mobility committee that's Wednesday January 17th 2018 it's
1134 we do have a
quorum so we'll go ahead and convene our regular meeting
with item a which is
consider approval of the mobility committee of the Dutton
City Council
meeting minutes of November 14 2017 I'll entertain a motion
I'll move approval
okay motion and second all in favor please raise your hand
passes unanimously
item two is receive a report hold a discussion I'm sorry
item B is receive a
report hold a discussion and provide direction regarding
Texas Department of
Transportation on system projects in the Denton area to
include the 35 Express
project okay we have with us madam chair Jim Klein
president of DCTA well did you
want to start with the DCTA item first and then go to on
system that would be
our request yes sir permission so we'll skip item B and
then we'll go to item C
which is receive a report from DCTA staff to include state
of the agency
passenger enhancements bus operations and DCTA capital
projects and provide
direction regarding strategic initiatives in the Denton
County
Transportation Authority service plan so so we do have with
us this morning Jim
Klein who's president of DCTA with him we also have the
city of Denton
representative who serves on the board for DCTA and that is
Richard Huckabee so
with that I'd like to turn it over to Jim Klein just a
hello for mr. Huckabee
for the record thanks Jim yes ma'am
thank you all for having us by the way we're always happy
to come here to the
mobility committee the City Council or any of your public
meetings I know we've
been active in the neighborhood study around the University
there's two of us
that sit on that committee so the that's been it's been
very interesting in terms
of how maybe we can be a part of that and at least getting
certainly gives us
a lot of insight into the community and how people how that
how the people we
serve see the future of the area so a little bit about DCTA
y'all know us
pretty well our vision you know we want to be leaders in
what we do and as a
part of our region which is really important that we are
part of what
happens with DART and the forward transportation authority
that we bring
forward first of all safe and serve our customers and be as
efficient as we can
and so see a lot of the strategic drivers higher education
is probably the
thing that drives that actually is the biggest driver of
our ridership and so
our partnerships with the University of North Texas Texas
Women's University and
NCTC are incredibly important to the future of our agency
and we always the
second from the bottom we're always seeking opportunities
for any additional
partners that we can find to enhance service and make it
better for our
community we always talk about you know why why do we have
transit you know
there's we'll talk about ridership and some of those things
that are going on
but you know we want to make sure that we do provide you
know it'd be ridiculous
for me to say that we're going to be able to provide an
opportunity for
everybody in Denton County to not own a car but if we can
get more a lot get
and provide an alternative to that single occupant vehicle
maybe a family
could have one car instead of two I think those are things
and particularly
development around stations where we can really make a
difference in that and then
we talked about access to education to work independent
mobility I pitch a lot
of times that when you look at a senior as we all and the
same thing I'm facing
as we all get older how do we maintain our independent
mobility and could we
through transit extend independent mobility for another ten
years is that
an option and how do we do that in a low density area and
we found that by doing
some different things through Lyft domain responsive
service taxis we've
done a lot of things who are experimenting with a lot of
things and
having some success and so you know how can we keep people
from in their
neighborhoods in their homes for the longest period
possible so there's a
real social benefit I think societal benefit to what we do
had an interesting
experience with the I think everybody had an interesting
experience with the
whole Amazon deal I was approached by the city of Denton
many communities both
in and out of the service area for what are you gonna do
about transit if Amazon
comes well I sent the same we basically the same response
is of course we're
gonna be part of the region and we'll be happy to to work
with that and work with
our funding partners to make that happen but it was
interesting to see the
interest of the business community and what kind of transit
service is
available and what options exist for their employees so we
're hearing a lot
about that but that was certainly one thing that's anecd
otal in terms of the
headquarters to site selection process it was that we went
through with our
partners so when we look at regional growth a lot of
opportunities in our
member cities to expand service we've just completed some
service changes here
in the city of Denton with route 4 extending route 6 off to
Discovery Park
a lot of it has to do with how we coordinated with the
University of North
Texas to streamline our services and bring about that a
long-term arrangement
with the University to continue our long-term arrangement
with University of
North Texas we currently do you know while we were focused
on our three
service sales tax contributing member cities Corinth and
Flower Mound
NCTC pays us to provide service in those communities to tie
it to the
University we're partnering with the city of with the Fort
Worth
Transportation Authority to link downtown Denton to
downtown Fort Worth
they provide one they provide a bus and we do and we run
opposite so they've
been so we share the service and it provides another
opportunity for
education and for workers and so we're in a lot of
conversations with certainly
UNT Alliance Frisco Flower Mound on the colony and others
and looking at how we
can continue to grow these partnerships and you guys stop
me if you got any
questions because I'm this is some of this is old hat for
you know some of
y'all have heard some of these things before but as we go
through just please
interrupt me is no worries go ahead yes sir I'll turn my
microphone I had a
citizen to raise some concerns and I'm sure you can answer
these about the
efforts that Denton County Transit Authority is doing to
provide service
for other parts of Denton County like Frisco and Flower M
ound and suppose the
colony I don't know and the question was how do you do that
and not
divert funds from the three contributing cities sales tax
to to to do that let
me give you an example of how we do that and you know we're
for the last year and
a half we've been providing service in Frisco it's an area
of growth for us in
terms of they wanted to provide elderly and disabled
service so we calculate all
the costs for fuel the vehicle maintenance the driver
everything that
goes into that and they we charge them 20% additional a 20%
surcharge to cover
our overhead costs and so they we also do a taxi voucher
not a taxi voucher
program we did dispatch taxis in that's where our dispatch
er actually calls a
taxi or to expand their service without using more of our
vehicles and we do the
same thing we bill them and they pay us bill us every we
bill them every month
and they've been paying the bill so that's how we keep that
right so they're
paying for the actual cost of service plus 20% which it
would be an
administrative fee so that the money that we're paying in
to help cover your
salary and the other salaries of the general staff are
offset somewhat by
yes by that administrative fee that you're charging and
then we have and we
do it and we do different areas I mean we have a voucher
program that's very
simple for us to do and it's 5% from McKinney as an example
because in that
area it's all we don't dispatch cabs actually the
individual participants do
it's all basically we're just flowing a process through the
Irving Holdings
Company in terms of providing cab voucher system for their
so we're paying
the directs we're paying a surcharge they are to make that
happen because we
want to stay true you know faithful to our contributing
member cities and how
we do that so I think that as we look at some of the things
that will be
challenges as we go to the future is when we look at you
know one of the
things that we've got you'll see in the future slide here
as it goes but should
we be providing service across 380 right the links Denton
to say McKinney and
prosper how can we tie that together I think there's a very
logical link on
from Lewisville out to the area near 121 in the toll road
and actually out to
McKinney maybe even to prosper they're having trouble
getting people to work
getting employees to come in there struggle is that people
that in the
five billion dollar mile or whatever it is and I forget now
how many billions it
is in Frisco the people that if you're the CEO you can you
live down the street
if you're not you're traveling a good distance to get there
and so is there a
way that we could find a way to do commuter bus as an
example that would
link you know I think it was chase JP Morgan Chase that
left Lewisville and
went to Plano legacy area a lot of the folks that you used
to work I think it's
Jason JP Morgan Chase I could be wrong on the name but it
was a large financial
company that left Lewisville those people still live there
how are they
gonna get there we've got challenges with Mary Kay Cos
metics move their
their their manufacturing facility from Regal Row up into
near run convergence
in Lewisville not a dent in issue but you know how can we
work with them to
help that happen is that van pools passes I mean we're and
we're being and I
think you can tell by the tenor of what I said about cab
vouchers dispatch cabs
we're using we have a contract with Lyft right now that's
providing service in
Highland Village it's a very low density area just seems
that it's actually works
fairly well for us we're we're set now we'll be
implementing the next week or
so using Lyft service for the 2 to 7 a.m. safe ride home
for the University of
North Texas under that contract and so we're trying we're
open to trying
everything and being as innovative as we can be to provide
very efficient
service and address the true need right so instead of
saying kind of the
traditional I don't want to say traditional transit but it
's traditional
transit way it goes is I have a solution let me desperately
seek a problem and
I'd like to flip that around and say let me take your
problem and then let me see
if I can find you a good solution so all these things that
we're testing I
believe will have well example is the Lyft will be
operating and Denton will
be for the University but is there something that could
happen with that
could we make a better answer or develop a better answer
going forward and so a
lot of opportunity so that's part of what I want the
feedback from you guys
to be we know we need to make sure we stay true to as I
guess dance with who
brought you so to speak in terms of the communities that
are paying the sales
tax and how but how do we add with that context how do we
also maintain our role
as a regional partner and bring in new people into this
into the new services
into the arena because if we can provide opportunities for
people in Denton to
get to work somewhere else wow that's a big one that's a
big benefit I think and
how can we do that in a way that's fair to the taxpayers in
that so just to
follow up on that so I think what I hear you saying is that
you have the three
member cities and they all pay taxes this didn't Highland
Village in Louisville
and so those monies are kind of siloed right yeah we're
very careful when we
provide a service outside our area that we make sure that
those are trapped
captured in a separate organization separate org in our
accounting system so
we can track those expenditures and then look at where we
need to you know what
makes sense in terms of an administrative fee to bring to
again
provide that pay for you know there's a lot of things we do
we you know I I
there's one president there's not a president for Frisco
and a president for
McKinney there's but one of us and we're leveraging that
and same with
procurement so how can we do those things fairly inequit
ably to to them as
well as our member cities so we're very careful about that
so I see on the on the
next slide under the financial there's just a general
overall breakdown but
can we go on your website or a taxpayer and see exactly
what each member city
contributes and how that is spent probably not that level
of specificity
we do get the way part of it and it's important to keep in
mind that when you
look at our overall budget we have I treat the and this is
I hope this
answered your question but Denton Highland village Lewis
ville because of
the a train really is it's is a is a business unit unto
itself so we keep
those make sure we track those funds for that project so
allocation between bus
and rail we know what they are how much of that is Denton
so much of that is
Lewisville you know and unfortunate party goes to some
areas that it doesn't
stop right do Corinth and the Lake Cities which would be a
good thing if we
could get that to happen and get them contributing that's
on the plan we want
that I think there's a good thing there but we could we
have all the information
we put in our board reports on exactly what the
contributions are from each of
the agencies so I'd be happy to walk you through that we
have all that on our
website we have our budget on the website that shows all
these different
units and so and if there's any additional detail you'd
like I'd be
happy to provide that or come with some more detail I didn
't bring a complete
detail breakdown today but we we have our CAFR we have her
all that all of our
information we try to be as transparent as possible you can
look at our check
register too yeah I just wanted to let the people watching
are the people that
do watch that there is a place they can go find that which
is on your website
just because it's not presented here today and if someone
has a question
please call us and we'll be happy to help them walk through
that okay thank
you so that's a nice segue into my next slide which is
financial stewardship we
are one of the things we just got our audit report
yesterday from 2017 FY 2017
allocated two hours for the meeting and good news is we
were done it less than
an hour no management comments no issues and was an unmod
ified opinion
leaves the right word now it used to be unqualified the
good one so we've been
taking care of business with your money and I want to make
sure that's that's an
approach we take is it is we do see ourselves we do see our
agency as
stewards of the money that is given to us but it is our is
the our community's
money that we're being stewards of not something that we
control we do have
strong reserves this is our FY 18 budget numbers we we
maintain an operating
reserve of 90 days meaning that we could do all of our
operating expenses for 90
days if our if we received no additional income which is
not for something we
foresee is thing that would happen really not a rainy day
fund this is the
hurricane fund this is the earthquake fund this is if we
reach true true
problems this gives us that level of comfort knowing that
we can have
continuity of operations now on a lesser level we have 3%
of our sales tax we set
aside to help buffer any changes one of the things that's
different between DCTA
in a city is that we have no ad valorem taxes so we're
subject to the the vast
majority of our budget is based on sales tax and so we have
to be ready for a dip
in sales tax and so by having we by having this 3% that
gives us a chance to
slowly work into if we have to have a reduction in service
we have to cut that
cost somehow or maybe right out of storm we have a you know
occasionally and you
guys see this in your reports it'll be in a big adjustment
sometimes based on a
boundary issue with another area so we may have a drop in
sales tax in a given
month so this helps us get through that fuel yes ma'am so
sorry it might be a
staff question so one when we have like a tax abatement
agreement for economic
development how does that affect our sales tax is going to
DCTA it doesn't
have any effect okay it's just it's just a city's portion
of the sales tax not
DCTAs okay thanks no no no I want you guys to this is I
want this to be a
discussion not just a me talking to you we also fuels an
area that we've been
very fortunate in in terms of we've been budgeting three
three fifty four dollars
a gallon for fueling in years past and so we've been coming
in at under two
dollars a gallon in some cases we have a partnership with
the city of Denton for
the purchase of fuel for our on-road vehicles and then we
also purchase red
dye diesel for our off-road vehicles which is our trains
but with that we
still have to watch that that is an area where when you buy
eight hundred thousand
gallons of fuel a year a small change in your fuel rate can
be incredibly
impactful to your overall budget so we want to make sure we
've got some money
set aside out there that the board can allocate if we have
an increase in fuel
costs a question for you I know that for some time now you
have gone from a
larger train set to a smaller train set so that means less
fuel how much less
fuel what percentage we're saving it all in about a half a
million dollars a year
we still have the engineer and the conductor on board what
we found with
the conductor and and you'll see that and if you go to
Austin who runs very
similar actually the same trains we do they don't have a
conductor we had we
had a conductor because of the second car to start with
what we found is that
the customer service the order on the trains the lack you
get on our trains we
don't have graffiti minimal amounts of trash good behavior
and having that and
just from a customer service standpoint the conductors help
a great deal so in
terms of the crew the crew didn't change but the wear and
tear on the vehicles
and the fuel changed and that's about a half million dollar
a year savings so
yes ma'am you're talking about Austin which reminded me my
understanding is
that there is some movement there to utilize or leverage
the Volkswagen
settlement funds to create an electric bus system or at
least a component of
their bus system being electric is that something that
could be feasible for
Denton it could be I have you know I tell you the trend
that we've looked at
in buses in terms of alternate fuels alternate fuels is the
diesel has been
getting better and better and better and a progression that
other agencies have
done has gone to natural gas I've got a couple of concerns
with that one is
we're not quite big enough we're getting close but we're
not quite big enough to
justify the cost of the compression you know the compressor
that has to be
located or fueling facility potential to share facilities
that's an answer
possibly I'm concerned about the noise in the neighborhood
where our bus
facility is I don't want to I think making that happen
would be awkward at
best so I see the best benefit for the agency is making the
jump from diesel to
electric that's the long-term plan what we're watching very
carefully is what's
happening in California California is mandated that all
transit buses have to
be electric over the next several years right now electric
bus is about trouble
what a diesel bus cost so you make up a lot of that and
maintenance costs
because you don't have to change the oil it's still got the
same brakes it's
still got the same air conditioner but you can save quite a
bit of money on
maintenance but the charging facilities are interesting on
how you have to do
that because you need it right now the technology is you
really have to charge
a midday there are some that can maybe go all day they're
getting the battery
technology is getting better and better and with more and
more buses being sold
that are electric we're gonna see the I believe we'll see
the cost go down the
differential between a diesel bus and electric bus getting
much closer so my
my guidance to the staff and what we've developed is that
long-haul making the
move from diesel to electric will make the most sense and
we're open to the
idea of trying that I think we've got it we just have to
weigh getting our
mechanic skill set right getting enough critical mass in
terms of the buses to
where it makes sense so I hope that was it I told you how
to make a watch when I
should have said yes but anyway that's where we are a
couple other things just
internal coverage ratio that's our that's our amount of
money at the end of
the month we have left over to pay our debt so we're at two
and a half almost
two and a half times what that you know when we we don't
run out of month for
running money we're good on that and then solid cash flow
model I've already
talked to you about audits I'm sure you all see the same
thing with the GFA
awards we've been consistent in that for the last several
years and the
procurement award to of excellence in 2016 we're pursuing
that further now this
gets into some of the cost size cost savings opportunities
we are looking at
right sizing our bus fleet we have we're running all big
buses in Denton we may
we're gonna dial some of those back to medium-sized buses
that'll be more
efficient with fuel cost of buses and from a city
perspective lighter
vehicles that will put less wear and tear on your roads now
we need the
bigger buses up to TW up to Denton that's five six seven
and eight routes
five six and seven and eight and so we're making that
happen we've done some
modifications to our to our routes in fact done some as
recently as yesterday
one of the things just a small thing but we've consolidated
all of our electric
providers outside of the Denton municipal electric so we
can have greater
bidding power on that so that's a positive thing and you've
seen yes ma'am
on the right sizing of buses you said smaller buses does
that mean shorter or
not as wide I mean I'm just curious because you know
generally it's gonna be
a little bit of both and it will you know we run the full-
size transit buses
right now so we'd want to probably look at something a
little bit shorter not
the full you know not the not the very small buses that we
run sometimes for
like the ADA service but a medium-size it's kind of halfway
in between because
we we don't run if we're running to the university where
those buses are full a
lot of the time or and but in some of the areas routes four
one two and three
when we aren't quite as full it doesn't make a lot of
consistently on some of
those routes are not utilizing the capacity of that big bus
it's a big
cost to it's a big cost to you to run those buses right I'm
also thinking that
we have several streets in Denton that are smaller streets
which make the
bigger buses more difficult especially when there's cars
parked on the road and
cyclists so getting everybody on the street safely is a
concern so this is
interesting thank you well and having been a public works
director in the past
in my previous engagement with the city of Irving the the
heavy vehicles in the
right lane puts a lot of damp mean it is a an impact to
streets I mean that's just
where we have trucks large trucks buses so if we can light
en that load that helps
reduce cost to the community as well we did get a lot of
federal funding oh I'm
sorry positive train control which we're moving forward on
that's that's happening
we did save a lot of money by going with the different
technology same with rail
ops we rebid our we sent out for procurement our rail
operations and saved
amount of me in a year a little over a million dollars a
year with the new
procurement and we're always in the pursuit of other people
's money
particularly the federal government and for trails positive
train control
transportation development credits which are credits for
tolls paid we get it's a
long story kind of a roundabout way but it keeps us from
having to pay matching
funds and we did get the bus maintenance facility paid for
80% so we're the city
of her in the city of Denton we might just talk a little
bit more about
positive train controls in the news last month that the
train in the so
Washington Washington so very short answer to what is the
purpose of
positive train control positive train control provides a
that will stop the
train outside the control the engineer if one of four
things happens this
overspeed it's incurring into a temporary speed restriction
like a for a
great crossings out that's this out of operation it will
stop a train if it
violates a work zone and we'll stop the train if it viol
ates if it if a switch
is misaligned so you have a train that's coming at 60 that
hits a quick switch
that can cause a derailment and so those are the things
that are out there now
the agencies that have to operate on the general rail
system have to also be
interoperable meaning they have to be able to any railroad
can come in and use
the system we're somewhat on an island that's one of the
reasons why the
alternate technology work part of it is is if it's the
person driving the train
I don't know what you call that person engineer is not
paying attention and for
whatever reason if and you've seen a lot of them where the
reports are right that
the engineers have lost situational awareness and they've
lost where they
are because you know I mean if you make the bold presum
ption that the engineer
has the same will to survive as the passengers do you know
when they that
one particular incident as reported hit a we're going
basically about 80 miles an
hour and hit a point appropriately to go 80 and then didn't
slow down when they
got to the point where it should have been going 30 now on
our tracks we've
basically got a straight track from one end to the other
there are a few curves
and we run at a maximum speed of 60 so our train we think
that's a fairly
de minimis risk for us but our PTC system will enforce all
of those things
that it said well you also have on the trains I saw this
when we did a field
trip out there the engineer every 30 seconds has to and
they are a case I
think it notifies the dispatcher and then they go stop and
pricing how we can
do thing because you know during the construction it hurt
and be very
specific about that almost 500 riders that showed a
positive thing so on the
table for discussion I think we need to look at a dramatic
too also is what are
we trying to do in terms of how do we get the best bang for
a buck sure you
know and I'd be honest the best riders for us are 250 days
a year rock workers
or students coming in those weekdays every every day every
week or three days
a week those are the ones that actually the backbone of a
ridership yes well
speaking of students and it's jumping down on your list
with NCTC planning to
have a downtown campus by those are areas where we saw
where is that just
that get on a train or a bus now if they ride now it's not
linked trips meaning
that if you ride the train and then you ride a bus that
would be separate
boardings that's how we do the numbers okay so one to your
that other and it
has we wanted to go through and say gosh what are the
benefit at all of these
things and what's happens make a big difference even people
did this says
Lake City's completion or final throws of that right now
that was it should be
we're going out to bid short the county so I think there's
two pieces to go with
that one DW that's a very logical route I mean things in
Austin where they had
you know torn up and and I know y'all are you know the the
v-ride bikes and all
them but if we had bikes that were say Dalton's bike that
wanted to leave his
bike overnight about how do we facilitate bike training
that we already
have so future I'm just gonna keep up with that I tend to I
mean having
having been ability and then that nuts to me is a natural
low income what we
typically do is we bore those to sell passes at a very
reduced rate they may
then choose to give those to people or sell them and then
they sell them at a
further discount right now well in a I guess on the 25th
there's a point in time
that's it thank you so much for thank you and discuss
meeting times and dates
for future was was held of recent those meetings of back I
mean maya culpa it's
me I don't want meetings on Tuesdays it's better to have a
back-to-back meeting
so I someone to handle my kids for a certain day instead of
having something
every single day but I'm okay with not having them on
Tuesdays what I would
like for you guys to consider is that there's economic
development there's out
of you definitely can't eating for economic development or
be blocked off
on my schedule as me our Tuesdays were just just thing that
made for long days
but but but that's why we ended up with them you know you
need to get set that
yeah I think I've told you when I can't come with with with
schedule or some of
the other committees is those meetings end up getting moved
over to set date
and then and then something happens in the second Wednesday
of the month which
is one of the Wednesdays you were out so we're all here on
the third Wednesday of
the month it appears open it also provides in the past to
do an RTC and
with Commissioner Mitchell on those staff direction to
frame if it works
maybe okay so I think that's it for agenda the third
Wednesday at 1130 or
noon meetings until May then we're gonna go back up to the
discussion and provide
direction regarding Texas Department of Transportation
include the 35 Express
project and I believe mr. Polster will be doing that that's
correct just madam
sure what and we'll probably move through this a little bit
quickly based
on the fact that we we heard quite a bit of about some of
the transportation
product I'd have to go up to the podium is it the handout
from yesterday
I think most of y'all remembered a lot of what we covered
yesterday but this is a
project that starts we're the 2499 hang on are we just
going over what we went
over yesterday essentially well John's here and he blazer
and hat what he was
gonna do is hit these first three very quickly and then
roll on to the back
side of the report which okay so on 2181 the north-south
segment project this is
the project that is being done by MCM the main issue I
wanted to point out is
that it has a construction time frame between now and
January 2020 phases of
the project there will be that they can really give you a
notice on because they
do it up and down the group clearing the drainage areas and
the and beginning
substructure improvement so the main some impacts to
traffic foreseeable future
with the one traffic one lane going for both directions
using flaggers that's
the main point on that one three studies yesterday this
project is going to be
ready to let by Malibu have the exhibit a executed road
with a may let day and
once we get that project let we'll have the number of days
in the contract that
the contractor bid we'll be able to tell you what the
contract completion date is
the item and the rest of them have been really Pacific Rail
road to let it that's
a sense of what this sheet says is on the utilities 2199
section 5 this road
is partially open except for in and around Robinson Road
the Stots
contractors subcontinent to install the signal so we went
with another firm that
the city uses regularly as well and we're anticipating them
being out there
and having the signal installed within 30 days so it hits
that February time
frame these are the ultimate improvements LTR Campbell will
be
removing David Lavelle off the report he's no longer 1c on
our project that
the schedule the time frame on this project and right away
is not necessary
because we're making improvements within our utilities
should be minimal given
that everything's out there's been torn up over the last
three years so we think
that once we get LTR a on contract top fairly quickly and
have these
improvements on the ground sooner than one would normally
think it on the
issues with where I'm reporting December to January is what
OHL is saying they're
gonna do but Texas not accepting that schedule so I mean
because even if we
don't I December I think we can have done by August of 2018
because they were
gonna want to try to be open that fall of 2018 so they're
open and we're not
completely not unusual or unaware of because we did the
same thing at the
one the 114 and when they're supposed to open yet I mean I
've seen signs that
say 2019 but do we have any idea when we were doing the
negotiations Jill we were
given was we needed to have our our improvements done
sometime in the summer
of 2018 because that's when they 2019 they may be hedging
their bets but but I
can't because I'm actually working with them on an honest
job I'll be seeing
them tomorrow I can ask that yeah I think there's a lot of
interest in if
that roads gonna be finished or what the overlap might be
yes there is and so
with this project yesterday mark of very eloquently went
over all the up and down
the corridor issues with your secondary streets that are
going to be stuff that
they have to we have to maintain and pay attention to so
this is a 35 project
from 380 north to the county line this is a project we are
almost done with the
value engineering and once we get through the value
engineering then the
district will basically meet with the division headquarters
folks about
looking at the timing for funding this project and it is
currently estimated
it's just about 860 million bucks that's not a lot we can
that's a rounding
area for those guys in Austin we can work that out so once
we get the value
engineering done the critical path item on this project
right now on the
schedule is the environmental clearance for for the end of
this year and we're
on track for that if we get the value engineering done once
we get the
environmental clearance done then it allows us to begin the
right away
acquisition and those funds are paid for out of a different
bucket than the
construction dollar so they can go ahead and start
acquiring the right away in
that corridor so you'll start to see this project schedule
mature fairly
quickly after the December 2018 environmental clearance
date so in town
you know it I just left it in there they're doing punch
list items TDLR but
it's completed and open to traffic you will not see this in
your report next
month because we take them out once we're done 288 this is
a project that
Miss Briggs was talking about this is a project that's
basically going to be a
maintenance job and Tina's telling us that during the
summer when it's warmer
she'll come back in and do these improvements and they'll
do she's going
to do them to the inside so it won't require any additional
work for the
drainage it's on the outside of 288 there at 380 so we
should start to see
something happen on this project during this summer time
frame just do maintenance
work just for clarification for those who are participating
via video confer
video Tina is Tina Massey the area engineer here and the
Denton office
okay and just to confirm there's going to be a separate
right-hand lane in that
area what's happening is the traffic coming on right that
lane is actually
we're gonna do if you look at it on the inside where we can
come in and add
another lane a u-turn left so you had because it's very low
volume u-turn
movement there literally go through because there's no
point right can you
not going back on the highway unless you got lost but you
still have to have okay
just getting confirmation for that right turn lane again
yes that's the whole
point these project this is a project that's a basically
trail into the green
belt it's done and they've got two firms doing should be
done sometime in the
spring for the plans as those plans come together we we
bring those to the city
engineers and let them review make sure that it's
consistent with what they have
Oh Teal and like it's a super Street well you heard it here
first that's what I
usually tell people when we're doing a project in the
current document which is
expedite the environmental clearance so we should have this
project schematic
approved and once the environmental document is cleared
elements can be
moved up 2045 plans update and with text that the county
originally and text that
said look you keep your powder dry we'll pick them up to do
so we have to wait
again till the mobility 2045 plan is a firm for a project
that's not in the
plan and it will be in the plan this summer so again again
on 288 I do that
the environment is done on that it is not okay we have what
we call a locally
and technically preferred alternative what the city wants
what our mental
process and we were starting about four months ago from the
county stand to
spend the money on environmental let them do it and 15 I'm
not sure exactly
why is there's two maps and I am technically I'm wording
underneath it
says that we've got LTR it's the timing on 15 so we just
got them on contract
this past commission's us a fee they've already submitted
some fee we got them on
contract we're gonna go meet with text dot part of February
and get the time
schedule again primarily y'all y'all will be the driver on
what it is 1515
but it's for the businesses out there getting we feel need
so we are way of
issue for the city is to make sure that why doesn't shut
some of these guys down
during their shift changes so that'll be like a zing of the
project to keep
changes in mind
there are improvements that are on 1830 this is up text
that also will start to segment
out room and on 1830 where they're going to be coming
making into a slash rural
is a unique animal in some areas dance although the traffic
warrants a raised
median the time 1830 are more rural in nature and so we're
either looking at
areas that will have a contract on engineering contract
will work with the
city on what segments of that project or what type of
crossing over to e which is
the last item staff reports we have a memo for bike share
permit Texas trails
and active transportation see a permit policy as it relates
to dockless bike
shares in fact here momentarily also wanted to bring your
attention to the
Texas trails and active active transportation conference
that'll be
down on the UT campus I'm sorry May 2nd through I've gone
ahead and reserved
to ensure that we have represent we're determining which
which of the
engineers will go I assume that I'll probably go and then
we can also read
all of them have been on but since bidding fine to do it
probably isn't
worthy for me to go it could very well be that other folks
also right so we'll
keep those hotel reservations open until keep you updated
as to who will be
attending that particular conference but it's been it's
been a positive conference
that we've attended I know city staff has attended the 16
event in Houston and
the 14 event in full
sorry I wasn't on mic question of clarification regarding
councilwoman
Briggs request for a left turn discussion on left turn off
old 18 did
we already get that we were gonna do a verbal here at this
particular meeting
okay and so yeah the reason it's a verbal it was on one of
the projects on
the small project list that was approved by council for
funding so this the RFQ
is out we're in the process of selecting design consultant
for one of this part
of the six projects so this will be designed and
constructed this year I
think yeah you addressed that with a small quick projects
presentation okay I
think that's it question about we late those come through
the mobility
committee before they go to council did that one come
through us before we
changed we passed something last weekend on the consent
agenda councilmember
typically those will go through the traffic safety
Commission okay and then
they'll make a recommendation to committee of the whole and
I believe
that anyhow there was a question about about that a speed
limits were maybe too
high and I've sent I answered her but it may be appropriate
tentatively to just
put an explanation on our next agenda how the steps that
happen to in process
and the rules at the state level that that sort of direct
that but she also
raised the concern that there is a school located at the
corner of
Nottingham and University Drive Calvary Calvary Christian
Academy and we've
actually passed a rezoning for that for that location so it
's it's an official
school location and I don't know that they've requested a
school zone I don't
know that it's needed but I'm very curious about if there's
a school there
do they even have to request it or is that an automatic
trigger for some other
type of speed limit in that area so if y'all would check
into that and make
that part of the report very well we can do that the the
other thing is
regarding the May 2nd through 4th Texas Trails and
Transportation Conference I'm
just wondering if we think we're gonna have a bike
coordinator hired by that
time so that that person could attend the conference do we
know what the time
frame is for that I don't have a specific time frame for
that but but I
think that would be our hope is to have somebody on board
it's January in place
that's four months away so we certainly should have
somebody on board by then
okay okay I think that's it just well if with the traffic
calming art
presentation next week if we can be sure to include funding
options very well
okay no new business besides what you brought up okay that
will conclude this
meeting and we are adjourned at 1259