COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA PUBLIC HEARING COMMITTEES ON LAW AND GOVERNMENT and STREETS AND SERVICES - - - - Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Thursday, August 5, 2004 11:30 a.m. - - - - RESOLUTION 040646 - Resolution authorizing City Council's Committees on Law and Government and Streets and Services to hold public hearings to investigate the state of intergovernmental cooperation between the Streets Department, the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and the City Council of Philadelphia... PRESENT: COUNCILMAN DAVID COHEN, Chair ALSO PRESENT: Robert Jaffe, Special Counsel Steven Masters, Staff Attorney Jason Mayland, Legislative Assistant - - - - V A R A L L O Incorporated Litigation Support Services Eleven Penn Center 1835 Market Street, Suite 600 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19103 215.561.2220 215.567.2670 2 I N D E X RESOLUTION 040646 DARLENE DAVIS HEEP, Law Dept......... CHARLES TRAINOR, Streets Dept........ 6 GHON JORDAN, Streets Dept............ 25 CHARLES DENNY, Streets Dept.......... 47 7 JOSEPH DOYLE, Streets Dept........... 68 8 9 3
This is the continuation of a hearing of the Law and Government and Streets and Services Committee until the hearings are completed. The main purpose today was to get up to date on the documents requested by the Committee and some questioning of the few witnesses preliminarily. Mr. Lutz, in going over with the Committee Members, I'm told that your testimony will not asked for today, so as far as this Committee is concerned, you are free to leave. Or you can stay as a member of the public or the Streets Department, but you will not be called. The others, I'm asking at this time to remain. There may be a few questions of a preliminary nature. So, Mr. Lutz, feel free to leave if you'd like.
Everyone else may be called today. Now, my staff has been working with 4 the witnesses here today to try to check as to whether the document requested have been delivered. And I'm going to turn over the procedure at this point to Mr. Jaffe to help determine whether we have the documents needed or what's still needed and when they can be arrived at. Mr. Jaffe, you will be authorized in turn. If members of your staff are dealing with certain phases, turn over questioning to them. I want each person to know precisely what we requested and whether the documents are what we needed. And there may also develop a need for additional documents as a result of this questioning. That, I can't foresee. Mr. Jaffe, go ahead.
Thank you, Councilman. Thank you, fellow employees of the City of Philadelphia Streets Department. What we're planning to do is to learn about how you make your decisions, how you form the files. And we've submitted 5 material back to you. You gave us approximately 30,000 cases of recent consideration in decision-making. We picked out basically two pages and stopped on two topic areas. What we'd like to do is just have a district engineer come forward and go through the list and tell us which cases they're in charge of with those files, what they've given us, how that file took formation, is the file complete, is there anything that you have redacted or anything that Counsel has advised you to redact, is there anything that we haven't gotten. We were going to start just -- you have the list that we submitted to the Streets Department previously into Counsel, Ms. Heep, from the Law Department. Could you identify yourself for record?
Darlene Davis Heep, I'm a Senior Attorney with the Law Department. I'd just like to say for the record that Joseph Trumbetta (ph) and Paul Lonie are both now retired. Ghon Jordan is not here today for 6 medical reasons, and Bob Wright is not here because he's out of state.
Could you speak directly into the microphone. I'm having great difficulty with two hearing aids hearing you.
Okay. My name is Darlene Heep, I'm a Senior Attorney with the Law Department. I'm here to give a statement about who is present and who is not. Mr. Trumbetta and Mr. Lonie are now both retired and they are not here. Mr. Ghon Jordan is out for medical reasons so he will not appear today. And Mr. Robert Wright is out of state so he will not be here today.
You would be in agreement, wouldn't you, Ms. Heep, that the fact that a person's retired would not relieve that person of the requirement of fulfilling a subpoena? I'm sure you may not have the power to get him to come, but I'm sure we do.
It was my understanding that your office perhaps had sent them 7 subpoenas at home. I don't know anything about that.
It's my understanding that your office had subpoenaed the two men who have retired separately perhaps at their homes, but I'm not familiar with that.
I'm under the impression that many but not all of the jacket case files have been submitted to us. I believe Steve Masters from Technical Staff Services to City Council has material you submitted. And if you want to start with the top case, and whichever of you is responsible for that, that might be an easy way just to say that we'll start with that district engineer and you can tell us which one is yours and go through; if we haven't gotten any, which ones we haven't gotten and why.
I think what we'd like to do is have Charles Trainor and Charles 8 Denny be up at the witness stand for all of them. And we would like the district engineer who is working on or who did any work on the 700 McClellan location, the Seventh Street and McClellan Street and Eighth Street and McClellan Street, which are TR18853 and TR17445.
Whenever, in the opinion of a witness, the test that is being discussed is done under a PennDOT requirement so that the employee believed he was working and carrying out a State regulation rather than a City requirement, please so state. If you don't state it, we're going to be assuming for purposes of this hearing that you're carrying out the duties as a City employee, carrying out duties that are ordinances or resolutions or whatever it is, the City regulation. So if you're doing something in your judgment or the person about whom you were reporting did it pursuant to a PennDOT ordinance or regulation that he believed he had to follow, please state that. Otherwise, we're going to assume it's City work. Is that 9 clear? Because that's been one of the areas that's been very unclear in the many years I've been involved in hearing testimony involving Streets activity. Sometimes employees have appeared saying that they're acting pursuant on a certain matter to a State regulation. It's very important for the purpose of this hearing that we be clear whether you're performing, in your judgment or in the judgment of the person who undertook the assignment that he or she was performing, as a City employee or whether they were carrying out duties they thought were imposed upon them by the State. All right, with that introduction, Mr. Jaffe, whenever you're ready, proceed.
Could you please identify who you are for the record, and for the district engineer to identify himself as well on the record.
Good morning, Councilman Cohen and staff. I'm Charles Trainor, Traffic Engineer for the City of Philadelphia. 10 I'd like to take this opportunity to answer any questions I can regarding the one-way operation or any of the operations involving traffic engineering and the Traffic Engineering Division. The one-way or change of direction of streets normally starts with a request from City Council, from a City Councilperson, the District Councilperson, to be more specific. The Traffic Engineering Unit looks at the request and we determine whether there is an impact on safety and/or circulation for that roadway. An example of safety would be if we had a five-lighted intersection controlled by a traffic signal and the odd street is one street away from the intersection. If we receive a request to change that street to the other direction and therefore bringing it into the signalization, we would oppose that because we're now bringing in an additional movement into that intersection which winds up decreasing safety and decreasing the efficiency of the operation of the signal 11 because a signal of two phases has the time divided in half. This would require us to divide the time in a third and therefore less time for the particular movements. Another example would be from a circulation perspective. A few years ago we had a request to change a two-way street to a one-way street. We had problems with it regarding the circulation of it. A Council hearing was actually held where we opposed it. One of the residents or actually a property owner on the corner was a car dealership. They opposed the change. The overhead community group was opposed to it. As a result of the hearing, we posted a trial operation. And I believe within about four weeks, the trial ended; it went back to a two-way operation. That is where the one-way or any change in direction of streets occurs. If we get into a situation where we are receiving a request for a state highway, it is that point in time that we would bring PennDOT itself in to look it over and see what their opinion is 12 and get their testimony if need be.
In that case, you say you rejected the request for the one-way street after a trial period of four weeks? Is that accurate?
We opposed the trial based on the circulation that we saw that the two-way operation provided. A hearing was held on a bill to make that street one-way in the Streets and Services Committee. As a result of that hearing, it was agreed upon to post the street as a trial. We posted the street as a trial, and within approximately four weeks we received a request from the District Councilperson to put it back the way it was.
Yes, the District Councilperson, to put it back the way it was.
Why the District 13 Councilmember? Suppose some other Member of Council not the direct District Councilmember requested? What would the difference have been?
We would have referred a Councilperson-At-Large or another District Councilperson back to the originating District Councilperson. The one-way or the change in direction request originates within the District Council Office.
Suppose the request had originated with a Councilmember-At-Large?
If it was an original request to change the direction of a street or a request to end the one-way, to end the trial, we would have referred the Councilman-At-Large back to the District Office.
It's the District Council Office that generates the ordinance 25 for the change of direction. 14
Why do you say that? Suppose the example I gave you was where a Councilmember-At-Large generated the ordinance?
If we received the original request from a Councilperson-At-Large to change a direction of the street on a trial basis, let's say, without the ordinance, without a bill being introduced, we would have referred the Councilperson-At-Large to the District Office.
Well, is there an ordinance, is there a law of Pennsylvania that says District Councilmembers exclusively have certain rights which no Members of Council have and that a District Councilmember for a particular district is the sole Councilmember that can deal with the matter?
I know of no law. I believe this is basically the Council practice.
Well, who authorized the Streets Department to make that determination? 15
Councilman, this is the way, I believe, it's been done for 30 years that I know of.
Well, you'd have to do better than 30 years because my span covers 36 in Council. And I've never seen any effort made by anybody to show any authority for why a District Councilmember of a particular district has more rights with respect to part of a City than any other Councilmember. Who in the Streets Department makes the determination as to what Councilmember something is referred to?
Councilman, it depends on the specifics, I would say. Again, if we are talking about changing a direction of a street, this is, I believe, the practice in traffic engineering for 30 years, for 30 years that I know of, and it is referred to the District Councilperson for action.
Well, I just don't understand it. You mean that you believe that various Councilmembers have 16 different powers than other Councilmembers and not all Councilmembers are full Councilmembers? I don't understand this distinction you're making, and I've never heard of it before. I only hear of it on occasion from the Streets Department. I know of no other department in the City that talks about that under any circumstance. I'm looking for -- is there anybody among any of the witnesses, including Ms. Heep here, who has any ordinance or state law or anything to justify separate treatment of one Councilmember, giving him or her more power than any others? Is there anybody who has any evidence to that fact? Ms. Heep, did you want to address that issue?
There is no particular regulation or ordinance that we know that gives any particular Councilmember any more power than another. The Streets Department only acts when it receives an ordinance from the City 17 Council. It's been the pattern and practice of the City Council to refer such matters to the District Councilman, and Streets merely follows that pattern and practice.
Well, there's probably no objection to anybody ever being advised by any member of any department of anything, but does that include a power that only such a Councilmember has any power in an area?
Well, that determination, based on my understanding, is not made by the Streets Department. They simply follow the Municipal Code which instructs them to maintain the appropriate markings and put up signs and change the direction whenever an ordinance or regulation designates a change.
In the case that you're speaking of, was there a study made by the Streets Department during the trial period? In that four weeks of trial period, were there studies made of the traffic situation?
The case I'm talking 18 about, there was not specifically a study made as to the impact from an accident perspective because the time span was so short. In most cases --
Excuse me, sir. Which case are you referring to? Can you be specific what you're thinking of?
I believe the Councilman is talking about the case where we had the request that the Streets Department was opposed to, and after the Streets and Services Committee hearing, we posted a trial change and within four weeks we were asked to put it back the way the was. The reason we put it back or the reason that we got the request was because of the impact on circulation within that area.
Are you referring to any of the cases that you've submitted to us by jacket number? Can you identify it? Do you have the material just so we can be specific 19 what you're talking about? Do you have -- This is your material that the Streets Department provided to City Council and then we've printed out parts of it and given it back to you, so this is basically your material, your identification.
The case I'm speaking of, I believe pre-dates the data that we provided to you in the digital form.
Thank you. Are you able to identify it by any part of the City, any address, any way?
Mr. Trainor, do you know approximately what date that trial period occurred?
I do not. A lot of these run together. I really don't have the specifics. I just remember sitting here in City Council discussing the issue and then posting the street. I believe what we call a Type 3 barricade had been posted and that was moved frequently. I think every other day either us or PennDOT were up there replacing the barricade. I don't remember the specific dates and stuff.
Mr. Trainor, just to clarify, you were talking about trial periods earlier and you said they were pursuant to Councilmanic ordinance, correct?
They're pursuant to the request of City Council to try something. The trial ordinance, I believe, can be -- the trial regulations, let me put it that way, can be used for the change of direction and, of course, some parking regulations.
Now, pursuant to these kinds of trials, the rubric that you used, the matrix to define whether or not the trial was a success, are those provided to you by 21 PennDOT? Is there a certain series of checks that you go through to find out the types of benefits that are anticipated to be derived by having this kind of trial?
Not in all cases. As a matter of fact, not in most cases. Most of our requests are for small streets which are within the mid block, if you will. Between 12th and 13th you may have two streets running to Juniper Street. The impact on that would really be from a circulation perspective.
And by circulation, sir, you mean traffic flow, vehicular traffic flow?
Correct. And with that type of small street, it's really how the individual block who made the request through the City Council really feels it's working for them. In the case of a five-legged intersection where the fifth leg is now coming into the intersection, in that case, we would try to do a before-and-after accident study and observe the traffic at the intersection 22 from an efficiency and capacity perspective.
So there's a difference, sir, in how you would approach departmentally something like Red Lion at the Boulevard versus Ionic Street? There is a fundamental difference in how you would conduct that actual study?
Now, in the term of something as small as Ionic Street, is that essentially a visual assessment? So you say that you look at circulation. So an engineer would go out to the site and he would look around and he or she would say, "It doesn't appear as if this request is warranted" or "It appears as if this request is warranted"?
But you would not say, sir, that it's merely a subjective analysis; there is an objective criteria that is used or a series of criteria that are applied to make that sort of decision? 23
It's not going down a checklist, although they're in our own minds in most cases.
We're going to the top of the list of our request, and we had asked the district engineer to come forward who dealt with the 700 McClellan and Seventh Street and Eighth Street and McClellan which were identified as TR18853 and TR17445. I wanted to, as a preliminary matter, read a portion of the subpoena duces tecum which is the definition of documents. "Documents includes records, books, papers, contracts, memoranda, invoices, internal studies, internal reports, correspondence, e-mails, notes, minutes of any meetings including meetings with agents or employees, instructions, guides, compilations of rules, regulation or policies, daybooks, calendars, photographs, telegrams, messages, drawings, charts, graphs, other writings, recording tapes, recording disks, mechanical or electronic information storage or recording 24 elements spanning the time period from January 1, 1999 to the present." So the question that I'm going to have about all of these is, are all the documents of the types that we defined in the subpoena, were all of them provided related to these two jackets; or were any documents withheld?
I would like to respond. Subsequent to the issuance of the subpoena, I met with staff of the Councilman on at least two occasions, and the subpoena and what was requested was substantially narrowed. A letter dated June 30th that you should have explains the agreement that was reached. And subsequent to that, we met with the Councilman's staff and reviewed the disk which contained the summaries of the various jackets contained in the Department, and that was further reduced to the list that was produced on last Friday, maybe, and we provided everything that is in those jackets. Nothing has been redacted.
So your testimony is 25 for TR18853 and TR17445 which I'm holding up now, this collection of papers that are stapled together, there is nothing else that corresponds to these two requests that is being withheld from Council at this time; is that your testimony?
He originally was not going to attend because of illness, but here he is.
All right, great. Thank you, Mr. Jordan, for making the extra effort. Can you walk us through the paperwork you provided us with today and tell us first why do we have two TR numbers for the same job?
It happens all the time. Two different people request it. Somebody takes the request and they fill out a TR. I have a stack by my phone. Virtually anybody who calls me on almost anything, I might as well write it down on a TR because it might wind up being work, and I get their address and phone number, et cetera, et cetera. So it's not at all unusual for the same request to come in multiple times by different people or two different people and you wind up with two numbers. You often wind up with more than two.
In the database that we were provided, it looks like the request for both of these TRs came from Councilman DiCicco.
This one's filled out by someone other me, and this one is filled out by me. So the same office called and reached two different people and they both took a Trouble Report down. I recognize my handwritting, and I'm not a hundred percent sure whose handwriting that is. And they came 27 in on difference dates four months apart.
Do you have any idea why Councilman DiCicco's office would have had to notify you twice about the same request? The first time it looks like November 18, 2002; and the second time, March 14th of 2003. Why one request would not have been sufficient?
Sure. Not everybody on the street wanted the street to be changed.
Can you walk me through this? Is the first contact you had about this matter on November 18th of 2002, or was there something before that?
November 15, 2002, is what I've got as the first time I saw it. (Pause.)
The first time we saw it was a letter from Frank DiCicco to me saying that there's a petition and could we 28 give consideration to making the change.
So that's your first contact. And then what's your next step when you get some kind of contact like that from Councilman DiCicco?
I go and do a couple of things generally. One, we look on a map and visit the site and try to make a consideration whether this is a good idea or not and find out why this is being requested. And those criteria, in my mind, are first and foremost the wishes of the District Councilperson, the circulation, will it be reachable by the people, what problem are they trying to solve by this, whether it will be easier or harder to reach the block and exit the block, look into its impact on the parking, on-street parking on the block. Sometimes people don't take that into consideration. And sometimes Street reversals, one-way streets will increase or decrease the amount of on-street 29 parking. And if you switched the direction and parking is lost, the direction often gets switched back, and that generates more work for us and hassles so we try to get it right the first time and point out all the consequences of the action. Certainly, look at crashes that may be on the streets, lines of sight, et cetera, et cetera. And that's what we do.
Mr. Jordan, it will be helpful for us -- and your testimony so far is quite helpful. But what would be more helpful for us would be if as you recount what you did in this case if you could make reference to the various documents you provided us with that were from that jacket --
The most interesting of all the documents is a Trouble Report 18853, that's the one that I remember working on. It's all in my handwriting. And you can note on that on November 12th Irene who was a staffer at Frank DiCicco's office clarified that, yes, we should change the direction of the street in spite of some of the static that 30 they were getting in the office, the Council Office.
So you got a letter October 2nd, and then the first time that you contacted DiCicco's office was November 12th; is that what you're saying?
October 15th is your Trouble Report, but then there's a notation November 12th. Is that a subsequent conversation with Irene?
Absolutely. You see there's a line? It says, "Change direction from eastbound to westbound." And then at a different time I wrote "Correct," which means that's what they wanted, that fit the facts. Then I look into it and I'm saying, Okay, it's only a block or two long; we can change this direction; the sun will still rise in the east; I didn't have any safety concerns, per se; it's a minor street; if that's what the folks there want, there's no engineering reason to object to it. 31
Could you stop at that point? So when you say you didn't have any safety concerns, did you actually conduct any investigation between the time that you first spoke to the office on October 15th and the time that you made that notation where you said, "Okay to change"?
I probably looked at the crashes on our very nifty computerized crash database. I had received -- the work is written the week after I called Irene. Just give me a second to see what's in this pile, if you will.
I probably looked at the field sketch, which I cannot find, or just did it off a map and phone conversations.
Mr. Jordan, please don't consider this giving you a hard time, but when you say probably, are you saying 32 probably because you don't really remember and this is what you usually do?
It's what I usually do. And since I don't have a hard copy, I didn't hit the print button on the crashes that I called out that day for McClellan Street. It's something I normally do, but I can't prove it to you that I did it. That's why I said probably.
Now, when you look at -- let's say when you usually look at crash data and when you're investigating these types of requests, how often do you hit the print button and include that information in a written form in the jacket?
Occasionally. Not frequently, particularly on something like this. The crash data probably showed very little and so there's nothing to be learned. Let's say there had been no crashes, why would I push the button?
Well, the question would be, what policies or obligations are you under to document a file when you do these 33 investigations? That would be my question. If you're asking the question why would you include a printout that shows no 5 crashes, why look at crash data at all if you're not going to document the file? That would be my question to you.
I'm more worried about getting the thing done right than documenting it. And if you look at your tools and one of your answers come back as there are no 12 crashes, okay, there's no crashes and it's not materially significant. It doesn't void the argument that there's a safety problem if there's few crashes. I'm not the greatest filer and I don't always hit the print button.
When you do these types of investigations and you do find a crash history, are you any more likely to print that out and include that in the jacket?
So are you testifying that if you don't include crash history in a file then you found no crashes, or are you not certain about that? 34 In other words, if we find other jackets that you worked on and it doesn't have any crash data documented by a printout, are you saying that that's because you found no 6 crashes, or you probably found no crashes but you could have found some crashes and still not include it in the file?
So you spoke to the Councilman's office on the 15th of October, you looked at the crash data in your database. Did you visit the site personally to look at the situation firsthand?
So was it at that point that you said it's okay to switch "PK" which means parking, question mark?
That's correct. And that did subsequently become a very real 35 problem. And then I called back to -- or Irene -- one or the other of us. Irene is a real nice lady and we deal with her all the time. So on November 12th, I made a notation to call Irene. You can see I crossed that out with a pencil and then it says "November 12th, Irene says change direction street," which means I looked into it, I called her back as I promised, and she said go with it. One of the things that's not on the table yet is that on the back of another piece of paper here, which you may or may not have because it's on the back of a piece of paper, in my own handwriting I have notes from multiple people who live in this vicinity and I have their phone numbers written down. That means those people called me, my office, because I certainly didn't go looking for them and wouldn't have known to do so. So the word got out on the street that this change was being considered and some people were less than thrilled with that and were calling me up to get clarification and/or to complain.
I would like to know 36 if I have a copy of that because it looks like I have --
Right, but if there's something on the back side of a document, are you telling me that we don't get any copies of the back sides, only the front sides of all the documents in your jacket? That's clearly a concern.
Again, I'm not the greatest keeper of records and I just turned a piece of paper over and started writing things down on it.
No, I'm not saying that I have a concern that you write things on both sides of a piece of paper; that's fine, that's ecologically correct. What I'm concerned about is whether we've been given both sides of the pieces of paper when there's writing on both sides. Ms. Heep, do you know -- 37
As far as I know, we gave you everything, but apparently we missed the back sides of some of these pages. So what we'll do is go through the files and be sure that you get copies of any reverse pages.
Now, I have an e-mail in here from March 11, 2003, from Cathy McKenna to Charles Trainor. Who is Cathy McKenna?
Cathy McKenna was the Executive Secretary for the Streets Commissioner. She retired, I believe, the end of December.
This e-mail says, "The Committeeman for 50 years of this block called today because his neighbors were upset. When they came home from work today, the street had been changed from west to east. He asked why no one new anything and he certainly new that that Councilman DiCicco would not have requested it. Could you check and let me 38 know." But you're saying that there was opposition before March 11th that you were aware of?
SO when was the first time you were aware of opposition to this?
I don't for certain know because I don't have dates. I'm volunteering this information for you, and one of those two names is on a piece of paper that's on the front side, Work Order No. 14 72962, Dominick Seya (ph). I'm not sure I'm pronouncing the man's name correctly. And that was one of the names that was written on the back of that other piece of paper that I no longer have in my hands.
I have Work Order 72962, but I only have printing on one side.
I do have another copy of it with a Post-it, Dominick Seya with two phone numbers. 39
And that's one of the names that was on the back of the other piece of paper. So let me just try to sum up what I know here, to save us time.
These calls come in. I listen to the people. One of them had been Committeeman since Hector was a pup and they were concerned. And as I recall, their concerns were twofold: One, they insinuated that they didn't know about this; and second, they weren't entirely sure they wanted it to happen.
Now, how would they have known to call you to complain? Was something done?
That's a very good question on the first one, isn't it? They did know, otherwise, why would they call the Streets Department and find me? So they obviously did know something was afoot, otherwise, they'd have no reason to ring me on the phone. 40
did you post any signs or anything? Was there any public notice at the time that you got these calls that there was a change contemplated on this street?
No. When we do the change, we get our ducks lined up and then we just change it, just pretty much taking down stop signs, putting up stop signs, reversing one-way signs and changing the parking signs.
Sure. Making sure that the City Councilperson wants it and we don't have any real live problems that we're going to continue to ask the Councilperson to consider our point.
So at this point, was this -- this was still in 2002 when these people started to call you? Or was it closer to the March 2003 when the work order got put in on a different TR number?
Probably in 2002. I think that's why Irene and I were calling back and forth to each other. 41
Because you had heard some opponents who didn't want this to happen?
You said you thought this is why you and Irene was calling back and forth to each other. Is it because at some point you got wind that the community or at least part of the community was against this change?
And this street, as I understand it, was already a one-way but it was going in the opposite direction from the request for the change, right?
So were you ever brought to a community meeting where they discussed it?
When you spoke to Irene from Councilman DiCicco's office, did she tell you the basis for her belief that the community wanted this? 42
When you spoke to Irene in Councilman DiCicco's office, what did she tell you about the community's feelings towards this change?
I don't remember specifically. Knowing myself and knowing that I had two things on the back and knowing that I'm familiar with Irene and I have a reputation for speaking my mind, I undoubtedly told her that these people had complained and passed along whatever their Ps and Qs were to her to play the cards face up. And it was my speculation -- at a Council hearing I'm not sure I should be speculating on anything, and therefore I don't know how to continue.
Well, this isn't a court of law; you can speculate here. What we want to know is --
I think there was a local political situation going on that had nothing to do with me, the safety of the people, the direction of the street or the 43 parking or any of that stuff. I think that was not what the real problem was. I think it was local politics and people's emotions as opposed to "is it safe, is it good parking, will there been good lines of sight, does circulation make since."
So presumably this was just a two-block area of McClellan Street that was requested to be changed? Does the rest of McClellan Street on either side of these two blocks continue to be one-way the original way?
So you have a one-way street -- is it going from Seventh towards Eighth or Eighth towards Seventh, the original direction?
It was all westbound originally, and we switched it to become eastbound.
So it was westbound from the Delaware River area towards the Schuykill. You're saying?
And then the request was for two blocks of this one-way street to make it -- to reverse those two blocks?
What would be the possible reason from a traffic point of view that that would make sense to you?
It stops people from using McClellan Street instead of the parallel bigger street that may have progressions on it. From a traffic engineering point of view, most of the time we'd rather people be on larger streets than baby streets. And if you've got many blocks in one direction going the same way, some people begin to use it as local circulation. And then the people on one block say, "Hey, if that street went the other direction, now people can't go through on our block and we'll have less traffic on our block and it will be calmer, quieter, safer for our children, et cetera." And that's why they 45 request it. It's done frequently in the City that on the smaller streets the direction almost deliberately is changed to stop that from becoming a parallel route.
But would that typically be done on just one block of a street or would it be done on a bigger segment?
Mr. Jordan, you've been quite helpful explaining this file. If you look at the list of file 15 jackets that we've requested, are there any others that are inside your jurisdiction? It looks like probably Almond Street and Winton Street, because those are all requested by Councilman DiCicco. Would that be true, those are the ones that you worked on also?
On the western end of that block after we changed it, there were continuous complaints because of difficulty of people accessing their off-street parking. And I think that's where some of those original complaints came from because the people anticipated that problem. And I did get calls about how we can eliminate some parking so people could maneuver into their garages at the western end of block. That's one of the unintended consequences.
So you did ultimately change it, you did a trial period? Did it begin in March or did it begin March 11th, is that why you have the new TR number on that one? I'm sorry, I had a few more questions on McClellan Street.
I don't know what date it was done. None of the pieces of paper seem to have a completed work order date on it. So I got copies of things before they were done. Well, see, this was done to deal with a 47 parking problem. So I presume --
I think we have those documents. I think we'll be able to figure that out. Now, on Almond Street there's a lot less documents here. This looks like -- I have here DS9868. That's not the same one. Do we have the documents for DS12262?
Good morning. My name is Charles Denny, I'm Assistant Chief Traffic Engineer. I provided the data. Almond Street, the two Almond Streets are combined. The actual completion of DS12262 is -- we have not sent the final letter saying that we have completed the work. The work was completed, but we have not sent a letter over to Councilman DiCicco's office stating that we had finished the work. The work orders that did the work are here, but they're not the final work orders, they don't show the completion dates. The first letter which is on the second page of your list was a request from 48 Representative Taylor's office. We responded to Representative Taylor saying that the requests to make streets one-way have to go through the office of Council and he should contact Councilman DiCicco. I assume that's what he did because we got a subsequent request from Councilman DiCicco. And after reviewing the situation, we went out, wrote orders to change the street to one-way.
Now, in general, a State Legislator can contact the Streets Department and make various requests for changes in signs and traffic, right?
But in this case, you suggested they go through Councilman DiCicco because ultimately there has to be an ordinance enacted to make this permanent?
Correct. The Vehicle Code requires a change in the direction of streets to be done by ordinance, and the ordinances in the City of Philadelphia is done by Council.
So if you don't have a 49 Councilperson that's going to do an ordinance, so you're saying what's the point of doing a trial period because nothing's going to be done with it?
We forward all requests to Council when there's a request for a change in direction of streets and have them involved.
Excuse me, Steve. I think another witness wanted to answer the question that you previously stated.