The first of several upcoming open office hours for the Powder House Boulevard Traffic Safety Plan took place last Wednesday at West Somerville Neighborhood School.

By Jackson Ellison

The first open office hours for the Powder House Boulevard Traffic Safety Plan were held by The City of Somerville Office of Strategic Planning and Community Development’s Transportation and Infrastructure Division at West Somerville Neighborhood School last Wednesday, April 10.

The office hours were set up so that public officials could get feedback from residents about the proposed safety plan. The plan is still a work in progress, so the Division wanted to first hear from the community before holding bigger community meetings.

The safety plan is aimed at controlling traffic by adding more speed control features on roads as well as implementing new devices to make intersections safer for pedestrians.

The city began work on Powder House Blvd. in the summer of 2017, and is projecting to be finished with the traffic safety elements by the summer of 2020.

A main area of interest at the office hours concerned adding bike lanes to Powder House Blvd. and the surrounding streets. The main reason is that while bike lanes make cycling much easier and safer, they also would take away street parking for many residents.

There are a few options of how to implement bike lanes. The two main options are adding either a one-way bike lane, or a two-way bike lane. Either way, having a bike lane would eliminate parking completely on one side of the street.

Residents argued both for and against the addition of more bike lanes. Some at the meeting who live on Powder House Blvd. pointed out that it is already a challenge to park on either side of the street.

According to the plan, an advantage of having a two-way bike lane is that they can help with traffic calming by narrowing the roads, forcing drivers to pay more attention to their surroundings.

Another feature of the safety plan is to convert Curtis St. from a signal intersection to a four-way stop. Depending on the success of the change from a signal to a four-way stop, the city would move forward with other safety options.

The city is also thinking about introducing the HAWK signal at Hardan Rd. According to the plan, “HAWK signals use a series of flashing and solid yellow lights to slow traffic, as well as flashing and solid red lights to stop traffic before they signal for pedestrians to cross.”

The city has a few more office hours planned before holding community meetings in the summer. The next office hours will be held on Thursday, April 25 from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at West Somerville High School.