Wednesday, December 7, 2022

News from the Truck Route Committee

At its meeting in November, the Common C0uncil ad hoc Truck Route Committee discussed a directive issued in 1976 by then police commissioner Thomas Quigley designating the truck routes within the city. Forty-six years later, that directive is still in effect, and at the committee meeting last Thursday, Councilmember Margaret Morris (First Ward), who chairs the committee, suggested it was time to amend it. The directive designates "Columbia St. west to North Front St." and "North Front St. -- north to Dock St. south to South Front St. to City Line" as part of the truck route. Morris proposed that the directive be amended to eliminate Columbia below Third and all of Front Street and to identify as truck routes only Route 9 and Route 9G as they pass through Hudson. Trucks are allowed to stray off these routes only if they are making local deliveries. 


The discussion inevitably led to Colarusso trucks, which use Front Street on their return trip from the waterfront in Hudson back to the quarry in Greenport. Morris maintained that the trucks returning to the quarry are not making local deliveries and hence should be required to travel only on the state highways that pass through Hudson. She maintained that the trucks could use Colarusso's private "haul road" through South Bay on the return trip, and, because the Department of Transportation will not allow them to make a left turn onto Route 9G, they could make a right turn, drive to the roundabout, come back into Hudson on Route 9G, and follow the truck route back to Newman Road. 


Fourth Ward supervisor Linda Mussmann argued that the haul road was one way. Council president Tom DePietro pointed out that the road was one lane not one way. Mussmann insisted that Colarusso could not use the road for travel in both directions unless it was widened to allow trucks going in opposite directions to pass each other on the road. That necessity assumes a fairly high volume of trucks coming and going between the quarry and the river. Morris maintained that it was not impossible for the road to be used in two directions. DePietro opined, "The real issue is: can we de-designate Front Street as a truck route?" It was decided that a legal opinion was needed.

The committee also discussed a document being developed by committee member Donna Streitz which makes the case for adopting what was identified in the truck study done by MJ Engineering and Land Surveying as Option 12, shown on the map below. That document can be found here

COPYRIGHT 2022 CAROLE OSTERINK

15 comments:

  1. Bravo. It is long overdue for the City to end supporting the fiction that Colarusso"s trucks can only go in one direction over their PRIVATE ROAD. It is just absurd to even consider that anyone would say the road is "one way." That distinction is a total arbitrary one, created by a private entity to coerce a favorable outcome out of the Hudson Planning Board, using the overburden of their heavy trucks on local streets to bully the City into a zoning change. Saying that the PRIVATE ROAD over the South Bay is one way is akin to saying that you can only use your driveway one-way, totally absurd and crazy.

    The size of the road is a self-created hardship for Colarusso. It is their problem, not ours. The size of the existing road is what they bought, as is the existing zoning considerations. Furthermore, if the Police Commissioner designated the portions of Columbia west of 3rd and lower Front Street as part of a local truck route, it should be simple enough to delist the portions by a decree of the commissioner or a local law. -John Rosenthal

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  2. 1.

    Colarusso "could not" use their existing private road in both directions, or would not?

    In her usual role as unofficial company spokesperson, Supervisor Mussman is parroting what they all simply want as if it's somehow necessary.

    Notwithstanding Mussman's shoddy reasoning, there's not only no practical requirement that trucks have room to pass one another, but the Core-Riverfront (C-R) District was *designed* so that they could not.

    Guided by the NYS Department of State, the Common Council's thinking at the time (2011) was that rather than risk a lawsuit over improperly regulating a private business, the best way for the City to limit truck volumes at the waterfront was "limiting the way the trucks get there," as Planning Board attorney Mitch Khosrova ably explained to Board members, company representatives, and the public in 2017. Who doesn't remember these things?

    Everyone should take a drive down Rte. 9W in Cementon to experience a workable alternative, where oncoming lanes of traffic are reduced to a single lane, and all traffic is regulated by traffic lights (e.g., near to where Quarry Road enters).

    Colarusso's claim that it cannot use the existing private road in both directions of travel as its predecessor did is easily explained. If the company can fool city officials and residents with atrocious memories into thinking that, yes, trucks must be able to pass one another on the causeway, then all will forget the waterfront plan (LWRP) which was years in the making and which led to the creation of the C-R District. In place of that plan worked out with at least a modicum of public participation, Colarusso and Mussman want permission for exactly the sort of plan the LWRP aimed to prevent, i.e. a technical "haul road" (which doesn't yet exist!).

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  3. 2.

    Though still requiring compromises from all parties, the LWRP pretty much solved the city's gravel truck problems, providing the plan was brought to completion. Regarding the latter, it's a little known fact that ever since Colarusso made improvements to its woodland road between Routes 9 and 9G, the last pieces of the puzzle - the missing curb-cuts - can be installed "in one afternoon," according to NYS DOT.

    Thus, by ending the local "truck route" on Front Street, attention should be drawn to Colarusso's *refusal* to complete the curb-cuts in the greater LWRP plan. For the company to claim privation would be a case of chutzpah. (To review, the LWRP allowed for a private, one-lane road to be used in two directions of travel, for "ingress to or egress from the property" [325-17.1(D)(2)]).

    (For anyone who's unfamiliar, Ms. Morris' proposal of southbound turns or "egresses" onto Rte. 9G from the causeway road are already a feature of the company's "Haul Road" proposal.)

    On the other hand, and in strict accordance with the C-R Zoning District, residents should demand an explanation from City Hall as to why the company is currently operating without any permit at all? This circumstance alone tells Colarusso that the City of Hudson is populated by losers. It does make you think.

    At this point, though, better than chasing old plans in changed circumstances (acknowledging that the City's [/Ken Dow's] successful defense in court was thanks to the LWRP), what would be the total opposite to being a loser city?

    Depending on the reasoning in the forthcoming judgement of the NYS Appellate Division, the best solution to Hudson's problem will be to deny the company an operating permit altogether. This can begin by denying the permitless operation in the present.

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  4. Thank's John. To this I would add some of your own historical perspective quoted by Gossips on July 26, 2017, including that the one-lane road was built on the old causeway specifically to handle staggered two way traffic. Also, that our 2011 zoning intended that the road remain as is--not widened into a behemoth truck-way that completely betrays the city's own vision: "Around 2011, the previous landowner built the current private haul road. The City rezoned in response, locking in the single lane "haul road" and dock as nonconforming uses (freezing them at their dimensions in 2011), allowing for entering and exiting the dock via a private, single lane. Colarusso bought the property in 2014, after the rezoning took effect and began arbitrarily using their private haul road in one direction, rather than routing their trucks back and forth across a single lane. The company chooses to send empty trucks back out along Front Street and Columbia Street to rejoin the state truck route. They are abusing City streets to try to force a zoning change. They have a single lane, private road and pretend that they can only use it one way."

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  5. Colarusso wants the two lane road for only one reason: to ramp up volume to a scale that would swamp all other waterfront uses, while providing the city with little, if any, economic upside.

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  6. Number 5 from that document explains why Columbia Street, 3rd Street and other streets in town are in such horrible condition (and will remain that way) and FULL of not so smooth small and large patch jobs by DPW. It says:" A federal study once found that road damage from one (loaded) 18-wheeler is equivalent to the impact of 9,600 cars." Of course, Hudson taxpayers pay for the damage these trucks bring us. Time for a 50 cents truck toll at each end of the truck route at our borders while we figure out how to BOOT THE ROUTE! B Huston

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  7. There have been two Hudson truck traffic studies in recent years. The first one was mandated by our Planning Board and was performed by the firm Creighton-Manning. Colarusso had resisted coughing up their truck data for 4 years, but finally the Planning Board found its backbone and demanded a proper study. What it revealed was that the original 2016 projection of 2,000 truck trips annually had mushroomed into 15,000 trips, a 700%+ increase!

    The second truck study was the result of a $100,000 grant secured by NY State Assembly Rep. Didi Barrett, and that document produced some amazing traffic data. The two principal routes coming in and out of Hudson (9 & 9G) carry a daily traffic load of 13,000 vehicles (approx. 6,500 daily on each route) during working hours. This means that the Colarusso trucks would be interacting at right angles on two separate highways with a massive amount of traffic. This is not only dangerous, but a recipe for congestion and delay. And after passing thru the two new intersections, the Colarusso trucks would have to travel thru South Bay, a wetland that enjoys status as a Significant Fish And Wildlife Habitat. Then the trucks would interact with over 20 trains per day at the Broad St. rail crossing, where there has already been one accident involving a train and gravel truck.

    This scheme is beyond ridiculous, and it's a damn shame that the Hudson Planning Board has messed around with the Colarusso application for 6 years. The company has sued the City twice during that period of time, and has made it clear that it has no regard for all the negative impacts it is imposing on Hudson. It is also worth noting that Colarusso has no operating permits and no grandfathered status-- the company is before the Planning Board as a new applicant that should have been rejected years ago.

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    1. So what's the best theory, Peter, as to why the city allows Colarusso to continue its operations in Hudson when it has no operating permit. Is there a quid pro quo, or is it just a favor from the building inspector?

      Someday some judge will ask the same question when the city suddenly claims the operation is a hardship. The record will show otherwise.

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    2. If you read the plaque down at Promenade Hill and observed the gigantic sewar pipes being installed by Colarusso on Lower State Street it seems easy to surmise that city govt. is deeply entrenched in a relationship with this company, which would explain their favored operational status.

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    3. Exactly.

      But what explains Hudson's previous oversights? Why did the building inspector give them a pass when they widened and resurfaced their causeway road east of Route 9G? That was a plain infraction of the Code at 325-17.1, which only invited the further insolence which is still in litigation.

      https://gossipsofrivertown.blogspot.com/2016/12/three-hearings-and-no-quorum.html

      Until Hudson's culture changes so that residents can recognize bad governance, no amount of professional planners are going to change a damned thing except for the city's tax rate.

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  8. Peter Spear submitted this comment by email:

    The waterfront issue is as incoherent as the rest of the city, because the City of Hudson’s waterfront and LWRP have fallen into The Planning Gap:

    In the absence of a professional planner in the City of Hudson whose job it is to ensure that the words and actions of the City of Hudson adhere to the shared vision of the community encoded in a contemporary Comprehensive Plan (or LWRP), the City of Hudson remains (at best) incoherent to itself and it’s residents.

    I can’t help but wonder how this might have played out differently if the City of Hudson had a city planner?

    Instead, the contributions of a rotating cast of Mayors, members of the Common Council, volunteers on the Planning Bard, and residents in the LWRP planning process disappear, and go completely forgotten.

    Without the institutional memory a city planner would provide - and without functional local journalism - we are left without any ability to understand the situation we are in, or to agree on fundamentals.

    The incoherence of the City of Hudson has real consequences.

    Peter Spear

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    1. Don't forget the rotating cast of City attorneys, Peter.
      Nothing will improve, with the truck nightmare or otherwise, until Craig Haigh, the head Code Enforcement Officer, is required/expected to do what all other department heads are doing, which is to appear monthly in front of the common council and the public to give a monthly report and take questions from the council members and the public. Until this is done, we can't believe that Hudson City Hall is serious about accountability, good governance and solving problems small and large, including the truck routes. When our important code enforcement office is finally properly engaged with the council and the public, Hudson will be moving in the right direction, or at least less so in the wrong direction.
      B Huston

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    2. It all does seem pretty absurd. You have a company with no operational permit running trucks through a recreational-conservation district and operating an industrial gravel transfer station in a core riverfront district - and city govt. is unable to do anything to regulate this? A simple first step would be to ban truck traffic down Front Street, how they deal with the directional travel down the gravel road is their problem, not Hudson's. They could use radios, install lights, many ways to regulate the two way travel. Of course then you have to ask the question, why are fleets of tractor trailers driving back and forth through a recreational-conservation district? There are lots of other things they could do with that property, it could be a campground, or they could build a bunch of mini houses and rent them out to eco-tourists.

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  9. Part of the problem here is that Colarusso does a lot of the paving work within the City, so there are likely officials who are loathe to interfere with the company's agenda. It's a classic case of pathetic small town politics.

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