- Good morning and welcome to this meeting
of the Mobility Committee of the City of Denton.
We have a quorum, but we have a full house.
So let's begin our items for individual consideration.
The first item is consider approval of the minutes
of February 16th, 2022.
I'll entertain a motion.
- I move approval of minutes.
- Is there a second?
Okay, all in favor, aye.
- Aye. - Aye.
- The minutes are approved.
The next item is a receiver report
to hold a discussion regarding the City of Denton
transportation/mobility project status report.
Mr. Poulster, good morning.
- Hello, hello.
Is that ready for the meeting to go on?
- That means soft.
You have to very gently touch it
for exactly half of a second.
- I just saw that.
See, y'all told me that, didn't ya?
There you go.
Uh-oh, okay.
We'll go by Braille.
No, no, no, we are in the roll.
I got this stuff memorized.
So this first sheet, for those of you who are watching,
this is a project summary.
It goes over the let dates, who's working on it,
and then what the construction cost is.
And these are essentially the projects in the report
that we'll go over today.
And it totals, we're chasing about
two billion dollars worth of improvements
in and around the City of Denton.
FM 2181, north-south.
- Pardon me, John.
I have the number in my head of 2.4 billion
for the longest time.
- So what happens is as projects come off,
like that 1.4 million for the 380 interim,
as they come off, we take 'em off the list.
- Got it.
- So 2181, we have a completion date of October 22.
Finally, it's been going on for like 37 years.
And it's still looking like October will be complete.
And we are in the last throws of our last shift
that occurred on March 14th.
And so from this point forward,
it's just getting the last bit of pavement down.
And then I would say sometime in summer,
we'll get to what we call substantially complete,
which is where you're driving on the lanes
in the proper location that you should be.
And everything else is just ancillary work,
like growing the grass, moving the signal poles, et cetera.
So we will definitely be coming back
with a party on that one.
- I have a question about that one.
First of all, I wanna thank staff
for pushing out the information about,
there was a closure, where was it?
At like Ranch Man or Briar Forest,
somewhere in that area.
And I know that there have been issues
with closures in that area in the past.
So thank y'all for communicating to residents
so clearly about that one.
The intersection of Teasley and Robinson
is really a wreck.
There's a grade difference and it's just dirt.
And with the rain we've been having,
it's already, the dirt is like washed out
and there's like a huge drop-off.
And that's a real busy intersection.
Can we see about maybe getting like asphalt?
- Yeah, we'll get with Travis Campbell.
I'll do that as soon as I get out the door.
- Great, thanks.
Okay, so your I-35E Mayhill job,
this is a project from Mayhill up to 288,
including the northbound and southbound frontage roads
to 288 and a direct connect with,
I mean a bypass over Brinker.
We are ready to let is September 23.
And we are on track for that.
If you'll note, we are in the 95% plan review
and primarily, yeah, all of this from this point,
we see utilities down or all the utilities
that we're working on to get relocated
by that September 23 timeframe.
We believe that we will make that date.
TxDOT and City of Dent's been working diligently
to ensure that the additional scope of work
that we added to the project doesn't impact
the city's ability to move their utilities.
And like I say, we're on track for September 23.
And the difference between the let date
and the ready to let is,
ready to let is when everything's done.
Ready to let is when the money currently is allocated
because that's what the date they thought it would be.
But once we show them that we can hit the 23 date,
the funding is there.
It's fully funded at $72 million,
so we'll be able to move the project up
to the ready to let date.
Okay.
The big job, the merge,
we will be done with the RIDO acquisition
at the end of this month.
There's one parcel left that we have some legal work to do.
The utilities are ongoing in this corridor.
They are, you'll see in a second, quite lengthy.
And we are pushing for a ready to let of August 23 as well.
And again, the design's essentially done.
We've been working with TxDOT on the aesthetics
for this corridor 'cause we wanna be able
to do some things in the corridor
that we did in the 35E section
where we added some aesthetics.
And we are working on that packet
to be included in the design and the construction
of the project by TxDOT.
And then again, here from utilities all the way down
to the bottom of the page.
These are all the utilities that have to get done,
but we believe that we are gonna make that,
what was it, August 23 date.
The interim, that's done.
We just wanted to leave it in one more month
'cause it was a good project to see.
And actually, we were waiting for a couple of the polls
to be moved.
And I did check from our last conversation we had
that caution sign they have
when there's congestion ahead, it triggers,
it's not been triggered on this project
since we've done the interim improvements.
I don't know what's going on.
All right, I-35 North, this is the $763 million one.
It'll be ready to let in December 23.
Again, it's fully funded.
We get to that date, we can move the money,
and that'll go all the way up to the county line.
Again, lots of utilities.
35W Frontage Road.
So we've been waiting for TxDOT
to enter into a contract with HNTB
to do the design on this project
that's environmentally cleared.
Apparently, they couldn't get to a number,
so TxDOT terminated that negotiations
and they're negotiating with an alternate firm.
They have not told us who that alternate firm is,
but I told them they're running out of time,
so we're kind of in a holding pattern on the design
until TxDOT gets somebody on contract.
You're at 380, 377 Corridor.
That's under construction,
and we're talking about a completion date.
Here it is right here, December of 23.
And right now, we're moving a little bit faster
into phase two on the westbound side,
and we're using daily closures to do that.
And we're trying to get the bridges secured,
the under abutments secured,
so we can put that center median barrier
because the accidents that are happening
on this section of 380 are crossovers.
And once we get the bridges shored up,
we can put the physical barrier in the middle
and it'll preclude those types of accidents.
380 East, it's under construction.
It's basically a lot of the dirt removal
and stormwater work and a lot of culverts.
And so it's mostly underground work that you're seeing done.
And I would just say if you don't have to go out there,
don't go out there 'cause it's pretty rough.
Okay, the 380 feasibility study has been completed.
And it essentially says there was a lot of stuff
about the integrated corridor,
a lot of stuff about the outer loop in it.
And the 380 feasibility says we're gonna build a freeway
on the blue section and we need to add frontage roads
to the brown section of the loop.
And so it's closed out and so we're gonna get back
with TxDOT tomorrow and get some clarity
on some of the components of your thoroughfare plan
and the county's thoroughfare plan
to make sure they're consistent
with the findings of this report.
But there'll be things coming off.
For example, we had references to the integrated corridor.
That's no longer a thing.
And so we're just taking the outer loop
all the way across to Milam.
And 380 will be the freeway
and 288 will be turned into a freeway.
And so we'll get with city staff and TxDOT together
and then we'll come back to you with recommendations
on changing your thoroughfare plan
to acknowledge those things.
And speaking of Luke 28 West,
this takes it from 35 all the way around.
We have Chang Patel on contract.
And they are doing the design
and the design is anticipated to be October 23.
We're shooting for a 26 ready to let date
because we have a lot of utilities we have to deal with
in this corridor and not the least of which
are all the natural gas providers out there
that we have to avoid.
1515 LTRA is doing that work.
We got the reevaluation.
Remember we came back after we got environmentally cleared,
removed the traffic circle, made some tweaks
at the Peterbilt location and some other places.
And we've got the reeval done.
So now we're able to finalize the design set
and go back to hit our schedule for the 1515.
1173, we hired half associates last month.
I can't remember to do the PS and E on this job.
And what we're trying to do is hit a June of next,
this year for 60% plans adequate
because when you hit that in June,
that allows tech stock to start the utility relocations
on this project.
And we're trying to get this project to be consistent
with the 35 jobs so that when we do the 35 job,
we can, for a billion dollars project,
you know, 47 million dollars is a rounding error
and we're gonna try to get that project built with 35.
Almond Locus, so I think we're working internally on that.
I'm gonna be quiet at this point.
Operator Error.
- Yes, John, thank you so much.
So we have received plans actually yesterday from TechStot
for the Almond Locus corridor that's south of the square.
And then we're gonna be meeting internally to review those.
The field meetings have been conducted
and working through that execution plan
and making sure that we're all in agreement
with the path forward and the pavement repair in that area.
So because the plans are completed,
once we can work through those steps
of having those internal discussions,
turning our comments back over to TechStot,
then they'll give us a schedule from there
as to what they anticipate to have that area completed.
So--
- Pardon me, so how soon would we get to,
at least even like a sketchy timetable?
This is one of the areas, you know,
we get asked about the most.
- Sure, we do too, I feel your pain.
Definitely, what I would anticipate
is once we can have those internal conversations
being that we received the plans yesterday
and can work through that, I would anticipate
that within the next timeframe
of when we have the next mobility committee meeting,
we could be able to produce you
and provide you a schedule at that time.
It's gonna take a little bit of time internally
for us to have those final conversations,
review that set of plans, but I would hope
that we would have a rough schedule of that timeframe
of when they could actually start the construction
through their maintenance contract
by the time we have the next mobility committee meeting.
- And because it's a maintenance contract,
it's more expeditious and, you know,
if we get this last part done soon enough,
I think that we're coming into a good paving season.
You know, it'll just be a matter of us pressuring them
to make it a priority.
I think they already think it is.
- That's what a priority looks like, okay.
Can you help us with just like a short explanation
or some language to answer the question,
why has it taken so long?
- Yes, the short answer?
- Yeah, not the fully technical one,
but when you can tell your neighbor.
- Elm and Locust are tech stock project, our roads,
but they are roads that were older roads
that were basically put on the system
when we did some stuff to 377th Street Town.
City has always had utilities under the pavement
and that causes problems with the pavement
and the utilities and this last cycle
of where the city needed to come in
and do some very significant improvements
to the downtown area for the utilities and drainage.
Tech stock said, look, at one point a couple years ago,
they held our permits hostage
'cause they said, we're not gonna let you do the work
until you agree to take it off system.
Well, now they've even reversed that
and we have to like negotiate to get it off system.
And so that held us up for a while
and we finally got them to give us the permits
and then it was a matter of,
oh, we're gonna take it off system
but it depends on quality of the road once it's done
'cause right now we're gonna tear it up
and we don't wanna go back and do a base repair
and full depth on those areas that we mess up
and then you come back behind us and tear it all out
and fix it to our standards and give it back to us.
So there was a negotiated battle
that dealt with that for about a year.
And so it's just the process of you have a city road,
it's a state facility with city utilities in it
and they all have different purposes
and they all have ways of getting in each other's way.
- Trying to think of how to make that simpler.
- I would just like to add to that
because it's a textile roadway, textile gave us the permit
to go ahead and do the construction
for the water and sewer underneath the roadway,
although it's a textile roadway.
There's some terminology that we're still working through
because the city from my understandings,
understanding was that it was gonna be completely rebuilt
and with TechStop working through with a maintenance program,
it's going to have more of a rehabilitation type measure.
So I'm looking at the types of the useful life
of the roadway that's going to be constructed
before the city says, yes,
that's the path we want to go down.
So there's a lot of conversations going back and forth,
just simply from the standpoint
that yes, we need the roadway completed
and we need the roadway fixed, obviously, right?
We all know that, we all have that same concern,
but I also don't want,
and I know Danny Kramer's sitting over
in the area over there,
but he has the individual with public works
over the entire street operation,
the city doesn't wanna accept and take a roadway
into our system that doesn't meet our standards.
And so it's a constant conversation,
making sure that what is constructed
is something that the city's comfortable with
to the standard that we're comfortable with,
because the previous conversations were
from the understanding that
if we did this utility work and drainage work,
the roadway was gonna be completely reconstructed.
It's now looking as if that's a more
of a maintenance rehabilitation.
So we're looking at what does that truly mean?
And like I said, we got the plans yesterday
so that we can now evaluate it.
Staffs had multiple field visits,
but I myself don't feel comfortable,
and I know city manager's office
and then of course, street operations,
doesn't wanna take something on,
nor does Textodot at this time
want to put together that agreement
that's not something that we can all come to terms with.
And ultimately it impacts also,
the roadways further north in this area.
So it's kind of a catch-22
because they don't typically allow you
to have utilities in the roadway.
Those are past history.
Those things happen probably in the 20s, 40s.
I have no idea when that was constructed.
So just understand the reason
why it's taking a little bit of time
is because we wanna make sure if we do say yes,
we wanna move forward with that turn back
and take that portion of the roadway over,
that it's built to a standard
that the city is comfortable with.
- So let me try, and go ahead, please.
- I was gonna wait until you were done.
Yeah, I just have, what's circulating in my head
is that any citizen that is driving through,
of course the complaint is that it's just taking so long
versus what they actually see.
Big pipes on the road, things opening up.
It's obvious that they are expanding
because the city is growing.
That's what I say.
It's road work because the city is growing
and they need to put bigger pipes in.
That seems to be the basic type of conversation.
But now I'm thinking, as I'm hearing,
that the utilities are literally under the road, right?
Is that what I heard?
- Yes, ma'am, that's correct.
- Because we're going to be upgrading some utilities
under some roads that are in, already here.
I appreciate hearing that.
So generally, where are the utilities located
when a new road is built?
- Utilities are always located underneath the roadway.
- Yeah, on a city road.
- On a city roadway.
Elm and Locus are state roads
and the state doesn't allow utilities under their pavement.
They'd have a 15-foot parkway on either side of the roadway
that they allow utilities in
and all the drainage for the roadway itself
can be under pavement,
but the utilities have to be outside in the parkway.
- So this, I'm sorry.
- No, go ahead.
I was just going to say that typically,
from the city perspective, what John's describing,
that's called the utility accommodation zone.
Cities typically don't go
within the utility accommodation zone.
We purchase, as you're aware of,
of course, with the 35 Project,
easements that are outside the right-of-way line
so that our facilities can go in,
water or sewer easements outside the TxDOT roadway.
Correct.
- But that can't happen on this roadway
because it's an older road.
- Well, the outside of the roadway is the sidewalk
and then outside the sidewalk is the building.
- Yeah.
- So we are--
- So you're saying what we want.
- Yeah, we're restricted.
And so the good news is,
the reason why I think the maintenance contract
is going to go faster than we think
is because about two months ago,
the commission threw everybody a curve ball
and says we may not be interested in turn back anymore.
And so we may get the road upgraded,
leave the utilities in the ground,
and TxDOT come back and later go,
we're not going to give it to you.
So then you don't have to maintain it.
- That's interesting.
'Cause our call, we're clearly voting.
I didn't vote for it, but there was a vote on council
to say that we would take it.
I'm sorry.
- Yeah, so I just wanted to,
I don't know if now is the appropriate time to bring it up,
but I just wanted to kind of,
you know me, I like to throw ideas out there
regardless of whether they're realistic or not.
But given that we've got Paul and Brittany here today,
I wonder if now would be a good opportunity
to talk about this section of roadway
and the section of roadway to the north.
I know that the, you know, the phase one area,
there aren't currently any bus routes
that run on that roadway,
but this is, you know, the core of the city.
And as bus routes change and evolve over the years,
you know, I hope that we'll have an eye toward roadway design
that's accommodating of buses.
You know, maybe that could include a pull-off
or maybe it's just, I mean,
I don't know if there are any design standards
as far as like the quality of the pavement
that needs to be bolstered
if there are gonna be buses on it,
but something to consider I think.
- So if it stays on system,
a lot of that, I mean, the pavement thickness
is gonna be what the pavement thickness needs to be.
But if it's on system, a lot of that stuff
to accommodate the transit won't be allowed.
That was part of the reason why we wanted
to get it off system because once it's off system,
you can create it in your own image.
- And I would also mention that as we look at the plans
that are being evaluated that we received,
we also are gonna be looking at
how the roadway can be striped, right?
We wanna continue to have the two-lane capacity.
I realize when you're coming, you know,
going northbound on Locust, it's actually three lanes,
but what Nathan is evaluating is looking at
how we can include bike lanes, pedestrian facilities.
TxDOT's not evaluating that
because that's not a part of their overall approach,
but it's working on that collaboration
of what can we do to have the roadway striped appropriately
to make sure that that's a corridor,
that we do have the pedestrian accommodations
and the bicycle accommodations
to bring that multimodal approach to that roadway.
- So just so you know,
the reason why they have terminated turnbacks
is because they found out that communities
were taking their state facilities,
reducing capacity and doing everything that Becky just said.
And so that's when they killed it.
They took one back from San Antonio
that they gave to them in 2014,
and they were about to go to construction with it, so.
- Because, but what?
- How dare a city provide accommodations
for a desk fan? - Yeah, because they added
facilities? - No, they,
because they went from number of lanes to less lanes,
and then they turned them into a multimodal facility.
So everything you want to do,
everything that everybody wants to do
are the things they don't want you to do.
And I'll be careful on how I say this,
but there is some irony, or confusion.
Well, someone's listening.
They want you to take the road.
It would be like buying a house from somebody,
and then they tell you,
you can't do any remodeling to it, right?
After it's yours. - Yeah, that's weird.
- That's what we're doing.
- You know, I'm sorry to be beating at that horse.
I know we got more to cover,
but just a couple loose ends on this topic.
Am I correct in understanding that the utility work,
it's not just a matter of upgrading,
it's part of the PEC-4, this is a question,
is it part of the PEC-4 deal where,
you know, it's, where we've done necessary work
to get that area out of the floodplain?
Is it connected with that?
- The utility work, water and sewer construction,
and also the drainage construction is complete.
And we are working through what's called
a LOMAR process to remove the area for phase one and two
out of the floodplain, you are correct.
- So it is part of that.
So it's, we can talk a little more about it offline,
but it's a really good thing.
But, and then just to, for me, cap it off.
So that, that's a good thing, I understand that.
And then it's the status that the really,
after the utility work,
that there hasn't really been a lot of movement
on the ground because we're in this negotiation
over which way it's gonna get rebuilt or, you know.
- So just, the guy that works for me,
he used to be the area engineer here,
and he had an anecdotal story with it.
When he did a resurfacing of Elmer Locus at one point,
and he, the contractor had, part of the contract
was to when he discovered base failure,
he was to repair the base failure,
and he only had like 15%, whatever.
And there was one area of Elmer Locus
where they uncovered the pavement,
they found a sinkhole big enough to put a car in.
- Wow.
- There wasn't anything between the pavement and that hole.
We weren't sure how the road stayed up.
And so what the city wants to make sure is,
is that, you know, you got a pretty two inch overlay,
it's not on quicksand.
- Yeah, yeah.
- And I just--
- I'm done, go ahead, did you?
- Oh yeah, I'm done.
- One last thing I just wanna mention
with this entire conversation,
we're only talking about the green section on the map,
which is phase one.
Obviously the blue section on the map,
we still have water and wastewater utilities to improve.
We still need a large sum of money
to do the drainage improvements along that area.
And then of course a similar conversation with TxDOT
as to how the roadway will be reconstructed.
So just wanted to clarify that the conversation
we're having is just specifically with the areas
of water insert that's already been completed and drainage.
South of the courthouse.
- Yes, sir.
- Great, okay.
Thanks for--
- Just for the record, all my reports
that I've gone over really fast.
When we get to the one for Becky, it takes longer.
Oh, now we're done.
- Well, actually--
- Actually.
- I wonder if, you know, the other one
that I hear the most about is Bonnie Bray,
especially south of the university.
Can we include a status on that when we talk about it?
And, you know, it just, it doesn't feel
to constituents like we're making any progress there.
- So Bonnie Bray, phase four--
- Bonnie Bray, south of the university.
- And five, but are you discussing, sir,
between 380 and say 35, Bonnie Bray?
- Yeah, south of the university.
- University and--
- Sure.
- So that's actually--
- Yeah, we're down to one lane, you know,
big pipes along the side and all that, you know.
- Staff can bring you a separate report
as part of the staff update.
If you'd like to continue to hear updates
on the Bonnie Bray project, we don't have an issue with that.
It's actually not a part of Mr. Polster's report
because he's specifically talking about on-system roadways.
- I thought we changed that, that it was,
like it had been that for a long, long time.
It was just textile.
- No, no, for a long time, it was everything,
and the stuff that wasn't me, I didn't know anything about,
I was just putting it in a report.
- Yeah, yeah, 'cause it's, we used to call it
the on-system report, but now it's
City of Denton Transportation.
I thought we would cover our main, just topics of interest.
Frankly, this precedes these guys being on here.
Senator John Ryan asked for that.
- I think the best way--
- It precedes you too, as a matter of fact.
- Well, thank you.
I think the best way for us to go about that,
if you would be amenable to,
is to have that as a part of our staff update,
because it's a project that the city staff is managing,
and it actually is something that we're collaborating
with the county and the state on, specifically
because of the funding, and of course because of,
with COG, but it's not something that Mr. Polster
would be able to have an update on.
- Okay.
- Yeah, if, I would appreciate it if we could get, you know,
maybe a standing update each month from our staff,
not from, not from John.
- On Body, Brain, specifically?
- Anyone but John.
- Yes, on Body, Brain, specifically.
- Sure, that's fine.
- Since that's such a, such a big project,
and it's so disruptive to a lot of folks, yeah.
- Absolutely, we can add that as a part of the staff update.
- Thank you.
- Do we want to go over the acronyms?
- Yes, absolutely.
Thank you very much.
- I can't turn it off.
- Okay.
I tend to, you know, I realize I tend to do these
without breaks, is that, are you all right with that?
Or would you like to take it, take, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Okay.
Okay, let me know.
All right, so we'll move on to the next item.
Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding updates
from the Potentum County Transportation Authority.
- Good morning.
- Put my millennial skills to use.
Oh, no, not like that.
Like that.
All right, good morning, Mayor Potem-Melzer,
members of the council.
My name is Brittany Farr.
I'm the Director of Government Relations
for Denton County Transportation Authority,
and we are here today to provide you
with an update of our activities at DCTA.
I'll start by introducing our Deputy CEO,
Mr. Paul Christina.
As you're no doubt aware, Mr. Raymond Suarez
submitted his resignation this month.
As of April 1st, Mr. Christina will be taking over
as our interim CEO.
Seeing as how this is both of our first time
to address this committee,
we're going to tag team it today, safer in numbers.
So I'll bring up Mr. Christina.
He'll introduce himself,
talk a little bit about our efforts
around the comprehensive operation
and fare structure analysis that's going on,
and then I'll come in at the end
to provide an overview of the Connect service changes
that went into effect a couple of weeks ago on March 14th,
as well as provide our response to the inclement weather
that struck the region two times in the month of February.
And then we'll both be here to answer any questions
that you may have for us.
So with that, I'll bring Paul up to the podium.
Welcome, both of you.
- Thank you very much.
It's good to be with you.
Like Brittany said, my name is Paul Christina,
and I've been given the privilege of leading DCTA
as an interim CEO beginning April 1st,
and so I'm pleased to be with you today
to provide the update on how we're moving forward
with our comprehensive operations analysis
that you all have been seeing in progress for some time.
So at the core of what we're doing
is that right now we're leveraging ridership data.
- Do you want to take questions as you go,
or should we hold them till the end?
- I'm happy to have a conversation,
so if you have questions and would like to raise your hand,
please do, and we can talk through it,
and that's just fine.
Thank you for that.
So right now what we're doing is designing
an integrated service across all of DCTA's modes,
and we're doing that by leveraging ridership data
across GoZone and the Connect service
in order to be able to make recommendations
about the proper levels of service among those modes,
fixed route and on demand, enabling us to implement
what will be an integrated
and complementary multimodal system.
Fair pricing is part of that conversation
because we believe that we can use the pricing
of the GoZone service and the Connect service
to cause riders to make decisions that are best for them
and for the modes of service that we have available.
So this chart here just shows
the way that we're going to do that
is right now we're in the process
of looking at the fixed route network,
and you've seen several revisions of that
over the course of the last several months,
and then as we think about how riders will use those
or access those resources, it's through the GoZone app
that will enable them to book a ride
that uses a GoZone vehicle perhaps
for a portion of their trip and a fixed route vehicle
for the portion of their trip
if that's the way that their trip aligns,
and then like I said, we can use pricing,
fair structure between those two modes
to encourage the most efficient use of those resources
and ultimately being able to deploy
what is an intermodal solution for riders
through the app or through the traditional means
of purchasing tickets like they do today.
- Does the app show alternate routes
and estimated time of journey for each of them?
- I think, so we're going to be going through this tomorrow
with our board and just where we are in the process.
It's going to be a very high level,
but what I think you can expect to see
is that a rider could put in their current origin,
their destination, and provide here's the method
by which you can use transit services
to get from point A to point B.
- The reason I ask that is as with any number
of route planning apps that we all use,
if the options are presented with the times
and number of contacts, doesn't that provide incentive enough
for the rider to go, oh, I want to go
in the least amount of time
or I want the one with the least changes.
- Potentially, and I think that that sort of feedback
is going to be really good for the public involvement process
that we'll have over the course of the next 90 days.
And so beginning about in April,
again, our board will be briefed on this tomorrow,
but there'll be a public comment period
where people can provide that sort of feedback
that could inform the way that these things get rolled out.
Yes, ma'am.
- Does that feedback also include comments from employees?
- It is going to be an open public comment period
that anyone will be able to provide input for,
and when those channels are opened up,
we're going to do our best effort
to disseminate the channels for that far and wide
so that everybody who's interested can make such comments.
- Okay.
So here's sort of a couple of bullets
on where we've been and where we're going.
It was in the December 2021 board meeting
that we had the discussion about a COA
that would be presented in the June 2022 meeting
here in a few months to talk about
the evolution of the service.
We have on our team consultant experts from Accenture
as well as VIA, who is the on-demand transportation provider
for the GoZone project who are working
to develop those alternatives.
And we will have, like I said,
a touch point with our board this month
at tomorrow's board meeting to talk about
how those things are being developed,
then again in April and then again in May
prior to the board making a decision in June,
and obviously we will continue to use this forum
as appropriate to provide updates
on how that project progresses.
In terms of the fare structure analysis
and sort of the conversation that's being had,
these are the things that we know.
The initial GoZone program had a promotional price
of 75 cents a ride, and then like I said before
at the outset, the fare structure that we're considering
will start there to determine what's the right way
to engage riders to use the most efficient sort of trip
to get where they're trying to go.
We're in the process of that fare structure analysis now
on tomorrow's conversation with the board
will be more around what are the limits or boundaries
of what that fare structure could be.
- If I may, I don't know how tuned in
you might've been to this process.
I'm not quite sure when you joined the organization
or whatever, but this body drafted a resolution
that was then approved by council
and was meant to be instruction to our representative
at the time who wasn't that interested in representing us.
But one of the things that was in our resolution
was a request that we, that the idea
of a fare free system be evaluated.
So if you're evaluating fares.
Now, I think at the outset, a person might say,
well, that's completely crazy.
But let me just say a little bit
about why that's not necessarily the case.
At the time, we were told that the fare contribution
to total DCTA revenue is I believe less than half a percent.
So essentially a rounding error.
Your revenues are assured because they come from sales tax.
It's nothing to do with whether you're efficient or not.
The revenue comes in.
- Right.
- I'll offer you a little bit of a model.
We've got the Thinline Festival is starting this weekend
and then you've been a sponsor of it in the past and where
that used to be a paper drink deal, an $8 thing.
And I was on the board when the decision was made
and I thought it seemed crazy at first
to make it a free festival, but it's a game changer.
It's just a different model.
It doesn't mean you don't have revenues.
It means it changes the model.
Now in that case, the model is greater advertising revenue
because more people will come to something
that are free.
For public transit, it takes away the friction
so that instead of just providing service carefully
to the small number of people who are dependent on transit,
it takes away the psychological barrier.
Free is a very powerful thing so that even people
like the people in this room might go,
I know I can get on.
There's no friction.
I don't have to know how it works.
You know, it's something I can do.
So that's why I think it's at least worth thinking about
how would you configure the product
to mitigate against whatever risks you think come with free.
Like you have to get out at the end of a ride.
Maybe there's a definition of what a ride is.
It's unidirectional.
But if you wanna meet the real goal of public transit
of taking cars off the road and improving air quality,
and really having transit be part of our,
you know, much bigger part of how our community works,
could that be evaluated?
It's a long way to get to the end of that question.
- I'm gonna jump in as your representative
on the DCTA board.
I'm well aware of that resolution, which I hope to draft.
And this is something that I insisted on
at our last board meeting that as one of the options
that we consider when we discuss fare pricing options,
I wanna see an analysis of eliminating fares,
but I'll let Paul elaborate on that.
- Wait, one more little, oh sorry, sorry, please go ahead.
- And besides, people that make a lot of money
and have a lot of money, that can afford a lot of things,
they like free.
So, and they probably appreciate free
more than someone that doesn't have as much.
So, if we're talking about taking cars off the road
and having them to come to the city for nice free things,
you know, this additional opportunity to do that
and satisfy all of that, that's why I voted for it, yes.
Thank you.
- Just one little, before you respond to this onslaught
of demand for free things,
is there funding that comes to DCTA,
federal sources I'm imagining,
that's attached to ridership?
That's a genuine question, I don't know the answer,
but is there a funding benefit to increasing ridership?
- I'm not prepared to speak on those details here today,
but certainly as we get ready for our conversation tomorrow,
we can talk about those sorts of things
and we can come back to this forum
with more details on that.
Obviously, the mission of DCTA is to enhance ridership,
that's the reason that we're here.
We want as many people to use public transit as possible
for all the good reasons that you just laid out.
And so, if that's an interest of this body,
then we can talk more about that in our board meetings
and then here as well.
- Well, I hope, you know, if there is a funding angle
that can, you know, help in the analysis.
- Yes, understood.
- Okay, thanks for that.
- So obviously, FTA wants to see ridership increase
across transportation agencies also.
- There you go.
- I think that's the answer.
Okay, so to answer the question about,
is free going to be considered in the process?
The answer is yes.
We heard that feedback from our board in our last meeting
that we would need to evaluate
or they would like us to evaluate a no fare option
or a no fare alternative on the Connect service.
And so, we will be talking about that
here in the next few months
as we lay out this comprehensive operations analysis.
We've started with the GoZone fare pricing
and then next month, we'll be bringing,
layering in GoZone and fixed route
and that's where you'll begin to hear about
no fare alternatives on Connect.
- To clarify, I meant fixed routes broadly,
including the A train.
- Okay, very good.
- You know, if I can strain your patience a little.
Is there a conceptual reason
in maybe how the compensation works, the contract works,
why the same logic wouldn't apply to GoZone?
Why would you say we'll look at fare-free for Connect,
but not for GoZone?
- I expect that could come out in our conversation
with the board tomorrow about that idea.
I don't know that we've gotten very far into that idea
with our board up to this point.
And so, it's definitely a good conversation
for us to have as we go through this process.
So, we'd like to maybe layer that
into our conversation tomorrow.
- Thanks for letting us keep you at slide six
for 10 minutes.
- There's only a couple more, so we're doing great.
So, this is just a snapshot of,
when we talk about potential pricing structures,
the concept is that there are,
and again, conceptual discussion only,
there are fixed pricing models
that no matter how far you go, this is what the fare is.
There are variable cost models
that kind of like an Uber that says,
when you go this far, it's this much money.
If you go a little bit farther, it's this much money.
And then there's a hybrid fare sort of model
that says the first several miles,
whatever that might be, are a fixed cost,
and then beyond that is a variable cost.
And that's really what we're talking about
when we talk about the idea of trying to entice riders
to use fixed routes when it's possible,
if that's the most efficient way for them
to make their trip.
And so here's a snapshot of the multimodal app
that's being developed right now.
It would be like you see there,
a place where proposals of different,
multiple legs of a single journey can be evaluated,
and then the rider get to decide
what is the best route for them.
And again, we'll go into more conversation on this
in our board meeting tomorrow,
otherwise we'll have the folks from VIA on hand with us
to talk through that.
- I'm embarrassed that I don't already know this,
but are we talking about an update
to the current GoZone app
or a new app that's being designed?
- It's an evolution of the current app.
- Okay, thank you.
- Yeah, I would just, I'm not to be too repetitive,
but do you use Google Maps or anything like that for yourself?
- Yes, sir, I do use Waze, Google Maps.
- So, I mean, you don't need a price incentive
to figure out that you want to do the thing
that's most efficient for you.
- Correct. - Yeah, okay.
- Okay, if no other questions,
I'm happy to turn it over to Brittany
to talk about the modifications from March.
Thank you very much, it's very good to meet you,
look forward to working with you.
- Of course, thank you.
- You'll notice I let Paul take the hard stuff, so.
The kid, so I'm here to go over the changes
that went into effect with the March service change
that was instituted on March 14th.
I know Mr. Suarez was here earlier this year
to present these changes that were proposed
and approved at the December 2nd board meeting.
I'll start by giving you an overlay
with the blue being what the new routes look like,
overlaid with the gray that was the previous service.
And then I want to show you this next slide
that also lays in the UNT shuttles.
So you can see even though some of the service
was appeared to be cut in the southern portion
that is covered by and large by the UNT shuttles,
which are also open to the public
and an opportunity for them to ride fixed route as well.
Before I start going into the individual changes,
there's just a couple of points that I want to make
as far as trends that you'll see
with the changes that we've made to the fixed route.
I know Mr. Suarez has talked to you before
about the importance of both frequency
and on-time performance in building ridership.
People won't take the bus if it doesn't show up often
and if it doesn't show up on time.
So all of the changes that were put in
to the March service changes were done with this in mind.
How do we take our resources and maximize them
on the segments of ridership
that have the highest level of ridership
so we can get the bus there more often
and we can get the bus there more on time?
Another point that I want to make is that these changes
were meant to be temporary as we work through the process
that Mr. Christina just went over.
As we look at GOZONE and the A-Train
and the Connect service and the shuttles
all working together to create
a more integrated multimodal system.
So these will be on all likelihood changing
with whatever the final service plan
the board approves later this summer.
- Pardon me. - Yes, sir.
- Just so I understand, they're temporary
in order to meet what temporary objective,
what are you solving for?
- Well, three things really.
Increasing on time performance, increasing frequency
and then also working within the confines
of the operational shortages that we have right now.
Like DART, like Trinity Metro.
Yeah, yeah, that's exactly right.
Like many, like the school districts,
like many across the country,
we are seeing a shortage in operators.
And so not being able to make those runs,
not being able to put out reliable service
is one of the driving factors
for modifying these services
to be able to ensure that we're meeting the demands
of the highest ridership portions
and we're getting those buses there on time
and as frequently as possible.
- So if circumstances change or the offering changed
and you're able to recruit, you know,
if there's a shift and you're able to recruit more operators,
is the thought that you might, you know,
re-flesh out the roots?
- That's certainly a consideration
I think the board would look into
when making those service decisions later this summer.
And this is a plug, if anyone knows any operators,
please send them to ride dcta.net, so.
- Do we pay as much as the alternate services
that an operator might work for?
- You know, sir, I don't know the answer to that question.
I can certainly get with our HR department
and find out where our starting pay measures
with both public providers as well as private providers,
which is really one of the industries
that is siphoning off as more and more of us
order from Amazon Prime
and we expect those boxes to be there the next day.
Those are the kinds of service,
the CDLs that we're competing with, so.
But I can certainly look into that
and we will be prepared to speak to that
at our next presentation at this committee.
So with that, this is the new Connect route.
You'll remember at the end of December,
Denton Connect route one was suspended
along with the two routes in Lewisville 21 and 22.
Another consistent theme across the scheduling
is that the routes tend to start a little bit later
and end a little bit sooner.
And that's capturing the changing shift
in ridership patterns that we're seeing
as a result of COVID-19.
As more folks work from home or have a hybrid schedule,
they're not having those normal rush hour periods.
We're actually seeing more travel throughout the midday
as folks utilize the fixed route,
the GO zone and the A train
to accomplish more midday tasks.
So we've shifted our schedule to accommodate that.
Oh, it went backwards.
My millennial skills are failing me.
So here's the revisions to Denton Connect route two.
By shortening this route
and taking out the loop component of it,
we've been able to increase the frequency of the bus
from running once every 60 minutes to once every 42 minutes.
So an 18 minute improvement.
That's also allowed us to increase the number of routes
that we can run during the day
from 13 round trips to 15.
I'm gonna go through these kind of quickly
since they've already been presented.
But if you have any questions, please stop me.
So this is route three.
This one we've been able to improve the frequency on that
from every 46 to 51 minutes,
depending on the time of day
to consistently running it every 40 minutes.
This has been able to increase the number of round trips
from 14 to 17.
And we've also made some modifications to now serve stops
at both Serve Denton and Denton County Health.
So route four was trimmed down
and now has an improved frequency
from every 56 minutes to every 40 minutes.
And to make up for that cutoff portion there,
we've also put in a new Denton Connect route five.
This is a new circular route
and it has a frequency of every 30 minutes
and makes 22 round trips every day.
Route six, we've increased the frequency
from 50 minutes to 33 minutes.
So significant improvements on the frequency there.
And that has allowed us to run this route round trip
from 13 trips a day up now to 20 routes a day.
And then finally revised route seven.
This one has a variable time depending on peak period.
So it was running every 30 minutes to every 68 minutes,
depending on the time of day.
Now it runs every 27 minutes
and then the last shift of the day
between seven and eight o'clock,
it runs at an hour frequency.
So significant frequency improvements
during that midday and early peak period.
We've also been able to increase the number of round trips
on this route from 22 a day to 24 a day.
Yes, ma'am.
(mumbling)
Okay.
- I apologize if this sounds really just
kindergarten level question.
For a route like this and for the amount of time
that you're saying that it's gonna take to get that route,
are there, how many vehicles are on the,
that's handling this route?
Is this one vehicle that's just going around and around?
Are there a couple of vehicles?
- I'm not sure how many vehicles are dedicated
to each route, but I can certainly take that back
and I can figure that out from our operations folks
and get back to you how many vehicles we run
on each route each day.
- 'Cause I'm just hearing varying times,
take 18 minutes or 30 minutes to go this route.
That's, it just sounds almost kind of impossible
for one vehicle to do all of that, so I appreciate that.
- Yeah, I'll look into it.
Depending on the route, it may have different vehicles
on different routes, but that's a very good question.
I'll find out and we'll definitely get back
to your office, yeah, I agree.
- Do you have an office?
- I do, I have an office.
(laughs)
- Or carrier pigeon, whatever motive, whatever, yeah.
I'll get the same.
And so now, oh, yes sir.
- Yeah, before we get off this topic.
- Sure.
- So how were these changes communicated
to the drivers and to the general public?
- So we have a variety of methods that we use
to communicate to the general public.
We did a lot of stuff on our website, social media,
but we also use traditional methods of public involvement,
so putting it in the newspaper.
We've also ordered bags that we have a QR code on them
that we put on the stops that were closed
that folks could take, that would take them
to the trip planner so they would understand.
But our marketing and communications department
utilized all of the resources available to us
to make sure that, most importantly,
our traveling public knows of these changes.
And then the changes to the routes communicated
to the operators were done through our partners at NTMC
and the close communication that we have
working with the HTG and NTMC entities.
- This is sort of anecdotal,
but from speaking with operators,
the version that was filtered to me was,
no idea what's coming, show up one day,
get the new lefts and rights.
It sounds like kind of skimpy to me.
I understand there's an intermediary,
but I think ultimately we're still responsible
for quality control.
I'm just sharing that back to you.
- Absolutely, and we'll take that feedback back
and make sure that we do a better job
of conveying any kind of upcoming changes
through our channels as well as through NTMC's channels
with any future changes we have,
and appreciate that feedback.
Any other questions on the March service change
before I move into the fund that was February?
- I just wanted to address, we were talking about pay,
and I wanna make sure that David hears that
as our new representative on the NTMC board.
Trinity Metro has job postings for brand new trainee
who does not have a CDL starts at $17 an hour.
With a CDL, they start at $20 an hour
and go up to $25 an hour.
Dart is starting folks with a CDL at $21.13 an hour.
And NTMC is starting folks, it looks like with a CDL,
at $14 to $17 an hour.
- How does that compare?
- So there's, yeah, somebody who has a CDL
would have an obvious choice to make.
So I think if we're gonna address those staffing shortages
at NTMC, we might need to address that.
- So if we're serious about having a robust system,
you need to have operators.
If you're serious about having operators,
you've got to offer competitive wages.
- We'll take that back, thank you, Council Member McGuire.
So for the increment weather response and next steps,
I like pictures, not bullets on the slide.
So I wanna talk you through our response
to the two winter storms that struck
the North Texas region in the month of February,
go over some of our lessons learned
and then talk you through some of our next steps.
I apologize, Council Member McGuire,
it's gonna be almost verbatim
what I provided the board earlier this month.
But to begin with, I wanna put a little bit of context
around how the decision are made
in these kind of increment weather events.
When it comes to modifying or suspending any kind of service,
that's not something that we take lightly.
We recognize that we are a public service agency
and that we provide critical lifeline services
to many of our customers.
Providing transportation is always one
of our guiding principles and highest missions.
When increment weather strikes the North Texas region,
particularly icy weather like we saw
through both winter storm Landon and winter storm Oakley,
safety has to be our highest priority
and transit agencies across the region
really have to strike a fine balance
between providing those critical lifeline services
and then keeping the safety of our staff, our operators,
and then our traveling public top of mind.
So we look at all kinds of things.
We look at weather conditions, we look at road conditions,
we look at what our partners across the region are doing,
what decisions are being made from DART, Trinity Metro,
other providers, and those are all considerations
that go into making any kind of service determination,
augmentation, or suspension.
So we take that very, very seriously.
So going into winter storm Landon,
which did strike the North Texas region
the first week of February,
we began that Wednesday meeting regular two-hour periods
to evaluate the forecast
and start taking the preliminary steps needed
to ensure the continuity of service
when the weather did hit.
Our contractors, Rio Grande Pacific,
began that evening by lighting the switch heaters,
which is the picture of the rail on fire,
which I think is a very cool picture.
Those will keep the rail switches from freezing
and allow us to continue running A-train operations
during prolonged periods of below freezing temperatures.
We also had crews out that evening
laying out biodegradable ice melt at the DCTA stations
and bus stops and sidewalks and parking lots,
as well as provided our operators with biodegradable
ice melt on their vehicles to spot treat as necessary.
That evening, we did make contact
with all three of our member cities
to evaluate their needs
during the incoming inclement weather.
We worked closely with the city of Denton
on their request to provide shuttle services
to the emergency warming centers
and shelters at our Daily Bread
and across the city of Denton.
For the city of Lewisville,
we provided a warming bus on standby
at one of the rail stations
in case they had any emergency needs
for warming centers or evacuations
like they experienced in February of '21.
And then Highland Village politely declined
any requests for assistance.
So moving into Thursday,
we started meeting regularly at 5 a.m. in the morning
to evaluate road conditions
and start making determinations on service.
Our partners at VIA requested
that we go ahead and suspend GoZone service.
And this was done in accordance with similar decisions
made by VIA-provided service at Trinity Metro
in the city of Arlington.
We did decide to continue running the A train
and the Connect service,
albeit on a Saturday schedule.
And then pair transit service
and the emergency shuttle services ran as normal.
Moving into Friday, things really got icy.
Our friends at DART went ahead and made the decision.
And I worked at DART for nine years
and never saw it happen to suspend all service
on both the train and the buses.
And with that decision,
that lack of regional connectivity,
we made the decision to go ahead
and suspend A train operations.
We planned on running a limited Connect service,
but as road conditions deteriorated Friday morning,
operators had a really hard time getting to work
and of course, putting their safety first.
We went ahead and made the decision
to cancel Connect service and shift those services
onto providing those critical lifeline services.
So those operators were deployed
on the emergency shuttle services
for the city of Denton
and then primarily on our paratransit services.
And on that Friday,
which was arguably the iciest, most dangerous day,
the day that DART shut down,
our operators took nearly two dozen people
to their dialysis appointments.
And I know that two dozen people
for some of the larger agencies
doesn't sound like a whole lot,
but to me, that's 22 people
that could have potentially suffered
life-threatening ramifications had we not got there.
And it's a point of pride for me
that we got those 22 people there
and I am so proud of our operators and our staff
for getting those 22 people where they needed to go.
That's why we get up and come to work every day,
is to make sure those 22 people
have the services they need.
So the shuttles, the UNT shuttles were suspended
'cause campus was of course closed.
Via the GoZone service also did not run on Friday.
Moving into Saturday,
we had a little bit of break from the ice.
It was still a hard freeze in the morning,
which made getting operators to work
to mark up a little bit difficult.
But this was GoZone's ability to really step up and shine
and demonstrate their flexibility.
As the roads began to thaw,
as the temperatures did increase throughout the day,
we were able to launch the GoZone service
beginning at noon and running until seven o'clock
when the roads started to refreeze.
And in that time, we completed nearly 1,100 trips
on the GoZone service.
By Sunday, we were back to normal,
all modes operating regularly
and we all took a big sigh of relief,
which lasted for about two weeks
until winter storm Oakley showed up.
When that storm struck at the end of February,
very similar protocols began meeting every two hours,
reached out to the cities,
again, got the request from the city of Denton
to provide the emergency shuttle and warming center,
which we were able to accommodate.
As the ice began to fall that Wednesday afternoon,
UNT made the decision to cancel classes early,
so we went ahead and suspended the UNT shuttles.
And then as the roads really started to slick
as the sun went down,
we went ahead and suspended the GoZone service at 5 p.m.
But the A-Train and the Connect service
did finish their regularly scheduled routes for that day.
Moving into Thursday,
we also had the request from VIA
to suspend the GoZone service,
again, in conjunction with similar decisions
that were made at Trinity Metro in the city of Arlington.
We had planned that Thursday to run a regular Connect service,
albeit started a little bit later at 10 a.m.
to give the roads an opportunity to freeze,
which they did not unfreeze.
And so we did have an operator shortage
and once again made that determination
that those resources would be better shifted
onto providing those emergency services,
those lifeline services.
And then we did continue Route 7,
which was still showing some ridership as well.
The A-Train operations also continued that day.
By Friday, luckily, this was not as long in duration
as Winter Storm Land, and so by Friday,
we were back to normal and everything was running
as per usual.
And we tried to do our best,
and I think we were very successful
in communicating these changes frequently
to the board member, again, I apologize for all the emails,
the traveling public, and then to the cities as well.
So as we're moving into March now,
and as we've already seen this week,
hopefully we're moving out of winter weather season
and straight into tornado season.
So, but we're not waiting until next winter
to already start dissecting what we've done
with our winter weather response.
We've already been meeting both internally
and with our partners to evaluate our lessons learned
and start thinking about next steps.
A few things that we learned from the two opportunities
February gave us to respond to winter weather
is the value of making decisions on a day-by-day basis.
There's a saying here in Texas,
if you don't like the weather,
wait 15 minutes and it will change.
And that doesn't stop during winter weather events.
So the ability, as much as some of us were a little cranky
and uncaffeinated at those 5 a.m. meetings,
the ability to meet every day,
to meet with that kind of frequency
allowed us to be flexible and nimble
and make decisions as they were presented to us.
And so short-term decisions, meeting regularly,
standard operating procedures were definitely
one of the lessons learned,
the best practice takeaways that we had.
Another one is being able to communicate regularly
with our partners.
So including VIA, including Rio Grande Pacific,
including NTMC in our decision-making process
allows us, again, to be flexible,
to know what their limitations are
and then to respond as appropriate.
And then the last best practice lesson learned
is communication, communication, communication.
I cannot overstate the importance of communicating,
whether it be with this council,
whether it be with our partners at our different agencies,
but especially with our traveling public
and letting them know what's going on
and what goes into the decision-making process,
that these decisions aren't made in a vacuum.
As we look towards the next winter season,
we're already starting to take a look at things
that we could do better.
So how can we start being proactive
in a way that allows us to continue operations
as much as we can, again,
always with that safety component top of mind.
And then we also know that the City of Denton
has been interested in having conversations
with transportation needs for individuals
to emergency warming centers and shelters,
even when it's not icy.
So those are conversations that we're happy to engage with
with the city as we start planning for next February.
So with that, that's really all I have
on the winter weather response.
And if there are any questions, I'm happy to answer them.
- Great performance, I mean, with the service.
- Yeah, and I said this at our last board meeting,
but I wanna say it here as well,
that thank you to DCTA staff.
I know that our staff here at the city
also did outstanding work during both of those storms
to keep folks safe and maintain those essential services.
It was a tricky situation.
Safety always comes first, obviously,
and that's a balancing act.
No, you don't want vehicles on the road unnecessarily,
but as you said, there are folks who need to get to dialysis.
And I think that y'all did an excellent job
of balancing those concerns.
- Thank you, ma'am.
- All right, well, with that, that concludes our presentation.
Thank you again.
- No, don't leave, don't leave.
- Aw, man. - Any questions, sorry.
I figured, you know, DCTA is on the slide,
therefore we could ask anything related to DCTA.
I hope that's right.
- That's fair game. - We like long meetings
here in Denton.
- I was wondering, Paul, could you maybe share
with my colleagues a little bit about what's going on
with the A train?
Because there are so many exciting plans in the works
for the A train with Corinth and Carrollton
and positive train controls and maybe double tracking.
- Sure, glad to.
So in our last board meeting, we provided,
I provided a briefing on opportunities
to enhance the value of the A train,
that really the value that the A train provides
to our member cities
and our broader Denton County community.
The basis of the presentation was,
we have opportunities for new member cities,
potentially in Corinth.
We have opportunities to be in further partnership
with Dallas area rapid transit
to get the A train down to Carrollton.
And we have opportunities to partner
with the private development community,
as well as leverage our own land resources
to do transit oriented development.
All three of those different things we believe
would lead to increased ridership on the A train
and again, causing it to be of greater value
for our communities.
And so the vision that was set forth in that meeting
was the opportunity or the need really
to evaluate all the different infrastructure components
that are required to make those things happen.
And that's enhanced capacity primarily through,
by increasing speeds, we can increase speeds
and capacity by doing things like improving
our positive train control system,
which is the automated safety overlay
that sits over top that train
to make sure that it operates within its boundaries
as safely as possible.
Also the addition of track segments in different places
be a siding so that two trains can pass one another
or double tracking so that two trains can operate
in the same space simultaneously
as they go in opposite directions.
The old, if a train leaves station A at this time
and a train leaves station B at this time,
where do they meet?
That's the kind of analysis that we're talking about.
And so the board provided signals
that it is interested in moving forward
with understanding what that would take.
And so we've been in conversation
with our consultant partners
who have evaluated different pieces
of that puzzle over time.
Like what would it take to add a station at Corinth
and not degrade performance?
What would it take to enhance our PTC system?
But we have not done that evaluation altogether
because the system of the railroad
depends on all those different pieces.
And if we wanna really determine
what are the most cost effective ways
to achieve those outcomes,
we should look at them altogether.
So since that board meeting had a call
with our consultant team as recently as yesterday
to continue to refine the scope of services
that we can bring back to our board here
in the near future to say, here's a path forward
should we choose to take it.
So thank you for the question.
- I have several questions about via GoZone.
If I can hold you a little bit.
- Sure.
- Do we have safety expectations in our contract?
Are there metrics about accidents and frequency and so on?
Any kind of service level definition related to safety?
- I would like to be able to really digest the contract
with these sorts of questions in mind.
- I'll give you the questions.
You do not expect me to answer something like that.
- Okay, great.
So safety metrics.
- Okay, yeah.
- And then obviously the rejoinder is how are we doing?
How's that looking?
Do we have average wait time expectations
with service level metrics in our contract
and how are we doing?
- Okay.
- And last one I wanna in that vein is
do we have specific service level metrics
related to having rides available for disabled customers?
In other words, how many times do we provide a vehicle
that is, that can take someone with a wheelchair
or a walk or whatever when it's asked?
- Right.
- Is there a correctly equipped vehicle available?
And obviously these questions are coming from a concern
that maybe we're not meeting those standards
or that there aren't standards built into the relationship.
So, you wanna know, I wanna know.
- Yeah.
- We'll talk about it when--
- So we will in the conversation
that we'll have tomorrow at our board meeting,
we are gonna talk about performance metrics
like average wait time, seat unavailability,
those sorts of things.
We'll have a conversation with the board
about what are the inputs that can be had
to improve those things.
And so we can certainly come back to this body
with more details around the more robust set of metrics
that you've just laid out.
- I'll tell you, the driver safety thing,
if the anecdotes bear out, that's a really serious concern.
If there's something systemic in the way
that they're compensated or managed
that is leading to a problem there,
I'm gonna stay from Missouri, you'll tell me,
but if that is a reality,
that's gotta go to the top of the list, right?
- Understood.
- Okay, that's great, thank you very much.
I really appreciate you coming in, sharing with us.
- Oh, please.
- I wanna preface this by saying that I was on Nextdoor,
you know the Nextdoor app?
So there's all kinds of things that are going on.
But one of the questions that came up
and it seemed a bit petty.
And as a city council person,
I always wanna just jump on there
and say something, you know, to these people.
But I know that it has to be in a way that, you know.
So I just choose not to indulge.
But the question came up and the concern in the,
and I'll use this term loosely,
the pettiness came up as to why the GoZone cars
do not have the State of Texas registration tags on them.
And so they're concerned that the vehicles may not be safe
as if they were not, you know, that's serious,
but it was just kinda, you know, a first thought that,
well, what does this matter?
But it does if we're talking about people riding
in State of Texas examined vehicles, you know,
we have to have our cars inspected
before we get our registration.
And if we're seeing a lot of cars coming out of Florida
or wherever these tags are from that's,
they didn't say that.
I'm adding that particular part on there
that it's a safety factor as well.
So Mayor Pro Tem, I appreciate you bringing
that conversation up, you know, that topic up of safety.
This also goes along with that.
How can we assure our riders
that they are in the safest vehicles possible,
especially by having those vehicles registered
with the State of Texas?
I don't think I've seen one that shown
that it was a Texas registered vehicle,
which thereby means that it's been inspected
and, you know, and allowed to be on the road.
- Understood. - Thank you.
- Yeah, you know, if you can, you know,
if the general safety issue is substantiated,
then I'm sure there are many tools
you're gonna want to look at.
How are they recruited?
What are the standards?
What's the training, right?
So obvious management stuff.
Yeah, thank you so much.
- Okay, thank you.
- All right, we're on to MC22-08 staff report.
(door thudding)
All righty, well, thank you very much
for having me to allow me to do the staff report today.
So the first thing that I wanted to start off with,
I know last month we introduced Brett,
our new deputy city engineer.
Trevor also is new to our department
and is taking the position
that Rachel Wood previously held.
And so I wanted to give Trevor a chance to come up
and introduce himself, talk to y'all a little bit
about his different roles he's played within the department.
And we're gonna start off with that.
So Trevor.
- Good morning, thanks for having me.
So my name's Trevor Crane
and I'm the Deputy Director of Capital Projects.
I've been with the city almost three years now.
I originally came in October of 2019
as a project manager in the Capital Improvements Department.
Close to about 10 months ago,
I was promoted to the Public Works Inspections Manager,
and I've been in that role since,
or I guess up to about a month now I've been in this role.
So I'm excited to move into this role.
I worked with Rachel very closely
when I was a project manager in that department.
I was involved in a lot of those policies
and procedures that we built.
So I'm excited to be back with that team
and keep moving this forward.
- Welcome.
- Thank you.
- Thank you, Trevor.
The unfortunate part is we now have
a Public Works Inspection Manager position to fill.
But I am glad to have Trevor in the position that he's in.
He's doing a fantastic job already.
So the next item that we wanted to go through
was the Parkway Street and then the Locust Elm intersections.
I know Mayor Pro Tem, I believe you asked
for some additional information.
We do have individuals from the Traffic Operations Team
present today that helped work with us on this.
So specifically, you asked the question
about when the traffic signal analysis was completed,
when the signals were brought down,
and kind of what that process was.
So I'm gonna paraphrase, but of course
you have the backup in your information.
So June 2019, staff did construct
a traffic signal warrant analysis
and determined that they thought it was best
to remove the signals at those intersections.
And that deactivation occurred in January of 2020.
And then it kept in that same operation
until December 8th of 2021.
During that time frame, that intersection
operated with a side street stop on Parkway.
So if you can envision, you're only stopping
at Parkway at both Elm and Locust.
So there was free flow of traffic traversing
up and down Elm and Locust.
October 8th, our team, along with James Andrews
and Danny Kramer, Traffic Operations, Street Operations,
worked through to install that all-way stop.
So now envision that now we have stop signs
both at Elm and Locust.
Then James actually worked to install
the red flashing beacon.
And that's actually just at the intersection of Elm.
What we found, and James did some of this evaluation,
was folks that are coming northbound on Locust,
they've just come through the intersection at McKinney,
so they're not accelerating as quickly,
and they're noticing that there's a stop sign
almost immediately.
Folks that are coming down Elm Street, unfortunately,
they haven't had a signal since 380.
They could have picked up a decent rate of speed,
and we're not always noticing those stop signs
that were installed at Elm.
So red flashing beacons are located at that location.
We did work with PD to assemble crash data,
and we're working to complete all of that.
I know we mentioned that we're gonna have
that crash data available.
Nathan has some preliminary,
which he just stepped out of the room,
preliminary data.
One of the things that we're working through
is collecting all of that
so that we can provide that information to you.
So something that we're continuing to work with PD on.
We ourselves, because we're now housed
right at the corner of that intersection,
have seen several crashes.
The data is not exactly adding up
with the information that we've seen.
So we're working through that
so that we can bring that back to the committee.
And then, of course,
we're continuing to evaluate the operations.
I do feel like from the current perspective
that we see that the all-way stop is working
in a much better fashion
than just the stop in the direction of Parkway.
So wanted to bring that forward.
Of course, as usual, we provide you the information
where that was provided in previous Friday reports.
There was one in October that we provided information
about the warning signs and the stop signs.
Any additional questions on that item?
- Yes, I have one question. - Sure.
- I travel that, I travel those roads
'cause I live kind of on the north side.
Are there any warning signs to prelude the stop signs
that are going south on Elm?
Do we get a warning back here that there are stop signs?
- Well, I travel that every day, too,
and I'll have to be honest with you.
I don't know that I've ever noticed that.
James says yes.
James, would you like to come up
and speak where those locations are?
(man speaking faintly)
- Okay.
- The stop ahead signs, that's what they're called.
- Yes, ma'am.
So sounds like they're stop ahead signs.
I would assume they're several hundred feet
from the intersection north of the intersection
that actually tell people that there is going to be
a stop sign ahead.
And we can look at those exact locations, too,
if you'd like to know this.
- Well, I'm gonna drive. - Okay.
- I gotta go that way anyway when I leave here.
- Well, great.
- So I'm gonna come back on Elm
because my next meeting is over across the way
at your building.
So I will see that for myself
because I don't have it in my head
as to whether or not I'm told that there's a stop sign.
- Sure.
- Ahead, other than then seeing the flashing lights.
- Absolutely.
- So, yeah, I'll do that.
- Okay, great.
Wonderful.
So on that item specifically,
hopefully we've addressed the questions.
The only thing that we have still we're working through
with PD is just that crash data specifically
on the Parkway and Locust and Parkway and Elm.
Like I mentioned, Nathan is working
with the police department to continue to collect
all of that in a fashion that we can present
that information to you.
So we will bring that crash data back at the next meeting.
The next item that was a part of our staff report
from last month was to get an update kind of on,
and I think it was quoted saying kind of what's going on
in the Dearwood, Kingsway, Kingsrow area.
And so we are working with the development services team
to provide you information that shows you
the existing configurations in that area,
what the mobility plan now shows for that area,
and then specifically what the development was required
to do in that area, or asked to do in that area
as a part of that PD.
So that'll be a presentation that'll be brought back
at the April meeting.
Is there anything else specifically that you'd like
for us to drill down on that individual item?
Okay.
- I just have another question here.
- Sure.
- Speaking with the State of Texas group
and connecting with our city,
I mean our development issue that we had over there,
I know that one of the primary concerns
was whether or not that frontage road would be ready,
you know, when this development came through.
And I think that that was one of the things
that it was highlighted pretty heavily,
you know, at that point.
And as we were having that conversation,
I was trying to connect whether or not
if we did the service to that community,
and trying to figure out the timeframe
that a frontage road would be put in,
versus the timeframe when the development would be there.
So the issue is still there,
because some of the conversation came through
as to the lot size and all of that other stuff.
So would you all look into that?
You know, how closely would the development be done
versus being able to have a true frontage road?
- Sure, we can absolutely bring that forward.
I will mention to you, Mr. Polster made that
as a part of his presentation.
You saw where they're just in the very beginning stages.
So those frontage roads, it's gonna be sometime
before those are constructed.
What you will hear in the presentation
is that the developer, actually myself,
TexDOT, several on our staff,
and TexDOT Dallas district office,
along with the planning department,
development services team, coordinated with TexDOT
to see what could be constructed
since it will be sometime from the frontage road.
And that's what some of the options were
that Ms. Wyatt presented at that meeting.
So we can bring that forward
so you can kinda understand what the conversations were
that we had with TexDOT.
That's gonna be a similar conversation
anywhere along the Loop 288 corridor
from 380 all the way to 35,
and really actually even to the west side of 35,
where what we call the paper clips are
until Loop 288 west is connected.
In that particular area,
because it's a controlled access freeway,
direct connection because folks are driving
60 miles per hour is prohibited.
So we're not going to, along with ourselves
and TexDOT, allow connection directly to Loop 288.
So that's why some sort of frontage road
will be constructed when folks need to do so.
So we can bring that back to you, no problem.
So timing on the actual construction
of those frontage roads is quite a ways out
based on Mr. Polster's report.
The next question that was asked
was specifically related to Southeast Denton,
seeing the trucks go through to get to Duncan.
And I know this is something that Mr. Kramer
led the charge on with help from
some of our engineering staff
and then also our transportation planning staff.
I think Council Member Byrd,
this is one of the ones that you brought forward
asking questions about trucks going through
to get to Duncan and some signs
that might need to be installed.
Traffic operations through James' team
actually did observe the street sign
and determined that it needed to be replaced.
So that happened on March 14th.
And then you can also see additional information
that was provided in the Friday report
in December of 2021.
So I think that from the street department,
public works and traffic operations department,
they feel as if they've installed
the additional traffic sign measures in that area.
And I'm not aware of any additional concerns
that we've received in that area at this time.
Okay, okay.
And then of course, the last question that came up
was kind of talking about the citywide speed study.
Nathan is leading the charge
on the citywide speed study for our team.
And so I would just mention that we're currently
in the data collection phase.
That's the exciting part
'cause we're getting all of the data collected.
Nathan actually did a fantastic job
of actually developing a GIS system
that shows actual points of where the data
is gonna be collected along with kind of an overview
that shows the information that will be collected.
You can see in the report that traffic speed
and volume counts are being conducted.
I mean, he's also looking at crash data
and several other measures so that when we look
at the speed of the particular roadways,
there's more data that's going into those conversations
in that collection.
We anticipate that that will be completed by late May.
So typically you wanna collect not when it's spring break
and not when school's out of season.
So right now we're working to collect the data
from now until basically late May.
Once that data is completed,
then our staff along with transportation planning
in development services team will work to coordinate
and evaluate all of the data to draft a speed study report
that will be presented not only to this committee
but then also to city council in that late summer,
early fall timeframe, August, September
to get direction from council.
And of course we completed several Friday report items
on speed reduction.
So I wanted to make sure you saw that that was in the June
and the July Friday reports.
And then with that, we are gonna move over to our matrix
that Ms. Logan has provided for us.
So on the first item, which is the construction
of Bonnie Bray and the timing,
we believed that we had addressed that concern
at the February meeting.
But as of today, I think that based Mayor Pro Tem
on your feedback, you'd like to hear a reoccurring conversation
just to give a brief status update
as a part of the overall report
at each one of the mobility committee meetings.
- Yes, and with specific focus on the torn up area
kind of from Oak Street South there.
And I wonder if you'd be able to get something
into a Friday report before our next mobility committee
meeting, even two or three sentences.
It just helped me out, you know,
try answering these questions, you know,
when you have a slightly annoyed person behind a door
that you've knocked on and they're trying to close it,
you know, that's the kind of answer I need.
- Sure, we can put something,
we can work to even maybe try to get something
in the Friday report this week, if not next week.
We actually have a change order
that'll be coming through the system.
It goes to PUB on Monday and to council on April 5th.
That'll talk about some of the improvements
that are gonna be made to expedite
some of the pavement repairs in that area.
So definitely something we can bring forward.
We can, Trevor and I can work on making sure
that that's in a Friday report.
So that's not an issue at all.
- Most recent email I got about that
from a constituent referenced a car-sized pothole.
I don't know if you got that one, yeah.
- Well, if you'll continue to bring those
to our attention, you know, we received word yesterday
from TXOT about some concerns on their driveway entrance
because that's one of the only ways in and out
of their facility and they drive larger trucks
through that area.
If those concerns are brought to our attention,
whether it's through the project manager,
engaged it and et cetera, we'll be happy
to have the contractor go out and evaluate those concerns.
I know there's been several that Danny assisted with
during some of the ice and some of the weather conditions.
So if we're aware of those, we'll work to address them.
Obviously we understand the roadway needs to be repaved.
We're working to complete the utility.
The next item on the Parkway Locust,
I'm gonna leave that on the overall agenda
because I wanna make sure that we bring back
that crash data.
Nathan's gonna work to collect that
and present it to you in a manner
that we can share that information.
The Kingsrow, we already discussed that.
That'll come back at the April 20th meeting.
I guess Council Member Byrd,
would you like for us to leave the Southeast
in the neighborhood until you have an opportunity
to discuss with constituents
if they're still concerned in that area?
- I'll be speaking with them on Monday
at their neighborhood meeting
and we'll have that conversation.
By the way, I did notice a nice brand new Dunkin' sign
up there off of...
When you cross over Dallas Drive,
I think it's called Shady Oaks or something like that.
I never could get the name of that street right.
But I did notice a brand new sign,
but I did not notice any signs notifying drivers
of larger vehicles that this is not a through street area.
I need to check with that.
So I'll talk to them on Monday
and I'll get back with you.
- No, that'd be fantastic.
Actually, if you have that opportunity to speak with them
and then could provide that information to us,
we'll make sure that we address it
at our next mobility committee meeting.
Yes, ma'am, thank you.
And then of course, the citywide speed study,
we've given you an update.
Is that something that you still want us to continue
to give you a monthly update on or do you feel like
since we're in the middle of data collection,
we can wait until the time that data has been collected
and of course, we're ready to kind of do that draft plan
or is that something you're wanting us
to continue to bring back to you?
- Comments, sorry. - I think I can wait.
- How about you, do you need a continuous update
or ready to wait until there's something to report?
- At least I could be able to let my constituents know
that we're working on a speed study.
- Yes, ma'am.
It's gonna be several months to collect that data
so we don't anticipate even having that data in
until late May.
So we wanna work through the school year
because that's when normal travel patterns are happening
and so it'll be late May before Nathan has that data in.
- I'm happy to wait until there's something to report.
- Okay, perfect.
- And also-- - Without objection.
- Excuse me, sir.
Also, is this speed study,
is it including that South Indian version
of the evil ways that you've renovated?
- There will be roadways that are included.
Keep in mind that this is only for roadways
and that's something we could report on,
but this is only for roadways where posted speed limit
is not 30 miles per hour.
So there's specific lists that were provided previously
that we evaluated and then Nathan also evaluated
additional roadways that he wanted to study
based on conversations that we had
or questions that come in maybe
from a speeding perspective, et cetera.
So definitely roadways that may be traversing that area,
but not specifically residential streets
in that downtown area.
So with that, that is all that we currently have
on the staff report.
Is there anything additional
that either one of you would like to add
for us to bring back at the April meeting?
- Yes, I'd like to add a street to the report.
It's gonna be Swisher Road
that's off of Shady Shores Road.
Yes, it's in the city of Denton.
- Portions are and portions are not.
- Right, so this particular portion
is there beautiful homes on the street,
but the road is not conducive to what they need right now.
- Okay.
- Some culvert issues, drainage,
and I've driven out there and spoken with homeowners
in that area.
So that road doesn't have any lights.
Pavement is worn down.
So we'll just have to give that road some attention.
- Okay, well we can look and see if it's scheduled
or planned as any part of any bond package
or upcoming CIP.
If not, we can work with Danny's.
Okay, perfect.
So what we'll do is bring back to you
what phase of 2019 that's in
and then also when that is scheduled
and what the anticipation.
So that'll be a very easy question to answer.
Absolutely, we can do that.
I don't have the map in front of me,
but we all have this handy dandy PDF
that we keep on our desktop
so that we can answer those questions.
So we absolutely can bring that back to you, no problem.
That'll be very simple.
- Councilmember McGuire,
anything you want to add to the list?
- I'm going over my long list of things
that I'm thinking about,
but I don't see anything currently that's relevant here.
- I think we've done it.
- Well, wonderful.
Thank you very much.
Well, we look forward to bringing back
these future items to you
and look forward to hearing from you
about the Southeast Denton area.
And then with that,
I guess we're done with the staff report.
- All right, thank you. - Thank you very much.
- All that remains is concluding items.
Does anyone have any concluding items?
Seeing none, we are adjourned at 1039.