The Traffic Safety Advisory Committee reviewed town crash trends and furthered its discussion of the group’s mission, goals, and objectives at their latest meeting on Monday. This was the second meeting the committee has held since being formed and appointed by the Select Board earlier this year.
Chair Gary Hebert assembled data on Marblehead crashes throughout the last five years from the state’s highway crash website and distributed it to his fellow committee members.
“It helps me direct my energies toward the appropriate locations that are the highest crash locations in town,” Hebert said.
Committee member David Kucharsky noted how the data seems to support a recommendation he had made to implement safety improvements along the corridor of Lafayette and Pleasant Streets that extends to West Shore Drive and Spring Street.
“I think of the 41 crash locations, there were 13 or 14 along that particular corridor,” Kucharsky said. “That makes up about 32% of the overall number. That road serves the majority of the schools in town.”
Police Chief and Committee member Dennis King expressed his belief that analyzing this data can lead to the committee accomplishing its goals.
“This is how you design effective answers and solutions,” King said.
Hebert added that a lot of crashes involving pedestrians and bikers are focused in the vicinity of Pleasant Street and Atlantic Avenue.
“That’s largely the area near the schools, which is important,” Hebert said. “We gotta focus on doing a good job at trying to make things safer for the students and senior citizens that are walking around town.”
The committee continued their discussion on its mission, goals, and objectives that began at their last meeting on Nov. 20. After the discussion concluded, they voted unanimously in favor of finalizing the language. The Committee’s three goals are to accelerate the progress on the town’s complete streets policy and provide advisory support to the Department of Public Works and Town Engineer, reduce all crashes and ultimately eliminate the amount of fatal or severe injury crashes in town and provide advisory guidance to the Select Board, and respond to community members’ traffic safety concerns and educate community members about traffic safety. Each goal has a subset of multiple objectives.
The committee also voted unanimously to recommend the installation of stop signs at the intersections of Evans Road and Elm Street, Arthur Avenue and Robert Road, and Casino Road and Atlantic Avenue. This proposition will now go before the Select Board for final approval.
