Welcome to the City of Denton Mobility Committee meeting.
It will be today July the 20th, 2022.
Meeting is coming to order at 9am.
First item for consideration is MC-22014.
Consider approval of the minutes from April 20, 2022.
I move approval.
Can we get a second?
Well I wasn't here.
You weren't here.
So I'll second.
And so the motion is approved.
The next order of business is MC-22018.
Receive nomination and elect a chair, a vice chair.
At this time I'm sitting in the seat.
Mr. Bird as the interim chair.
Is there anyone that's interested in being chair of this committee?
It's my understanding you were the vice chair, is that correct?
I wasn't the vice chair.
Oh you weren't?
No.
I'm just the interim chair.
I'm going to nominate you for chair.
You're going to nominate me for chair?
Second.
Okay.
Vicki Bird chair.
I'll accept the nomination.
So Vicki Bird is the chair of the Mobility Committee.
Can we get a motion or a motion for vice chair?
Is anyone interested in being vice chair of the Mobility Committee?
I nominate Councilmember McGuire.
I accept the nomination.
Okay.
Councilmember McGuire was nominated and accepted the position of vice chair.
So our chair of the Mobility Committee at this time is Vicki Bird and vice chair is Alice McGuire.
Point of order.
Should we, I know it's not melody, but should we take a vote?
Should they take a vote?
Let's take a vote on both of those at the same time.
And let me see a short hand.
Aye.
That's all of them.
Thank you.
The next order of business is MC-22015.
We're going to receive a report and hold a discussion regarding the City of Dent Transportation Mobility Project's status report.
And Mr. Polster is walking in the door, so if we want to give him a couple of seconds to get up to this location, I see him coming.
There he is.
He's just walking along with that Texas stroll.
He'll be so excited to know he's here and ready to rock and roll.
He's back to Texas.
Welcome, you're up.
What an entrance.
Sorry.
That's all right.
It's traffic.
Was it 35?
The phone wasn't connected.
It's probably local.
Oh, well, there you go.
And we're just using the overhead mic so you don't need to talk to the microphones.
Excellent.
Mr. Polster here at Transportation Solutions.
And this is our project report.
We start with a project summary.
And currently, the amount of projects we're working on on this project, once completed, will total about $2.3, $2.2 billion worth of project infrastructure.
We'll put it on the ground in and around the city of Denny.
So on 2181 North/South, this is a project for those that are somewhat new to the process.
This project was originally awarded to MCM back in 2017, 2018.
And that's the company that had the bridge drop on everybody in Florida.
So very quickly after that, they defaulted on a lot of projects.
So they defaulted in January of '19.
We picked up Zachary as a contractor.
They got selected when they began work, November of 2019, to finish the project.
All that work there is basically we're finishing up the paving on the main lanes.
So we keep having generic utility conflicts, but we are able to address them in the field usually.
And if you've driven it, you know that every day you go out there, it's a little bit different configuration because they have daily lane shifts.
So we are on target for October 22 completion date.
So this fall we will be done.
And I don't know if anybody's going to want to do a ribbon cutting or just ignore it.
We would enjoy.
So your I-35E Mayhill project, essentially we will be done.
It says July 22.
The reason that is we have our two EVs set for the end of July.
And once we have those here, we take possession.
So essentially the right of way will be acquired.
The utilities will be relocated.
The big issue we're having right now on this project is, and we're working again with Becky and the staff there,
to make sure that gas station at Mayhill, we're taking the tanks.
And so they have to be, the state bought the whole gas station,
but apparently the state doesn't have as much authority to kick people out once they own it.
You would think they would.
And so there's a date certain that those occupants have to be out.
And the demolition firm won't start removing the tanks until they know the building is vacant.
The building doesn't have to be gone.
They just want to make sure that if something blows up, nobody dies.
John, which station, is that the racetrack or the mobile?
Which one is it?
It's on the, has it gone south, it's on the south, north side of Mayhill.
It's that old gas station, I think it used to be at Exxon.
Yeah, I know which one it is.
So it's not that quick trip that you're talking about?
No.
No, ma'am.
It's on the other side.
Oh, on the other side, okay.
Yes.
So we're not impacting the quick trip.
If you look at that aerial in that area, you'll see the quick trip and all the development there was set back because of 35E, which has been environmentally cleared since 2012.
So all the developments since 2012 had to honor that larger footprint.
That's where there's that large area between the frontage roads and the buildings.
So we are anticipated to have it done by December of next year.
The push on this was, it was going to be done earlier, but we recognized early on that traffic that was wanting to get to Loop 288 that would exit Mayhill was being impacted by the brinker lag.
And so about a year ago, we backed up, looked at it and decided to redesign where we put a through access lane up top where the main lanes are so that you can, if you want to go to Mayhill, if you want to go to Loop 28,
you'll be in the left lane, you'll go up parallel, height-wise with the main lanes, drop back down and come to 288. If you want to go to brinker, you stay down, come to the left, go left to right, and it'll be the same in the other direction.
That's great.
We decided that the improvements were worth the time. So that's what pushed the schedule. And it's fully funded at the $95 million.
You'll notice right now that we have 98 allocated to it. Our current estimate is 95, but they're leaving those dollars in these projects because of the tendency for all projects to currently go up faster than we anticipated.
John, on the top, it shows these kinds of descriptions like ready to let date and let date.
Yes, sir.
Ready to let date. Is that when the actual contracts go out for bid?
No, sir. That's a good question. So what ready to let and let date mean is right now, once you've got your schematic approved, your environmental clearance, if you see utility relocations are done by December 2030.
Okay.
Because always if you look at the 100% plans, the plans are always done before everything else. So once your utilities are relocated, that project is considered ready to let. If you don't have any funding for the project, the let date would have an asterisk.
So right now it's in June of 2025, because that's where some of that $2 and $11 are programmed. But like we're doing right now, every year they update the 10-year plan in general, particularly the first four years, which is called the STIP, State Transportation Approval Program.
And you can go from year 10 to year two in one of those updates if your project's ready. So there are projects that aren't going to be ready and there are projects that are going to be ready, which is why in the Dallas district, because they're working in a lot of different districts, the Dallas district focuses solely on the ready to let.
They want their projects ready to go, regardless of the funding source, so that when things happen, things can happen.
So we see the utilities here, and all those little dots, those are all the utilities we're able to deal with to get this project done, and that's why we're talking, we've got the right of way now, and it'll take us all the way to December in a year and a half, if the utilities are located.
There's a lot of utilities on 35E.
And then you go up around the corner, this is the merge up to 77.
The multiple CSJs are because the merge that originally started at the two Wishbone area, and then we stopped at 38, and then the bigger project went from 38 to the county line, and we all agreed that the project that impacts the city of Denton the most ought to be one project left as a unit.
So that's what we do, we've got two CSJs, but essentially one project.
And again, we have more money in the project than the current estimate is, but we're not letting it today.
So by the time we get to next year, it may cost more, it may cost less, so they're leaving the $434 million that's allocated to it in the project, and we are shooting for a ready to let date of August 23.
And why that's important is that's a tight run, because we are supposed to let it in September.
So this one's going to be a tight fit on the schedule, but we're all working together to make sure it happens.
And again, if you look, when you get to this area, all of these are utilities that have to be relocated.
And they're all like saying they'll be done in September, September, September, so it's going to be touch and go, but we'll make it.
And then the big project I was talking about a moment ago, it goes from basically 77 all the way to the county line.
The reason for the different colors and the different CSJs is we are going to be building the, and I'm going to call that purple, but I don't know.
My wife says I only know five colors.
That second small project, that project, apartment saner. Yeah, it's the 455 interchange, because we're letting 455 like in the next couple of months.
So it goes all the way from the high school on the east all the way out to Bolivar 24, 40 something out there.
2450. That road. Long road.
And it's a safety. We're going from a two lane hog back to I think it's a four lane divided urban.
And most of the reason that is is that if you miss the road out there, you're going to drop 10, 15 feet into a ditch and die.
And nobody will see you.
That's a good reason to change the roads.
So since 455 was going to get there first, we decided to go ahead and let the purple project with 455.
So whoever gets 455, builds 455, builds the interchange at 35 and on out towards the west.
The other projects are, and the reason, the other reason they're broken up is if we can keep these projects below a certain dollar amount, then we don't have the VE issued value engineering.
We don't have a lot of the criteria we have to follow for assuming that it should be a design build, something like that.
So it just keeps it under the radar of just being a design build project, which is what we want.
And so again, the 081, which I'm going to call blue, has a December 24 and the 074, which I think is yellow, is December 25.
But we're going to let those together.
So we're going to get those dates set to where they work together because they'll be, they want to let it at the same time.
And they can be the same contractor, but they'll be two projects.
And again, a lot of utilities.
And then on the other leg, the 35, 35W, we're currently working on the frontage roads from just south of the railroad tracks.
So we probably need to extend that yellow line a little further north down to just south of 407.
And the reason we're doing the northern segment first because you got the Hunter Coal, you got the Centurion American, you got Hillwood, and some of the third thing.
It's all developed in that area.
And so we had to keep the dollar amount under 200 million, again, for the same reasons I said earlier.
So we're targeting less than 200 million dollar segment.
And they've got WSP is on contract to do the design.
It's been environmentally cleared since 2020.
The right away will be completely acquired by March next year, and the ready to let date is June of 2024.
And we are shooting for September of 2024, let date.
And again, there's monies coming in from the back end of the system.
If you paid, I didn't mean that money, if you paid attention, I didn't mean it that way, but if you saw Austin sue Textile on the 35 project,
and there were three projects they sued them on, south, middle, and north.
The south was actually under construction, so that project stopped.
So that money had to go somewhere.
The north, they had just awarded it to a contractor, so that money was there.
The middle is an environmental impact statement, EIS, and it was in the process of doing the environmental.
And Austin sue Textile, and I mean, it's a legitimate argument.
I mean, I wouldn't have done it, but it's a legitimate argument.
They're building X number of lanes in the south, they're building X number of lanes in the north, and those are less sensitive areas.
That sensitive area, they have to do a major environmental document.
And their argument is, since you broke it up, right, what are the odds of the feds not finishing the gap?
Had you done the whole thing together as an EIS, then they could have a better chance of dealing with sensitive issues.
And so that's $6 billion. It's got to roll back through the system next year.
And so we're looking for a lot of our projects because they haven't ready the lead in that 2023 through 2025 timeframe.
We're thinking, because they have to spend the money, that's the point, they have to spend the money.
And so what they do is they don't unfund Austin $6 billion.
They just simply move it out here.
And then they have that money in here, they have to find projects for it.
So that's why, although we have asterisks on funding, we're pretty certain we're going to get it funded because it meets all the criteria the commission has set for projects that will be considered for reallocation of those funds.
I have a question.
Yes, ma'am.
And so this is just for the frontage roads we're not talking about.
So are we going to have some type of toll road coming up from Fort Worth or anything?
So this is recorded, right?
Okay, I'll be careful.
What we're building out there right now, regardless of whether it's a rural freeway, which is what we've cleared, or an urban freeway that has what we call a 3223 configuration, which is three general purpose lanes in one direction, two toll manage lanes, two toll manage lanes in the opposite direction, and three general purpose lanes in the opposite direction.
direction that all fits in the same footprint and the frontage roads are in
the same place regardless. When we were clearing I-35W that's when the paradigm
shifted in Austin where they started saying no more tolls because they don't
understand what a toll management is. So it's a toll, it's a toll, it's a toll, it's a toll. So instead of killing our future, right,
because the city of Denton, Denton County, and TXDOT are all immortal beings. The constituent parts die off but the entity itself
stays on. So eventually the people that are in Austin won't be there, right.
Paradigm shift that it has over the last 30 years back to common sense and when
that happens we'll flip the environmental back on, convert it to a toll
manage lane, clear it as a toll manage lane, and then we'll continue that configuration up
that's in Fort Worth all the way to Denton and it'll match into the toll
manage lanes over 35E coming up to 38. So the only reason we're doing the frontage
roads and only the frontage roads now is because we have no intention of building
35W as a rural freeway. But again, the frontage roads are in the same place in
both configurations and the footprint is the same. So it's cleared, we'll find her out of the way,
there's no throwaway, and we'll just wait.
Okay, this is the 38 project coming out of Denton across the lake to 377. It's
under construction and we are anticipating it being completed in
January 2024. Basically we are behind in some parts of the project and ahead in
others. We're trying to get a catch-up scheduled from these guys, but the area
around the bridges, they are moving a little bit faster than anticipated. So
we're planning in the next month or so to allow the contractor to go into phase
two sooner than what we anticipated they would be. So all in all, it's doing
pretty good.
Can I ask a question about that? Absolutely, that's what I'm hearing. And this is for people that I'm just
watching having comments and asking questions. There's a big why question out
there. Why what? Why are sidewalks being built out there before anything else
shows up out there? Can we give these constituents some type of answer for that?
So the federal guidelines require that any facility that has federal funding in
it accommodate all modes of transportation. Pedestrians are a mode. In this
particular case, the 10-foot shared use path from Denton out to the Greenbelt is
out of the construction path of the road itself. And so it was something they
could get done just because it's not in the way of the rest of it. Typically you
can't do sidewalks until you build the road because the road's moving. What we're
doing is shifting in most to the south and the 10-foot shared use path is on the
north, so it was just something that could get done as part of the project. I wouldn't
walk out there because the project's done. Well, that'll give me an opportunity to make a statement?
Yeah, we had a chance to get it done earlier, so we did. Okay, so your 380
feasibility study. We will be closing this up. They said July, but probably it's
going to be August. We had to get a couple of letters from
Oak Point, Crossroads. Crossroads and Little Elm, they have some issues concerned with the
feasibility study said the place to make 380 a freeway is on 380 as opposed to
an alternate route. And there were some economic impacts. Crossroads,
Walmart, all that stuff there in the path. So we're working with, County is working
with Oak Point and Little Elm to essentially identify what they think
their impacts are and then finally help mitigate them through the bond program
that we're proposing in November. And so they had to then turn around and write letters to
text out saying, "Nale of the mind, you don't have to do an economic study. We're
going to work with the county." So that took a while. Now they're closing it out. The
feasibility study said the place to build a freeway is on 380. If you'll note that
brown section, you could also assume that you wouldn't go through town with a
freeway, right? That you take the traffic up and around the loop. Right now it's
not a full-fledged freeway because it doesn't have frontage roads. So it's in
the next rest of the port. County has picked up Pacheco Cove to do the
environmental study to turn Loop 288 northeast into a freeway by adding the
main lines. It will take a lot of pressure off of vacuuming you guys for
developers that want to tie directly into a 60 mile an hour main line, which we can't
allow them to do. But once we get the frontage roads done or you just cleared, then we can
start working with these developers. But the intent is for the traffic on 380,
this freeway, it hit Denton and go up around the loop to 35. And then we're building the loop around on the other side as well.
If you look at McKinney and Prosper and Salon and all those people over there in
Collin County, they're fighting like cats and dogs on the alignment because nobody will work with each other.
And so there's like nine different loops that we're talking about doing and nobody agrees with anybody.
So we're about, because the city of Denton was forward thinking a long time ago, we've already got our bypass route ready to go and we'll get
ours built before they probably even agree what the alignment is over there. Speaking of the rest of this, Loop 28 West takes it from 35 all the way around down to 2449.
And if you'll note, we environmentally cleared it to that 2020. We're looking at 2024 for completion of the right of way.
We're working on what the heck, why does it take four years? And the answer is that all of those gas wells and distribution lines, you have to deal with them in right of way.
And during utility relocation, but you have to deal with them in right of way because moving them is a financial cost and they've got precedent.
So we've had other areas in the state where we've found that dealing with them in the right of way process is easier than dealing with them on the utility side.
So it'll take a long time, but if we beat this time frame, we can move up to that day.
All right, so this is the project I was telling you about a second ago. In order to take 380 to a freeway, we've got to get around Denton. We're going to take it up to the north along 281.
And we are looking at a more seamless movement between 380 and the Loop. I've got a line there just because I just stick the line there, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's where I'll be.
We're going to have a better transition so that you can get from 380 to the Loop without having to go through a box or something. So that's where we're at on that.
1515 County picked up LTRA, did the work, and we did the environmental clearance initially and then we had some changes to the design that we needed to make, which required us to do a re-eval.
The re-eval was completed in '22, and we are looking at having the right of way done by '23, and they're ready to let in '24.
FM 1173, we picked up half of the project, and we are shooting for August, September, May, and October to have the plans adequate, which means your design plans are at 60%.
Because if we can get this project fast-track, TechStut wants to find a way to include this segment of 1173 in the 35 project that's $750 million dollars off.
Ellen Locus, so Becky's working with TechStut on the agreeable, acceptable pavement design for the South, and once we get that agreed to, then TechStut will use their maintenance money to go fix the rug, however we all agree to.
And I'll let Becky expand if she wants to.
I've got a question. Oh yes. So have the utilities been, all the utilities been done on both of those roads that we're talking about?
No sir, so the southern half of Ellen Locus, which is basically south of the courthouse to Eagle, the water, the sewer, and storm drain has been installed. We're currently working with, as John mentioned, TechStut on the pavement design that all parties can agree to, which we're hoping is going to be available this week or next, and then we can move forward with working on an agreement.
On the northern portion, which is basically north of the courthouse, all the way to 380, the water and sewer lines both need to be replaced, drainage will need to be installed, and we are currently working with John at the county to put that as a part of the county bond package that will be in the November election.
The city will fund the water and wastewater, and the county will fund the roadway improvements, a portion of it. So we're basically funding about half, and the county would be funding about half of those roadway improvements. And so that's the collaboration that we're working on.
At such time, all of that happens, then the city will be looking to take over all of Ellen Locus between 380 and Eagle as city infrastructure. But from the courthouse south, everything is done, and the road is ready to be fixed. We just have to agree on this.
So, and our standard is a little bit more stringent, and so that's why we're actually using actual pavement design to make those determinations as to what, you know, our goal at the city, and it's my responsibility to make sure what's put back is going to last, you know, for a long period of time.
And so that's why those collaborations are happening, and TexDOT's been very open to those conversations, and John's been very helpful with that also. So we're in hopes that we'll have something, I would say, within the next couple of months that we're in agreement with, and you'll see an agreement come before council as to that collaboration.
So I thought my understanding was that TexDOT would, we would do the utility replacement, however the city would, but then TexDOT would pay for the...
Yeah, we're not on the hook for anything south of the courthouse. And the point is, is that at the end of the day, we wouldn't care, but at the end of the day, the road becomes a city at some point.
So we do care at that point what's beneath it, because if we left TexDOT to their own druthers, they would give a contract to do a mill and overlay, and if they found a pothole underneath it, they'd stuff some stuff in it, and move on.
So, but the north side, you said the county was picking up the new improvements?
Well, you're submitting projects to the county for bottom program considerations, and one of those projects is the collaboration, and it's a three-way collaboration, it's the county, the city, and TexDOT, because we're not pitching it because it's not a single unit.
We are looking at Elm and Locust from EGLE to 380 as a project, and when you look at those parts, it's more like one-third, one-third, one-third in the partnership, and the district engineer is keenly interested in getting this off of his books, because he gets bad scores for this road, as you can very well tell.
The only thing I would add is EGLE between Elm and Locust will remain TexDOT because it is an on-system roadway that connects Dallas Drive to Carroll Boulevard, which is Fort Worth Drive, obviously.
But it actually, I'm very pleased with the collaboration, and I'm really excited about getting this moving forward.
We'll see. What happened on some of the resurfacing that started was the temperature got to a point where it was hard to lay down some of the resurfacing materials, and so the contractor that's doing the work has their own plant, you know, whatever that is, the asphalt plant.
So they had to stop for a couple, three weeks, A, because of the temperature, but that was because they needed to go reconfigure their, whatever their formula is on that stuff, because what they were doing, what they were laying down was rolling right back up in a couple of days.
So you saw them start and then you saw them stop, and that was the reason. They're behind schedule, but the intent is to have 3580 have a passable, smooth surface from basically Corinth through Denton to 388.
And they do it all at night, so just don't get out at night.
And then that's my glossary of terms.
And usually somebody always asks me a question that's not on the glossary.
Can we return briefly to the Locust, Elm, Eagle conversation? So I know that we've talked in the past about, well obviously we're talking right now about pavement design and trying to sort of establish standards that will meet the city's needs for Elm and Locust.
Is Eagle going to be to that same standard even though it's not coming off system?
Eagle will also be replaced with texot, and they'll do that at the same time that they do Elm and Locust.
We don't know.
Okay, but we don't know yet regarding pavement.
As long as it's got a smooth surface, technically we don't really care because we don't have to maintain it. We just have to complain if it falls apart again.
Okay, so it's a conversation we have to constantly explain that that's a texot roadway, and if they choose to use the same standard pavement width as they do on Elm and Locust with the same contractor, that's texot's decision.
If not, as John mentioned, they can use to use a different- And they probably will go ahead and just use the same contractor, same contract, same design because it's more costly to change it, right?
Okay, but that is up to texot.
There's a better and good chance that they'll all look the same underneath.
Okay, all right, that's good news.
And John and myself, we'll make sure we're going to continue to work through that because we're still receiving weekly questions and requests about potholes along Eagle.
So that's a constant conversation, so we want to make sure that it's put back to a standard that we're all in agreement on, but because that won't end up being a city roadway, it's not something we actually have the jurisdiction over.
Okay, so that's pavement design.
We had a brief conversation maybe a couple months ago about roadway design on Locust and Elm, and I know that we had kind of, you know, I brought up the idea of, you know, a bus kind of pull off lane, and there was some conversation around, you know,
texdot may not be willing to give us the leeway to do that kind of design. Do we have any say whatsoever regarding like bike and pedestrian facilities along Eagle, or is that 100% texdot decision?
We have to, we have to comport to their design criteria for those things. Part of the reason why we want Elm and Locust off is because once we take it off system, we can do it to what we want.
And at that point, because the roadway itself, and what Becky made sure to include in that contract, is a certain number of feet of curb improvements, because there's a lot of places where the curbs are bad, and you don't want the road to be done, and you have to come in and cut it up to fix the curbs.
So the contractor that does Elm and Locust to whatever pegged design they agreed to also has to do a certain number of feet of curb improvements. And the intent is to get the road functionally as a road sound, and then after that, we take it off system, then we can configure it to what the city wants it to look like.
And at that point, and at that point, then Becky will say we want to do a complete street scenario, and she's going to say go out and find some money for it, and then Cog has programs to convert texdot roads to more local use facilities.
Okay, so that's Elm and Locust though. Are we asking for curb improvements along EGLE?
We're going to argue the same criteria for the whole Elm, Locust, and EGLE, but when you get to pullouts, things that are not necessarily texdot friendly concepts, we won't get that through on EGLE.
Well, in the right of way, we'll accommodate that on EGLE, obviously. You know, I guess really what I'm trying to get at is like, who's responsible for sidewalks along EGLE? We're responsible for the sidewalks.
In your NMA that you signed, you're basically responsible for everything on system except the road itself. Okay. Signs, signals, sidewalks, yada yada yada.
And something you can understand too, our goal currently is to get the pavement designed to the thickness that we can agree to, get the agreement in place, work forward with the county on the northern portion, but as we start working through a design, what is the ultimate striping plan?
And then I do anticipate, at some time later, that we will come back and have to do some sidewalk improvements in the entire area, but that's not currently included. The only part of the texdot project that we're working on right now is everything from the curb inside.
Plus some feet of curving that need to be fixed. To facilitate perhaps future sidewalk improvements, but that's not part of the project. That is correct, and Nathan has that a part of his sidewalk work plan, and he's also looking at ways to use that as a multimodal area to get from 380 down to EGLE through the downtown, but I anticipate that being a future project.
My first goal is to get Elm and Locust to a drivable surface that everyone can agree to, and then get the northern half of the Elm and Locust replaced with all the utilities, because obviously that's aging infrastructure, I know you've heard.
Yeah, yes. Absolutely. Alright, thank you for that clarification. I think I understand now.
Oh, we have one more question. Well, that's more of a question for Councilmember Dwyer. What sidewalks are, which part of this alignment are you talking about? Sidewalks for? I was referring to sidewalks, the sidewalks along EGLE, which are not in great repair and are very narrow, but I'm, you know, I recognize the urgency of, I mean that is not a functional thoroughfare right now, and so I recognize that we need to focus on that pavement.
First, and then once pavement encroachs are complete, we can start talking about sidewalks. Well, I know we've got sidewalks on the, which, you know, they're old, talking about, I guess, the south side of EGLE, but we also, when we redid that road, we put in two bike lanes on both directions, which are also pedestrian lanes.
So, I mean, I've seen people walking in that, and I think there's, it's a little dangerous to me, but they still, they still, okay, I just, I wasn't sure which part of the alignment you were referring to. Yeah, I just want to make sure I was clear on what TxDOT's responsible for, what we're responsible for, how we can influence.
The majority of the scope of the project, TxDOT is going to be from the front of curb in, except for those areas we identified that need curbs improved, and then those areas will be the back of curb in, but once you hit the back of the curb, anything past that, TxDOT's not even going to look at it.
Because then we're in trouble, because that's where all your utility stuff is, there's some underpayment, and it's just a big box of worms.
Thank you very much.
Sorry to be late.
That's okay.
Thank you, Don.
Thank you.
Thank you, Don.
Sure.
We're going to, if there's any other comment on that, we'll move on to MC-22016.
Receive a report and hold a discussion regarding updates from the Denton County Transportation Authority, otherwise known as DCTA.
Absolutely.
Thank you, welcome.
Yes ma'am, good morning.
So, good morning, thank you for having us.
I'm joined by Brittany Farr, our Senior Director of Engagement Administration, and my name's Paul Christina, the Interim Chief Executive Officer.
I recognize Council Member McGuire gave a briefing on much of this content last night, and thanks to her and staff, as we establish our regular cadence of communication with our member cities,
and have gone to something less than a monthly cadence here, we will continue to line these things up so that we can keep in front of you at the right schedule.
So, I will move very quickly through the content that was covered last night and end up waiting to spend the most time on the things that you want to know about, if that's okay with you.
So, I think we talked about, Council Member McGuire talked about the TRIP program last year.
We appreciate the City of Denton's participation in this.
All of these TRIP projects were approved at our last DCTA board meeting, and so congratulations to you all, and we appreciate the engagement of staff on the execution of these projects.
From the Mobility Services side, as you know, we've been marching towards...
Oh, yes ma'am.
Would you like for us to answer or ask questions as you're going along, or if there's anything?
Sure, that'd be fine.
I have a question.
Okay.
What does PURR Applied Zone pedestrian improvements mean?
So, it is the railroad, usually when you see railroad, that's what that is, and so it should be UPRR, which is Union Pacific Railroad Quiet Zone Improvement, so it can catch.
Okay, all right.
There is a UP Railroad, not a PURR, although some people who work at BNSF might say it is a PURR, but that's a different story for different...
All right, well it just looked familiar to me, so I just wanted to clarify that.
Thank you.
We have another question.
And just for clarification, because I know, I don't know why it's taken so long, but we still haven't done our quiet zones for the UP Railroad through downtown.
Right.
But that's not what this is talking about, or is that what this is talking about?
This is a part of that overall project.
Right.
And one question I have, and I don't know if it's you all, but I've had some people talk to me about when the trains are coming, when DCTA trains are coming through, you know, from Loop 288 all the way through downtown.
The cross arms come down, and then it's like a couple minutes before.
Is that sort of a federal requirement?
There's a certain warning time that is required between the time the gates go down and the time that the train actually passes.
What I know about our signal system is that we have varying block lengths throughout, and I'm learning the reasons why our gate down times are different in different places.
What we are doing right now is the A train enhancement study that's going to talk about making the train go faster, and so that will help with the gate going down and the train getting there sooner, but we'll be looking at the gate timing across all those places as well.
Thank you.
Appreciate that.
Okay.
Thank you.
Yes, please, please interrupt as I'm going through here.
Okay.
We'll make our way.
So we're really excited about this. We've launched performance dashboards for our GoZone service and our Connect service that talks about the key performance indicators that we're seeing on the system.
And so this is really the first step in what staff and the board are working towards to make all of our performance metrics much more visible and front and center to the public and to our staff as we think about the future of DCTA and how we provide the highest quality service possible.
And so that is part of the conversation that's ongoing through our budget process this year. And so we're really excited about this launch, this information will be available on demand.
This is a view of our ridership for the month of May.
You can see the dark blue GoZone, light blue UNT, our vanpool service which is continuing to be popular post pandemic. And what really is attractive about it to nonmember cities is there's no cost to the municipality.
This is really an arrangement between the employer and the employees that want to use it. And so we're seeing good movement in that as well.
And you will find these reports on our, the metrics behind these reports on our dashboard, our ridership between Connect and GoZone by month.
Our GoZone ridership continues to increase as we, following the investment that was made in the service back in our April board meeting.
This is a view of our safety performance that has really been the result of a lot of interest on the public side and our ability to visualize what our safety record is based on incident rate per 100,000 miles.
We have two categories of incidents, FTA reportable and non FTA reportable. FTA reportable incidents are those in which, generally in which somebody has to be treated medically offsite or the vehicle is towed away from the scene.
Again, as we continue our reporting and data availability, we're working with VIA to make, to be able to identify root causes so that we can drive continuous improvements in our safety performance.
Do you keep track of, and I don't need to know what it is, at fault? In other words, with these accidents under either category, if it's determined to be either the driver of VIA, GoZone, or someone else?
Yes we do, and as we get into what's the right amount, what's the right reporting we provided on a continuous basis, that's one of them at fault versus not at fault.
Here's a look at our service quality by month. Seat unavailability at the top, following the implementation of additional service, we've seen that number drop significantly, as has our estimated time of arrival.
Question. Yes ma'am. Clarify what seat unavailable means.
This is the percentage by which people who request rides are unable to get it because they get the message on the screen that says a ride is not currently available.
Any time a person would be expected to wait longer than 30 minutes for a GoZone vehicle to get to their point, they get that seat availability message.
So this is the part that we can go through really quickly as well, based on the conversation that was had last night.
We're asking our board this month to decide on three different things relative to our overall service, that is our fare structure, and our pass structure, and then finally the routes that will be utilized for Connect going forward.
So this is just talking about fare alternatives, whether it's a flat fare or a hybrid fare for the GoZone service, a hybrid fare meaning an incremental charge for every mile beyond four miles.
We've used these graphs to demonstrate the data that's available because of the GoZone service to be able to identify actually where the demand is for service.
And that's an improvement over the typical census block data that has pretty low fidelity in terms of transit dependent or transit prone riders.
But these origin destination pairs that you see on these maps we anticipate will be helpful in order for us to understand better what is the demand and who are the users of our service so that we can provide multimodal alternatives moving into the future through a long range service planning process.
This is a view on the operating cost for the Connect route versus the GoZone route.
The policy decision that we're framing up is if we understand the cost of a GoZone vehicle and how many people it moves in an hour and we understand the cost of a Connect bus and how many people it moves in an hour, what's the right balance of Connect service to provide the most cost effective and comprehensive service possible. That's the foundation of the policy discussion.
And then on the Connect side we've broken that down, same metric with a more finite view of different periods of the day because not the same bus route might have different utilization and different ridership throughout the day.
And again this is that discussion of the decision that we're framing up for this one.
So we have several alternatives that were presented to our board really based on trying to identify again the balance of cost effectiveness between the GoZone service and the Connect service and I believe that you all went through these alternatives last night so I will breeze through.
And then on to agency updates.
On June 10th, last month, our board and staff got together and talked about what is the future of DCTA look like and where are we going as an agency.
The headline from the Denton Record Chronicle I think is really apropos, we're getting back to basics, how do we provide the types of services that are needed for the people of Denton County and our member cities, how do we make it easy for the rider in order to drive a better future for Denton County.
And so we're going to have a conversation around those sorts of key messages in this month's board meeting that really provide the pillars of goals and objectives for the entire staff, strategic, I'm sorry, I'll first start with strategic goals for the entire agency as defined by the board,
which drives goals and objectives for the chief executive officer, which drives goals and objectives for every member of the DCTA staff so that everybody understands where we're going and staff can better communicate how we're going to get there.
This was the framework for that strategic board workshop and the input from the board is what's allowing us to create those strategic goals such that we can create the key performance indicators and evidence of success so that everybody who touches the DCTA system can understand the value that we bring to our community.
And then I think finally an update on our chief executive officer search, the board has hired K&A associates who's doing a national search, K&A associates has generated a number of qualified candidates, the board is in the process of doing preliminary interviews on a small subset of those candidates, we expect there will be a short list of final interviews in the August/September timeframe and a new CEO onboarded shortly thereafter.
Any other questions or thoughts for me?
Does anybody have any questions?
I think it was the third slide from this one, next one.
Okay right there it says projected FY2020 ridership 2.2 main, that includes the North Texas ridership.
I have a couple of questions.
Okay.
The first one is training for drivers, can you give the public a bit of information as to how the drivers are trained, what's the training process for your new drivers?
So are we talking about bus drivers or goes on drivers?
Goes on drivers particularly.
Okay so VIA provided some updates in our last couple of board meetings about their driver training process, generally it is onboarding training, well first the comprehensive background check to meet the qualifications of anyone we want interacting with the public.
And then onboarding training around safety, service, how the platform works, all those sorts of things. And then there's a platform of online training that is encouraged but generally not required for drivers as they move through the system.
Obviously whenever there's an incident, there's a thorough investigation and that fault incident generally would drive retraining or disciplinary action.
Certainly can come back next month with a more comprehensive view on that, taken from those previous board meetings if you'd like.
Okay.
Also, the next question is about the cars themselves and goes on cars.
Give us an idea of whether or not they, talk to us about the, are they leased, are they rented, are they, you know, how are all of these cars coming in from all over the country with all of the license plates?
Of course there's the big concern of whether or not they're truly inspected, you know, with that kind of thing. Can you give us some information on that?
So, VIA has a leasing arrangement with Avis, is that right, Avis, the national car rental company.
And Avis is the one, is the entity who procures and sources those vehicles and then they're brought to the shop to provide graphics and decals and all those sorts of things.
I could bring back details on the arrangement between VIA and Avis if you would like.
I recognize that the vehicle registration item has been one that's been brought up several times.
We've talked with VIA about what it takes to have vehicles that are registered in Denton County or at least Texas so that they can be insured to follow the same standards as we have here.
And so we can bring back an item on the arrangement between DCTA and Avis to, I'm sorry, VIA and Avis to the extent that that's allowed because some of those deals might be proprietary between the two entities.
The third question is, I don't know where I got this information from, maybe from last night I heard that the vehicle location or the vehicle use has been maximized here in this area.
In other words, you're not bringing in any additional vehicles to compact some of that time frame that people are getting picked up. If it takes more than 30 minutes for a vehicle to pick up a person, why, why does it take so long?
We're going to bring more vehicles in to cut down on some of that time or should we as a public expect to wait 20, 30 minutes for a vehicle?
So the contract between DCTA and VIA sources a certain number of service hours to service the entire area.
VIA is responsible for delivering that number of service hours within the limits of the KPIs that we have available to us.
So that is the supply side of the equation. Now what we learn about is the demand side of the equation and the board made the decision to, the DCTA board made the decision to add more go zone vehicles back in April with the expectation that KPIs would increase but also understanding that demand would increase as well.
And so that's why you see the slides that you do about what is our current wait time, what is our current vehicle unavailability and therefore we can monitor what is the right balance or what are the right performance metrics for the service that we're putting on the street.
So we expect that VIA provides the number of vehicles that are needed to provide the service that they're committed to.
And this service is giving some significant time frames here. In other words, I'd like a vehicle and I would prefer to have it to come to me as quickly as it can, but it's telling me that there's nothing available within 30 minutes.
I mean that's got to be very frustrating for people that use it. I don't use it, I have my own car. But for the sake of acceptance by this college town, I would hope that we would want to make sure that there's enough vehicles to cut down on some of that time.
So, yes sir. Well, I thought in the presentation last night, and maybe you looked through it, but that number has come down.
It has come down. Yeah, that number has come down almost. I think it was 19 minutes or maybe it was, there was something about five minutes, I can't remember what it was, but it's certainly much improved since the board made that decision to do that.
Okay, the seat unavailability has come down. Well, also the wait time. Yeah, the wait time. And we're targeting 5% seat unavailability and 15 minute ETA between the time, average ETA between the time you call the vehicle and the time the vehicle shows up.
Okay. Yeah. All right, I just wanted to get that out there and lay that up on the table. So, anyone else? All right, so I'll just give you my experience that I had. This is real time for me, what happened to me.
I was on University at Elm, stopped at the red light there by the CVS, the Walgreens. I'm in the right hand lane, goes on car right next to me, light turn green, goes on middle right turn on Elm right in front of me.
If my head had been on straight and I would have gone straight ahead, we surely would have had an accident. I just had to be late because I was probably looking somewhere or changing my radio or whatever.
But that kind of thing is what I hear from people that may text me or email me on my phone that these goes on people out here are mad. Who are these people that are driving these vehicles?
Please take that back and I don't know where to take that. But I could have had a collision myself. Yes ma'am. Well, I appreciate the feedback. That's the reason that we're focused on identifying what is our safety performance across all of our modes so that we can drive that sort of continuous improvement.
Thank you and certainly we appreciate the feedback. Anything else? Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate the update.
Right now we move on to NC 22017 staff report.
Well good morning. I wanted to take a couple of minutes to introduce a couple of new individuals that are on our team. As y'all are aware we have four different divisions amongst the capital projects and engineering team.
I know you've all met Trevor Crane before. He's our deputy director of capital projects who's on vacation this week so he's not with us. I'm sure we all wish we were on the beach too.
We have Brett Bourgeois who is our deputy city engineer. Brett if you want to raise your hand. I know Councilmember Watts you may not have met Brett yet but he's our new deputy city engineer and he's been with us since February.
And then we have two new individuals. One is new to his role not new to the city and the other one is new to the city. So I wanted to introduce Chris Laganar. Did I say it right? Okay. I never can get his last name right.
But Chris is our new capital projects administration manager. He comes to us from California. He has over 30 years of experience and we're really excited to have him on our team. He's responsible for our administration functions which includes a lot of our financial functions.
The day to day operations of all the committees and commissions that we are responsible for. Council requests and many more things. We have an entire dashboard that our team works off of and supports and keeps up our CIP map and discuss it.
And so Chris is we're very excited to have him and he's been here a couple of months. And so I wanted to introduce him and then I also wanted to introduce Wesley McBride. Wesley has been with the city for about eight years.
He has over 20 years of experience with tech stock and he has been with the city like I said about eight years and he's worked his way through the inspections department and with Trevor's recent promotion there was an opportunity for a new individual to take the public works inspections manager role and Wesley was a successful candidate.
And you may or may not know but his team is responsible for inspecting all of the capital projects all of the development projects that are within the right of way so any of the public infrastructure that's being installed and then also all of the right of way permits.
So just like to give you a face to a name these four gentlemen have to put up with me which is sometimes tough but they're all doing a fantastic job and we're super excited to have them on the team.
So the next thing I wanted to do and the only two things we had on our agenda from last month was talk about Bonnie Gray Street and give a brief update on that.
And so I know the North South Water main project and they are all aware we had that issue with the contractor defaulting and had to get a new contractor on board. We are so happy to say that that finally passed all of this test and was placed back into service around May.
So what we're currently working on is the southbound lanes of Bonnie Bray between I-35 and Scripture and we call that phase 4A sorry 4B and we're working with that contractor to restore the pavement.
Our goal is to have that completed by the beginning of August based on supply and demand but what that is doing is providing a temporary surface until we can come back through and reconstruct the entire Bonnie Bray.
And so at such time and Mr. Polster is helping with this as we've submitted Bonnie Bray phase 4B and 5. So 4B is from Scripture to 35 and 5 is from Scripture to 380.
We've submitted both of those for the county bond package and for their possible election in November and with hopes that we'll receive the additional funding needed to make that a four lane divided roadway and we're currently working through finishing the design on those sections and also working through real estate acquisition so we can move towards construction.
What we knew due to the fact that the water line improvements had torn up the road into the consideration needed to be taken place to make some type of improvement and so that's the decision we made which was to make this overlay happen in this area this two inch surface replacement.
And so that's very temporary. We talk about the project in phases I know it doesn't mean a lot to you but I do I have to look at a map and memorize it because there are seven phases of this.
I also wanted to bring forward that Bonnie Bray phase three which is actually from Rose on to 35 phase one and phase two were already completed. But the portion that's from Rose on Drive to 35 that's phase three. It's currently at 60% design we're working through those design comments getting it to 90 ultimately to 100% and that along with phase six which is from 380 to 77.
Those two sections and phases are we're on track to have those to begin construction. Our hopes are by the end of the year so that means getting that project bid all the real estate we're still working on acquiring the real estate north on that face six is taking a little bit longer than I anticipated and several of those properties are going through the
planning process. And so we anticipate those taking approximately two years to construct, which would be the end of 2024.
So any questions on Bonnie Bray.
All right. So then the citywide speed study I'm actually going to have Nathan George, our bicycle pedestrian ADA coordinator, his title is a mouthful, come up and talk to you about the citywide speed study, and he is leading this effort for our team.
And I know it's something we've come to counsel with a couple of times, but allow him to give an update as he's the one managing this project. So Nathan forgers.
Good morning. Morning. What's my first time to say hello to you so nice to meet you morning. Good to meet you. So just a brief update on the citywide speed study. Last time we briefed you we were in the data collection phase so that was while we were out collecting speed sample data that will feed into the report that was completed at the end of May.
And then we went through a process to review and screen all that data posted make sure we had good quality data, and then sign off on the invoice for our consultant who performed all that data collection for us.
So we have all that data has been combed through and it's all good. We've been working for the last few months on digesting the data.
Identifying the critical values that we're looking at when we complete this kind of study 85th percentiles, and then all the additional data points so combining and averaging data, making sure we get good weighted averages, and then starting to look at how that data fits with our current
speed zones that are in our ordinance that establishes speeds throughout the city.
So that's a process that is coming up on completion where we're hoping to have the draft completed by the end of the month, which is next week.
And then we'll be working through an internal review process and documenting so everything will be in a technical document that will bring before council in September, the date that we have put on the schedule right now September 27 to bring this report to you as a work session.
So that's when you should expect to see the recommendations that we're putting forward.
We're also reviewing a lot of crash data. So layering on additional information is another part of this process to make sure that we're not just looking very, very much at the speed results but we're also layering on additional information that might help support
reducing speed limits for seeing performance will also hopefully be highlighting additional opportunities to improve safety as an outcome of this study so hopefully we're going to see a kind of multiple benefit of this, not just to establish new speed limits but
also to identify any safety trends and make recommendations in terms of where we might see some poor performance that doesn't necessarily justify adjusting speed limit but it might be a good recommendation to do some sort of a safety project as an outcome.
So we'll hopefully see some combined benefits of this process to delivering the speed study. That's all I can say for right now but I'll be happy to answer questions if anybody has any.
Any questions? Yes. When you mentioned the term safety project, what would something like that look like?
So what I was saying in some of the crash data was like if we had high incidence of rear end collisions at an intersection or maybe a high incidence of left turn collisions at an intersection so we might see some trends in the data that suggest
maybe a signal phase needs to be adjusted or there are certain types of crashes that indicate a crash trend so we might see some opportunities to make specific recommendations about a safety related improvement that's not a speed specific challenge
but the crash data indicates that there may be some other issue that's related, not speed related to safety performance of the road. So I've seen some examples of that that we can highlight.
Some of them will be on TxDOT roads as well so it won't be recommendations we're making to ourselves but certainly recommendations that we can pass along to our partners at TxDOT.
I can see the way you're talking, I'm thinking about certain intersections and as I'm sitting at the light I'm saying to myself, you know they could really use a sign up there that says go straight ahead, make a right turn or a U-turn.
I'm just trying to think of an intersection, the Buckings intersection, I think it needs one that says go straight ahead, turn right, you know those kind of signs, those are the things that I just kind of pick up on.
Can a regular citizen like me call something like that in or put that on Engage Denton? I would say we see a lot of requests like that through Engage Denton, this study will, unless it has a very specific trend that I can see in the crash data, we probably won't see anything to make recommendations about signing for turn lanes or anything of that sort.
But we could see, like the example I was saying of left turns, we could see some cases where folks are violating a traffic signal that might be helpful to provide some reinforcement sign, there could be opportunities for that but I would expect that to be pretty rare and Engage Denton or other ways that we can receive that sort of comment.
Certainly we always, we're dealing with a lot of those requests throughout the week. Yes, so that's what I'll do, I'll go through Engage Denton for everything that I'm waiting on the light to change.
And you said you're going to give us a complete report on September 27th in a work session? Correct.
Another question for me is the warning, speed warning signs? For? Just right now I'm thinking about Moore Street of course, Moore Street, this is you know, burning my brain.
Are those just generally put at the beginning of the street or are those usually found in the middle of the long roadway? How do you all make a determination as to where to put those digital warning signs? I've seen them, there's one as a matter of fact that's on Bale Street that's going north.
To show that one, that one's kind of blocked by some limbs right up here on Bale and Bingo Road, you know withers. How do you all determine where you're going to put those?
Yes, thanks for bringing that question. So the driver feedback signs are those dynamic signs that report by radar what the speed of an approaching car is. That's currently a pilot program that we've initiated at council requests to install those signs and see if they have a positive effect or a positive correlation on getting drivers to obey the speed limit.
We've recently installed several in Southeast Denton for and those we have completed pre, before installation radar collection and we'll go back and take samples after those signs have been installed.
They're also portable signs so we can relocate them to see what the effectiveness is over time and develop a program for deploying them in different neighborhood streets to try and encourage appropriate speeds as we rotate them in different parts of the neighborhoods.
That's a current pilot program that we plan to bring back the results of our evaluation probably early in the fall would be my expectation based on data collection needs and getting the speed study completed.
How we select the locations is really trying to identify a location to post the sign where a driver can see it clearly. We want to make sure it's in a location that would introduce a driver reaction so when drivers see those signs they tend to slow down at the sign.
So we're certainly you would expect to see an impact within a certain zone before and after the sign but it's really there to encourage drivers to obey the speed limit. The studies tend to say that it cuts off the really fast drivers and folks who are well in excess of the speed limits.
So it tends to get folks more concentrated driving around the speed limits so it just basically tightens up traffic and everybody is sort of operating closer to the speed limit which is a positive safety outcome.
We're hoping to see that in the data but we want to collect the data and analyze it and see if that's the sort of results we're seeing here.
Well N equals one but I'll say the one on Robinson is a very valuable reminder to me almost every single morning I go oh wait wait wait wait 35.
I need those reminders sometimes.
So is this can we anticipate something like that being is that something like that being permanent for the city or we just use it just for data collection.
Right now it's in pilot so I'll let Becky say exactly.
What we're currently working on is just looking at this study program to see whether or not we're actually going to see a positive trend.
Those signs cost an order of magnitude more than just a typical speed limit sign and so we want to make sure because the investment in the particular sign.
You know obviously is something that we want to pay attention to but then also the operation and maintenance the overall process just to keep those operating.
James Andrews his team keeps us operating so we're going to work to take the data that we currently have pre and post right.
So pretty data as Nathan described the signs in Southeast and they're actually going to move to different locations we already have all of those mapped out so that we can collect that pre and post dated bring that back to you.
But there hasn't been a determination made at this time whether or not that's going to be a permanent type of sign that's used throughout the city.
We want to collect the data and then be able to make the best decision and what Nathan's research has shown and kind of what we've learned and we're waiting to see if this is true in some of these areas that it's a very small fraction of folks that is actually impacting.
And so we just want to make sure that that's an alignment with what the data is that we're going to see the way it's collected.
So there has not been a determination yet to make that permanent and I would venture to say I believe based on the data and I'm looking at James they cost about three times the amount of a normal a normal speed limit sign is about a hundred and fifty dollars.
So you can see you know a normal speed limit sign that we can manufacture ourselves. James has the ability to manufacture those at about a hundred fifty dollars versus you know a three thousand dollars and that's with current dollar amounts and keep in mind to the science that we have installed right now in Southeast Denton.
They're giving you the driver feedback but we're not recording the data. Those are an additional two thousand dollars on top of that so those run about five to six thousand dollars for us to actually have the driver feedback and then collect the data that's sent to a system where then we can use that information.
So there's many different types. It's a mind frame shift and before we look at trying to deploy those throughout the city we want to make sure that they're actually going to serve the purpose that they are which is to notify drivers of their speed.
Absolutely.
I was just going to offer driver feedback science is one tool to help make streets more self-enforcing. We're working on a number of other opportunities to I'll just use the term traffic calming.
So we're looking at different traffic calming opportunities as a department to see what we can do. So this is one tool that we're looking at. We have some others that are in the works so we'll be reporting back on those as well.
So just wanted to offer that highlight as well.
All righty. So that's all that we have for the staff report today and I am going to go to the matrix which is very small for me. Hopefully you can see it.
So these are the updates that we'll we're providing monthly which is the Bonnie Bray Street update and then the citywide speed study update wanted to ask whether or not I know the Bonnie Bray is something that we've asked to continue to report on monthly.
I don't know that there's going to be a whole lot of movement with the information to share on the citywide speed study but of course we're happy to always include that in the monthly update.
Are there any other things that anyone on the committee would like to see as the next monthly update? Any items?
So this isn't a staff update necessarily but I have kind of a two part request.
Okay.
So this this body is is impacted by the Texas Open Meetings Act right which of course means that members of the public are always allowed to make comment.
So the first part of my request is that we just on every agenda just have a placeholder item for public comment at the beginning.
I recognize it's probably most meetings that probably won't be utilized but if we could just have that there as a placeholder.
And then my second request is if there are any members of the public here today who have public comments if we could open the floor up to that.
I would have to look at okay have to have to get the legal department to tell me what I can and can't do.
I don't want to do anything.
We're absolutely open always to receiving that and we have recently moved on the Traffic Safety Commission to have that as a part of the meeting and so it's not a problem at all to add that as a part of this meeting too.
I don't see any concerns.
Ben do you have any concerns?
No.
Awesome.
Yes ma'am.
Before we do that.
Yes ma'am.
I just want to make a statement in regards to I alluded to some of this last night in my concluding item in regards to citizens.
Although we have a lot of traffic and road updates that are going on which causes traffic to slow down.
But it is very serious that whoever is listening and watching that we do slow down on our roads regardless of if they're getting fixed or not.
And it's just becoming increasingly it's a scary moment out there when cars are just speeding through.
They come to this, they're here because we like the slowness of a small town field when we are a small town field but we are not treating it that way.
So I just want to let the public know that it's very important that we be respectful to each other out here on these roads.
But I'm also pretty much amused by the fact that we like big roads but we want them to be slow.
So we take all of this energy in widening and making our roads nice and big and wide.
But then we have to have strategies to come back in and slow them down.
So that's an interesting thing that I thought that I would put out there.
But meanwhile if we're ready for any kind of open comment I guess we could do that at this time.
Sure and before we do that I have one thing that I'd like to add to the agenda.
Next time I would like to bring forward an opportunity to possibly move the time and date of this meeting.
We have others that are in the city manager's office that are unable to attend this and would like to do so.
And so it's something that we'd like to bring forward so we can get our calendar also set for the rest of the year with the new commission.
The current time that we're looking at is exactly the same time.
It would just be on the third Wednesday. I mean I'm sorry the fourth Wednesday instead of the third Wednesday.
Oh we had ten instead of nine. Logan's telling me he's giving me all of mine.
But we will bring that back as an item to make sure that that works with all of your calendars.
I know the last time we discussed it we talked about the fact that it worked really well to be the morning after council for all of you.
So we'll look at that and see if that works with all of your your schedules and just bring that back as a future item.
But as I mentioned we'd like to see about having it the fourth Wednesday at 10 a.m.
If that works great if that doesn't work we can stay with this time.
The only thing that we have to work on is making sure that the rooms available so that it can also be broadcasted.
Which we're not the only committee and commission as you can imagine that needs to be able to use this room and do the broadcasting.
All righty thank you. So with that I will turn it over to public comment.
Who's keeping who's keeping time?
So you'll have three minutes.
Should I just get it from here?
Come on up. I will pull everything down for you Christine.
All right and it's the overhead mic.
Yes sir. I'm sorry.
You're good. Hi Christine Bray at 1204 Cordell.
I apologize to the various staff who heard this comment on Monday.
But I'm a commissioner on the traffic safety board and I wanted to share a comment that was put before us on Monday.
So I'm just going to read her prepared remarks for beta.
And she we had to wait the time limit for her because she delivered this through tears the entire time.
So her comment was good evening my name is Heather.
I came here tonight to share a family story and hopes that it will help you understand the importance of robust transportation options in our community.
My daughters are 20 and almost 22 years old.
They were both diagnosed with autism in 2003 and we moved to death in the following year from Houston.
So that I could attend graduate school and learn how to best support them throughout their lives.
This community has a wealth of knowledge and expertise expertise which we have benefited from tremendously.
I'm glad we relocated our family then.
Both of our daughters currently attend UNT and are involved in a number of helpful programs.
They achieved more than I expected and even hoped for.
But unfortunately their prospects our prospects for the future here after they graduate college are incredibly limited because they do not have access to safe and reliable transportation.
This means that we will likely have to find a new city to call home in the next few years.
In general getting around Denton is not safe.
Car accidents are frequent.
Pedestrians and bike riders are at significant risk because our city lacks the infrastructure to protect them.
There should be protected bike lanes to separate bike traffic from vehicles not just white lines on the road although that's a start.
There should be more protected crosswalks to make it clear that pedestrians in the crosswalk have the right of way.
Like the ones on campus near the Civic Center.
So the pedestrians can more safely cross the street in high traffic areas.
An easy example is the street in front of Avondale Park which is visited by many families every day but we don't even have sidewalks in most places.
When I walk my dog I'm frequently walking on the side of the road and just hoping that the driver in the car passing me isn't also texting or just not paying attention.
Currently most places in our community are not accessible without a car and because of issues related to autism driving is not an option for either of my daughters.
This means that transportation is one of the biggest challenges my family faces on a day to day basis.
We've encountered a number of difficulties trying to access public transportation here.
Too many of them count in three minutes though I'd be happy to provide more details if anyone was interested and I could pass along their contact information if anyone wants it.
But the effect is that the three of us are not able to participate in our community to the fullest extent of our potential.
Even after getting my PhD and having more than 15 years of experience in my field my prospects for employment are limited because my adult children do not have access to reliable transportation.
I cannot work fixed hours, I cannot leave town, I prioritize their autonomy over mine to a large degree which is not a choice everyone can make but what happens if something happens to me.
Their futures should not depend entirely on one person with a car.
Lack of access to safe and reliable transportation negatively impacts autonomy, quality of life, earning potential access to networks of support,
and for me the ability to build assets that will support my disabled adult children after I die.
Disability is not just about impairment, it's about the deliberate choices that we as a community make and who to include and what barriers to access we have to put in place.
Do you mind if I keep you on?
No, hold on a second.
Do you mind if I keep you on?
Yes please.
Each policy decision you make can have the effect of excluding whole families and groups of people from equal participation.
Lack of transportation affects the jobs that people can hold and the support networks people can build, the recreation, wellness, and leisure options available to them and depresses local economic activity.
For young disabled and elderly people as well as people with mental illness, the lack of safe and reliable transportation can mean a life of isolation and loneliness.
I hope that you continue to find ways to include everyone in our community by providing safe and reliable public transportation options and increasing access to protected bike lanes and crosswalks and sidewalks.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you for the incentive.
Thank you.
Are there any kind of concluding items?
Do you have any concluding items?
If there are no concluding items and any other comments we are going to close this meeting at 1030 A.M.
Thank you.