Our hometown regional transit agency, PARTA, is always working to keep up with the times and they’ve got some changes in the works for their Dial A Ride services (DART) that they want to share for public comment at some upcoming meetings.

DART provides eligible and registered transit riders a special pick-up and ride service for folks whom for various reasons are unable to utilize the fixed-route bus system that most of us are more familiar with.  In those cases, riders can call for pick up and delivery on demand similar to taxi or Uber services.

PARTA transit services are critical in Kent — both DART and fixed route buses — so I’m happy to spread the word of their upcoming proposals.

                                                     

PARTA,

Portage Area Regional Transportation Authority                

Contact: Katherine Manning 330-678-7745 x 113; kmanning@partaonline.org

 Service Change Public Hearings

PARTA will hold public hearings on potential dial-a-ride changes set for July 1, 2018.  Public hearings will be held at the following dates and times:

April 16, Reed Memorial Library                                           10:00 a.m.

April 16, Garrettsville Library                                                2:00 p.m.

April 17, Randolph Senior Center                                         10:00 a.m.

April 18, Kent Central Gateway (2^nd Floor)                         2:00 p.m.

April 19, Reed Memorial Library                                           5:00 p.m.

April 20, Streetsboro Library                                                 2:00 p.m.

 

Dial-a-ride response service (DART) is shared-ride, general public transportation available to passengers who register with PARTA.  PARTA is proposing a series of changes to its DART service with the goal of creating long term sustainable service.  PARTA has not made any substantial changes to its DART system or its fare structure since 1998.   A countywide sales tax passed in 2002, along with contract and state and federal funding, has in part funded a countywide DART service over the last 15 years.  However, despite PARTA’s efforts to run efficiently and keep costs low, PARTA has seen a decline in revenue along with inflationary costs.  Therefore, PARTA is now taking steps to redesign the DART service model to support ongoing service for Portage County residents by:

 

Reallocating Days/Hours of Operation

Service hours will be reallocated to support expanded days and hours of service, mirroring fixed route services:  Monday-Friday 5:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. and Saturday 8:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Increase in DART Fares

DART	Current	Proposed
General Public	$4.00	$6.00
Reduced Fare	$2.00	$3.00
Medicaid (Contract with JFS or DD Board)		Free
Ticket Book General Public (10 Ride)	$30.00	$54.00
Ticket Book Reduced Fare (10 Ride)	$15.00	$30.00

 

Utilization of Fixed Route System

Trips that have easy access to fixed route bus service and have pickup and drop off locations within .3 miles of a fixed route will no longer be eligible for DART service. Trips will still be eligible for DART if pickup or drop off locations are outside the 0.3-mile subject to service availability.

PARTA offers free travel training to help individuals and groups learn to use PARTA’s fixed route system. Individuals who attend the class for the first time receive a free 10-ride pass. (A list of upcoming classes is available on partaonline.org.)

PARTA encourages Portage County residents to attend the public hearings that have been scheduled.  If residents are unable to attend, comments should be directed to PARTA at 2000 Summit Road, Kent, OH, Attention: Planning Department, via mail or fax at 330-676-6310.  Comments can also be made online at www.partaonline.org.

Mayor Fiala sent along some old newspaper clippings from the last City Hall ribbon cutting he participated in and said he’s looking forward to Kent’s next one.

The City Center idea was a temporary fix that lasted Kent 30 years.  It served the City well but time caught up with it and the Mayor said he’s ready to find the kind of City Hall that Kent residents deserve.

Back in 1974 ODOT, Akron and Kent had plans to construct a highway that would connect Akron and Kent — and beyond into the northern parts of Portage County.

 

Parts of the new highway were built — including the Inner Beltway in Akron and SR 261 in Kent — in expectation of more to come but after years of waiting, it became clear that time passed the idea by and both Akron and Kent are now looking to re-purpose those highway segments that ended up being the highways to nowhere in their communities.

Without the planned highway connections to the east or west, SR261 in Kent today is a whole-lotta-road without a whole-lotta traffic.  That seems like that’s a good problem to have but it turns out that too much road can be just as bad as too little road.

Kent emergency personnel are all too familiar with what happens when a road is overbuilt for the traffic it carries.

Wide open highways inspire speeding and speeding leads to crashes — and they’re not your garden variety fender benders, these are high speed dangerous life threatening crashes.

SR261 has been on the region’s “most dangerous” list for years and as it became clear that the super-highway was never going to be built ODOT, Akron and Kent started to think about what they could do to redesign the highway to make it safer and fit better in the current context of the community.

Planning groups have been busy in both cities and Akron recently released an update on the status of their plans:

AKRON INNERBELT UPDATE – The ongoing $19 million project to improve the Akron Innerbelt was the topic of discussion at the Jan. 18 meeting of the AMATS Citizens Involvement Committee (CIC).  Akron Planner Dylan Garritano briefed attendees on the status of the project, which is expected to be completed later this year.  To view our latest video feature recapping this meeting, please click here.

Meanwhile in Kent we don’t have any fancy videos yet but a small group of local residents have been working with City staff and ODOT for months to come up with some options to remake SR261 into a road that better fits the needs of the community with an emphasis on bicycling and walking — with plenty of room left for driving.

Stay tuned.

Last month the City’s Community Development Department issued a “Request for Qualifications” (RFQ) seeking proposals from qualified consulting firms to conduct a comprehensive review and update to the City’s Zoning Ordinance.

The City received nine (9) proposals from a range of planning and legal consulting firms, and all have been checked to verify that the required materials and information were included with each submission.

The City planning staff will now begin evaluating and scoring the proposals, but an invitation was also extended to the three (3) Council-at-Large Representatives and the Chairpersons for the Planning Commission and the Board of Zoning Appeals to participate in the review process too.

The Council and Commission member participation in the review process is voluntary and scoring of the proposals will be based only on the number of completed reviewer packets actually received so any invited volunteer reviewer who cannot participate, will not affect the final scoring — but as the leaders of their respective public bodies we thought it was important to get their input in selecting the firm that they will be working with in performing this important update.

The staff is hoping to have the completed reviewer scoring sheets for all nine (9) consulting firms back by 4 p.m. on Monday, February 12, 2018.

A quick tabulation will follow and then a short list for possible interviews with the leading firms will likely be arranged.

If all goes well, we may to be in a position to get the new firm started in March.

Dan Morganti in the City’s Community Development Office sent around the notice that the Community Development Department is beginning its 2018 Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program and is seeking proposals for CDBG eligible activities and projects.

CDBG funding has been one of the sources of revenue from the Federal government that has been targeted for cuts for years, but so far it has managed to survive all that budget haggling — although Kent’s share has been cut in half in the last 15 years.

Kent receives a relatively small amount compared to bigger cities but every dollar helps and we’ve got plenty of good uses for it.

Dan is moving forward with the annual CDBG project application and selection process but with the whole Federal government “shutdown” issue, we’re not really sure what that will mean to CDBG funding, if and when it would arrive, and how much should we should expect to receive.

Hope spring eternal so Dan is going through the CDBG public process as he does ever year in anticipation of everything working itself out in Washington DC.

Dan will be accepting applications through Friday, February 16th, 2018 at 4:00 pm.

Here’s the application details:  2018 CDBG Application Information

And here’s the Proposal Form that needs to be submitted.