1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:08,920 >> Good morning, mobility committee. I'm Rachel wood, deputy director of capital projects. 2 00:00:08,920 --> 00:00:15,400 I will be serving as the primary staff liaison for today's meeting in Becky's absence, but 3 00:00:15,400 --> 00:00:21,720 just wanted to say good morning and I'll turn it over to chairman Meltzer to begin the meeting. 4 00:00:21,720 --> 00:00:29,840 >> Good morning. Seeing that we have a quorum present, I invite you to watch as we convene 5 00:00:29,840 --> 00:00:34,440 the mobility committee for this morning. Our first item for individual consideration 6 00:00:34,440 --> 00:00:40,200 is item a, considering approval of the minutes and I'll entertain a motion. Councilmember 7 00:00:40,200 --> 00:00:44,680 McGuire. >> I move to approve the minutes. 8 00:00:44,680 --> 00:00:49,960 >> As written. >> Councilmember Bertha, I realize I didn't 9 00:00:49,960 --> 00:00:56,120 fully see if your hand was up or not, so if you could make it real big because I'm only 10 00:00:56,120 --> 00:01:04,600 seen you on a little screen. Is there a second? >> I second. 11 00:01:04,600 --> 00:01:12,480 >> Thank you. All in favor, please raise your hands. Okay. Minutes are approved. So we have 12 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:20,600 -- we're moving on to item b. Receiving nominations and electing a chair and vice chair. Because 13 00:01:20,600 --> 00:01:26,020 this is almost an entirely new committee now. We have two new members that I'm happy to 14 00:01:26,020 --> 00:01:37,080 welcome today, so I'll entertain nominations for chair. Councilmember McGuire. 15 00:01:37,080 --> 00:01:41,160 >> I would like to nominate Mayor Pritz and Meltzer for chair. 16 00:01:41,160 --> 00:01:55,240 >> I'll accept. Let's see. Look for any other nominations. Is there a second? Well, I suppose 17 00:01:55,240 --> 00:02:02,840 I can second my own nomination. >> I second. 18 00:02:02,840 --> 00:02:12,880 >> Okay. Thank you. All in favor of Meltzer continuing as chair, please raise your hands 19 00:02:12,880 --> 00:02:22,600 where I can see him. Okay. So I'll continue as chair and now I'll entertain a nomination 20 00:02:22,600 --> 00:02:30,880 for vice chair. And councilmember McGuire. >> I would like to nominate councilmember 21 00:02:30,880 --> 00:02:35,200 Byrd for vice chair. >> Councilmember Byrd, do you accept? 22 00:02:35,200 --> 00:02:39,600 >> Yes. >> It's a weighty responsibility. You sure 23 00:02:39,600 --> 00:02:46,160 not? >> I promise I'll get here on time next time. 24 00:02:46,160 --> 00:02:54,720 >> That's a good goal. I'll second that nomination. And all in favor of councilmember Byrd as 25 00:02:54,720 --> 00:02:59,440 vice chair of the mobility committee, please raise your hands. And that is unanimous. We 26 00:02:59,440 --> 00:03:09,120 have a new chair and a new vice chair. We're excited to welcome this whole team to this 27 00:03:09,120 --> 00:03:18,200 mobility committee meeting. Now, I believe we have some scheduling pressures that would 28 00:03:18,200 --> 00:03:23,760 favor us taking item D before item C. So I'm going to call that one first unless there's 29 00:03:23,760 --> 00:03:31,360 any change to that. Rachel? >> Correct. We are still planning if the 30 00:03:31,360 --> 00:03:38,160 committee is open to it, we'd like to have item D, the DCTA item go prior to item C just 31 00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:42,460 because there are some schedule conflicts with the DCTA team who's presenting today. 32 00:03:42,460 --> 00:03:50,160 >> Okay. Without objection, I'll open item D, receive a report and hold a discussion 33 00:03:50,160 --> 00:03:54,640 regarding updates from the Denton County Transportation Authority. 34 00:03:54,640 --> 00:04:09,160 >> Well, I see, Randy, I see Nicole. >> Thank you, councilmember. I think I'm going to go 35 00:04:09,160 --> 00:04:18,160 first. And then Raymond and Nicole are both on the call as well. So you've got the whole 36 00:04:18,160 --> 00:04:22,760 gang here. So we're going to certainly tackle this as a team. But I'm going to just pull 37 00:04:22,760 --> 00:04:40,160 up the presentation if you'll give me just a moment. 38 00:04:40,160 --> 00:05:05,360 Okay. It's coming up now. There we go. Can you all see my screen at this point? 39 00:05:05,360 --> 00:05:13,160 Yes, and I should clarify, Randy, you don't actually represent DCTA, you're -- 40 00:05:13,160 --> 00:05:19,160 >> I do not. I was going to mention that in just a moment. So thank you for that. So I 41 00:05:19,160 --> 00:05:26,240 am actually the city's consultant on transit-related issues, have been for the past three years 42 00:05:26,240 --> 00:05:32,000 now for both the cities of Louisville and Denton. So I presented to council the last 43 00:05:32,000 --> 00:05:37,280 time in April. So councilmembers McGuire and Byrd, this is my first time before you, so 44 00:05:37,280 --> 00:05:45,200 thank you for having me. And I -- after hearing the presentation last week on the GoZone to 45 00:05:45,200 --> 00:05:50,800 council, a city staff asked me to present this presentation to you today just to give 46 00:05:50,800 --> 00:05:57,240 you a little more historical context and some of the data that really led to the DCTA board 47 00:05:57,240 --> 00:06:02,480 and staff making this recommendation and going down this path. So that's really my goal today. 48 00:06:02,480 --> 00:06:08,760 And again, I said you've got the whole DCTA team here, so please feel free to just interrupt 49 00:06:08,760 --> 00:06:12,280 me if you all have questions. We definitely want this to be interactive and make sure 50 00:06:12,280 --> 00:06:20,320 that the council gets the information you're looking for. 51 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:26,060 So this first slide really just gives you an overview of some of the historical trends 52 00:06:26,060 --> 00:06:32,720 that we've seen in the past five years. And you'll notice that this is all pre-COVID ridership, 53 00:06:32,720 --> 00:06:40,040 so intentionally left off FY20 in order to really look at pre-COVID numbers. This is 54 00:06:40,040 --> 00:06:46,800 something that the DCTA board has been focused on for the last couple years. This is A train 55 00:06:46,800 --> 00:06:51,640 ridership, it's connect bus ridership, so including Denton, Louisville and Highland 56 00:06:51,640 --> 00:06:57,440 Village. And then the sales tax contributions only from the city of Denton, just to show 57 00:06:57,440 --> 00:07:01,760 you that those numbers continue to increase and so the funding streams are continuing 58 00:07:01,760 --> 00:07:12,340 to increase. I also wanted to mention of course that COVID ridership certainly is much below 59 00:07:12,340 --> 00:07:17,800 these numbers. But again, I really wanted to show you the pre-COVID numbers and to focus 60 00:07:17,800 --> 00:07:22,440 on the fact that the board has really been focused on pre-COVID ridership in order to 61 00:07:22,440 --> 00:07:29,840 make these decisions. I next just wanted to go through the existing 62 00:07:29,840 --> 00:07:35,320 bus routes in the city of Denton very quickly. I know you're all very familiar with them, 63 00:07:35,320 --> 00:07:39,200 but this will just give you a quick overview of the ridership numbers on each of these 64 00:07:39,200 --> 00:07:46,080 routes. So this is route number one. Again, this is FY19, so pre-COVID ridership. This 65 00:07:46,080 --> 00:07:55,560 particular route carried 5.7 passengers per hour. This route goes from the downtown Denton 66 00:07:55,560 --> 00:08:04,000 Transit Center down to Unicorn Lake. And I did want to mention as well that in the information 67 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:09,360 that council member Armenter sent, the analysis from Dr. Fisher, I thought she made a lot 68 00:08:09,360 --> 00:08:15,240 of great points and one of them I wanted to mention. So the analysis and the article that 69 00:08:15,240 --> 00:08:18,480 she sent from Jarrett Walker, I don't know if you had a chance to read that, I'm sure 70 00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:26,000 you did. He's a very well-known transit consultant in the business. He is brilliant. The stuff 71 00:08:26,000 --> 00:08:30,880 that he did in Houston was fantastic with their bus network redesign. He's actually 72 00:08:30,880 --> 00:08:37,180 doing a project for Dart right now. He's working on their bus network redesign and very excited 73 00:08:37,180 --> 00:08:42,540 about what I've seen out of that project so far. But one of the points that he makes in 74 00:08:42,540 --> 00:08:47,800 his analysis is that the worst performing suburban routes around the country at least 75 00:08:47,800 --> 00:08:53,280 carry 10 passengers per hour. And that's, I think, an important benchmark because that's 76 00:08:53,280 --> 00:08:59,200 the same benchmark that Accenture used in their analysis of the DCTA bus routes. And 77 00:08:59,200 --> 00:09:05,760 so you'll see that in a moment. But you'll see that there's only two routes in the system 78 00:09:05,760 --> 00:09:10,360 in the city of Denton that come anywhere close to that number. And there's really only one 79 00:09:10,360 --> 00:09:16,160 route 7 that actually exceeds that 10 passengers per hour benchmark. And then of course all 80 00:09:16,160 --> 00:09:23,880 of the UNT routes, which are very efficient and have very high ridership. This is route 81 00:09:23,880 --> 00:09:33,960 number 2 and it carried in 2019 7.4 passengers per hour. It runs every 60 minutes Monday 82 00:09:33,960 --> 00:09:39,640 through Saturday. So the thing that I wanted to mention most about the days of the week 83 00:09:39,640 --> 00:09:46,320 of all of this current service is that the via on demand service that's being considered 84 00:09:46,320 --> 00:09:53,760 by the DCTA board, that will also run on Sundays and holidays. So 365 days a year, which I 85 00:09:53,760 --> 00:09:59,160 think just provides predictability, which is important for increasing ridership. The 86 00:09:59,160 --> 00:10:07,720 current service runs six days a week, Monday through Saturday and does not run on holidays. 87 00:10:07,720 --> 00:10:13,560 This is route three and this is the second highest ridership route in the city of Denton 88 00:10:13,560 --> 00:10:21,400 in the system. This route carried 9.5 passengers per hour pre COVID. And this is one of two 89 00:10:21,400 --> 00:10:31,760 routes that the DCTA board is considering keeping as fixed service because of the high ridership. 90 00:10:31,760 --> 00:10:41,640 This is route number four in the city of Denton. It carried five passengers per hour pre COVID. 91 00:10:41,640 --> 00:10:47,280 This route, I think is a perfect example of some of the initiatives that the current DCTA 92 00:10:47,280 --> 00:10:52,840 board has been focused on and Raymond and Chris can add to this later in the discussion. 93 00:10:52,840 --> 00:11:00,160 But the DCTA board has been very focused on increasing frequency on the highest ridership 94 00:11:00,160 --> 00:11:05,800 routes. And so this particular route during COVID was reduced down to 60 minutes all the 95 00:11:05,800 --> 00:11:12,360 time, all day. And as part of the discussion last summer, the DCTA board insisted that 96 00:11:12,360 --> 00:11:16,600 this route and several of the other higher ridership routes in Denton and Lewisville 97 00:11:16,600 --> 00:11:21,040 be returned to 30 minute frequency. Because everyone understands of course that the higher 98 00:11:21,040 --> 00:11:26,000 the frequency, the higher the ridership. And so this is certainly something that the board's 99 00:11:26,000 --> 00:11:32,080 been focused on. And they're actually having conversations now about the fixed route service 100 00:11:32,080 --> 00:11:37,380 that is going to remain in Denton, the higher ridership routes, about increasing the frequency 101 00:11:37,380 --> 00:11:46,600 on those bus routes as well. This is route six. And so it carried 6.6 passengers per 102 00:11:46,600 --> 00:11:56,400 hour pre-COVID. It runs from the DDTC up to Discovery Park. It runs every 50 minutes currently 103 00:11:56,400 --> 00:12:04,080 from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. And then this is route seven. This is the highest ridership route 104 00:12:04,080 --> 00:12:09,280 in all of DCTA's system and of course in the city of Denton as well, excluding the UNT 105 00:12:09,280 --> 00:12:13,680 routes. So the UNT routes obviously have the higher ridership. This is the highest ridership 106 00:12:13,680 --> 00:12:20,560 route of the Connect service. So it carried 14.5 passengers per hour pre-COVID. It currently 107 00:12:20,560 --> 00:12:27,120 runs every 30 minutes. This is the other route that is going to remain a fixed route bus 108 00:12:27,120 --> 00:12:34,040 service because of the high ridership. It certainly justifies the fixed route service. 109 00:12:34,040 --> 00:12:40,240 And then I wanted to just cover quickly a little bit about the process that the DCTA 110 00:12:40,240 --> 00:12:46,200 has gone through to get to this point. So Accenture did an efficiency study to look 111 00:12:46,200 --> 00:12:51,960 at all aspects of DCTA's operations. And part of that analysis was to look at all of 112 00:12:51,960 --> 00:12:59,440 the fixed route service and recommendations for how to increase ridership on that service. 113 00:12:59,440 --> 00:13:03,160 And so this slide is a little busy, but I'll try to walk you through it. So I apologize 114 00:13:03,160 --> 00:13:09,040 for that. But this came directly from Accenture. This was the result of their analysis and 115 00:13:09,040 --> 00:13:14,600 this was really kind of the crux of what led the DCTA board to consider going down this 116 00:13:14,600 --> 00:13:21,600 path and making this a very large service change. So here you're seeing eight routes, 117 00:13:21,600 --> 00:13:26,160 one through eight in the city of Denton, the two Lewisville Connect routes, and then North 118 00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:31,560 Texas Express, which is a route that goes from Denton down to Fort Worth. This is showing 119 00:13:31,560 --> 00:13:41,440 you the average daily boardings per hour pre-COVID in blue and then during COVID in green. So 120 00:13:41,440 --> 00:13:47,880 prior to the board even considering this change to on-demand during COVID, DCTA had already 121 00:13:47,880 --> 00:13:52,720 eliminated routes five and eight because they were duplicative of other routes that were 122 00:13:52,720 --> 00:13:58,360 already included in the system. So those riders were already served by other routes in the 123 00:13:58,360 --> 00:14:04,080 system. So the only two routes remaining that meet this threshold of 10 boardings per hour. 124 00:14:04,080 --> 00:14:09,160 And again, remember, according to Jarrett Walker and his analysis, 10 boardings per 125 00:14:09,160 --> 00:14:13,980 hour is the minimum threshold for fixed route bus service, the worst performing routes in 126 00:14:13,980 --> 00:14:20,040 his terminology. So the only routes pre-COVID that meet that criteria are three and seven, 127 00:14:20,040 --> 00:14:25,360 the two fixed routes that the DCTA board is considering keeping as fixed routes because 128 00:14:25,360 --> 00:14:31,160 the ridership justifies it. And then post-COVID you'll see or during COVID, post-COVID I should 129 00:14:31,160 --> 00:14:37,560 not say, during this particular pandemic, none of the routes meet that threshold, except, 130 00:14:37,560 --> 00:14:44,120 I mean, you can see route seven gets very, very close, but none of them currently meet 131 00:14:44,120 --> 00:14:48,120 that threshold. But the board certainly has not been focused on COVID ridership. We all 132 00:14:48,120 --> 00:14:53,280 expect that that will come back at some point and hopefully very soon. And so they're making 133 00:14:53,280 --> 00:15:01,040 this decision based on the pre-COVID ridership. So this slide just gives you a little bit 134 00:15:01,040 --> 00:15:06,920 of a cost and ridership comparison. And this is not at all apples to apples. I'm just trying 135 00:15:06,920 --> 00:15:12,320 to give you some ability to compare the two services. They cannot be directly compared 136 00:15:12,320 --> 00:15:19,440 certainly, but I did want to present a little bit of the numbers and the data that the DCTA 137 00:15:19,440 --> 00:15:26,220 has been looking at and making this decision. So annual cost for VIA for the base service 138 00:15:26,220 --> 00:15:32,320 and phase one add-ons, which you have been presented to by DCTA several times. And I 139 00:15:32,320 --> 00:15:36,320 think Nicole can cover that more in a minute if you have any questions about what's included 140 00:15:36,320 --> 00:15:43,400 in that base and phase one. But the annual cost is 5.3 million. The ridership misses 141 00:15:43,400 --> 00:15:50,360 a low end and a high end range of ridership. This is estimated obviously based on coming 142 00:15:50,360 --> 00:15:55,640 out of COVID. They're certainly looking at what the ridership is today on the system 143 00:15:55,640 --> 00:16:01,040 and estimating the speed at which people will then come back to the system. And with all 144 00:16:01,040 --> 00:16:06,320 the additional service that's being offered by the VIA on-demand program, how many additional 145 00:16:06,320 --> 00:16:14,760 riders the service might attract. The cost per trip varies very widely based on the ridership 146 00:16:14,760 --> 00:16:20,360 numbers. So depending on how this service actually performs, we'll determine the cost 147 00:16:20,360 --> 00:16:25,760 per trip. But based on their estimated ridership, the cost per trip would be somewhere between 148 00:16:25,760 --> 00:16:34,240 $11.85 and $7 per trip. And that just gives us a benchmark of the efficiency of the service. 149 00:16:34,240 --> 00:16:39,720 So it's obviously not the only factor, but something important just to be able to compare 150 00:16:39,720 --> 00:16:44,840 the efficiency of the two services. And then the vehicle hours that are going to be delivered 151 00:16:44,840 --> 00:16:53,560 as part of this base and phase one add-ons is 129,941 annually. That's the annual vehicle 152 00:16:53,560 --> 00:17:00,000 hours. So just to give you a little bit of a comparison, the Connect bus service, and 153 00:17:00,000 --> 00:17:06,480 this is again in Denton, Lewisville, and Highland Village. So all of those services combined, 154 00:17:06,480 --> 00:17:13,320 not just the city of Denton, but the total annual costs of that service is $6.3 million. 155 00:17:13,320 --> 00:17:19,600 The ridership, and I'm just giving you a range here as well so that you can compare the two. 156 00:17:19,600 --> 00:17:30,800 So current ridership or fiscal year 20 ridership, so during COVID was 347,174. And then on the 157 00:17:30,800 --> 00:17:36,040 high end, looking at the last six years, the highest Connect bus service ridership that 158 00:17:36,040 --> 00:17:43,480 we encountered in any year was 589,404. So that just gives you a range in order to compare 159 00:17:43,480 --> 00:17:50,440 the two. And then based on that ridership, the cost per trip ranges from $18 down to 160 00:17:50,440 --> 00:17:57,520 1070. And then the vehicle hours that were provided as a result of that service were 161 00:17:57,520 --> 00:18:06,320 73,107. So I should mention a couple of things about this. One, it's not at all an apples 162 00:18:06,320 --> 00:18:12,760 to apples comparison because the VIA service includes greater coverage, it includes greater 163 00:18:12,760 --> 00:18:20,000 frequency. It also includes the service on Sundays and holidays that I mentioned. And 164 00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:25,280 it includes better connections to DART because there's a component of the Phase 1 add-ons 165 00:18:25,280 --> 00:18:31,840 that the DCTA staff and board have been working on that will allow people to connect to the 166 00:18:31,840 --> 00:18:38,320 DART Greenline in the extra hours. So the DART Greenline runs till 1 a.m. DCTA A train 167 00:18:38,320 --> 00:18:43,360 ends at 10. So there's a gap there. And we have heard from citizens in Lewisville and 168 00:18:43,360 --> 00:18:48,200 Denton that that's an issue in taking the DART train back to Trinity Mills, they can't 169 00:18:48,200 --> 00:18:53,920 get home. So part of this service is to provide on-demand that will connect to Trinity Mills 170 00:18:53,920 --> 00:18:57,940 and take people either to Lewisville, Highland Village or Denton so that they can better 171 00:18:57,940 --> 00:19:04,120 utilize DART and get home during that gap hours. The other thing I wanted to mention 172 00:19:04,120 --> 00:19:10,660 on the connect service and the cost is that there's a wide range. This includes both direct 173 00:19:10,660 --> 00:19:16,600 and indirect cost. And there is certainly a question about how much indirect cost will 174 00:19:16,600 --> 00:19:23,760 be eliminated as part of the VIA service. And so that's a savings that can be quantified. 175 00:19:23,760 --> 00:19:30,000 So the range that connect service or the bus service could be as high as 10.1 million, 176 00:19:30,000 --> 00:19:34,720 and it could be as low as 5.4 million. So the number that you're seeing here reflects 177 00:19:34,720 --> 00:19:44,820 35% of the indirect cost being achieved as savings as part of that connect service. So 178 00:19:44,820 --> 00:19:50,880 I wanted to mention one other thing and then I will stop and we are all available for questions 179 00:19:50,880 --> 00:19:58,320 and we certainly want to leave plenty of time for that. So this slide just gives you a snapshot 180 00:19:58,320 --> 00:20:03,380 of the cost per passenger trip of the DCTA connect service. This does not include the 181 00:20:03,380 --> 00:20:08,680 UNT routes, but just the connect service in Denton, Lewisville and Highland Village comparing 182 00:20:08,680 --> 00:20:14,200 it to the other agencies around the state. And I will say this is not an apples to apples 183 00:20:14,200 --> 00:20:19,420 comparison either. The other agencies are much larger and they have higher ridership 184 00:20:19,420 --> 00:20:24,480 and the ridership really determines the cost per trip because there's a significant amount 185 00:20:24,480 --> 00:20:29,940 of fixed costs associated with fixed route bus service. And so the ridership really drives 186 00:20:29,940 --> 00:20:35,520 that cost per trip. It's not a reflection on DCTA at all, because again, the ridership 187 00:20:35,520 --> 00:20:40,240 is really what drives that cost per trip. But I did want to mention it to you because 188 00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:45,160 I do think it's a benchmark that we should aspire to at some point in the future. And 189 00:20:45,160 --> 00:20:51,240 I should mention as well, the highest performing route, so route seven and all of the UNT routes 190 00:20:51,240 --> 00:20:59,380 do have comparable if not less cost per trip than these numbers of the peer agencies at 191 00:20:59,380 --> 00:21:04,680 Dart, Trinity Metro and Capital Metro. Route three does not, but it's very close. And again, 192 00:21:04,680 --> 00:21:09,040 it's the second highest ridership route. And so the board certainly feels like it's on 193 00:21:09,040 --> 00:21:15,800 the cusp and should remain as fixed route. So I will just pause there and we are all 194 00:21:15,800 --> 00:21:24,840 available to answer any questions you may have. 195 00:21:24,840 --> 00:21:25,840 This is- 196 00:21:25,840 --> 00:21:26,840 Questions. 197 00:21:26,840 --> 00:21:29,640 Okay, go ahead. I'm sorry. 198 00:21:29,640 --> 00:21:33,400 Council Member Byrd? 199 00:21:33,400 --> 00:21:36,360 Yes. I'll go first. 200 00:21:36,360 --> 00:21:37,360 Yep, sure. 201 00:21:37,360 --> 00:21:47,800 Okay, I just had a couple of questions here. I was looking at the cost per trip, and my 202 00:21:47,800 --> 00:21:54,920 question is, what all entails, you know, what's the details in that number? It looks like 203 00:21:54,920 --> 00:21:59,960 it's a little higher. Does it have anything to do with just the number of people that 204 00:21:59,960 --> 00:22:08,200 are riding or does it have some salaries included in all of that? 205 00:22:08,200 --> 00:22:13,640 It does, yes. So when I said direct and indirect cost, so the direct cost would be the direct 206 00:22:13,640 --> 00:22:21,820 cost of providing the service. So labor, the buses themselves, the indirect cost would 207 00:22:21,820 --> 00:22:27,320 be facilities, all of the additional administrative staff that go into administering the entire 208 00:22:27,320 --> 00:22:32,840 program. DCTA staff can certainly add some detail there and elaborate on it as well, 209 00:22:32,840 --> 00:22:38,400 but that is the difference. So that cost per trip includes all of those costs fully loaded 210 00:22:38,400 --> 00:22:43,640 to understand what is the cost per passenger trip to deliver that service. 211 00:22:43,640 --> 00:22:54,560 Okay, so I'm concerned about the- my primary concern at this particular point is the advent 212 00:22:54,560 --> 00:23:03,920 of losing the labor part of it. I know that I have had a number of people to connect with 213 00:23:03,920 --> 00:23:12,760 me about the opportunity for them to lose their jobs, so I understand that these same 214 00:23:12,760 --> 00:23:22,320 people will have an opportunity to apply for this other particular service, but is that 215 00:23:22,320 --> 00:23:31,920 a weighty factor on this $11 in- I don't have the number in front of me, but the $11 for 216 00:23:31,920 --> 00:23:43,280 the ridership is the- it's a cost for the employees, a heavy rider, on that. So if we 217 00:23:43,280 --> 00:23:54,320 were to go with the other- if we want to go with the other route system, the other system, 218 00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:58,920 I'm just thinking about those people that might lose their job right now for this question. 219 00:23:58,920 --> 00:24:05,520 Absolutely, and that's a concern that's shared by everyone. So I will tell you, my understanding 220 00:24:05,520 --> 00:24:11,200 is that the hourly rates are comparable to what is currently being paid to DCTA drivers, 221 00:24:11,200 --> 00:24:16,460 and there is a huge shortage of CDL drivers around the state, so both Dart and Trinity 222 00:24:16,460 --> 00:24:23,320 Metro are always seeking additional CDL drivers, but DCTA certainly may want to add some additional 223 00:24:23,320 --> 00:24:38,060 to that question. I noticed that the ridership was higher, estimated higher for the new system. 224 00:24:38,060 --> 00:24:43,820 How does that happen? How do you justify such a significant number? I do understand that 225 00:24:43,820 --> 00:24:52,000 you say it is not tit for tat exactly, but the numbers just seem so much higher with 226 00:24:52,000 --> 00:24:57,320 this new system. I'm not understanding the justification for that. 227 00:24:57,320 --> 00:25:02,120 So I'm happy to answer that question. These are ridership projections that have been provided 228 00:25:02,120 --> 00:25:08,900 by VIA based on the level of service that's being proposed, as well as density within 229 00:25:08,900 --> 00:25:12,640 the zones that are being proposed. But they are just estimates. 230 00:25:12,640 --> 00:25:13,640 Just estimates. 231 00:25:13,640 --> 00:25:19,680 And I will add to that as well, Councilmember, that the coverage area for the VIA service 232 00:25:19,680 --> 00:25:24,800 is so much larger, that there's so many more citizens that will have access to the service. 233 00:25:24,800 --> 00:25:31,120 I think that's a huge driver behind the difference in ridership. 234 00:25:31,120 --> 00:25:41,560 You said -- so it looks like a portion of this did not include the UNT riders. I was 235 00:25:41,560 --> 00:25:48,360 just trying to see if this is also part of that higher ridership. I can hear you, but 236 00:25:48,360 --> 00:25:55,600 I can't really, really hear you very clearly. Did you say that as part of justifying the 237 00:25:55,600 --> 00:26:03,440 higher ridership? At some point, you said something about the UNT connect is not a part 238 00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:08,000 of a number. Can you go back and tell me what that's about? 239 00:26:08,000 --> 00:26:16,920 Yes, absolutely. So this entire analysis is focused on the City of Denton connect service. 240 00:26:16,920 --> 00:26:22,480 So the UNT routes are not being considered to convert to on-demand because they have 241 00:26:22,480 --> 00:26:27,920 such high ridership that they're already very efficient service. So those routes, all of 242 00:26:27,920 --> 00:26:34,480 the UNT routes will continue as fixed route bus service as well as routes 3 and 7 in Denton 243 00:26:34,480 --> 00:26:38,800 because those are the highest performing routes. I'm sorry. I hope you can hear me okay. 244 00:26:38,800 --> 00:26:41,760 I can hear you because I know what I'm listening for now. 245 00:26:41,760 --> 00:26:43,480 Okay, good. 246 00:26:43,480 --> 00:26:50,360 That definitely helps. Now, what about the marketing program, the marketing side of all 247 00:26:50,360 --> 00:26:57,000 of this? I just seem like, you know, just as a regular citizen, which I was just a few 248 00:26:57,000 --> 00:27:03,520 weeks ago, it just seemed like I didn't hear a lot about DCTA that would make me want to 249 00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:13,720 get to use the system. Tell me about your marketing program prior to this proposal. 250 00:27:13,720 --> 00:27:20,520 Pardon me. I mean, you're welcome to answer, but I just want to remind you, Council Member 251 00:27:20,520 --> 00:27:28,040 Byrd, we're also going to hear from DCTA. Ms. Byrd, who's not related to you, I don't 252 00:27:28,040 --> 00:27:29,040 believe. 253 00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:30,040 No, not. 254 00:27:30,040 --> 00:27:33,880 Doesn't represent DCTA. She's our consultant, and we've actually got the marketing. 255 00:27:33,880 --> 00:27:34,880 Okay, thank you. 256 00:27:34,880 --> 00:27:38,200 But, you know, go ahead as you wish. 257 00:27:38,200 --> 00:27:42,400 No, I'm sure Nicole would love to answer that question. They have a very robust marketing 258 00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:48,520 plan planned for this launch of this service, and Nicole can add to that. 259 00:27:48,520 --> 00:27:55,720 Sure. I'm happy to provide some details. So we have explored new marketing techniques 260 00:27:55,720 --> 00:28:02,800 to promote the public involvement plan for the GoZone service and to educate passengers 261 00:28:02,800 --> 00:28:09,440 on what the final service will be and educate them about the launch and how you ride. We 262 00:28:09,440 --> 00:28:14,840 will be mirroring a lot of our existing activities that we've been using for the public involvement 263 00:28:14,840 --> 00:28:20,920 period. I will tell you from a data perspective and an engagement perspective, we have seen 264 00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:26,240 incredible results from our public involvement outreach. And so we feel pretty confident 265 00:28:26,240 --> 00:28:31,780 that mirroring those activities will result in a widespread education of the community 266 00:28:31,780 --> 00:28:38,240 on how to utilize the service. Additionally, we plan to provide kind of on-site and virtual 267 00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:43,280 trainings for folks that need assistance with how to purchase, whether it's via the mobile 268 00:28:43,280 --> 00:28:48,240 app, or actually at a facility or over the phone. So we'll kind of have some on-site 269 00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:54,120 and virtual assistance if someone needs a one-on-one walkthrough. So we plan to, again, 270 00:28:54,120 --> 00:28:58,160 just like we did for the public involvement plan, to have a widespread education plan 271 00:28:58,160 --> 00:29:04,920 that would support the service that our board approves for launch on September 7. 272 00:29:04,920 --> 00:29:15,300 - Thank you. - Anything else, Council Member Perk for now? 273 00:29:15,300 --> 00:29:19,600 - I'm done. Thank you. - Yeah. Okay. Council Member McGuire. 274 00:29:19,600 --> 00:29:27,680 - Thank you, Mayor Perkett and Meltzer. So I wanted to ask about the sort of overall 275 00:29:27,680 --> 00:29:33,680 costs. And I know that you mentioned it's sort of, these are just projections and it's 276 00:29:33,680 --> 00:29:42,680 not apples to apples. But I believe I recall Mr. Suarez telling us in the work session 277 00:29:42,680 --> 00:29:50,120 last week that... Sorry, I'm trying to find the numbers here. I recall him saying that 278 00:29:50,120 --> 00:30:01,120 the VIA service would be slightly more expensive than the Connect service. But if I can find 279 00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:07,360 the dang slide, you just showed us a slide saying it would cost less. So I was wondering 280 00:30:07,360 --> 00:30:11,720 if you could, if you or Raymond or Nicole could speak to that a little bit. 281 00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:16,680 - Yes. And we both can. So Raymond and Nicole, please add to this as well. The difference 282 00:30:16,680 --> 00:30:21,760 is whether you're talking about just the base service that's being provided by VIA or the 283 00:30:21,760 --> 00:30:26,960 phase one or phase two add-ons. So the numbers that I showed you today are just the base 284 00:30:26,960 --> 00:30:31,680 service and phase one add-ons, because that's really the service that the board has discussed 285 00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:38,140 so far and seems to have support for. Obviously that final decision has not been made yet. 286 00:30:38,140 --> 00:30:43,280 The phase two add-ons, when you add that in, it does make it more expensive than the Connect 287 00:30:43,280 --> 00:30:50,000 service. So that's really the question. And certainly on the numbers that I showed you, 288 00:30:50,000 --> 00:30:56,840 if the phase two add-ons are added, we don't yet have that comparison as far as the access 289 00:30:56,840 --> 00:31:01,740 service, because that's something that's being contemplated in phase two. And those cost 290 00:31:01,740 --> 00:31:05,920 numbers, I don't know that the board has seen yet, but staff certainly may want to elaborate 291 00:31:05,920 --> 00:31:07,080 on that as well. 292 00:31:07,080 --> 00:31:12,520 - And I would just add to that, that the costs that Brandy is sharing today are those direct 293 00:31:12,520 --> 00:31:19,320 costs, specifically related to labor, wages and fuel. There are also those indirect costs 294 00:31:19,320 --> 00:31:23,840 related to like facilities and the staff to manage programs and the customer service and 295 00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:28,080 all of that, that is not included. And so when you combine the direct costs and the 296 00:31:28,080 --> 00:31:33,480 indirect costs, there is a slight increase in the cost of overall service, but the number 297 00:31:33,480 --> 00:31:37,880 of service hours of what's being proposed is higher than what we're currently operating 298 00:31:37,880 --> 00:31:38,880 today. 299 00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:47,800 - Okay, thank you. Yeah, that clarifies that for me. I appreciate that. So I also, if I 300 00:31:47,800 --> 00:31:54,880 remember council member Byrd correctly, I thought she was asking about DCTA's marketing 301 00:31:54,880 --> 00:32:01,320 of the connect service, like pre-COVID, which if that was what you were asking council member 302 00:32:01,320 --> 00:32:10,880 Byrd, that kind of ties into my next question, which is, prior to this proposal of the via 303 00:32:10,880 --> 00:32:21,320 on demand service, what steps did DCTA take to improve ridership on fixed routes? Was, 304 00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:29,400 I mean, was there an effort made to sort of tweak the current system and improve ridership 305 00:32:29,400 --> 00:32:33,240 as opposed to sort of abandoning it abruptly? 306 00:32:33,240 --> 00:32:39,000 - Sure. I'm happy to answer that question. So I would say it's a combination of many 307 00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:44,720 things. So from a grassroots level, the promotion of services as well as programs that tie into 308 00:32:44,720 --> 00:32:49,400 those services. So whether it's like our discount pass programs for social service agencies 309 00:32:49,400 --> 00:32:55,600 or groups, or even with the schools, like we provide like a summer pass for the students 310 00:32:55,600 --> 00:33:03,740 and we had various programs that were promoted and developed in order to drive ridership. 311 00:33:03,740 --> 00:33:09,840 We also participated in a comprehensive operational analysis about four years ago that looked 312 00:33:09,840 --> 00:33:14,480 at the existing connect routes across our system and modified them in order to gain 313 00:33:14,480 --> 00:33:22,120 additional ridership. And then most significantly, we put together two different fare systems 314 00:33:22,120 --> 00:33:29,280 in place that did show increased ridership. So the first of that being the A train free 315 00:33:29,280 --> 00:33:33,800 fare zone, that would be from Hebron to the Trinity mill station, as well as from Medpart 316 00:33:33,800 --> 00:33:38,280 to the DDTC, where we provide free service if you're just traveling between those two 317 00:33:38,280 --> 00:33:44,400 kind of mini destinations. And then the additional fare modification that we made about a year 318 00:33:44,400 --> 00:33:51,000 and a half ago is that when the regional fare increased, we are part of a regional fare 319 00:33:51,000 --> 00:33:56,680 program with the other transit agencies in the area. DART leads the development of any 320 00:33:56,680 --> 00:34:01,680 fares as part of the regional perspective. And so they were promoting and recommending 321 00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:07,640 an increase to their regional fare. And DCTA chose to go ahead and accept that fare so 322 00:34:07,640 --> 00:34:13,200 that our passengers got the benefit of the entire system. But we decreased our local 323 00:34:13,200 --> 00:34:18,600 fares so that we could give passengers the option to buy like one local DCTA pass and 324 00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:23,440 a local DART pass. And it would actually be cheaper than what the previous regional fare 325 00:34:23,440 --> 00:34:29,160 pass was. And we did see a significant increase in ridership. Just from that, we also saw 326 00:34:29,160 --> 00:34:34,120 an increase in our fare revenue from that specific fare adjustment as well. 327 00:34:34,120 --> 00:34:40,480 There wasn't long after that that COVID hit, so we saw a reduction there. I also mentioned 328 00:34:40,480 --> 00:34:50,760 during our presentation that fixed route bus can be impacted by a lot of different things. 329 00:34:50,760 --> 00:34:57,840 As we talked about during the conversation, amenities, sidewalks, curb cuts, those types 330 00:34:57,840 --> 00:35:03,600 of investments are really important because they can be barriers to fixed route. The other 331 00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:10,000 big initiative that I guess data point that really hasn't been shared in the analysis 332 00:35:10,000 --> 00:35:15,000 and we've shared with our board is when our board asked us to put together the metrics 333 00:35:15,000 --> 00:35:20,520 in the five-year history, they asked for some context about what were some of the impacts 334 00:35:20,520 --> 00:35:28,400 that caused the reductions in service. And I would say more so in Denton than in the 335 00:35:28,400 --> 00:35:34,600 rest of our service area, there's been significant amount of infrastructure, road infrastructure 336 00:35:34,600 --> 00:35:42,400 on University, on Hickory, on Bonnie Bray over the last three to four years that while 337 00:35:42,400 --> 00:35:47,120 we're making improvements in the service, there's no question there's a lot of stops 338 00:35:47,120 --> 00:35:53,520 that were not accessible. Trying to get through those corridors really caused a lot of on-time 339 00:35:53,520 --> 00:35:58,200 performance issues. And so when you just look at the data, the data doesn't necessarily 340 00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:05,360 tell the whole story. And so to Nicole's point, there's a lot of different variables that 341 00:36:05,360 --> 00:36:15,720 go into it. I do believe to Councilman Davis's comments around fair pricing, just in typical 342 00:36:15,720 --> 00:36:22,120 economics, if you have inventory, drop your price, make it more competitive, people will 343 00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:28,560 use it. We actually did that. He had provided some comments. I want to say it was pre-COVID, 344 00:36:28,560 --> 00:36:32,900 we went back, we looked at pricing, we talked to the board about it. They were in favor 345 00:36:32,900 --> 00:36:40,100 of reducing the cost for the fares and we did see to Nicole's point a significant increase. 346 00:36:40,100 --> 00:36:46,880 So it's hard to say that marketing alone won't necessarily change things. It's a combination 347 00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:52,120 of things, but I wanted to provide that additional data point because the infrastructure improvements, 348 00:36:52,120 --> 00:36:56,820 while they've helped the city in so many ways, they certainly didn't help on-time performance 349 00:36:56,820 --> 00:37:01,400 and the speed and accuracy of our service. And that, in my opinion, was probably the 350 00:37:01,400 --> 00:37:10,000 biggest contributor over the last three to four years in the performance concerns and 351 00:37:10,000 --> 00:37:13,560 ridership barriers on the system. 352 00:37:13,560 --> 00:37:20,840 Specifically to the Denton construction, we had to reroute the majority of our fixed routes, 353 00:37:20,840 --> 00:37:26,600 probably anywhere between four and six times over a period of about two years to accommodate 354 00:37:26,600 --> 00:37:32,000 the construction. So to Raymond's point, that did have significant impact and communicating 355 00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:41,760 that obviously to our passengers was a fairly large struggle, but luckily we have very dedicated 356 00:37:41,760 --> 00:37:46,080 riders and so they sign up for rider alerts and we're able to target them directly based 357 00:37:46,080 --> 00:37:51,120 on the route that they ride, but it did have impacts to our overall ridership for sure. 358 00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:56,760 And as I mentioned, one of the benefits of VIA is with a big bus, it's really hard to 359 00:37:56,760 --> 00:38:03,480 make left and right turns on alternative roads. With vans, it's much easier to get around 360 00:38:03,480 --> 00:38:09,080 those types of situations and pick people up. So it has a lot more flexibility and ability 361 00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:16,000 to access, provide accessibility on the system than the bus service, but I just wanted to 362 00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:19,520 provide that additional context since you're asking the question about what we did to market 363 00:38:19,520 --> 00:38:25,200 the existing system. Hopefully that helps. Yeah, it does. And I really appreciate that 364 00:38:25,200 --> 00:38:30,040 you're, you know, taking a broader view that it's not just about what DCTA has done, that 365 00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:37,240 the city bears a great deal of responsibility for, you know, making DCTA services accessible. 366 00:38:37,240 --> 00:38:46,320 So yeah, I appreciate that. Just while we're on the topic that you raised, 367 00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:56,120 business-wise, would you mind sharing what percent of DCTA revenues Fairbox does represent? 368 00:38:56,120 --> 00:39:04,200 Because I really don't know. Percentage-wise, it's a smaller, I'm sorry. 369 00:39:04,200 --> 00:39:14,360 I'm sure it's overwhelmingly sales tax. It's overwhelmingly, it's 51% sales tax, about 370 00:39:14,360 --> 00:39:20,360 40, I want to say 43%. It's changing. I was looking at budget numbers this morning for 371 00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:30,960 FY22. I'd say the Fairbox revenue is less than 10% of the revenue that comes in to support 372 00:39:30,960 --> 00:39:34,640 the system. I don't have the exact number in front of me. My apologies. I'll look it 373 00:39:34,640 --> 00:39:39,720 up more on this conversation. That scales it anyway. So if we don't have 374 00:39:39,720 --> 00:39:47,760 any more questions right now for Ms. Burt, do you want to go ahead and give the DCTA 375 00:39:47,760 --> 00:39:52,240 presentation? If you had planned to do one? Yeah, I would be happy to. 376 00:39:52,240 --> 00:39:56,840 Nicole, before I wrap it up, I was just going to turn it over to the DCTA Board Chair, Chris 377 00:39:56,840 --> 00:40:11,840 Watts, if you wanted to say a few things before we finish. 378 00:40:11,840 --> 00:40:19,680 Thank you. Thank you for that. Just to share with you a couple of thoughts from the Board, 379 00:40:19,680 --> 00:40:27,360 you know, basically is what the philosophy has been. And I understand about the construction 380 00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:33,880 and I understand about that that may have impacted ridership to some degree. But I think 381 00:40:33,880 --> 00:40:38,360 it's a combination of a lot of things. If you look at the data, we're back up to the 382 00:40:38,360 --> 00:40:45,120 ridership pre-COVID that we were back in 2015, which is about 500 and something thousand 383 00:40:45,120 --> 00:40:50,800 riders, which let's make sure we understand when we talk about riders, as illustrated 384 00:40:50,800 --> 00:40:59,520 in the slides, you have to do some calculations to try to get how many people that that represents. 385 00:40:59,520 --> 00:41:05,920 You know, how many individuals? And as you could tell, it was, you know, five or six 386 00:41:05,920 --> 00:41:15,560 per hour. The board has been totally committed. Prior to this new board, the old board was 387 00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:22,040 totally committed to that main mission of how do we provide the best public transportation 388 00:41:22,040 --> 00:41:28,440 system for the dollars that we have and for the capabilities that we have as an agency. 389 00:41:28,440 --> 00:41:34,040 DCTA is a very unique agency. There's not very many agencies that are situated with 390 00:41:34,040 --> 00:41:39,600 member cities that, you know, sort of have not autonomy, but, you know, different levels 391 00:41:39,600 --> 00:41:44,760 of service for each member city. So when you look at other agencies and you try to compare 392 00:41:44,760 --> 00:41:50,280 things, as Brandy said, it's not necessarily an apples to apples. But what we all have 393 00:41:50,280 --> 00:41:57,520 in common is we want people to have an alternative. We want people to have a choice that will 394 00:41:57,520 --> 00:42:02,960 get them where they need to go in an efficient manner that will motivate them to use public 395 00:42:02,960 --> 00:42:08,000 transportation instead of using a vehicle. Now, for those who don't have a vehicle, it 396 00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:12,920 becomes even that much more critical that we provide those kind of services and those 397 00:42:12,920 --> 00:42:19,760 kind of efficient services to get them where they need to be on a timely manner. So this 398 00:42:19,760 --> 00:42:25,680 has not been something that this decision has not happened overnight. It's certainly 399 00:42:25,680 --> 00:42:31,480 not happened in a vacuum. There's been a lot of analysis on this, understanding that 400 00:42:31,480 --> 00:42:37,920 it is a very far departure from the paradigm that we've been operating on over the last 401 00:42:37,920 --> 00:42:44,880 10 years since DCTA has come into existence with the Denton bus service. But when you 402 00:42:44,880 --> 00:42:51,640 look at the data and you look at our ridership pre-COVID in 2019 was at the level a little 403 00:42:51,640 --> 00:42:59,160 higher than 2010 or 2015. And you look at the sales tax dollars that were paid in 2010 404 00:42:59,160 --> 00:43:04,480 to support that ridership, which it did support it. I mean, there wasn't a budget issue. The 405 00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:12,080 DCTA staff and board at that time, I mean, they managed the finances in such a way that 406 00:43:12,080 --> 00:43:19,880 they were able to do that. So this is an attempt to try to figure out how do we provide better 407 00:43:19,880 --> 00:43:25,600 service? I mean, the service hours, what is it? I think it's 129,000 for Via roughly and 408 00:43:25,600 --> 00:43:34,600 173 for Denton Connect. That's almost, that's over a 50% increase in service hours, if my 409 00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:43,120 math is correct. Plus in Denton and in Lewisville, you have your zones where people can pick up 410 00:43:43,120 --> 00:43:50,880 those on-demands have increased, especially with the add-ons. So that certainly and the 411 00:43:50,880 --> 00:43:58,040 headways are 15 minutes and the location. So I understand the concerns and quite frankly, 412 00:43:58,040 --> 00:44:02,720 I really appreciated the feedback last Tuesday because one thing that I heard that I'm going 413 00:44:02,720 --> 00:44:08,680 to make a recommendation to the board is I think it's, and it's not that it hasn't been 414 00:44:08,680 --> 00:44:13,560 said before, but you know, sometimes my memory fades me that, you know, how long will the 415 00:44:13,560 --> 00:44:20,960 fixed routes that are proposed to sort of transition out, how long will they be running 416 00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:27,520 concurrently with the on-demand system? And I thought I heard two weeks or something. 417 00:44:27,520 --> 00:44:33,120 That's not been a board decision. The board has not made a decision on that. So I don't 418 00:44:33,120 --> 00:44:37,840 know where that number came from, but I think it's a worthy discussion of the board to say, 419 00:44:37,840 --> 00:44:42,400 hey, we need to make sure that there's a big enough transition period to where we give 420 00:44:42,400 --> 00:44:51,540 everyone the opportunity to be fully educated and not just the passengers, but DCTA to understand 421 00:44:51,540 --> 00:44:57,840 what are our gaps because the concern that I heard last Tuesday was, okay, those, and 422 00:44:57,840 --> 00:45:03,600 I heard the term middle-class, you know, they'll, I guess, figure it out. But what about those 423 00:45:03,600 --> 00:45:08,420 people who are in social services agencies, those that, you know, may not have access 424 00:45:08,420 --> 00:45:13,960 to telephones, you know, those that are experiencing homelessness, how do we help those people? 425 00:45:13,960 --> 00:45:19,800 How will they take advantage of the system? And I can tell you, the board and DCTA staff 426 00:45:19,800 --> 00:45:30,120 is 100% committed, more than 100%, to determine what those needs are and how we address those 427 00:45:30,120 --> 00:45:36,360 needs. So I feel confident that we will be able to do that in a way that's even more 428 00:45:36,360 --> 00:45:40,520 efficient than the way that we're meeting those needs today. 429 00:45:40,520 --> 00:45:48,840 So the philosophy has always been, how do we move more people conveniently that helps 430 00:45:48,840 --> 00:45:53,800 them get where they need to be? I have, you know, we're looking at what would it cost 431 00:45:53,800 --> 00:46:00,720 to take the bus service to a 15-minute headway? You know, to try to compare, well, if you're 432 00:46:00,720 --> 00:46:07,040 doing a fixed route system and you've got a 15-minute headway on on-demand, what would 433 00:46:07,040 --> 00:46:13,040 that cost with a fixed route system? Understanding, though, that the on-demand will provide more 434 00:46:13,040 --> 00:46:19,560 locations for pickup and more locations for drop-off. 435 00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:26,800 So the feedback has been wonderful. I think we have time as we move forward to take a 436 00:46:26,800 --> 00:46:35,520 look at it. But just rest assured that I don't think that DCTA over the last four years or 437 00:46:35,520 --> 00:46:41,800 the City of Denton have, have there been some things happen that have contributed to lower 438 00:46:41,800 --> 00:46:48,240 ridership with construction and all those kinds of things? Yes. I mean, that goes without 439 00:46:48,240 --> 00:46:55,840 saying. Is that the crux and the totality of the issue? I don't think so. I think what 440 00:46:55,840 --> 00:47:00,880 the issue is people are having to wait. And I will tell you, the City of Denton has also 441 00:47:00,880 --> 00:47:07,520 asked and DCTA has complied in the capacity that they have that they can. What do we do 442 00:47:07,520 --> 00:47:13,920 with our bus stops? I mean, I'm not sure how many covered shelters we have in the City 443 00:47:13,920 --> 00:47:18,360 of Denton. I've lost track of that number. But, you know, you often see people standing 444 00:47:18,360 --> 00:47:29,640 out just along a right of way or on a sidewalk or sitting, you know, on the ground. And that 445 00:47:29,640 --> 00:47:34,120 has been something that the City and DCTA have worked on for many years to try to figure 446 00:47:34,120 --> 00:47:39,800 out and continue to figure out how can we do more of that. But as technology has advanced 447 00:47:39,800 --> 00:47:44,020 and as these other types of modalities, I mean, Councilmember Davis made a statement 448 00:47:44,020 --> 00:47:50,000 that, you know, some people depend on fixed route buses. And I made the comment, well, 449 00:47:50,000 --> 00:47:53,700 that's because that's all they've been offered. That's because that's all that we've sort 450 00:47:53,700 --> 00:48:01,860 of tried to create. There are people who do depend on public transportation. And to me, 451 00:48:01,860 --> 00:48:09,720 that is the theme. That is the statement that has to be at the crux of every deliberation 452 00:48:09,720 --> 00:48:18,100 and every analysis we do when we're looking at how do we move more people. So the feedback 453 00:48:18,100 --> 00:48:24,120 has been great. I think that we can take some of that and tweak some of this with some additional 454 00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:30,280 data. I certainly know that DCTA staff is committed to continuing their mission in the 455 00:48:30,280 --> 00:48:36,320 best way possible. I know that the Board is doing the same thing. So I just would simply 456 00:48:36,320 --> 00:48:43,100 say keep the questions coming because it spurs that kind of collaboration and dialogue and 457 00:48:43,100 --> 00:48:50,860 brainstorming that really is what creates the maximum decision. I mean, we're not making 458 00:48:50,860 --> 00:48:56,180 this decision in a vacuum. We're still the decision, you know, we've moved it down this 459 00:48:56,180 --> 00:49:03,580 path because the data, the data at least that we have available seems to indicate that this 460 00:49:03,580 --> 00:49:07,820 is worth a shot. Now, does that mean I'm going to be honest with you and this is the first 461 00:49:07,820 --> 00:49:18,080 time I've ever said this? My fear, my fear on all this is it will be widely successful. 462 00:49:18,080 --> 00:49:24,980 And if it's widely successful, then guess what? We'll have to come back and figure out, okay, 463 00:49:24,980 --> 00:49:29,260 how do we, you know, if it's widely successful, you know, does the on-demand costs grow to 464 00:49:29,260 --> 00:49:33,640 a point where, you know, there's some you can bring back in a fit? I mean, there's so many 465 00:49:33,640 --> 00:49:40,780 options that are available. And that's why I don't want us to get locked into this thought 466 00:49:40,780 --> 00:49:47,440 process of this is a one and done thing. This is simply an option that we're moving forward 467 00:49:47,440 --> 00:49:53,200 based upon the data, based upon the feedback of people who also there's feedback who don't 468 00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:59,700 share the same sentiment. And those are the people that we want to really hear from so 469 00:49:59,700 --> 00:50:05,740 we can try to craft a decision. Personally, during the transition of this where you're 470 00:50:05,740 --> 00:50:10,760 having the buses and the on-demand running concurrently, I think we need to figure out 471 00:50:10,760 --> 00:50:16,500 a way to put people on each bus who can answer questions, who can either, you know, take 472 00:50:16,500 --> 00:50:21,500 down, here's my, here's my obstacle. I don't have a phone. I don't have this, you know, 473 00:50:21,500 --> 00:50:26,080 get some contact names. It's, I mean, really get at the grassroots level to where we're 474 00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:32,140 hearing the actual needs. And that will help us better address it because it's going to 475 00:50:32,140 --> 00:50:36,060 be a, it's going to be a transition, but I think we're going to be able to do it. And 476 00:50:36,060 --> 00:50:43,220 there will be kinks, there will be, you know, some obstacles, but the more we can resolve 477 00:50:43,220 --> 00:50:48,420 on the front end, the less we have to resolve, you know, once it gets implemented. So I think 478 00:50:48,420 --> 00:50:54,420 the board is open to doing everything that we can to make this as, as smooth a transition 479 00:50:54,420 --> 00:51:02,620 and to meet the needs that, that, that are out there in a way that after a while people 480 00:51:02,620 --> 00:51:08,020 will say, well, gosh, I can get in on this corner and I don't have to wait 30 minutes 481 00:51:08,020 --> 00:51:15,180 for a bus and I can get dropped off, you know, 20 yards, 30 yards, 40 yards from where I'm 482 00:51:15,180 --> 00:51:22,940 going. That, that is appealing if everything else is even just equal, you know, or even 483 00:51:22,940 --> 00:51:30,300 if it's even a little bit slider cost, because I think those intangibles are what the customer, 484 00:51:30,300 --> 00:51:35,620 and let's not lose fact of it's really the customer, it's the rider that we're really 485 00:51:35,620 --> 00:51:42,780 trying to benefit here. And I feel confident that whatever, however this turns out, we 486 00:51:42,780 --> 00:51:48,460 will find a way that better helps the rider get where they're going. So that's really 487 00:51:48,460 --> 00:51:52,940 all I have. I mean, I, I really can't answer a lot of these specific detailed questions 488 00:51:52,940 --> 00:51:57,140 like the, like Nicole and Raymond can, but I certainly can share with you sort of the 489 00:51:57,140 --> 00:52:05,060 thoughts from the board as far as the thought process of moving in this direction. 490 00:52:05,060 --> 00:52:11,540 If I can offer some individual input and I appreciate the fact that, you know, you're 491 00:52:11,540 --> 00:52:17,980 really making an effort to soak it all in. And I'm, I'm really speaking more frankly 492 00:52:17,980 --> 00:52:29,100 as a guy who introduced new products for 30 years. I would encourage resisting the idea 493 00:52:29,100 --> 00:52:38,140 that it must be a transition when what you're trying to meet a whole array of needs. And 494 00:52:38,140 --> 00:52:45,500 I think if you want to, in almost any industry, any service offering, if you want to maximize 495 00:52:45,500 --> 00:52:50,900 the coverage of, you know, of the needs that are out there, you would, you would think 496 00:52:50,900 --> 00:52:58,100 in terms of a product portfolio that suggests to you that a fixed route meets a somewhat 497 00:52:58,100 --> 00:53:03,460 different need. I mean, it's all transportation, but within that category fixed route meets 498 00:53:03,460 --> 00:53:10,140 a different need than on demand. And it also meets a slightly different need than payable, 499 00:53:10,140 --> 00:53:17,300 right? That, and that if you really want to maximize the opportunity and minimize the 500 00:53:17,300 --> 00:53:24,220 risk that you're going to screw something up big, you would add features, add components 501 00:53:24,220 --> 00:53:29,340 to your product portfolio and then adjust the mix. What you're trying to do is maximize 502 00:53:29,340 --> 00:53:36,540 what they call turf, total unduplicated reach and frequency, right? Some, some people, you 503 00:53:36,540 --> 00:53:40,940 know, are going to like two of the three options. Some are going to use all three, but what 504 00:53:40,940 --> 00:53:47,300 you want is the, is the portfolio that, that gives you the maximum coverage of the, of 505 00:53:47,300 --> 00:53:51,900 the customer demand. So I, you know, I would suggest, I mean, and I'm somebody who is quite 506 00:53:51,900 --> 00:53:58,460 persuaded that for many people, you going on my schedule instead of me having to go 507 00:53:58,460 --> 00:54:04,140 on yours is going to be more convenient. I'm quite persuaded that for some people, you 508 00:54:04,140 --> 00:54:09,740 going on my route is more convenient than me having to go on your route. So I totally 509 00:54:09,740 --> 00:54:14,900 get that. There's a difference between, now I'm going, I've worked in several industries 510 00:54:14,900 --> 00:54:19,260 and one was baked goods. Okay. So this, I would just say to you, there's a difference 511 00:54:19,260 --> 00:54:24,660 between a brownie and a brownie mix. Some people said you can't, Pepper Farm can't do 512 00:54:24,660 --> 00:54:28,860 a brownie cause you can get really good brownie mixes. Well, they're totally different consumer 513 00:54:28,860 --> 00:54:35,000 decision-making processes. If I knew, if I want to step off the train, you know, and, 514 00:54:35,000 --> 00:54:39,540 and get my ride, that's halable. And that is entirely different need than, Oh, I got 515 00:54:39,540 --> 00:54:43,540 to plan this thing and figure out how to work this app and all that. It's just a different 516 00:54:43,540 --> 00:54:47,340 consumer decision-making process. So that, that, that's my main point. If you add, add 517 00:54:47,340 --> 00:54:52,100 the elements, there's absolutely, well, I wouldn't say absolutely, but there's no apparent 518 00:54:52,100 --> 00:54:56,820 need to say we're committed. We already know that the other thing is bad and this thing 519 00:54:56,820 --> 00:55:00,820 is good. And it's only a matter of the transition. In fact, this had originally been presented 520 00:55:00,820 --> 00:55:09,060 to this committee as, as a pilot to test our way in. And, you know, that, that, you know, 521 00:55:09,060 --> 00:55:13,060 desire seems to have evaporated, but I think that that was, that, that was right. So I'll, 522 00:55:13,060 --> 00:55:17,980 I'll, I'll have more comments later, but I just wanted to, you know, respond to that 523 00:55:17,980 --> 00:55:27,860 point. Cause I know we've got some more to hear from DCTA. Thank you, chair. Chairman, 524 00:55:27,860 --> 00:55:32,060 if I may, let me, let me answer a question that was asked earlier about revenue. Sales 525 00:55:32,060 --> 00:55:38,900 tax revenue is 51%. Our federal grants for operating capital roughly are 42% of the revenue 526 00:55:38,900 --> 00:55:46,700 that comes in. Contract services, which is revenue. A portion of that you consider Fairbox 527 00:55:46,700 --> 00:55:52,980 is 6.2%. The actual passenger revenues that are more attributable to the Fairbox is less 528 00:55:52,980 --> 00:55:57,540 than 1%. So when I was saying it was less than 10%, it was actually, I was thinking 529 00:55:57,540 --> 00:56:04,420 about the contract revenue and the, and the passenger revenue. So it was less than 10%. 530 00:56:04,420 --> 00:56:10,140 Yeah, it was less than 10%. So it wasn't necessarily wrong, but it was a, it's significantly less 531 00:56:10,140 --> 00:56:14,820 than, than 10%. Yes. Almost, almost a rounding error, it sounds like. Yes, that's correct. 532 00:56:14,820 --> 00:56:20,780 Which reminds me of how we seem to be summoning council member Davis to mind a lot today. 533 00:56:20,780 --> 00:56:26,020 So I don't know if he's listening, but you know, to his point, it does make you wonder, 534 00:56:26,020 --> 00:56:32,420 this is another bit of input. You know, should the idea of taking Fair out of the question 535 00:56:32,420 --> 00:56:38,260 to maximize the ridership, you know, is that worth considering when you consider that it's, 536 00:56:38,260 --> 00:56:43,260 you know, almost undetectable as a revenue source. Now, I would just add one more point. 537 00:56:43,260 --> 00:56:49,580 If you take Fair out of the picture, well, first of all, you're talking, you're the concern 538 00:56:49,580 --> 00:56:56,000 you raised when we spoke last, President Suarez was that people would view the buses housing 539 00:56:56,000 --> 00:56:59,620 instead of transportation. But when you're talking about a little vehicle, it seems a 540 00:56:59,620 --> 00:57:03,900 little less likely. That's just an opinion. But then also if you take Fair out of the 541 00:57:03,900 --> 00:57:10,020 issue, you become hailable. You don't have to add technology to be able to take a swipe. 542 00:57:10,020 --> 00:57:19,380 And if you only on, let's say on the facts, if your opinion and the opinion of consultants 543 00:57:19,380 --> 00:57:25,260 is that you still need to run a big dang bus for three people or five people, whatever 544 00:57:25,260 --> 00:57:33,300 it is, you could experiment with running the little vehicle on the fixed route. Maybe it'll 545 00:57:33,300 --> 00:57:37,940 be electric someday too and not be polluting. And you could try that without the ability 546 00:57:37,940 --> 00:57:42,900 to collect fares for a week or two. I'm just putting that out there. Anyway, thanks for 547 00:57:42,900 --> 00:57:46,380 that perspective about how we've certainly captured the feedback and we'll provide that 548 00:57:46,380 --> 00:57:53,740 back to the board. Thank you very much for the input. All right, chairman, chairman patient 549 00:57:53,740 --> 00:58:12,020 to call your turn. I will go ahead and just share my screen. And I promise I will only 550 00:58:12,020 --> 00:58:20,380 take less than 10 minutes to kind of go through this. But I will say that city staff did ask 551 00:58:20,380 --> 00:58:26,980 that I provide just at least in the packet, an update based on the feedback that we received 552 00:58:26,980 --> 00:58:32,900 at the June 8th council meeting. And so while I will not go over all of that feedback in 553 00:58:32,900 --> 00:58:39,660 detail, it is included in your packet should you want to review it. So just as a reminder, 554 00:58:39,660 --> 00:58:45,040 we are still in the public involvement feedback process. And so we have dctafeedback.net as 555 00:58:45,040 --> 00:58:51,460 an option. If you know, council members or the public stakeholders organizations would 556 00:58:51,460 --> 00:58:57,500 like to provide that feedback, we are still doing a wide array of stakeholder presentations 557 00:58:57,500 --> 00:59:02,260 for holding virtual town halls. We're also attending a lot of community meetings. So 558 00:59:02,260 --> 00:59:08,340 in fact, we will be at the Juneteenth celebration in Denton talking about the proposed service 559 00:59:08,340 --> 00:59:13,220 and collecting feedback as well. And so all of those outreach efforts have proven to be 560 00:59:13,220 --> 00:59:18,700 very successful. We have gotten an incredible amount of comment back from the public and 561 00:59:18,700 --> 00:59:23,060 our stakeholders, which we plan to share with our board. And as I mentioned, city staff 562 00:59:23,060 --> 00:59:28,100 asked that I just kind of provide a recap of the information that I sent out after the 563 00:59:28,100 --> 00:59:34,420 June 8th Denton city council meeting. So I did send out an email of follow up items after 564 00:59:34,420 --> 00:59:39,620 that meeting that I knew city staff forwarded to the council. And there were a lot of attachments 565 00:59:39,620 --> 00:59:45,300 in there. So I just kind of wanted to talk about them high level. Based on your feedback 566 00:59:45,300 --> 00:59:50,500 for the council's feedback, we did hear that many of the council members had not necessarily 567 00:59:50,500 --> 00:59:54,980 concerns with the actual service itself, but the implementation of the service, and that 568 00:59:54,980 --> 01:00:00,420 perhaps a more hybrid approach might be appropriate. So we did go ahead and add an item to our 569 01:00:00,420 --> 01:00:06,380 June 24th dcta board meeting to have a preliminary conversation with our board about some of the 570 01:00:06,380 --> 01:00:11,220 feedback that we've collected thus far. So we will be sharing kind of a preliminary feedback 571 01:00:11,220 --> 01:00:16,260 report with the board. It does not capture all of the feedback that we've captured, you 572 01:00:16,260 --> 01:00:19,980 know, through the end of the public involvement period, because that ends on the 25th and 573 01:00:19,980 --> 01:00:24,140 our board meeting is on the 24th. But it will capture the feedback that we've collected 574 01:00:24,140 --> 01:00:29,900 from April 19 through June 11. And so we do plan to have a discussion with our board next 575 01:00:29,900 --> 01:00:34,180 Thursday to talk about some of that feedback, the trends in that feedback, and to see if 576 01:00:34,180 --> 01:00:38,980 any sort of modification in the service delivery would be required prior to bringing it back 577 01:00:38,980 --> 01:00:45,380 to the board in July for adoption. And Chair Watts had requested during that city council 578 01:00:45,380 --> 01:00:52,300 meeting that we provide that final transformation initiative report from Accenture. And so I 579 01:00:52,300 --> 01:00:57,140 did include that as well. And that's also included in your packet. And this is a presentation 580 01:00:57,140 --> 01:01:03,060 that was presented to the DCTA board of directors in December of last year that just captures 581 01:01:03,060 --> 01:01:08,280 all of their analysis that they conducted on both our overall efficiency as an agency 582 01:01:08,280 --> 01:01:14,020 as well as well as route and train performance. And so I did call out a few of the pages within 583 01:01:14,020 --> 01:01:18,700 that study that you might find helpful. So the ridership and boarding details which Brandi 584 01:01:18,700 --> 01:01:23,580 actually shared in her presentation can be found in that final report from Accenture 585 01:01:23,580 --> 01:01:30,020 on pages 46 and 47. And then there were some additional route recommendations that Accenture 586 01:01:30,020 --> 01:01:36,460 made based on their analysis. And so they put several options together based on density 587 01:01:36,460 --> 01:01:41,540 and route productivity. So you can read through those. That's on pages 36 through 61. It's 588 01:01:41,540 --> 01:01:47,740 not captured on a singular slide. But if you were interested in what Accenture's analysis 589 01:01:47,740 --> 01:01:52,980 resulted in in regards to our route performance and some of their recommendations, you can 590 01:01:52,980 --> 01:01:58,780 reference those pages. I also provided via case studies that I followed up after last 591 01:01:58,780 --> 01:02:03,300 month's mobility committee meeting. And I did want to reference that those case studies 592 01:02:03,300 --> 01:02:09,700 were based on Chair Meltzer's request about case studies regarding ridership. So those 593 01:02:09,700 --> 01:02:14,860 via case studies are not related to programs that are similar to DCTA. Those are specifically 594 01:02:14,860 --> 01:02:20,860 about where ridership has been much higher than anticipated and then also where ridership 595 01:02:20,860 --> 01:02:25,860 did not meet the estimations and they had to modify the programs post launch to increase 596 01:02:25,860 --> 01:02:31,020 ridership. I will be following up with the council with specific via case studies about 597 01:02:31,020 --> 01:02:36,540 programs that are similar to ours. And then Mayor Hutzpick had asked for just some more 598 01:02:36,540 --> 01:02:41,040 information about the promotional materials that we've been sharing as part of our public 599 01:02:41,040 --> 01:02:46,580 outreach efforts. And so we did provide kind of an advertisement that's in your packet. 600 01:02:46,580 --> 01:02:51,660 But also you can go to DCTAfeedback.net, go to our media center and hit the promotional 601 01:02:51,660 --> 01:02:57,700 materials download and you can find sample content for any medium, graphics, anything 602 01:02:57,700 --> 01:03:00,860 that you're looking for there. And so we've been working really closely with the City 603 01:03:00,860 --> 01:03:04,980 of Denton staff and they've been an excellent partner in helping us share that message so 604 01:03:04,980 --> 01:03:11,140 that we can get as much feedback as possible. So those next steps, as I mentioned, so we 605 01:03:11,140 --> 01:03:17,420 are still on schedule to take the final proposed plan back to our board on July 22nd for review 606 01:03:17,420 --> 01:03:21,980 and consideration of approval. We do have some time between now and then, and based 607 01:03:21,980 --> 01:03:27,100 on feedback that we receive from our board next month as to any modifications that need 608 01:03:27,100 --> 01:03:32,980 to be made. I will say that if they are some minor modifications, so whether that's extending 609 01:03:32,980 --> 01:03:38,340 the time period in which fixed routes and GoZone operate at the same time, or if it's 610 01:03:38,340 --> 01:03:43,460 a slight modification in the zone, we would have the time to make those modifications 611 01:03:43,460 --> 01:03:48,860 and then bring it back to the board for approval on July 22nd. If it does come back from our 612 01:03:48,860 --> 01:03:52,900 board that they would like to look at more significant changes, maybe particularly to 613 01:03:52,900 --> 01:03:57,460 the Denton zone, that will require additional time to model the service and then we would 614 01:03:57,460 --> 01:04:02,300 be required to take it back out to the public and follow that public involvement process 615 01:04:02,300 --> 01:04:06,300 before we can take it back to our board for formal adoption. So I will say that there 616 01:04:06,300 --> 01:04:14,140 are kind of two paths we could take based on DCTA board feedback at next week's meeting. 617 01:04:14,140 --> 01:04:17,780 And then, as I mentioned earlier, we will have a comprehensive marketing communications 618 01:04:17,780 --> 01:04:24,100 education campaign to ensure that those who are transitioning over to this GoZone service 619 01:04:24,100 --> 01:04:29,820 have all of the tools necessary to do so successfully, and that will also include kind of virtual 620 01:04:29,820 --> 01:04:33,740 and in-person trainers. We will have people on vehicles, we'll have people stationed at 621 01:04:33,740 --> 01:04:40,420 our downtown Denton Transit Center and to Chair Watts's point, it is our high priority 622 01:04:40,420 --> 01:04:45,180 to make sure that this transition is as easy as possible for passengers. They're our first 623 01:04:45,180 --> 01:04:51,340 priority and so we'll certainly be focusing our attention to specifically the education 624 01:04:51,340 --> 01:04:57,860 of passengers. I did want to provide just some other DCTA updates for the new committee 625 01:04:57,860 --> 01:05:03,020 members. I typically attend every single month and provide general DCTA news. It just so 626 01:05:03,020 --> 01:05:07,740 happens to be focused on GoZone the last couple of months. But I did want to mention that 627 01:05:07,740 --> 01:05:12,140 we have just reopened our downtown Denton Transit Center. If you'll recall, we had closed 628 01:05:12,140 --> 01:05:17,780 the downtown Denton Transit Center due to COVID. And so we did a soft opening on June 7th. 629 01:05:17,780 --> 01:05:21,980 We now have core hours, so it's open in the morning. There's a break during lunch and 630 01:05:21,980 --> 01:05:26,020 then it's open in the afternoon and the evening. And we have that break in the middle of the 631 01:05:26,020 --> 01:05:30,200 day in order to make sure that deep cleans are conducted in the facility. We're also 632 01:05:30,200 --> 01:05:36,240 limiting capacity and requiring masks and social distancing and doing high touch point 633 01:05:36,240 --> 01:05:42,780 cleans during those operating hours. And so far, that soft opening has been very successful. 634 01:05:42,780 --> 01:05:48,660 And so we continue as the mask mandate is lifted, we hope to bring the DDTC back to 635 01:05:48,660 --> 01:05:53,380 our full operating hours. And we'll also be looking at potentially increasing those hours 636 01:05:53,380 --> 01:05:59,100 and days of operation with the GoZone plan because the GoZone service now is operated 637 01:05:59,100 --> 01:06:04,020 more days of the week and longer hours of the day. I also wanted to mention that the 638 01:06:04,020 --> 01:06:08,980 A-Train's 10th birthday is coming up. This Friday, we will be doing free A-Train rides 639 01:06:08,980 --> 01:06:13,340 all day with the code word A-Train birthday. We are doing goodies for passengers who are 640 01:06:13,340 --> 01:06:18,180 on the train. We've got a virtual scavenger hunt, a lot of really fun activities in order 641 01:06:18,180 --> 01:06:23,100 to celebrate the A-Train's 10th birthday. So we encourage everyone to participate and 642 01:06:23,100 --> 01:06:28,700 again, free rides on the A-Train on the 18th. I wanted to mention our community outreach 643 01:06:28,700 --> 01:06:35,060 education campaign. We launched this at the start of COVID to provide some virtual resources 644 01:06:35,060 --> 01:06:39,860 to those who are doing at-home schooling, our teachers who are looking for some additional 645 01:06:39,860 --> 01:06:46,380 curriculum. We have been updating our community education resources available at ridedcta.net. 646 01:06:46,380 --> 01:06:51,380 And we just recently launched a new safety book, which is also a coloring book and new 647 01:06:51,380 --> 01:06:57,180 summer related coloring sheets that are available. So those are available for easy download. 648 01:06:57,180 --> 01:07:02,260 They're great resources. Our social service agency round table that we hold quarterly, 649 01:07:02,260 --> 01:07:09,420 both in Lewisville and in Denton is coming up. So mark August 17th and August 19th on 650 01:07:09,420 --> 01:07:14,820 your calendars. Anyone is welcome to attend, but we typically have anywhere between 20 651 01:07:14,820 --> 01:07:20,460 and 30 social service agencies attend where we talk about DCTA news that would be of interest 652 01:07:20,460 --> 01:07:24,580 to them, how we can assist them with their clientele, and then any general challenges 653 01:07:24,580 --> 01:07:30,780 that they have to see how we can work collaboratively to get them a solution. And then just a reminder 654 01:07:30,780 --> 01:07:36,900 that even though the governor lifted the mask mandate, DCTA still falls under the federal 655 01:07:36,900 --> 01:07:42,420 mask mandate. And so we are still requiring masks in all of our vehicles, at our stops 656 01:07:42,420 --> 01:07:48,540 and stations, as well as in our operating facilities. So just a little reminder there. 657 01:07:48,540 --> 01:07:51,980 So I know I went through that really quickly. That concludes my update, but I'm certainly 658 01:07:51,980 --> 01:07:57,080 happy to answer any questions that the committee may have. 659 01:07:57,080 --> 01:08:08,240 Okay. Questions, comments? And Council Member McGuire, if you're, I mean, Bird, if your 660 01:08:08,240 --> 01:08:09,980 hand is up, I can't see it. 661 01:08:09,980 --> 01:08:21,920 Yes, I had one question about the, the liability cost with, you know, using buses versus cars 662 01:08:21,920 --> 01:08:25,500 how is that, how is that weighted? How is that going to work for us? 663 01:08:25,500 --> 01:08:31,500 Sure. So DCTA has been working with our insurance company and as well as our legal representation. 664 01:08:31,500 --> 01:08:38,020 We have specific liability thresholds in place. And so in order for VIA to even be pre-qualified 665 01:08:38,020 --> 01:08:42,700 as a potential vendor for us to consider, they had to either meet or exceed those liability 666 01:08:42,700 --> 01:08:49,780 requirements. So we do have that in place. And I think Raymond might want to add something. 667 01:08:49,780 --> 01:08:55,300 Many of our contractors, whether it be rail or private contractors are also typically 668 01:08:55,300 --> 01:09:00,700 covered under our liability insurance. So there's multiple layers of coverage. We're 669 01:09:00,700 --> 01:09:09,060 also, we have tort liability so that much like the police cities do. So it limits the 670 01:09:09,060 --> 01:09:14,840 exposure, but typically we'll have our insurance in place. The contractor has their insurance 671 01:09:14,840 --> 01:09:21,740 in place. So it shouldn't be much different than what we're operating today. 672 01:09:21,740 --> 01:09:29,060 The only other question that I have is I heard you say something about central location pickup. 673 01:09:29,060 --> 01:09:35,540 And this is where the, this is where that goes on. And the door to door pickup, is this 674 01:09:35,540 --> 01:09:41,900 a true door to door pickup or is there certain areas that you want people to be at? 675 01:09:41,900 --> 01:09:48,380 Sure. So this, this service is considered curb to curb. They also provide door to door 676 01:09:48,380 --> 01:09:53,540 service if you are, if you self-select in the booking process as having a wheeled mobility 677 01:09:53,540 --> 01:09:58,780 device or if you're ADA qualified. And so then it would take you door to door. But in 678 01:09:58,780 --> 01:10:04,020 most cases, this is a curb to curb service. It's quite more convenient than our existing 679 01:10:04,020 --> 01:10:09,740 bus stops because what they consider for door to door or curb to curb is much closer than 680 01:10:09,740 --> 01:10:14,540 what our actual bus stop location provides. So I like, always like to provide the example. 681 01:10:14,540 --> 01:10:18,900 If you're going to a Walgreens, they're going to drop you off in the parking lots to Walgreens. 682 01:10:18,900 --> 01:10:23,820 They're not going to drop you off in the street outside of Walgreens. If you are ADA qualified 683 01:10:23,820 --> 01:10:28,220 or you self-select and so having a wheelchair device, they will actually take you to the 684 01:10:28,220 --> 01:10:32,780 door. They would also provide you service like at your, at the front of your house. 685 01:10:32,780 --> 01:10:37,700 So it does provide both. At this point in time, we are not recommend, recommending kind 686 01:10:37,700 --> 01:10:45,060 of centralized like hailing zones. Via's recommendation is for us to provide the curb to curb and 687 01:10:45,060 --> 01:10:50,940 door to door service and be able to look at data that would show us kind of the hot points 688 01:10:50,940 --> 01:10:57,020 of where people are primarily, you know, requesting rides or requesting a drop off. And then based 689 01:10:57,020 --> 01:11:02,300 on that data, we could create kind of hailable zones that would be available so that you 690 01:11:02,300 --> 01:11:06,100 wouldn't have to book up front. You could actually just go to that location where we 691 01:11:06,100 --> 01:11:11,020 would most likely have a bus stop with a shelter in place and you could go to that location 692 01:11:11,020 --> 01:11:16,860 and you could just wait for the next vehicle to drive by. The cost of that addition to 693 01:11:16,860 --> 01:11:22,320 service would be, you know, based on how often we would want a vehicle to drive by. So there 694 01:11:22,320 --> 01:11:29,300 are a lot of parameters regarding that, but it is definitely a potential as a future phase. 695 01:11:29,300 --> 01:11:30,300 Thank you very much. 696 01:11:30,300 --> 01:11:38,180 Did you have any further questions or comments? Not at this time. Thank you. 697 01:11:38,180 --> 01:11:52,780 I have a little more to add. I do not envy Chair Watts in having to convey the guidance 698 01:11:52,780 --> 01:12:01,700 from seven different voices. Yet again, Councilmember Davis made quite a good point in response 699 01:12:01,700 --> 01:12:09,540 to another Councilmember saying we don't speak as a body unless we vote. So you've got seven 700 01:12:09,540 --> 01:12:19,020 voices plus all the voices from the public. But I think it would be meaningful if we could 701 01:12:19,020 --> 01:12:34,860 find a way to, in work session and then ultimately with a resolution, craft our instruction or 702 01:12:34,860 --> 01:12:41,380 wishes or guidance, I guess I would say, our guidance to our representative. And I would 703 01:12:41,380 --> 01:12:46,900 further suggest that it is probably not all that helpful if it is just like split decision 704 01:12:46,900 --> 01:12:53,380 four to three or whatever, but to see where as a body we have at least like a super majority 705 01:12:53,380 --> 01:13:04,180 if not unanimity to provide guidance as a Council. And now the timing becomes complicated 706 01:13:04,180 --> 01:13:12,580 for doing that since you've got a meeting next time we meet, your meeting. My opinion, 707 01:13:12,580 --> 01:13:19,100 it's only an opinion, is that you'd be pretty safe if you wanted to suggest that you're 708 01:13:19,100 --> 01:13:27,580 representing a consensus. You'd be pretty safe in moving forward to add something, but 709 01:13:27,580 --> 01:13:35,040 I would say there's at least a diversity of opinion or not clear guidance yet, maybe by 710 01:13:35,040 --> 01:13:40,280 next Tuesday, but not in time for your meeting probably. There's not clear guidance on taking 711 01:13:40,280 --> 01:13:50,540 anything away or carving anything in stone about how much or when, transitioning. And 712 01:13:50,540 --> 01:13:56,140 I realize you're responding to your staff input and all that, but if you wanted to have 713 01:13:56,140 --> 01:14:02,420 clear guidance from Council to you, my opinion is it'd be great if we could craft a resolution, 714 01:14:02,420 --> 01:14:10,740 if you felt, I think you'd be on completely uncontroversial grounds to, and I look to 715 01:14:10,740 --> 01:14:18,100 my fellow committee members, I think you'd be on controversial grounds to say, yeah, 716 01:14:18,100 --> 01:14:25,380 let's start trying this thing. Certainly the parallel part, but I invite comment from my 717 01:14:25,380 --> 01:14:30,420 colleagues on that point. Council Member McGuire, sorry, I saw her hand first because it's bigger 718 01:14:30,420 --> 01:14:38,060 on my screen. Yeah, I think that you characterized that well. To be honest, I think that I'm probably 719 01:14:38,060 --> 01:14:46,420 the most, well, Council Member Arminter and I are probably the most suspicious of a plan 720 01:14:46,420 --> 01:14:53,740 that includes cutting significant numbers of fixed bus routes, but yeah, I do think 721 01:14:53,740 --> 01:15:00,360 that Council Member Mayor Pratam Meltzer has accurately characterized my position that 722 01:15:00,360 --> 01:15:13,380 I'm not opposed to trying out an on-demand service as an addition or as part of a multimodal 723 01:15:13,380 --> 01:15:18,500 system that still includes significant fixed routes, although they may not look like they 724 01:15:18,500 --> 01:15:25,340 do look now. But yeah, I think that that's one thing, I don't want to speak for the council 725 01:15:25,340 --> 01:15:29,060 members who aren't here, but I suspect that you're right, that we are all in agreement 726 01:15:29,060 --> 01:15:36,460 that some kind of multimodal system that includes on-demand service is something we would all 727 01:15:36,460 --> 01:15:37,460 be interested in. 728 01:15:37,460 --> 01:15:45,820 My opinion is, hey, if they're both out there or multiple things are out there and nobody 729 01:15:45,820 --> 01:15:52,180 takes the fixed bus route anymore and everybody is on on-demand, I think that we might reach 730 01:15:52,180 --> 01:15:56,380 a different conclusion, but my point is we haven't reached that conclusion. Council Member 731 01:15:56,380 --> 01:15:59,980 Bird, do you have a comment as well? 732 01:15:59,980 --> 01:16:06,540 I just want to say that I really appreciate the opportunity for the on-demand service. 733 01:16:06,540 --> 01:16:18,500 I was very skeptical of it earlier, but as we think about the way that our system, our 734 01:16:18,500 --> 01:16:26,580 lifestyle is changing and we are meeting the needs of a whole new crop of people out there, 735 01:16:26,580 --> 01:16:35,660 I'm thinking about the millennial people that are used to on-demand everything. So it just 736 01:16:35,660 --> 01:16:41,660 sounds fairly reasonable to me. I appreciate the opportunity to have a little bit of input 737 01:16:41,660 --> 01:16:48,980 on it personally. Looking forward to being able to use this service myself whenever I 738 01:16:48,980 --> 01:16:54,180 don't want to really drive my car. So yeah, I'll just leave it there. Thank you all so 739 01:16:54,180 --> 01:17:02,780 much for everything that you all have done and being new to the council, I'm just really 740 01:17:02,780 --> 01:17:09,620 appreciating learning all of the aspects of in the details of what it takes to make things 741 01:17:09,620 --> 01:17:14,980 happen. So I'll keep that with me and I'll appreciate the opportunity to ride when it's 742 01:17:14,980 --> 01:17:17,240 time. Thank you. 743 01:17:17,240 --> 01:17:24,300 Council Member Bird, if I can press you a little, would you support or not support the 744 01:17:24,300 --> 01:17:31,880 idea that this committee would ask staff to communicate to council that we'd like to discuss 745 01:17:31,880 --> 01:17:37,380 a resolution to give guidance to our representative on this? 746 01:17:37,380 --> 01:17:40,700 Sir, I would definitely support that. Thank you. 747 01:17:40,700 --> 01:17:48,260 Okay. So staff, if you'll note that, I appreciate that. Anything else would be good on this 748 01:17:48,260 --> 01:17:51,180 item? Council Member McGuire? 749 01:17:51,180 --> 01:17:57,700 I just wanted to, I guess, specify that yes, I'm definitely in favor of hammering out a 750 01:17:57,700 --> 01:18:03,820 resolution because this is nuanced, it's complex. I think even those of us who have strong feelings 751 01:18:03,820 --> 01:18:09,980 about it one way or another still have a pretty nuanced position on it. So I think, yes, I 752 01:18:09,980 --> 01:18:16,980 think we need to really work out what we as a body want to see from DCTA on this. 753 01:18:16,980 --> 01:18:26,440 Well, I thank all of you for coming and sharing the data and your thoughts and all the great 754 01:18:26,440 --> 01:18:34,820 insights and very optimistic prospects for really meeting our residents transit needs. 755 01:18:34,820 --> 01:18:37,340 Thank you. Well, thank you. And if the committee or 756 01:18:37,340 --> 01:18:41,140 the council has any further questions, please feel free to reach out. We're always happy 757 01:18:41,140 --> 01:18:46,700 to respond. All right, then. I think we can go backwards 758 01:18:46,700 --> 01:18:53,220 now and that'll close item D and go back to item C. Receive a report and hold the discussion 759 01:18:53,220 --> 01:19:00,420 regarding City of Denton transportation slash mobility project status report. 760 01:19:00,420 --> 01:19:10,460 Mr. Poulster with us today? Can I request a 60 second break? 761 01:19:10,460 --> 01:19:18,120 That is 45 seconds. Okay. So we'll take a break at 1027 for how 762 01:19:18,120 --> 01:19:24,780 about five minutes? That should be enough. That's more than I need, but yes. 763 01:19:24,780 --> 01:19:31,780 We'll time it. Okay, Mr. Chair, we are ready to reconvene 764 01:19:31,780 --> 01:19:37,640 the meeting. Great. Okay. We are back from break at 1033 765 01:19:37,640 --> 01:19:42,900 and open item reopen, I guess, item D, receive a report and hold the discussion regarding 766 01:19:42,900 --> 01:19:53,180 updates regarding City of Denton transportation slash mobility project status report. 767 01:19:53,180 --> 01:20:03,260 Okay. Hello, my name is John Poulster. I'm with Innovative Transportation Solutions 768 01:20:03,260 --> 01:20:09,980 and I'll be going over, not really sure, let's look that way, I guess, where to look, but 769 01:20:09,980 --> 01:20:16,460 this is the report. We'll start with for the new folks that haven't 770 01:20:16,460 --> 01:20:24,300 seen this, this is a summary sheet of the projects that were listed, the pertinent information 771 01:20:24,300 --> 01:20:28,940 that we have and then the total cost of the construction that we know at this time on 772 01:20:28,940 --> 01:20:39,220 the projects that we're tracking for the city. So the first project we'll go with is 2181. 773 01:20:39,220 --> 01:20:44,140 This is a project from basically 2499 in the south all the way up to Lillian Miller in 774 01:20:44,140 --> 01:20:49,780 the north. The project was originally awarded to MCM. 775 01:20:49,780 --> 01:20:56,900 Back in the day, they defaulted. And so Zachary got the contract and the current construction 776 01:20:56,900 --> 01:21:02,740 report from TxDOT states that we're continuing to move forward for a summer of next year 777 01:21:02,740 --> 01:21:07,140 completion date. All the current activity you see there primarily 778 01:21:07,140 --> 01:21:13,780 tells you that we've been having some minor utility conflicts that we are dealing with 779 01:21:13,780 --> 01:21:21,220 on a day-to-day basis. They are minor. They just happen fairly regularly and we're continuing 780 01:21:21,220 --> 01:21:26,820 to work on the southbound concreting of the paving of the main lanes. So if you drive 781 01:21:26,820 --> 01:21:33,060 the area, you should be able to see that there's quite a bit going on now that the concrete's 782 01:21:33,060 --> 01:21:38,380 beginning to be poured. Before our drive project is complete, we left 783 01:21:38,380 --> 01:21:45,140 it in one month from the last report. We wanted to put the big completed sign on it. We had 784 01:21:45,140 --> 01:21:52,940 our ribbon cutting back in April and we will be removing this project off of the list once 785 01:21:52,940 --> 01:21:57,820 staff tells me that they're ready to not see it anymore. 786 01:21:57,820 --> 01:22:01,860 Right now, this just tells you they're doing punch list closeout items for the contract, 787 01:22:01,860 --> 01:22:10,260 that the road itself is operational. Okay, your Mayhill 35 project, initially this 788 01:22:10,260 --> 01:22:19,300 project was going to be let in late '21, early '22, but in designing the project, we realized, 789 01:22:19,300 --> 01:22:25,100 I think everybody that drives this corridor realizes, that the brinker signal was minimizing 790 01:22:25,100 --> 01:22:32,540 the throughput of the frontage roads to Loop 288. So TechStat in the county and the city 791 01:22:32,540 --> 01:22:42,960 looked at that design and will be adding a bypass lane over brinker. It'll be basically 792 01:22:42,960 --> 01:22:48,580 a frontage road that comes up, attaches to the main lanes and then drops back down north 793 01:22:48,580 --> 01:22:54,460 of brinker and then the same in the reverse going southbound so that if you want to exit 794 01:22:54,460 --> 01:22:58,780 to go to Loop 288, you don't have to sit at the light at brinker. If you don't want to, 795 01:22:58,780 --> 01:23:06,880 you can go up and over. So that added five more parcels that we needed 796 01:23:06,880 --> 01:23:12,540 to acquire. They were environmentally cleared back in 2012, so there wasn't an environmental 797 01:23:12,540 --> 01:23:16,620 clearance issue. It was just that we weren't intending on acquiring those initially and 798 01:23:16,620 --> 01:23:24,700 now we are and that pushed our right of way date to January of next year, which then again 799 01:23:24,700 --> 01:23:32,580 pushes the utilities and that's the reason for the push in the date. The difference between 800 01:23:32,580 --> 01:23:42,500 the ready to let date of January 23 and June 25 is just a procedural process. We're putting 801 01:23:42,500 --> 01:23:47,820 June 25 because if you look up on the TxDOT system, you'll find that it says June 25 and 802 01:23:47,820 --> 01:23:53,620 they just put it there because it's outside the four-year window for funding and these 803 01:23:53,620 --> 01:24:00,460 funds are more than what they had in the first four years. The good news is that RTC, when 804 01:24:00,460 --> 01:24:06,540 they met last week, they approved the difference between the $62 million that we currently 805 01:24:06,540 --> 01:24:14,180 had on the project and funded the $77.6 million that's needed to complete the work. So again, 806 01:24:14,180 --> 01:24:23,300 after our next report, we'll show you that the Category 2 dollars match the construction 807 01:24:23,300 --> 01:24:28,700 cost. So here you see in the report, those are 808 01:24:28,700 --> 01:24:34,380 all the utilities we're working with in that corridor to get this utility clearance date 809 01:24:34,380 --> 01:24:45,380 of January 23. So this is the Dallas Drive Interim. We're keeping it on the report until 810 01:24:45,380 --> 01:24:54,020 TxDOT figures that if you drive through their northbound exiting to go to Dallas Drive, 811 01:24:54,020 --> 01:25:00,080 the bollards, the plastic bollards that preclude people from crossing from the frontage road 812 01:25:00,080 --> 01:25:07,460 to go northbound on the frontage road are installed but they have a yield sign that's 813 01:25:07,460 --> 01:25:14,380 protected by some construction barrels and the city's asked TxDOT to figure out what 814 01:25:14,380 --> 01:25:17,540 they're going to do with those construction barrels so that they don't have it look like 815 01:25:17,540 --> 01:25:23,180 a permanent construction project. So we're still working on how to keep that sign there 816 01:25:23,180 --> 01:25:28,900 without people not seeing it. So that's why it's still up. Essentially, what we wanted 817 01:25:28,900 --> 01:25:33,180 to accomplish has been accomplished but we just haven't gotten rid of those barrels yet. 818 01:25:33,180 --> 01:25:43,860 Okay, so this is the big project, 35E, 35W Merge, all the way up to US 77. We have completed 819 01:25:43,860 --> 01:25:54,060 the right-of-way on this project and we are now moving into full utility relocation coordination. 820 01:25:54,060 --> 01:25:59,980 There are significant utilities in this corridor including City of Denton, actual utilities 821 01:25:59,980 --> 01:26:06,260 and the DME's, electrical lines that we're meeting I'd say every two to three weeks. 822 01:26:06,260 --> 01:26:12,940 City staff is with TxDOT to try to figure out how to coexist in that environment once 823 01:26:12,940 --> 01:26:23,260 we start to widen the road and that essentially is what you'll see in the wording there. We're 824 01:26:23,260 --> 01:26:35,100 still on track for the June 22 so far and the funding was increased to match the estimated 825 01:26:35,100 --> 01:26:40,100 construction costs and we'll reflect that in the next report at the last RTC meeting, 826 01:26:40,100 --> 01:26:45,660 all of them were. Good news here, this is the other trauma project. We're only showing 827 01:26:45,660 --> 01:26:52,420 you half of the drawing because it would take up multiple pages but we are making improvements 828 01:26:52,420 --> 01:26:59,180 to 35 north of the merge, south of 380 where all that congestion is on the main lanes and 829 01:26:59,180 --> 01:27:05,140 frontage road. We're basically flipping the ramps, adding an auxiliary lane on the main 830 01:27:05,140 --> 01:27:11,940 lanes, adding an auxiliary lane on the frontage roads and making some improvements at the 831 01:27:11,940 --> 01:27:18,620 intersection of the frontage roads and 380 such that it'll allow dual lefts going westbound 832 01:27:18,620 --> 01:27:26,780 to through in an extended right turn lane going eastbound and we anticipate that project 833 01:27:26,780 --> 01:27:33,500 to start in July next month. It'll be a maintenance contract and we expect to be done by December, 834 01:27:33,500 --> 01:27:42,220 January, December of this year or January of the next year. So about six months. January 835 01:27:42,220 --> 01:27:52,940 22, just noting it. My parents live out there so I drive it all the time. Okay, 35 north 836 01:27:52,940 --> 01:28:00,500 is the big project north of here from 77 all the way to the county line. It's about 800 837 01:28:00,500 --> 01:28:10,420 million dollars. Again, the difference between the 600 and 800 has been met at the last RTC 838 01:28:10,420 --> 01:28:14,980 meeting and we'll reflect that in the next report. But again, we have a ready let of 839 01:28:14,980 --> 01:28:23,060 March 23 and a December 24 let date and that's an actual let date because some of the dollars 840 01:28:23,060 --> 01:28:32,780 that we have on this project aren't available until that fiscal year. Okay, so 35 main lanes. 841 01:28:32,780 --> 01:28:39,260 The main thing we want to point out here on this project is that the schematic essentially 842 01:28:39,260 --> 01:28:48,740 for the main lanes have been approved, which is good. That means we can move on to the 843 01:28:48,740 --> 01:28:55,060 finalizing the environmental document, which is probably going to be next month. And that's 844 01:28:55,060 --> 01:29:01,220 just for the main lane portion. And I'll go to the next one and show you that the next 845 01:29:01,220 --> 01:29:10,420 project that we're doing that we're focusing on more are the frontage roads and HNTB has 846 01:29:10,420 --> 01:29:20,220 been contracted to do the plan specifications and estimates. That's what PSNE stands for. 847 01:29:20,220 --> 01:29:28,020 And they basically had to suspend their work until September 1st because Austin ran out 848 01:29:28,020 --> 01:29:32,700 of develop authority funding. And so they have to wait till a new fiscal year to give 849 01:29:32,700 --> 01:29:38,460 them notice to proceed. But come September 1 HNTB will begin the design work. We're focusing 850 01:29:38,460 --> 01:29:47,260 on a portion of 35W frontage roads from 407 North on both sections. And I don't know if 851 01:29:47,260 --> 01:29:53,620 I've ever pointed out the logic on why we're doing the frontage roads first and not the 852 01:29:53,620 --> 01:29:58,540 main lanes. And the logic is the frontage roads are going to be where the frontage roads 853 01:29:58,540 --> 01:30:03,460 are always going to be once it's ultimately built. They'll be in the same location. And 854 01:30:03,460 --> 01:30:10,580 it allows development to occur along the interstate because you have frontage roads. And the reason 855 01:30:10,580 --> 01:30:16,700 we're not pursuing the main lanes right now is because when we cleared the main lanes, 856 01:30:16,700 --> 01:30:21,740 as we went through the clearance of it, it was initially planned to be a what we called 857 01:30:21,740 --> 01:30:28,900 a 3223 configuration, which is three general purpose lanes going northbound with two toll 858 01:30:28,900 --> 01:30:34,260 manage lanes, two toll manage lanes going south, and three general purpose. Currently 859 01:30:34,260 --> 01:30:40,660 what you have out there are four general purpose lanes, two in each direction. And that 3223 860 01:30:40,660 --> 01:30:47,100 configuration matches what is coming up from the south out of Tarrant County. But we weren't 861 01:30:47,100 --> 01:30:55,540 cleared for a managed lane facility and the paradigm shifted on tolls versus non tolls. 862 01:30:55,540 --> 01:31:00,420 People not understand the difference between a managed lane or toll road. So we just converted 863 01:31:00,420 --> 01:31:11,740 the project to a rural freeway. And if rural freeway has a 500 or so foot footprint, and 864 01:31:11,740 --> 01:31:17,340 we're doing that because we feel that the paradigm will shift before we actually get 865 01:31:17,340 --> 01:31:22,340 to build the main lanes and we'll convert it back to a toll manage lanes. And the footprint 866 01:31:22,340 --> 01:31:29,140 for a rural freeway is the same as a footprint for a 3223 toll manage lane. I don't know 867 01:31:29,140 --> 01:31:34,100 if I've ever explained that. And if anybody needs help because I'm not very clear, I can 868 01:31:34,100 --> 01:31:43,100 help them with pictures, some other point. Sure. It sounds like to me what you just said 869 01:31:43,100 --> 01:31:49,020 is that the justification for it, thank you, the justification that we'll see is all of 870 01:31:49,020 --> 01:31:57,300 this extra wide space between those lanes. So what you normally see in a rural freeway, 871 01:31:57,300 --> 01:32:02,660 like what you see out there now with the four lanes, that's a rural freeway. So what you 872 01:32:02,660 --> 01:32:07,260 have is you have two lanes. If you had frontage road, you'd have the frontage roads and a 873 01:32:07,260 --> 01:32:12,300 wide parkway between the frontage roads and the main lanes, and then a wide parkway between 874 01:32:12,300 --> 01:32:18,460 the main lanes, which is what you have now for the main lanes. And there's all the drainage 875 01:32:18,460 --> 01:32:30,820 is trench flow on an urban facility. All of that goes into storm sewers. And you don't 876 01:32:30,820 --> 01:32:36,780 need as much room for the for the lanes and the drainage so you can put more lanes in 877 01:32:36,780 --> 01:32:42,380 that same footprint. It just kind of reminds me of what happened on 35 E down there in 878 01:32:42,380 --> 01:32:49,140 Louisville where we sat for years and years watching all that open wide space wondering 879 01:32:49,140 --> 01:32:54,020 what was going to happen with that. Well, so now that's the net what you see there now 880 01:32:54,020 --> 01:33:00,020 is an interim project to we're waiting for the permanent. And if you unfortunately, starting 881 01:33:00,020 --> 01:33:04,320 next year, if you're driving into Dallas, from the county line south, they're going 882 01:33:04,320 --> 01:33:11,700 to be doing the ultimate and that's 4224 toll manage lanes. And so we just finished the 883 01:33:11,700 --> 01:33:16,100 interim and now we're going to go back and break it for the ultimate, but not in didn't 884 01:33:16,100 --> 01:33:30,420 county yet. Did my thing go away? I think I know how to do that. I think. Right. Oh, 885 01:33:30,420 --> 01:33:39,300 right there it is share. See, I'm not totally helpless. I get other skills. Alright, so 886 01:33:39,300 --> 01:33:44,380 that's the 35 W main lanes versus the frontage roads. And that's why you got two separate 887 01:33:44,380 --> 01:33:47,460 projects. Because the frontage roads will always be where they're going to be in either 888 01:33:47,460 --> 01:33:57,660 case. Alright, US 380 77 project. This is a segment that's under construction. And the 889 01:33:57,660 --> 01:34:02,460 news on this, I don't know if it made the report because it just happened. But last 890 01:34:02,460 --> 01:34:14,300 week, the county requested that text dot consider a work zone speeds reduction in this corridor 891 01:34:14,300 --> 01:34:24,380 and we've been concerned about it. But after the accident, they're near 377 North, the 892 01:34:24,380 --> 01:34:30,180 county asked text dot because it's not their policy anymore to reduce the speed limit as 893 01:34:30,180 --> 01:34:37,300 a work speed. You can go to those work zones. Their their argument is they design the road 894 01:34:37,300 --> 01:34:42,140 to be able to be under construction at its current speed. That may be true, but the optics 895 01:34:42,140 --> 01:34:52,140 are pretty bad. And so we asked them to reconsider their policy and they have reconsidered it. 896 01:34:52,140 --> 01:35:00,540 And so they're doing the work right now to get the commission approval to do work zone 897 01:35:00,540 --> 01:35:07,020 speed limit of I think 50 miles an hour from loop 288 all the way to the county line because 898 01:35:07,020 --> 01:35:15,580 the next project is fixing to start. And it'll be it'll have to be approved by each of the 899 01:35:15,580 --> 01:35:24,420 communities, right? So if the city of Denton, Crossroads, Little Elm and Frisco don't agree 900 01:35:24,420 --> 01:35:30,160 with the speed study, I mean, the speed reduction during construction, then they can have their 901 01:35:30,160 --> 01:35:34,900 say at that point. But we're, we're asking the state to at least allow the cities to 902 01:35:34,900 --> 01:35:43,980 consider it. But we're still moving on with the November 23 completion date. And other 903 01:35:43,980 --> 01:35:53,220 than the speed reduction, there are minor issues that we're dealing with, but they're 904 01:35:53,220 --> 01:35:59,260 they're only minor. And so we're we're going pretty good on that project. Now the big project 905 01:35:59,260 --> 01:36:06,180 further east, this is the one where we're adding five grade separations at Navo, Teal, 906 01:36:06,180 --> 01:36:14,800 Legacy, 423 and 720. And an additional general purpose lane in each direction. We currently 907 01:36:14,800 --> 01:36:20,620 are showing a let date of Asterik because we had some issues with Upper Trinity that 908 01:36:20,620 --> 01:36:28,180 impacted co-serve and co-serve and then impacted AT&T, Grande, Verizon, Suddenlink and the 909 01:36:28,180 --> 01:36:36,980 Dominote. But we were thinking that it would be next year that we would let the project, 910 01:36:36,980 --> 01:36:45,180 but I'm hearing that the district is intending to let this project in August of this year 911 01:36:45,180 --> 01:36:48,580 because they've got some assurances from the utility providers that they'll be able to 912 01:36:48,580 --> 01:36:54,060 be out of the way in time. So we'll get you an update when we know it for sure. But the 913 01:36:54,060 --> 01:37:01,060 good news on this section of 380 is we may be letting it sooner than we originally anticipated. 914 01:37:01,060 --> 01:37:09,700 And all that there you see is all the utilities we're dealing with. Okay, so we're building 915 01:37:09,700 --> 01:37:15,120 $140 million worth of improvements to 380, but we also got to figure out what we're going 916 01:37:15,120 --> 01:37:21,400 to do with 380 in the future. So TechStat did a 380 feasibility study that essentially 917 01:37:21,400 --> 01:37:31,420 had a multiple alignments, many of which caused anguish and trauma for city staff because they 918 01:37:31,420 --> 01:37:39,100 all came into your thoroughfare plan and they were just lines on a map. So the feasibility 919 01:37:39,100 --> 01:37:45,380 study will be closed out at the end of the year and the study is recommending that the 920 01:37:45,380 --> 01:37:53,500 alignment stay on 380, the new future alignment, and that it be a freeway. So we'll be able 921 01:37:53,500 --> 01:38:00,900 to close this feasibility study out I guess soon, for lack of a better word. It may be 922 01:38:00,900 --> 01:38:07,300 December, it may be October, depending upon TechStat's schedule. And then we'll be able 923 01:38:07,300 --> 01:38:18,060 to put it to bed. All right, Loop 288 West, we have finalized our negotiations with Cheney 924 01:38:18,060 --> 01:38:23,660 Patel. So in about two weeks, we'll have that contract. It's a little over $5 million to 925 01:38:23,660 --> 01:38:32,500 do the plan specifications and estimates for the loop. And that will then update our schedule 926 01:38:32,500 --> 01:38:39,100 accordingly. And we are still looking, we've submitted this project for Clear Lanes funding. 927 01:38:39,100 --> 01:38:44,780 In Clear Lanes funding, our funding is a category, in Category 12, the commission selects for 928 01:38:44,780 --> 01:38:51,940 those projects that help reduce congestion on the interstates. And a bypass route such 929 01:38:51,940 --> 01:38:58,580 as the Loop is eligible for Clear Lanes funding. So once we get the PSNE started, we will start 930 01:38:58,580 --> 01:39:09,980 to submit the money we need for the Loop 288 construction. 1515, again, same there. We've 931 01:39:09,980 --> 01:39:16,900 gotten our agreement with LTRA. The only thing that we're working on now is we're coordinating 932 01:39:16,900 --> 01:39:30,100 with Peterbilt and TechStat and city staff regarding a change in the schematic to minimize 933 01:39:30,100 --> 01:39:37,940 the impact to the Peterbilt facility. And they've come up with some design ideas. We're 934 01:39:37,940 --> 01:39:47,020 going to be meeting with those folks at TechStat soon, but it shouldn't do much to the schedule. 935 01:39:47,020 --> 01:39:53,380 And again, we've entered into a contract with LTRA to do the plan specifications and estimates 936 01:39:53,380 --> 01:40:04,820 for this project. The county has. My apologies. FM 1173, the project is anticipated to be 937 01:40:04,820 --> 01:40:11,260 environmentally cleared in July. There are 63 parcels. Ultimately, they'll have to be 938 01:40:11,260 --> 01:40:16,380 acquired. Once it's environmentally cleared, the city, the county, and the state will get 939 01:40:16,380 --> 01:40:19,620 together to determine whether or not they want to proceed with the right of acquisition 940 01:40:19,620 --> 01:40:27,560 now or wait until we know more what's going to happen on the 35 project that's being funded 941 01:40:27,560 --> 01:40:34,340 and built in the next couple of years. And then there's your glossary of terms and acronyms 942 01:40:34,340 --> 01:40:43,380 that I use. If I've said anything you don't understand, I apologize. So I'm going to stop 943 01:40:43,380 --> 01:40:50,500 sharing. Is that what I need to do? Yeah, thanks. All right. We've got some questions 944 01:40:50,500 --> 01:40:58,140 along the way. Other questions, Councilmember McQuire? I have so many questions. Maybe I'll 945 01:40:58,140 --> 01:41:06,660 have less questions as I start to understand more. But perhaps I will not. So Teasley, 946 01:41:06,660 --> 01:41:13,260 I'm definitely really plugged into that one. That is my area. I live like feet from where 947 01:41:13,260 --> 01:41:19,460 concrete is being poured there. So you mentioned that there are some utility conflicts that 948 01:41:19,460 --> 01:41:26,340 are kind of maybe causing some minor delays. Can you speak to that a little bit more? And 949 01:41:26,340 --> 01:41:31,540 is there anything that the City can do to help move that along? Yes, ma'am. The minor 950 01:41:31,540 --> 01:41:38,900 delays that we're talking about are where you have a franchise utility or such as mostly 951 01:41:38,900 --> 01:41:47,380 franchise where they said they were on plans and where they were in the ground weren't 952 01:41:47,380 --> 01:41:55,820 the same. And so the contractor was relying on the plans and found the utility in the 953 01:41:55,820 --> 01:42:02,660 ground in a different location. And so which just stops them for a short period for them 954 01:42:02,660 --> 01:42:08,580 to have to come in and repatch and reroute the utility. But those are hourly impacts. 955 01:42:08,580 --> 01:42:14,140 They're minor. Days impacts, weeks impacts. Those are the ones we concern ourselves with. 956 01:42:14,140 --> 01:42:22,020 All right. Thank you. That clear set up for me. I have had a hard time finding this information 957 01:42:22,020 --> 01:42:27,860 and now that you're in front of me I'm going to ask, are there plans for sidewalks or protected 958 01:42:27,860 --> 01:42:37,500 bike paths along Teasley? So federal requirements require all federally funded assisted projects 959 01:42:37,500 --> 01:42:46,300 to have five foot minimum five foot sidewalks in both directions on all roadways. Historically 960 01:42:46,300 --> 01:42:53,660 up until about a year ago, they also required the outside lane to be 14 feet. And that was 961 01:42:53,660 --> 01:43:00,140 a hard and fast requirement that the feds required. Now they're allowing you to have 962 01:43:00,140 --> 01:43:08,900 some flexibility on that 14 foot outside lane. And the argument that the roadway guys make 963 01:43:08,900 --> 01:43:15,220 is that from what they see from the bicycling community, they don't ride on the outside 964 01:43:15,220 --> 01:43:20,460 part of the lane. If they're knowing what they're doing and they're on a roadway, they're 965 01:43:20,460 --> 01:43:26,900 in the middle of the lane. And so if they have to share the road, they're going to share 966 01:43:26,900 --> 01:43:33,180 a 14 foot road by being at the middle line of seven feet. And if it's a 12 foot, they're 967 01:43:33,180 --> 01:43:37,260 going to be at six feet because that's where they ride. So the argument wasn't against 968 01:43:37,260 --> 01:43:46,460 accommodations. It was that the one size fit all criteria wasn't working. So but the state, 969 01:43:46,460 --> 01:43:52,700 the feds do I'm sorry, go ahead. Oh, I'm sorry. So just to be clear, how wide will the outside 970 01:43:52,700 --> 01:43:59,420 lane be on Teasley? So this one was part of the projects that were mandated before the 971 01:43:59,420 --> 01:44:08,140 flexibility came in. So the outside line on 2181 is 14 feet. Okay, does that give y'all 972 01:44:08,140 --> 01:44:16,540 enough room to do like a bollard protected lane? Or or no? Are we just counting on bicyclists 973 01:44:16,540 --> 01:44:22,620 sharing that lane? So I just want to be clear on one thing, I actually worked for you. This 974 01:44:22,620 --> 01:44:27,380 I just happened to be exposed to the state enough to where I make it sound like I'm part 975 01:44:27,380 --> 01:44:34,740 of their team, but I'm not. So you sound like you're part of our team when you talk to them, 976 01:44:34,740 --> 01:44:46,380 right? Yes, too. So the state doesn't have the same philosophy about bicycle lanes as 977 01:44:46,380 --> 01:44:51,940 say most of the communities do. So you'd you'd the only time you'd see an actual protected 978 01:44:51,940 --> 01:44:59,840 bicycle lane on a facility like Teasley or 2181 is if it was taken off system and then 979 01:44:59,840 --> 01:45:02,940 maintained by the city and then they could do with it what they want. But as a state 980 01:45:02,940 --> 01:45:12,380 facility, they don't do that. Okay, thank you that that clears that up for me. Do you 981 01:45:12,380 --> 01:45:20,020 know what the speed limit is going to be on Teasley? Like, sorry, make sure I'm looking 982 01:45:20,020 --> 01:45:27,700 at the right area. So like from Southridge or from Lillian Miller, so I can I can save 983 01:45:27,700 --> 01:45:34,540 a little bit of time on that. Your city has the authority to set the speed limit on these 984 01:45:34,540 --> 01:45:40,300 state facilities by ordinance. Now they got to follow what's called the 85th percentile 985 01:45:40,300 --> 01:45:49,100 rule, which means that you open the road to traffic, it's unimpeded by congestion or 986 01:45:49,100 --> 01:45:53,260 construction, and then you do a speed study where you hide in the bushes and you take 987 01:45:53,260 --> 01:45:59,140 radar and see what people are actually doing when nobody's looking. And then they take 988 01:45:59,140 --> 01:46:05,620 the 85 the 15% fastest people and throw them out considering their reckless drivers. And 989 01:46:05,620 --> 01:46:13,260 so whatever that 85th percentile is, that the speed set that then you can set that speed 990 01:46:13,260 --> 01:46:21,020 limit on that road seven miles plus or minus what the speed study calls for rounded to 991 01:46:21,020 --> 01:46:30,980 the next five or zero digit. It makes sense if you do it in math, but so let's say the 992 01:46:30,980 --> 01:46:38,380 speed study says that it needs to be 55 miles an hour. And you don't want it to be 55. You 993 01:46:38,380 --> 01:46:46,380 could reduce it by seven and then round it down. So you could have it go to 45 in that 994 01:46:46,380 --> 01:46:54,020 case. Or if you wanted it to go up, you could go, you know, 65 because it'd be the seven 995 01:46:54,020 --> 01:47:02,420 plus rounded up. So you just got to do the study but mostly the city of Denton sets the 996 01:47:02,420 --> 01:47:09,300 speed limits on the state facilities. For example, 2499 it would be as it's a sister 997 01:47:09,300 --> 01:47:15,820 project and it's I think the city's got that speed limit at 45 miles an hour. And the speed 998 01:47:15,820 --> 01:47:22,420 setting came in at 55. I will I will look more closely at that 85th percentile rule 999 01:47:22,420 --> 01:47:30,700 another time. Okay, my next question is just sort of a general question about sidewalks 1000 01:47:30,700 --> 01:47:37,860 along I-35 frontage roads. I know that there are some areas that do have sidewalks, not 1001 01:47:37,860 --> 01:47:45,020 very many. Who builds those sidewalks? Who owns those sidewalks? How is the decision 1002 01:47:45,020 --> 01:47:49,180 made to build a sidewalk in some areas and not in other areas? 1003 01:47:49,180 --> 01:48:00,500 So TxDOT builds the sidewalks when they construct the road. In I-35E's case, that was an interim 1004 01:48:00,500 --> 01:48:05,980 project so there were areas through Denton in particular because of the right-of-way 1005 01:48:05,980 --> 01:48:12,500 constraints where the frontage roads weren't impacted by the improvements to add capacity 1006 01:48:12,500 --> 01:48:17,140 to the main lanes and so those frontage roads weren't upgraded. But if you look across like 1007 01:48:17,140 --> 01:48:26,340 Lake Louisville where we go across the lake, we put sidewalks there, well actually it's 1008 01:48:26,340 --> 01:48:34,980 a walking path, it's a 10-foot path on both directions because we were impacting both 1009 01:48:34,980 --> 01:48:40,540 of those sections of the freeway and frontage roads. So anywhere where we impact the frontage 1010 01:48:40,540 --> 01:48:48,160 roads, we being whoever's wanting the project, the state comes in and adds sidewalks in both 1011 01:48:48,160 --> 01:48:53,460 directions. So the reason you don't have some in areas is because those sections of road 1012 01:48:53,460 --> 01:49:03,140 haven't been upgraded. Okay, so in general going forward when TxDOT 1013 01:49:03,140 --> 01:49:08,220 sort of redos the frontage road, we should expect that there will be sidewalks to add 1014 01:49:08,220 --> 01:49:12,220 to the frontage roads within the city. That one project that I was showing you on 1015 01:49:12,220 --> 01:49:18,540 the report from Mayhill up through Brinker to 288, we are impacting the frontage roads 1016 01:49:18,540 --> 01:49:23,700 on both sides. So that schematic shows pedestrian accommodations. 1017 01:49:23,700 --> 01:49:32,300 Excellent. I'm really glad to hear that. Okay, another question. So the project for 1018 01:49:32,300 --> 01:49:37,660 like the 35 east-west merge going north, I know I've seen some pretty extensive plans 1019 01:49:37,660 --> 01:49:43,540 for a new underpass for Windsor, that's underpass, correct? 1020 01:49:43,540 --> 01:49:44,860 Correct. Okay. 1021 01:49:44,860 --> 01:49:47,700 I believe it's going underpass. Can you speak to... 1022 01:49:47,700 --> 01:49:53,340 I'm sorry, I think it's going over. Okay, so Windsor will go over 35. 1023 01:49:53,340 --> 01:50:00,420 I think that's the case, yes ma'am. Okay, okay. Can you speak to what other under 1024 01:50:00,420 --> 01:50:08,700 or overpasses are going to be either rebuilt or added as part of that project? 1025 01:50:08,700 --> 01:50:14,220 So everything from the merge, everything from the merge all the way to the county line is 1026 01:50:14,220 --> 01:50:20,820 ultimate construction. So I can't tell you off the top of my head, but everything that 1027 01:50:20,820 --> 01:50:30,980 is there now will be upgraded. And typically we try to keep the stack for lack of a better 1028 01:50:30,980 --> 01:50:38,740 word as it was before, but in some cases we flip the stack because the old paradigm was 1029 01:50:38,740 --> 01:50:44,180 you make the minor road go over the major road. The new paradigm is the major roads 1030 01:50:44,180 --> 01:50:49,860 going from Mexico to Canada. So it has a longer time to run out its grade, right? And so you 1031 01:50:49,860 --> 01:50:54,900 allow development to occur at the corners by taking the interstate up as opposed to 1032 01:50:54,900 --> 01:51:03,260 the cross street. So I can get that information for you. I'm certain the staff has the schematic 1033 01:51:03,260 --> 01:51:08,300 that was approved for these, but I don't remember off the top of my head. 1034 01:51:08,300 --> 01:51:15,580 Okay, yeah, I'd be fine to take that in an email, just to see where those underpasses 1035 01:51:15,580 --> 01:51:19,460 overpasses are going to be located. 1036 01:51:19,460 --> 01:51:25,620 So just one more on that. So for example, your thoroughfare plan shows the outer loop 1037 01:51:25,620 --> 01:51:34,540 tying in to 35 roughly around Milam Road. So what we're doing at Milam Road on the new 1038 01:51:34,540 --> 01:51:40,420 project is we're building what's called the box for the direct connects. And so what the 1039 01:51:40,420 --> 01:51:46,260 box is, is if I don't know if you go south into like Louisville where you get to 121 1040 01:51:46,260 --> 01:51:52,060 Sam Rayburn, and you let's say you want to go to the airport, but before you go to the 1041 01:51:52,060 --> 01:51:56,460 airport you want to stop at Steak and Shake and get a drink. To get to Steak and Shake 1042 01:51:56,460 --> 01:52:01,880 you exit, you run the frontage road, hit the signal and turn on on to Sam Rayburn to exit 1043 01:52:01,880 --> 01:52:06,100 to get to Steak and Shake. That's the box. If you just want to go to the airport, you 1044 01:52:06,100 --> 01:52:10,900 get up on the direct connects and you never stop, you continue to move. So what we're 1045 01:52:10,900 --> 01:52:19,940 building in the 35 project for the outer loop where the city's thoroughfare plan shows it 1046 01:52:19,940 --> 01:52:25,900 to be on their plan is near Milam and they're building that box as part of the project. 1047 01:52:25,900 --> 01:52:33,220 So all those great separations all along through your city limits should be consistent with 1048 01:52:33,220 --> 01:52:34,980 your thoroughfare plan. 1049 01:52:34,980 --> 01:52:45,980 Yeah, thank you so much. Okay, I also had some questions about the I-35 West. You were 1050 01:52:45,980 --> 01:52:52,300 talking about, you know, changes to what the plan was going to be and I just want to make 1051 01:52:52,300 --> 01:52:57,940 sure I'm clear about what those changes are going to be. So will there be storm sewers 1052 01:52:57,940 --> 01:53:01,580 or will there be like ditches? 1053 01:53:01,580 --> 01:53:07,980 So the frontage roads will have the outside part of the frontage roads will have storm 1054 01:53:07,980 --> 01:53:13,500 sewers. The inside part of the frontage roads because we're not touching the main lanes 1055 01:53:13,500 --> 01:53:21,020 yet will have open ditch similar to what you see out there now between the two main lanes. 1056 01:53:21,020 --> 01:53:29,420 But ultimately when we come in with the main lanes, everything will be in system. It'll 1057 01:53:29,420 --> 01:53:36,580 be in a storm system underneath the frontage roads or the main lanes or in between. But 1058 01:53:36,580 --> 01:53:42,340 it'll instead of shrinking the footprint because the reason you have an urban design is when 1059 01:53:42,340 --> 01:53:47,980 you come through an urban area typically you need a smaller footprint. And so you house 1060 01:53:47,980 --> 01:53:54,620 the the water, those are the storm sewers underneath the frontage roads so that you 1061 01:53:54,620 --> 01:54:01,180 don't take as much right away. But at where we're at now, the right away is there. There's 1062 01:54:01,180 --> 01:54:06,820 no development. And so we're going to take that rural cross section and convert it to 1063 01:54:06,820 --> 01:54:11,980 an urban by adding essentially four more lanes. 1064 01:54:11,980 --> 01:54:20,860 Okay, yes. That I understand now. Thank you. So you you did say in part of your explanation 1065 01:54:20,860 --> 01:54:28,060 earlier about the I-35 West frontage roads and main lanes that like there would be frontage 1066 01:54:28,060 --> 01:54:32,660 road lanes and then a parkway and then and then the main lanes. Can you just define the 1067 01:54:32,660 --> 01:54:42,380 term parkway for me in this context? It's grass. Okay. Okay. Okay. And so just to be 1068 01:54:42,380 --> 01:54:52,740 clear, you said there are not going to be toll lanes on this part of the 35 West project. 1069 01:54:52,740 --> 01:54:58,260 Will there be non-tolled express lanes that are separated from the main lanes? So I'm 1070 01:54:58,260 --> 01:55:03,860 going to be clear on this. What we're doing now is focusing primarily on the frontage 1071 01:55:03,860 --> 01:55:11,060 roads. And we are moving forward with the environmental clearance of the main lanes. 1072 01:55:11,060 --> 01:55:15,060 And the reason we're doing that is because we have to justify being able to acquire all 1073 01:55:15,060 --> 01:55:19,120 of the right away, both the main lanes and the frontage roads by being environmentally 1074 01:55:19,120 --> 01:55:28,700 clear. But there's no intent by the region at this point, or TXDOT, to build the main 1075 01:55:28,700 --> 01:55:36,340 lanes as general purpose lanes only. They're going to they're going to build when they 1076 01:55:36,340 --> 01:55:40,220 build a general purpose lanes, they'll do it after the paradigm shift and we can add 1077 01:55:40,220 --> 01:55:46,800 our toll managed lanes. And there's no benefit to a non-tolled managed lane. And I'll give 1078 01:55:46,800 --> 01:55:53,260 you the perfect example of where the only non-tolled managed facility I know of in the 1079 01:55:53,260 --> 01:55:59,700 state of Texas is and that's the elevated section of 35 through Austin. And if you've 1080 01:55:59,700 --> 01:56:03,660 been down there, you know that those lanes don't work any better than the ones under 1081 01:56:03,660 --> 01:56:10,740 them. So the region and so that brings me to a point I probably need to explain. There 1082 01:56:10,740 --> 01:56:15,540 is a group called the North Central Texas Council of Governments, and they are basically 1083 01:56:15,540 --> 01:56:25,620 both a federal authority entity and a state authority entity that represents also local 1084 01:56:25,620 --> 01:56:31,740 governments. So they're basically a regional entity that has both federal and state authority. 1085 01:56:31,740 --> 01:56:36,900 When it comes to transportation projects in a metropolitan area boundary, which is basically 1086 01:56:36,900 --> 01:56:46,060 eight counties within the Dallas-Fort Worth area, your MPO, the Metropolitan Planning 1087 01:56:46,060 --> 01:56:51,540 Organization, which in this case in North Texas is the Regional Transportation Council, 1088 01:56:51,540 --> 01:57:00,060 they set the priorities on what can and can't be done inside that metropolitan area boundary. 1089 01:57:00,060 --> 01:57:07,980 So the fact that Tex.Austin right now doesn't want to do any tolled managed lanes means 1090 01:57:07,980 --> 01:57:13,380 that they can't build anything in the region that the RTC doesn't agree with. And so we're 1091 01:57:13,380 --> 01:57:19,380 not the region has said they are not building any more freeways that don't have tolled managed 1092 01:57:19,380 --> 01:57:26,460 lanes on them because they're a congestion tool. And so they're simply moving forward 1093 01:57:26,460 --> 01:57:37,580 with the frontage roads. Okay, yes. Thank you. I think I understand now. Okay, the next thing 1094 01:57:37,580 --> 01:57:44,260 I just wanted to kind of express my support for the county's request for a work zone speed 1095 01:57:44,260 --> 01:57:58,120 limit on 380. I would also like to see that. Okay, so I wanted to ask about there was something 1096 01:57:58,120 --> 01:58:06,180 in the 380 discussion that I did not quite understand. So you said that Tex.DOT is providing 1097 01:58:06,180 --> 01:58:12,980 an advanced funding agreement to the city of Denton for a 10-foot sidewalk component 1098 01:58:12,980 --> 01:58:19,620 on the funding agreement has a fixed cost of $95,000 to be transferred to Tex.DOT. Can 1099 01:58:19,620 --> 01:58:27,140 you just explain what that is? So your staff, y'all had a bike czar back in the day, or 1100 01:58:27,140 --> 01:58:32,100 I don't know if that's what you call them, but that's what I called her. She met with 1101 01:58:32,100 --> 01:58:39,100 cog when we were designing 380 and essentially got the council of governments to agree to 1102 01:58:39,100 --> 01:58:47,940 pay 80 cents on the dollar for a 10-foot path out to the green belt, I think is where it 1103 01:58:47,940 --> 01:58:52,820 ends. And so what those notes are referencing is that agreement and that's part of the project 1104 01:58:52,820 --> 01:59:00,620 that's currently under construction. And then the city went and asked, so I think your local 1105 01:59:00,620 --> 01:59:05,980 match was like $95,000. And then your city staff asked the current county commissioner 1106 01:59:05,980 --> 01:59:16,380 at the time to participate. And he put, I think, $50,000 in that account. And so that's 1107 01:59:16,380 --> 01:59:22,740 the 95, the city's portion was 45, the money was transferred, and the project is being 1108 01:59:22,740 --> 01:59:31,040 built that includes your 10-foot shared path. Thank you. I just wasn't quite clear on all 1109 01:59:31,040 --> 01:59:36,600 of the lingo, but I understand now. Yeah, I think that was all my questions. That was 1110 01:59:36,600 --> 01:59:42,420 all my questions. Thank you so much. Sorry to eat up all of your time. That's all you 1111 01:59:42,420 --> 01:59:51,540 had? Come on. All right. Councilmember Byrd, questions? Additional questions? I appreciate 1112 01:59:51,540 --> 01:59:56,420 all of those questions because I have my little check marks off and the things in my head 1113 01:59:56,420 --> 02:00:04,660 that I wanted to ask about, so I appreciate you, Councilwoman, for getting that information 1114 02:00:04,660 --> 02:00:15,580 for me. I had a question about the 288 West. Let me ask you about 288 as it is now. It 1115 02:00:15,580 --> 02:00:21,540 appears as though it's under some construction work. I haven't driven around there here in 1116 02:00:21,540 --> 02:00:28,420 the last couple of weeks or so. 288 up going north, Kings Row area. I think that might 1117 02:00:28,420 --> 02:00:33,980 just be maintenance. Just regular maintenance on that? Because right now, the reason you 1118 02:00:33,980 --> 02:00:42,100 see 288 work well from basically 380 on around to 35 is because the city had made a deal 1119 02:00:42,100 --> 02:00:48,740 years ago to protect that corridor as an actual bypass. And so the city of Denton protects 1120 02:00:48,740 --> 02:00:57,260 that road by precluding development to be able to attach directly to the lanes on 288 1121 02:00:57,260 --> 02:01:04,420 so you don't have another Golden Triangle issue. What we're proposing to do going forward 1122 02:01:04,420 --> 02:01:10,020 on that segment is if you saw in that feasibility study, 380 feasibility study, you saw that 1123 02:01:10,020 --> 02:01:16,260 the green line, 380 hit 288, and there was a brown line. That brown line means the Metropolitan 1124 02:01:16,260 --> 02:01:24,140 Planning Organization, the RTC, has said that they believe that it's now time to actually 1125 02:01:24,140 --> 02:01:32,660 put frontage roads on 288 northeast so that you don't have to protect it by ordinance. 1126 02:01:32,660 --> 02:01:39,900 It'll be protected by design. So that's what we're planning to do there so that you'll 1127 02:01:39,900 --> 02:01:44,660 be able to, if you want to get to Denton, you'll take the outer loop, you drop down 1128 02:01:44,660 --> 02:01:52,220 423, you come in, you go to town. If you come in 380 and you want to go north, you'll be 1129 02:01:52,220 --> 02:01:59,660 able to take the 288 and go north and allow the city to preclude more forcefully all the 1130 02:01:59,660 --> 02:02:05,620 truck traffic that currently comes down through town on 380 business. 1131 02:02:05,620 --> 02:02:16,020 Okay. So then the new section there starting from 35 and going west, is that going to look 1132 02:02:16,020 --> 02:02:18,620 like what we're seeing right now? 1133 02:02:18,620 --> 02:02:24,420 No, it will be, I apologize. It'll be a controlled access facility. And what a controlled access 1134 02:02:24,420 --> 02:02:29,540 facility means, you'll have main lanes and frontage roads. So if you're driving on loop 1135 02:02:29,540 --> 02:02:36,500 288 west and you exit 35 and you want to go all the way down to 24 or 49, you'll be able 1136 02:02:36,500 --> 02:02:41,900 to drive nonstop because all of the main lanes, so where it crosses the railroad track, there'll 1137 02:02:41,900 --> 02:02:47,860 be a grade separation. Where it crosses 380, it'll be grade separated. So all of the approach 1138 02:02:47,860 --> 02:02:53,940 streets will have to tie into a frontage road, go to the next crossing to come back if they 1139 02:02:53,940 --> 02:03:00,020 want to come back. So you'll have a free flow movement of traffic on the main lanes and 1140 02:03:00,020 --> 02:03:05,860 access to the frontage road for your commercial development to the inside, whatever's going 1141 02:03:05,860 --> 02:03:09,940 to happen on the outside, will come and develop to the frontage roads. 1142 02:03:09,940 --> 02:03:10,940 Okay. 1143 02:03:10,940 --> 02:03:11,940 So it'll be a freeway looking project. 1144 02:03:11,940 --> 02:03:12,940 It'll look like a freeway? 1145 02:03:12,940 --> 02:03:13,940 Yes, ma'am. 1146 02:03:13,940 --> 02:03:18,500 As opposed to what 288 looks like right now, it doesn't really look like a freeway. 1147 02:03:18,500 --> 02:03:26,220 So loop 288 from 35 to 380 is an arterial, and so the difference between an arterial 1148 02:03:26,220 --> 02:03:31,740 and a freeway are controlled access facilities. An arterial provides more access and less 1149 02:03:31,740 --> 02:03:39,500 mobility because it's the only thing a road can do is access and mobility. 288 northern 1150 02:03:39,500 --> 02:03:45,180 part is more mobility because there's nothing to access because you control it by permit. 1151 02:03:45,180 --> 02:03:49,860 Access will be controlled on the main lanes. You'll have mobility on the frontage. You'll 1152 02:03:49,860 --> 02:03:50,860 have access. 1153 02:03:50,860 --> 02:03:51,860 Okay. 1154 02:03:51,860 --> 02:03:52,860 It's both. 1155 02:03:52,860 --> 02:03:56,380 Okay. It's going to look a little different. I wanted to ask about the -- can you answer 1156 02:03:56,380 --> 02:04:01,780 the question about the brinker area because right now it's just pretty much terrible. 1157 02:04:01,780 --> 02:04:02,780 Terrible. 1158 02:04:02,780 --> 02:04:07,140 To get off of. It looks like you just want to kind of roll over to the -- in the little 1159 02:04:07,140 --> 02:04:08,140 pond there. 1160 02:04:08,140 --> 02:04:12,940 And you can't go to the inside because I've tried. There's a ditch about five feet deep. 1161 02:04:12,940 --> 02:04:21,580 That's absolutely right. So I believe that you answered that question for me. Mayhill. 1162 02:04:21,580 --> 02:04:30,380 Mayhill. Do you have anything -- I'm trying to understand why the construction work stopped 1163 02:04:30,380 --> 02:04:36,220 at a certain point in Mayhill. What was the delay? What was the delay for that? And how 1164 02:04:36,220 --> 02:04:39,260 is that road going to kind of connect into 2499? 1165 02:04:39,260 --> 02:04:45,620 That's a good question. So the City of Denton, years ago, partnered with the Metropolitan 1166 02:04:45,620 --> 02:04:56,340 Planning Organization, in this case RTC, and the county to fund Mayhill from 380 to 35. 1167 02:04:56,340 --> 02:05:06,460 And it was a $40 million commitment from the RTC, which required a $10 million commitment 1168 02:05:06,460 --> 02:05:11,900 from the locals. And so City of Dent put in five, and then two county commissioners put 1169 02:05:11,900 --> 02:05:19,360 in two and a half million apiece for the five to get the 10 for the match for the 40. 1170 02:05:19,360 --> 02:05:25,740 They designed it and moved along. As they -- as the previous staffs moved along, they 1171 02:05:25,740 --> 02:05:31,780 found out that the project was going to cost more than they anticipated. So at that point 1172 02:05:31,780 --> 02:05:38,340 in time, staff decided to simply truncate the project prior to the railroad track because 1173 02:05:38,340 --> 02:05:48,780 that was a significant cost increase and just tie it back in as it is. Future administrations 1174 02:05:48,780 --> 02:05:55,660 come in and go, that's silly. Let's see what we can do to fix it. So they asked me to go 1175 02:05:55,660 --> 02:06:01,980 see if we can find five million bucks laying around. So we went and made a pitch to the 1176 02:06:01,980 --> 02:06:07,580 RTC. They said, in for a penny, in for a pound. City, if you'll pick up the $4 million it 1177 02:06:07,580 --> 02:06:14,620 takes to buy the right-of-way, we'll put the $14 million we need for the remaining grade 1178 02:06:14,620 --> 02:06:20,620 separation over Mayhill. But they were already constructing the first phase with Zachary, 1179 02:06:20,620 --> 02:06:27,340 so they decided to just let that go and do this second phase as a second phase. So we're 1180 02:06:27,340 --> 02:06:33,700 now in the process of reevaluating the cost, and we have some issues with the project that 1181 02:06:33,700 --> 02:06:40,700 may require an additional $5 million. And your staff has already been working with the 1182 02:06:40,700 --> 02:06:47,780 RTC, and we've gotten a verbal commitment, I think about a week and a half ago, from 1183 02:06:47,780 --> 02:06:55,700 the MPO, that they would fund the $5 million. So we're back cooking with gas on that one. 1184 02:06:55,700 --> 02:07:02,140 So that's why it's broken up, because of funding issues and just different thought processes. 1185 02:07:02,140 --> 02:07:10,180 But when we're done, it will continue up and over the DCTA. It will be grade separated 1186 02:07:10,180 --> 02:07:16,460 over the track, and then it will tie straight in to where Colorado and Mayhill are. If you're 1187 02:07:16,460 --> 02:07:19,700 coming up Mayhill and you have to stop and go left or right, and you go, "Man, it would 1188 02:07:19,700 --> 02:07:23,660 be nice just to go straight," you're about to be able to go straight. And then you'll 1189 02:07:23,660 --> 02:07:31,060 curve back over, and it'll all be grade separated. And then we'll tie Edwards in further to the 1190 02:07:31,060 --> 02:07:36,300 north so that there's no at-grade crossings at the railroad track, which was very important 1191 02:07:36,300 --> 02:07:41,340 to both the city and the RTC. They wanted to make sure there was no at-grade crossings. 1192 02:07:41,340 --> 02:07:47,980 So from now on, if you're coming to Edwards, you'll take a little veer north, TN, and then 1193 02:07:47,980 --> 02:07:56,260 you'll get on to Mayhill and come up and over the track to get back to 35. So funding, I 1194 02:07:56,260 --> 02:07:59,340 guess, is the way to basically say it. 1195 02:07:59,340 --> 02:08:04,540 So I have a big smile on my face, and that is totally genuine right there. So I live 1196 02:08:04,540 --> 02:08:09,060 kind of over in that area, and I use that area quite a bit, so I really appreciate that. 1197 02:08:09,060 --> 02:08:13,900 I'll make sure I tell my husband that. Let, L-E-T. 1198 02:08:13,900 --> 02:08:22,180 Okay, I'm sorry. So TechStat has contracts every month, and their term is they let them 1199 02:08:22,180 --> 02:08:27,340 out to the contractors to bid on them. So they literally let the project out, and when 1200 02:08:27,340 --> 02:08:36,580 it says the let of June of 2022, every month the state has to spend so much money every 1201 02:08:36,580 --> 02:08:41,180 month. And so they have to do whatever they got to do. And so the way the city and the 1202 02:08:41,180 --> 02:08:44,660 county has been successful is we've been getting our projects where you see there's a ready-to-let 1203 02:08:44,660 --> 02:08:49,100 date, and then there's a let date. There'll be times where we're working towards a ready-to-let 1204 02:08:49,100 --> 02:08:54,060 date where we don't have any money, but we get it ready-to-let because somewhere else 1205 02:08:54,060 --> 02:08:58,860 somebody's project didn't get ready-to-let. They had a let date and had money. They don't 1206 02:08:58,860 --> 02:09:03,260 get unfunded. They just get pushed out a year, but they still have to spend that money in 1207 02:09:03,260 --> 02:09:09,740 that year, and we step in. So that's the difference between ready-to-let and then let. 1208 02:09:09,740 --> 02:09:11,820 I was looking forward to that to be an acronym. 1209 02:09:11,820 --> 02:09:13,620 It will be now. It will be now. 1210 02:09:13,620 --> 02:09:19,100 Yes. Okay. All right. Thank you. And I believe that is all the questions that I have. I was 1211 02:09:19,100 --> 02:09:20,100 just so excited. 1212 02:09:20,100 --> 02:09:21,100 We're starting to get hot in here. 1213 02:09:21,100 --> 02:09:22,100 Thank you. 1214 02:09:22,100 --> 02:09:29,660 Well, I am really disappointed that my colleagues couldn't come up with any more questions. 1215 02:09:29,660 --> 02:09:36,580 Okay. That's great. Thank you very much for that. We'll close this item and move to item 1216 02:09:36,580 --> 02:09:42,460 E. Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding the proposed Bell Avenue pedestrian 1217 02:09:42,460 --> 02:09:48,660 corridor for the portion of the roadway through T.W.U. from Administration Drive to just south 1218 02:09:48,660 --> 02:10:06,300 of Chapel Drive. 1219 02:10:06,300 --> 02:10:10,740 Good morning, committee members. I'm pleased to be here presenting. It was a great morning 1220 02:10:10,740 --> 02:10:16,740 listening to all the topics, and you all have some fantastic questions. I hope you can hear 1221 02:10:16,740 --> 02:10:21,740 me clear, and if not, I can't see you anymore. We've got the presentation up. 1222 02:10:21,740 --> 02:10:27,620 So hopefully, and my hope for myself is that you've run out of questions, but I hope to 1223 02:10:27,620 --> 02:10:31,780 answer all of them. I'm here happily today to present a new project that the city's been 1224 02:10:31,780 --> 02:10:37,020 working on for a few years. It's called the Bell Avenue pedestrian corridor. My name is 1225 02:10:37,020 --> 02:10:41,260 Tracy Beck, and I'm the project manager for this project. A little bit of the project 1226 02:10:41,260 --> 02:10:46,500 history on this is that it kicked off in about 2018. There was a traffic study that was prepared 1227 02:10:46,500 --> 02:10:52,100 for the entire T.W.U. area when T.W.U. suggested maybe closing down Bell Avenue. When they 1228 02:10:52,100 --> 02:10:56,540 suggested the closure, we said, "Why don't we share in a traffic study?" We started collecting 1229 02:10:56,540 --> 02:11:02,700 some data and numerous intersections, numerous roadway links spanning from the Carroll Street 1230 02:11:02,700 --> 02:11:08,500 over to Mockingbird throughout all the areas in this, I don't know, peachy, fleshy color. 1231 02:11:08,500 --> 02:11:14,800 We shared a traffic study with T.W.U. sharing the costs, and then the city in 2020 initiated. 1232 02:11:14,800 --> 02:11:20,020 This is in the fall. What we are calling is a T.W.U. area program, where we started looking 1233 02:11:20,020 --> 02:11:24,860 at the study, and it said, "We can surely close down the Bell Avenue Road. There won't 1234 02:11:24,860 --> 02:11:30,540 be any traffic issues, but in the future, there's going to be some discussions that 1235 02:11:30,540 --> 02:11:35,740 we'd like to talk about on some roadway capacities." We started looking at the roadways in this 1236 02:11:35,740 --> 02:11:43,860 T.W.U. area program. In 2021, this past March, we kicked off some of the projects within that 1237 02:11:43,860 --> 02:11:48,100 program, and I'll go over those in a minute. Unfortunately, the flood, I've got a little 1238 02:11:48,100 --> 02:11:52,780 mosquito in here, they love me. We had it, so I'm going to probably hit and swipe. You 1239 02:11:52,780 --> 02:11:57,420 don't see me, but if I hit the mic again, I apologize. We've got the design started 1240 02:11:57,420 --> 02:12:02,220 in March, but then we went into a huge rainstorm that kind of delayed all of our traffic data 1241 02:12:02,220 --> 02:12:06,940 collections. Here's the T.W.U. program overall. The completed 1242 02:12:06,940 --> 02:12:10,780 projects are the traffic study I mentioned a moment ago, and then we're also working 1243 02:12:10,780 --> 02:12:16,220 on a way we worked on a wastewater line. If you can see the map off to the right, Bell 1244 02:12:16,220 --> 02:12:19,860 Avenue is going to be the green line. Then under construction right now that you may 1245 02:12:19,860 --> 02:12:24,480 have seen driving by is the Bell Avenue water line. This spans from approximately University 1246 02:12:24,480 --> 02:12:31,780 South to McKinney. Then under contract, which is what started in March of 2021, is the Bell 1247 02:12:31,780 --> 02:12:36,540 Avenue pedestrian corridor that we'll focus on today, as well as some additional projects 1248 02:12:36,540 --> 02:12:41,060 were shown in the map, which are the yellow line showing the Mingo, a southern section 1249 02:12:41,060 --> 02:12:47,220 of Mingo, a northern section, and this is split at the Riddell intersection, an improvement 1250 02:12:47,220 --> 02:12:51,860 at the Riddell and Mingo roadway, and improvements to Riddell. 1251 02:12:51,860 --> 02:12:56,380 And the benefits of these corridor projects is we're working with T.W.U. closely to see 1252 02:12:56,380 --> 02:13:01,260 about getting the right-of-way necessary. If you guys have traveled through this area, 1253 02:13:01,260 --> 02:13:04,860 you'll know that right-of-way is very tight. We have a railroad on one side, and we have 1254 02:13:04,860 --> 02:13:09,600 homes on the other side, and where we don't have homes, we have a T.W.U. campus. So they 1255 02:13:09,600 --> 02:13:14,020 have been wonderful to work with lately. We've built a lot of working relationships with 1256 02:13:14,020 --> 02:13:19,360 their staff coordinating these projects. And the final project within this group of projects 1257 02:13:19,360 --> 02:13:24,540 that we've gone under contract is the Mingo Quiet Zone. So these are, you can see little 1258 02:13:24,540 --> 02:13:29,500 Xs and 0s along the lines. Those are going to be the quiet zones that we're looking at. 1259 02:13:29,500 --> 02:13:34,220 Taking away the train horns as best as we can and replacing them with the signal, the 1260 02:13:34,220 --> 02:13:39,180 intersection horns. This does not stop the horns from honking on the train. I've been 1261 02:13:39,180 --> 02:13:43,160 told so many times by all the railroad people, they can still honk the horns if they want 1262 02:13:43,160 --> 02:13:47,180 to, and that's only if they see people on the tracks or some obstruction. But on the 1263 02:13:47,180 --> 02:13:51,960 everyday uses, they're going to have those intersection horns that sound a little foggier. 1264 02:13:51,960 --> 02:13:57,000 To me, they sound a little foghorned such. So T.W.U. projects, they have their own projects 1265 02:13:57,000 --> 02:14:00,980 that we talk about, and we have monthly meetings. The Frame Street access, where they want to 1266 02:14:00,980 --> 02:14:04,380 have an access here on the Star. And then we also have some drainage studies that we're 1267 02:14:04,380 --> 02:14:10,380 looking at. And then we have future potential projects, including Oakland Street. Jumping 1268 02:14:10,380 --> 02:14:15,340 into the point of today's discussion is the goals and purposes. We have, if you're looking 1269 02:14:15,340 --> 02:14:19,240 at the map, I think I can describe it a little better. University on the north side. Chapel 1270 02:14:19,240 --> 02:14:25,060 is currently an intersection. Traveling a little bit further south, there is an intersection 1271 02:14:25,060 --> 02:14:32,140 with the dining hall. And T.W.U. would like to stop Bell Avenue at the dining hall driveway, 1272 02:14:32,140 --> 02:14:35,900 letting people in and out of the dining hall, stopping that corridor, shutting it down to 1273 02:14:35,900 --> 02:14:41,900 through traffic to administration. This corridor would be opened to vehicle emergency vehicle 1274 02:14:41,900 --> 02:14:46,580 access so fire and police could get through, as well as keeping that corridor wide open 1275 02:14:46,580 --> 02:14:51,220 for pedestrians and bicycles. The whole point of this is that the university has been reaching 1276 02:14:51,220 --> 02:14:56,620 out to us for years saying, the students crossing back and forth for campus activities, there's 1277 02:14:56,620 --> 02:15:00,380 no single point of access. They'll walk across as they feel. They're not going to walk up 1278 02:15:00,380 --> 02:15:06,380 to a signal. So they'd love to have this area just cordoned off for pedestrian and bicycle 1279 02:15:06,380 --> 02:15:11,740 access. The concerns that the city had is to keep that corridor open to serve the police 1280 02:15:11,740 --> 02:15:16,020 and the fire. We are working closely right now with the police and fire to see what are 1281 02:15:16,020 --> 02:15:21,980 the issues that they have. And fortunately, the fire department's main access in service 1282 02:15:21,980 --> 02:15:26,580 area is on the south side. They don't typically go through Bell. However, when they have big 1283 02:15:26,580 --> 02:15:31,180 events, they do want to cut through Bell to get to the north side. So we've been working 1284 02:15:31,180 --> 02:15:35,780 closely with them as well as police to make sure that we have the emergency component 1285 02:15:35,780 --> 02:15:40,060 of this. Closing the road is not a big deal for cars because fortunately, as we've gone 1286 02:15:40,060 --> 02:15:44,580 through COVID, we've noticed no complaints. We've noticed no issues with traffic backing 1287 02:15:44,580 --> 02:15:49,540 up. When the water line project went through and when the COVID has worked through, there 1288 02:15:49,540 --> 02:15:57,020 have been minimal impacts to traffic. So that's been great and very positive. Moving through, 1289 02:15:57,020 --> 02:16:01,100 the hurdles that we have right now that we're looking at is temporary versus permanent. 1290 02:16:01,100 --> 02:16:04,900 Do we temporarily shut the road down or do we permanently shut it down? And then the 1291 02:16:04,900 --> 02:16:11,080 construction funding, we're looking at funding in the fiscal year '21-'22 as a CFP request. 1292 02:16:11,080 --> 02:16:15,220 And then we also are concerned a little bit about potential pushback from residents regarding 1293 02:16:15,220 --> 02:16:20,660 the closure. So that's part of today's discussion too is just to open up a dialogue and not 1294 02:16:20,660 --> 02:16:26,260 asking any permission today and what to do. We have ongoing meetings and discussions with 1295 02:16:26,260 --> 02:16:31,540 our city staff, but to find out what the best solution would be to move forward with this 1296 02:16:31,540 --> 02:16:37,140 closure. And here's some examples real quick is that this is the intersection looking at 1297 02:16:37,140 --> 02:16:41,820 administration on the top and then on the bottom is a chapel. And these are unfortunately 1298 02:16:41,820 --> 02:16:45,900 my sad little cheesy designs here with the little red sticks. Those are kind of the little 1299 02:16:45,900 --> 02:16:50,480 bollards that we've seen before. I heard about them talked earlier where they delineate the 1300 02:16:50,480 --> 02:16:54,540 cars from switching lanes on the highways. And you can see a little picture on the right 1301 02:16:54,540 --> 02:16:59,700 where they flip over, they bend over if a fire truck hits it and they spring back up. 1302 02:16:59,700 --> 02:17:03,280 So we're talking about something such as those types of bollards. There was a discussion 1303 02:17:03,280 --> 02:17:08,300 about possibly the bollards in the middle that go up and down a little bit more sturdy, 1304 02:17:08,300 --> 02:17:12,860 stronger and they would definitely stop a vehicle. However, the concern is they go up 1305 02:17:12,860 --> 02:17:17,180 and down into the ground and they can also not go up and down in the ground. So if a 1306 02:17:17,180 --> 02:17:21,180 fire truck was coming through and they do not retract and they expect them, they can 1307 02:17:21,180 --> 02:17:26,880 do some significant damage to the fire truck. So a little costly option and also we're looking 1308 02:17:26,880 --> 02:17:31,660 into a little bit more. Is there a way to make sure that these have retractable? Some 1309 02:17:31,660 --> 02:17:37,020 of the discussions we'll have with staff are is that the right solution? Other solutions 1310 02:17:37,020 --> 02:17:40,140 on the very bottom that we're discussing, and none of these are set in stone at this 1311 02:17:40,140 --> 02:17:44,100 point. We're having a big I'm calling it a Come to Jesus meeting where we all sit down 1312 02:17:44,100 --> 02:17:49,140 and talk about our pros and cons. A gate, similar to what you see in the apartment complexes, 1313 02:17:49,140 --> 02:17:52,700 but we could set it up in a way that we could still allow the bicycle and pedestrians to 1314 02:17:52,700 --> 02:17:56,540 get through the gate without having to open it. We'd have them offset, but it would be 1315 02:17:56,540 --> 02:18:01,700 an extra discouragement to the vehicles. So again, administration, we would have the road 1316 02:18:01,700 --> 02:18:07,100 closed off on the north side of the intersection. We're also looking at signal studies to remove 1317 02:18:07,100 --> 02:18:12,060 the traffic signals because at this point it would operate as a three-way stop, all 1318 02:18:12,060 --> 02:18:17,660 stop signs. And then similarly at Chapel and Bell, we're looking at removing that signal 1319 02:18:17,660 --> 02:18:22,100 too. And we'll do the correct studies to make sure that is the appropriate move. Now 1320 02:18:22,100 --> 02:18:26,780 this is a picture of what it's going to look like potentially, where we have the pedestrian 1321 02:18:26,780 --> 02:18:31,100 bicycle emergency only access. Again, this is stemming from administration is on your 1322 02:18:31,100 --> 02:18:35,500 left going to the right, which is just south of the dining hall. And what we'd implement 1323 02:18:35,500 --> 02:18:39,980 for this turnaround is because we don't have an intersection such as administration to 1324 02:18:39,980 --> 02:18:43,900 have folks turn to the left and right. If somebody goes rogue, and there's also a little 1325 02:18:43,900 --> 02:18:47,660 tiny driveway you might see at the tail end, it's a little bit small here, is that we 1326 02:18:47,660 --> 02:18:51,960 have to get access to the end, get access into the dining hall with semi-trucks loading 1327 02:18:51,960 --> 02:18:57,620 deliveries, and then turn them around. Originally this was presented as a possible roundabout 1328 02:18:57,620 --> 02:19:01,760 and we're not excited about the roundabout options. They have their place, but this was 1329 02:19:01,760 --> 02:19:06,820 not a place. We looked at this more as a U-turn. So it's a teardrop is what we're calling it. 1330 02:19:06,820 --> 02:19:11,860 The reds inside would match what the existing pavement looks like. It would be the stamped 1331 02:19:11,860 --> 02:19:17,780 concrete so it would be pleasing to the eye as well as functional emergency vehicles as 1332 02:19:17,780 --> 02:19:22,100 well as delivery trucks could roll over that. And then we'd also have some curb options. 1333 02:19:22,100 --> 02:19:26,900 And if I move down, these are some simple curb options, a little bit of a blow up. And 1334 02:19:26,900 --> 02:19:31,380 I spoke about temporarily, we can add a temporary curb such as what they call tough curb, the 1335 02:19:31,380 --> 02:19:35,340 yellow one at the side. There's a flexible curb that's kind of a hard rubber that we 1336 02:19:35,340 --> 02:19:40,340 can mount down and remove. And then those typically run at about the same price as a 1337 02:19:40,340 --> 02:19:46,300 concrete curb. And the concrete curb is a standard at the top. And TW has, it's said 1338 02:19:46,300 --> 02:19:52,180 that they do not need these parking spaces, that that is their available space to use. 1339 02:19:52,180 --> 02:19:56,020 And we would try to salvage at least three of these, but with the new parking lot that 1340 02:19:56,020 --> 02:20:00,500 they've built, those parking spaces would no longer be needed on Bell. And then on the 1341 02:20:00,500 --> 02:20:05,140 south, not south side, but on the bottom side of this picture would be the dining hall entrance. 1342 02:20:05,140 --> 02:20:08,780 So these are the designs that we have today. We're working through the material options. 1343 02:20:08,780 --> 02:20:13,180 We're working through the police, the fire, talking to parks. We're talking to the streets 1344 02:20:13,180 --> 02:20:19,380 department. We're talking to the traffic department, trying to get all the vetted out concerns. 1345 02:20:19,380 --> 02:20:22,520 Because I can tell you, if you just talked to somebody in the grocery store about this, 1346 02:20:22,520 --> 02:20:26,820 they do have an opinion about Bell. And a lot of them don't see the need for it to stay 1347 02:20:26,820 --> 02:20:32,340 open. They're just curious. They're very curious and they love the idea of the pedestrian component. 1348 02:20:32,340 --> 02:20:36,940 So the next activities that we're doing, continue stakeholder engagement. We have a meeting tomorrow 1349 02:20:36,940 --> 02:20:43,820 with some TWQ staff. A meeting Friday with more of all hands on board with the city staff. 1350 02:20:43,820 --> 02:20:48,300 We are working on completing the designs. And then we will proceed with construction. 1351 02:20:48,300 --> 02:20:52,740 We need some funding. We're working through those hurdles as well. But at this point, 1352 02:20:52,740 --> 02:21:02,000 I'm going to open up for questions. And I think I stopped sharing. Oh, it stopped sharing 1353 02:21:02,000 --> 02:21:05,860 for you. I love it when it happens. It's like our new DENT development services, all the 1354 02:21:05,860 --> 02:21:14,260 doors and lights open by themselves. Yeah. Shocker. I have a few questions. Can I get 1355 02:21:14,260 --> 02:21:21,700 a closer look at you showed kind of a map, but it was like at a crazy angle of what's 1356 02:21:21,700 --> 02:21:29,920 what the future plans are for the area around like Riddell and Mingo and Willis and Lattimore. 1357 02:21:29,920 --> 02:21:36,680 So North Riddell. So it's Riddell is going to connect across Mingo. And that's going 1358 02:21:36,680 --> 02:21:42,860 to be aligned. Was I seeing that correctly? Correct. The Riddell intersection is looking 1359 02:21:42,860 --> 02:21:50,860 to move. As Tracy is pulling up her screen, Councilmember Maguire, this is Rachel, just 1360 02:21:50,860 --> 02:21:55,900 wanted to make a few notes there. So as Tracy mentioned in her presentation, there is an 1361 02:21:55,900 --> 02:22:01,700 overall TWU area program that we're currently working on taking several of those projects, 1362 02:22:01,700 --> 02:22:08,300 some of which were part of the 2014 bond program to 30% design. And then in the future, hopefully 1363 02:22:08,300 --> 02:22:13,740 later this summer or early fall, we'll be presenting those to full city council to get 1364 02:22:13,740 --> 02:22:19,220 feedback from a prioritization perspective on which projects we should be pursuing first 1365 02:22:19,220 --> 02:22:23,700 so that then we can identify the necessary gap funding. Unfortunately, because of the 1366 02:22:23,700 --> 02:22:27,860 age of some of these projects, of course, there have been significant cost escalations 1367 02:22:27,860 --> 02:22:32,560 just in the cost of construction, right of way acquisition. So we want to get some feedback 1368 02:22:32,560 --> 02:22:38,460 from you on of those projects, which should we be focusing on first to get those completed? 1369 02:22:38,460 --> 02:22:42,940 Tracy's moving forward with the quiet zones. As she mentioned, the Bell Avenue corridor 1370 02:22:42,940 --> 02:22:49,320 was requested as Tracy mentioned from TWU, just from a pedestrian safety perspective due 1371 02:22:49,320 --> 02:22:53,740 to students crossing across Bell. So that is why we have moved forward with that more 1372 02:22:53,740 --> 02:22:59,340 quickly. We actually met with Chancellor Phaeton and several of her leadership staff on May 1373 02:22:59,340 --> 02:23:05,940 27th to discuss this. And the sentiment or the request from TWU, particular to Bell Avenue's 1374 02:23:05,940 --> 02:23:12,540 closure is because there have been those closures already as a result of the water line project. 1375 02:23:12,540 --> 02:23:16,460 And as Tracy mentioned, yes, we have gotten some feedback. And of course, we've gotten 1376 02:23:16,460 --> 02:23:22,020 some positive and negative feedback from residents regarding that closure. There already have 1377 02:23:22,020 --> 02:23:26,980 been adjustments to people's traffic patterns. They've gotten used to not using Bell over 1378 02:23:26,980 --> 02:23:33,860 the past few months. And so the ask of TWU is, is there any way that we could expedite 1379 02:23:33,860 --> 02:23:39,900 the potential closure? And this truly what Tracy presented, at least as currently concepted, 1380 02:23:39,900 --> 02:23:45,460 would be an interim solution to close Bell Avenue. So it would be a pilot that if we 1381 02:23:45,460 --> 02:23:50,460 wanted to make additional investment, you know, Tracy mentioned those collapsible ballers. 1382 02:23:50,460 --> 02:23:54,220 Maybe we start with the plastic option and then move to something more permanent. That 1383 02:23:54,220 --> 02:24:00,500 is something we could do. So we're still in the design, early design phases, but the waterline 1384 02:24:00,500 --> 02:24:06,260 project that utilities currently has is set to complete at the end of this calendar year. 1385 02:24:06,260 --> 02:24:12,900 So the request of TWU is, is there a way for us to potentially keep Bell Avenue closed, 1386 02:24:12,900 --> 02:24:17,700 have that true pilot project in place? But then from a larger perspective, and I think 1387 02:24:17,700 --> 02:24:22,880 Tracy may be ready to pull up the screen now, we have that overarching TWU area program 1388 02:24:22,880 --> 02:24:29,020 where Tracy is serving as the project manager, meeting on a monthly basis with TWU. And as 1389 02:24:29,020 --> 02:24:33,780 I mentioned, the thought process is either later this summer or early fall, we'll be 1390 02:24:33,780 --> 02:24:38,900 coming back to you with an overview with those 30% design schematics of all of the projects 1391 02:24:38,900 --> 02:24:43,500 that Tracy mentioned, and getting some feedback from the city council on what we should be 1392 02:24:43,500 --> 02:24:50,100 prioritizing in our capital investment plan. 1393 02:24:50,100 --> 02:24:59,380 Thank you, Rachel, very much. And I'm hoping that I'm sharing screen. Very good. Fantastic. 1394 02:24:59,380 --> 02:25:03,700 So this is the area. It is a skewed because it's a kind of a fun graphic for colors just 1395 02:25:03,700 --> 02:25:08,860 kind of get the whole area on the square. But I believe if I understood you, you're asking 1396 02:25:08,860 --> 02:25:14,220 about the Riddell and the mingo intersection, which is this area, is that correct? Yes. 1397 02:25:14,220 --> 02:25:19,180 Okay. This intersection currently today exists as a T intersection, Riddell comes in and 1398 02:25:19,180 --> 02:25:24,220 intersects, and then you have to turn left or right at mingo. And then similarly, there's 1399 02:25:24,220 --> 02:25:30,300 an intersection that's through this, the city didn't service center. We're looking at closing 1400 02:25:30,300 --> 02:25:34,900 that driveway, you can see the X here, and then realigning the Riddell alignment to take 1401 02:25:34,900 --> 02:25:39,780 the existing alignment through this orange corridor, and then tying into a four legged 1402 02:25:39,780 --> 02:25:45,980 intersection. The reason for that is when you go through quiet zones with the railroads, 1403 02:25:45,980 --> 02:25:50,940 they typically ask that you close one or more intersections. We're looking at the closure 1404 02:25:50,940 --> 02:26:02,820 of pertain as well as, I want to call it Willis, it's not Willis, it's Texas. Willis. Willis 1405 02:26:02,820 --> 02:26:09,820 is the street that connects to Riddell and intersects mingo. Correct. So what we'll do 1406 02:26:09,820 --> 02:26:14,900 is we'll realign this and we'll add it, the proposal at this point, as Rachel pointed 1407 02:26:14,900 --> 02:26:20,500 out, all of these plans are at a 30% level. We would propose this as a full blown intersection 1408 02:26:20,500 --> 02:26:24,940 with all the lanes needed at the intersection. I don't know if you've driven an intersection 1409 02:26:24,940 --> 02:26:29,420 where you say, wow, great new road, but they forgot to blow the intersection out at the 1410 02:26:29,420 --> 02:26:34,460 crossing, and then you drive fast, quickly, and then you get to a little two lane, at 1411 02:26:34,460 --> 02:26:39,140 two lane intersection road. So what we wanted to do is propose starting at this particular 1412 02:26:39,140 --> 02:26:46,700 intersection, getting all the infrastructure in place, and then as well as doing that, 1413 02:26:46,700 --> 02:26:51,700 looking at possible pedestrian corridors, looking at the sidewalks, the projects, and 1414 02:26:51,700 --> 02:26:55,900 let me clarify real quick, we don't have a lot to share with you right now on designs 1415 02:26:55,900 --> 02:27:00,700 because we did just start in March and the rain has set us back. Our consultants have 1416 02:27:00,700 --> 02:27:05,900 been actively and specifically on the Riddell and mingo, they're aggressively working on 1417 02:27:05,900 --> 02:27:10,140 the designs, collecting the data to show where the existing right of way is. We didn't even 1418 02:27:10,140 --> 02:27:15,060 know where that was until just recently. And then looking at how many lanes can we fit 1419 02:27:15,060 --> 02:27:19,140 in the existing, how many lanes do we need permanently, and then what types of sidewalks 1420 02:27:19,140 --> 02:27:24,300 can we get into this area. So we'll come back to this committee and share more information 1421 02:27:24,300 --> 02:27:28,380 as we have the details. Today was just kind of giving you a precursor, we're looking at 1422 02:27:28,380 --> 02:27:33,740 it, and we'd love to have any input since we are early in the stages, and then work 1423 02:27:33,740 --> 02:27:39,940 with that feedback. So this would be a line for a four legged intersection, and we would 1424 02:27:39,940 --> 02:27:47,740 be removing two existing crossings. Okay. So just to clarify, because I've had a constituent 1425 02:27:47,740 --> 02:27:52,820 ask me about this. Yeah, there we go. Sorry. Yeah, we need to be on screen when we talk. 1426 02:27:52,820 --> 02:28:00,260 Okay. Yeah, so just to clarify, because I've had a constituent ask me about this, are there 1427 02:28:00,260 --> 02:28:08,340 any plans related to extending or connecting Lattimore or Texas Street? That is not part 1428 02:28:08,340 --> 02:28:13,460 of the current TWU program and we might have future phases, but we haven't discussed those 1429 02:28:13,460 --> 02:28:24,100 yet. Okay, thank you. So one other question. I'm interested in the U-turn idea that you 1430 02:28:24,100 --> 02:28:31,900 showed us south of Chapel. Would there be any kind of similar construction south of 1431 02:28:31,900 --> 02:28:37,740 administration to sort of alert people to the fact that they can't get through Bell 1432 02:28:37,740 --> 02:28:45,060 and they need to take another route, or would there be anything at Schmitz Avenue or Texas 1433 02:28:45,060 --> 02:28:52,500 Street or Withers or Mingo that would alert drivers to the fact that they can't get through 1434 02:28:52,500 --> 02:28:57,580 Bell and they need to take another route? Sure. Part of the design scope for our consultant 1435 02:28:57,580 --> 02:29:02,600 is to take a look at the traffic patterns. When you shut a road down, of course, everyone's 1436 02:29:02,600 --> 02:29:07,680 going to find a new route. Unfortunately, the new route going towards the west would 1437 02:29:07,680 --> 02:29:11,380 go through administration, through campus. It's a private road and if you're familiar 1438 02:29:11,380 --> 02:29:16,980 with the area, they have an overhead pedestrian bridge and they're concerned about large vehicles. 1439 02:29:16,980 --> 02:29:21,900 So when this was proposed, nobody gave a lot of thought about getting any types of big 1440 02:29:21,900 --> 02:29:28,020 trucks backwards. Small cars can travel through the roads with no issues and they can go through 1441 02:29:28,020 --> 02:29:32,260 the campus and find alternate routes, but it's larger vehicles. So that's going to 1442 02:29:32,260 --> 02:29:35,940 be one of the components that we're going to be working with everybody is the traffic 1443 02:29:35,940 --> 02:29:41,580 controls, signing, giving warnings, giving people opportunities. There might be future 1444 02:29:41,580 --> 02:29:47,620 U-turns that we can do, future roundabouts if that's the tool decided that's right. But 1445 02:29:47,620 --> 02:29:52,820 right now, the teardrop was not proposed because it is an intersection that we would dead end 1446 02:29:52,820 --> 02:29:56,780 and we're open to ideas at this point. Everything costs money, so we're trying to work within 1447 02:29:56,780 --> 02:30:01,220 a budget as well as implementing as quick as possible because one of the ideas that 1448 02:30:01,220 --> 02:30:05,220 we'd like to do is if we do closes for the students and having them coming back in the 1449 02:30:05,220 --> 02:30:11,260 fall, reopening it when the water project is complete to turn around and close it would 1450 02:30:11,260 --> 02:30:15,980 be awkward. It would be a little bit confusing. So we're looking at ideas as well as maybe 1451 02:30:15,980 --> 02:30:21,060 temporary gates. What can we do temporarily to close it and still offer the safety benefits 1452 02:30:21,060 --> 02:30:25,740 and then come back with a retrofitted permanent solution just so that we can tag along to 1453 02:30:25,740 --> 02:30:26,740 that water line. 1454 02:30:26,740 --> 02:30:33,260 Okay, thank you. Yeah, that answers all my questions. 1455 02:30:33,260 --> 02:30:37,980 I'll entertain questions, but only from a TWU alumna. 1456 02:30:37,980 --> 02:30:45,100 Hire an ear woman, hire an ear woman in the house. 1457 02:30:45,100 --> 02:30:49,220 Is it the owls? Do you do like Hoot Hoot or something like the gigons? 1458 02:30:49,220 --> 02:30:51,220 That is very new, so that's beyond. 1459 02:30:51,220 --> 02:30:53,940 Is it? Okay, because I didn't realize they were owls. 1460 02:30:53,940 --> 02:30:56,380 I didn't either. I had no idea we were owls. 1461 02:30:56,380 --> 02:30:57,380 I knew pioneer. 1462 02:30:57,380 --> 02:30:58,380 Hire an ear woman. 1463 02:30:58,380 --> 02:30:59,380 Yeah, I like pioneer. 1464 02:30:59,380 --> 02:31:07,340 You know, I'm hiring ears. Yeah, I, as you were talking about that overpass down there 1465 02:31:07,340 --> 02:31:12,420 on Administration Drive. By the way, I worked at TWU for 23 years, so I'm very familiar 1466 02:31:12,420 --> 02:31:19,180 with that area and lived there on campus as well. That overpass, I think that's just only 1467 02:31:19,180 --> 02:31:25,380 about 14 feet high. I mean, it is very low and it's been hit several times and there's 1468 02:31:25,380 --> 02:31:30,900 a lot of warning heading up to it, but people still kind of ignore it. 1469 02:31:30,900 --> 02:31:36,140 I was thinking, oh, so the other question, the question that I initially had was when 1470 02:31:36,140 --> 02:31:43,500 this area closes, is there going to be some type of, is it going to be, like the road 1471 02:31:43,500 --> 02:31:52,900 is going to be bricked or just some really significant way to show that the areas are 1472 02:31:52,900 --> 02:31:59,720 still connected to each other or is it going to stay the same and just close? That's one 1473 02:31:59,720 --> 02:32:06,660 question. The other question is about Oakland Street. Did I hear you mention something about 1474 02:32:06,660 --> 02:32:07,660 Oakland Street? 1475 02:32:07,660 --> 02:32:08,660 You did. 1476 02:32:08,660 --> 02:32:09,660 And there's not anything that's going to be going on there yet? 1477 02:32:09,660 --> 02:32:15,300 Nothing in this phase of the project or the TWU program, that was on our sites, on our 1478 02:32:15,300 --> 02:32:19,260 target board. And when it came to funding as well as the consultants, we were trying 1479 02:32:19,260 --> 02:32:24,780 to expedite as quick as possible. And there's so much to be done to Oakland Street that 1480 02:32:24,780 --> 02:32:30,100 we thought, you know what, that's going to take a little bit of a bigger stab at beyond 1481 02:32:30,100 --> 02:32:34,660 30%. We wanted to make sure that we put a lot of time and focus on that because it's 1482 02:32:34,660 --> 02:32:39,500 drainage, utilities, it's road, it's parking, you name it. So we do have that on our sites. 1483 02:32:39,500 --> 02:32:45,060 We have a monthly meeting with TWU and at those meetings, we have a parking lot of projects 1484 02:32:45,060 --> 02:32:49,120 that we talk about and we say, don't forget about these. And every time we meet, we remind 1485 02:32:49,120 --> 02:32:53,540 ourselves where are we at and we have upcoming plans for drainage. But right now we don't 1486 02:32:53,540 --> 02:32:57,940 have anything consulted yet, if that makes sense. 1487 02:32:57,940 --> 02:33:08,060 The other thing is closing, I see that you're closing the north part of that, that Bell, 1488 02:33:08,060 --> 02:33:14,780 is there any future plans to just close it all the way through? Because I remember someone 1489 02:33:14,780 --> 02:33:21,100 getting hit there in front of the MCL building and there's just no thought to look left and 1490 02:33:21,100 --> 02:33:26,420 right hardly anymore. People are just walking out and there's just a little bitty concrete 1491 02:33:26,420 --> 02:33:33,380 to go from one side of the street over to the MCL building. Is there any future plans? 1492 02:33:33,380 --> 02:33:37,420 Not at this point and what we're doing is partnering with the TWU's master plan, which 1493 02:33:37,420 --> 02:33:42,860 did not include that closure. It was just this, this is how they envisioned their pedestrians, 1494 02:33:42,860 --> 02:33:49,500 their area. And we also have, part of this is also finessing the closure to look at where 1495 02:33:49,500 --> 02:33:53,340 the fire access is. There's actually beyond just the fire truck getting to the points 1496 02:33:53,340 --> 02:33:57,860 is they have hookups to get to the building if that truck, that truck needs to get somewhere. 1497 02:33:57,860 --> 02:34:02,900 So with the north end, there's actually driveways that if we severed it, we wouldn't have any 1498 02:34:02,900 --> 02:34:07,660 access to the dining hall for vehicles, we wouldn't have access to the chancellor's house 1499 02:34:07,660 --> 02:34:13,060 and she might, she might take exception to that. So I think that that's part of the plan 1500 02:34:13,060 --> 02:34:17,540 is that this was the section where we would have the least impact to driveways, buildings 1501 02:34:17,540 --> 02:34:23,220 and allow the students to have a point of safe crossing. And ideally it'll shorten, 1502 02:34:23,220 --> 02:34:30,980 with less traffic traveling through, if someone crosses the northern section, there should 1503 02:34:30,980 --> 02:34:34,780 be less traffic at that point because people are not cutting all the way through to McKinney 1504 02:34:34,780 --> 02:34:40,580 or back from McKinney. And that's part of the strategy we have with it being a pilot 1505 02:34:40,580 --> 02:34:44,700 project. We'll of course have signage and make sure that it's very clear that it's not 1506 02:34:44,700 --> 02:34:49,900 a through street, even for the duration of the pilot. But as we're looking at traffic 1507 02:34:49,900 --> 02:34:54,980 patterns that are adjusted as a result of the closure, we can certainly make adjustments 1508 02:34:54,980 --> 02:34:59,820 based on feedback we get from TWAU, the traffic counts that we're seeing as well. And then 1509 02:34:59,820 --> 02:35:03,340 to answer your question about the improvements that would be made, I think you were asking 1510 02:35:03,340 --> 02:35:09,100 about essentially the pedestrian mall that would be created. That is a part of the TWAU 1511 02:35:09,100 --> 02:35:15,500 master plan, something that we're coordinating with TWAU staff on. We do need to get our 1512 02:35:15,500 --> 02:35:20,140 Parks and Recreation Department involved as well. But my understanding, and this is very 1513 02:35:20,140 --> 02:35:26,420 preliminary conversations, is TWAU does have some plans to have some enhanced landscaping, 1514 02:35:26,420 --> 02:35:31,020 some pavers to really accentuate this as a feature on campus. And so that's something 1515 02:35:31,020 --> 02:35:35,820 because it is city right of way, we would need to work with TWAU on an agreement just 1516 02:35:35,820 --> 02:35:40,460 in terms of who's responsible for maintenance, who's responsible for the ultimate design. 1517 02:35:40,460 --> 02:35:44,380 But all things that we're planning on working through, we have started those preliminary 1518 02:35:44,380 --> 02:35:56,660 conversations already. I'm going to say this. I had heard even way back when in I would 1519 02:35:56,660 --> 02:36:03,580 say even the early 90s that this was something that was kind of on the horizon. And even 1520 02:36:03,580 --> 02:36:12,060 as an employee then, I was envisioning them shutting down the entire street and rerouting 1521 02:36:12,060 --> 02:36:17,300 everything over to Rue Del. That was the big talk way in the back. So it's just really 1522 02:36:17,300 --> 02:36:24,140 interesting to see that finally 20 something years later that it's now coming into fruition 1523 02:36:24,140 --> 02:36:29,780 as to what that long term vision was. Thank you. Those are all the questions that I have 1524 02:36:29,780 --> 02:36:30,780 today. 1525 02:36:30,780 --> 02:36:35,820 Super. We will be bringing back more as needed. So this is just a taste of what we're bringing 1526 02:36:35,820 --> 02:36:40,220 to you and we'll have more details and more input from the other groups to share. 1527 02:36:40,220 --> 02:36:50,620 Okay. I'd like to add a few comments. First of all, I think TWAU is a great partner in 1528 02:36:50,620 --> 02:36:58,260 the City of Denton. I think it's a fantastic institution. Not only as the alma mater of 1529 02:36:58,260 --> 02:37:05,420 one of our distinguished council members, but what they do for particularly women and 1530 02:37:05,420 --> 02:37:12,020 social mobility, just a great presence. I love TWAU. I love my relatives too. I wouldn't 1531 02:37:12,020 --> 02:37:21,420 give them a street. I'm only one. I don't know if you'll ever need my vote for this, 1532 02:37:21,420 --> 02:37:27,660 but at this moment, it's very clear to me what it would do for TWAU. Not clear at all 1533 02:37:27,660 --> 02:37:35,460 to me what it would do for the City of Denton. I'm highly skeptical of the claims that in 1534 02:37:35,460 --> 02:37:40,300 any kind of similar numbers that there are comments in favor versus opposed. I think 1535 02:37:40,300 --> 02:37:48,640 people have found it to be just my perception. I don't have any data, but my perception is 1536 02:37:48,640 --> 02:37:56,200 people have found it to be a pain in the neck to have bell closed. So I think it's a meaningful 1537 02:37:56,200 --> 02:38:03,740 traffic. Now, it's not impossible for me to imagine a conversation where something that 1538 02:38:03,740 --> 02:38:08,820 I would view as a huge give up. We don't have a whole lot more than streets we can give 1539 02:38:08,820 --> 02:38:14,940 up. Nobody gets a street, but it's not impossible for me to imagine a conversation where there 1540 02:38:14,940 --> 02:38:23,340 was something so clearly of lasting and significant benefit to the City of Denton that was part 1541 02:38:23,340 --> 02:38:32,580 of our partnership beyond kind of what we already have, where I could confidently say 1542 02:38:32,580 --> 02:38:37,460 every day as people are annoyed that bell is closed, they can go, "Well, that's what 1543 02:38:37,460 --> 02:38:44,620 we had to do in order to get X." Now, whatever the X is, is off posting. But that's my frame 1544 02:38:44,620 --> 02:38:48,800 of mind. I hate to be the skunk at the party, but that's what I think. 1545 02:38:48,800 --> 02:38:53,660 In future presentations, Mayor Pro Tem Meltzer, what we can do is bring back the results of 1546 02:38:53,660 --> 02:38:58,500 the traffic study. And I will note, again, it's off posting, so I'll just note that we 1547 02:38:58,500 --> 02:39:03,660 are having conversations. We did mention several of the projects that are part of that holistic 1548 02:39:03,660 --> 02:39:09,460 TWU area program, and Tracy's managing all of those projects. There will be some asks 1549 02:39:09,460 --> 02:39:15,220 of TWU, particularly for right-of-way, that's necessary. And so I do want to note that there 1550 02:39:15,220 --> 02:39:21,540 will be some financial requests that will be made of TWU as we look at the implementation 1551 02:39:21,540 --> 02:39:24,220 of the overall TWU area program. 1552 02:39:24,220 --> 02:39:33,580 Okay. I appreciate that. Thank you. Anything else on this topic? Anyone? All right, then. 1553 02:39:33,580 --> 02:39:39,820 Thank you for the presentation. We'll close item E and open up item F, staff reports. 1554 02:39:39,820 --> 02:39:46,100 First, we've got item one, staff memorandum update regarding senior planner, bicycle, 1555 02:39:46,100 --> 02:39:48,580 pedestrian, and ADA coordinator position. 1556 02:39:48,580 --> 02:39:53,900 Yes. And Council Member, I'm sorry, Mayor Pro Tem Meltzer, in the interest of time, I'm 1557 02:39:53,900 --> 02:39:59,240 not going to pull up the memo, but I do have great news. So I believe at the last Mobility 1558 02:39:59,240 --> 02:40:04,860 Committee meeting, our city engineer, Rebecca Devaney, mentioned that the candidate that 1559 02:40:04,860 --> 02:40:10,340 was our top candidate was coming in with his wife to look at schools, look at houses and 1560 02:40:10,340 --> 02:40:15,980 spend the weekend in Denton. Since that time, we are delighted to announce that he has accepted 1561 02:40:15,980 --> 02:40:21,820 the position and will be starting in July. Unfortunately, because he is not yet on the 1562 02:40:21,820 --> 02:40:27,140 city's payroll, I have been advised not to share his name. However, I believe our next 1563 02:40:27,140 --> 02:40:35,300 Mobility Committee meeting is on July 21st. And I am fairly certain, almost 100% certain, 1564 02:40:35,300 --> 02:40:40,660 that he will be on the city's payroll at that time. And we will gladly have an agenda item 1565 02:40:40,660 --> 02:40:45,620 or part of our staff update where we will introduce him, share his contact information 1566 02:40:45,620 --> 02:40:50,620 at that time, because at that point, he will be on the city's payroll. But we are very 1567 02:40:50,620 --> 02:40:54,740 excited. I know he's actually listening right now. I've been emailing with him. So he's 1568 02:40:54,740 --> 02:40:59,740 actually listening to today's Mobility Committee meeting. And I know he's already been listening 1569 02:40:59,740 --> 02:41:03,820 to council meetings. I know he heard some of the comments that were made at yesterday's 1570 02:41:03,820 --> 02:41:10,180 city council meeting as well. So we are excited to have him start, which should be in mid-July. 1571 02:41:10,180 --> 02:41:15,220 And as soon as he starts, we will share his credentials, have a big Friday report right 1572 02:41:15,220 --> 02:41:20,200 up. And then, as I've already mentioned, he will be introduced at a Mobility Committee 1573 02:41:20,200 --> 02:41:24,860 meeting as well as Traffic Safety Commission, Committee on Persons with Disabilities. I 1574 02:41:24,860 --> 02:41:30,420 know he is going to be a very popular and very busy man once he starts in his role. 1575 02:41:30,420 --> 02:41:34,700 And I know John Polster mentioned the title earlier. He is not going to be called the 1576 02:41:34,700 --> 02:41:42,180 bike czar. He's actually, his title is Senior Planner, Bicycle, Pedestrian, ADA Coordinator. 1577 02:41:42,180 --> 02:41:47,980 So kind of a mouthful. You may hear several people refer to him as the bike peg coordinator. 1578 02:41:47,980 --> 02:41:53,820 I believe that was the title that Julie Andrews had and then Mark Oliphant as well. The position 1579 02:41:53,820 --> 02:41:59,220 has been a little bit expanded past that to include the ADA components. But we are so 1580 02:41:59,220 --> 02:42:03,660 excited to have him starting in mid-July. He's moving across the country. So that's 1581 02:42:03,660 --> 02:42:08,380 the reason for the bit of a lag that we have in terms of him starting. 1582 02:42:08,380 --> 02:42:16,860 And apparently coming by bike. So that's great. Congratulations. Yeah, I'm glad that he was 1583 02:42:16,860 --> 02:42:22,540 hearing the comments. I was going to ask, related to those comments, if part of his 1584 02:42:22,540 --> 02:42:33,100 remit will be seeing that we're thoroughly implementing the already approved 2012 bike 1585 02:42:33,100 --> 02:42:43,960 plan in our projects. I'm sorry. Was there a question in that or was 1586 02:42:43,960 --> 02:42:47,900 that a comment? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, 1587 02:42:47,900 --> 02:42:55,620 will part of his remit be ensuring in alignment with the questions that were asked last night, 1588 02:42:55,620 --> 02:43:03,140 ensuring that we adhere to and implement the approved 2012 bike plan? It was sort of alleged 1589 02:43:03,140 --> 02:43:10,740 that and I don't know, you know, fairly or not, but I kind of trust the particular speakers 1590 02:43:10,740 --> 02:43:16,180 we had, it was alleged that we've just not done stuff that was already approved, which 1591 02:43:16,180 --> 02:43:21,100 is concerning. Yes. So he will be an embedded member of several 1592 02:43:21,100 --> 02:43:24,860 of our capital project teams. And I think that's where we really have the benefit of 1593 02:43:24,860 --> 02:43:29,700 the synergy of him being a part of the capital projects and engineering department. But yes, 1594 02:43:29,700 --> 02:43:34,260 one of his top charges will be ensuring that we're implementing all aspects of the mobility 1595 02:43:34,260 --> 02:43:40,020 plan, which will include the bicycle and pedestrian plan. And we've actually got a meeting scheduled 1596 02:43:40,020 --> 02:43:44,580 for Friday of this week. Unfortunately, he won't be on board yet, where we did receive 1597 02:43:44,580 --> 02:43:49,980 several questions from the bicycle advocacy groups. Miss rumor actually has created a 1598 02:43:49,980 --> 02:43:55,580 Google Google document that we're kind of using to facilitate some of that dialogue. 1599 02:43:55,580 --> 02:44:00,260 And I've got a cross departmental team focused on answering some of those questions. One 1600 02:44:00,260 --> 02:44:05,380 of the things with several of us being new to our roles is we've inherited a lot of projects 1601 02:44:05,380 --> 02:44:10,300 that are already midstream in terms of construction and design. So one of the things that he's 1602 02:44:10,300 --> 02:44:14,980 going to be charged with right out of the gate is finding out ways that for these projects 1603 02:44:14,980 --> 02:44:19,940 that we already have underway, how do we retrofit them to ensure that we're not just looking 1604 02:44:19,940 --> 02:44:24,620 at vehicular traffic, but we're looking at the needs of pedestrians, bicyclists and those 1605 02:44:24,620 --> 02:44:30,460 that are alternatively abled as well. And so that is going to be one of his top priorities, 1606 02:44:30,460 --> 02:44:35,220 that he will be an active member of each of our capital projects teams, starting from 1607 02:44:35,220 --> 02:44:40,420 initiation all the way through to construction, working with the bicycle community, working 1608 02:44:40,420 --> 02:44:44,860 with pedestrians, also working with the committee on persons with disabilities to make sure 1609 02:44:44,860 --> 02:44:49,100 that all of those different lenses are being looked through as we're finalizing design 1610 02:44:49,100 --> 02:44:57,460 and constructing these important projects. Excellent questions, comments, other committee 1611 02:44:57,460 --> 02:45:09,980 members? Councilmember McGuire. Thanks. I question, will this new coordinator have any 1612 02:45:09,980 --> 02:45:21,660 involvement in public transit plans? Yes, he will. So I guess, let me answer that in 1613 02:45:21,660 --> 02:45:30,380 two ways. When the city has capital projects that involve access to public transit facilities, 1614 02:45:30,380 --> 02:45:36,100 he'll, of course, be a part of that from the city's team. But we are, of course, always 1615 02:45:36,100 --> 02:45:40,060 working on, and I apologize, I'm doing something weird with my screen that I'm worried I'm 1616 02:45:40,060 --> 02:45:45,380 going to mess up Zoom. Okay, hopefully that didn't mess anything up. But we are actively 1617 02:45:45,380 --> 02:45:51,820 working with DCTA on making sure that the city's voice is heard as they're planning new facilities 1618 02:45:51,820 --> 02:45:57,580 and new projects. And of course, we will be using him, his expertise as a transportation 1619 02:45:57,580 --> 02:46:05,260 planner as we make those recommendations and ask of the DCTA board as well. Great, glad 1620 02:46:05,260 --> 02:46:14,380 to hear that. I want to make sure new coordinator who is listening that you know, and I think 1621 02:46:14,380 --> 02:46:19,340 that you do know this already, since you've been watching meetings that, you know, this 1622 02:46:19,340 --> 02:46:27,500 is a community that's really engaged and really passionate about these issues. So we're really 1623 02:46:27,500 --> 02:46:34,540 looking forward to having you join our team and help facilitate these projects because 1624 02:46:34,540 --> 02:46:40,820 there is a great need and a great deal of enthusiasm from the community. I have kind 1625 02:46:40,820 --> 02:46:47,900 of a, I guess a procedural question, I want to make sure I'm clear on, you know, the exhibit 1626 02:46:47,900 --> 02:46:54,260 to identify items of interest for future consideration. Are you asking us right now to identify items 1627 02:46:54,260 --> 02:47:00,100 of interest for future consideration? Is that just a list of things that have been discussed? 1628 02:47:00,100 --> 02:47:05,180 That's an excellent segue. And I can, of course, leave it up to chairperson Mulser. 1629 02:47:05,180 --> 02:47:10,380 But typically, I think Becky goes through the staff memo, which today was very short 1630 02:47:10,380 --> 02:47:17,540 just involved the update on the, the senior planner bicycle pedestrian ADA coordinator 1631 02:47:17,540 --> 02:47:22,220 position. But I was planning on transitioning, pulling that up, giving you a few quick updates 1632 02:47:22,220 --> 02:47:26,860 and then asking you if you had any additional items that you wanted us to add and follow 1633 02:47:26,860 --> 02:47:32,860 up in a future mobility committee meeting. So Mr. Chair, if that's your desire. 1634 02:47:32,860 --> 02:47:53,940 Yeah, that sounds like our typical M.O. Then I will pull that up very quickly here. And 1635 02:47:53,940 --> 02:48:00,100 this is, I apologize, a little bit small. I'm looking for zoom here, but it is also 1636 02:48:00,100 --> 02:48:09,940 included in your backup. So I'm having trouble seeing where I can zoom in. So I do apologize. 1637 02:48:09,940 --> 02:48:14,900 But there are really only three items on there. One we've already hit on, which is the update 1638 02:48:14,900 --> 02:48:20,340 on the senior planner position. Second is provide future items for consideration report, 1639 02:48:20,340 --> 02:48:24,820 which is what we're doing right now. And then the third one is provide a summary of traffic 1640 02:48:24,820 --> 02:48:30,460 engineering related engaged in request. And I will note that I've had several conversations 1641 02:48:30,460 --> 02:48:37,140 with the city manager's office on the capabilities of engaged in those capabilities are somewhat 1642 02:48:37,140 --> 02:48:43,980 limited. And unfortunately, because of the way the requests that come in are categorized, 1643 02:48:43,980 --> 02:48:50,060 it's a very manual process. If we were to create a heat map or even just create a consolidated 1644 02:48:50,060 --> 02:48:55,780 list of all of the engaged request that we receive on a daily basis that pertain to traffic 1645 02:48:55,780 --> 02:49:01,620 related items, not impossible. But the recommendation that I got from the city manager's office 1646 02:49:01,620 --> 02:49:06,300 was if there are key themes, if there are key projects where you want to find out the 1647 02:49:06,300 --> 02:49:11,980 type of information that we've received, we can of course pull those. If there is a project 1648 02:49:11,980 --> 02:49:16,500 where we're wanting to pull specific information from the public, I believe most of you have 1649 02:49:16,500 --> 02:49:22,300 heard of our new discuss Denton, which is kind of an interactive add on feature to the 1650 02:49:22,300 --> 02:49:26,020 city's website. We're actually testing it and we've had a lot of great success with 1651 02:49:26,020 --> 02:49:30,340 the all way crossing project that we have on the downtown square. So that's another 1652 02:49:30,340 --> 02:49:34,580 way for us to get some of that feedback. But the recommendation that I received from the 1653 02:49:34,580 --> 02:49:40,180 city manager's office was, you know, we've got the 311, which is going to have very sophisticated 1654 02:49:40,180 --> 02:49:47,540 mapping reporting capabilities that is underway right now. And by fall of 2022 should be fully 1655 02:49:47,540 --> 02:49:53,460 operational. So something that we can absolutely have with our new 311 system. But it may be 1656 02:49:53,460 --> 02:49:58,060 that if it's a specific project, there's another way that we can get to that without kind of 1657 02:49:58,060 --> 02:50:02,800 going through the manual ongoing manipulation that would be required in order to have that 1658 02:50:02,800 --> 02:50:12,620 heat map or standing list of open engaged Denton requests. 1659 02:50:12,620 --> 02:50:26,300 Okay. Anything else? Now we open up to open to new items. 1660 02:50:26,300 --> 02:50:40,860 Chairman, so we have engaged in, we have discussed it, and we're going to have 311. Our community 1661 02:50:40,860 --> 02:50:46,760 should be very, very happy that we're giving them an opportunity for all three of these 1662 02:50:46,760 --> 02:50:55,020 ways to connect with the city. And you'd see that the for clarification, you see the engaged 1663 02:50:55,020 --> 02:50:59,380 didn't is more of a manual. I've never used engaged in, but I have a feeling I'm going 1664 02:50:59,380 --> 02:51:03,960 to be using it from my own little neighborhood here pretty soon. 1665 02:51:03,960 --> 02:51:11,260 I'm so sorry to interrupt your flow, but just to kind of keep us on posting. We're really 1666 02:51:11,260 --> 02:51:16,980 not posted to discuss the items. It's more to just to tee them up for future discussion. 1667 02:51:16,980 --> 02:51:23,820 Okay. All right. Well, I was just going to clarify that it engaged didn't. We're manually 1668 02:51:23,820 --> 02:51:31,300 putting in all of the information and then discuss didn't. I'm sorry. How does that work? 1669 02:51:31,300 --> 02:51:35,260 Really quickly and I'm looking to try. So tell me if I'm getting too far off the reservation, 1670 02:51:35,260 --> 02:51:42,100 but this was an item that we had listed as an attachment. So really quickly, the request 1671 02:51:42,100 --> 02:51:46,820 that we're responding to was engaged and of course, as an app, you can use it on your 1672 02:51:46,820 --> 02:51:51,460 phone. You can go online and also submit those requests. The request we had of the committee 1673 02:51:51,460 --> 02:51:57,340 is can we aggregate the request that we're receiving as staff so that the mobility committee 1674 02:51:57,340 --> 02:52:03,140 could see at summary level, either via a map or a report, all of the requests that come 1675 02:52:03,140 --> 02:52:08,700 in that pertain to mobility and transportation related items. And so what I was responding 1676 02:52:08,700 --> 02:52:14,380 with is it's a little bit more difficult than it probably sounds, but we do have alternate 1677 02:52:14,380 --> 02:52:19,300 options to get feedback from the community. Discuss Denton through the city's website 1678 02:52:19,300 --> 02:52:26,020 is one of those. And then long-term fall 2022, the 311 system will give us that reporting 1679 02:52:26,020 --> 02:52:30,580 capability, which should make it very easy to provide those reports that the mobility 1680 02:52:30,580 --> 02:52:43,380 committee requested. Okay. Other items of interest for future consideration? That's 1681 02:52:43,380 --> 02:52:51,540 one we'll go over. Yes. You know, it's already been said, but I just want to reiterate the 1682 02:52:51,540 --> 02:52:58,700 importance of reviewing that the by Denton plan and ensuring that all of our projects 1683 02:52:58,700 --> 02:53:07,500 are meeting the goals that we set forth in that plan. Yeah. I'd like to suggest that 1684 02:53:07,500 --> 02:53:19,020 a sort of status update of the key elements of that be added to the, to the sort of transportation 1685 02:53:19,020 --> 02:53:26,940 mobility project update we get so that, you know, there's just a check-in. So I'm suggesting 1686 02:53:26,940 --> 02:53:31,100 that for consideration that that's a way that it could come back to us. And just on my very 1687 02:53:31,100 --> 02:53:39,180 narrow little thing that I've brought up many times on the topic of West Oak between Bradley 1688 02:53:39,180 --> 02:53:47,740 and Thomas, I'd like to hear if it's going to be, if it's on some list could be a list 1689 02:53:47,740 --> 02:53:51,660 of things we're going to ask about in the future, but I think we need a plan to either 1690 02:53:51,660 --> 02:54:01,420 fix it or charge admission to it. We will add that to the list. Okay. I'd say a dollar 1691 02:54:01,420 --> 02:54:08,580 ride ought to do it. All right. I think that's it. Unless anybody else has anything else 1692 02:54:08,580 --> 02:54:16,940 going once, going twice. All right. We will adjourn at 1207. Thanks everyone. Thank you.