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Natural Areas Commission Minutes
Monday, January 14, 2013
2nd floor conference room, city hall
Members Present: Jon Meigs, Anna Stalter, Joe McMahon, Dan Hoffman, Ron Herring
Visitor: Todd Bittner, Cornell Natural Areas liaison, Roxy Johnston
Designation of note - taker: Ron Herring
Minutes October and November meetings approved with minor corrections.
December meeting were not available for approval.
Reports and Announcements:
Anna Stalter: Nature Journaling for Kids at Six Mile Creek is planned as a
series of Spring workshops. February 9 will be animal tracking with Linda Spielman;
April 13 will feature a stream safari with Phil Koons, focusing on freshwater ecology,
demonstration of benthic invertebrates. Others are upcoming; information will be
emailed to NAC members by Anna. Future journaling opportunities will involve wild
flowers in May and native trees in June.
Joe McMahon: Fire department and water department maps of the Six -Mile
natural area have not been updated since 2006. The departments were happy to see
maps updated by hand; they will go out with GPS units and annotate maps so they
will know what kinds of uses are appropriate for what trails. They were informed
about the trail marker plans of the NAC; they agreed with the Commission that it is
not feasible to be more precise than the maps are now. They did agree that the
dispatcher flip chart to triage information and locations would be a good idea for
getting emergency responders to the aid of hikers in trouble in the gorge.
Todd Bittner said this kind of documentation has been done for the Cornell
campus gorges. But personnel face many fewer options in comparison to the
extensive areas of 6 Mile, so their task is much easier. One issue is whether or not a
hiker in trouble could ascertain her /his location with a cell phone /GPS unit and
report precise location when asking for help. The problem is that cell phones are
unreliable in the gorge.
Joe also reported that recent floods illustrated the dangers of camping in the
gorge; an illegal campsite was evacuated successfully.
Roxy reported on the status of planning for the new water plant. Erik
Whitney has said that the design is 90% finished; these plans will be available for
the public when completed.
Agenda Items:
Gorge Safety: Todd Bittner reported that there has been success in
getting a FEMA grant for repairing the Cascadilla trail from downtown Ithaca to the
Cornell campus. This is for repair of damage from tropical storm Lee.
There was considerable discussion of the death in the Cascadilla gorge in October. Is
this an example of a failed gorge- safety program in which both the city and Cornell
have interests and roles? An individual fell over the railing on Stewart Avenue,
resulting in death. Evidently there were known safety issues. The NAC has suggested
in the past improvements to that trail. For railings, 200 lbs of lateral force is the
standard, as well as minimum height. In addition to guards at the top of the gorge,
which may be dangerous if unsuitable or unstable, bridge abutments are old and
may present a hazard as they could fall on the trail below. Deficiencies have been
noted in the city engineer's report to the Board of Public Works.
Roxy will check with BPW on potential plans of action and NAC will develop a
resolution for the Cascadilla walkway.
One line of discussion was reconciliation of safety standards with aesthetic
considerations. Can we do without chain -link fences everywhere. There are options.
The public interest in safety concerns conflicting notions of what barriers should be
in place, Stewart Ave to Linn Street. Should we as a commission be concerned, have
a role? The interest of the NAC on barriers is the value of the view, the aesthetic of a
significant natural view -shed, though of course pubic safety is the first concern.
Management Plan for Natural Areas of Ithaca: Chris Proux was not present, so
we did not address this issue; Andy Zepp was also not available. This important
discussion did not come together. The NAC has a continuing interest in an overall
plan for managing natural areas in the city: what are our priorities? Do we have
different functions in mind for different natural areas? Should some areas be left
relatively un- managed [perhaps Fuertes] and others developed more for education
and recreation? What precisely should our role be vis -a -vis other units of the city?
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Tri -fold for Six Mile Creek
There was no available model to look at. The ideas for the trifold were
discussed. A consensus seemed to be that certain elements are important: Map +
'don't do' list + smart use suggestions + contact info [eg water plant number] +
cautions: 'watch out for.'
Todd said professional studies suggest that'you get three messages.' More
than that produces less effectiveness through clutter. He discussed the Cornell
experience with regulations and messaging and testing of messages. Universal
symbols were discussed as a good way to convey important information in a small
space: eg, a stick figure of a person falling to indicate a risky trail. Use of symbols
seems to be a best practice in contrast to using lots of words. Everyone agreed that
this makes sense. We looked at an example of Google map for the trifold distributed.
There followed discussion of a possible interpretive trail, similar to that of
the Cornell Plantations and other natural areas in this area [Lime Hollow ?] and
elsewhere. Joe noted that based on his long experience: 'signs disappear.' There
were also worries of making trails too cluttered with signage, while recognizing the
value of educational interest in the natural nature of natural areas.
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