Peterborough has hired an engineering firm to assist this summer with a visioning process to revitalize the downtown.
On Tuesday, Select Board members approved hiring Hoyle, Tanner & Associates, an engineering firm that has worked on other downtown projects, including the reconstruction of the Main Street Bridge and the construction of a parking area on River Street, to work with planners on the downtown visioning process.
Town Planner Danica Melone said the process will include a series of community feedback meetings this summer focusing on streetscaping and beautification and improving bicycle and pedestrian access in the area of Depot Street and the Depot Street/Main Street intersection. The role of Hoyle, Tanner & Associates will be to assist the groups with finding feasible projects.
“We want it to be representative of community feedback and meet our budget, but we most importantly need them to make sure that whatever the outcome is meets local, state and federal regulation” Melone said.
Hoyle, Tanner & Associates will meet with town staff to review the scope of work, determine a baseline of the feasibility of the existing goals and provide recommendations for effective uses. The company will also provide three conceptual designs for the area, based on public feedback and ideas, and provide a final plan with specifications that can be used for future bidding processes.
The visioning process is set to conclude by the end of this year.
The town selected Hoyle, Tanner & Associates from two applicants. The process, including the company’s fees, is being paid through in a combination of grant funding and funds from the downtown Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, district. A town can designate a specific area of town as a TIF district, meaning the tax assessment for that area is frozen, and revenue from any additional value added to properties through improvements is captured in a separate fund that can be used for projects specifically in that area.
The visioning process is using up to $20,000 from the downtown TIF fund, and $30,000 from a grant from the Monadnock Alliance for Sustainable Transportation.
The first information session on the visioning process was held Wednesday, after the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript deadline. A recording of the meeting is expected to be posted on the Peterborough town website.
In other Select Board news, the town gave Department of Public Works Director and Assistant Town Administrator Seth MacLean and Town Administrator Nicole MacStay the authority to apply for American Rescue Plan Act funding through the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services for culvert repairs. MacLean said there are at least three culverts in town that would meet the requirements for the funding – one on Pine Street, one on Old Dublin Road and one on Prospect Street. There is also a potential fourth culvert on Powers Bridge Road, but that culvert is within a TIF district, and TIF funding could be used for the repair.
MacLean said the funding would allow for everything from “the engineering through the physical construction of the asset.”
In another discussion, the board directed MacStay to schedule a public hearing to accept gifts given by community members or organizations for the beautification of town parks. The daughters of resident Mafalda Boccelli Ames, who recently died, have offered the town checks in the amount of $2,000, which were collected instead of flowers for her funeral, to go toward plantings in the town’s Boccelli garden.
Specifically, her family has requested the planting of hydrangeas, which were Mafalda’s favorite, and other flowers which attract butterflies, and for the use of an arborist to tend to the apple tree in the garden.
Also being donated to the town is a bench from the Peterborough Lions Club. The bench is made from 500 pounds of recycled plastic bags.
Select Board members thanked the community for the gifts, and directed MacStay to schedule a public hearing for their official acceptance. All gifts given to the town are required to be presented in a public hearing before the town may accept, in accordance with state law.
Ashley Saari can be reached at 603-924-7172 ext. 244 or asaari@ledgertranscript.com. She’s on Twitter @AshleySaariMLT.