On Aug. 4, the Pagosa Springs Town Council engaged in a conversation with town staff about traffic and safety concerns on San Juan Alley, between South 8th Street and South 10th Street.
Brad Lattin was on hand at the meeting to inform the council about conversations that staff has had with residents around the alley.
He explained that staff presented nearby residents with three choices to address their traffic and safety concerns, including making the alley one-way westbound, installing a speed dip, or leaving the alley unchanged.
He added that staff distributed these choices using flyers to 22 residents around the alley seeking their feedback and input on the choices.
Out of the 22 flyers sent out, town staff received feedback from 11 residents, he noted.
An agenda document on the matter documented the following responses from residents: six said they wanted “no change,” three said they wanted to have a “speed dip” installed and two said they wanted to make the alley “one-way westbound.”
Lattin explained that this amounts to the majority of respondents, about 55 percent, wanting “no changes” in the alleyway.
“I don’t think we need to do a speed dip at this time,” he said.
Instead, he recommended redoing the resident survey and crafting a new policy after downtown road reconstruction has been completed, to gauge residents’ thoughts after the construction ends.
He also explained that he received feedback from the library and elementary school, and that “the feedback that I got is pretty much that everyone is wanting to leave it alone and to see what happens after the downtown construction is over.”
He recommended that the residents should “go out and get together and come up with a plan to bring to us, so we don’t have to do all the little things to get back to where we are today.”
Council member Leonard Martinez also recommended that the residents get together after the construction ends to see what everyone wants for the alley to meet their concerns.
Lattin explained, “We’ve actually done [the survey] three times now. We did one in the winter time, last year ... one last spring and one right before we did this study.”
He added, “We did it while school was going because that’s when we get the most traffic through there.”
Council member Gary Williams stated that he thought that “contacting the local residents is a nice way to proceed.”
“I hope we can create this atmosphere within the town and in government, in particular, to be adaptive, and that is to … try things and see if they work and we’re not locked in,” he said.
Town Manager David Harris explained that what the town is looking at is creating a policy that “would not lock us into a rigid protocol, but what we’re trying to lay out is how would a neighborhood make a request, and that’s the big key … is getting information from a neighborhood.”
Williams added that the town should “come up with a system in which neighborhoods can be more integrative and more communicative among themselves.”
Mayor Shari Pierce said to Lattin, “So, it looks like, to me, that you are here to inform us that we’re not going to be doing anything currently, but we are going to work on a future policy.”
Lattin replied, “That is correct.”
During public comment, resident Eddie Archuleta expressed that he was upset that nothing would happen in the alley.
“They all told me this was a done deal … and they were just waiting on the contractor to do it. You lied … what a bunch of liars,” he said.
derek@pagosasun.com
>