And also Guilford so I think I had emailed you about this as well but because even I were working on the subcommittee, and there's this UMass student who is going to help and I know you've talked about hiring the consulting and so on to work on the complete streets plan. But you had mentioned for that plan you'd probably have like 15 to 20 projects to prioritize and have the consultant like worse on like the cost estimates and so on. And so if we could have that list to just like identified or I don't know how much that list varies from the other list we've talked about maybe we could talk about this at the next meeting. But just talk about it more. Yeah, yeah, sorry, I just let's try to make that the next in reviewing our minutes I was reminded just a conversation kind of came full circle so I just wanted to remind you on East Pleasant Street. Oh this person that is kind of because she said she contacted you to and I wasn't sure. Oh I think I know you're talking about. Yeah, but then the problem we're running into and the problem staff is having is someone asked for something. And then we find out there from the media. And they're actually writing all these articles about it and they're publishing these articles. The media is kind of like become this great blurry place. It's not. What do you mean I like, I'm not I'm not authorized to speak for the town. Right, right, right. Yeah. So those things are supposed to come from the authorized spokesman from the town, and people just ask for stuff and it just gets sent out that's. Yeah, which is why I didn't I didn't respond because I wasn't sure how I would respond to the how I'm supposed to respond to this person, but it just reminded me that we had talked about this before, just, you know, and I feel like it would just alleviate, you know, the concerns, you know, I don't know when it is part of our chart. It's part of our charts to like have a prioritized list right and we go over it. But then again, how we post it and and how it gets put out there. No one's really said how to do that yet with the town government. So it's like, so I as an employee I'm kind of in the middle I just it's like you as a UMass employee you just can't make a statement or release stuff that doesn't like sign off on. Yeah, of course. You can either confirm nor deny. No. Well, I think I mean one thing right with public meetings all being recorded. There's like a lot more things that people can. Yes, I mean, I mean it used to be that like meetings would just happen where there wouldn't necessarily be that many people there and now if the town is posting like every meeting. And frankly, everything we show is supposed to be a public document or the meeting right and no one's giving guidance on how we're going to post all these things and this shore and so forth. So, it's, we're just, we're just all the committees are trying to catch up I think some committees are more. And they know how they want to do it or they have regulations, like planning and all those but we're not as formal and we haven't given any guidance. I mean so I think with the priority list I mean that should be an item I guess for next time but. I guess that we could like review it we haven't reviewed it in a while, right, we could review it and like take a vote on it or a review of the priority list we could put that on the next. Yeah. The product or the upcoming projects for this is actually projects or whatever, you know, okay. But like the list that you're going to have in the complete streets plan when it goes to the state like that's going to all be public too so it would be good to see what that looks like. I mean it would be draft and like unofficial but yeah I mean I think our committee as an advisory committee can still look at the documents.  Yeah, no I think we should. Okay, official, you know, I move to win. Who seconds. Second. Thank you. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Thanks for your help go for great. Welcome. See you. Yeah, bye.


Why are there only KYC videos on The George Show lately? Where are all the YouTube tip videos and the $100,000 sponsorship and channel reviews? Why are we only doing Know Your Channel to help keep your channel safe? Well, it has to do with articles like this one behind me. Right now, top of mind on YouTube and in media is content quality. Because this is such a big, big topic in YouTube to help restore advertiser confidence this year in 2018.  But I want to hear your opinion. Tell me what you think down there in the comments below after we go over this article starting right now. I'm going to hide myself. Oh, and before I do, this all started because of the media in 2017 sensationalizing issues like PewDiePie being a Nazi supporter.  It was crazy stuff that I can't believe worked, but it did. And big brands pulled their budgets from YouTube in 2017. Because of this sensationalistic, dramatic clickbait news articles, and these aren't small time publications, guys. These are like New York Times writing things like, you know, YouTube helps fund terror by showing maybe one example that a news reporter found of an inappropriate ad in front of a video that might be considered something bad and supporting terrorism. In my opinion, it's all a big exaggeration that the media used to get a lot of views and hurt a lot of people, including YouTube in the bottom line. Again, this is my opinion. I'm not speaking for anybody here, just George's own personal thoughts. That's enough of that. Let's get on to reviewing this article. So this is an article on Polygon that's claiming, it's an opinion piece, see, opinion, that YouTube is turning away from its creators to become a new MTV. And I'll get into why this is why we're doing only KYC videos on The George Show. So let me just zoom this in a little bit. YouTube imagines itself as a retro MTV. Oh, and the link to this article, in case you want to read it yourself, is down there in the description below. Everything I'm going to talk about in this video is linked down there in the description below. So check that out if you want to get more information. This was in a conference meant to sell advertisers on the platform, not by some of the most popular creators like PewDiePie, KSI or Lisa Koshy. Actually, I don't know, Lisa Koshy. I know KSI and PewDiePie. And their stance is logical. The company can't sell against creators who routinely make controversial jokes or go to war with other YouTubers. Okay, fair point. But then the article talks all about the problems with Logan Paul. Yes, he was a problematic creator who made a video about a suicide forest. Like they filmed a dead body and showed it on YouTube. And that was certainly not okay. But for that to take us versus them as the theme for this opinion piece is what makes me upset. Because they're sensationalizing this. In my opinion, there's a balance to be drawn between what is considered bad behavior on YouTube. And those are the channels we've been on linking and that have been getting terminated. And just making YouTube feel like it's only for premium content. I'm just scrolling through this article as I'm talking. But you can read here, for example, there is Anna Akana as a popular YouTuber who appeared in movies like Ant-Man. They were paraded out on stage. But this is just pushing them closer to typical Hollywood culture than YouTube. Some of today's biggest creators who dominate YouTube culture never came up. The facts are YouTube is creating new strict policies that are terminating, demonetizing, and YBP suspending channels from the platform. And we are focusing on KYC because that is what we want to prevent happening to you. Freedom has already unlinked over 3,000 channels. So let me tell you the numbers so you know how much we're talking about. Before February 20th, Freedom had over 125,000 channels in its network. YouTube unlinked 96% of that, leaving us with about 9,000 channels. Then we unlinked, since March 1st, about 3,000 more channels leaving us now less than 6,000 channels in Freedom. So this is the most important thing that we can be talking about right now on the George Show. And there are so many examples of things that are considered bad acting according to YouTube that you may not think is bad acting. So I want to bring all those to you. Click that I in case you missed any of these KYC series. It's a playlist of now four episodes that go over specific channels and why I think they are good or bad to help you decide whether that kind of content is okay on your channel. Don't stay on the gray line, guys. Right now YouTube is about being squeaky clean, about being advertiser friendly, about being brand safe, and about only doing things that a human does. Don't do any botting. Don't do any automation on your channel. Use humans, not tools to do activities on your channel. Otherwise you may be miscategorized and YPP suspended, demonetized or terminated because of it. Now we've brought back channels. We've brought back 12% of the channels that had an abuse event in freedom. So YouTube does make mistakes when they do an abuse event and there is a chance that by explaining to YouTube the context of your channel they will reverse their decision and restore it or reinstate it. And of course we're here to help you do that if your channel has an abuse event and you need help just contact support at freedom.tm and we'll do our best to escalate your context that you tell us to YouTube through our direct connections at YouTube to help them reinstate your channel. So I hope you understand that is why we are only doing KYC and I want to bring attention in the same article to another really good video which is right here where the Chief Business Officer Robert Kinsle of YouTube sat down with a YouTuber. This is the YouTuber, this is the, where are we? How am I going to point to him? There, this is Robert Kinsle. Click that I to see the video of this interview which I think is exactly what YouTube should be doing more of talking directly through YouTubers that eventually reaches the press and all of us on what's going on with YouTube. What are they thinking behind the scenes? What are their plans for the future? Now, I actually did a little trick there. If you clicked that I, did you notice what happened? I am playing the video, the original video. I'm not uploading it to my own channel and playing a copy of it. That would be illegal or that would be a bad actor because I'm duplicating content without permission. So don't do that. You saw I put it into a playlist. That is a pro tip. Whenever you link to someone else's video, add it to a playlist on your channel with other videos you think are relevant to that one that are on your channel. So you will get an extra few views from people who are watching the video. Now after watching that video, go and look right and see what other videos they can watch from your channel. That way you control the suggested videos column, at least the top part of it in the playlist. So always use playlists guys whenever you're linking videos on Facebook, on Twitter, on any social media, emails. Don't just link the video ID. Link it with a playlist so that people who watch your video will have other videos that you want them to watch next in their list of things to watch. Do you do that? Do you have any other pro tips to help everyone grow together? Share them down there in the comments below so we can say it with me. Grow together as a family, which is the spirit of freedom. So guys, I have a lot of other updates that I've been meaning to share with you. Updates like how is our company formation in Dubai going? I will share with you what we've written as a business plan. So you can start writing your business plan if you think creating a company in Dubai which offers zero tax on all profits and payments to you. That's just the law in Dubai. It's a zero tax country. I was so shocked when I first learned about that. And my first reaction was, I gotta go get me a company in Dubai. So that was a few months ago and if you click that eye, you'll see the video I made of me in Dubai. So if you haven't watched it, I encourage you to watch it. It's a fun video and they have a free play Pac-Man, like many arcade game machine in the hotel I stayed at. I featured that in my video, which was really the highlight of my trip to Dubai. I'm a gamer guys. I've always been a gamer. I'll always appreciate games. I just don't have time to play them anymore, sadly. It's almost like someone who appreciates something. I was about to say smoking. That would be a bad example because we don't want to promote anything like smoking. But let's say something you're passionate about. You just can't do it because of time restrictions. So enough. But I digress. So we have updates to share with you about the Dubai company. We have updates to share with you about the game that I've been talking about. The games that we've been building and the game studio we've been in talks with. I'd love to share more updates on those soon. And I also want to talk about just how you are doing. I would love to be doing live streams where we can talk one on one. But until I have time to do live streams, just share your comments down there in the comments below or click that I and see the video about your YouTube experience. It's called Double Your Subscribers because in that video, one person who shared his YouTube story doubled his subscribers and I made a video about it to encourage everyone to share their YouTube story to tell us how you got to YouTube. What is personal about you? And that may help people check you out because they want to see who this person is after you share your personal story. I'll give you an example with me. My personal story is I used to be building a company called TGN that before it became a YouTube company that was trying to be a curse competitor. What that means is we were building wikis and forums around popular games. And we weren't doing so well. That was back in 2009. And then I uploaded some videos about World of Warcraft Cataclysm like six months before that expansion launched. A friend of mine gave me three beta keys and thank you friend for that because that's what started TGN as a YouTube network. We saw very quickly how many views World of Warcraft videos were getting on YouTube and we pivoted from being a web-based company for gaming communities to a YouTube video company making videos for World of Warcraft. Remember the TGN World of Warcraft channel guys? That's how we started. That's how I started on YouTube. And as you know I sold TGN to Broadband TV in 2012. I exited and I founded and started Freedom in 2013. And well the rest is history. We are here because of a long series of events that has culminated into Freedom what it is today. I can share more details if you're interested. Tell me down there in the comments below if you are. But that gives you a sense of the kind of story I would love to hear from you and if you want make a video about it and then send a link to that video in the comments so we can watch that video and not just read the text about your story if you have a lot of details you want to share that doesn't fit into a comment. Alright guys this video is getting a little bit long. But we haven't spoken much and I'm kind of using this opportunity to speak to you on a more personal level and share some of my thoughts not just tips on YouTube or how to keep your channel safe but also just so we get to know each other a little bit better so we feel a bond because that's also the spirit of freedom. You aren't just a number in our network you're not just a statistic on our financial reports. You're a person and we want to know you we want to help you we want to become your coach and actually that is what our team is now training to do which is one-on-one outreaches to be your coach to check in and see how you're doing give you some advice or just chat about whatever it is you want to chat about to make you feel like you're not just a number or a statistic in an MCN you are a person and a person that we care about. I wish we actually had done that sooner but of course it's a matter of time and staffing and I hope you'll appreciate these outreaches as they start coming out hopefully next week. I'll make some videos explaining that process and maybe giving some early results from the people we reach out so you can get a sense for what that means if you haven't been reached out to yet. Alright guys, anything else we should talk about? Should I do a fireside chat with George like I used to in the past? No, you know the drill, tell me in the comments below. So who am I? I am your Papa George. Your George Sun Pie. What other names have you guys given me? I don't even remember now, it's been so long it's like a routine I say. All the beautiful names you, the beautiful Freedom Family have given me. I am the CEO and founder of Freedom for Freedom and the Freedom Family. Again, we have a mission statement I should play for you. What do you think of the message and what do you think of the music? We specifically picked the music out to go along with the message and I hope it creates an emotional reaction among all of you the audience watching it. Did it? Any suggestions on improved phrasing? Tell me down there in the comments below. Until the next episode, I am George and you've been watching. Click that I to partner with Freedom and join the Freedom Family so we can all grow together. You get many perks like position music, you also get epidemic sound, a lot of other access to royalty free videos, sponsorships and many things to help you grow. Just click the links down there in the description below to get involved in our community, our forums, our Discord chat servers, meet our graphics team, meet our community team, all of that on Discord and the forums. What are you waiting for? Get started. And we will grow together as a family because this is the Freedom Family. You are part of it, we are all part of it and we're all growing together. To get more George, click that big F that will subscribe you to Freedom Central, home of the George Show. And PewDiePie gave one of you Freedom Family a big shout out. Click that video to see the shout out and to see our new 3D sets for you and click that video to see what YouTube recommends you watch next.