Stories indexed with the term ‘Fuller Road Station’

Ann Arbor City Council meeting (March 1, 2010) Part 2: Editor’s note: The major themes of the council meeting – the 3% budget directive, a ban on use of cell phones while driving, and a planned unit development called The Moravian – are covered in Part 1 of the March 1, 2010 meeting meeting report.

Larry Deck, board member of the Washtenaw Bicycling and Walking Coalition, addressed the council during the public hearing on the repeal of the city's bicycle registration system. (Photos by the writer.)

The council scrapped the city’s existing bicycle registration program at its Monday night meeting, but gave an assurance to a representative of the Washtenaw Bicycling and Walking Coalition that it would soon be replaced with something better.

Mayor John Hieftje used his communications time to rebut criticism of the planned Fuller Road Station – both with respect to its funding and its siting. While he assured critics that funding for the project would not come from the general fund, he allowed that he did not know how the project would be paid for.

And Christopher Taylor (Ward 3) reiterated enthusiasm for Ann Arbor’s response to a request for information by Google about a local fiber-optic network. He had also introduced the topic at a recent council meeting focusing on the budget.

The city administrator’s report to the council included updates on construction projects.

The city also continued a monthly recognition of its parks volunteers with a mayoral proclamation honoring Praveena and Madhan Ramaswami for their efforts to improve Bromley Park by organizing biannual events to remove invasive plants, plant flowers, and clean up the park. [Full Story]

Chris Leinberger was blunt in his assessment of the proposed Fuller Road Station: If the parking structure is built as proposed, in 20 years it will be torn down.

The city-owned Fuller Road parking lot, site of the proposed Fuller Road Station. To the south of the lot is the University of Michigan medical complex. (Photos by the writer.)

Speaking at a forum on transit-oriented development, Leinberger – a University of Michigan professor of practice in urban planning – said current plans for the joint UM/city of Ann Arbor project do a good job of incorporating different kinds of transit, from bikes and buses to perhaps, eventually, commuter rail.

But Leinberger criticized the project for taking some of Ann Arbor’s most valuable land and turning it into something that won’t generate revenue for the city. He told Eli Cooper, the city’s transportation program manager, that “whoever’s in your position 20 years from now will tear it down.”

Monday’s forum, held at the UM Art & Architecture building on north campus, was organized by members of the WALLY Coalition and the 208 Group, among others, to focus on local transit-oriented development efforts. Moderated by local developer Peter Allen, the event included presentations by Cooper, Richard Murphy of the city of Ypsilanti and Shea Charles, Howell’s city manager. [Full Story]

At left: Architect John Mouat, a member of the Fuller Road Station design team, talks with Eli Cooper, the city's transportation program manager, before the start of the Feb. 10 citizen participation forum. Mouat is a partner in the Ann Arbor firm of Mitchell and Mouat. (Photos by the writer.)

For Eli Cooper, the city of Ann Arbor’s transportation program manager, a project like the proposed Fuller Road Station happens “once in a lifetime” – an opportunity for the city, he says, to take a vision and make it reality in a fairly short time.

What it will take to reach that reality was the topic of a Feb. 10 public meeting on the Fuller Road Station, a joint University of Michigan/city of Ann Arbor project. Its first phase entails a parking structure with about 1,000 spaces – nearly 80% of them earmarked for UM use.

But much of the presentation by city staff and members of the design team focused on the broader goals for that site, which they hope will eventually include a train station for commuter rail. [Full Story]

Ann Arbor Transportation Authority board meeting (Dec. 16, 2009): At its regular meeting Wednesday night, the AATA board gave authorization to staff to solicit bids for the demolition, design and construction of a replacement for the Blake Transit Center, located in downtown Ann Arbor on Fourth Avenue.

At its headquarters on South Industrial Avenue, the AATA board tried out a makeshift venue for its Wednesday board meeting, because it offered an additional 12 seats for audience members, compared to the actual boardroom. Conceptual plans for the new Blake Transit transit center downtown include a boardroom. (Photos by the writer.)

The conceptual design calls for the new center to be constructed on the same footprint as the old center, with flexibility to expand, if abutting property were to become available.

The hope for flexibility on the Blake Transit Center design had also surfaced earlier in the day, at the Downtown Development Authority’s transportation committee meeting. There, the concept of Fourth Avenue as a transit corridor had been floated by DDA executive director Susan Pollay.

In other business, the board kept the discussion going on the question of how to proceed in expanding its service to include more of Washtenaw County. But they did not consider any resolutions related to formation of a new, expanded public transit authority. As part of the effort to expand, a general board consensus emerged that the public needed to be educated about what public transit is, and how the AATA worked.

Related to the need to educate the public about what the AATA does was the treasurer’s report, submitted by Ted Annis, which recommended greater financial transparency through posting various financial data on the AATA website. The specific suggestion to post employee salaries was not embraced by all on the board, but the suggestions were remanded to the performance monitoring and external relations committee (PMER).

And a response by staff to the November treasurer’s report highlighted a potential point of contention in estimating revenues available for funding an expanded service. Specifically, how much revenue could be expected from fares in an expanded service? [Full Story]

Left to right: Brian Nord and Caleb Poirier (back to camera), who are both advocates for Camp Take Notice, a self-governed encampment of homeless people. Also Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Mayor John Hieftje. (Photo by the writer.)

Ann Arbor City Council meeting (Nov. 5, 2009): Meeting on Thursday due to the elections, instead of in its usual Monday slot, Ann Arbor’s city council moved ahead on two major initiatives that will eventually have a significant impact on Ann Arbor residents.

The council approved a memorandum of understanding with the University of Michigan to move forward on joint development of the Fuller Road Station, which offers the university an alternative to construction of a parking deck on Wall Street. The first phase of the project is anticipated to be completed in mid-June 2012.

Also given a green light was a conversion to single-stream recycling – a single cart will be distributed to residents to replace the twin totes currently used for curbside pickup. The new carts will be rolled out in June 2010.

A more immediate impact will be made by a council decision to allocate a combined $159,500 to the Shelter Association of Washtenaw County and the Interfaith Hospitality Network – the funds will increase the sheltering capacity by 50 spots for individuals through the winter, starting Dec. 1, and provide housing vouchers for eight families for a year. [Full Story]

The proposed business improvement zone would include Ann Arbor's Main Street from William Street in the south to Huron Street in the north.

Ann Arbor City Council work session (Oct. 12, 2009): It’s a world where you can throw your newspapers, glass bottles and plastic tubs into one single recyclables cart and set it out for morning collection.

It’s a world where you can then board a bus that drops you off at the train station for your morning commute to Detroit.

It’s a world where during the work day you watch a foot of snow fall, but on your return home to Ann Arbor, you see that the snow hasn’t just been plowed on Main Street – it’s been completely removed – along with those handbills you’d noticed plastered on the lightpost.

It’s a world where later at home, you roll your empty recycling cart back to its place. Then you log on to the internet and see you’ve earned $250 worth of points tallied by the weight of the recyclables that the truck has been recording and crediting for the last year.

At its Monday night work session, Ann Arbor’s city council heard presentations on all the discrete elements of that world, which Ann Arbor could start to resemble in a couple of years. [Full Story]