- Good morning and welcome to this meeting
of the Mobility Committee.
We have a quorum present and we'll dig right
into the agenda.
First item for individual consideration is item A,
MC21-025, consider approval of the minutes
of June 16th, 2021 and June 29th, 2021.
I'll entertain a motion.
- Motion to approve.
- You need to use your mic, Council Member.
- Motion to approve.
- And we have a second.
- I second.
- All in favor, aye.
- Aye.
- Okay, the minutes are approved.
And item B, MC21-026, receive a report
and hold the discussion regarding
City of Denton Transportation/Mobility Project
status report.
Title of that thing gets longer and longer.
Good morning, Mr. Poulster.
- Good morning.
- All right.
Good morning, my name is John Poulster
with the Innovative Transportation Solutions
and I'll be providing you guys with a update
on the city's on-system projects throughout the community.
So this sheet shows the dollar amounts of the total
of the projects that are construction costs
that are being tracked by our firm
with the city staff that impact the residents
on mostly on-system projects.
So those are the dollars that we either have committed
to a project from the state or in the feds
or we'll get.
So the first project is 2181 North-South
from essentially 2499 in the South
up to Lillian Miller to the North.
The construction report is provided
on each of these projects
that have construction work going on.
Right now, 2181 is working mostly
with subgrade improvements,
pavement, subgrade improvements,
and then laying of concrete.
We've got some minor utility conflicts that occur
as we go through the process.
They're just essentially utilities
that were not where they were said to be on the plans,
but they are not things that are really impacting
the schedule of the project.
And currently we're still on track
for summer of next year to be completed with this project.
Your Mayhill 35E project, this project,
you note that for those of you who are seeing these reports
for the second or third time,
the yellow items that have changed
from the last time you saw the report.
So the schedule has been modified
to reflect the completion of the utilities
in September of 23, and that was pushed
because we had to add about four parcels
to this project because we're adding
that direct connect ramp on Brinker
so that you don't have to stop at the signal.
So that pushed the schedule out to September 23.
The funding for this project is in place,
and we're working with several utilities,
everything you see there on that list
are all the utilities we're working with
to get out of the way essentially for that project
so that we can construct it in September of 23.
So the interim improvements,
we met with TechStat last week,
and they are going to use one of their maintenance contracts
to essentially, the reason the barrels are still out there
is there's two lanes that come up from the frontage road
to where Calloways is, but when you get to the intersection,
it's a right only, so they're gonna stripe off
the hatch stripes so that it narrows it down
to one lane before you get to that turn.
So that everybody knows it's only one lane now.
So as soon as that striping is done,
the barrels will be pulled up and it'll be essentially,
this interim project will be done.
Yes ma'am, that was the improvement,
was to put the bollards up and to make it a right turn only,
and they were able to get that done quickly
to stop the movement, but we need to get the traffic control
and the striping done to fit the situation now.
And once we get that done, we'll pull the barrels.
Okay, the Big Kahuna, I don't know why I keep doing that.
So this project is the project from the two merges
all the way up to 77.
The critical path item on this project are the utilities,
and we are working with TechStat on a,
I would say bi-weekly basis to coordinate the city's
utility issues and DME to make sure that we're,
the project is accommodating the utilities
and the utilities are working with the project
as best we can.
And so for example, up there at the Presbyterian Hospital,
we're working with DME to,
'cause the transmission line crosses there at Oak,
and we're rebuilding that interchange.
And so that utility has to move
so we can do that interchange.
And so we're working with DME, the hospital and the county
to coordinate those efforts.
So there's an ongoing full court press
between the city and the county and the state
to make sure that the utilities in this corridor
do get completed by the August 23,
because that's the critical path item on this project.
Again, fully funded,
just waiting for the utilities to be acquired.
The new right away is essentially completed.
There's a couple of parcels
that have been negotiated and approved,
but we have to wait till the new fiscal year
before we can actually pay them,
because the state ran out of right away money
for this fiscal year.
So essentially it's done,
but they won't close those documents until October.
So good news is 380 improvements was let on July 2nd.
Jago Public got it.
That's 120 working days.
And so technically they have till January 22 to get that.
So it's about six months to get all those improvements done,
but we think it'll be more closer to December
for a substantially complete,
which means that they're still working
on the contract punch list items,
but we're driving on it the way we wanna drive on it.
So that should do a lot to solve a lot of the problems
in that part of the city.
- So December 22, 2022.
- Six months, let's do it that way.
- Yeah, which six months, okay.
- This six months from now till December 21,
maybe January 22.
- That's great, I appreciate the focus on that.
- City, your staff really pushed the issue
and also was part of the solution for solving the problem.
And so they really need to be appreciative of that
'cause they really didn't get in with their sleeves rolled up
to resolve that problem.
You bet.
- Thank you for the reminder.
Would you, for the people that are looking,
explain that picture.
What is all this red and excellent,
I mean, Xs and stripes?
- Okay, so what we're showing you there
is a snapshot of the northern part of the project.
But the project goes from essentially scripture
all the way up to 380.
But if we showed you the whole drawing,
it would be so small you couldn't see any of the details.
So to keep it on one page,
we're just showing you the intersection.
But essentially what you have right now
is you enter the freeway north of scripture
and you exit the freeway just south of 380,
right at the intersection, right?
Which we exit right there.
What we're doing is flipping that process
where we're gonna exit down further south
and you're gonna enter where the exit ramp is.
And so if you look at the drawing here,
that exit ramp is the hatch part where you see
that goes from main lanes to the frontage road.
That's coming out.
That's where the current ramp is now.
And then the red line's going from the frontage road
to the freeway is the on ramp that we're putting
on the project so that you can get on the freeway.
And then the red you see on the frontage road
just south of that old curve is where we're adding pavement
so that when you get to the intersection at the 380 and 35,
you'll be able to have a longer right turn bay
to transition so you're out of the through traffic.
And then we're taking that nose
at the end of the frontage road at the intersection.
We're taking that out so it'll allow for a dual left,
which you currently already have a left and a through left.
It'll allow us to have two dual lefts and then two throughs.
So that'll also put more traffic through the intersection.
So we're improving the intersection to have more capacity.
We are flipping the ramps so that you get off further south
and all your weaving and merging happens
on the frontage road at lower speeds
and up on the main lanes.
And then we're adding an auxiliary lane
on the frontage road because we're taking the off ramp
off further south, we're adding another lane
so that there'll be three lanes of frontage
on the frontage road.
And then we're adding an auxiliary lane on the main lanes
because right now, when you come up 35W,
you've got two lanes that merges over that bridge
down to one, it's striped.
And then you have to get on the freeway as a single lane.
That bridge is built for two lanes.
So if we add the auxiliary up through this intersection,
then 35W will have two lanes coming up
across the bridge and onto the highway.
So it gets through that funnel at 35W
and it takes all the merge and weave
and puts it on the frontage road.
- And Mr. Poulster, Council Member Byrd,
I just wanted to add that city staff has been working
on some graphics that are, you know,
a little bit more simplified that help explain
kind of what's going on in this area.
I realize this is a fairly detailed drawing
and John did an excellent job of explaining it,
but it is a little bit difficult to understand.
And so we are working on that in collaboration
with Public Affairs, also TxDOT,
and then also our Economic Development Department.
And we are going to be posting that information
on the website.
So there's gonna be additional information
that's gonna be available and we'll make sure
that y'all are aware of those locations.
You know, we did have a meeting last Friday
to talk through those specific logistics
just to help in that nature.
- Thank you very much.
I mean, I have one question and me personally,
I'm curious about is how does a decision made
to create a U-turn versus a non U-turn
at a major intersection like that?
- So--
- 'Cause I don't believe that intersection has a U-turn.
- It does.
- Oh, it does, okay.
- It does, you just can't get to it
because there's no transition or de-cell lane there.
It's just, you're waiting in line
for your chance to either go left or make the U-turn.
- Okay.
- So the answer is, is in the past,
they would put Texas U-turns where they were warranted.
Now, every interchange that the state does
has Texas U-turns in them.
So as you upgrade a project, they use the new paradigm
and they come in with the new Texas use.
- Someday you'll explain to me why that's only in Texas.
- Well, Texas is, I think, one of the only states,
if not the only state that does have frontage roads
and that takes one movement out of the intersection
if you have the U-turn and if you have frontage roads,
you need to separate the turning movements.
Most states don't have frontage roads,
but that's why Texas has a better economy the most
'cause we have more development.
Whether you think that's good or bad,
I'm just saying we got it.
I've been married a long time.
All right, 35 North, this is a project from 377
all the way out to the county line.
They are gonna be building it in three segments
and they think it's pretty close to what you see
on the color scheme.
And that only is because they wanna keep
the dollar amounts per contract at a certain level
because it allows a broader spectrum of contractors
to bid on it.
And we're moving towards a ready-to-let of December 23
and we're still on track for that.
The U35W main lanes, again,
we're awaiting environmental clearance.
We think we're actually gonna get it this month
because all we were actually waiting for is conformity
to be approved and what conformity is
is there's the Clean Air Act
and then there's the National Environmental Protection Act
for environmental issues.
And what conformity requires is for your transportation plan
to conform to the concepts and ideas and visions
that are included in NEPA and the Clean Air Act.
So for example, in North Texas,
we have a 10 county area that's in non-attainment
for air quality.
And so you have to do certain things.
And one of those things you have to do is make sure
that whatever transportation system you're putting
on the ground in the next 20 years has a budget,
an emissions budget below the budget set by Clean Air Act.
And so you have to, whenever you add a project
to the system, you have to go through this air quality
process to determine that the vehicle,
the fault organic compounds or VOC emissions
are below a certain threshold of so many tons per day.
And that whole process is called conformity.
So we got conformity approval,
which means that at the end of the month,
the feds will give us an environmental clearance,
which means that it actually doesn't mean anything
because if you look on the next page,
we've already got the exact same footprint cleared
back on June 30th of 2020 for the frontage roads,
which is the furthest part out on the project.
So we've already got the footprint cleared
and they're already acquiring right away.
And this may be a good time to stop and note that
the Houston folks filed lawsuit against TechStop
on what they wanna do for the North Houston
Highway Improvement Program in their city and county.
So TechStop, being the accommodating folks that they are,
decided to take $3 billion back from them
and they're gonna reallocate that to other projects
in the state 'cause they still have to spend the money.
So North Texas is the largest metropolitan area,
even larger than Houston.
And we've got the most number of projects
that are eligible for the criteria that's set
for that 3 billion and the frontage road project
has been submitted to the commission
for consideration of funding in the next 18 months or so.
So we're acquiring right away now.
If we don't get the full dollar amount,
we will work with TechStop Dallas and headquarters
to at least get some partial funding on it
to do the frontage roads from roughly 407 North
to the city of Denton-Wishbone.
So these dates are critical for us to continue
to hit the March 23 and June 24.
Now your US 377 project, this is a project
that is under construction with TechStop.
We've been doing some work on changeable message signs
to really push people to slow down.
What was gonna actually help solve the safety issue
with the road is when we can get a center temporary barrier
up because most of the accidents that have happened
out there have been crossover accidents.
But what they have to do first is those bridges
are only rated for so much weight.
And even if you put a barrel out there,
the barrel is filled with water
and it has a weight capacity to it.
So they're under pinning the bridge structure as we speak,
evaluating which columns need to be shored up.
And once they get certified,
that it can carry the additional weight,
they'll put a center barrier throughout the corridor
to preclude the crossover issues,
which should go a long way to solving the problem
we have right now, which the ultimate project will solve
because it'll have a raised median.
And everything I just said is in there on the report.
You can.
- When they put the barrier up, the temporary barrier,
is it just gonna be in certain locations
or is this gonna expand the whole?
- Well, it will essentially cover the limits of the project
with the exception of where you have cross streets
that have to cross over and turn left.
So it'll be mostly continuous.
- And that's gonna be that low concrete wall type barrier?
- It could either be the low concrete ones
or those orange, they're the same shape,
they're made out of plastic filled with water.
Both of them do the same thing.
It's just one's a little bit lighter.
- Thank you.
- So then your 380 East project further on,
for those of you that drive that way,
we've been told by TechStot to go ahead,
if you remember our last report
where it says the let date, it was an asterisk
because we weren't sure.
What TechStot's decided to do,
they've got the certifications
from all of these utilities here
that they will have the utilities completed
by December of this year.
But when they looked at where the utilities are working
versus where the contract can work,
there's significant portions of the road
where the contract can work
where the utilities are already relocated.
So they're gonna let the project in August
with special notes, special provisions
saying you can work in these from station to station.
So when they bid it, they're bidding it
knowing that they can't work in these areas before December
so we'll get comparable bids.
So it will go in August,
which means that September, October,
late September, early October,
the contractor has about 60 days to mobilize.
You'll be seeing work out there anyway
because the utilities will be out there
but the contractor themselves should be out there
sometime in the October, November timeframe.
And this project adds,
just like the previous one does, additional lanes.
So currently you have a four-lane with a flush median
and the project that's under construction out here,
you got four lanes with flush median.
When we're done, you'll have six lanes
with a raised median and you'll have grade separations
at NAVO, TEAL, Legacy, 423 and 720.
So it'll act like a semi-freeway.
Okay, so feasibility study for 380,
they are gonna be coming out saying
that 380 needs to be a freeway
but they're not gonna finish the report till the fall.
And again, the reason they're not finishing the report
till fall, 'cause they're already done,
is they ran out of develop authority
until the next fiscal year, which starts September 1st.
So HDR has to wait until they get a second notice
to proceed to do the final public meeting
just from a financial standpoint.
They'll close it out and we're already,
the city and the county, we're already working with TechStat
to begin the environmental clearance right now on a freeway
'cause it's already needed.
Luke 288.
So Denton County will be putting the contract
for Chang, Patel and Yerby on their court agenda
for July 27th.
That's a little over $5 million
for the plan specifications and estimates.
The project is environmentally cleared.
They're acquiring right away
and we will be designing the project
and this is another because it's a loop.
It's eligible for both clear lanes
and because we're environmentally cleared
and we're acquiring right away and we're starting design,
it's also eligible for being submitted
as a candidate project for that $3 billion.
So right now we've got very little funding
allocated to the project
but this is a project that is critical
for both city of Denton and the county.
TechStat was one that asked us to revive it
because it's part of the future outer loop
and then the region because it's part of the outer loop.
- Excuse me, John, if you don't mind going back one.
When you say it needs to be a freeway,
which I would agree is eminently true,
what does that physically mean to you
when you say it needs to be a freeway?
Elevated?
- Yeah, so what happens is it's not necessarily elevated,
although parts of it will be.
It's that it's controlled access.
So you have frontage roads.
So you have frontage roads and grade separations
and free flow main lanes.
And to put this in perspective,
I think the average daily traffic out there
is a little over 70,000 cars and 55,000 or more,
you get to where you should be in a freeway scenario
and 12 years, 15 years from now,
it's pushed to be like 90,000.
So even that's after we plug in the outer loop
as a limited access facility or freeway.
So that traffic that's gonna come from the fact
that we're building the toll road right now
to Grayson County, it's under construction,
that traffic is gonna come south.
And if the outer loop is there,
they'll take that in west because it's a quicker
move around the corner.
But if that's, even with that there,
380 goes to 90,000 in 2035 or something like that.
- But controlled access is the core thought
and frontage roads, but then when you say great separation.
- That's a bridge over.
So when you pull up to 423 coming out of Frisco,
you go north, when you hit 380,
380 is gonna go over, you'll go under--
- Overpasses and underpasses.
- Over and underpasses.
- Got it, great explanation, thank you.
- I'll take the two great separations
in the appendix glossary.
So in that note, Loop 288 is proposed
as a actual physical controlled access facility.
So it'll have frontage roads and freeway main lanes
and great overpasses and underpasses at the cross streets.
So again, we've already, today's the 21st,
so yes, it is, right?
Okay, so yesterday, Commissioners Court approved
the LTRA design packet for doing the design
on this project as well.
It was about just under two million bucks
and we are working with city staff to make sure again,
because this is primarily a road that impacts
all of the industrial area in that area,
that we'll coordinate with the city to make sure
that what we design is what the city wants to see happen.
1173, so right now we're awaiting environmental clearance
and we're also, it was part of conformity
and we were told last Friday that it will be cleared
because it has received conformity,
so 1173 will be cleared this month as well.
There is negotiations and conversations
between the county and TechStock
on who picks up the next phase of the project
where on the design and at some point,
well, the county's decided they're gonna go out
for a bond program next November
and we're already working with city staff
to coordinate your efforts on that
and probably this will be one of those projects
that you see on the bond program where the county
goes ahead and moves forward with all of the design documents,
the 10% right away match and then any construction dollars
that TechStock says they may need on the project.
So this is gonna become fairly more active fairly quickly.
Okay, so Alma Locus and I'm gonna be out of my depth
real fast on this, but essentially we've been working,
I know that's not surprising to anybody.
We've been working with TechStock
on how to deal with Alma Locus for years
and we think we have a tentative agreement.
City's gone in from the courthouse south
and all those improvements and the road
is in a certain degree of state of disrepair
that we were talking about on Friday
that TechStock needs to find a quick remedy
to get that pavement back to a navigable surface
in the interim, but ultimately to reconstruct it
and at that point, TechStock inquires to the city's desire
to take Alma Locus off system
and the thinking is if you take it off system
after they fix it, right, where it's a real road again,
that you'll be able to use the road as you see fit
and make it into your own image as opposed to something
that TechStock says you can and can't do.
So I don't know how much I butchered that,
but I'm looking for salvation.
- Well, I'd like to understand why there's discussion
of two steps, you know, making it quickly navigable
and reconstructing it.
Why are we just doing it?
I think that'll be really confusing to people.
Like they fix it and then they tore it up again.
That's the thing that makes people laugh.
- What we're talking about is the milling overlay
so that you're not looking like you're in the Kosovo, right?
So we just wanna get at something that's drivable,
that's quick and easy because the reconstruct
where you come in and you do the subgrade improvements
and you put the road back so that it lasts a long time
so that if you do take it, you're getting a quality product
as opposed to something with paint on it, essentially.
- What's the time interval between milling overlay
and just reconstructing it again?
- A long time for people.
It's a minute for TechStock, but it's a long time for humans.
I'm still looking for help.
- No, you're fine, I was waiting for you to be finished.
Mayor Pro Temelter, I just mentioned that this is something
that we are actively working on with TechStock.
Our concern is we are gonna be completed
with all of our project in the very near future
and that is the water and sewer
and storm drain improvements basically
from the courthouse south, as John mentioned.
And I think our concern is that that road has been patched
so that it still has a drivable surface.
And some of the discussion, and this is a constant
conversation that we're having at this time,
is previous staff have looked into taking
this roadway infrastructure over at such time
that is repaired and reconstructed to a standard
of which we feel like we're comfortable with taking over.
A milling overlay would be something that would be
an interim step that could be completed maybe
through a maintenance contract with TechStock
versus a full reconstruct which would have
to actually be bid and a process would have to go through.
- And designed. - And designed.
And so there may be this interim step simply
from the standpoint that the city is not interested
in taking over the roadway permanently
until it's reconstructed to the standard
of which we are willing to accept.
So I think the purpose of the mill and overlay
is simply from the standpoint that currently
that roadway infrastructure is not designed
and also not a programmed project that they currently have
that they're working through.
So those are interim conversations that we've been having
over the last few weeks.
TechStock's committed to working with us
to come up with a plan.
And so I would say that that mill and overlay
that John mentioned is just simply from the standpoint
that we don't want there to be a large gap of time
in between the time that the utilities
and the storm drain is completed until they can actually
come in and do that reconstruction.
So-- - Forgive me, I'm a bit baffled
'cause it's gotta be a good year ago or more
that council voted to take those over
when it was put in condition to be worthy
of being taken over.
So why isn't it being bid now
so that after utilities, the reconstruct happens?
I don't understand the gap. - Well, I'm gonna answer that
'cause I don't want her to answer that.
What happened at TechStock is
they have turnover there as all organizations do.
And the people that are there now
did not get communicated properly with.
But the intent was we come along right behind them.
So somewhere along the way that,
and I'm gonna take responsibility for that.
Somewhere along the way when the transition of staff
at TechStock occurred, that communication didn't get made.
And when we were talking to the folks that we think
they're gonna start showing a really good focus
for city of Denton, with the folks that got there now
are there long-term and they're very capable.
We essentially started that conversation on Friday.
So I'm gonna call that on me.
- Yeah, I appreciate you owning that.
That's, I guess I'd ask you offline to think about it.
How could I possibly avoid the future?
That's a big miss.
- Yes, sir.
But the mill and overlay is simply,
they came in with a machine, they mill it flat,
get it as smooth as possible
without impacting any of the substructures.
And then they come in with a two-inch overlay.
And that's like a coat of paint.
And that will last about as long as it takes us
to get the other project designed and bid and awarded.
So we'd have to do that anyway.
But if the city wanted to just take it over after that,
I would fight you hammer and tongue
'cause the substructure's not good.
- Yeah, we wanna make sure
that when we take that infrastructure over
that it's to the standard of which we believe it should be.
And that will be part of the MOU.
My understanding that all of the MOU,
and I wasn't in this position at that time,
but the MOU that has been processed
and has been evaluated was not completed.
And so we still need to bring that back to council.
We're looking at bringing that back in pieces.
And this is one of the projects
that is highest of interest of staff,
simply because we see the improvements
that have been made south of the courthouse,
but it's also very much on our radar.
And the reason why you also see it on this graphic
and why John's included in the report
is now we want to come up with the plan.
And like he mentioned, the new area engineer and his team,
we are having monthly meetings with,
and sometimes we're even talking weekly or daily
on different things that are happening throughout the city,
but we want to come up with the plan also
to execute from now the courthouse north to 380
in a more succinct manner
that's more of a programmatic matter.
So I would say that at this point,
we are looking for measures to make improvements
to the roadway on that temporary or interim basis
before that complete project can be reconstructed
to the standard of which the city would then be interested
in accepting it.
- Yeah, I've said what I needed to say about it.
Any other comments?
Okay. - Sorry.
Fortunately for me, I think I'm done.
Any questions? - Any questions?
- Got a question.
Would you please explain this,
still on Elm and Locust phase two,
it was so much going on with that conversation.
For this red line, what does this mean to the people?
- So this was a conversation we had on Friday,
and I told my staff, hey, we need to get it in the report
so we can talk about it, throw something in there
so we can have a conversation.
So this will be upgraded to a far better graphic and details
the next time you see it.
But essentially, the city's doing the work in phases.
Courthouse south is essentially fixing to be done.
Courthouse north has some challenges
from a financial standpoint that we need to discuss,
and we're gonna coordinate and memorialize
with text what Ms. Devaney was saying
in a more programmatic manner
so that we do the northern part better than the southern part.
- And the same thing that's happening in the southern part
that's going to happen in the northern part,
but it's gonna be-- - Better, better.
- Yes, yes, ma'am.
- Is that, you can't expand that world all the way out.
- Well, I mean-- - The utilities need to be--
- There's not a lot of right of way there.
It's very tight, which is why I think the city
would be better off having control of it
because you don't have to follow state standards.
You just have to follow AASHTO or your own city standards,
and you can make it more of a origin destination route
as opposed to a state facility.
- Yeah, and I would just mention
that the same utility improvements
that were made south of the courthouse
need to be made north of the courthouse,
so that's water, wastewater, and drainage infrastructure.
As Mr. Polster mentioned, there are funding gaps,
and I know you've seen this in some of our CIP presentations
where we are looking for drainage funding
for that portion of the project,
and we're working with TxDOT on some creative ideas
to help solve some of those issues.
And then ultimately, that roadway being built
to the standard of which the city
would then be able to accept it from that standpoint.
I would like to mention also that it's very interesting,
and we run into this many times.
There are six TxDOT roadways throughout the city of Denton
that are TxDOT responsibility and maintenance,
and we also have some maintenance agreements
that we're gonna be working through with them
in the near future.
They showed us a preview of that last Thursday.
I say that to tell you that typically on TxDOT roadways,
utility infrastructure is not allowed
underneath the main lanes,
and so that's another very interesting reason
as to why it would be in the city's best interest
to take over these roadways
once the infrastructure is completed and reconstructed
to the standard of which we would accept.
And really, that boils into on normal,
and I say normal in quotes,
but standard TxDOT projects would be
that utilities would be located
either in the utility accommodation zone,
which typically is the last three to 10 feet
on the outside of the right away,
or in a private easement that is purchased
by the city of Denton for those utility infrastructure.
So this is a little bit different standard,
and so I think that's another major reason
why it's in the city's best interest to look at.
I'm taking over this from the infrastructure standpoint
with the needs of the water and wastewater in this area.
- Closer in and around the courthouse,
back of curb is sidewalk.
Back of sidewalk is building all the time,
so everything has to be under the pavement,
and that's something that we've had to,
it's always been a pain whenever we wanna do
utility improvements on Locust and Elm
because it's under pavement of a state facility,
and you gotta take it all the way
to Austin and back every time.
- I have one last thing I just wanted to mention.
I know Council Member Byrd,
you asked specifically about the red lines.
Some of that area is very interesting.
One of the things that we are working on educating residents
about really is that portion of EGLE
that's on the left graph,
that's the very last line that you see
that's running east-west,
that portion of EGLE between Elm and Locust
is actually textile maintained.
So some of those things are things
that we're working through
because that also is in a similar state of disrepair.
I know they've done some recent potholes,
but that's part of the outreach.
This not only impacts the city infrastructure,
but then I would say even from winter weather,
who's going to provide the snow and ice maintenance measures,
whether it's sanding or putting out the chemical
that they do to help with the ice.
So these are some things that we see that are on our radar
that we also are working with the streets department on.
So I mentioned that just to say that,
from a resident standpoint, you're driving Donegal,
you assume it's a city roadway,
but it's actually maintained by Text-dot in that area.
So those are some of the things that we're working
to kind of coordinate with Text-dot on it
and per se clean up to make sure that those roadways
are built to the city specifications and standards.
- Thank you. - No problem.
- Do I stop, oh, go ahead.
- Oh, okay, so I shared this thought
with Ms. Devaney and Ms. Wood in our meeting last week.
Sorry if this is a harebrained idea,
but I just want to throw it out there
while the 35 project is in the design phase,
or before the design phase, whatever it is.
So I love the overpass,
the bridge across 35E at North Texas Boulevard.
I would love to see the other overpasses
that are being built have a similar kind of design.
I know that there's one that's gonna go from Windsor.
And in the interest of improved connectivity,
especially for pedestrians and cyclists,
I would love to see a similar overpass at Scripture and 35.
- We can look at the approved,
'cause the environmental schematic's already done,
so we can look to see what's there.
The North Texas Boulevard and similar,
as you go down through Lewisville,
we see those aesthetic improvements.
There's a certain threshold that Text-dot
will include naturally in a project,
and we had to, the cities along the corridor
had to agree to a palette of colors
and standardized form liners,
and they could be emphasis areas.
So you have, Denton has North Texas
as the green color mixed in.
Lewisville had the lake with the blue,
and we had further south, Old Town area,
Carrollton had a kind of a brown type palette,
so we have a palette that we're gonna be working
aesthetically with on this project.
But then when it comes to like those medallions
that are at North Texas Boulevard,
back then, the city staff came to the aesthetic conversation
a little bit later than Lewisville did.
Lewisville was early on, so we had to redesign some stuff
for that wall to be wired and structured
so it can hold that 18-foot medallion.
- So I guess I should clarify,
the aesthetics are very nice,
but what I mean is that it's very pedestrian-friendly.
- Okay, so the bridge deck, again,
everything that was done to North Texas Boulevard
was a negotiation between the city staff,
the city and Text-dot and the county,
and whatever the county could press the state to include
from an infrastructure standpoint or a structural standpoint,
we did that from the county standpoint,
and then the city came in and would partner with
the color patterns, the separated pedestrian facilities,
all that was negotiated, and if there was anything
that had to be above and beyond at the time,
the city paid for the Delta.
So we're doing that for all of the other projects
on the ultimate as well, so I would say you're right.
It's not a crazy idea.
Now's the time while we're designing the project
because we can incorporate fractured fin, if you want.
We can do certain types of aesthetic form liners
that you want, and if you want to do specific form liners,
as long as you keep it to a minimum of, say,
five or six different form liners for,
so Louisville had to pay for half the form liners
for all those fish and boats and whatever
because there was a certain number of form liners
that the contractor was gonna have to use anyway
just for the fractured fin format,
so they work it out on a negotiation,
and then they incorporate that into the design
so the contractor will build it when they're building
the facility as opposed to after the fact,
which is what the medallions were.
The up part was negotiated early on,
but everything, I think the question was asked once before.
There are places in the interim project now
where there are sidewalks on 35,
and there are places where there aren't,
and the answer is the places where they are,
we've done something to the road.
Those places where we have it
because that's a new paradigm didn't.
What we're doing from the merge north
is all new construction, and I think,
I'm remembering, I could have a dream,
but I think Tech Start's saying right now it stops short,
just short of North Texas Boulevard,
that I think the district wants to go ahead
and extend that 35E leg to pick up North Texas Boulevard,
to widen that structure, right,
and we get a second shot at making the bottom
look as good as the top.
- And I would just mention to Council Member McGuire
and the Parks Department is looking at
the different aesthetics from medallions,
different types of forms,
and so that's something that we're coordinating with Tech Start.
It's not at the local office,
it's actually at the Dallas District Office,
and some of those things they may even be bringing forward
to the Public Art Committee,
and so that is a constant conversation.
I think what I heard you say,
and I just wanna confirm specifically,
and I know this was what we talked about in our meeting
on Friday, is that you're looking at some type of bridge
or structure that could possibly be constructed
where Scripture would actually go over 35
and connect to the west near the Jim Crystal area.
- Possibly, yes, and I know that there,
you know, there were some questions
about whether it would be feasible
to extend Jim Crystal Road to meet Scripture.
You know, in the absence of that,
if that turns out to not be feasible,
I would also love to just see Scripture go across,
have a nice sort of pedestrian-friendly intersection there
where folks could access the frontage road
on the west side of 35 as well.
- So I'm expendable, that's why I'm here,
but if there's not a bridge structure
already included in the project,
I have to crush your hopes horribly right now
'cause they won't add it.
It's too far along.
So I don't know what's in it.
If there's a structure there,
we can make it as appealing as you want,
but if there's not one there now,
which now I'm starting to remember,
I don't think there is because we're doing a braided ramp
in that location, northbound at least.
So all these things we're doing on interim improvements there
all get pulled out because the ultimate has the on-ramp
and the off-ramp in the exact same location
and the ultimate,
which is if you go down to Western Center Boulevard,
down towards Fort Worth on 35W,
where you see those big giant exit and entrance
at the same place, it's called a braided ramp,
that's what you'll have at least on the northbound side
of 35 in that area.
- Okay, so the off-ramp is gonna be
to the south of scripture from 35 North?
- The interim or the ultimate, interim or ultimate?
- Ultimate.
- North.
- Okay.
- So essentially between scripture and 380,
almost dead center there is where the braid will be
so that you'll exit the main lanes and go straight to 380.
And if you're on the frontage road south of there,
you'll enter the freeway right there.
And I'm not, I can't remember
'cause I think we flipped the stack,
whether the exit is that grade
or the entrance is that grade.
It's typically the exits that grade
because you want those people on the ground
as quickly as possible so they can turn into the development.
But I don't know off the top of my head.
- Okay, all right.
- With all that's on the website,
keepitmovingdallas.com,
you can go look at it or we can go run it to ground for you.
- Okay, yes, I appreciate you clarifying that.
I totally understand if a bridge at scripture is,
if it's too late in the process to add something like that,
I just thought I'd throw it out.
- I think there's a really helpful thing to be aware of
for us that when bridges are planned,
we can talk about having pedestrian faculties on them.
If only we had a bike pad ADA coordinator
to be on the lookout for things like that.
- That's right.
- Maybe we'll talk about that later in the meeting.
- Danielle, you still have one of those?
- Wish they started Monday.
I think they, our ADA person started on yesterday
for the first time.
- He's sitting in the front row.
- Oh, is he?
There he is.
I had a question about,
oh, I'm a pioneer woman,
Texas Women's University alum,
and I seem like Texas Women's University
should be represented somewhere along the corridor of I-35
as it is a major employer and user of the city.
Can we speak to those folks or bring that in
as part of the new process?
It's front door is on 380.
- We are actually already in the works with that.
The Parks Department is already looking at ways
to incorporate possibly something from TW
and also something to show when you're coming
from the Oklahoma area into town
that you're entering Denton.
So those types of conversations are in the works
with our Parks Department currently.
No problem.
- So unlike I was taught in kindergarten,
I'm gonna stop sharing, right?
- So we're good, we're all done?
Yep.
Okay, thank you very much.
Let's move on now to item C, MC21-027.
I never used to read the numbers, but the mayor does it,
so I'll do it too.
Receive a report and hold the discussion
regarding updates from the Denton County
Transportation Authority.
Nicole, hi, Nicole.
- Good morning.
- Can everyone hear me okay?
- Sorry?
- Can everyone hear me okay?
- Oh, yes.
- Yes.
Ish?
- Yeah.
- Okay, well, I'm Nicole Recker.
I'm the VP of Mobility Services and Administration at DCTA.
And I also have with me Christina Holcomb,
who is DCTA's Deputy CEO.
City staff asked that we present about our trip program.
So Christina is gonna cover off on that
and answer any questions.
And then I just have just a couple updates to share.
I will let the committee know
that we do have another pending meeting at 10 a.m.
that both Christina and I are in.
And so we will do our best to answer any questions,
but we might have some scheduling conflicts.
And so with that, I'll go ahead and share my screen.
And then Christina can begin.
- Thank you, Nicole.
Good morning.
I wanted to provide a very brief overview
of the Transportation Reinvestment Program
per staff's request.
The TRIP program is a new program to DCTA
and is a new version of a former program
we used to have, which was called ELAP.
Next slide, please.
Just to give a brief overview of what TRIP is all about,
it's really focused on providing funding to the cities
to implement projects which are consistent
with the DCTA's long-range service plan.
We do have a long-range service plan from 2012.
You can see the key objectives for that plan on the screen.
So any project that the city might have
that meets these goals,
it is something that DCTA may be able to assist with funding.
Kind of go back a little bit,
just a very high-level education as just to confirm
that you are aware that DCTA operates
off of half-cent sales tax from each of our member cities.
So city of Denton, we get a half-cent sales tax,
and that is what is used to operate
and maintain DCTA assets, fleet, and operations.
So in a way to partner with our member cities,
we take a portion of that money
and provide that in partnership to the city
to execute projects that, again,
might meet these goals and objectives.
Next page, please.
So in looking at the funding,
how it is determined, how much that funding is,
is the annual TRIP budget is based on 15%
of DCTA's net available cash from the previous fiscal year.
And I will say, sometimes we think we know
what the final tax receipts are in a year,
but then there's always a true up at the end of the year.
So we have found in this first year
of having this TRIP program
that we have had to make some adjustments
along the way on the total final amount.
And I'll show you what those numbers look like.
For this initial year, which was this past year, FY21,
we did infuse, the board wanted to infuse
an extra $2 million on top of the 15% net available cash
into this first year of TRIP projects.
Then we take out 5% of the overall budget
to allocate towards DCTA's program administration.
So we have had to use one of our on-call engineering firms
to assist us in administering this program.
We guessed at 5%, we weren't really sure
exactly how much we might need
for the administration portion.
Again, first year, so this policy is expected to be updated
for the next year.
So when you look at the different member city allocations,
we have three member cities,
Denton, Louisville, and Highland Village,
all collect and administer
different levels of sales tax, right?
It's all a half cent, but clearly the bigger the city,
the bigger the sales tax contribution.
So the formulas on the screen about how we determine
how much each member city will get
out of that bucket of dollars.
Any dollars that are not spent by a city
at the end of the fiscal year
may roll over to the next fiscal year for three years.
So that way, if you have a bigger project
you know is coming up in FY23,
you don't have to spend as much in FY21 and FY22
because you can roll it over and kind of save up your,
make your bank bigger for the FY23 projects
that you might have slated.
Again, that last bullet,
I do anticipate that the board will be amending
the trip policy based on this first year of programming.
Some of the timing didn't quite work out right,
so we will work through some of those amendments.
Next page, please.
So we do have an annual call for projects.
So how a city will seek funding from DCTA
is in January, we announced
that we'll have an annual call for projects.
We have an application that city staff completes for us.
Then they submit it within about 90 days.
Staff reviews that information,
confirms that all of the requested projects for funding
meet the goals and objectives of the Long Range Service Plan
that the agency has.
And then we take those projects to the board.
So this, we actually just, for this fiscal year,
the first year of trip,
we took all of the call for projects that were submitted
to the board this past month in June.
And the board reviews those projects
and then they approve them for project funding.
And it is a reimbursement basis.
So the city will basically go through,
execute their project.
Our staff and consultants will check in from time to time
to ensure that all of the processes are being followed
that are outlined in the policy.
And then, so in June, the board did approve projects.
So on the next page,
let's talk a little bit about eligibility and selection.
As I mentioned, it must meet Long Range Service goals,
must be financially sound.
We do have a policy that your staff should have
that they can look through
and probably share a copy of it with you
to get the nitty-gritty.
But since we're on a time restriction,
I won't go into this in much more detail.
Next page.
So let's talk dollars.
For FY21, the total allocation to the trip program
for distribution to the three member cities
was 7.7 million.
Now, I will say that is more than the 15% budget allocation
but the net available fund balance
because this first year,
the board wanted to infuse that extra $2 million.
So the total came to 7.7 million.
Denton's portion is 3.4 million.
When we had the anal proffer projects,
that number was not that high
because we had to make some adjustments.
Again, the final sales tax dollars did not come in.
So the total amount ended up being 3.4.
Now that we've already completed the anal proffer projects,
the city of Denton does have an extra $900,000,
so almost a million dollars to use this year
if there are additional projects that the city has
that meet those goals and objectives.
So kind of next steps,
those will roll over into the next fiscal year
and be added to the ones that will be added
for the FY22 budget.
To give you an idea of what we're looking at for FY22,
again, just an estimate
'cause we are currently in the budgeting process
but the proposed budget that will be presented to the board
does include 7.1 million for trip projects
for the three member cities.
So very similar to what you received in FY21,
a little bit less, but then you also have this extra
almost a million dollars to add to your pot for FY22.
I said that really quick.
I'm sure there are questions.
I can maybe answer a couple
or if you want to email those to me, maybe we can respond.
That way it gives Nicole the opportunity
to answer your questions regarding the GoZone service
or whatever questions you have for her
before we have to jump off in less than 60 seconds.
- You're right on 10 o'clock.
Anything real quick?
- And this is the list of projects
that your staff did submit to DCTA
and these are the ones that were funded
and the amount that they requested
for those particular projects are listed.
So it really is a great partnership.
Clearly crosswalks and sidewalks benefit transit travel
and then the bike path.
So these were excellent projects
and very well aligned with our longway service plan.
- This isn't a question, but I would just like
to thank Nicole for her service to DCTA
these last few years.
I know that she's moving on to other opportunities
and Nicole, I just want to wish you the best of luck.
- I didn't catch that.
Nicole's-- - Thank you.
That's actually one of my announcements today.
- Oh, wow, I don't know how--
- Sorry to steal your thunder.
- Councilmember McGuire has the secret source of news.
- Yeah, I know.
- Wow, yeah, let me add my good wishes to you.
- Same here, Nicole, thank you.
- Just quickly on this, on the trip projects,
just not generally, even if you have to drop off,
I'm kind of more speaking to any
of the general public listening.
Unlike most things we do, DCTA is not funded
based on figuring out what the needs are
and then developing a budget and funding that.
It's funded based on just what the sales tax revenue is.
So whether the ridership is going up or going down,
it's just, it's not responsive to that.
So the fact that this program helps bring some of that money
that isn't going into literally mass transit,
back into the community in a related way,
I think is very smart and much appreciated.
- Well, and I would say that if you have any questions
about the trip program, like Christina mentioned,
feel free to email those over to me.
We can make sure that we get those answered
and submitted back to the committee.
I know Christina has to jump off.
I'll show up fashionably late to the meeting, Christina.
- I'll cover for you while you're gone.
- Thank you all.
I did want to update the committee just on some progress
on the GoZone proposal that is going
to the DCTA board tomorrow.
- We were talking about that just recently.
We were talking about that just recently.
- You might've heard.
- I've slept since then, yes.
Yeah, so we are expecting the resolution
from the city of Denton and we will forward that
to our board of directors prior to tomorrow's meeting.
But the board will be considering approval
on a variety of items related to GoZone.
So I'm sure that we will submit a written update
to city staff after the Thursday meeting
just to kind of keep everyone on the same page.
And so just thank you again for your continued conversation
about GoZone and your feedback.
I know I speak on behalf of staff.
We have found it extremely helpful to have, you know,
kind of a vibrant conversation about some of these changes
for the community and we'll certainly be in touch
after our board has some lengthy discussion
and makes a decision about next steps regarding
any sort of service modification.
And then I did just wanna let the committee know
that my last day at DCTA will be August 4th.
I have served a very happy seven years at DCTA
and although I am sad to leave,
I am sure that DCTA has such amazing things ahead of it.
And I just wanted to thank the committee
for providing DCTA with a platform to talk about, you know,
our services and our programs and our projects
during my tenure here at DCTA.
And I will certainly make sure that, you know,
you have a representative who will still come
and attend monthly.
So hopefully you will not go without any representation,
but I just wanted to personally thank each one of you
for being invested in transportation for the city of Denton
and providing your feedback.
I have found it extremely educational
and I've really enjoyed my time working with this committee.
- Well, you have been just a crackerjack representative
for DCTA to us and I really appreciate your preparation
and your clarity and you're leaving big shoes to fill.
And you can only do well in what you do next,
I fully expect.
I have just related back to GoZone.
I'll just, if I may, I want to underscore some things
that might not be obvious from just the headline
that if you take into account the full conversation
and the full proceedings that actually all seven members
of council voted in some form or another
for an extended parallel test to optimize the mix.
All seven members voted at one point or another
for consideration of elimination affairs
and evaluation of that opportunity.
All seven members voted at one point or another
for consideration of right sizing the fleet
in terms of the vehicles themselves on the fixed routes
and a super majority did vote for some form
of keeping the workforce whole.
So I hope that helps the discussion,
knowing kind of what council has expressed.
Other comments?
We're good?
Okay, thank you.
- Oh, I do have a question.
- Thank you. - Please.
- All right, I do.
- I do have a question.
She mentioned something about the funds being rolled over
into the next year for three years.
- Yes.
- And what my question in my head was,
well, what would make a city not use the funds
for three years?
What kind of circumstance would an area have to be under
to not to take advantage of using those funds?
And then what happens to those funds after three years?
Are they dispersed to other cities to use?
Tell me a little bit about that.
- Sure.
So the purpose, and there's really two main purposes
in allowing the funds to roll over.
So the first purpose would be much like Christina showed
on that slide, that the city submits a number of projects,
they're approved, but they don't spend the total allocation
for the year.
And so you have a bit of a fund balance
that then you can roll.
The second purpose would be that if the city had the intent
of submitting a project that required more funding
and was available for one singular fiscal year,
and they decided to roll a portion or that entire funding
over to the following year to basically combine annual funds
so that they would have enough money for the project.
So it provides the city with just a little bit
more flexibility as to how they want to submit for projects.
They can do many low dollar projects,
or they could do something that's much larger
and requires more funding.
And it just gives the city flexibility to use that funding
based on their needs.
After the three-year period of time,
the fund balance then just rolls back down
to our cash bottom line.
And so it would be represented in the following fiscal year,
that 15% of overall cash balance at the end
of the fiscal year, it would be represented there.
And so it's highly possible that the city would just get
a slightly increased portion because that balance
has rolled down to the cash.
- What, when does, tell me again,
when are these decisions made as to how to use those funds?
When does that come up?
- So we do an annual call for projects.
This year, the annual call for projects was in April,
and then reviewed by our board in May,
and then approved in June.
So there's an annual call for projects,
and then we work with city staff to let them know
that timing, and then city staff has their own internal
process for determining what projects are submitted.
- And if I may, Mr. Chair, we will certainly make
a commitment to not run into the issue of leaving funds
available for other cities to potentially be able
to avail themselves to.
So we will be bringing back very soon a plan
for that additional roughly $900,000.
That was great news for us whenever we found it out.
We've actually got a couple of projects that,
the numbers actually work out really well,
projects that we've already submitted
for the first round of trip to fund the design.
It will help bridge the gap that we needed
for construction dollars as well.
So we'll be bringing that back
at a future mobility committee meeting,
and then we're strategizing right now,
and we're delighted to have our new
senior transportation planner on board.
But what does that process for vetting potential projects
for the 2022 cycle look like?
- I'll just let you know right now,
what we're looking at primarily focusing in on
is the gap sidewalks in front of schools.
And so this is gonna be a great way to augment
that $12 million that we had approved
as part of the 2019 bond,
to fully fund those Safe Routes to School projects,
where unfortunately we haven't gotten
some of the text dot dollars that we've gotten
in the past to fund that program.
So we will be coming back to you
within the next couple of months,
talking about our strategy,
talking about the vetting process for potential projects.
And we do plan on having our application
ready to go in January,
which is the same timing that we had last year.
City Council, once we've got the list
vetted through this committee and Traffic Safety Commission,
then City Council will adopt a resolution
endorsing the application.
And so we wanna make sure as soon as April comes,
we've got that resolution approved,
and we're ready to submit our application to DCTA.
- Great, thank you.
Anything else?
You look like you have something you wanna say, no?
- That's just my face.
- Okay.
- That's perfectly acceptable face.
So, okay.
Thank you so much, Nicole.
We'll miss you.
- Thank you.
- Moving on.
Let's open item D, MC21-028.
Receive a report and hold the discussion
regarding the City of Denton's proposed expenditure funds
in the amount of $70,553
to TxDOT's Highway Improvement Safety Program.
- Good morning, everyone.
I'm Chandra with Traffic Engineering.
I'm here to provide an overview of HSIP program,
which is short and form
for Highway Safety Improvement Program.
HSIP is an annual textile program
to improve safety of intersections or corridors
along roadways in the City of Denton
or statewide highways in Texas.
The project selection criteria is based on
mostly the fatal or serious injuries in highways.
There are two categories on projects awarded
is based on on-system and off-system.
On-system are the TxDOT roadways
that has owned or maintained by city
and county-owned roadways.
In case of on-system roadways,
TxDOT pays for 100% of the construction cost
and city is up for design, review fees,
and any additional overages at the time of construction.
Off-system projects are slightly different
in the way of the dollar amount.
TxDOT pays for 90% of the construction
and city pays for 10% matching funds for construction,
as well as design, overages,
and any review fees from TxDOT.
In this project, we have three locations.
One is, as you see on the map,
the north arrow is to the left,
Kingsrow at Loop 288, Loop 288 at 380 interchange,
and McKinney at Loop 288.
This project was submitted back in 2018
with an estimate funds for improving the signal heads
that was 20 years or older.
For pedestrian access,
putting in all the new controller cabinets,
battery backups, adding signage,
and also increasing intersection stripings.
The location at Loop 288 in Kingsrow
is to modernize mainly the traffic signal.
Permanent fixtures, right now it's on a mast arm,
so they will change it out to put in
from the span wire to mast arm with luminaries,
also controller cabinet and communication equipment
with the latest technologies to optimize efficiency
and safety at the intersection.
This will also improve pedestrian crossings,
which is not available right now,
and they will deploy radar and all the grid smarts cameras
to monitor activities so we can improve functions remotely.
Similarly, at Loop 288 at 380,
the intersection and the controllers were pretty old,
so they are upgrading all the communication equipments,
changing the lightings to LEDs,
and also the latest cameras that we can control remotely.
At Loop 288 at McKinney, it's similar,
we are upgrading all the controllers
and detection equipments
so we can optimize and monitor remotely.
At the time back, the previous staff
submitted the initial estimate based on 2018 dollars.
It was costing a little more than,
a little less than 700,000
based on TechStat's 100% construction cost.
Citi was up for a little less than $30,000
for TechStat plan reviews,
and in the process between 2018 and '19,
we hired Lee Engineering as a designer
for the three intersections
at a cost of $88,250 for design,
and when we completed the design
and submitted for TechStat for bidding,
the actual bid results came out to be
around approximately $768,000,
and since Citi will have to match any overage costs
from the initial estimate in 2018 to 2021,
we are on the hook for $70,000.
When we submitted the project,
we were on hook for 17% of the total cost
of the entire project,
and with the additional overage of $70,000,
it's mainly, we are on right now at 25%,
we're still getting one to three dollars.
For one Citi dollar, we are getting three TechStat dollars
spent on the Citi Road base,
and the additional $70,000 is mainly accounted for
in the inflation as well as the project scope.
Right now at King's Row at 288,
there is no pedestrian crossing across the loop,
so with this project, they will be adding crosswalks,
and also with the new equipments,
they will be able to control the intersection efficiently
that will enable the delays on King's Road to be optimized,
and we can minimize the delays.
Also, at the same time, provide safe crossing
for pedestrians on either side of loop 288.
With this project, we're still getting good bucks
spent on Citi dollars,
even with spending the additional $70,000
that came out of the bid results in May of 2021.
With that, if you have any questions.
- Councilmember McGuire,
you look like you have something to say.
- Oh, sorry, what?
- I said, you look like you have something to say.
- I do have something to say.
So you sort of alluded to this in your mention
of the traffic congestion at King's Row and 288.
Did you see the video that a citizen showed last night
at the council meeting of that intersection?
Okay, just want to make sure that you were aware
of that footage and sort of taking
that particular issue into account.
It sounds like you are, but.
- Yes.
- Councilmember Byrd.
- Yes, I have a question about the loop 288
in King's Row area.
Am I, let me see, let me phrase this
because what I have in my head is, what is a mast arm?
- It's the signal indication that's on a cantilever arm,
the permanent structures.
- Just kind of leaning over like that?
- Yes.
- That's a mast arm?
- Yes.
- Versus the little line that goes across with the?
- Yes, it's on a wire, currently it's on span wire,
so if there is a wind or any hail
or any kind of environmental forces,
those kind of like literally move,
but with mast arms, it's literally,
you can see in one place.
- You know, 288 is a very fast--
- That's right.
- Roadway, and in my mind right now,
I just can't imagine having a crosswalk,
you know, across that roadway.
I've seen people run the light there on that roadway,
and maybe you don't have anything to do with this part,
this may have been for the question
for the other gentlemen about an additional,
I guess they're gonna be widening that roadway,
they're gonna be doing something there,
where those cars, to which you alluded to,
can, they run out into the roadway,
I mean, they run out into literally on 288
to wait their turn. - Currently,
currently they are all backed up with the delays,
because one is the capacity issue on 288,
and the school traffic that we are aware of from 2019
that it's backing up onto the freeway.
With this project, we could add more timings
to the cross street, which is Kingsrow in this case,
and Loop 280, as you all know, it's a non-system facility,
and Techstart have plans to improve as well,
and they recently added medians along 288,
so that will give some protection
for pedestrian crossings in the future.
And with this improvements, the signal optimization
and the error in functioning can be controlled.
At the same time, the indications would be slightly bigger
than what it is right now in field.
- So with that being said, and the timing,
is that gonna change throughout the year,
based on when the school session is in?
- Yes, we have the flexibility with this,
we can have multiple patterns within a day,
and we can have it for school time,
we can have it for weekends,
we can even have it for morning and evening,
so we have a lot more flexibility to adjust.
- Thank you, while we're on the subject of Kingsrow,
do you think that the signal timing is enough,
does that represent a kind of a comprehensive solution
to what we've been hearing from the public
about that intersection, or is there more to it
to address the concerns, the backups at Hodge?
- Mayor Pritam, Chair, I believe that the signal project
is going to improve, as Chandra mentioned,
the timing in this area.
I would say specifically related to that development,
that's not on the posting for the agenda today,
so we would have to discuss that at a later time.
But we do know that the signal timing in that area
is going to be improved by this project.
We also know that, as Council Member McGuire alluded to,
there are concerns in this area,
so we know this project will help improve in that area.
I would also mention that staff is evaluating
these improvements that are going to be made,
and also evaluating the timing of the signal in this area.
We are also looking into,
from the timing perspective and the school district,
we understand that many individuals in this area
were actually driving their children to school,
versus having them ride the school bus due to COVID,
and so we are evaluating that,
and seeing if that does need,
additional improvements need to be made
from a timing perspective.
So this is specifically a project
that's already been planned, regardless of anything else
that's going on in the area.
- I'll sneak it in under E5 anyway, so that's all right.
I did specifically mention the signaling in my comments,
but I take your stern correction there.
- I also want to mention that this is proposed
to go to Council on August 10th,
for adoption and approval through the City Council.
So this is something that TxDOT is very interested in us
moving through the process,
as the way that they actually bid these projects,
it's not just the City of Denton,
it's also the City of McKinney.
So they're very interested in getting this completed
so that they can have the contractor go out
and do the improvements to these signals
for these multiple cities.
- I think it's great, thank you so much.
Have you presented to us before?
- No, this is my first presentation.
- I thought so, congratulations.
- Thank you, thank you.
- Are we good?
- Yeah, we're good.
- Yeah, okay.
(laughing)
- Yes, you had to look like,
there was a thing I wanted to say
and you neglected to ask me.
(laughing)
- I just finished my talk, you heard me.
- Yeah, wow, I want some of that.
Okay, so moving on to item E, MC21-029 staff report.
- Wonderful, well thank you so much.
I know all of you know me, but I am Becky Devaney,
the City Engineer and Director of Capital Projects
and I have an exciting announcement.
I know this is a much awaited position.
And so the first item on our agenda today
is for Mr. Nathan George to come up to the podium.
(applauding)
And introduce himself.
Nathan is going to explain to you some of his education,
experience, technical background.
Nathan started with us on Monday
and he is our new Senior Planner,
Bicycle Pedestrian and ADA Coordinator.
And so I'm gonna turn this over to Nathan
so he can visit with you briefly.
And I know there's gonna be much more opportunity
for us to have other conversations.
And so he is at the point, I guess it's been three days,
so I would say he probably could mention to you
that he is drinking from a fire hose,
as they say from this point.
But he's ready to go and already tackled
a few things for us and been in the field.
So we're very delighted to have him
and I'm gonna turn it over to Nathan.
- All right, so my name is Nathan George.
I'm very happy to be here.
When I told people I am moving to Denton, Texas,
the first question people asked me
was why are you moving to Texas?
Do you have family there?
I am an East Coast based individual.
So I come to you from Washington, D.C.
Worked in the consulting field.
I've spent almost 20 years in this field
working transportation, land development
and the bulk of my time has been in the transportation sector.
So the reason that really drew me here
was that I was looking for a new opportunity.
I wanted to transition out of the private sector
into the public sector and put a lot of my experience to use
during the types of projects that I was able to glean
from a lot of research on the city
that are of interest, bicycle and pedestrian access,
safety, all those things that are really the subjects
that generated a lot of interest in this position.
So when I started to do some research,
I realized there was a really good fit
with your interest and with mine.
So to give you a little background on myself,
I have an undergraduate degree in environmental management
from University of Maryland.
It's now called Global Campus,
but University of Maryland University College
when I went there.
And I was working in the transportation sector
as a traffic engineer for about a decade
that I was designing intersections and signals
and things like that.
And I didn't really, I wasn't an engineer.
I didn't really wanna stay in that career field.
So I was looking for an opportunity
to put my skills into practice in something.
I was a little more specialized,
found myself really gravitating to pedestrian safety
as a big issue that's very important to me.
So a lot of people hear bike in my title
and they gravitate towards the bike side,
but I actually like to focus on the ped side
and ped safety is really my area of specialty.
And I also really have worked on a lot
of innovative bike designs around Washington DC
and the mid Atlantic area.
So I have a lot of experience there as well.
So I have a really robust and full background
of experience that I'm bringing to the city.
I'm really excited to put that to work.
I'm really excited to work directly with leadership
to bring some of those innovative ideas to the city
and try and work out and solve some of the challenges
that come up on projects as they naturally do.
And happy to give you guys more background.
You'll get to know me a lot because I'll be here.
Our family is moving here next month,
but I'll be here permanently
and looking forward to collaborating with city staff,
with the entire leadership of the city
and to making these projects very successful
and achieving your goals
because we're here to work together.
So if you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer.
- You know me.
So obviously you're aware of the fact that
you know the issues that you're gonna be dealing with
are things that are very high priority for council,
very high priority for the community.
I would say that we are sort of in a period of transition
where we were sort of semi-rural slash suburban
and we're really looking to be
you know more of a dense, urban,
walkable, bikeable type environment.
So you've got your work cut out for you for sure
and we're very excited to have you.
I'm curious if you could speak to your experience
with ADA related issues.
What kind of training do you have in that area?
- Okay, yeah, ADA is a very comprehensive area
within the field of transportation.
A lot of my work was focused on intersection improvements
and you know I've had to
from a planning and design perspective.
So I've had to work through development of programs
to you know to bring facilities into compliance
at a county wide ADA transition plan
for a transit system for example.
So you know a lot of my work did involve
making all of our transportation facilities
compliant on transportation side.
So you know not building that sort of experience
and throughout that time you know this goes back to 2008
when I officially became transportation specific
focus in my career.
I've had a ton of training, worked through a lot
of project specific and design specific work
that centered around ADA and then you know ADA pairs
with a lot of the other types of improvements
that we designed so you know that naturally comes along
with traffic controls and the innovations
that have come into practice in our field over that time.
So you know I'm not just looking at projects
from the ADA compliant perspective
and making sure that we're addressing those needs
but also looking at how can we improve traffic controls,
how does that influence safety.
So looking at it as a more robust
and holistic sort of approach
and trying to make sure that we're navigating the process
so that we're achieving sort of multiply benefits
if you will.
Segregating users, there's been a lot of work recently
where we're looking at like dedicated bike facilities
and how does that influence the multimodal not just ADA
but how those multiple modes are addressed
and we identify conflicts and mitigate them.
So there's a, we can talk four hours about that
so I'll just leave it there.
- Oh we will.
- Oh we will, yes.
(laughing)
- Council Member Perkins.
- I am so happy to see you.
My background is health and safety as well
but environmental management and all of that good stuff
so I'm very excited to know that there's someone here
that's gonna be dedicated to the safety
and well being of our bikers
and our multiple able people
here in the city.
And just knowing that this is a city
that has two major universities in it
where the majority of the people that live there
and live around there are biking, walking people.
So I'm glad you're here.
This is like a breath of fresh air.
I'll move on with my question.
What makes a street qualified to have a sidewalk on it?
- How do we determine where to put a sidewalk?
- That is a quite nuanced question
and we have been looking at the sidewalk program
this week since I arrived
and I got a nice briefing on that yesterday.
Typically I would tell you that a sidewalk
should belong on any urban street.
That's my personal opinion.
There are going to be some nuanced details to that
but certainly when you're in an urban environment
sidewalk should be provided.
It's part of a complete streets environment
unless drivers truly wanna be sharing the street
with pedestrians or bicyclists
we really need to accommodate those users
outside of the roadway.
So that's where there will be some nuance
and I personally live on a more suburban street
that has no sidewalks.
There are cases where you don't have a lot of traffic,
traffic volumes are low, speeds are low.
So it's really a character assessment
what are the characteristics of the road,
the nature of the traffic
and that's going to help influence
when we should provide those dedicated facilities
versus when it might function a little bit better
as a shared street.
But those are certainly conversations we'll have a lot
as we're trying to figure out
where to put sidewalks in the city,
how to prioritize those needs
because that's a theme that I've heard talking with staff.
So we'll certainly be trying to figure out the answers
to those questions on each street segment throughout the city
as we try and put a response to good use.
- And Council Member Byrd,
I think I would just mention that
there are city standard details
that show what the cross section of a roadway should be,
whether it's a residential street section,
a primary arterial, secondary arterial
or a collector status.
And so what our goal is is to be able to bring Nathan
into the design of those different types of roadways,
whether it's a brand new project
or a brand new roadway being constructed
or a roadway that is being rehabilitated
and using his expertise to see what makes the most sense
from that multimodal perspective.
So it's very much, I would say in general,
what we've seen and what Nathan and I've talked
in great detail about is we're very much interested
in getting the roadway reconstructed, right?
So, and I think that there is definitely a interest
to take into consideration all those other modes
such as sidewalks and bicycle.
And so I definitely think that Nathan's gonna be able
to help provide that technical expertise to our team,
which we're very excited about.
I would mention, there are always gonna be challenges
that we're gonna run into.
In many cases, I think from a sidewalk perspective,
as long as the right-of-way is available,
it makes it much easier to construct.
But there are cases and we receive citizen comments
that come through that say,
I don't want a sidewalk on my property.
And so that does happen quite a bit and more often
than you actually probably would realize.
And so the other thing is many times easements
have to be acquired just to be able
to put sidewalk within them.
So those are some of the challenges
that we are super excited to have Nathan on board
to take his background and his expertise
and look at that roadway cross-section
between Chandra and Nathan
from that transportation traffic engineering perspective,
and then also including that sidewalk perspective.
So just thought I would add that just because
it's a typical cross-section doesn't necessarily always mean
that that's going to be the method of which we move forward.
We have to do what makes sense.
And I also don't want to look at it from the perspective,
and I know Nathan doesn't either, of a singular road.
We want to take the opportunity to look at it more globally.
And I think you see that from our team
as we bring things more to you in a programmatic approach
versus just focusing on an individual roadway, so.
- Well, I'm going to express my,
of course, biasness to my area, District One.
It is the urban, you know, more of the urban type.
It's the closer-knit, smaller road area.
And I have seen some sidewalks in that area
that could definitely use some immediate attention.
So when you all get started,
would you all consider that area, you know,
as a priority area, it's more denser than the other areas.
So I'd like to see that, you know,
as part of your priority area that you look at.
- Sure, I think we absolutely can take any requests
that come in into consideration.
I will tell you, another one of our project managers
has worked to develop an entire sidewalk work plan program.
And so we have really an executed, well-thought-out plan
and how we take those sidewalks and incorporate them
into projects such as the 2019 Bond Program.
So definitely interested in looking at any improvement areas
of which need additional sidewalks.
So, you know, I definitely think that there's always
opportunity to see how we can do things better.
- Wes?
If I can turn my mic on, there it is.
So you mentioned, you know, that it's not unusual
to have residential areas where property owners
have said that they don't want sidewalks on their property.
And I've heard that quite a bit in D4.
And an area that comes to mind is Southridge.
I've heard from a lot of Southridge residents that,
you know, they wouldn't mind sidewalks,
but you know, maybe it's not a high priority for them,
or maybe they don't want to give up, you know,
yard space for that.
So the thought has crossed my mind,
and sorry to get into like real specifics,
but for example, an area like Pennsylvania Drive,
where in some places the roadway is very wide
and there are no sidewalks.
- Would you mind if I ask you to hold it for item five,
I'll just feel a little bit better about the unposting.
- Yes, I will hold.
- Thanks.
I hate to do that, but you know.
Yeah, and I'll just say, Nathan, welcome.
- Thank you.
- You've come to a really great community.
I think you'll enjoy living here.
I'll instruct you, if I may, that the correct answer,
if you're asked, are you from Texas,
is I came as soon as I could.
- Okay, I came as soon as I could.
- Well done, well done.
Fast learner, fast learner.
And yeah, I think you really enjoy living here,
and you have come at a great time,
where there's lots of support, I would say, you know,
demand even for becoming more multimodal,
as other members have said,
and I look forward to you helping puncture our ableism
and help us be, you know, as accessible
of a community as we can possibly be.
- Thanks for that.
I would definitely, I do wanna put in a plug,
is it engaged in, or the,
I wanna make sure that, you know,
folks, as they're out and they see problems,
let us know through that system,
because that's gonna be one way
that we're going to find some of those challenges,
and also, we're working through the ADA transition plan,
so we do have a good background
that I'll be working through,
that I've already started taking a look at.
So I'm looking forward to putting my skills to work,
and it's been a pleasure to meet you all,
and I look forward to seeing a lot more of you
in the months and years to come.
- Great. - Thanks.
- Thank you.
- Awesome, thank you, Nathan.
So as you could tell,
we're very pleased to have Nathan on board.
So he's had a fast, quick three days,
and so thank you, Nathan, for taking that time.
The next item that we wanted to bring forward last,
Mobility Committee meeting, there was a question asked,
and we received several questions
kind of over the 2012 Bike Denton plan,
and we just wanted to let the committee know,
now that Nathan is on board,
we are currently reviewing that plan
that was presented back in 2012, evaluating it,
looking at it in relation to the existing capital projects,
and then also coordinating, really,
with Nathan on future projects.
So definitely something that I know many folks
brought to our attention and our radar,
and so we appreciate that,
and we're gonna be working through and coordinating that.
So hopefully that answers some of the questions
that had existed.
No problem, sir, happy to do so.
We actually have been meeting with North Texas
in relation to the 2012 bike plan, also.
So just, you know, there's a lot of conversations going on,
and now that we have the right folks at the,
and I guess they say on the seats on the bus,
we're ready to rock and roll.
The next item I wanted to bring forward,
and I know, Chair, this is something
that's definitely been on your radar.
I know you've asked me about this multiple times,
and so we did receive your request,
and we have reviewed the resurfacing
and street reconstruction plans.
There's currently not an existing project
coordinated with Oak Street between Bradley and Thomas.
The new overall condition index for the streets has come in,
so this is a recent,
I know we were using 2015 data,
and Streets Department has let us know
that that new information has come in
within the last couple of weeks.
- Are you gonna tell us what it is on that stretch?
- I don't have that number available,
but I absolutely can get that number for you,
but we are going to be working through
how to program that street in the future
based on its overall condition index.
So definitely something that we wanna take from the concern
and try to work it into the overall program.
- Or charge admission to it.
(laughing)
- Well, yes, sir.
So, and then I think the last item really we had
on the staff update before we go to future agenda items
is Council Member McGuire had asked for a list of overpasses
for the 35 widening.
And so we did provide that in the Friday report
on July 2nd, but you'll see in your backup information,
really all the different intersections.
What I could tell you is based on kind of
what we are looking at overall,
the existing over or underpasses basically
are being replaced or reconstructed.
The only one that we're aware of to date
that is new is that Windsor.
And I think you've seen that come for you before
with the Westgate presentation.
So that is the one that we are aware of at this time.
So if anybody has any questions on that,
I'd be happy to answer.
If not, we can move on to future items.
- Oh, I just want to express my disappointment
that I missed the boat on that scripture.
- So we're good on four for the moment, yeah.
And then, but why don't you go ahead, we're on five now.
You had some items that you wanted to look for focus on.
- We actually, let's see, on the future staff reports,
I do believe that we have request,
we have actually been working through several of these.
If you'd like, I can go through and update
on each one of these and then we can see
if there's any additional requests.
So update on the senior planner, that was the first item.
So we've tackled that.
The third item is the traffic engineering request,
I can't speak, in regards to and related to Engage Denton.
And we're kind of working through that
for a potential heat map.
I think some of this actually we're working on
in coordination with the process of moving
from the Engage Denton to the 311 system.
So that's ongoing, it's definitely something on our radar.
The 2012 bike plan, I know I just spoke to this
and that's something that we did provide an update
in the Friday report.
The list of overpasses, that's been completed.
And then the future plans for West Oak
between Bradley and Thomas,
and we just gave you that information.
I think, I guess what we could add to that
is you'd like to see what the OCI rating is
based on the new data from that.
I gleaned that from the smile that I saw on your face.
So definitely something that we can look at
and get from the streets department
is that information for that cross section.
So with that, I will open it up and y'all can let us know
other future agenda items you'd like for us to look into.
- Okay, so I would like this looked into,
but perhaps you can also provide a little bit of insight
regarding feasibility.
So as I mentioned, I have heard that concern
from residents of Southridge in particular
and to a lesser extent in Denia,
the idea that sidewalks would be fine,
but they don't necessarily wanna give that right of way.
But for example, Pennsylvania Drive is a very wide roadway
that doesn't have sidewalks along the entire length of it.
Would it be feasible to, at some point in the future,
redesign that roadway to be narrower
so that sidewalks can, we can add sidewalks
without doing right of way acquisition?
Sorry, I couldn't get myself unmuted.
I think I could talk loud enough without the microphone.
But I think definitely that's a roadway cross section
that we could look at.
We would have to pull plat information
to see what right of way was dedicated
and what was constructed in that area.
I think many of the concerns or questions that we get
are specifically related to the fact that folks believe
and citizens, residents believe
that where the back of curb is located
is really where the right of way stops.
And in many cases, that's truly not true.
The right of way does go into their private property,
their private property line
and the right of way above each other.
And so I think in order to look at that,
we would just have to evaluate it from an approach
of where is the existing right of way line
and then evaluate what measures could be taken
if that's something that's an interest
as to whether the existing right of way already is available
for sidewalk to be constructed,
even if it was on one side and not on both sides.
The other options are, like you mentioned,
looking at that roadway cross section
to see if it's wider than it shall be
and if there's ways to improve that.
So typically those roadway reconstruction projects
really are based on the OCI, the overall condition index.
And so that would be another evaluation
that would be done as we look through the work plan
and what roadways need to be completed.
Obviously looking at the infrastructure
under the ground too that needs to be completed.
So definitely there's several different options
that can be looked into there,
but we would have to have the background information
to see the survey, where the actual right of way line is.
I brought up the conversation about the location
of sidewalks just simply from the standpoint
that some of the things that we hear on
some of the recent sidewalk projects
that we've been under construction on is a misunderstanding
that actually the right of way line,
like I mentioned, is the back of curve
where the right of way line actually goes into individuals.
They think it's their property because they mow it
and they maintain it and they water it and sprinkle it,
but actually in many cases that is not necessarily the case.
- I appreciate you making that point
and I would add too that like particularly
in the case of Pennsylvania Drive
that there have been concerns about speeding
and I would posit that that's probably,
there is speeding on Pennsylvania Drive for sure
and that the kind of excessive width of the roadway
might be contributing to that.
And I was gonna say something else,
but I forgot what it was,
so I will hand it off to Council Member Byrd
who I believe had something else to ask.
- He'll come back.
- Speaking of speeding,
I know that Moore Street is a thoroughfare now apparently
and I'm always getting notices from the community
about Moore Street is a very wide road,
so I know that there's going to be some utility work done
and I would like to see something to slow that road down.
I've been on that road and I've even caught myself
kind of going over the speed limit a little bit,
but it's a easy road to speed down,
so would you add that one please to the list?
Lakey Street, that's not a particularly wide road
and that may be just a community,
something that the community needs to work out
with them themselves is to take care of some of those roads,
but Moore Street for sure is a road
that I'm particularly concerned about.
But my question is for that area,
I know that we've already talked about the upgrades
and the utility upgrades,
can you give us the date when that's gonna start?
Is that a fall project and where are we gonna start
with the utility upgrade for that area?
- And what street are we gonna start with?
Is it Robertson Street?
- So that's something that we're actually working through
right now is the actual construction.
The construction began on Monday.
Okay, here comes Rachel, she's gonna correct me.
I know we began construction.
- Just to clarify, construction did begin on Monday,
but that was for the MCFC and Loft streets
that don't include any utilities
and are not in Southeast Denton.
So Southeast Denton construction will be beginning
in early calendar year 2022.
And we are still working through the sequencing
on what specific streets that will be.
- 'Cause I'm sure they're asking.
- Sure, and I would say on the Seymour actually
was something that happened the last weekend.
I'm sorry, I was getting confused.
I know Rachel and I were celebrating
that portions of the bond package construction,
but those were the ones that did not include utilities,
which I know have very interesting names of MCFC and Loft.
So that's really just the first initial of those roadways.
But the actual 2019 bond specific to the Sedna area
is something that we're using the Seymour approach.
And so that actually, we received those,
and you could go into greater detail if you'd like.
- Sure, so we've got the two packages currently
in Southeast Denton.
We've got phase A and phase B.
So phase B is what Becky's describing.
It's got the construction manager at risk
where we're actually reviewing those submittals
that we got two weeks ago for that right now.
Phase A is currently wrapping up design,
and that's what will be initiating construction
early calendar year 2022.
So before we actually go to construction,
we will have another community meeting,
and we're happy to provide,
because by our next mobility committee meeting,
we should have more finite information on sequencing.
We can talk to you specifically
about what that first street
or first series of streets is going to be,
and we can bring that back to you either myself
or the project manager, Seth Garcia,
can give you those dates.
But we do have movement in both the Southeast Denton
phase A and phase B projects,
both of which will be under construction
within the next year.
Right now we're just kind of working through the sequencing.
- Okay.
- And we do need to select a contractor
for Southeast Denton phase A.
So that's gonna be kind of the next leg.
We're wrapping up the design right now.
Hopefully by the end of this calendar,
well actually by the end of quarter three,
we plan to bring forward to the construction contract
to consider what contractor we're gonna hire,
and then that construction would begin
early calendar year of 2022.
- Thank you.
- You're welcome.
- And one other thing, just observation on Nottingham.
We could see where those beautiful lawns are being,
sidewalks are being put over those beautiful lawns,
you know how you were talking about earlier?
380 and Nottingham North.
I was just driving through there the other day
and saw where the sidewalks were being laid
for an area that actually needed a lot, needed the sidewalks.
- Sure.
- So, and as you were going through and saying that,
you know, that doesn't really belong to the home,
but to the city, you know, that was just a revelation.
And so that's gonna help with the bike path
'cause there's also a little fake mini bike path
kind of going down through that way as well.
That's also a very fast street because it's on a hill.
So, you know, it's working, it's coming along.
Thank you very much.
- No problem.
And I would mention that the project manager
on that sidewalk project has been in close coordination
with the residents as, you know,
they have different questions that come up.
And so I definitely know that she's been sending us
quite a bit of updates even in regards to some cardinals
that were in the area and another bush that was in the,
you know, to that level of detail.
You know, obviously, as you're working with residents,
it's very much important to us that we're communicating
and coordinating so that they understand
the expectation, definitely so.
I did wanna circle back to the Moore Street.
So I was given information by Logan,
our management analyst, that she let me know
that the actual Moore Street,
and I was on vacation this day,
but Moore Street actually was in the Friday report
on February 2nd.
And so we'll go back and see if there's anything additional
we need to add, but I believe we've answered
some of those questions in that Friday report, so.
And thank you, Rachel, for coming to my rescue.
So I appreciate that.
There are 90 different projects going on,
so I don't pretend to remember every single thing
that's going on within the City of Denton.
So we have great folks that were helping
get the projects moving along, so.
- I find I can remember three.
And so if you can have the other 87 on a list,
that's usually helpful. - Okay, well, maybe we can,
like, test each other in some kinda quiz or something.
- I have a couple of items to add.
- Sure, yes, sir.
- Actually, it was, you know, Council Member Byrd made
the, you know, eminently sensible comment to me earlier,
you know, my sharing that, you know,
we would not necessarily have heard
about how troubled that area around Hodges
had there not been the prospect of future development.
So that leads to two points.
One is, as I tried to tee up earlier,
is there a more comprehensive approach needed
in addition to the signal improvements at Kingsway
and 288 to alleviate that situation?
I don't expect to have the answer,
but I'm putting it on the list.
- Sure, no, absolutely.
And I will tell you that Chandra and I
have had this on our radar since about March,
and not specifically related to the development
in that area, and I'm, you know,
open to having some of that conversation,
and definitely know that there needs
to be additional conversation based
on the posting last night.
What I will tell you is Chandra and I
have been evaluating that Hodge Elementary
and coordinating with DISD.
We understood that there was a greater presence
of parents or caretakers that were actually
taking their children to school,
simply from the standpoint that they didn't want
their children to be riding the school bus
due to COVID.
So definitely we had improvement measures
that we were looking at, even making specifically
around Hodge Elementary that we were gonna
be coordinating with DISD on, even looking at,
in some areas, some one-way traffic just
to keep traffic flow during the school hours
and putting up proper posting.
What we decided and evaluated and made the decision
to do is wait to see to the new school year,
because it was something that was basically
gonna be enacted for about six weeks,
and knowing that the overall situation due to COVID,
we were hoping to improve and change.
And so when the new school year comes through,
we are committed to looking at that,
evaluating that if we need to perform additional
studies in that area, traffic count studies,
we will do so.
And specifically regarding that development
with the traffic impact analysis that was performed
in that area, and this is some of the information
that will be provided in that presentation
with the development.
There are measures that we have been working on,
and Chandra's reviewed that traffic impact analysis
three times, so they submitted three different times.
And we did work through with them some improvement measures
that could be made, such as additional turn,
a left turn lane into that Deerwood area,
along with we already knew we had the signal improvement,
the pedestrian improvements in that area.
So definitely something that's on our radar,
but maybe was escalated due to the fact
that there was a development in that area,
if that helps answer the question.
- Yep, and yes, it does.
- Okay, good.
- What it also points to, to me,
is the fact that sometimes unless something
is really screaming, flaming, and burning,
the public comes to us en masse,
it's not necessarily on our radar,
but it may be on yours, but I'm wondering,
are there other situations like that,
that, you know, but for some new development,
we might not hear about, you know,
are we aware of the other Hodges,
if there are any, around the city,
so that, you know, we're kind of proactively on top of them?
And how do we know?
- So I think that kind of goes into
not only looking at things
when they're brought to our attention,
either through an engaged in council request,
a citizen request, or even something that we hear,
you know, just from other individuals
within other departments and other users
of the roadway network system.
I would say that we definitely look into different,
whether it's a traffic impact analysis that needs to happen,
or a traffic study, and we have a budget
that's set aside, and you'll see even
some supplemental requests when we present
our operating budget to ask for additional funding,
to look at particular areas of which we want to focus in on,
or areas we want to improve.
Ultimately, the solution is, such as you see the HSIP,
to make some signal upgrades.
There may be some other areas where turn lanes are needed,
or, you know, striping signaling's needed.
But ultimately, our goal is to turn those things
into capital projects.
If they are in coordination with a capital project,
that's fantastic.
If they need to be a standalone project
to do intersection improvements,
we have two currently that the project managers
are delivering, one's the 2018, and one's the 2019.
So definitely there's areas that we receive
the heightened alert about, or we evaluate ourself.
- That's really my question.
It's not the response, which, you know,
we're very systematic about, it's,
how do we know, are we, you know,
is there any way that we can know proactively without,
you know, before people have to say,
hey, aren't you aware that there's
a screaming, burning, flaming problem, you know?
- Sure, and I think that's where we take the mobility plan
and look at those future roadway networks
based on the land use assumptions,
and that's why it's so important that the comp plan
and those future land use assumptions
take into consideration, you know,
what is programmed for those land use assumptions,
how we look at the roadway network
that makes sense with those land use assumptions,
and then evaluate those, and ultimately,
our goal would be to take projects
that are on the mobility plan
and turn them into capital projects,
and there are different studies and evaluations we do
based on level of service,
and those would be performed
through a traffic impact analysis.
So I will tell you, you know, certain areas
that we see that need to have improvements made,
many of the measures that will need to be made
is either through a traffic impact analysis
or an actual traffic study,
and we are proactively looking at those
and working through then trying to put them
into an actual project.
Westgate is another example of an area
where we are looking at
what are improvements that need to be made,
how do we conform to the mobility plan,
you know, what does the traffic impact analysis show
or the traffic studies show in this area?
- Well, I'm gonna take inspiration
from Council Member McGuire being willing to tee up,
you know, a potentially harebrained thought.
(laughing)
- Sure.
- And, you know, maybe, you know,
you can build onto it into a reasonable one.
You know, if we had chopper seven,
you know, traffic on the ones or whatever,
and then we'd hear about all the time
where the pileups are, but we don't.
We're not that big yet.
- The harebrained ideas, you know,
would it ever make sense to fly a drone around
during peak traffic times and see empirically
where problems seem to be?
- Definitely.
- Do you agree that that is harebrained sounding?
- Oh, no, sir.
I'm not ever gonna say any idea you have is harebrained.
But I definitely do know that we have drones
within the city of Denton and licensed drone operators.
I think that's something that we could get an evaluation,
I think, to get the actual data
that we would need to make the determination.
It's in our best interest to perform a traffic study
because it looks at the counts, but I think--
- I mean, to give you, you know, clues where to look.
- Sure, sure.
And I will tell you too, ultimately, our goal,
you heard me mention the sidewalk work plan.
Ultimately, our goal is also to have work plans
for all those different areas and then, you know,
have all of the different needs,
whether it be intersection improvements,
whether it be sidewalk, whether it be bike lane,
use the mobility plan and those different sidewalk,
bicycle and thoroughfare plans within the mobility plan
as kind of that planning tool,
but then ultimately taking it from that,
putting it in an actual work plan
with a programmatic approach as to how we execute those
and then actually completing those projects.
So I don't think it's a bad idea at all
and I know I'm more than happy to talk to Chandra about it.
I know Chandra and I are aware of several intersections
that we already have concerns about
and so that's what we're doing is looking at
how do we make improvements to those
and I would say many of these intersections
are being improved through the HSIP program
'cause there are a handful of them
that are already under construction
and then even a few more that we are seeing come through.
So I guess the other thing I would mention
is once the land use assumptions are completed
from the comp plan and we can work
to finalize the mobility plan,
we can also look at what is the existing roadway system,
network on a specific roadway and what is it to be
and when is that timing so we can work on planning
that in more of a capital perspective
because that also impacts utilities, sidewalk, street light,
there's a whole lot of things that go into that
and that'll help us package up and plan those projects so.
- I have one more. - Sure.
- I know this item's been running long, we're almost out.
I think it's gonna be really annoying to the public
to see Elm, was it Elm and Locust
that have to get mill and overlay
and then undone and reconstructed?
- Yes sir.
And I don't have a solution,
but my request is for at least a conversation to occur,
but this is sort of like your kind of CIP planning project
that you're doing, but to have a conversation occur
between y'all and public communications
about how to communicate to the public.
It is bound to just really make people nuts
when they see it fixed and then undone and then done again.
And I think just kinda looking the other way
is probably not the right answer, it might be,
but I think a conversation oughta happen.
That's the last one I have on that.
So anyone else have anything on the additional items?
- I just have a comment on the Hodge Elementary situation.
- Yes ma'am.
- It just so happens that I'm a substitute teacher,
a retired teacher and started studying
and Hodge Elementary is one of my preferred schools
to go to, so I've had opportunities to put kids in cars.
Being a teacher, you go out there
and you load the kids up and everything.
And it is a revelation that it was more so of a problem
because of the COVID than it is on any other regular day
that I've experienced going there.
I probably go to that school more
than any other school that I attend, I like that school.
And it's still the same way, it's still a long,
it's a backup all the way, like what we saw,
but I don't think that it was something that extensive.
So that's probably why we hadn't heard about it.
Because the parents were used to just kinda being in line,
but the line flowed.
You know, as the kids were getting into the cars,
they always made sure that those kids were ready
to hop in those cars when the parents pulled up.
So, but it is, it should have been,
should have been looked at a long time ago.
But I think because of the parents bringing the kids,
you know, more so now because of the COVID situation,
that that's what we saw.
So I'm glad, I'm just glad we just finally addressing that
and also connecting with the school
and Didn't ISD to even make some different kind
of arrangements as to how they put the kids in the cars.
I don't know if they can go around the school
or change the bus section to the,
'cause you notice the buses were coming
from a different direction than the cars,
you know, coming back out of the neighborhood.
So maybe that might need to be adjusted.
I'm not sure how you all or if you all are,
I'm sure you gotta be sitting down with Didn't ISD
and the school itself to see how that might be rerouted
as well, so they, anything can help.
But I just wanted to just, you know, put that in,
put that on the table that it does still get backed up
even if it wasn't COVID.
- Oh sure.
- But not to that extent that we saw
with cars driving on sidewalks
because they're frustrated about waiting.
- Sure, and I understand that and I would say that
overall when individuals are picking their children
up from school, there's always going to be a line of cars.
I mean, I've experienced that myself with my own children.
And so, you know, I think the fact of the matter is,
is that for a short period of time, you know,
but is it to a level that is something
that there is a actual transportation issue
that can be resolved?
And that's really what we're most interested in
as we know school is gonna be starting back up
in a few weeks and doing that evaluation.
So, you know, seeing if there's anything
and Chandra had already come up with a great plan
to look at some one-way traffic
and we do meet with DISD monthly.
And so those are definitely things
that we will bring to their attention
once we have additional data to show that that is a need,
but we're really waiting to see kind of what happens
with the COVID.
So, and Chair, I wanted to bring up to you
to I do understand your concern about Elm and Locust.
I think from the city staff concern
is that currently that reconstruction is not programmed
and they're looking at ways to evaluate that
and ways to actually do the project that was to be,
to happen with that final reconstruction.
And I do understand that there will be public outreach
that's needed.
I think from a city staff perspective,
we're more concerned about the fact
that that roadway could stay in existing condition
and if a mill and overlay did not happen,
it could be a year in order for that project
to be able to be designed
and then work through the bidding process,
funding process and construction.
So although the stop gap may not be the solution
that would have been preferred from our perspective,
we are more concerned about the fact
that that roadway will be in a state of disrepair
for a longer period of time.
So that was really an interim step.
- Not mutually exclusive to do the right thing
and have good communication about it, right?
- Yeah, no, and I think that would be our goal
is to be able to communicate
and really honestly, that's our goal with everything
because even temporary patch that's put down many times
or permanent patch that's put down is torn back up
and then a roadway is reconstructed
and a lot of that just goes for the education piece.
So I'm definitely happy to look into,
just wanted to let you know that the timing
is really what is more of our concern.
And wanna make sure that that's addressed
because if not, I know it's going to be something
that we definitely are going to hear about
and we want to take the opportunity
to work with TxDOT to try to address.
- I remembered what I was gonna say.
- Sure. - It was about OCI.
I had wanted to acknowledge
that in terms of Pennsylvania Drive,
I'm sure like OCI, it's not a super high priority.
But I was just using that as an example of,
you know, I'd like to see us considering,
especially with those older residential streets,
the possibility of narrowing them
as like a traffic calming measure
and as a way to make them more pedestrian friendly.
- Awesome, I appreciate that update.
- We all good on the future items?
Yep, so we're on to concluding items.
Anyone else have any concluding items?
(indistinct)
- Okay, I have two.
First, I wanna thank City Engineer DeViney
and whatever her incredibly long title is,
Rachel, for helping on my town hall
and fielding questions on the spot about this stuff.
That's how you know that people go nuts
about things getting done twice.
But super job and second item is,
comments have been made regarding
the special session that we had.
And I just want to underscore my view
that first of all is terrific management
of the process from staff to have there be a way
for council to express as a body,
you know, our guidance to our DCTA rep.
And furthermore, I just think you did an outstanding job
of managing the special session.
It's not an unusual, it was not a usual situation.
It was a special situation.
And I would say that when it's sort of high stake stuff
that really matters and there's time pressure on it,
what that looks like, having spent 30 years
in the private sector, I would say
that looks like work, that's how work looks.
That's how teamwork looks when it's done.
It's really hard and complicated
and takes a lot of focus and you just did great.
And I think the proof is in the pudding
that there was a very clear communication
to council of the intention and it ultimately
achieved a super majority so they were able to vote on it.
So thank you very much for working in an unusual way
and I underscore the word working.
Not always comfortable, that's what work looks like.
- Thank you.
With that, I'll close the meeting.
Thank you, we're adjourning at 11.15.