MEMORANDUM TO:

Joseph Scariza,
Design, DOT,
NYS Office Building,
250 Vets Memorial Highway,
Hauppauge, NY 11788

CC: Senator Ken LaValle, Assemblywoman Pat Acampora, Assemblywoman Pat Eddington, Councilman Ed Hennessey Councilman Gene Gerrard, Joseph Boardman Commissioner DOT, Thomas Oelerich P.E., Jon Orcutt, Tri-State Transportation Campaign, Eric Alexander, Vision L.I., Lisa Tyson, LIPC, Chris O'Connor, Neighborhood Network, Lori Baldassari, ABCO

FROM: Connie Kepert, Chair Middle Country Road Leadership Committee, President Longwood Alliance

RE: Striping Rt. 25 Middle Island, Coram

DATE: August 22nd, 2002

In an attempt to create a safe, effective, people friendly roadway the Middle Island, and Coram communities have been working with the Department of Transportation for many years.  We have held numerous meetings with community organizations, elected officials, and the Department representatives.  Our latest effort was a community wide visioning process in which a wide diversity of community organizations, residents, Town of Brookhaven officials, and traffic and Planning experts developed a consensus plan for the future of the Middle Country Road corridor.  This plan has been endorsed by all of our elected officials, and reviewed and discussed with DOT representatives.  We are currently working to align the community's vision with the needs of the department, between CR 83 and Coram Mt. Sinai Road, the the only portion of the roadway for which there is funding available.

On the remainder of the roadway from Coram Mt. Sinai Rd to CR 21 a resurfacing project recently took place.  No further enhancements to this portion of the roadway are planned until after 2008.  Therefore, the type of striping which were planned, and have indeed occurred on the roadway, is extremely important to the Middle Island and Coram communities.

Accordingly, representatives from the Middle Country Road Renaissance Project and Vision L.I. met with several designers including Eric Koster, and Anna Elias, and reviewed the community's vision, and problems with the proposed striping, as well as preferred striping alternatives for this portion of the roadway.  We were told that striping changes which altered the size of lane widths could not be entertained because such would require opening the project to public review.  Parenthetically, public review of a project which will serve as the only enhancement to this portion of Middle Country Road until 2008, would have been the appropriate, and reasonable course of action for the Department.

However, since that was not the course of action chosen by the Department, we provided the design team with modifications which would allow lane widths to remain unchanged while reflecting the community's vision, and enhancing the safety of motorists, cyclists and pedestrians.  Simple striping, and crosswalk enhancements,(enclosed) were proposed.  We also provided the design team with a specific list of the areas on which modifications were desired.

Out of the seventeen specific areas we requested modifications the design team responded that they could only accommodate two.  Accommodations which dealt with the large expanses of shoulder widths were summarily rejected.  This tired response fails to take advantage of the freedom which both the Inter modal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act ISTEA and TEA 21 provided to every state.  In essence ISTEA and TEA 21 allows citizens and highway departments to collaborate on design of roadways which meet the needs of the whole community, preserve its character, and protect or enhance its aesthetic appeal.

Even the bible of conventional design, the AASHTO Guide provides the traffic engineer with flexibility.  According to its forward the guidelines are intended to be only a "reference manual for assistance" which allows "sufficient flexibility...to encourage independent designs tailored to particular situations."  The AASHTO Guidelines are just that, guidelines.  They are not standards which must be followed in every instance, no matter what the local circumstance.  AASHTO states that highways should be, "designed to complement their environments:" and that "environmental (which includes community) impacts can and should be mitigated by thoughtful design processes."

Unfortunately, thoughtful design or even reasonable accommodation is not what the Middle Island and Coram Communities received.  Allow me to underscore that the striping which we recommended simply enhances the safety of the roadway for all uses, and requires only paint.

We find the response of the design team short sighted and contrary to the recommendations which came out of the time consuming and arduous visioning process, the desire of every official elected who represents the area, and the antithesis of the recommendations coming out of the Governor's Quality Communities Task Force.  It is indeed bureaucracy at its worse.  We ask that you act quickly to review the decision of your designers and to work with the Middle Island and Coram communities to accommodate our more than reasonable requests for simple striping enhancements.  Thank you.

encl: Proposed striping enhancements, Memo of 7/19