Jul. 16, 2014:  Mayor Mary Marvin welcomed Village Administrator James Palmer and Village Treasurer Lori Voss to their first board of trustees meeting. "I have to say they both hit the ground running," Marvin said. "You really picked up the rhythm and I think we have a wonderful team."

Unlike normally uneventful summers in Bronxville, this summer is proving to be a very busy one for the board of trustees as it undertakes an unusual number of significant projects in the village.  Included in them are:  the Kensington Road Development project, the Garden Avenue parking lot project, the school flood mitigation project, Parkway Road Bridge reconstruction, village sewer systems conditions, roads and curbs maintenance, landscaping of village post office, restoration of village clock, street lights improvements, and phase I review of the zoning code. 

"I'm happy to be part of all these new initiatives," Mayor Mary Marvin noted at the board's regular meeting on July 16. "I think it's great progress and growth for the village long-term."

The trustees, after having heard parking concerns from several Sagamore Road residents at the June 24 public meeting about the Kensington Road development project, passed a local law to allow permitted street parking. Holders of 24-hour parking permits in the Kensington lot will receive LK permits that will grant them overnight street parking privileges during the construction period.

Mayor Marvin stressed that the permitting is a temporary measure and that, by village request, the law contains a sunset provision and will expire at the end of construction. "This effort is to accommodate a particular development in the village," she said. "The public meeting was a great give-and-take, and the residents had some very valid concerns that we incorporated in tweaking our plan."

Construction on the Kensington Road project is scheduled to begin at the end of July.

Garden Avenue Parking Lot:  Village Administrator James Palmer reported that the Garden Avenue parking lot stormwater and drainage improvements project in progress will not only help in capturing and treating storm runoff from the lot and neighboring areas, it will also give the village the opportunity to create a more user-friendly parking area.

Palmer stated that the underground chambers, which will capture and treat stormwater, have been installed. Pervious concrete pavers designed to allow water to permeate through their surfaces to the chambers have also been put in place.

After completion of the project's stormwater improvements, Palmer, along with Peggy Conway and Rocco Circosta, superintendent of public works, will examine options for reconfiguration, restriping, and repaving and recurbing the Garden Avenue lot. Palmer expressed hope that those improvements, intended to create more efficient and positive parking options for merchants and their patrons, will take place in August and be completed by September.

Kensington Road Development:  In anticipation of the Kensington Road development project, the trustees established a public hearing for altering certain parking meter time configurations in the Garden Avenue lot. That hearing will take place at the next scheduled board of trustees meeting on Monday, September 8, at 8:00 pm.

Per Conway, the proposed alteration of meters from the current three-hour limit will provide 12-hour parking for merchants who will have to vacate the Kensington Road lot and create a third row of parking available to merchants.

Of the four parking lanes available in the Garden Avenue lot, the two lanes closest to Garden Avenue are currently designated for merchants, with the other two lanes designated for the public. The proposal would result in the three lanes closest to Garden Avenue being 12-hour parking reserved for merchants.

"It's essential for those merchants who park there," Conway stated. "We've had some comments from the merchants who have been displaced for the current Garden Avenue project. The need for this has been apparent in the last couple of weeks." She pointed out that business owners have been forced to return to parking meters every two or three hours to pay for more parking.

The board of trustees will not meet in August.

Pictured here:  Deputy Treasurer and Parking Director Peggy Conway with Bill Dowling seated in the background.

Photo by Carol P. Bartold