Property Damage to Our Property by Bypass, Complete Disregard of Residents of Dundee

Here's more fun with the Newberg-Dundee Bypass project.  I had to send this tonight to the Police, City and ODOT -
Dear Police Chief Casey as well as City of Dundee & ODOT leadership.

Tonight I came home to our entire front yard and my driveway striped 25 feet from the edge of pavement of Parks DR.  Please see pictures.  This is in complete disregard of the No Trespassing sign I have posted on the front yard.  Police Chief Casey, I'd greatly appreciate if you could send someone out and review whether this is vandalism especially since they painted my driveway (see pictures).

What blows me even farther away  is that someone would do this without talking to us.  You were 10 feet outside our front door!  How do you think that makes my family feel about their safety to have some strange man wandering around in front of our house?!  I believe that without talking to us first about whatever it is causing you to paint our yard, you even put your own man at some risk.  This painting is well beyond what a normal person would consider the Right of Way for a city.

In the below picture the paint is where my measuring tape handle is at

When this occurred earlier this year, both ODOT and the city disavowed any knowledge of this prompting me to put up the No Trespassing sign because no one could man up and tell us what's planned for our front yard.  This shows further complete disregard for the neighborhood/residents of Dundee by the Bypass project.

Would someone please let us know what is going on and why you feel the need to paint our yard?  We do live here and take some pride in our home!!  It is the biggest purchase of our life, and we are there everyday.

And if there's some grand plan to take out the intersection of Parks and Edwards and smooth the road through our yard, I will fight it and get all of the neighbors to fight it.  We already hate how fast traffic is and facilitating even faster flow seems very wrong and I'm sure all the neighbors will agree!!  As I write this there's a little girl walking in the road out the front window in the middle of that corner.  Is that really where you want future "bypassers" (because it will still happen) flowing even faster?!

Please, let us know what is going on and treat us like we live here, not like we're an inconvenience to your project.

Isaiah and Kellie Cox

Bypass Work Starting at 5 AM Hard on Family Sleep

Well, twice in the last two weeks we've had bypass work going past, or in front of our house at 5 in the morning.  Two weeks ago it was backup alarms and loading an excavator at 5.  I went out and talked to the driver and he told me he had permits to start that early.  Yesterday it was haul trucks.  Fun stuff.

I sleep through anything but yesterday was the first day my wife tearfully told me she regretted us buying this house last August. True it was just after I'd yelled at a haul truck to slow down and he's slid to a stop glaring at me trying to decide if he'd get out and attack me.  I was hoping he would.  It would really show the attitude these projects have towards our neighborhood.

Our realtor had said, "Oh, they've been talking about a bypass for 30 years, it'll never happen" last July when we first looked at the house.  Construction started the next week.  Fun stuff.

The city of Dundee ordinances say construction noise can begin at 7 AM weekdays and 9 AM on weekends (section 8.28 Noise). The Bypass crosses through City limits on Edwards and the hauling yesterday was from a site in town to a site in town.

Here's video of the 5 AM work -

Haul Trucks Putting Us at Risk Again

So that's my little Suzuki which I placed out there as a "we live here hint".  You can see in the video how well that's working.  My wife and I often drive through the intersection they are blowing through. There is a stop sign under the tree they are disregarding. I will be sending this to the police as they didn't seem to believe me when I didn't have video.

Reminder - Newberg Dundee police are responsible for construction traffic safety.  If you are having problems with construction traffic you can contact them at:   (503) 538-8321

Newberg Dundee Bypass Traffic Safety Complaints Contact Number

It's taken me a year of calling ODOT but I've finally been told by ODOT, and it was confirmed by the police chief, that ODOT have given all responsibility for traffic safety on the Newberg Dundee Bypass to the police department.  They are even contributing dollars for increased enforcement to match the increased traffic.

This following is from the Newberg-Dundee Chief of Police (in an email to me in response to an email I'll post below) -
"The police department is responsible for enforcing traffic laws so we will respond if there are violations occurring.  The officers who previously worked the area reported back that the overwhelming majority of trucks were complying with the speed limit and other traffic laws."

The non-emergency contact number for the Newberg-Dundee police is:

503-538-8321

Here's the email chain with ODOT and the police department:

Dear Police Chief Casey,

First let me say thank you.  After I complained last year about the intersection outside our home (Parks, Edwards, Fulquartz) and the many near incidents my wife and I have seen and heard, I've noticed more officers pass through.

I'm writing you because I, and every neighbor I've spoken with, were very unhappy with the driving of the contractors during the 1st phase of the bypass project (which was part of my concern to you last year). I've engaged both the city (I was at the last City Council meeting) and ODOT on this issue.  The City (cc'd) asked ODOT to respond to my concerns because they had not (in a way that made any commitments to safety). ODOT's "area manager" (cc'd on this email) responded that they rely on your department, and partially fund it, to ensure traffic enforcement.

I've copied the most recent email exchange (this week) between myself and ODOT in below.  Mr Potter tries to make it sound like I haven't talked to ODOT in person, but I've often talked to ODOT as noted in my reply, which is also pasted in.  They have made no changes or given any feedback other than essentially "we're fine".

Here's a list of incidents and why I don't think they are fine:

·         I'm getting in my car one morning and I hear a diesel truck floor the throttle. I turn and see the neighbor’s cat scrambling out of the road as the site mechanic swerves to the middle to run it over.  I yelled "Real nice man!".  He locks up his brakes and comes back to get in a yelling argument with me, with threatening overtones, about his rights to run over cats in the road.

·         My wife is on the couch downstairs and watches a haul truck back up in the intersection and hit an old man's car.  The driver gets out, still on the phone, and the old man tries to get his info.  The driver argues with the old man about how there's no damage.  Unfortunately my wife didn't get pictures because we weren't yet to the point of documenting the Bypass safety issues.  We tried to get ahold of ODOT and received no response.

·         I come home to find ruts and a burn mark in my yard.  Another group of contractors, installing some sewer in Fulquartz, come over to tell me they watched the one of the Bypass pickups come around the corner too fast and their street sweeper had to evade into our yard. He said he wasn't by his phone so unfortunately he couldn't get pictures in time but he tried. I do have a photo of the ruts and burn mark which due to size clearly point to the sweeper.

·         I spoke to their site manager in the site trailer who assured me he had no authority and only the police could enforce road safety.  This is completely bogus.  I have been on numerous highway projects and the CM has all the authority.  I even have stickers on my hard hat that read "Be Safe or Be Gone", which was enforced.

·         I talked to my neighbor (Shannon, 1st house North or ours on Edwards) who said that she stopped several of the site trucks to ask them to slow down.  Their response was to flip her off when they saw her.

·         The haul trucks were not stopping at Edwards/Parks until I repeatedly complained that we drive and walk around the corner and they were putting us at risk.  They then made half hearted attempts to stop and you may still be able to see the skid marks on the road where many of the trucks would drive as quick as they could until almost the corner and then lock it up to stop very briefly.

·         I talked to Mr. Snow, who was the first project manager in the trailer.  He confided in me that the truck that hit the cyclist in Newberg last year was somehow associated with the Bypass and he was "trying" to get better on-site driving.  He left the job shortly thereafter.

·         We continually had site employees jumping on their throttle as they left the site trailer or came around the corner in a way that none of the neighbors would do (seemed to not recognize they were operating in a neighborhood).

·         About two weeks ago a herd of F250s blew through our stop sign going way too fast.  Realizing that it looked like a bypass entourage I jump in my car and drove down to the bypass closer to the river and sure enough it was the next contractor doing a walk through.  I told them I’d appreciate them stopping at the corner and one of them said they would.

I’m sure I can’t remember all of the incidents.  After talking to their on-site manager, and their ODOT representative Kraig Kanoff, things never got better.  I then engaged the person they hired to respond to community concerns who also gave me a lot of platitudes but never an action of how they would address safety.  Then, they started ignoring me.  They never responded about the sweeper in our yard or the truck hitting the old man’s car in the intersection.

My wife felt trapped in the house because she couldn’t go for walks with this type of traffic in front of our house.  Last night I was talking to the woman that is the last house South on paved Edwards and she told me she’d only let her boys play in the backyard.

What I’m hoping is that the next phase of the project shows our neighborhood more respect, and that the driving exhibited would be what you would expect in a residential neighborhood.  According to ODOT, your team is largely responsible for that (see below email from ODOT).  I would greatly appreciate your help in making the second phase of the Bypass project go better.

I believe the second phase of the Bypass is set to start in the next week or two.

Thanks,

Isaiah Cox

860 SE Parks DR

Letter from ODOT

Mr. Cox,

            My name is Tim Potter. I am the Area Manager with the responsibility for delivery of the Newberg Dundee Bypass project. Thanks for contacting us. I want to take this opportunity to address the concerns you noted in your email.

First, I want to assure you that we take safety very seriously, and the Oregon Department Of Transportation and the Oregon contracting community have a long track record of cooperation in this regard. We regularly meet with law enforcement as well as the Association of General Contractors (AGC), the trade association to which a majority of Oregon civil contractors belong. There is a separate committee that works to address the contracting language around the safety protocols used on ODOT and other civil works jobs within the state, and ODOT  actively participates on that committee. I realize that your perception of our focus on safety may be different. Please call me to discuss your concerns directly.  We have spoken with the contractor about the issues you have raised, and we have addressed your concerns with him.

·         Regarding obeying the speed limit, we worked very closely with the Newberg-Dundee police department to have ongoing monitoring of the contractor’s vehicles as they traversed the communities. The police chief reported to both city councils in that regard, and found very consistently that the haul vehicles were obeying the traffic laws. We also provide extra funding to both local and state police forces to increase patrolling in the vicinity of our projects, with the goal to improve compliance. That will continue to be the case as this project progresses.

·         The labeling of the trucks is strictly up to the contractor, and their compliance with motor carrier laws. We will not intervene in that.

·         As mentioned above, the contracting rules are well established, as is the protocol for safety compliance. We will not be establishing a separate committee, as the responsibility for safety resides with ODOT and the contractor. If there are specific instances of violation, then please let us know of them, and we will take the appropriate action either as determined by our contract, or through law enforcement. 

·         We will be happy to meet with reporters from the local media, and, in fact do so regularly. Please refer them to me if you have instances in the future about which you feel you must call them. Or I would encourage you to contact me directly first, to see if we can resolve the issues.

·         We are well aware of the dangers posed by heavy equipment. Me and my staff have decades of experience in civil construction and other heavy industries, and we work with contractors who also have been in the business for many, many years.

As we have in the past, I would again invite you to contact me directly so that we can sit down and discuss your concerns face to face or by phone. I realize that email is convenient, but it is rarely a suitable method to discuss issues of importance, and I know that this is a very important issue, both to you and to ODOT. Please call me so we can schedule a time to meet or talk.

Best regards,

Tim Potter

Area 3 Manager ODOT Region 2 885 Airport Rd SE Salem, Oregon 97301 Ph 503-986-2764 Fax 503-986-2881

My Response:

Tim,

To paraphrase, your email seems to say that you find mine, and my neighbors concerns, without merit and you will do nothing to address them.

I have spoke face to face with authorities on your project team.  Numerous times I walked over to the project office and expressed my concerns to the project manager.  He assured me he had no authority to improve safety and only the police department does.  This is completely bogus.  As a project manager, holding the subcontracts, you too are responsible for safety. I too have industry experience and to say only the police can monitor the traffic on the job site is completely bogus.

I have also called ODOT, and safety did not improve.  I've spoke with Krag Kanoff several times.  He asked me to respond in email and your nice marketing lady for last phase continually told me things would get better, which they did not.

I have sent in specific incidents by email for which ODOT never responded, including property damage when your contractor ran his own man off the road into our yard, leaving ruts and a burn mark.  I sent this in by email and no one responded!

I am putting this in email so it is in writing.  I feel the safety concerns that I've been addressing may become a harsh reality if someone gets hurt.  I want my safety petitions to you well documented.

I think you misunderstood about the reporter.  We're going to ask a reporter out as a community to address our frustration with our perception of your safety and lack of empathy for the east side of Dundee.

In conclusion, I, and the others on the East of Dundee, are at a point where we'd like to hear some steps taken to address our safety concerns.  I realize I haven't communicated in person with you, but I have communicated with a number of other ODOT individuals.  I don't have much desire to have another conversation.  I want action.

Steps we'd like to see include giving the residents of East Dundee a phone number of someone with real authority to address unsafe driving or offensive behaviour (and when reported actual action taken and feedback provided to the complaintant).  We'd also like to be able to identify the trucks on the site so we can point to specific offendors.  And it would be great if the project office was not across the street from our homes.  Why not put it closer to the river where there isn't any homes?

I personally have told my wife to film and/or photograph any incidents in the future if possible and I will be doing so as well.

I've emailed with the Newberg police chief before.  Now that I know how strongly you are counting on his team to be the enforcers of traffic violations I will also forward this email on to him tonight with an explanation of my point of view.

Thanks for your response,

Isaiah

Newberg-Dundee Bypass Project Status Update

I just heard that the bypass work will be restarting in the next several weeks.  ODOT has not responded to my last several emails regarding safety concerns and suggestions, including when their contractor drove the sweeper into my lawn (to avoid hitting his boss who was going too fast around the corner).

I reached out to the Newberg Graphic, who agreed to send a reporter to investigate if the next phase of construction continues to be unsafe for the residents of South East Dundee.

In addition, I made a plea tonight at the Dundee City Council that more effort be put towards safety and possibly sound mitigation (and less towards art work).

Please join with me in pushing for the next phase of construction to be safer or I fear that the contractor will end up hurting someone in our neighborhood and I'm scared that my wife and daughter are closest to the risk living right next to their base camp.  Road work machinery provides no room for error and its size decimates most things you would find in a residential neighborhood.

This is the email I sent to ODOT after the meeting tonight-
Good evening,

I just wanted to follow up in writing what I said at the city council meeting (and hopefully be a little more clear).

My calls for safety during the last phase of the Bypass were ignored as evidenced by the incidents almost to the day the contractor left.  I've sent a list of those incidents before so I won't send them again but I would like to ask that moving forward the site workers:

Obey the speed limit

Put the contractor company and a ref # on all trucks being used on site so residents can complain specifically about offensive vehicles

Establish a safety committee that is required for the GC and all subs and put a community member on the committee.  I would be happy to volunteer.  This should be a re-occurring meeting with notes taken so continuing offenses can be documented.

I'm afraid that if you don't establish some of these industry best practices for working in a residential neighborhood you will hurt someone.  Again, the 1st phase of the project demonstrated that potential with several near-injury incidents.

Because the last several times I've written ODOT about incidents and suggestions I've received no response I reached out to the Newberg Graphic.  They've agreed that if the next phase continues to operate in an unsafe manner they are willing to send out a reporter to investigate.

Please, for the sake of my family, make the next contractor act like he's in a residential neighborhood.  Heavy civil construction isn't home construction.  When accidents happen with big equipment people get seriously hurt or die.  My degree is in construction management and I've worked Heavy Civil jobs across the West as a Project Engineer for both Granite and Kitchell.  I know the damage heavy machinery can cause.

And on that note, please don't put the office across the street from our house.  It increases the traffic in our neighborhood and we often have to listen to cussing all day.  It's quite clear in our home and that's not the environment I want my wife and daughter in even if I can handle it (and I'm moving to rotating shiftwork so I too will be home on weekdays).

Looking forward to a better experience with the next phase,

Isaiah

Newberg-Dundee Bypass ODOT Complete Lack of Management of Costs and Community Care

Meet our new neighbor thanks to the Dundee Newberg Bypass project - an open sewer manhole pumping sewage with a 24/7 diesel generator that resonates within our home.  And of course they start it up on a Friday and scamper off to their homes likely because they knew I'd be beating on the construction trailer door.  Sure enough, no one onsite  to complain at.

We're not the first to be shown this inconsideration.

There's the couple down the road whose property has been split in two, and ODOT says they'll have no access to the back half, but isn't paying them for it.

At the April 24 Dundee budget committee, meeting one of the city staffers mentioned that they'd found a possible solution to not having to bore and jack a utility under the fill which would potentially save ODOT hundreds of thousands and ODOT hadn't seemed interested.  That's our tax dollars!  Remember teachers aren't being paid enough and we still have that sort of attitude at the state.

Then there's the couple that had to threaten to sue before ODOT would pay them enough to live in a home similar to the one that was being condemned for the project.  He had a house with a separate workshop and ODOT wanted to pay enough for an apartment.  That conflict garnered a cable TV news story. Here's the news piece -



This is on top of what my wife and I see daily demonstrated in front of the house.  We've seen an accident at the intersection when a construction dump truck backed into a local driving by.  We've seen one of the workers take out the neighbors cat by stomping on the accelerator to make sure he got it.  After numerous complaints about safety ODOT's never said a thing about what they're doing to control it, they only say they hope Phase 2 will be better.

I've been a project engineer on-site for the managing firm for two large civil projects, the Reno ReTRAC and the Hokuli'a Subdivision.  I can say from experience, this is very poor project management.

Killing Cats, Hitting Old Men, and Running Over Bicyclists

Today we witnessed a concerning accident.

We were home and witnessed a haul truck, stopped at the Parks Dr Stop sign, back into a white car.  The white car was honking.  The haul truck driver was on his phone.  After striking the white car he remained on his phone while the little old man he struck yelled at him for a minute.  When the driver did get out of his truck it was apparent that there was no resolution and the two drivers started yelling at each other.  From the window it appeared your driver was trying to convince the white car there was no damage. They each drove off separate directions.

 

We continue to not be impressed with site safety and conduct. 

 

We can't figure out why the haul truck was backing up and we're concerned it could have been us, even us out for a walk with our baby, not just us in a car.  It was clear the driver was not aware of the other vehicles around him when he did a very dangerous action by unexpectedly backing up at an intersection.   

 

Then, for the driver of the offending haul truck to act in the manner we witnessed toward the other driver is entirely unacceptable.

 

The old Project Manager told me that it was one of the site construction trucks that struck a cyclist several months ago in Newberg as well.

 

And I remember their first week on the job when the site mechanic ran over my neighbors cat for fun, with me watching as I got in my car to go to work.  He claimed it "was an accident".  He can say what he wants but I'm not a moron.  I've sped up for a squirrel/bird or two myself.

 

He also got in a yelling match with me when I yelled at his truck, "real nice!".  He slammed on his brakes, backed up and acted aggressively.  Of course I didn't back down and he eventually drove off but I was stewing for a week.

 

The neighbor told me that the cat was the only thing he had of his sister's; she had passed away two years ago.

Deforestation of Wildlife Habitat and Community Sound Barrier - Newberg-Dundee Bypass

I'm starting this blog because I've become fed up with how inconsiderate the Newberg Dundee Bypass project is considering the residents of Dundee.  This first post is a photo of the harvested forest that WAS between us and the road.  They are in the process of taking out the trees all along the South East side of Dundee although they're well away from the proposed road (in the above photo, the proposed road is back where the crane and red truck are; the road you see is simply one of many access roads blighting our community now).

I have no idea why they are doing this.  I hope they did their environmental studies because I'm sure there were all sorts of critters in these woods, especially since there is a small creek that runs through it.  Just the night before this came out I was on a walk and stopped to listen to an owl sitting in the trees that are no longer there.  A big, majestic 100+ year old Oak is next along their march north.

If you'd like to see how rich and thick this area is/was look at the satellite view of the area in google -
https://maps.google.com/maps?q=dundee,+or&hl=en&ll=45.271819,-123.00544&spn=0.001046,0.002468&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=38.502405,80.859375&t=h&hnear=Dundee,+Yamhill+County,+Oregon&z=19

Beyond the environmental consideration, this stretch of woods would provide a sound barrier for the South East residents of Dundee.  I reached out to the Superintendent with ODOT to ask why these woods were being removed.  He replied, "for future facilities".

I checked the project map at their website and nothing is shown in this area.  I sent him the map, and asked, "Nothing is shown, can you tell me what is planned?".  He did not respond.

This is just one example of the inconsiderate treatment of the South side of Dundee.  I'll blog  more about the 200+, per day, double trailer rock haul trucks that drive past our homes and bus stops.  There is a long list of other issues like not providing people access to their property, unsafe driving by site employees, trespassing, gross misspending of public tax dollars, etc.