Strong Town Seacoast Project Updates
So, what is it you say you do here?
Normally in my second monthly newsletter I give a summary of our most recent meeting, but this month's meeting was a social event without any specific topics to dig into. So, in lieu of a designated topic, I think it would be a good idea to talk about the projects that we have been working on and where they are at currently. Most of these are topics from previous meetings that created initiatives that we have been working on, and I want to express my thanks to everyone who participates in those meetings to help us identify what actions to take or recommendations to make. The feedback that is gathered at in-person meetings makes an impact on what message we take to the city, so thank you to everyone who has shown up and participated in a meeting for Strong Towns Seacoast (STS)!
I would also like to take this opportunity to give a tremendous thanks to the two other people that are helping to lead STS, Betsy Samber and Eric (Noca) Leaver. These two expressed an interest in what my group was doing, and I have been nothing short of amazed with the work that they have done and passion that they have brought to the group.
Betsy has been generous and allowed us to host our in-person meetings at her restaurant as well as our leadership meetings at her house. She has also done research, prepared, and presented our advocacy to the city. She is very detailed and thoughtful in her recommendations and despite having a busy schedule as a local business-owner she consistently makes time for her role as a leader in our group.
Noca has been very helpful in editing and producing this newsletter. If you've noticed any increases in its quality over the last year or so, it has been due to his help. Since cycling is his primary means of transportation, he also has great insight into bicycle infrastructure recommendations and highlighting where there are gaps and opportunities to be had. He has also been a thorough researcher and been helpful in identifying areas where STS can engage the city, which helps us decide in-person meeting topics.
Finally I want to give a word of thanks to Chris Parker, the Deputy City Manager of the City of Dover. When my wife and I first moved to Dover I was looking to explore the community and wanted to know more about what was going on. I reached out to Chris and he helped me get started on producing a season of my podcast, Your City Podcast, with a focus on Dover. Thanks to him I was connected with multiple people within the city staff and broader community and I feel grateful to him for helping me find my footing so early on. He has also attended a STS meeting and helped facilitate meetings between STS and city staff for discussion on our ideas. He has most certainly been a helpful connection with a willingness to listen and give our leadership team advice.
Strong Towns Seacoast Projects
We've been busy over the last year, it seems our ambitions have kept a consistent workload in front of us. Each of these projects is something that our group has engaged the city about and we have made various forms of progress on. I'll lay out how each of these projects got started and where we are currently at in our initiatives.
Central Avenue Bump Outs
A long time ago, at our 6th in-person meeting, we reviewed Dover's Downtown Pedestrian and Vehicular Access Improvements Project. From that, we decided to make a recommendation to the city in the form of crosswalk bump outs at two locations on Central Avenue in Dover. In April of 2024 we made a presentation to Dover's Transportation Advisory Commission (TAC) and received a unanimous endorsement from them.
At a recent TAC meeting in March 2025, this topic was discussed and the city has decided to make our recommended fixtures a permanent installation that should be coming later this year. The city is looking to acquire funding through a Community Block Development Grant that should be voted on at the next City Council meeting (March 28th). It looks like this project will be going down as a successful endeavor and we plan to attend the meeting to say, "thank you" to the city officials who helped us get to this point including Chris Parker, Donna Benton, and members of the TAC.
Downtown Dover Street Lamps
Back on November 13th Betsy, Noca, and myself went to City Hall to speak to several topics regarding the upcoming vote on the Capital Improvements Plan (CIP). While we did advocate for several different ideas, Noca specifically highlighted the street lamps in downtown Dover that were not functioning which was letting Dover's most productive land fall into darkness every evening.
These repairs were originally going to be a part of the afore mentioned Downtown Improvements Project, but that has been pushed out until past 2030. We advocated to the city that they should put the downtown as one of their highest priorities since the land was so valuable and it should not want for maintenance. After we spoke during the public forum, we have seen action regarding the lighting in downtown Dover. At the intersection for Third Street and Central Avenue they have completely replaced the lighting fixtures. There are still several fixtures remaining, but there is movement on this goal.
Graffiti Cleanup
For our monthly meeting in October 2024 we discussed several ideas for a new community project to take on. One of the ideas we discussed was cleaning up the utility boxes around downtown which were covered in graffiti, and this was expanded into a general graffiti roundup that ended up being our November monthly meeting. We walked around downtown, snapping around 100 pictures of graffiti, and created a map of their locations to present to Dover's Committee for Graffiti Management.
I've been in contact with Jacqueline Manning from the committee who has informed me that the city plans to do a cleanup on June 22nd for the graffiti that is on our map. She said it is open for volunteers from STS to join, and I myself will be there to help out. I'll provide more details for this as the date gets closer, but it looks like this advocacy is also going to result in positive outcomes.
Henry Law Avenue Redesign
We started the year off by looking at the City of Dover's plans for a redesign of Henry Law Avenue and Payne Street. It looks like the city is getting ready for the Waterfront Development and wanted to make some changes to nearby streets. At our meeting we noted some places where we felt like the design fell short of Dover's Complete Street's Policy and decided to approach the city about it.
So, we scheduled a meeting with a few city engineers and Dover's Parking Manager, then Betsy began working on a presentation of our ideas with Noca assisting with research. After what we felt like was a productive meeting with city staff, we were recommended to be put on the agenda for Dover's Parking Commission where Betsy would give her presentation in the hopes of getting some support for our ideas from a local board.
Unfortunately the parking commission did not make a motion to endorse or support our ideas and Betsy received an email from city staff saying that they were going to move forward without adopting any of our suggestions. They said that our ideas were feasible, but that our proposed contra-flow bike lane would require a reevaluation of utility conflicts and site lighting that would add between $20k - $40k and 3-4 months to the project. A disappointing outcome, but we learned a lot in the process.
We still feel like the city's current design does not live up to Dover's Complete Street Policy and we are considering what our next steps will be. We don't expect to change the city's mind on their decision, but we want to express our disappointment that the city is sacrificing an opportunity to be more walk-friendly and bike-friendly in favor of additional parking. I'm very proud of the work that Betsy and Noca put into this project and thankful for the feedback from group attendees in January.
Bicycle-Friendly Streetscapes Guidelines
Our group was fortunate enough to be given an early draft of Dover's Bicycle-Friendly Streetscapes Guidelines document for review at our March Meeting. This document was an agenda item at the May 19th TAC meeting of which I am now an alternative member. Prior to the meeting I took the feedback that was collected from our STS meeting and created a revised version of the document that was presented alongside the city's version at the TAC meeting. Most of what the city is recommending is good and we tried to make our suggestions constructive without being disruptive to the nature of the document.
I am happy to report that our efforts have paid off and the TAC voted to approve the revised document with the consideration that the city can make modifications for safety concerns. If the city does make modifications, the TAC will have a chance to amend the document with those safety concerns in mind. This is a win in our opinion as these guidelines will be used during repaving and restriping projects that occur every year. This could be a great way for Dover to jump start its lacking bike infrastructure.
Repaving Recommendations
To continue on the topic of repaving, at our April Meeting Noca put together a list of upcoming repaving and restriping projects for our group to consider and give detailed feedback on. During the meeting we made it through half of the list with Noca finishing out the remaining streets and compiling them into a single document that was also an agenda item at the May 19th TAC meeting.
During the TAC meeting, we were told that the document was quite substantial and that it would need to be given more time in the hands of TAC members before it would be ready to be considered. A meeting in June for the TAC is being planned with this document as the primary agenda item. We are ready to discuss these recommendations further with the TAC members and hopefully get some productive conversation around these streets individually.
Conclusion
Turns out, we have a lot going on. I am so thankful to everyone who has shown up to help capture this feedback or worked with STS to present materials to the city. I am also very thankful to the City for listening and giving us the time to make a case for our ideas. We can claim to have a few successes now, and we are learning more about how to effectively engage the city and meet them where they are at. A strategy that we have adopted over the last few months is to find out what the city is currently talking about and focus on giving feedback on those topics. I think that this has been working well for us and if you want to help us with that effort, we would love to see you at our next in-person meeting!