The Traffic Safety Advisory Committee discussed what its goals should be at its first official meeting on Monday.
The Select Board elected the members of the committee back in October. It appointed Gary Hebert, David Kucharsky, and Rick Smyers as its three residential representatives after interviewing 11 applicants. They were joined by Police Chief Dennis King, Fire Chief Jason Gilliland, Department of Public Works Director Amy McHugh, and Town Engineer Charles Quigley, who make up the remainder of the committee’s roster, at the meeting.
At Town Meeting in May, Article 49 was passed, allowing for the creation of a TSAC “to implement the Marblehead Complete Streets Policy and evaluate public-safety issues involving traffic, roads, and other transportation, infrastructure in the town.”
After brief introductions, Town Administrator Thatcher Kezer restated the committee’s purpose. The members were then tasked with electing both a chair and a secretary. Hebert and McHugh were nominated to serve as chair and secretary, respectively, and the rest of the committee voted unanimously in favor of both.
Smyers made a motion to establish three overarching goals for the committee to follow.
“First being to have zero fatalities or serious injuries of any road user in Marblehead, second for every parent in Marblehead to feel safe having their children bike or walk to school, and third for Marblehead community members to feel that the town is responsive to their traffic safety concerns,” Smyers said.
While the board agreed with the points Smyers made, its members responded by suggesting that the official goals of the committee should be more specific.
“One of the goals is to reduce the number of fatal incidents involving traffic. I think that is an overall objective goal of any committee that is geared toward safety and traffic,” King said.
King added that he feels goals are hard to define, as TSAC works in concert with other departments such as the Complete Streets Committee, which implements numerous plans and projects.
“We have to focus on something because there’s the need to hone our expertise,” King said.
Hebert suggested that a total review of the Complete Streets project list should be an early priority for the committee to focus on.
“We’ll need to go down that list and find out what we’ve done, what we haven’t touched, and where we need to go,” Hebert said.
King explained that he and McHugh have fielded traffic-safety requests from residents before, but expressed his hope that the creation of TSAC will assist in creating more data-based permanent solutions.
Nothing was voted on at the meeting, as the committee hopes to finalize its goals at its next meeting, which is preliminarily scheduled for Dec. 18. Hebert also asked his fellow members to identify three town locations each that need their attention the most.
“I’m sure we’ll get a lot accomplished because this committee has all the right people on it,” Hebert said.