Sep 14, 2017 Traffic Safety Commission on 2017-09-14 5:30 PM

Item number one on our regular meeting is to consider approval of the Traffic Safety Commission meeting of meeting minutes of August 7th 2017. Has everybody had a chance to look at the minutes? Okay. Do I have a motion? Okay. I have a motion. I have a second. Anyone favor? Approval? Yes. Okay. That brings us to item B which is to receive a report, hold a discussion, and provide direction relating to speed limit along Hickory Street between Avenue A and Welch Street. Thank you, Vice Chair. My name is Preet. I'm the Traffic Engineer for the city and I'll be presenting next two to three items and then I think the last item will be presented by the chief. So let me get started. I want to, I know everything is written down in the report but I really want everyone to focus on the area, the way it is set up, and here's a map. The previous Commissioner, Mr. Hannon, he had brought up this issue regarding the speed limit along this segment of Hickory Street. This segment of Hick ory Street is right in the middle of this whole commercial district. It is not adjacent to UNT property. So currently the posted speed limit between Avenue A and Welch along Hickory is 30 miles an hour which is pretty standard for residential streets throughout the city and the segment of Hickory between Avenue C and Avenue A is posted at 20 miles an hour because as you see there's UNT right on the south side. There is a parking lot and all these different buildings that I think most of them have classes in them. So because of this being a school or an educational institution, the speed limits per our ordinance. I think the chapter 18 section 18-72 says that if you're close or if you're abutting a school or educational institution, church or a medical building or a hospital, the speeds may be reduced to 20 miles an hour. And based on that ordinance, back in the day this segment between Avenue C and Avenue A was converted to 20 miles an hour. Rest of Hickory , west of Avenue C and east of Avenue A is all 30 miles an hour and Commissioner Hannon has suggested looking at this segment, just a short segment and converting it into a 20 mile per hour zone. So what we did is we collected speed information, collected speed surveys for a period about five days and we found out the majority of the motorists or vehicles are traveling at around 25 to 26 miles an hour. So it's not over the speed limit, it's not even close to the speed limit, it's a about five miles less than the speed limit. So yeah, given the fact that they're fairly within the speed limits currently and there no one's speeding, 85% of folks are doing this and given that we need to quickly move traffic in this particular segment, there are sometimes loading trucks and stuff like that. So the more traffic that stays in this area and the slower it moves in this area creates a lot more congestion. So looking at all the different aspects of this, staff feels that we feel that it should be 30 miles an hour, remain 30 miles an hour. There's no ordinance to back that section to going down to 20 miles an hour. There's nothing, we'll have to specifically take it to council and reduce it. Even the 85th percentile suggests it's 26. Typically when you do that you have to bump it to the nearest, round it to the nearest highest and that's the posted speed limit. So there is no nexus or there is no real study to back this up. So staff is suggesting we don't change the speed limit and leave it the way it is today. Any comments, questions? Yes. There is currently signage that actually starts right about there. So right after you cross Avenue A. Oh boy, it's not going to work. But there's signage right about here. It says it's 30 miles an hour. I'm on the wrong direction. Yeah, it's hiding. It's hidden behind this pole. Okay. Well we do have a card on this item and I've card from Kim McKibben who wishes to speak. So if you would please, will you state your name and your address? My name is Kim McKibben. I own the business in the building at 1306 West Hickory Street. It currently houses Oro Coffee. Specifically the merchants along with the Fry Street Merchants Association have requested previously that this small section be reduced to 20 miles an hour. We feel like it will increase the safety in the area and not so much congest anything because if they're moving through another 600 feet at 20 miles an hour, we've got students that walk right out into the traffic. We have a lot of congestion in the area and we did specifically ask that this particular part of West Hickory be changed to 20 miles an hour and we're told no. I would like to point out that the traffic study that he is referring to was done beginning August the 1st which was prior to school going into session this summer and that previous traffic studies that had been done when they wanted to do additional development in the area came back, well you've got about the right number of cars but you've got a speed problem down here. Hickory becomes where it crosses Welch is one of the bus iest intersections in the entire area around the University of North Texas. That 's been proven with other studies done during the school year. So we specifically requested that this be slowed down, that you know we are looking to increase the safety. They're also looking at a lot of other things in this particular area as this is part of the small plan development that is going into place. We're not real sure what's going to happen at this point with sidewalks, with bypass, and those sorts of things. But we did request that this be reduced to 20 miles an hour and do not see any evidence from what was presented in the data that was in on the website at this point that it's going to cause any difference in what's going on. Most of the trucks, the delivery trucks, are past the area down there around Lucky Lou's where it opens up a little bit. They pull over to that side or they pull up right in front of that area. For me on the other side I 'm still in the 20 mile an hour zone and I can tell you that they're not doing 20 miles an hour when they come from the other areas and down the hill because it comes down the hill. Not even the bicycles are doing 20 miles an hour coming down the hill. I would submit as a representative of the other merchants on the Fry Street that this be changed to 20 miles an hour is not a hardship to the city. It's not going to make a big difference. You also have people parallel parking in the area and you know it helps if if they're slower. But our major concern was for the students and for the individuals going in the evening back and forth from the the U Center over to the bars that are on that side and over to the commercial areas that are there. So yes this request was made. I am a little surprised that the study wasn't brought out any more than just presenting data. So I guess that's all. Unless somebody has questions I can answer your questions. I have a question. On your form you said that there was not enough info on the agenda to know what was being discussed. Do you feel that other Fry Street merchants would also felt less informed and then they may have needed to be in order to come to this evening? Absolutely. There was nothing there except the first initial statement about that there would be a discussion and then the raw data. It wasn't that the city was proposing that it remain at 30 miles an hour. There was no indication of what was going to be discussed here this evening. There should have well I had other people who were supposed to come with me but you know that happens sometimes. Pretent does this have to be noticed to business owners? No. Typically speed limits are it's more based on federal and state guidelines how we define speed limits and post them and regulate them. So if there were studies conducted that show that speed limits cannot be changed or if you try and reduce the speed limits there are going to be more citations there are more people that are going to go above the speed limits more kind of regulatory issues that the city is going to run into as well as challenges in proving in court that this was acceptable when the study shows that or the speed survey shows that 85th percentile is more than 20 miles an hour. How would you set something at load? Those are the typical federal and state guidelines that we follow and it's been seen throughout the nation that if speed limits are set based on these particular guidelines typically they are followed they can be regulated they can be and they're acceptable in the court of law. But here if we post something that's below then it becomes a challenge for everyone. I'm all about safety I'm not saying that's not. I can only make comment if I'm asked a question. My question is if this were to be reduced is the major cost to the city enforcement? Correct. En forcement and actually compliance. People complying would go and the other issue would be is if we start enforcing and start ticketing if it's challenging the court it doesn't hold ground. Our study doesn't support it. Thank you. I have a question. Who enforces the parking and the speeding? City or UNT? It depends on where you are. Supposedly the University of North Texas is responsible for the parking in most of this area. It is currently the city that is responsible for enforcement of the speed limits all the way down West Hickory Street. It is not the responsibility of the University of North Texas by the Interlock and Agreement to enforce speeding only parking. So this is one of the things that we were we were looking at when we made this request at multiple meetings. Where are you going with the small area plan? Don't know yet. Don 't really have answers to those things yet. They are currently started collecting data from the stakeholders and from the people in the area. They started doing interviews with the consultants. The consultants were just brought on board beginning of this month I think with the final budget approval. So we won't know that for a little while. Would you be happy with a fresh survey when a little farther down the road? I would be happy with a fresh survey. I would also like to give the the other stakeholders and business owners in the area an opportunity to know that they need to speak to this council related to this. I speak to this committee related to this. I do not feel like that we were well informed about what's going on. I just came not knowing what it was. Would one more meeting be sufficient for you? If you will allow me to develop some sort of petition for those people who cannot get here to give comment or to send comment to you guys individually. So can we hold it for a date certain? Yeah we can. For next meeting. Next meeting. Can I have a date for that please? It's uncertain. I understand that. This is not the usual Thursday. No this is not the usual. No because it's the holidays. It's typically the first Monday of the month. So yeah we we 're not sure if we want to meet in 15 days and if we can even get there within 15 days with this particular item. Can we go to the first November? Sixth of November. Is that okay? That should be fine. Okay. Thank you very much for coming. We appreciate it. So if it's okay with everybody we will continue this on November 6th. Do we re... this isn't planning and zoning. Do we don't need to reopen anything? We don't need to reopen anything. Okay so November 6th. We'll see you again. Okay that brings us to item number C. Letter C. Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding no parking anytime restriction on the south side of Congress Street from Bolivar Street to Carroll Boulevard. Okay this item has been on the matrix for a while and it was first brought up by some residents in the area and since that time and even in the recent past there have been quite a few changes along this particular segment of Congress and currently Congress Street which stretches pretty much east-west from I think it stretches from Oakland all the way west past the high school. So the section between... I'm trying to get to that. Okay the section between Carroll and Bolivar is the segment that we're currently looking at and just a little brief background on what the street widths are and why we 're proposing the parking restrictions on Congress. So what's happening is if you go all the way to the east this segment of Congress between Oakland Street and all the way to Elm is 20 feet wide. It barely has any space for parking lanes. There are two travel lanes. They're striped that way and if I can zoom in you can see it better. But this is a really narrow section of Congress. The further you move out I think the pavement width changes so does the land use . If you look at this segment this land use is commercial between the two one-way couplets between Locust and Elm and this commercial area this is about 30 feet wide which can support parking on either side. This is the widest segment which is 36 feet wide. It does have commercial on either side. Then you get into this this particular segment which is what we're talking about. It is a mixed use at this point. It is not necessarily completely a residential like this segment on the other side of Carroll. This has a seven-mile cafe, some more commercial in the backside. There is other things going on here. I just found out from one of the residents that this is being used as a yoga place or something more than just a residential unit. So all these different things happening at this corner and I believe there is a trickle effect of this natural foods and the parking kind of you know overflowing into the street. So a lot of things this kind of area acts as a as a mix to use and that's why this is was targeted as the section to look at and restrict parking and make make things safer for residents. This segment is completely most of the times completely parked. There's barely any space to for vehicles to pass especially if you're traveling either direction and you come across each other one vehicle has to pull over close to the curb. The curb to curb width here is 29 feet. Fire lane typically , fire department requires 20 feet clear which only leaves 9 feet. If we park on one side that 9 feet is enough but there's not it's not enough to park on even on both sides and that's what's happening. They're using both sides to park vehicles. These businesses that business and some other you know resident home businesses have really kind of used up all the parking and that's why we looked at this parking lot. This is a city-owned Chamber of Commerce parking lot that serves this building. This can be used as an overflow parking area and there's parking up and down in Bolivar. So it's not that there's no parking available next to this and that's why based on the width of the street the fire lane requirements fire lane requires at least 32 feet to allow parking on both sides 26 to allow parking on one side. So we're between that range of 26 and 32 feet and that's why staff recommended that parking be restricted on one side. Here I said the south side primarily because there's a huge vacant space. There are some commercial here and there's a parking lot here so the impact would be minimal for residents that want to park and I think that's that's the recommended option is restrict parking one side for all the fall about reasons. Any questions? Did you is there a difference between the number of available parking spots on the north versus the south? I think it's fairly the same there there are a lot more driveway openings on the south side so there are lesser spaces on the south side. Okay and the driveway openings are wider that means you know even if you have like a one residential car entrance is much smaller than that so you would be losing lesser space if you restrict parking on the south side. How many spots are left then if we park on the south side? If we restrict parking on the south side? No you're proposing currently restricting parking on the north side right? On the south side? Correct. Okay. We can measure I can give you. You're counting? Yeah I'm counting. No there's a speaking card that you need to fill out. Okay. I would say there are about anywhere between 15 to 20 spaces on the south side but if you look at this parking lot this is fairly empty and can easily accommodate the 15 to 20 and there is parking on Bolliver so. Do all the houses have off-street parking? Yes all of them have driveways that go in there this is a big area in the back that has parking these driveways that are brand new and they have garages I believe. Most of them are quite long. No parking on the south side. We want to minimize the impact of you know taking away spaces but at the same time we want to be safe and if you look at this there's one car right there how would you fit three more cars on either side that's the whole argument here. Right now? On Bolliver? I think Bolliver is on one side. Wow. I think it's restricted to one side. It is one side parking. Right up against seven mile but if you're going north on Bolliver then you can park on both sides. Okay does anybody else have any questions real quick? Yeah we're grabbing some cards. Oh okay we can find some more. Yeah okay so we have some cards then and with people some questions and comments so I would like to start with Abby Buford and you have a question about the parking lot access and so if you would please would you go up to the podium and state your name and your address. Hello my name is Abby Buford 311 West Congress we work for seven mile. The idea of restricting the south side access makes sense to us I guess our question is would we then have access to the parking lot down the street? The Chamber of Commerce parking lot? Because I would say it's most of our customers that take up that street and it's not the cup or it's not right whatever yoga place is or isn't there. Right right and I think that's what Preeten was saying that the Chamber of Commerce parking lot since it is part of a city you know right a cooperative yeah you should have access to that. I never knew that was a free public parking kind of place. The south side of it sounds good. Is it marked as public right now? It is not marked. Can we mark it as public? Not marked? We know we can talk to the Chamber of Commerce and see what can be done but that's definitely an option. Okay we are against the north side being closed off so but south side sounds reasonable. Okay thank you and I'm putting by the way Kim and I'm putting your agenda number on here so and Abby I'm putting your agenda item on here also so we just keep you recorded. Okay I have another card to speak from Chuck Carpenter and if you would please go ahead grab the podium state your name and address please. Charles Carpenter residential address is 1112 Pennsylvania but I'm the owner of the property in question that parking lot is like private parking lot. We have a sign that designates it as such. I was interested who told you that was available to the public? Really? Yeah not that they we wouldn't be but we're in the meeting business and that parking lot is full a lot of the time and I would love to accommodate our neighbors at the end and we do. Part of the problem is we get a lot of people that aren't necessarily commercial oriented and I only have so much money to maintain that lot and so the other issue that we run into is the problem on the north side is that apartment complex has their trash pickup right there and it's very difficult for them to pull a truck up and pick it up from the side. Also from that standpoint very rarely at any time during the day can we make a left-hand turn out of our own parking lot so my issue is I'm very supportive thank you for even considering it. I wouldn't say that we wouldn't be amenable to public parking but that is a private lot and there's a very large sign that states that on our fence so I would leave it we would like to be good neighbors just for the standpoint that this is important to us but please correct the record that is a privately owned paid for by the Ditton Chamber of Commerce. Anyone have any questions? Is it developing more commercial? Is it developing more commercial along there? Not that I'm aware of most of he explained it very well it's a lot of multifamily our lot we have 28 spaces in there some of you that been long around long enough remember that building was actually up on stilts took my covered parking and when we filled in the lower space we had to move everything across the lot and so we only have ten spaces and we have to give those to visitors and guests coming in so any of my committees my staff has to use that lot so to just openly say it's it's a public lot would that would be difficult to sustain don't take it that we're not willing but I was very shocked at that statement I wonder who you spoke with yeah and they were said it's open to public so I can reconf irm my sources but well it's open to the public but not because we know it gets open to all kinds of use I have a usual Monday morning cleanup that amounts to a whole lot of different things we happy to respond to you and thank you for even considering all right thank you I have a card from Gary Steinmetz and also Chuck I'm putting C on yours just so we can keep our record straight hi hi if you would please state your name and your address for the record and we need to speak strongly in support of the fact it needs to be no parking on the street I we're retired we're on the street every day you know and it's been an ongoing maintenance problem from the very beginning you know not only picking up a broken tail of broken lights broken glass you know the the the fact that there has been a major injury on the street from from running on the street and having to do the sidewalk that was one of the reasons that the entire section of Congress Street was redone with new with new pavements their new sidewalks because there was a really bad act in a young lady you know they were very old and a young lady caught a curb and hit the ground and we immediately went out for under days to her and called an ambulance it was hard for the ambulance to get to her the fact is that there is an I understand there is an easy answer for who gets the parking on their side it's just not a good answer for either side this street has bicycles this street has bicycles that continually travel up and down the street including small children yes they do have the right to ride on and the on the sidewalk in this in our community but it is not not without their right to be able to be on the street we have a joggers that come from the college frequently we have joggers and students that we walk to the library on the street the continued evidence of a parking on both sides of the street endangers any anybody that's made a wrong decision momentarily either whether it's a turn signal into the parking lot or or whatever you know it endangers the the flow of students it endangers the flow of pedestrians and it certainly has become such an inconvenience to be picking up people's mirrors I picked up two cars hit on my property and on a daily basis I go outside and pick up the glass which is subdued and try and reattach parts to the cars that are parked to my neighbors and I and and it and it's not convenient for me either I'm not doing this because I don't have people that come to our house well my wife has you know she's currently under in- home health care so they got to find someplace to park that's their problem their job is to come to our house my job is to make sure that it's safe for my wife to have an ambulance and a fire truck to come down my street currently as of today they have found a water leak underneath and brand new asphalt and and and I didn't bring pictures of it but we're staked out and we have you know half of the street now closed and it's going to be under construction for the next several days which means that those that think they can park there I don't belong on the street are going to be wondering where to go the place to go is in the parking lot for the people and their homes and for the business across the street and for the people next door to me these are these this is a residential area this is not a Boulevard this is not a wide street you can't put cars on both sides and be fair to the residents and on the street it needs to be very simply no parking on the street there's we have plenty of residents have plenty of parking for their own the house across the property across the street from a zone by mr. Burkett and Adam you know he's got a nice big piece of property you want to you want to put in a public parking lot he's done his his land is underneath the flood zone he would probably be more than happy to sell a piece of that put in a little public park pop parking in the center of the street great we do not need parking on the street it's just too dangerous for bicycles oh another issue every year we're on the parade route and I love it I get to use my garden hose and hose the mayor every year it's great and I do a great job of it I got my garden hose and I wash cars you know and they throw candy very well at me okay and and so we have the parade that comes down our street okay we've hit we've hit the three-minute mark here but we hit your three-minute mark here but can I ask you how do you feel about parking on one side unacceptable unacceptable it still is not wide enough for the traffic flow that we get with buses with with with the delivery trucks that come for the for the restaurants we have we have had wires pulled down we've had branches pulled down there is you know it's already it's already rated for the fact that we have semis that come up and down the street I've picked up dead dogs I picked up dead squirrels you know I picked up broken glass this needs to be a no parking streets for the safety of the people on the street and the community at large especially with the fact that there's a school right down the street you want to have any questions for mr. Steinmetz and I had the favorite I had you know I don't have written approval of the three residents that that I've contacted to live on the street but they agree and it's just been I actually had a friend of mine hit a friend of mine it's not fun you know it's a good way to lose friends you know she hit her we know both of them we're the common denominator and I'm tired of being that you know the set guy that says well I'm really sorry about my street it's really dangerous you shouldn't come and see me wrong you should be able to come see me I certainly appreciate your time I'm strongly support that this is a no parking street with bicycles on both sides this is a definitely a bicycle community we have the bicycles already at large on it on that at the cupboard and at the the coffee shop regularly you know I highly recommend this is a no parking zone it would be the best for those the residents and and the parking could be available for mr. Burkett okay well thank you thank you very much and I have another card from Josie Klingman Klingman Kling er okay if you would please you can go up to the podium and again you know state your name address hi everybody my name is Josie Klingle my husband and I own seven mile cafe at 311 West Congress Street and we understand parking's tough there especially on the weekends when there's cars on both sides and we're not opposed to restricting parking but we would like it to be just on one side we do have a lot of customers that come to see us that they do have trouble parking our lot is about 27 spaces we park on Bolivar we do not park in the covered parking lot we're not allowed to park there we are open just from 8 a.m . to 2 and then to 3 on the weekends if there is a way to maybe you know ease up the restrictions from our business hours just you know during the day you know we would be up for that that would be very helpful for us it's just you know we're really trying to make that part of town a part of town where people could come they could eat they could shop at the cupboard you know get their massage across the street at the day spa or go to the glass you know spot and you know be able to park near the business not being able to park near our business it it definitely slows down and hurts our business we saw it when Congress and Bolivar were closed down during construction our business went way down when people couldn't just park in front even in our parking lot and just walk right in so we understand it's it's it's tight and we want emergency vehicles to be able to get in and we we feel that there be enough room if we limited parking to the one side and not both it would be really hard on our business there for sure you won't have any questions for Josie I don't know the traffic rules I'm leaving that up to the people who understand that better than me I I would think the south side because that way our customers don't have to walk across the street to get to our business there's less business on the north side I believe that people aren't really walking to you so I wouldn't want them to park on the south side and have to walk across the street over there I don't see that pedestrian traffic going that way I don't know how many spots are on each side and what's what's better that way how many driveways there are or anything like that I I would vote for Southside parking I understand that residents all have driveways as well correct and our our parking is really mainly from 8 to 3 I believe most residents may or may not be at work during that time I don't know how much resident parking is on the street during business hours that's okay okay anybody on the Commission have a question okay thank you thank you and I have another card for Jasmine Foster from Jasmine Foster and if you again state your name please and your address my name is Jasmine Foster I stay my residential address is 603 Bolivar Street apartment a on the map it's actually did you mean both sides of Oliver because there is actually a there is a sign that says no parking on the west side of the street correct I think some portion of Bolivar has only one side parking just given the width of B ollywood I think if you further go north yeah once you get past I want to say it's Egan is this next lock up is that's what that one you can park but on this side you can't and like like you said I think y'all's hours are 8 to 2 and 8 to 3 on the weekends I know for sure like if I leave and I come back I can't park anywhere so me parking and so I feel that if y'all do restrict it find somewhere for the people to go to the businesses to park so that I can still park to get to my house because where I park is literally my car is parallel perpendicular to the drivers I can literally get out of my car and walk straight down the driveway to my front door if people parking for the cupboard park there seven mile cafe or anywhere else park there I have to walk further to get home but then I can't see my car so if somebody breaks in my car what can I do you know and I use that car to take her to school take myself to school take myself to work if I can't get to my house because somebody else's parked there because where they normally park is restricted it's a problem for me and I know their hours are early so that's not really a issue for me I think it's more just people parking there because it's close to where they're going and not thinking oh well somebody else parks here to go home so I just think that's a and something to think about when you restrict the parking because me and my neighbor actually parked there and she has two cars so when she's gone in her little cars there it 's like okay where am I truck gonna go you know so just I guess thinking of the other people who do live on the residential side of Bolivar because there is a driveway behind the house on the corner but that driveway is for that house and I don't know how many people park in front of it but I know coming down Congress I've had you know where you go down the street and kind of weave behind a car for somebody to come down the street and come back but then you have the people trying to move out of their parking spot so it's just a lot of congestion and I'm kind of with them about restricting the whole street just to give everybody clear vision to get to where they're going and like how he said he can't turn left on his street out of his parking lot for his business if there was no parking he probably wouldn't have that problem so I think if it's restricted that would be good just designate parking for the businesses so that they're not taking up everybody else's spots for their for their place thank you and I have one more card from Arlene Hill for your agenda D item D okay is there anybody else who'd which to speak on item C any discussion oh I was just asking the Commission whether anybody had discussion so our choices include give us our choices again Pritam yeah the choices is recommend approval of the ordinance so recommend it or request it to council to accept the ordinance so that's the first thing for restricting parking on one side and define the side wouldn't that that would be and then decline the recommendation of no parking option one or two okay item C okay go ahead I actually work at seven mile cafe I'm when I'm assistant manager there and I am all for safety I do want my business or our business to still do well and I have worked there during the period of time that Congress wasn't open so I experienced the lack of business but possibly I was gonna say I know that your parking lot wasn't or you don't want it completely public but maybe employees only being able to park there on the weekends would maybe help with the congestion because we have a lot of employees and we have to get there and park so I don't know just trying to like bring up some sort of solution to this problem I completely understand but how many how many plays there on the weekend we were trying to like estimate I would I mean yes but not everybody drives and if we can't I don't know when the chambers of Congress meets and when y'all have your meetings are really it's only on the weekends that we have 20 or more on the weekdays we have like eight people up front maybe eight people in in back and a lot of us walk or bike whatever but it's more for the weekend that we have the worst time with the congestion and whatnot so yeah okay thank you okay well it sounds like we've got a couple things going on and one thing that we need to learn is more about the accessibility of the Chamber of Commerce parking lot okay so do we want to move forward with this without knowing the status of the parking lot or do we want to again hold this over for our next meeting it seems to me like that's more of an issue between seven mile and the Chamber of Commerce to work out the Chamber of Commerce wants to be a good neighbor then you know maybe they can have a conversation outside of this Commission I think our concern is more if somebody at the Chamber of Commerce or a seven mile cafe have a medical emergency can an ambulance get to them that that should be our first concern I'm ready to make a motion that we accept the staff recommendation I'll second time okay we have a motion to accept staff recommendation we have a second voting in favor aye aye okay it will move on to City Council okay item number D which is to receive a report hold a discussion to make room recommendation to City Council to establish a new school speed zone along Lakeview Boulevard between Black Walnut and Burr Oak Lane this is affecting Pecan Creek Elementary School okay let me get the bearings right here and go to the location the concrete elementary it's way down there on the south side of the city and they if you don't know where exactly it's located and what kind of access it has I don't know why it's doing this so it has two access points one on Lakeview Boulevard and that was when the school was designed that was supposed to be the main access and the main ingress egress there's a great drop-off area that was designed when the school was first constructed what happened eventually is instead of this area in front of the school and this area developing faster the area in the back started developing much more quicker as a result pocket page became a main entrance for the school and there are certain sections that we have school zone along pockets pages so that kids can across and there was no school zone along Lakeview Boulevard even though it 's a divided to lane right in front of the school and the reason being there historically there was no sidewalk connection on this side of the street and as you went further and further this neighborhood could easily cross across and get into the sidewalk and get to the school so there was no need or there were no students pedestrians crossing from this side there was no access it 's a creek area that's completely green built now what has happened in the recent past in the past six to eight months this area has started developing this subdivision came in they went through the planning process and now they have a connection here the houses are currently getting built most likely start occupying early next year and starting next school year a bunch of these kids would be walking down this sidewalk there's a brand new sidewalk now on this side of Lakeview Boulevard and it goes all the way and connects to this recreational area for for the HOA up there as a result of that sidewalk a lot of kids from the northern side this area will start using that particular sidewalk also to come down that side of the street so given the new development and and the existing development here on this side it is it's forecasted that a lot of kids are gonna start coming down this side on this side of the sidewalk so the PTA has been trying to get a school zone for years and they haven't been successful but given this all these new changes going on at this time it is it seems like this is a good time to get a school zone in this area we've conducted a speed survey particularly along Lakeview Boulevard right around this area and what we found as both directions the 85th percentile majority of the people are above 30 miles an hour so they're doing 34 35 miles an hour and if that continues happening during the school year especially when kids are trying to get across the street and there is a nice crossing right about here so this is a nice crossing to get to the other side I've already met with the principal we have talked about how they're gonna change this how a crossing that could be posted here and how their circulation would work if kids get on this side and how they would get into the school so we've talked about all that and at this point based on all the changes and all the new demand for pedestrian access a school zone is recommended starting right about here which is a few hundred feet south of this is Burr Oaks I believe right about here all the way back to Black Walnut so this area people will be forced to drive slower during the school hours definitely and we will install and enforce the school speed zone along this so the staff recommends we implement this so that next year we're ready if it goes through if it has to go through council we have to order equipment installation and all that so we think that we need to get this ball rolling and then by the start of next school year we have everything in place so will there be crosswalks correct there is already a crossing ADA compliant crossing area right about here which was designed for this particular reason this is a ramp that goes in and there is a so this will be completely striped as a crosswalk with pedestrian signage crossing guards and then the school zone would start somewhere back here that would slow down traffic about a year ago what was that change we made about a year ago here in the same area yeah along Lakeview I thought it was along I think we did back here where we shifted the crossing for pedestrians to the originally the crossing was located at this intersection oops wrong location but originally the crossing was located at this intersection with the development stopped now the development has moved further and I believe the crossing has moved here now eventually we'll get to post oak so I think this this was the change that was done for this particular school I'm not aware of anything that was done on Lakeview so indicate again where you plan to begin the school zone on the north on the north it is right about where it starts dividing into it's a few hundred feet 300 feet so let's see there's 300 feet of school zone oh it starts 300 feet yes it starts about there right where the market is and then it starts here goes all the way down to black walnut what's the speed zone on Lakeview until that point the speed on the posted speed limit is 30 and people are doing 34 it will go down to 20 during the school hours correct there will be yes blinking lights that turn on and notify this is the time when the speed is enforced it'd be morning peak between 7 and 7 30 or 8 30 something like that depending on I think each school is slightly different but we'll have some timings there and you calculated that spot based upon the crosswalk yes the ADA crosswalk basically what is happening is right after this divided area when they hit the single lane people tend to slow down so this area is where they tend to slow down there is going to be a brand new access here and an intersection so people are driving at a slower speed as opposed to this divided area there's yeah they're actually doing much faster in this so once they go get past the divided area they kind of slow down automatically so we don't necessarily need to extend it all the way back no I was thinking about the the breadth of it because I'm concerned of course about the equity of school zones across Denton ISD and not our school zones are 20 miles an hour are not necessarily equitable in all neighborhoods so that's something that I would watch for okay anybody else have any questions I have one card so finally Arlene Hill and if you would please go up to the podium state your name and address good evening chair person members my name is Adrian Hill and I am a student at Texas Women's University graduate student in family matters and policy this is my assignment to since I'm working as a teacher well not right now but going back into them working on another degree so we were concerned about the policies of this or the parents did this do they have any accidents in the area were there any children with fear because of the walking or bicycle riding or did they have any fear of the car speeding and they're not having any hesitancy well they did have hesit ancy they didn't have any hesitancy about crossing the street so can answer that okay so what it was for years they did have an issue with the speeding and they were there they were hesitant to send their kids even on bikes on sidewalks and walking due to the speed of the divide up in the divided area where Lakeview is divided completely that area was the scary part as far as speeding vehicles the other issue was a lot of people were getting dropping their kids off with the vehicles lined up early in the morning there was an issue with the conflict of you know vehicles try and driving at 30 miles an hour coming to halt or getting into the school dropping kids off and leaving at the same time pedestrians walking in so in order to have a can more controlled controlled entrance and exit that's why the parents were more want to move forward with the school zone thank you so another question the policy would that be coming from the traffic and safety Commission and sending it forward to the City Council for signature since you all are part of the legislative body the traffic safety Commission would make a recommendation and then that would go to City Council to be heard and voted on by council that's it for me as an educator thank you so much okay thank you is there anybody else who has who wants to speak on this item I mean I'm sure this one there there is a path there is currently a path and a gate on this side so a lot of kids actually use that yes yeah I talked to the principal and she said you'll be amazed how many kids actually use that path no that's the path and actually there is a bike rack here and a back access which is open for kids it's it's all locked there's a gate here for the fence but this is open in the morning and kids can park here okay is there anything else anybody have any questions discussion motion I move to accept staff recommendation okay okay there's been a motion there's a second everyone in favor all right and they will move forward to City Council okay we are now on item E which is to receive a report hold a discussion and make a recommendation to City Council for amending chapter 18 section 18 - 38 of the Code of Ordin ances use of wireless communications while driving good evening if you'll bear with me just saying here I'll bring up a couple of visual aids to you you yeah somehow I'm missing one of my visual aids now here we go okay good evening thank you for let me get on the agenda kind of at the last minute and bring this to you today what I'm proposing is for you to recommend consider making a recommendation to pass forward to the council to approve an amendment to the wireless ordinance while wireless use by drivers ordinance we as you know you recommended the current ordinance which was passed in December and then along came the 85th legislature of the state and House Bill 62 and they passed a statewide texting ban that preempted part of our existing ordinance concerning the using the phone as a texting or messaging device so the City Attorney's Office took a look at it and decided the best thing to do for us to keep intact the majority of our ordinance and laws in addition to the the state law that was just passed was to just to make an exception in the ordinance to make make it clear that it was not preempted or not addressed or did not address the texting part so that it's not preempted by state law so that's a it's a pretty simple fix and this section right here which is I section would be an addition to our existing ordinance as section I just would state that our ordinance is not not addressing anything to do with texting with wireless devices or sending electronic messages and so the portion that our ordinance that is then left behind to after the amendment is just simply the hand hands free part which prohibits using the device as a cell phone while you're driving so with this one little addition or amendment to the ordinance and plugging that in to the existing ordinance here at the bottom of this section at the just right after H would satisfy we believe satisfy legally to continue with our full ordinance in effect in addition to the state law and we would have the same coverage the same prohibitions as we would have from the original concept of the ordinance that was passed on December 6th so what the way we would enforce it is if officer wanted enforce a law regarding the use of the device as texting they would write the ticket under the state law if they saw somebody using the cell phone as a phone and holding it in their hand while driving then we would write the ticket under the ordinance so the only other there's a there's a couple of other issues that may come up in case that you would have a question about it one is there's a difference in the recommended fine amount the state law prescribes a $99 fine for the texting violation our ordinance says up to $200 which is just the way we write all of our ordinances to give the judge the latitude just put something in there but he had his fine for that other part of our ordinance would be typically would be the same as the state law texting part so it would it wouldn't create any issues there so really that's about all I have and I'll be glad to answer any questions that you might have yes so under yeah it just it just states that basically we're not touching the texting part or using it as a to read write or send electronic messages which is the way the the state law is is worded we already in in the existing ordinance we did that already just back to this one on H so H addresses a very similar issue where there was already an existing state law that prohibited wireless communication devices by miners when driving so that's the H is a very similar thing that it does away with being preempted by the state law and addressing the use of it by miners were in school zones so those were pre existing before our ordinance we just plugged that in to make sure there was no preemption and then we're doing a similar thing after the texting law went in effect any other questions look simple does anyone want to make a motion to move this forward and we'll vote okay okay it's unanimous thank you thank you we'll be taking this amendment to the council on the 19th so next Tuesday okay perfect thank you very much and then our last item is item F which is the matrix traffic safety new business matrix all right I have been trying to reduce the number of things here but things get added so I think we're still keeping the downtown comprehensive parking plan it's a valley and loading zone there's there are things happening on the economic development side and they're still working with businesses it's a it's a complex issue they were talking about sidewalk cafes and all this was being lumped together so they're still doing something I don't have an update at this point but we'll keep it and whenever I get an update I'll all the two huh the next two we already have them on the agenda and we've talked about it we'll bring back the Hickory Street speed limit with a new set of data and new information number four we were gonna hold off on that one just because when this was requested schools were not in session getting anything initially two three weeks or four weeks right after the schools open is slightly skewed not the typical data so we've decided especially both four and five to start collecting data in October I'm sorry September this month so we can get back to you sometime in October the fifth one was pedestrian crossing at Hobson we actually collected some preliminary data we had a camera mounted I don't know if I can pull that up here but we have a camera mounted on a street light pole at the entrance of at the entrance of the park and what we saw is early in the morning there were about five to seven people crossing that area we actually got a one of the days there was a cop a police car sitting right there waiting for speeders going up and down Hobson it was about 630 in the morning so so there there is some activity it's it's not a whole lot of pedestrian activity going on there and installing a signal requires a lot of pedestrian activity I think it requires about 50 pedestrian an hour to just be warranted based on the pedestrian activity we are going to collect traffic counts at Forest Ridge and Santa Monica which are which are two streets one Santa Monica directly is across from the access to the park and then Forest Ridge is slightly to the west and both of them will collect counts and see if they weren't any signals there to make it better for pedestrians across I think we had received two or three letters from residents the Commission had received it and as part of that we started that camera looking at the initial information it's it looks like that it's not going to warrant any signal there but that doesn't mean that we cannot do anything to improve the safety what we can do is add some more signage there are some of the sign age that is right across in front of the City Hall that actually starts blinking when pedestrians come in something like that can be installed that way drivers especially early in the morning when the kid when there is not enough light wintertime and kids are trying to cross their street it would be really helpful if the lights start blinking if someone you know wants to cross so that's something that can be looked at at this point I can only provide that kind of information so we we can bring it back as an agenda item once we have more information we can talk about this I just want to say I like that idea of the flashing crosswalk because Hobson is what's the speed limit on Hobson Hobson at that point is I think 30 miles an hour but seems like I like to drive further up is yes as you get closer to Country Club it's close to 35 or 40 I would say 40 okay okay yeah and that seems like a good place to use one of those lighted crosswalks since it's across the street from a park sorry oh you're such a gatekeeper Hilljoy I am being recorded okay moving on we'll bring back this item and then the last but not least there 's one extra item that Commissioner Oven wanted to add and that's converting the southbound right turn lane into a through right at mingo and that's something that we can look into we will have to get counts I believe that the right turn was separated just because of the number of right turners there but we can look into that and we'll also have to look at the alignment let me I can pull well we can't discuss this item we'll discuss it when okay does anybody want to add anything to the matrix it's now parking on both sides it's very difficult to get through there I haven't taken a tape measure out there but I'm pretty sure firet ruck cannot get through with parking on both sides so what are the limits of this for between what and what it's just two blocks long it's okay your microphone sorry it's just two blocks it's between oak and scripture oak and scripture okay and right now there's parking on two sides and we get a lot of students so it's parked up all day got it's very hard to get through there that has been on the matrix it fell off so at some point has it yeah we have been maybe it went into another dimension not going beyond it I want to point out to the small area plan and especially for this area so that might take care of or address somehow somewhat yeah we can't talk about it I'm new here I have a question related to like a topic you want to discuss at a future meeting yes okay you can start I'll cut you off okay I don't know I don't know if this is the right like if this commission would have anything to say about adding like like large cameras on street I'm not cameras mirrors on streets like and on busy crowded streets like like apartment complexes for folks coming out it's like the cars are in the street and they can't see some's coming around the corner to install like a large mirror for them to be able to yeah it's just west of Bernard Street on fanon probably around like fanon just just maybe like east of peak Street I think I'd have to look at what the actual address is it's like 922 because there's a apartment complex there that the cars are on the street and yeah you can send an aerial picture whatever you want but to pinpoint the location I was actually just thinking about that I wasn't sure if those are still used at any point but there's a real visibility issue going from old north crossing University going north on a board old north to yeah crossing northbound over University yeah like as you as mingo becomes old north and then like as you pass the gas place I guess sometimes it's difficult to see if there are cars oncoming from the other side and whether or not they're turning anybody else want to add to pretends with yeah this is matrix is much shorter than it was last time I was oh yeah let's load it up yeah uh-huh it's tempting I'm trying to cut it down I know well we can't talk about that my husband would like to add pedestrian light at the corner of Avenue C Jago and Oak right now there's a light but there's no cross there's no crosswalk there's no pedestrian it is coming we already have a design we're just waiting for the Hickory Street project to end really okay great put that on the list so we can take it right off exactly I just took it off he'll be so happy yes it was supposed to go under construction but Hickory Street is might divert traffic to oak while under construction right in front of fry Street so that's the reason they're not installing it right now is it gonna be one of those talking ones yes going up town Karen all right did anybody else have anything anything at all okay in that case we will close our meeting at 654 and I'll see you next month are we going to be meeting on the you