Public Forum On Pomeroy Village Intersection Today (SAT). Town Officials Seeking Public Feedback
Intersection of Pomeroy Lane and West Street. Photo: screen shot - Google Maps
Public Forum Saturday, March 27th, 2-4 PM on Zoom
Details on how to connect to this Zoom meeting available here
In November 2020, Amherst received a $1.5 million MassWorks grant to enhance traffic and pedestrian safety at the intersection of West Street (Route 116), and Pomeroy and West Pomeroy Lane (Indy article on this award here). This area, Pomeroy Village, already serves as a small village center, with a number of businesses located at the corners of the intersection – including restaurants, a gas station and mini-market, two hairdressers, a laundromat/dry cleaner business, a daycare center, a tailor,and a transportation provider– as well as other residential and business uses nearby. The intersection is located 0.6 miles from Crocker Farm Elementary School and less than 1 mile from the South Amherst Common and the Orchard Valley neighborhood. The Town anticipates that the infrastructure improvements that will be funded with the MassWorks grant will spur additional residential and economic development, and enhance pedestrian, bicyclist, and vehicular safety.
This four-way signalized intersection badly needs improvements. There are limited sidewalks and crosswalks, no pedestrian crossing signals, and poor ADA-pedestrian access. There are also no bike lanes or paths, and the two bus stops, just north of the intersection on West Street, have no benches or protected waiting areas. Because of the absence of vehicle turning lanes at the intersection, during weekday afternoon commuting hours, the southbound traffic on West Street often backs up, and it can take a few signal cycles for vehicles to get through the intersection.
The Town is considering two primary design options for upgrading the intersection and making it safer and more functional. The first option is an enhanced signalized intersection. The second is a roundabout. Either option will add new sidewalks, new crosswalks and curb cut ramps to the street, vehicle turning lanes, and accommodations for bicyclists. The roundabout option will also result in slowing and calming traffic traveling through the intersection.
The timeframe for the project calls for the Town Council to decide whether to support an enhanced signalized intersection or a roundabout by June 2021. The Council and Town staff are currently conducting outreach to help inform the Council’s decision.
In terms of public outreach, the Council’s Town Services and Outreach Committee (TSO) held one online public forum on Thursday, March 25 and has another scheduled for Saturday, March 27. The Council and Town staff are seeking feedback from the public on the following aspects of the Pomeroy Village area: when, how, why they visit or travel through Pomeroy Village; if they own a business or live nearby; what improvements they would like to see in the village and for the intersection design itself; how the area can be made more welcoming; and, how businesses can be more supported.
In addition to providing comment during the public forums, people can also share their ideas on the Engage Amherst web page for the project , via written comments to the Town Council (email: towncouncil@amherstma.gov), or at future TSO and Council meetings. Town staff are also planning outreach activities, such as meetings with businesses, property owners, and nearby neighborhoods, including some outreach in person.
The Design Review Board will be discussing this project at its meeting on Monday, April 5, at 5 p.m. (meeting agenda and Zoom link here). The project is also on the agenda for the TSO meetings on April 8th (discussion) and April 22nd (vote on preferred design). It is anticipated that the TSO will report on its recommendation at the May 3rd Town Council meeting, and that the Council will then vote on its preferred design in June. After the Council has indicated its preference, the engineering consultant for the project will begin on a detailed design for the intersection. It is currently estimated that reconstruction of the intersection will begin in 2022.
Additional online resources on this project:
Town staff presentation to the Town Council at the Council’s January 25, 2021 meeting:
Town of Amherst Community Chat with Amherst Public Works Superintendent Guilford Mooring and Town Engineer Jason Skeels, March 25, 2021:
Town of Amherst Community Chat with Amherst Planning Director Chris Brestrup and Town Engineer Jason Skeels on the project, January 28, 2021:
A roundabout seems like overkill. This is not a big business area; all our stores are small—unlike Atkins—and it is nice that way. A bike lane would certainly improve safety, as would making sure bike riders didn’t run lights. I use a cane to walk; better curbing would be great. Fixing the drainage problem on the gas station corner would be an enormous improvement; there is a lake after a heavy rainfall. Figure out better traffic light timing. Put continuous sidewalks on Pomeroy. Can you put in some small trees? Flower planters? We look neglected! And we have been…until the decision to “develop” us was made.
We are a neighborhood. We have character. We live here. We are a very various cross-section of the town’s demographics. If you want to make Amherst sleek and modern, continue doing what you are doing downtown.
Hi Michele, thanks for your comments. I attended the public forum on Thursday and some of the commenters suggested adding landscaping and places for people to sit to make it more attractive. I think that the number and diversity of the small businesses in Pomeroy Village are impressive, and it would be great to see more of them.
Regarding whether or not the intersection becomes a roundabout or not, Town staff could speak to this better than I but my understanding is that if it becomes a roundabout, it will be significantly different than the ones at Atkins. It will be much smaller, and it will have lower travel speeds, and much more focus on pedestrian safety and access. The Atkins roundabouts have few crosswalks. A roundabout at Pomeroy Village would have more of them. There are numerous examples of where roundabouts have enhanced village centers and pedestrian safety now harmed it. Two examples I like:
(a) in Great Neck Plaza, NY — a roundabout built in 2008. This is a small community with many residents (30%) over age 65 years old. The roundabout and related improvements/signage on the approach roads slowed traffic and increased pedestrian safety at the intersection. Here’s a link to more info on the project: http://www.pedbikesafe.org/PEDSAFE/casestudies_detail.cfm?CS_NUM=96
(b) in Fort Pierce, FL — a roundabout built in the 1990s. This is a seaside community, and the roundabout was installed at intersection near the waterfront to help promote revitalization of the waterfront area. Following the project, there was a large increase in pedestrian traffic, and vehicle traffic was slowed from 30-40 mph pre-project to 10 mph afterwards. The project included streetlights, landscaping, colored crosswalks, median islands, and curb extensions to narrow the vehicle travel lanes. Here’s a link for more info: http://www.pedbikesafe.org/PEDSAFE/casestudies_detail.cfm?CS_NUM=14
Roundabouts appear to be the newest fashion in traffic management. While they may have their advantages, one wonders whether or not these advantages can truly justify the costs of designing, building, and — at least when it’s done (some roundabouts in town appear to have been built with the promise of wonderful plantings, and then just abandoned) — maintaining these structures. When the Triangle Street roundabout was proposed, it was justified by arguing that it was a dangerous and potentially deadly intersection. That was never my experience, and I have lived in town since 1987. One wonders whether or not roundabouts are simply fun projects for the DPW to undertake, so that they can avoid doing the less glamorous ones like actual upkeep of the roads that have already been built and that continue to deteriorate. I believe that the last time I asked Guilford Mooring about the backlog in road maintenance projects, it was about $20 million. That would have been at the last Town Meeting, so it’s anyone’s guess as to how much that figure has increased. With the inevitable shortfall in town revenues because of COVID, we should ask why we are not spending monies on what really needs to be fixed, rather than on doing projects that are really not necessary.
Denise, as stated in the article, the Pomeroy Intersection improvements listed above will be funded perhaps fully but at least in part, by a 1.5 million Mass Works grant. I too live in the middle of town but it is clear to me that the pomeroy village intersection is in dire need of an infrastructure improvement- for example in the picture that accompanies the article, you can see that the crosswalks are in need of upkeep/placement, the sidewalks are not even and there are no bikelanes. As you rightly point out, DPW is backlogged with maintenance projects and our town needs to take advantage of grants like this to help with street improvements such as this one.