An attempt to delay plans that will add a bike lane to the upper portion of Huron Avenue failed during Monday night’s city council meeting, as a 6-3 majority of councillors opted to keep the project moving toward completion.
The issue first made council’s agenda last week, when Councillor Cathie Zusy submitted a policy order to delay construction for five years, citing a high desire for parking in the area to accommodate a 250-unit residence and recreational opportunities like the Fresh Pond Golf Course and Glacken Field. But instead of voting on the measure, Councillor Marc McGovern introduced a substitute policy order — aimed at keeping the construction timeline intact while the city works to find parking alternatives in the Strawberry Hill neighborhood — prompting Zusy to use her charter right to delay the vote a week.
While Zusy attempted a compromise by offering to reduce the delay in her version of the order to one year instead of five, McGovern’s version of the order prevailed. During debate, he noted that while some of the work to improve the street in preparation for installing the bike lanes will begin this fall, the parking spots will not be displaced until spring of next year, giving the city time to find alternatives for the 44 parking spots the order said will be lost.
McGovern said the plan for the lanes, which continues the implementation of the city’s Cycling Safety Ordinance, already reflected community compromise. He noted that originally around 81 spaces would have been lost, but the city’s Department of Transportation decided to cut “the amount of removed parking spaces in half based on public input. That seems to me to be listening to the public.” He also cited keeping loading zones and adding new accessible spots for disabled residents as examples of community suggestions from drivers that made their way into the design.
But Zusy said people who use the Fresh Pond Golf Course, Glacken Field and the Veterans of Foreign Wars center would be affected in ways that will be hard to address. She said she’s been brainstorming ways to make up for the lost parking since December and “just haven’t seen solutions.”
Golfers in particular are worried that the loss of street parking will lead to even more use of the course’s lot.
Cambridge Transportation Commissioner Brooke McKenna offered suggestions to help, such as providing the golf course with placards for its users to put on their cars to help identify people parked there illegally. The city could also work with the golf course to provide off-hours parking for places like the VFW. In addition, it could transition the remaining unrestricted parking on the stretch to residential permit holders only at night in order to prioritize parking for residents. What the department can’t do, she said, is grow new spaces out of thin air.
“We have been trying to find off-street spaces,” she said. “We have not been successful in doing that.” Deputy City Manager Kathy Watkins confirmed that attempts to lease new parking spaces from large residences like Parkside Place at 700 Huron Ave. have not been successful.
In the end, only Zusy, Councillor Timothy Flaherty and Councillor E. Denise Simmons opposed the substitute policy order.
Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui, who co-sponsored McGovern’s substitute, said there was value in holding the city accountable for reporting back to the public about ways to soothe the loss in total number of spaces.
“I think the proposed substitute strikes a balance around moving forward but continuing to work with residents and stakeholders on access,” she said. “I think coming back with a response to say ‘this is exactly what we did, here’s other things that we’ve tried,’ before this goes into construction in spring summer would be really ideal.”
A stronger
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