It's 532 and we have a quorum present and this meeting has
been duly posted and I will open this meeting to receive a
report and discussion on the recommended Denton mobility
plan.
And as a point of order as chair, I spoke with staff about
this. I think what might help all of us in the essence of
time tonight
is to observe somewhat like what we do in council chambers
is let's go through, we're going to have seven items.
Let the presentation do each of those items. If you have a
question that's not addressed to that item, let's make note
of it.
And when that item is presented, we'll open the floor for
questions at that time and I think it will help our meeting
this evening run a lot smoother.
So I would ask all commissioners to give me that leeway
tonight.
We'll open with PSRORA.
Good evening and thank you very much. I do appreciate you
indulging me in this special call meeting and I happen to
be the only item on the agenda.
So we'll have some time to go through today.
What I'm going to try and do is answer the questions that
came up in the last meeting.
Which one of them was how we go about exacting, doing the
road exactions when development comes in.
So I have some slides I'll go through that that relate to
what is in the current DEN Development Code or DDC.
The question about ex-commissioner that raised the
alignment of the post-walk road and we have some options
that we'll show you.
Commissioner Taylor had raised a question about north-south
connectivity on the west part of town as well as connection
, east-west connection on the south part of the town.
So we have put together some options and we'll share that
information with you.
And with that we'll get started.
So we'll start with how we go about a new development comes
into town.
What is it that they have to do to comply with the DEN
Development Code in terms of road improvements and how they
're exacted currently.
So a new development that comes in, as you can see, it is
going to create traffic.
And that traffic is going to come on the existing road.
And also if the development is existing but they're going
to add to that and put a bit so there's higher intensity of
usage so there'll be more traffic generated.
All that traffic has to be accommodated on the public right
-of-way.
So there's a cost. That cost is exacted as part of the
development process.
One of them will be the perimeter street improvement.
If it is on an unimproved street. So what is an unimproved
street?
If a road has no curb and girder and it does not meet our
current width requirements for our criteria manual.
I'll show you some cross sections later on that show what a
road that meets the criteria, what it looks like.
But an unimproved road would be without any curb and girder
and currently not meeting the width requirement.
So if they happen to abut the unimproved road, then per DDC
and the transportation criteria manual,
if it is a collector's street, they happen to be on a
collector's street, they have to construct 25 foot of the
road section,
which is like a two lane traffic and they have to construct
the sidewalk, curb and girder and dedicate also the right-
of-way from the center line of the road to interior of their
property.
On a collector's street, it will be half of 70, which will
be 35 feet. On a secondary arterial, which is a four lane
highway, divided highway, the right-of-way is 110 feet.
So that would be 55 feet from the center into their
property. They might have to dedicate 5 feet, they may have
to dedicate 20 feet to get to that 55 feet.
But in their primary arterial, that is 135 foot right-of-
way, so it's 67 and a half feet right-of-way dedication. If
it is an arterial street, they have to construct 28 foot of
the road section,
and I'll show you why in the cross section, as well as the
curb and girder, sidewalk, etc.
On a new perimeter street, if that road is not there and a
development comes in and it needs a new perimeter street,
then they have to dedicate the right-of-way, depending on
what the classification of that road is.
They have to construct 25 feet of the section for a
collector's street, or if it is an arterial, then required
bicycle lane plus the 25 feet and the sidewalk.
On a collector's street, the sidewalks are 8 feet, and on
an arterial street, secondary or primary, they are 5 foot
sidewalks.
And sidewalk, if there is already the road there, but there
's no sidewalk, a development comes in, they have to
construct the sidewalk.
Signal cost, if the development happens to be close to an
intersection, and we have in our master plan a signal to be
constructed at that location,
then based on the traffic generation, we calculate what
share they have to pay towards the signal cost construction
.
So that is also collected as part of the DDC.
The caveat to all that is a requirement put on all cities
by the state law, which is proportionality assessment.
We have a computer model that we had purchased from Kimley
Home many years back.
And we use that, it's part of the ordinance, where the
developer would ask us to run that model.
And if it is only a retail store coming in, and the burden
of constructing a 25 foot road and dedicating all the right
of way may not be proportionate to the amount of traffic
being generated.
So the computer model that we have, it accounts for the
traffic generated from that particular development.
It looks at what is the classification of that road.
It looks at what is the frontage of that, and then it comes
out with what is how much of the capacity they are using in
that road section based on the traffic generation.
So then if it is 100%, then they are going to pay 100% of
the cost.
If it is only 20%, they have to pay only 20% of the cost of
that road section.
So we sit down and we calculate for a 25 foot road section
or a 28 foot road section on their frontage.
What is the cost of that with the sidewalk and the right of
way also.
So we look at the right of way. We look at the appraisal
district.
What is the right of way cost? We add all that up and say
it is $100,000.
So if it is only 20%, they only have to pay 20%, $20,000.
All right?
And the current, this is the current process.
So that money, then it is tied to that location only
because with $20,000, we can't build that road section.
Right? So the worker is going to give us the money.
That money goes into account.
That is good for 10 years.
If we don't use that money in 10 years and build something
on that road which does include that address, we cannot use
that money.
In 10 years, after 10 years, that money goes back to them.
And that is where we are going to the road impact fees
because we can collect the road impact fees and be able to
pull them in a service area and be able to use those monies
.
That is the benefit of going to a road impact fee.
So the proportionality assessment is one of the tools that
we use in a computer model.
So those are the current ways that we determine exactions
for roads.
So here is a road cross section you can see.
And I was talking about 135 foot right of way where you
have a back to back 40 foot pavement including the curve
here.
And a 5 foot sidewalk with a 10 foot buffer in there.
So the developer, if they were on a 135 foot right of way,
they had to dedicate from this point to their property line
.
They had to make sure it is 67 and a half feet all across
their frontage.
If it is not, then they have to get back into their
property and dedicate that.
Then come back and construct all of this, 16 and 12, 28
foot.
That is the 28 foot coming in on a arterial street.
And on a secondary arterial is 110 foot right of way, so 55
foot.
Do the 28 foot construction, construct the 5 foot sidewalk.
On a collector street, 70 foot right of way, dedicate 35
foot.
8 foot sidewalk construction and 25 foot pavement
construction.
Of course all with a caveat with the proportionality
assessment.
Okay?
So that is how the current DDC works.
And the road impact fees that we will go to will replace
all of this.
And we will determine road impact fees based on the traffic
generation from that particular entity that is coming in.
If there are any questions up to this point, I will be
happy to answer those.
Commissioner Rosale.
Thank you, Chair.
If they are required to only build out their portion of the
frontage road, is the city obligated at that time to
complete the other half?
Or is it just half a road at that point?
This is where you run into those, they will build that 25
foot segment on their frontage.
And then they will go back to the existing road with a
transition.
And that's what they will do.
And since cities don't have the money, that will maybe be
like that for 10 or 15 years or so.
Until we collect enough money to do a project on.
Thank you.
Commissioner Back.
Thank you, Chair.
Proportionality assessment, that is based on the traffic
they are going to bring in, right?
That's pretty much it, right?
So if all the traffic is coming in, that's the 100% we are
talking about?
Yeah, if the model shows that it is 100%, then they pay 100
% of the cost of that road construction on their frontage.
That doesn't get impacted later if something else comes in
and offsets that?
Well, you know, it is determined during the planning
process, they tell us what use it will be.
So that's how we run the model.
But later on, they come back and say, hey, the use has gone
down.
Then we do work with it.
Yes.
Thank you.
Commissioner Dadovich.
Thank you.
You're showing us some concepts here.
Are these based on current DVC requirements?
Go through existing primary arterial or existing?
Yeah, that's existing.
That requires a 24 foot median, correct?
That's right.
How many of these types of roads do we have with 24 foot
median currently?
Not very many.
But that's the goal, to build those.
Why?
Why do we need 24 foot?
The turn lanes are one of the issues.
We mentioned that last time.
It allows you to cut into the median at the intersection to
put your turn lanes.
Otherwise, you don't have a place to put a turn lane.
Okay.
DOT is building roads and I don't have seen a 24 foot
median in that gap term.
So what my point is, and this is my, okay, and Chair
explains for future development,
my concern is in current developed areas, residents where
we're going to make improvements,
and I'm seeing and thinking that all of a sudden now we're
going to start taking property
in order to build 24 foot medians and buffers that are
going to require condemnation and taking up property.
And that is where the alternate cross sections will come
into play.
Where, you know, we may not be able to get all the right
over.
So if you cannot get all the right over because you've got
all these apartments built up and very expensive millions
of dollars of investment,
and you can't buy it, Eagle Drive, look at Eagle Drive.
You can't really buy any right over there.
Right, you can't.
So if you can, then you have to adjust your cross section
at that time.
You will adjust the cross section?
Yes, sir.
Because I'm afraid that, you know, I've seen all these
mobility plans and they're going to start going through
residential areas.
A lot of this will be for new, there's a lot of area in the
city which is brand new.
You've got almost 9,000 acres in adjusting your MPCs,
master plan communities, close to 9,000 acres.
And the cross sections they will use are these cross
sections.
I understand. New stuff, I understand completely.
I'm just worried about current existing, for instance, the
Bonnie Bray situation, where we're having to condemn, not
condemn,
but have to buy property and owners are wondering why do we
have to do this when we have an existing four lane highway,
by the way, at 35 miles per hour and all of a sudden now we
're looking at this.
I'm not sure, because the city is now going to be
responsible for buying property.
Yeah, this Bonnie Bray and Mayhill Road both, majority of
the funding is coming from the 121 project where the RTR
funding is coming in.
The 121 project was initially by bonds that TexDOT sold,
but now you actually have to pay money to get on 121.
So TexDOT was able to free up those bonds and that's what
is being used partly for Bonnie Bray construction and May
hill Road construction.
80% of the money being used for those roads is coming from
the state.
And follow up, just for the benefit of some of the new
commissioners, I've been on a sort of a pirate, if anything
, more than that,
where engineering in this situation can plan a road, but
they have no oversight as to when it's going to have 24
foot and when it's not.
And if they can enclose existing entrances and exits out of
businesses and what not.
There's not an existing format to oversee that other than
have a town meeting, make recommendations and they take it
back and they may or may not,
at their discretion, follow what the populace would like.
So I've been asking the process by which planning and
zoning can suggest or take to city council.
The fact is that let's take a look at that if it makes
logic and sense to close a street, a road, a driveway,
anything that has to do with current situations.
But there is currently no oversight.
So they kind of get to do what they think is best.
And I think that we need a citizen's review of that as we
do with plot plans and other site plans and everything else
to make sure it makes sense.
Now we're not asking to be engineers to look at, are they
using six inch concrete or are they using rebar or what's
the curb cuts look like or whatever.
That's their par view.
But something to look at it and say, for instance, we
looked at a couple of plots and turns and where roads were
going and you drive that and you go, that doesn't make
sense.
Well, same thing can happen in the city.
And I would like to be able to think that we have a way to
a process by which we can review it and do a logic check on
it.
I think there's a clarification staff.
Thank you, Chairperson.
Just for the edification of the commissioners, would you
please differentiate between text dot right of way as well
as city owned right of way and as it relates to where we
would install potential pedestrian utility easements and
how that would impact, for instance, the illustration that
we have before us as far as the buffers are shown and the
tree plantings are shown.
So that the commission has a very clear understanding of is
what they see on the ground or potentially what they see on
the ground.
Is it going to look like that or is it going to look
differently?
So just so if we can clarify that point, because in some
instances we may not have the ability to provide the tree
plantings either.
Okay.
If it is a city street, so the city owns a right of way,
then the utilities can be placed in the right of way.
And we do.
All the roads that you see in residential areas or
collector streets, civil line goes right in the middle.
Because that is the high point.
And we don't want the water flow from during storm events
to go into the manholes.
If the manhole is busted a little bit, all that water will
go into the manhole.
And that is extra water that we don't need in the civil
line.
So civil lines get put in the middle.
Water lines by state law have to be nine feet away from the
civil line so they get put in close to the curb down here.
And storm water lines usually will be on the other side of
the road.
The franchise utilities usually go in the parkway.
Or you also go in the right of way also.
There are a lot of Verizon and Atmos lines which are in the
roads.
And they are there.
So that is the city right of way.
If it is Tex-Dot or county, then with Tex-Dot what happens
is if we got a -- they have a utility accommodation zone
that they allow you.
And it is not very wide, but all the utilities, if it is
water or sewer or all the franchise utilities, Verizon, At
mos, cable or what have you, they all go in that
accommodation zone.
So we try not to put water or sewer utilities in the
accommodation zone.
But we have lots of utilities right now on 380, on Fort
Worth Drive, Loop 288 we had, where we had to spend
millions of dollars because those were constructed in an
existing right of way.
And when Tex-Dot came in to expand those roads, we had to
spend the money at our cost to move those utilities out of
the right of way.
So that is where our policy right now is to buy easements
and put those utilities in the easements.
It is not cheap to put a water or sewer line.
Eight inch line will cost you $100 a foot to put a sewer
line out there.
So it is very expensive.
It costs millions of dollars to do projects out there.
So that is the difference between a right of way owned by
the county and the state versus city owned right of way.
Because we have the right to go in our own right of way and
maintain that water or sewer line.
We can't do that in Tex-Dot or county.
We have to get permits from them.
We have to meet their requirements on the road
reconstruction.
In our case, we work with our own departments, state
departments to work on that.
So what happens is these street trees that you see right
here sometimes, the roots, you know, if there is a sewer
line,
that is going to be put in, you know, out here in the eas
ement.
Then if the tree is very close to the sewer line, the roots
of the trees, they penetrate the pipe, especially the
joints.
Currently, on the wastewater department, we spend close to
$100,000 a year just in root treatment.
Because these are sewer lines built where now we have trees
growing and roots go down and they like the water that is
going through the sewer line.
And that's what they want.
So they find a way to get into the joints and they push the
joints out.
They mess up the pipes.
It's a very expensive process.
So that's where, and same thing for our water lines.
So we've got to keep these trees a certain distance away or
have a clean, you know, some sort of a wall that will be
there,
that will control the root growth downwards and not towards
the water sewer line.
So sometimes we run into those issues.
And we have textile roads and now we've got a water and
sewer line.
We bought the easement and we spent, you know, $5 a square
foot or $10 a square foot to buy that easement and we have
to put the sewer line or water line.
It's very hard to accommodate trees in that area.
We do allow some landscaping, which is at, you know, if we
had to go back and fix the water sewer line, that's the
cost of the owner to put that back in.
Okay.
Commissioner Bruegel.
Thank you, Chair.
Yes, I'd like to change gears here for just a second and
talk about bikes because that's my thing.
Can you go back to that, the slide about the perimeter
streets?
Yeah, new perimeter streets.
They're required to build a bike lane.
Is that a dedicated bike lane or is that just simply a wide
outside lane?
Can you define that?
In the areas where based on the city's master bike plan, it
will be a dedicated bike lane with markings on it.
Okay.
So it'll be striped, it won't just be right over here in
the shoulder.
Yeah, that's what I, and I served on, and I'm embarrassed,
I served on the bike lane, but that was like six years ago.
So I, sometimes I draw a blank as to what exactly is in
there.
We haven't implemented much of it until just recently.
There is some work now actually going on.
There is some now, yes, right.
But did the bike plan include construction of new streets?
As I recall it, it was just we highlighted what we have
currently in Denton and said that these are going to be the
streets that we're going to put bike lanes on.
But I don't recall us talking about future construction,
future streets.
Well, they're like Sycamore Street.
You know, if you look at Sycamore in the, that was a
project that I did, the downtown implementation plan.
So we did a road master plan for the DTP area.
And that, so we did several computer models from that.
And Sycamore, if I remember, it showed a bike lane from the
bus station all the way to UNT.
And I remember this because that's an existing street.
So we're talking about new streets.
And when I look at the mobility plan, we're adding a lot of
new streets.
And I'm not quite sure that the bike, that the bike plan
that we did as a city five, six years ago talks
specifically about new streets.
So as long as we're talking about new streets here with the
new mobility plan, I would like a really clear definition
of what is a bicycle lane.
What exactly are they required to provide when they're
building a new perimeter street?
Is it simply a stripe?
Is it a share-o?
Is it a wide outside lane?
Is it something with a barrier?
And it could be, you know, it could be sensitive, it could
be specific to the neighborhood or the area.
But I'd like a clear definition on what exactly they're
required to provide with this.
And if you recall, I had done a presentation, a couple of
presentations back, which was on the context sensitive
design.
Yes.
And then we have some cross-sections that we have put
together.
They need to be vetted so that there are some alternate
cross-sections as that was pointed out.
If it's an existing road and a neighborhood and you can't
do anything with it to buy more right away, then what's the
best use of that road?
How do you get the maximum benefit that the stakeholders
want in that area?
And who would oversee that?
Would that be the Traffic Safety Commission or is that P&Z?
Actually, it goes through the Mobility Committee.
And sometimes, you know, they would ask me to go to the
Traffic Safety Commission.
And then, of course, it goes to the council.
If you all want to see it, once I get to the Mobility
Committee, I'll be happy to bring it back.
And you can show you what the bike line would look like and
all that.
Well, I'd like to see that.
That'd be great.
If you could also --
Or I can show it to you individually that we can share that
with you.
Okay.
But thank you.
I would like to see that.
But again, if we could maybe kind of firm up this
definition of what it -- because there's a lot of different
ways that we can build bike lanes in Denton.
So if we could maybe provide a clear definition for what
that requirement is, I think that would be helpful.
And my next question, too, again about bikes, it's on the
-- one of the slides where you have the cross-sections
where Commissioner Dudowitz was talking about the --
Yeah, I can go back to that.
The big median there.
Yeah, okay.
So an existing primary arterial.
So I see -- this is kind of our pie-in-the-sky idea.
This is what we'd really like all of our primary arterials
to look like in the city.
Yes.
Right.
And again, where's the bike lane?
And I'm wondering --
That's where, you know, the cross-sections that we have
done, they do include a dedicated bike lane.
Either --
I don't -- but I don't see it here.
-- enlarged sidewalk here or dedicated right here in this
area.
So secondary or collector's streets, there are several
options that we came up with.
And I want to run it through the mobility committee.
Do you have slides to show me?
Not here.
Okay.
I did show it to you all, you know, probably two or three
--
It's been a few months ago.
Yeah.
Okay.
Because I was --
I'll be happy to send that to you.
That'd be great.
Thank you.
Because my concern here is with this -- this extra four
feet for this wide outside lane,
that seems like space that could be better used to help
move people not in cars.
Yeah.
These lanes markings, you know, the lanes actually go down
to 11 feet.
They are not quite 12 and 16.
So that allows for the bike lane to be marked there.
The question is, how do you construct it?
You know, you have that two-foot marking there,
but do you want to actually have a physical barrier?
Right.
And that's what you're talking about with the context.
So --
Sensitive.
Perfect.
Okay.
Thank you.
Okay.
Move on.
The other big question that was, you know, came up in the
work session as well as in
the public hearing was the question on the post-hook
alignment.
And we got some options that we have brought here today to
get you situated here.
It's Sherman, 428.
Here's the natural preserve right here.
Post-hook comes along right here.
And this is Lakeview and Mayhill Road back here.
So in what you saw before, this was a routing that we
showed you.
And we have pulled some numbers, traffic numbers that the
computer model that was done,
that we shared with you in my first presentation, the
computer model was run for the entire
city for the existing condition that we got right now to
see what roads are stressed at
this time and, of course, to calibrate the model because we
went out to 112 different
locations in the city and got the actual traffic data and
calibrated the model to that data.
So once that model was calibrated, that's when we went in
and we took the full mobility
plan and ran the computer model.
So when we ran the model, these are the traffic numbers
that you are seeing coming off of
Sherman.
This is really, you know, Sherman and then people who want
to go from here or coming
from that side, 20,000, here's 25,000 actually going in
here.
So that is the 25,000 coming on post-hook.
One option, here is Cooper Creek Road right here.
And that was, you know, on the mark.
Sometimes out of the box thinking comes from people who
look from different areas and we
get tunnel vision sometimes.
So there are two options.
One is this one right here and one is further north.
This one would run through kind of adjusting development.
This one would bypass all of the development right here.
So this would be going through Greenfield right here in
this area.
A lot easier to manage.
Now, would this be a very high-profile project to put in
right now?
I seriously doubt that.
This part of post-hook is not constructed yet.
From preserve on, all that has to be constructed and right
away obtained.
And money is available to do all that construction, which
would be tens of millions of dollars.
Is the city going to be in a big hurry to come in and add
this in?
Not at this time.
We've got lots and lots of projects.
When I bring the numbers to you on road impact fees, you
will see what is the current need
and what is the projected need in 10 years.
This one will be a very low priority right now.
But for the mobility plan, with your blessing, you know, we
can go and take this option.
One of the benefits of this option, when we cross the creek
right here, this is a shorter
floodplain area to cross.
So shorter bridge, cheaper cost versus right here, much
longer bridge.
So much more cost here on that.
So this was a good thing that came out of it.
But the traffic is going to be -- but this is a built-cond
ition traffic.
Keep that in mind.
There's a built-out based on the land use plan done by WRT.
That's a traffic generation.
Commissioner Bruegel.
Thank you, Chair.
So you talk about how it crosses a much shorter floodplain
with this option to the west.
Why then would you route it to the east to continue along,
skirting that floodplain?
Why not just continue north and maybe connect it with -- I
don't know what that green road is up at the top there.
But it seems like that crosses a lot less -- yeah, there's
a road up there on the north side.
Why wouldn't you go -- are there developments in that?
Yeah, there are.
Commissioner Rosale.
Thank you, Chair.
That directly above it is Elm Fork or Elm Bottom.
It's an L shape.
This is floodplain right here.
And there -- all along that is 20-acre plots of residential
homes that are kind of ranch-style properties right there.
So I think going directly north would jeopardize those
residences kind of country living.
If you could bypass that to the right, it might be less
invasive.
Come down this way.
Okay.
Thank you.
So post-walk is an important route because it does allow
for people coming down Sherman,
they want to go to this part of town, it will let them do
that.
And also it will allow -- because Mayhill Road, if you
recall from the model run, it may be hard,
the sections of Mayhill Road that are going to be LOS
pretty low with all the traffic.
If you don't have post-walk, you know, to help it out.
That way people can make a choice to go on post-walk road.
Thank you.
Commissioner Detowes.
People coming from the north, they're going to come down
that road.
But I'm thinking that that western route and where they
would branch off and come east instead of going down May
hill,
these people are either going to come into Denton or going
to continue down Mayhill to link up with 35.
And that's the plan for Mayhill.
So I'm curious of why you're branching out and linking to
post-walk there because post-walk is going to go back into
development areas
and eventually get to 35.
But the shortest route to get to 35 from up there is down
Mayhill.
But that is where you know Mayhill itself is going to be a
choke point.
There is going to be -- based on the LOS we see, further
down there's way too much traffic on it.
So we need a reliever.
And the post-walk is currently designated as one of the
arterial streets coming from preserve area.
And all we are doing is allowing this to continue to take
that load off of Mayhill.
Sure.
And all I'm suggesting is that some of us take the least
resistant route and would rather go straight down Mayhill
to get to 35.
So as you've suggested, some of us drive and we know these
things to bring forward some ideas and some other options
to make --
And then people when they -- when we're talking about 30,
40, 50 years down the road, you know, to make this happen
--
Well, you're going to have -- Mayhill --
And they will know after they drive two times during that
time, they will know, hey, I need to go on this road.
Sure.
Well, understand.
But 30 or 40 years from now, we'll see, right?
Yes, sir.
And these -- you know, these -- as we go through the impact
free process, by state law, every five years we have to
come back and update.
So this is not something drawn in rock and it ain't going
to move from there.
Sure.
Commissioner Rosl.
Thank you.
The idea behind the post oak would be to have a north-south
corridor from 35 up to Shurm.
Is that correct?
Yes.
That's the intent?
Yeah.
And the preserve, as you can see, is very congested already
.
They have very limited ways to get to the town.
So this allows them to, you know, come through.
Lakeview, Willowwater is supposed to come through there.
But it didn't happen because I was going through a
neighborhood and they were in strong opposition.
So city decided to move that from there and move to post
oak.
So one of my questions is -- we talked about it previously
-- is if the intent is to, one, eliminate some traffic and,
two, expedite travel north-south would be ideal,
although this goes west, then north, then back east.
And so I'd be interested to see if Kimley-Horn could maybe
estimate time, travel time.
Yeah.
And we'll get back to you on that.
Okay.
If there's a significant difference.
Okay.
And we'll get back to you on that either through email or
when I come back in the public hearing process, we'll
provide you that information.
Okay.
After that, what I'm going to do is get out of this one
PowerPoint and show you a map.
I think I have it right here.
Yeah.
Right here.
And on the west side of town, right now, it's pasture land.
Not a whole lot out there at this time.
You know, it's not densely populated in any way.
The majority of the roads that we are seeing there are the
ones that are at least on the southwest part are what is
approved by the PNG and the council for the master plan
communities of Cold Ranch and Hunter Ranch.
All these roads that you see right here, all of these in
this color, they're all approved by the council.
We cannot change that.
Only time these roads will change is when these
developments actually start platting.
And now that we have a computer model, some of the roads
you see here are actually way more than the traffic
generation there.
That is the model is showing.
Primary arterials don't need to be primary arterials.
They could do a secondary arterial.
Some of those will change, and we can at that time look at
some alignment changes to see if we can have further north-
south connectivity at that time.
There are some issues.
We have Hickory Creek.
We have the airport right here.
Those are major, you know, stumbling blocks to put major
connectivity.
You can see this came about from our traffic guys, the ones
who travel in this area.
They said, hey, this is one clear shot we got.
Let's put that one in there so that we have a north-south
connectivity here.
There's not that much traffic.
But if somebody wanted to go all the way out here to 380,
they could get on that road and get out there and do it.
One option that we did look at is the Seawolf, and I will
show you that slide, I guess.
Maybe not.
We did extend this road out up to this point, and we need
to change this map to show it.
So this Seawolf road currently stops right here on Jim
Crystal, right, and it will then go up to 380.
So we'll have -- there's an existing property right here.
So we'll have to work around that.
But we will show that as part of the project, as part of
the mobility plan.
So that will allow, you know, all the way north-south
connectivity here.
This is the arterial.
This one is not.
This is a collector's street.
Then beyond that, there's not a whole lot at this time that
we have option until these guys start coming in and start,
you know, planting properties out there.
And this happens to be a gated community right here in Rob
eson Ranch.
We are showing this connection.
Who knows?
In 20 years down the road, it is still a gated community or
what it is.
So we'll see.
This is the Robeson Ranch Boulevard that goes -- spine road
that goes through the Robeson community.
That is the main entry right here.
And it runs this way here.
And we did -- as you can see, we provided a lot of
connectivity.
This is based on our traffic guys being out there every day
, our street guys out there every day.
And they brought all these issues that were given to the
consultant to add all these connections here.
And they all came about because of the traffic guys, all of
these connections you see right here.
And then, of course, these are new annexed areas that city
has now.
So those were put in based on the traffic generation that
came out of the computer model as to what collector streets
we need and what our trail streets we need.
And provide connectivity to Hills of Denton and to 35.
So there is one option that we had I want to show you,
pretty expensive.
Here's the PowerPoint.
This one right here.
This is 1830 right here.
And this is going to be a very expensive option to find a
way to connect the west side of town to the east side of
town.
And this is 2181 right here.
So that would be a major bridge crossing.
And a lot of property purchase and one bridge here and a
major bridge here at this place.
My suggestion would be to kind of leave it out right now
and five years down the road maybe.
You want to think about it, we can bring it back to take a
look at it a little more.
If you want it, I can put that in there.
Then we have to add that cost and our impact fee cost
calculation.
Commissioner Taylor.
Yes sir.
Thank you chair.
Could you return to the map with barriers you had up just a
moment ago?
Which one?
The city wide map with barriers that showed the airport and
so forth.
Could you scroll down to that very southern portion?
I've been looking at this map for quite a while and trying
to identify.
With Hickory Creek you have this mile wide barrier from out
west of the airport all the way to Lake Louisville.
Half mile to mile wide depending exactly where it is.
And I think it's in a 13 mile stretch there are five roads
that cross it.
35, Fort Worth drive, Country Club Road, 2499.
I think there's one more tucked in there.
And if there's anything wrong on any of those points you
end up with an eight or ten mile detour around.
And unfortunately I don't know what the cure is if you go
just a little bit further east.
Yeah so like in this area here and that's where you were
drawing in the connection from 1830 over to Teasley.
Yeah right further down here.
Yeah well further east as well like the one on Fort Worth
drive right now.
Yeah exactly.
So I think this is going to be one of the big challenges if
.
To right here.
Yeah as Denton grows south that's going to cut off a third
of our land mass from the rest of the city basically.
And the routing you know whenever the design is done the
routing these are already homes already here.
Yeah.
So you can't get in there.
That's why it pushed it further back this way to tie in
here in this area.
And I definitely understand there are a ton of barriers
between the railroad and the neighborhoods.
We can put that connection in you know so we can leave it
there in the mobility plan.
And that will be part of the cash calculation in our impact
fee.
It will slightly affect it's going to be a small part of
the total cost in that area.
So I don't see that being a real issue.
Well and I'm not necessarily advocating for putting a road
in that we probably won't build.
It's just that this is going to be an issue you know in the
next 10, 20 years.
And there aren't very many options because.
It may be a placeholder right now if you put that in it may
be a placeholder.
And as people look at this a little bit more there may be
better ideas come in.
I have a question to kind of piggyback.
Why can't you connect Hickory Creek over because obviously
that's a much shorter connection.
I'm sorry.
Up above Hickory Creek and just continue going west.
The Hickory Creek Road right here.
Yes.
This is the back and this used to run like this.
We changed the alignment so it comes back this way to tie
into country club road right here.
If it goes straight there's not just a floodplain there.
There's an actually.
Yeah you can see right here actually you can see that.
That's a creek.
Yeah.
It's all floodplain.
You can't get straight over.
It's all floodplain.
In fact there was a development coming there.
That's a bad intersection too right now.
Because you're up at a 45 degree angle.
Yeah lots of accidents there.
So this is where we changed the alignment to get out of the
floodplain area.
So you can actually really build this road here.
Because this is needed.
You can see the traffic and the volumes right here on this
road.
And we're putting in developments north and south of that
or mostly north of that up to Ryan Road.
Yeah and there was a development that was coming in you
know on along here and we were right here actually in this
area.
And we had as part of the DRC process exacted the right of
way but it didn't go through the full planning process.
It fell through.
Otherwise that portion would have already been established
the right of way.
Commissioner Rossell.
Thank you.
You mentioned that if we put on the books this potential
bridge.
Connections right here.
Right.
You said that that would impact fees.
Actually you know when we saw road impact fees as I
mentioned before we have five service areas.
It will be in one of the service areas this part.
So then we have to add that cost of construction of that
road to the pool of money for all the road projects to be
done in that service area.
But it could be it could hold a low priority even though it
's on the books.
Low priority but impact fees are calculated based on the
total construction cost that we'll have.
But over a 10 year window how much of that is needed.
And we will go through that process when we come back for
when you work as a capital improvement advisory committee.
Which hopefully will be very soon.
I'm hoping that this will get done here so we can get
started on that process.
Commissioner Bruegel.
Thank you chair.
Follow up with all of this so PS I heard you say that we
maybe don't have to add this in now.
We can maybe look at it in five years or 10 years and add
it at that point.
We can.
And I agree with Commissioner Taylor there's no sense in
adding this to the mobility plan if we're not planning on
building it.
But you know we all know Denton is growing very quickly.
Are we going to be boxed into another more expensive option
in five or 10 years because a lot of our growth is
happening in the south.
I mean is it better for us to just.
And you're right about that.
Just bite the bullet now and just go for it or.
And you will see that the impact fees that we calculate are
here need.
What all the cities are adopting is here compared to what
the real cost is.
So even if the cost goes up it's not going to make much
difference there.
Well I'm just because I'm just concerned like well maybe we
don't do it now because it is going to cost more but isn't
it going to cost more in 10 years when we have to now.
Yes.
Come up with a bigger bridge and come up with you know buy
more right away from.
If we show it then at least it allows us to start getting
right away as a development comes in.
Then our D.R.C. engineers look at that say we have this
road going through.
We need to exact right away from this or we need to reserve
right away from it.
Thank you.
Commissioner Roselle.
Thank you.
So I believe we're voting on this next meeting in the
public hearing next.
How do we provide you direction officially to put that in
the mobility for us to vote when I bring it to the public
hearing.
I already showed that.
OK.
So you'll vote on what is actually we don't need to vote
now for you to add that to the motion.
But you're not.
Yeah.
How do we agree.
You can give me direction that you want to add that word
there and we will go down that.
OK.
So when you were during the public hearing process then you
'll be voting on what is in front of you at that time.
Could could we see.
Grisham Bruegel.
Pardon me.
Thank you chair.
Could we see maybe both options.
Are we I mean I guess council is really the one that's
going to be looking at the bottom line and the money of all
of this.
Yeah but council has already gone through the mobility plan
and.
What.
Yeah OK.
I think maybe I'd like to see it presented maybe both ways
so we would have a couple of different options to choose
from.
Sure.
At our public hearing next week.
Would you like me to then in the same way and show this
also to options on the Cooper Creek side so that you can
vote on option A or option B.
Where we come in if I can get to that and not so much.
Right.
Further back.
Yeah I think that would be I think that would be helpful as
we're making our as we're making our motions next week to
say you know.
I'm not sure that I'm sorry this recommend this with option
this or option that and it would just I think it make it
easier for the record as we're as we're voting.
Thank you.
So that way gives you the option to go to option two on the
Cooper Creek Roadside and sort of the option one and then
that way I take it to the council.
That's what you voted on and same thing on the south
connection the connection of the east and west on the south
side.
Commissioner Taylor.
Thank you chair is just a career informal poll of the
commission as far as this the south road to old Alton the
old Alton connector if you will.
Does everybody think that's a good idea or a bad idea to
add just so we just so we have an idea like I'm like I said
I'm not strongly for or against I just want to see what a
reals thinks.
You know.
Commissioner back.
But keep it in.
You know we don't necessarily if we build it they will come
you know we don't know if that's going to work but being
there does in and we're suggesting that they are going to
expand south here that just has to put in the door for
Sarah I would be for just keeping it on.
What it does for you for the city is if it is shown there,
then during the development process if the development
comes in, then over the RC engineers look at the mobility
plan, and they see this road there and say hey, this road
is going through.
We need to reserve this much right away.
And as part of the then as well then they'll exact the
dollars for the impact fee. And those dollars that impact
for dollars can be used to purchase that right away in that
area.
So that it does give some, you know some flexibility for
the long term.
Commissioner that's good.
Thank you, Chair. Should we go back to that map again, the
overview, please, sir.
I'm just curious, with respect to the airport. Where's
Peter bill target distribution so on so forth.
Further back here.
A little bit would be here target is right in this area.
Fasten all is along here.
For the south.
Yeah, yeah.
So, currently, the only way to get it and correct me where
I'm wrong. There's that little bridge near victory
equipment to get over 35 w.
Is that. Are you following me.
Let me allow this for you so we can see it a little better.
You're correct. Little bitty. Yeah. Yeah.
And so, is there, is there a plan in here to make a better
way to get to 35 w or a better way, because I just
anticipate that area growing substantially.
There's access from 2499 from the south.
They turn it to target and everything from target so if you
had south.
So if you're going into the airport and take a left right
that first street that hits, it goes down and hits 2499.
Sometimes it's closed because of crossing.
Yeah, that happened in April when we had crazy.
That's when I was there and I actually saw it. But you can
see the, the, you see where the brown roads are down the
bottom left that connects up to airport road.
Okay, so there's 2499 or airport road would get you to the
airport.
Yes, but so that being said, I have a question.
Can you think. Yeah, thank you. Do you think that is a good
solution. So assuming that area grows assuming the airport
grows, assuming more corporations go out there, assume the
economic development is pushing more companies out there.
Will that hold, because I'm trying to tell you when I drive
to Peterville, and it's that one lane winding around, it's,
it's, it seems miserable, and I'm not out there that often.
And you have X amount of workers that are going that same
route that same time of day. It's very predictable and they
're all year, what two three shifts means you got a two Jill
ian cars going down this road, all at the same time.
That's when you see this connection right here.
Okay, pause connection.
This is not there right now.
There's a new proposed connection that we put in there.
That's where you can see the traffic over 13,000 vehicle
trips in a built out condition.
Right, the quarter already built, and it was done by peer
less manufacturing when they came in.
As part of that overall project, the quarter road, and then
target came in. So, I'm trying to recall, did the whole
section built or did we build the 25 foot on the quarter?
The whole thing got built.
Well, okay, so orient me though, because the road, the two
lane road that goes to the airport and Peterbilt, where is
that the two lane road out there.
That's it. There is a project, you know, being put together
on a little bit higher priority right now to fund
construction of this road.
Yes. To how many lanes? Because there is more traffic on it
. There's a lot of new development that has come in.
And it is especially during peak hours in the morning and
evening.
It is a issue. Yeah. Yes. But if I may.
You bet. So I'm asking you to though help me understand,
even if the road is wider, and you're feeding a two lane
bridge.
Which two lane bridge are you talking about? Over I-35W.
I-35W. And that seems expensive to build a new bridge
versus a better way to get to I-35.
We have to see, you know, what the plans for I-35W are here
in this area.
Because Tech Start would have some plans, and city
engineering department is going to coordinate the
construction of this road with I-35W.
Future. Okay. Also I have a few comments.
Thank you, Commissioner Detowitz, who's next. Thank you.
And I agree.
What we're talking about is a north, or for these
facilities to go south.
The problem is we have people coming and living in debt and
want to get to work and those trucks that want to go north.
And it's a cluster right there. So yeah, we need to think
about that north and east intersection and make it wide
enough for people to get around.
Because it's not very good. And Apogee Stadium is not too
far away. And during game times and university events, it's
quite congested there.
So Tech Start does have, you know, I mean, right now I don
't know where they are in terms of their planning.
35E itself, you know, they have a lot of work done. This
one is a little further down.
But yes, it's one of the projects they got for expansion.
Commissioner Taylor. Thank you, Chair. I'd also like to
point out, can you scroll north just a short distance there
?
So, you know, Western Center, or Western Boulevard was
built six years ago. Yeah.
And this other north-south connector that comes right next
to Peterbilt did not connect through five years ago.
So Airport Road used to be the only way in and out. And so
now there is a way for at least for northbound traffic.
You can take Western Boulevard up to Jim Crystal or you can
go all the way up to you will eventually go up to 380.
So that's really show this connection here continuing. Yeah
. And this area is much improved over what it was 10 years
ago.
10 years ago Airport Road was the only way in and out to,
you know, Tetra Pak, Peterbilt, Fastenal, Victor, the wareh
ousing across from Victor.
You know, so now there are already three or four other kind
of outlets. And it used to be when I worked at Peterbilt,
95% of the traffic went east.
And now it's almost a 50/50 split because people have found
they can find a different way to 380.
They can find a different way to Jim Crystal. So it is
better than it was. And I think it's getting better all the
time.
Commissioner Hatchbeth.
Yeah. So I have a question for Mr. Taylor. Having walked
the walk, do you find this sufficient to meet growing needs
?
And again, and I think so we're looking at five-year block,
right?
So I'm hoping again that we get new businesses and we're
saying, hey, here's Target, here's Tetra Pak, here's this
area where you can come and bring your company and your
whatever.
Do you think it meets? Well, I think Airport Road would
have to improve.
And I believe it's planned as a, because it's got like 35,
000 trips a day. I believe it's planned as a primary, which
would be a six-lane road.
That'll be an expensive bridge to build, but that is the
major way to get to I-35E.
And with improvements to Jim Crystal, which is currently a
little two-lane road and scheduled to be a primary arterial
, and the connection south whenever Cole Ranch goes in, it
won't be perfect.
And I'm sure, especially whenever you have 2,000 people get
off work at exactly the same moment and all get in the
parking lot and leave.
There's always going to be momentary traffic jams. But even
when it was a two-lane road and only one way out, it'd take
you 15 minutes to get out, which was very painful if you
don't work out there and you happen to get stuck in it.
But it's just kind of the way of life if you work at those
facilities.
But I think if you have three six-lane roads going
different directions out of there, it's going to be vastly
better than it was.
Okay. Commissioner Bruegel.
Thank you, Chair. And I wonder, too, Commissioner Hunsworth
, if we, how much business Denton might be losing out on
because that road is so small.
And as we expand this, I mean, going to your point of
bringing in more business, I think sometimes if you do
build it, they will come.
So I think to be looking at this and looking forward to the
future and what's the future of the industrial park and how
the mobility plan might kind of play a role in that.
So just my two cents.
Thank you.
So there is being attention paid to this area right now.
Plus this road is being expanded as part of the turge that
was put in there.
And then this will be a city project here for the airport
road.
Just for my clarification to follow on, I've got seven
items on here on our agenda that we're working through.
And I'm an hour down. So can you update me where we are on
those seven?
Okay. I'm trying to remember what I got left right now to
go through.
Let me see here.
It seems to me we kind of got started on about item five on
the post oak.
I went through, okay, let me see if this comes up here.
How our dedication is established.
So we've gone through that.
Road classification.
I went through those cross sections.
We went to the post oak.
Arterial parallel to Hickory Creek on the north and south
side.
Map of mobility plan with major barriers, which I had given
you with all the barriers.
And then we have a map with the flum overlaid.
So that map is in your packet that shows how we came about.
And I can pull that up for you.
Right here is the map.
I don't necessarily want to go through this unless you had
any question.
We have our engineer from Kimney-Horn, Janelle Hanson, who
actually did the computer model,
TransCAD model for this.
So if there are any questions, we'll be happy to answer
those.
But all of the traffic generation is based on the land use
plan that was done by WRT.
And of course it was fleshed out a lot more.
Looking at the DCAD data as well as what is currently out
there
that could possibly get built in those areas.
And then come out with the traffic generation for the
entire area.
And that's what the traffic numbers you see in the last
slide I was showing you.
Okay, so here are the seven items that I've got.
I've got the mobility plan presentation.
And I've got mobility plan additions, MPCs and new.
I've got mobility plan classification changes.
Have we done all those?
Those are all exhibits that I had given you.
These are the additions, which I already went through.
This is the MPCs and new.
I've already shown you that.
And the purpose of showing that was the connectivity, the
north-south connectivity in those.
So that was the main intent of bringing that in.
Classification changes is something that I had shown you
before.
And this was just something in there for you to have.
This is the one where based on the actual traffic counts
that were determined for the fully developed condition,
some roads, if they were a secondary arterial,
we found that it crossed the threshold in terms of the
amount of traffic to be classified as a primary arterial.
So that got changed to a primary arterial.
Vice versa, if the traffic was not enough,
when it was a primary arterial, it got changed down to a
secondary or secondary down to a collector.
So these are the ones that show that change.
There are not that many, but they are there.
So like you can see Robson Ranch Road, there's plenty of
traffic.
So from a secondary arterial, it changed to -- I'm sorry,
it changed from a primary -- so there's less traffic --
primary down to a secondary.
Red would be the primary arterial.
The green around that means it has changed into a secondary
.
And this one was a collector, and it changed to a secondary
arterial here.
This is John Payne Road.
There's a lot of traffic on it.
So it changed to a secondary arterial.
And then this changed -- as you can see, this road changed
to a primary from this point on,
because there's a lot of traffic on this one.
So the road that we've just spent the last few minutes
talking about,
Airport Road, is going from a primary to a secondary.
Let me go back and look at the mobility plan and see what
we have there.
[ Inaudible ]
Thank you for the clarification.
Okay, right here.
I'll enlarge that for you so you can see it a little bit
better.
Here is the Airport Road right here.
25,000 to 40,000 trips projected in 2035.
And so it is upgraded to a primary arterial.
The connection to I-35W goes on to 35.
So with that context, that's the classification for it.
Commissioner Beck.
Okay.
Got a little confused there.
I believe it's a primary road now.
It's a two-lane road now.
And we're going to up it to a secondary arterial.
A primary arterial.
That's six lanes.
Yes, sir.
But we have to see what the city really wants to do and how
much money they have.
So that -- it does make a difference.
So some of those things come into play.
The intent is to get the money as much as we can from the
state to build our project.
Okay.
Thank you.
Commissioner Hussba.
I'm sorry.
Is there a way -- I mean, because this highlights to me --
I know there's other ways to go,
but this highlights to me that just seems like a bad plan
to run people over I-35W.
And then you're -- so now you're causing congestion at
Bonnie Bray and I-35E so that they can
loop back around to get on W.
And so if you have 25 to 40,000 people, round numbers,
going that route, that seems a bit
cumbersome versus --
I mean, that's the total number of trips.
That's not the number of people.
Because those people will go and come back and then that's
the total number of trips there.
Thank you.
But is that the best route, I guess is my question to you.
Is there an option B that would prevent sending those
number of trips that way?
Yes.
This area -- this is now right now -- Janelle, would you
have a number there to show in this area what
we're doing with Traffic Wise on Bonnie Bray here?
Or I can probably pull that from this map here.
Quick.
Yeah.
Let's answer this question and I'll come back to you.
It's relative, I'm sorry.
Okay.
Roughly 25,000.
Yeah, you can see going north, south here there's not that
much traffic, 9,700.
But as you come and this traffic joins in, then this road
will have the capacity to handle that traffic over there.
Commissioner Donowitz.
I understand these traffic count numbers are based upon a
what time period?
Eight hour day, 12 hour day?
24 hours.
But if 50% of it happens within two hours, how do we count
for that?
Traffic to and from work, traffic in a condensed part of
town at a condensed time.
That really impacts the mobility, if you will.
So we have these models that give us 24 hours, but you know
, two cars in the midnight and we get 400,000 in the
afternoon.
I don't know.
There are ways to calculate the peak hour traffic.
So the ratios that are used to design these things, that's
the time they start looking at these a little bit more in
detail.
So it's in a computer model?
Thank you.
Commissioner Rozelle.
I just want to speak to Commissioner Hutsmith's point or
clarification.
To Commissioner Taylor's point, you can go up to Jim
Crystal and then head south on I-35 right there from the
Oak entrance.
Right here.
Before you actually cross I-35W, you can take a left up
near the, I believe it's a Budweiser Distributive, and you
can take a left and then get on I-35W.
You don't have to cross over to hit Bonnie Bray and then
loop around.
That's not the only way to get to I-35W.
There's two other options.
You can use this road or, like you said, you can come back
here and come down 35W off of that area.
But this is the traffic that's coming through the airport.
And we've got to bring that out here someplace.
When we, when this, you know, like I said, when the design
is actually done, the engineers will be looking at the
traffic that we are generating based on the computer model.
Work with Tech Start and then see what is the best
configuration that we can achieve at that time.
Commissioner Hitchbeth.
Yes sir.
No, I understand.
I was just curious if there's a plan B.
And just like Commissioner Rossell points out that route is
a good one.
I just want to see, kind of to your point.
I don't go on loop 288 because it's backed up.
And so I've learned to go a different way.
So in this instance, I'd love to do something more in our
control.
I'm not crazy about waiting for Tech Start to get all the
way up to Denton from the construction.
So I'd love to see something to motivate people.
And again, we're talking new development, new coal ranch,
new companies.
And I don't know that they're going to know, they'll learn
the other routes.
But I'd like to.
People who are not going north, they have the option to
come down here.
They have the option to come down here.
They have the option to come down Dakota, get on this road
and get on 35W right here.
Excellent.
So there are multiple ways to get here off of this road.
Sure.
And I guess my only point to that is 9,000 is a lot less
than 24,000.
So what can we do as a city, as a board, to motivate 10,000
people to take Dakota Road?
Because no one's taking Dakota right now.
And so that's my point.
Over time, it will change.
Because this road is not constructed right now all the way.
You know, what's the name of this road?
Oh, I'm forgetting.
This road right here is only built part of the way.
You know, it doesn't go right.
When it goes all the way, it's all connected.
Then you will start to see more traffic on that road.
Right now it is only used by one developer right here, Mr.
Marriott.
Corbin.
And then the folks right here.
Metro.
Right here.
So once that is all connected here, you will see a lot more
traffic diversion right here.
Okay.
Yeah.
Okay.
Do we have any other items on the list?
Well, the other items that were on the list were the real
ignments, update realignments.
We may have covered that already.
Uh-huh.
The flume overlay.
We did that.
We showed you that.
Okay.
And then the mobility plan changes descriptions.
Right.
And, you know, that is one of the files in your -- let me
see here if I can pull that.
Lots of things open right here.
Right here.
So you have this in your backup.
This is basically a table that shows you what I showed you
on the maps already.
These are the proposed upgrades and downgrades right here.
That you see upgrades right here.
Downgrades right here.
So that is one number of streets.
And then realignments.
Some of the roads were aligned better based on actual
evaluation of the areas and driving out there to see, you
know, where the best alignment would be for the roads.
So what they were shown before in the mobility plan, they
got changed a little bit to better align them.
But there is no classification change in those realignments
.
Okay. Well, those are the seven items that I have.
So I'm going to pretty much open it up now for just general
questions.
Commissioner Taylor.
Thank you, Chair.
In our meeting, we'd asked for most of these items up here,
like the post oak realignment, looking at Hickory Creek.
There would actually have been a couple of questions from
the public regarding congestion points around schools.
I figured there isn't much we can do, but I was hoping we
could kind of just look at the Pecan Creek.
I have to work with the engineering department on that
because that is more of a localized issue rather than a
mobility plan issue right now.
I know that on Fisher Road, that's one of the issues they
have.
We've been dealing with it ever since we started, you know,
going in the annexation process.
And I happened to be in the committee from the city that
sat with the three people in the city committee dealing
with the annexation,
with all the different people who were appointed for each
area that was being annexed.
This was one of the items they brought at that time.
So I'm pretty familiar with it.
There is some work being done, you know, in terms of trying
to create some trails that people, you know, kids can walk
on and get there a little easier.
Some of the roads that got built in that area already were
with the Preserve Development, so that is creating better
access in and out of there.
So that got done.
There were some issues they had about signage or no parking
.
So we went out and we did already all of those were already
done.
This is one of the lingering issues, you know, which is no
easy solution to that.
But it's not really a mobility plan issue.
Thank you.
Yes, you mentioned that the road impact fees are split into
five subsections of the city of Denton.
Where could I find a map of those subsections?
I will bring it to you in my presentation.
Okay.
Now you are by city ordinance appointed as the Capital
Improvement Advisory Committee, CIEC, which is required by
state law.
And all of the impact fee presentations you will hear will
be as a body, CIEC body, not as a planning and zoning
commission.
So there will be separate meetings and separate postings of
agendas for that.
And I will go through all those presentations at that time.
Thank you.
Yes, sir.
My turn.
I had a couple of just kind of general questions,
observations.
What's the issue that the city of Denton seems to struggle
with on the funding of so many of these roads when, for
example,
I had the opportunity to travel and some other business
dealings to Little Elm, Frisco, and there's great mobility
over there.
Four or six lane concrete roads built out to basically
vacant property.
How are they able to fund things like that?
And we have such a difficult time, to be honest,
maintaining what we have, much less providing any kind of
future mobility,
taking it from a map to actually the road is built and
people can come out and build the next phase.
It's much easier to build these roads when the hills of
Denton or any of those entities come in.
And these larger roads have to be built at that time.
You can have the right of way.
You can.
But in the city of Denton in general, all of the primary or
secondary arterioles are really owned by Techstart.
The city owns very few primary or secondary arterioles at
this time.
There's hardly any.
If you look at the roadmap there, all of the major roads
are Techstart roads.
So for whatever reason, back when, it was not done.
So nowadays it's a lot harder to do it, to get the right of
way, to ex-Kerrell Boulevard and all.
Kerrell Boulevard is about the only major road out there,
right, which is a city-owned road.
Beside that, there are two new ones that are being built,
which is the Mayhill and, or will be built,
they're under design, Mayhill and Monibray.
Now in the bond funding that happened in the bond election
last year in 2014, November election,
there was money put in for road expansions.
There is, and I may be wrong, but there is over 35 million,
around $35 million for capacity expansion projects.
So it is starting to happen.
May I please jump in here too, if I could?
Sure, Commissioner Buergele.
So to go along, looking, another reason I think why our
streets are not in as great of shape as some of the
surrounding communities,
is as I understand it, a portion of our sales tax that we
collect as a city goes to fund DCTA.
I was going there next.
Right, okay, good, and so we can't raise our sales tax as
per state laws.
So we're kind of, whereas other cities have a portion of
their sales tax going to fund the streets,
which is why I believe we're starting to look at road
impact fees, trying to find other sources of funding to
improve our streets.
But cool, so we're on the same page with this.
But there was-
Yeah, that was in the 80s.
That decision was made.
But we're living with it today.
We are, and that's exactly-
Yeah, but and yet we have public transportation in the city
, whereas our neighboring communities, many of them don't.
So it is a, we might have crumbling streets, but the trade-
off is that we do have some form of public transportation.
If I could just get on that for a minute.
Yeah, I'm going to stay away from how many people I see on
those horses, how many cars are sitting, and that's kind of
-
But that is a challenge, that they have those sales taxes
that can go to their streets and we don't.
And that's kind of where I'm going with some of my comments
and questions, is that I recognize and understand that's
exactly the reason that we're in the position.
And I certainly understand the tech stock right away, as I
think I've spoken on that a number of times here to this
commission.
And it gets back to the roads that we do have control over,
which is to the ones you brought up, Bonnie Bray and May
hill.
But we don't have the funds to be able to do those.
Those should be, if we're anywhere like the other
communities, those should already be six-lane concrete
roads from 35 to 380.
And they're not. They're as passable as they can be asphalt
and not even have curb and gutter on them.
So I understand to that point that we have some things that
were decided well before it ever came to the point that we
are here today that we're stuck with living with.
And I want to also ask just a kind of a general information
question for me.
I know there was a bike count that was done, I won't say
within the last month or two.
And I would like to see what those counts are versus what
our traffic counts are.
I think bikes are a great form of a way to get around if
that's something that works for you or for your family.
It's to the same vein of like DCTA.
I think these things are great ideas.
But I also want to balance the great idea of what we would
like to do with the reality of when we spend money on
things like this,
that public transportation, bike trails or bike lanes, that
we do that at the expense of other things.
And I would like to see just from a dollar dollar
standpoint is if we've got a bike count of 400 bikes on a
road and a traffic count of 25,000 cars,
how much money are we spending to do bike lanes versus
putting another lane or two lanes that travel, you know,
cars can travel on so that in another 25 or 30 years,
we're not sitting here going, well, we've got bike lanes
everywhere.
But now we really can't get anywhere.
And we kind of are sitting here going, you know, we need to
balance some of those things.
I think it's just my opinion that we look at it from that
standpoint as well because our predecessors that said at
this commission and City Council made these exact same
decisions based at different periods of time of what
sounded like a really good idea
and may have been popular at the time to do public
transportation.
And now we don't have the funds to maintain the roads that
we have.
And we've got tremendous gridlock in our city, and we've
got a tremendous amount of growth coming with 35. And we
can get from one side of town to the other.
We now have 2030 didn't plan, which is quit growing outside
of Denton and bring everybody in and if, in my opinion, if
we as a commission City Council and staff, don't get our
hands around how we solve some of these issues.
We're going to force everybody to be inside the loop, and
they're tech stock roads and we don't have money to do the
roads that we got.
We may need four lane bike roads because that's the only
way you're going to get around town.
And that's not going to be popular once 105 degrees or 15
degrees. So, if I can, Commissioner Brickle. Thank you, sir
.
I would also like to find out that that bike count as well.
And I'd like to hear kind of where Denton ranks in Texas or
among other mid sized cities in the country about per
capita bike use being that we are a college town and I
imagine it's probably higher than most.
So as long as we're looking at that those numbers, if you
could kind of give us an idea of where we rank among other
communities of our size or in our area for number of bike
users, that'd be helpful too.
Okay.
Lots of work for the department.
I'm sorry.
Lots of work for engineering department. I'm making all the
notes.
I'll get John Davis to come and give you a presentation on
that.
That's where we pay you the big bucks.
I think we have someone here already and to see staff that
can speak to some of these questions have been proposed.
Yes, please, Shandrin, if you wouldn't mind.
Good evening, Commissioner.
I'm Shandrin Jarvis with the planning department and I
spent most of my career as a transportation planner dealing
with these such issues.
I just have two recommendations and things to think about.
Your question about the sales tax is you're going in the
right direction, but I think two things that I've noticed
that are missing that may be happening in those other
communities is that they coordinate with the NPS.
I guess in this area, it's the NCT cog.
Have you heard about that?
I don't want to get into too many details, but states give
part of their gas tax funds to the federal government every
however many years.
Part of that is returned back to the states and is
distributed again through the NPS, but you have to request
that money.
And I don't know that that's been happening here.
So there may be something to look into.
The other thing is you may want to look into getting an MOU
with TextDOT to get control over your roles that are within
the city's jurisdiction.
So just something to think about.
Those are options.
MOU means?
Memorandum of understanding.
And is that something that P and Z can do?
Commissioner Bruegel.
Thank you, Chair.
Is that something that P and Z can do or is that more
something that City Council would have direction over?
Good.
Can I come back to you?
Because those are great ideas, but are we the right body to
finish that?
The coordination with cog is standard.
It happens.
So the projects that get done, cog is involved in those.
In terms of the turn back is what the term is being used by
TextDOT right now.
To turn back those roads where the ones that go through the
cities and majority of the traffic generated is through
those cities on those roads.
But they're not really a major TextDOT traffic route, if
you will.
And they're trying to give those back to the cities all
around the state right now.
City have been involved on that.
There's discussions going on currently with TextDOT.
When you take a road, all of the maintenance responsibility
come on the city.
So that's a big issue.
What TextDOT needs to do, what condition those roads need
to be before a city will take them over.
And in lieu of that, what TextDOT will do in addition to
that to build something else in the city.
So those discussions are currently underway right now.
There's been going on for the last almost two years.
Okay.
And that's happening among staff?
Yeah, it's with the staff.
We have one of the ACMs involved in it.
And some of the engineers involved in it.
Well, I want to ask a follow up on that.
Earlier in your presentation, you were talking about the
right of way the city has to acquire to get the utilities
outside of TextDOT right of way.
The easements.
And the costs associated with those.
It seems just on the surface that it would be to our
advantage to take those roads over sooner rather than later
, even though they may not be in the greatest condition.
Yes.
Because then we don't have to buy the right of way, reloc
ate all the utilities and all that additional cost.
Then those can actually stay in the current right of way.
Yes.
And on the chessboard, that is one of the items there.
That is one of the considerations that city is looking at.
Like in Kenya, we have to, you know, if TextDOT is still a
TextDOT road, there's a lot of utilities we got.
We have to move them out.
We have to buy lots of easements.
You know, millions of dollars adding to the total cost of
the project there.
So those are part of the mix.
We're already currently working on that.
Yes, sir.
Okay, great.
And if I could just answer your question, Amber, we, if P&Z
would not look upon memorandum of understanding, that would
be something that council would pass on and they would have
to pass an ordinance to authorize the city manager to
execute that.
But that wouldn't be within the purview of P&Z.
And it might also be helpful, I've just been listening to
some of your questions, and I think it would be helpful to
know where the funds come from for these specific items.
Because you have two issues with streets.
You have the capacity issue and you've got the maintenance
issue.
And I think that those are funded by two different sources.
So that might be something that you could bring forward as
to where that money comes from.
Yeah, the capacity, the impact fees are what will pay for
the capacity expansion.
The maintenance cannot be paid for through the impact fees.
But in the last bond election, there were additional bonds
sold.
So currently, the state department gets $6 million a year
as bond funding for rehab projects, plus additional monies.
So they're approaching, I think, close to $12 million a
year that they will be spending for rehab projects.
So yes, there is a lot of effort that have been put in in
the last three, four years to move up the funding for
street projects, especially the rehab projects.
So they can bring those to better driving condition, if you
will.
City does a overall condition index analysis of the entire
street system, OCI reading.
And streets which have a high OCI are good, 60 and over.
There are streets which are 18, 20.
So anything that is currently under 41 OCI is high priority
, because they will totally fall apart and the cost will be
even higher.
So those are on high priority to be done as part of the
rehab process.
Commissioner Roswell.
Thank you.
We mentioned last week in our meeting about the potential
for McKinney transitioning or turning back to Denton.
Is there a list or available list of current roads that are
being talked about being turned back,
just so we as a commission can understand maybe the
landscape of what's hopefully going to take place?
Yeah, it is kind of a, I think the Tech Start has come up
with a list.
I can check with them and see if we can pass it on to you.
Okay.
Thank you.
As an email.
Anybody else?
Well.
Just as a refresher, I mean, this might be helpful for you
all.
I know that we mentioned it when we were going over some of
the items for the new members, but when you sit as part of
the CIAC board,
that this mobility plan that's going to be passed by PNZ
will be incorporated into the CIP, correct?
And that's something that you're going to look at as long
with the land use assumptions.
And you'll take that information to determine any impact
fees that might be assessed for the roadway.
So you're going to be looking at it multiple times.
Just as a point of clarification.
Okay.
Chair, if...
Commissioner Duttlewitz.
We're now at the point of what's next.
I asked this question.
When we get the presentation next week, we will have a vote
, correct?
Yes.
And our vote will pass on yay or nay to City Council.
Can we do so with conditions?
Yes.
Chair, do you have some conditions you want to discuss
while we're having work session?
Well, again, going back to my issue of current streets
within the city, within residential areas that could
potentially widen,
and we have property issues and business issues.
Can we look at those plans that engineering is going to put
forth for a logic check,
and go back to that, that it makes sense for that plan to
be put in place?
Keep in mind that the mobility plan does not cover
residential streets.
It will be collective streets, which are more in the
commercial areas,
and also larger developments in the interior, collective
streets, the new ones,
and of course the primary and secondary art trails.
It would not cover residential streets in that.
Continue.
Yes, Bob.
Thank you, because that does clarify.
Because, again, mobility plan is a concept, but the issues
that I'm having is that,
once this goes into concept, at what point does it become
actionable?
When do they actually start to say, okay, we're going to
build that street, and here's the plan for that street?
We're in the process of --
The model, the traffic numbers I'm showing you, for the
current conditions we have, the existing conditions,
we have a model run that shows how much traffic is on each
street in the entire city.
So based on that traffic, we know which roads are failing
in terms of capacity.
Not my question exactly, because I understand that, based
on computer models.
Bonnie Bray is an example.
There's a concept plan for it, and in that model, certain
entrances to shopping centers and streets were eliminated.
It didn't make sense.
And so when I asked the question of why that was happening,
well, because we can't.
And, again, my point is there is no overview of a process
or of a plan other than engineering themselves.
No one else reviews that plan.
We review plans as P&Z of developments going in and streets
and how that impacts,
but we don't get to look at this as a approval process, if
you will, or an oversight to suggest changes, logic changes
that we're doing right now.
So I don't know at what point in the process it is, but my
concern would be,
will you approve the mobility plan and kind of have carte
blanche to go forward with it?
Yeah.
I mean, you can put that as a condition, but it is really
not something that mobility plan addresses.
That is not the intent of the mobility plan.
That is a site-specific design that you can definitely
address with the engineering department.
If you have something that is affecting a property that you
want to talk to them, you contact the engineering
department and talk to them.
I don't know if it's helpful, but a lot of the funding for
some of the streets that are contemplated by the mobility
plan
is done through the capital improvements committee, which
is like a budget committee.
And so it has to do with the bond election, and they go
through a separate committee for that.
My question, again, my concerns will still continue, and
this may not be the place to do it.
Sometimes the mobility plan is amended after that's already
been approved by a separate committee.
Jennifer is not going to talk about individual driveway
openings, etc.
It doesn't. That's not the intent of the mobility plan.
No.
And he gave me an explanation for that, and I understand
that.
So I have to reposition when and where I bring that up at
what point in time, or the process to get it in place.
And I'll be talking with legal staff on that in city
council.
Chair, can I ask a question?
Commissioner Rozelle.
Commissioner Notowicz, are you asking for a plat of the
road so you can see curb cuts, you can see medians, you can
see sidewalks,
and that approved by us, is that what you're kind of
getting at so we see the construction plans of a road?
I'm just trying to understand your concern.
Exactly. We saw a concept of Bonnie Bray done by
engineering.
And I'm looking at it as well as other people looking at it
and go, wait a minute, there's an entrance to this.
There currently is an entrance into the shopping center at
the corner of Bonnie Bray and University.
The plan showed it to be closed.
The plan also suggested there was a median in which any
traffic traveling from the south to the north on Bonnie Br
ay would not have the ability to enter that shopping center.
They would have to go up around, up to Robson, raise a
ranch, make a U-turn, come back in to utilize that, Alberts
ons and any of the restaurants and facilities there.
Now to me it doesn't make any sense because right now we
have, we have a little bit of a median, we have the ability
to turn in and turn out.
It just doesn't make sense.
As well as the widening of that street is going to require
the removal of half a parking lot, if you will, that now
services those businesses that face east within that
shopping center.
And the people that rent and lease those properties, my
business fronts it and now I have no parking because you're
taking that out.
And that was now shown on that plan.
And we're going, how do we change this or what's the
situation?
My answer that I got at the meeting, the open house meeting
or citizens meeting was it's a done deal.
Well, wait a minute.
Well, we had that approved by bond.
The bond approves to me the funding for it, but the design
I'm suggesting needs to have someone to look at it and say
does this make sense for people who travel or whatever.
There's a lot of older citizens south of there is a vintage
retirement center that utilize the medical accessory
building retail shops there.
They go to that Albertsons, they go to the restaurants
there.
They come up that road and they won't be able to turn in
there.
So again, just making sure that some of these plans have a
logic to it that doesn't impact the current businesses and
citizens mobility.
That's all.
That's where I'm at.
Yeah.
Come on, Becca, just to throw this at you.
We did a subcommittee, I think, in the last meeting or two
in regards to some of our zoning issues.
I don't I know this is a very dear issue to you.
We spent quite a bit of time.
Are we capable of doing a subcommittee of that and let some
of our commissioners that would like to spend some more
time on that and streamline this process some to do that.
I want to know what that is really because the reason why
we don't have a committee currently looking oversight
specific plans is because we have determined that that's
solely an engineering function because it has to do with
the design.
So and you want to stay away from that.
And for the benefit of the board, I just want to say that
we don't want to have public officials practicing
engineering who aren't professional engineers.
Excuse me. I've had that argument with legal and it doesn't
fly.
I'm not suggesting we look at rebarbed and engineering
drawings.
Materials are not the only thing that goes into engineering
.
Excuse me.
But we look at plot plans.
How far away something is from an intersection.
I disagree with that.
So I mean that's something else you and I can take up and
we can talk to you about that and issue an opinion if we
need to.
But I'm just letting the rest of the board know why we
haven't historically had such as a committee or commission
on things like that.
Commissioner has been tried.
Sorry.
I was packed up and everything.
Here's here's my thought to the I.
I get the heart of what Commissioner Duttle with the same
the linear side of my brain says, yeah, no, I don't I don't
want to know any of what PS knows.
I don't want to know any of it.
I mean, it's just it's too much.
And in addition to that, I would make a point to you, Mr. D
uttle, which that while your point is valid.
And again, I grew up in that area.
So I've ridden bikes up and down that road since Long John
Sivils was there.
But my thought is that same thought.
Take that same example of someone from vintage driving
their car towards Albertsons.
And now it's a six lane road or whatever it's going to be.
And they're turning across traffic and you got traffic from
the north.
I mean, I think there's factors in there that I'm not
saying it's the best for the businesses, but I'm also
telling you it's a fact.
I drive by Chinatown Cafe, whatever those other three
businesses face.
And I mean, you can't I've never seen that parking lot full
ever, ever in the 20 years I've lived on that street.
So I get it.
But we have to balance it with reality.
I balance it with I don't know the curb cuts.
I don't know the distances.
I don't know that stuff.
I think your input is valid.
But I also think you have to put a practical application to
it.
So I'd love to talk to those businesses, and I'd love them
to explain to me the day that their parking lot was full
because I didn't see it.
Excuse me.
I have a business there.
Sure.
I know that parking lot gets full at noon.
At noon?
Yes, thank you very much.
Okay.
So the impact is real.
And I have looked at and judged that issue from a practical
ity standpoint.
It doesn't make sense.
We have six lane roads with turn lanes available right now
on 380.
It can be done.
I'm not saying anything else, but it just it doesn't make
sense.
And maybe at the end of the day, some things will make
sense.
But we need to have at least a review of it and then not
let just one department have a carte blanche rule over it
and say you don't have any input.
That's my point.
And they may, excuse me.
They do try to get input by having neighborhood meetings.
But when you're at that meeting and someone answers me with
, well, you can't change it.
It's a done deal.
That's not an acceptable answer.
Not to a citizen who pays taxes.
I'm sorry.
I'm very passionate about it.
I'm sorry for that.
But this is a real one.
And it's going to continue if we're going to start to
improve our city streets.
And also within this plan, they plan to take a portion of
property that's going to impact business.
I have a business there.
It's going to impact my business and there's other
businesses there too.
Just to mention, Tex.DOT, expanding I-35 from 635, they're
buying out so much property to expand the road.
Motels, gas stations, other businesses out there.
And I think there's close to four or $500 million set aside
to pay for those properties as they acquire them.
Either sometimes that business will have nothing left, so
they have to pay for the business.
And that's all part of the evaluation process that they
have to go through.
Commissioner Tyler.
Thank you, Chair.
I think this is a broader issue than a single intersection
or a single curb cut.
You know, engineering is full of very smart people who know
their stuff.
They're all certified and experts in what they do.
But there is room in this for citizen input, if you will,
or some level of citizen oversight.
And it won't be, I don't like, I think you need to move
this 20 feet or that 20 feet.
It will be, let's look at other solutions to these
challenges here.
Especially, it's context-sensitive design.
So whenever you're going into an area that's got a 40-foot
built street and now it needs to become a collector, well,
how do we cram a collector into 40 feet?
What can we do to mitigate the traffic issues?
You know, the engineering standards and AASHTO and our own
design standards will say this is what it needs to look
like.
And we must have 500 feet to the nearest curb cut.
We must have, you know, 200 feet from the corners to the
nearest driveway.
And the engineering will, you know, it's their job to
follow those standards.
And those standards are put in place by city council and
other citizen oversight groups.
But there is room in that process probably for some
flexibility.
And it might be, there might be things where you can't put
a curb cut in there.
And there's a really good safety reason or a really good,
you know, whatever reason.
But I think it would still be better to have some way of
hearing that.
I struggle with this because I agree, but I don't know if
it's planning.
I don't think it's planning and zoning.
I don't know who it would be.
And it needs to be part of the process because it needs to
not hang up engineering for six weeks every time they want
to, you know, publish a design.
It needs to be something where it just, it flows right
through in the process.
And you have some oversight and some steering.
And it's not, it shouldn't be contentious.
It should be a way of making sure that, you know, the
community's values are represented in the designs.
And so questions and a little bit of discussion will happen
and then the concerns will be addressed, you know.
And context sensitive design is really what that's all
about.
And I don't know how we're going to implement it here.
And I don't know if it's going to have some kind of citizen
oversight beyond a set of rules in the DDC.
But I do think there is space there without overriding what
, you know, having somebody who's not an engineer tell an
engineer, you know, how they need to build something or
something like that.
Okay.
It's been a great discussion.
Any other questions or comments before we close?
So am I good to go in the next meeting?
I was going to ask a question.
I think so.
Yes.
Frank's the one you need to ask.
Yes.
I think I understand the conceptual.
I'll bring these up from my side and I will bring it up to
people in the city so they can come back and they will see
what they need to do with all this.
And I agree.
Commissioner Gattowicz.
I'm taking this up with council, mayor and Anita.
Because I've heard around the state these issues have come
up and some learned people have suggested a place to put
that oversight in place and we may review that.
But again, I'm just making sure the coals are staying warm
so that when it flares up, we have an understanding.
If it ever comes back to us, the other council or
commissioners have an idea why this is so important.
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you for the special session to answer a lot of
questions.
I know we've had a lot of questions and comments about
mobility over the last number of meetings.
So thank you for the extra time this evening to get those
answered.
And I'm looking forward to our next meeting.
We'll be able to have your presentation in public and
hopefully be able to move that forward on to city council.
I know you're anxious to be able to move that forward.
So with that, seeing no other questions or comments, we'll
close the work session tonight at 720.
Thank you.