Mary Dunbar

Cleveland Heights City Council Member

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Bicycle Safety Added to PE Curriculum This Year

This year, the Cleveland Heights University Heights District Schools are adding bicycle safety education and training to the PE curriculum for third, fourth and fifth graders.  This curriculum has been developed and piloted by PE teachers at Canterbury, Gearity and Fairfax Elementary Schools.  This year it will be implemented at all of our public elementary schools.  PE teachers will use the children’s bike fleet acquired for educational purposes by the City of Cleveland Heights.

Bicycling is a healthy, environmentally friendly activity which can be used for commuting, recreation and short shopping trips.  Some children have learned to ride a bicycle for the first time in the bike safety classes offered so far.  It can be an important life-long skill and source of pleasure.

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Making Routes to School for Children Safer

As you may know, I’ve been working since 2010 to make it safer for bicyclists in Cleveland Heights.  City staff has embraced this cause, and as a result, we have much better bicycle facilities now – bike racks everywhere, bike lanes and multipurpose trails to name a few.

Some years ago, then City employee Jennifer Kuzma and I worked on a first application for Safe Routes to School grants to improve walking and biking to school for our school children.  Since then, Joe Kickel, Capital Project Manager, has taken over the application process, and I’ve faded out.  As a result of our efforts, Cleveland Heights has received almost $1 million in SRTS grants, which may take years to actually come to fruition, as you can see from the list below. This is an example of “If you don’t ask, you don’t receive.”  We did it!

Here is a list of Cleveland Heights SRTS Project Numbers and the awarded funds:

2016 – 98324 – $291,711 Bike racks at Canterbury School, and Roxboro School, new curb ramps at Roxboro School and Canterbury School, speed feedback signs at Canterbury School, Monticello Middle School, Roxboro School, and Hebrew Academy

2017 – 98332 Non Infrastructure- $7,650.00 Bike Trailer, Bikes, Helmets, educational materials

2019 – 101112 – $190,620 New Traffic Signal and pedestrian upgrades at Quilliams/Noble (Oxford school)

2020 – 103700 – $298,791 – New curb ramps at Roxboro School, Hebrew Academy, Installation of Pedestrian Refuge Islands and Rectangular Rapid Flashing Beacons at Pennfield/Monticello (Monticello Middle School)

2022 NEW AWARD 2019 – $200,000 – new curb ramps at Oxford Elementary School, New curb ramps at Bradford Path (Canterbury School), and new bike racks at Monticello Middle School.

Total Funds Awarded $988,772

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Obituary for My Husband, Who Died on October 31, 2017

ROBERT C. DUNBAR PH.D. Age 74 of Cleveland Heights, OH; Professor Emeritus of Chemistry, Case Western Reserve University (1970-2017). Passed away on October 31, 2017 in the Cleveland Clinic of heart failure. Beloved husband of Mary A. Dunbar (nee Asmundson); loving father of Geoffrey T. Dunbar (Nancy M.) of Hanover, NH; William A. Dunbar (Ari Sato) of Yokohama, Japan; dear grandfather of Sarah A. and Emma L. Dunbar; brother of Anne D. Walston (Oliver) of Thriplow, England. Rob was born June 26, 1943, in Cambridge Massachusetts to William Harrison Dunbar and Carolyn Roorbach Dunbar. He grew up primarily in Washington DC, attending Sidwell Friends School for elementary school, Saint Albans School for high school, graduated in 1965 from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with a BA in Chemistry, and earned a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from Stanford University in Palo Alto, California in 1970. In his upbringing and at St Alban’s School, Rob learned values that he conformed to for his life. Family and loyalty were always important to him, he was honest, ethical and kind. Rob joined the Chemistry department at Case Western Reserve University in 1970, received tenure in 1975, became a full professor in 1978, and remained at CWRU for the remainder of his professional career. He specialized in basic research, primarily using mass spectrometers, in particular Fourier Transform Mass Spectrometry and Ion Cyclotron Resonance Spectrometry, to study topics such as the binding of metal ions, interstellar and circumstellar chemistry, and new approaches to the use of spectroscopy combining a free electron laser with a mass spectrometer. Rob had his own research group at CWRU for many decades. During the first decade of his career, he enjoyed Alfred P. Sloan and J.S. Guggenheim Fellowships and a Sigma Xi Research Award. His research group trained many graduate students who went on to doctorates in chemistry and careers in academia and industry. In recent years, Rob continued his research, collaborating with the FELIX (Free Electron Lasers for Infrared eXperiments) laboratory in the Netherlands. He published more than 250 research papers over the course of his career. He was a member of the American Chemical Society, American Society for Mass Spectrometry, American Physical Society, and Inter-American Photochemical Society. Rob met his wife Mary at Stanford University, and they were married June 21, 1969. In 1970, they settled into Cleveland Heights, where they have remained since. Their two sons, Geoffrey and Bill, were born in 1970 and 1973, respectively. They moved into their current house in 1976. Almost every summer of his life, Robert vacationed on Bear Island in Maine, where the Dunbar family has maintained a vacation home for over a hundred years. In the past decade or so, Rob enjoyed bicycle trips with his wife and other family, to Italy, Spain, France, Holland, Belgium, India, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and the Galapagos. Rob always enjoyed visiting family in New Hampshire, Japan, England, California and other locations. He always enjoyed puzzles of all types, especially torturing his descendants with fiendish mathematical puzzles. He was an accomplished pianist, playing daily throughout his life, and loved classical music, enjoying operas, symphonies, and concerts, especially the International Piano Competition. He was active to the end of his days, commuting by bicycle and riding recreationally. Rob and Mary also enjoyed gardening together in their home garden, and Rob kept fish and cacti throughout his life. The family prefers that those who wish may make contributions in his name to the Cleveland Institute of Music, 11201 East Blvd., Cleveland, OH 44106 or to the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, 1 Wade Oval Dr., Cleveland, OH 44106. A Funeral Service will be held on Saturday, November 4 at 1pm at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 2747 Fairmount Blvd., Cleveland Heights, OH 44106. FRIENDS MAY CALL AT BROWN-FORWARD, 17022 CHAGRIN BLVD., SHAKER HEIGHTS, OH ON FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3RD FROM 5-7PM. For further information, directions and to sign the guestbook, please log online to: Published in The Plain Dealer from Nov. 1 to Nov. 3, 2017