Board of Supervisors AC44 - Draft Transportation Chapter   5/28/2025

1. Call to Order

• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:00:14
    Supervisor Bea LaPisto-Kirtley of the Urbana District Supervisor Diantha McKeel, Jack Jouett District Supervisor Ann Mallek of the White Hall District myself, Jim Andrews, Representative Samuel Miller District Quorum is present in the absence of Supervisor Gallaway today We're also joined by our Deputy County Executives, Andrew Moll and Henry Thank you Mr. Richardson is unable to attend today Mr. Andy Herrick, our County Attorney, is here
  • 00:00:42
    and Ms.
  • 00:00:42
    Claudette Borkerson, our clerk.
  • 00:00:45
    Also, let me please welcome the Albemarle County Police Officer present, excuse me, Officers Shaka Joyner and Regina Cline.

2. AC44 - Draft Transportation Chapter

• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:01:15
    Drueber, Deputy Director of Planning, I'm sorry, Kevin McDermott, Deputy Director of Planning, Tanya Swartzendruber, Planning Manager, and Bart Zavoda, Deputy Director of Planning.
  • 00:01:31
    Welcome.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:01:33
    Thank you.
  • 00:01:33
    I am Tanya Swartzendruber, Planning Manager.
  • 00:01:37
    I'm here to speak about the transportation chapter of the AC44 Comprehensive Plan.
  • 00:01:43
    So just a quick agenda for today.
  • 00:01:46
    We'll go through some community input themes, a summary of the PC feedback that we heard a couple of weeks ago, and then the chapter overview and an upcoming schedule.
  • 00:02:01
    And as always, we have the focus topics slide that will show up at the end of the presentation as well for you to reference.
  • 00:02:12
    To start off, we heard a couple of things about transportation in the development areas, mainly about providing safe and comfortable infrastructure from all the modes, including sidewalks, paths, and bike lanes.
  • 00:02:30
    That's separated from cars.
  • 00:02:33
    Something else we heard is that transit needs to be frequent and reliable for those that are choosing transit over driving.
  • 00:02:44
    Specifically related to driving in cars, we heard that we need to slow cars down and potentially reduce parking requirements to reduce the amount of space and impervious coverage for parking.
  • 00:03:00
    There was a concern about traffic congestion and infrastructure keeping up with growth as well as safety in general.
  • 00:03:13
    For the rural area, a little bit different, but some similar themes.
  • 00:03:20
    We'd like to explore and implement ways to make walking and biking in the rural area safer, both by small-scale improvements and potential improvements to rural roads, like widening shoulders and adding signage.
  • 00:03:38
    Additionally,
  • 00:03:40
    Increasing access to transit in the rural area, especially access to the urban area of the development area to serve daily needs for those that live and work out there.
  • 00:03:55
    What we heard from PC specifically on development areas is
  • 00:04:01
    There needs to be additional bike and pedestrian connectivity, not just, or sorry, in addition to bike and pedestrian connectivity, we should promote vehicular activity.
  • 00:04:13
    And what this means is eliminating cul-de-sacs and dead ends so that cars can move more freely and have other choices, other routes to get around.
  • 00:04:27
    Also,
  • 00:04:28
    We heard that we should consider completing a study to enhance connections to the airport, prioritize infrastructure investments and multimodal connections despite the funding challenges that we've all been hearing about at the federal level, and then consider a recommendation to establish a parks and trail fund to support public space and greenways.
  • 00:04:52
    Specifically in the rural area, what we heard was, as I mentioned before, expanding the rural road margins, which is that shoulder piece outside of the line markings.
  • 00:05:06
    We're walking and biking along our major walking routes.
  • 00:05:13
    And then we were asked to consider moving rural roads away from the floodplain where flooding occurs.
  • 00:05:20
    or at least when roads are being laid out to really focus on keeping them out of the flood plain.
  • 00:05:29
    And then we did have a bit of a focus on recreational users specifically in the rural area.
  • 00:05:36
    Really felt like this might imply that all the other users are lesser priority and they should be prioritized the same.
  • 00:05:46
    I'm gonna turn it over to Kevin and he'll give you the chapter summary.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:05:50
    Thanks, Tanya.
  • 00:05:52
    To start off with, you might have noticed from Tanya's description about the feedback that we've been hearing is that there is a real distinct difference between the way we look at transportation in the development area and the way we look at it in the rural area.
  • 00:06:05
    And so that's kind of a theme that you'll see as we move through the chapter that there is a difference.
  • 00:06:10
    We have different goals, different objectives, and different needs.
  • 00:06:16
    Development lawyer chapters that you see here are different as well.
  • 00:06:20
    So the development area, we see that high peak hour demand issue.
  • 00:06:25
    It turns out to be a little bit of congestion in the mornings and evenings, especially in the development area where people are living and working.
  • 00:06:35
    There's a fragmented multimodal network and needed safety improvements to improve that multimodal network.
  • 00:06:43
    because of the way we've dealt with bicycle and pedestrian facilities over the years.
  • 00:06:48
    You'll see a lot of breaks in that where we have new developments that are put in those facilities, but the older developments don't have it, so it becomes a very fragmented
  • 00:06:59
    There's limited funding and rising project costs in Albemarle County and that's really prevalent in the development area because of the right-of-way issues we have there because of the utilities that the conflicts of space that you have a little bit more in the development area.
  • 00:07:16
    in the development area than you do in the rural areas has become an issue there.
  • 00:07:19
    And then the VDOT ownership of roadways.
  • 00:07:21
    That means that we have to adhere to all the VDOT requirements for those roadways.
  • 00:07:27
    They have a very strict process.
  • 00:07:29
    It ends up taking more time to move through their process to get approvals.
  • 00:07:33
    It ends up costing more.
  • 00:07:35
    So that's something that you see a lot in the development area.
  • 00:07:37
    In the rural area, it's a little different.
  • 00:07:40
    Safety really is the primary challenge that we have out there.
  • 00:07:43
    Not to say safety isn't a problem.
  • 00:07:46
    In the rural area we have narrow winding roads, little clear zone.
  • 00:07:51
    A lot of those roads don't meet the current standards for the roadways, too narrow, and don't have the sight lines that we would typically like to see.
  • 00:08:02
    We also see a lot of wildlife collisions that we'd like to continue.
  • 00:08:05
    continue to keep an eye on in the rural area.
  • 00:08:09
    Another challenge in the rural area is providing transit service to the aging population that we have out there.
  • 00:08:15
    We know that there's a lot of need to get into the development area for people that may not be able to drive anymore and we want to be cognizant of that.
  • 00:08:24
    Also, we see a lot of biking and walking for recreation and exercise.
  • 00:08:31
    So based on that, we've come up with two different goals, one for the development area and one for the rural area.
  • 00:08:59
    In the development area, we want to create safe, comfortable, and accessible
  • 00:09:07
    transit.
  • 00:09:09
    In the development area, obviously, the density that we see there really creates that use and makes it more worthwhile for us to build that multimodal network within the development area.
  • 00:09:22
    And then in the rural areas, we're really focused more on the movement of goods, and that includes interstates and rural areas, and just being able to get people from the rural areas into the development areas.
  • 00:09:36
    That's really our focus.
  • 00:09:37
    there but to retain that rural area feel that we like to have.
  • 00:09:48
    So our overall transportation planning strategy is to support the same land use strategies that we've outlined in the rural area and the development area land use chapters.
  • 00:09:59
    So that includes acknowledging the growth management policy, which directs all future growth that we can into the development area, and recognizing that in the rural areas, we would like to see less
  • 00:10:17
    need for services, for transportation services out there.
  • 00:10:20
    So we're going to focus on achieving that high quality transportation network.
  • 00:10:27
    And we recognize that this is going to take a long time and a lot of investment from both the public and private sector.
  • 00:10:33
    Future transportation planning can build on what we've included in this chapter that you have here and provide additional guidance.
  • 00:10:41
    And we'll get into that a little bit more as we get into the objectives here.
  • 00:10:45
    This next slide, which is about multimodal transportation plans.
  • 00:10:50
    So one of the primary recommendations that we have in this plan is to actually do a deeper dive into what we're terming a multimodal transportation plan for the county.
  • 00:11:02
    We recognize we just don't have the time or the resources right now to get into all that kind of detail.
  • 00:11:08
    The comp plan does is set up that high level overview of where we want to go with transportation, but we want to use a multimodal transportation plan to really get into the details of that.
  • 00:11:20
    It'll build on what you see here in the transportation chapter.
  • 00:11:24
    It'll articulate a long term strategy for transportation planning that includes prioritizing projects based on the values that we see in transportation.
  • 00:11:34
    in the comprehensive plan.
  • 00:11:36
    It'll integrate land use and transportation planning so that we know that our transportation proposals match the land use and zoning that we expect to see in the rural area and the development area.
  • 00:11:48
    And then our recommendations are the same for that.
  • 00:11:52
    So it'll also define typical cross sections for future roadway designs.
  • 00:11:57
    What this means is that we can set up
  • 00:12:02
    to see each of our roadways look like, what that cross-section is, what the pedestrian bike facilities are that are necessary on the different roads based on where they're located.
  • 00:12:21
    on where people want to go and how they want to get there.
  • 00:12:25
    So if it's likely that people will be walking the areas, we know that's the area we want to focus our pedestrian network or our transit network.
  • 00:12:34
    So really, it'll define what that network looks like, and then based on that, identify the cross-sections.
  • 00:12:41
    and then finally it'll prioritize projects based on the limited funding resources that we have and other constraints.
  • 00:12:50
    This is similar to what we've done in the past when we have done a prioritization process, but we'd like to set this up so that it's easily
  • 00:12:58
    replicable over every three years or so and be able to run through a process where we look at all the projects that are coming in based on the values we see in the comp plan and then tell us what we should be investing our money in, what those next projects that we should be looking at are.
  • 00:13:19
    So getting into the transportation objectives that you'll see here, I don't have to read all these, they're in your packet, but the development area we want to focus on is the development of transportation plans like that multimodal transportation plan that I talked about, also that would include
  • 00:13:40
    The second objective you see there is really focused on the bike pen network and how we want to build that out.
  • 00:13:54
    The third one is about public transit and how we want to
  • 00:13:58
    The fourth is really focused
  • 00:14:28
    The sixth one is focused on safety and improving safety.
  • 00:14:36
    And the fourth is addressing our climate action policies.
  • 00:14:42
    So then we get into the transportation objectives for the rural area.
  • 00:14:47
    The first one really focuses on how we want to address the safety issues.
  • 00:14:54
    for vehicular users.
  • 00:14:56
    We say vehicle congestion, that wording may want to change a little bit because we don't see a lot of vehicle congestion out there.
  • 00:15:04
    What we want to focus on is safety just to get people into those urban areas.
  • 00:15:09
    And then the second one we also discussed a little bit of the language here with the Planning Commission.
  • 00:15:14
    What we really want to say there is we want to provide access to transit services.
  • 00:15:20
    I don't want to imply by that objective is that we don't want to send fixed route transit service throughout the rural area because that would just be a lot of wasted resources if people aren't using it.
  • 00:15:32
    But we want to direct people to those areas where they can get transit services.
  • 00:15:37
    So this may be building on things like the Afton Express or
  • 00:15:43
    Connect routes that John operates and making sure they have a few designated places they can stop in the rural area to get people into the urban areas and rely on some parking rides and bus stops for that out there.
  • 00:15:58
    The third one is the safety element in the rural area.
  • 00:16:02
    The one thing that's consistent between the development area and the rural area is that need for safety improvements.
  • 00:16:08
    And then finally, number four there is improving rural area community members' access to walking and bicycle opportunities.
  • 00:16:16
    So this is trying to address that issue where we see a lot of people wanting to walk and bike in our rural areas on our rural roads and we want to make sure that we're cognizant of that as we plan for what those roads should look like and maybe develop programs that can enhance their ability to go out there and use those roads.
  • 00:16:39
    and I think with that I will be turning it back over to Todd.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:16:43
    Thank you.
  • 00:16:44
    So as you can imagine the transportation chapter does touch on a few of the other chapters and overlap a little bit including both of our land use chapters
  • 00:16:56
    our environmental stewardship chapter as Kevin alluded to looking at that climate change, climate mitigation component and then thriving economy where workers need to get to where they're going and then housing of course we need to connect our where we live to where we work or where we play.
  • 00:17:20
    So here's our schedule.
  • 00:17:22
    We met with PC on this topic on May 6, and we're meeting with you here today.
  • 00:17:28
    We just had our last chapter presentation to PC last night on cultural resources, and we'll be coming back to you on that topic on June 4.
  • 00:17:41
    We do have a virtual lunch and learn on that topic to be scheduled in June, but we'll be finalizing that date in the coming weeks.
  • 00:17:52
    Our next set of meetings is really to dive into implementation and what that looks like.
  • 00:17:58
    That will start with PC June 24th.
  • 00:18:01
    We'll be seeing you on July 16th to discuss implementation.
  • 00:18:07
    Just as a reminder for some of the folks in the audience or those who might be listening,
  • 00:18:12
    Ways to engage with AC44 are always listed on our Engage Albemarle website.
  • 00:18:20
    All of the chapters that we have discussed so far are uploaded on the site, including cultural resources.
  • 00:18:30
    Engagement activities and work sessions are always up on that site as well, and you can always sign up for a newsletter.
  • 00:18:40
    Here are our chapter focus topics, the questions that we usually provide for you to focus your discussion.
  • 00:18:49
    The chapter does outline different approaches to the rural area and development areas, and we'd like to hear your feedback on that.
  • 00:18:56
    As well as, do you support us looking into a program that supports active recreation on rural roads?
  • 00:19:03
    What might that look like?
  • 00:19:05
    And then, given the next step is implementation of this chapter,
  • 00:19:09
    Do you agree with the general approach of a multimodal transportation plan?
  • 00:19:14
    And as always, please let us know if we've missed anything.
  • 00:19:18
    I'll leave these up for your discussion.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:19:21
    Thank you.
  • 00:19:21
    Thank you.
  • 00:19:22
    We will discuss these and more, I'm sure.
  • 00:19:26
    I'm not sure if it's maybe best if we take this group, although we're going to have a lot of comments just generally.
  • 00:19:44
    For purposes, I'm just going to let people go a little bit and see where it leads us.
  • 00:19:52
    We'll write it in if it looks better.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 00:19:58
    Yes, procedure.
  • 00:19:59
    Are we starting with what we've heard so far to get that comment squared away before we get to the packet or not?
  • 00:20:09
    Those of us at the end of the list, I don't want to be told we're too late.
  • 00:20:11
    We're not going to listen.
  • 00:20:14
    This has a chance to have lots of comments from everybody, and it should, but hopefully we'll be organized about how to do it.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:20:24
    I'm going to open it up and see what happens.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:20:30
    So I'm going to begin by just addressing this.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:20:33
    Point one.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:20:37
    Yes, broadly speaking.
  • 00:20:42
    The objectives that are created by breaking them out are probably individually what we're going to spend a lot of our time on.
  • 00:20:49
    So we can talk about that in more particularity, but I think it's the right approach.
  • 00:20:53
    There's very distinct concerns.
  • 00:20:56
    We're not talking about sidewalks in the rural area.
  • 00:20:59
    And I think this generally captures that.
  • 00:21:03
    would be surprised if there's much disagreement on that issue.
  • 00:21:09
    Two, spicier.
  • 00:21:12
    This is something I've talked about before and I support in concept.
  • 00:21:16
    I think we need to think about tourism as a form of economic development and recreational tourism and using our land that we've spent quite a lot of public energy and sometimes
  • 00:21:34
    the public in a form of utility.
  • 00:21:36
    This is something I talk about a lot.
  • 00:21:39
    We have all this land, and we talk about it as our general common heritage.
  • 00:21:42
    But most of it's actually privately held.
  • 00:21:45
    And as people sometimes, I think, correctly point out, is that the only way to experience so much of our beautiful rural area is out of the window of a car, unless you happen to have the good fortune to have property there.
  • 00:22:02
    investigating discrete recreational opportunities and ways to enhance specific areas for recreational opportunities should be a county priority.
  • 00:22:16
    Guardrails, I think we would need to, as an initial plan, probably identify specific roads that could benefit from these improvements based on location, based on pre-existing geography, based on
  • 00:22:29
    Forest Valley, right?
  • 00:22:30
    Natural heritage value, however we want to articulate it, right?
  • 00:22:33
    Not every road in the county is going to be a beautiful place that someone would want to go for a 40-mile bike ride.
  • 00:22:41
    Just not every road is that.
  • 00:22:42
    But we have those roads.
  • 00:22:50
    The multimodal transport plan kind of begs a question that I marked several times throughout this.
  • 00:22:59
    or from Karna's work, understanding that this is a tricky position we're in that I think is a little difficult.
  • 00:23:07
    sections, where we have a very active planning process happening right now with political stakeholders that is discrete from the transportation section of the comprehensive plan.
  • 00:23:22
    And ideally, they would speak to and inform one another that they're moving at different speeds at the same time in separate silos.
  • 00:23:30
    So I guess I want to recognize that that's a complicated problem.
  • 00:23:33
    But I guess with this one, I would just
  • 00:23:42
    This is something that is designed to be co-developed with CARTA.
  • 00:23:46
    This is something that is supposed to thread in with CARTA's work and give the centrality that the chapter focuses on this and gets there.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:24:05
    I think that your description of it threading in is probably most appropriate.
  • 00:24:11
    We really can't move forward with transit unless we're working regionally with Carta, CAT, or other partners in that.
  • 00:24:21
    But also, they can't go out and plan for what's going on in the county on their own either.
  • 00:24:28
    So when we talk about how that regional planning works, I think a lot of it is working with
  • 00:24:34
    looking at our land use planning and figuring out where do we need transit to be serving and how do we want it to serve those areas.
  • 00:24:44
    And that's based on our land use and our existing network of roads.
  • 00:24:50
    So getting that information and making sure we're providing that through CARTA and to our partners and expanding on transit in that sense I think is probably the way it would work.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:25:04
    also informs a bugbear that I recently vented on a little bit from the dais, which is we have quite a lot of plans and documents in the county and through our regional planning partners.
  • 00:25:15
    And I'm not sure we always do the best job of cataloging and inventorying them and making them available to the public.
  • 00:25:21
    And I'm thinking of some studies that have been conducted by the RTP that speak to elements of that, but not in its entirety.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:25:32
    you're speaking of the transit vision plan maybe and obviously I think that's really the way that this should work so during that transit vision plan we had representatives at the table with the RTP helping them to understand
  • 00:25:47
    to understand how that fit in with our existing land use.
  • 00:25:53
    And that's a high level, broad vision.
  • 00:25:56
    We have another, I think that CARTA is getting ready to start another planning process, right?
  • 00:26:01
    The one that you were invited to sit on.
  • 00:26:06
    I think it's like an implementation type thing.
  • 00:26:08
    So how to make that vision a reality is what they're looking at right now.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:26:21
    I am in favor of all of this.
  • 00:26:28
    The thing I'm kind of stabbing at is there is always a concern, right?
  • 00:26:33
    Planning feels like it's a low-cost thing, but it's not, right?
  • 00:26:42
    There's a hundreds of thousands of dollar effort involving probably multiple contractors.
  • 00:26:48
    And there is, I think, in this realm, it feels like a colorable concern that there's duplicated effort.
  • 00:26:57
    And I guess I would leave that at that, because I don't claim to be expert in the degree of overlap on these planning processes.
  • 00:27:05
    But I might pitch that just as a concern I have for the rest of the board to reflect on.
  • 00:27:16
    That's a good point, maligning transit and transportation.
  • 00:27:19
    Sorry, I know you're speaking sort of OJ, but I did hear your point.
• • SPEAKER_00
  • 00:27:25
    Just to be clear, what I said is that this is a transportation plan, not just a transit plan.
• • SPEAKER_07
  • 00:27:34
    That's all I have.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:27:38
    OK, we're going to go more than once.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 00:27:46
    I'll go into more detail.
  • 00:27:49
    For bullet number one, absolutely, I think the rural development area have different challenges, have to have different ways to address those challenges.
  • 00:27:58
    So yes.
  • 00:28:00
    Doug, the devil's always in the details.
  • 00:28:03
    Just to add.
  • 00:28:04
    Do you support the investigation of a program to support active recreation on some rural roads, one of the card rails?
  • 00:28:13
    Generally, yes.
  • 00:28:15
    recognizing that we are often financially challenged.
  • 00:28:23
    And I understand what Mike is saying about using some of these areas for economic development.
  • 00:28:34
    They certainly are not ready for that now, right?
  • 00:28:37
    Having said that, I do think we have to be careful to make sure that we have our priorities right.
  • 00:28:45
    over and above recreation, safety, getting our citizens around to hospitals, to jobs, to work, to health care clinics.
  • 00:28:57
    So I'm just thinking there are guardrails in this.
  • 00:29:01
    And again, we're going to go into a lot of them.
  • 00:29:03
    But in general, I would support this in a limited way, perhaps.
  • 00:29:11
    Maybe more limited than something.
  • 00:29:13
    Given the next step in evolution, do you agree with the general approach of multimodal transportation plan?
  • 00:29:18
    Yes.
  • 00:29:20
    I think it is interesting.
  • 00:29:21
    So when you say multimodal, for the public, what do you mean?
  • 00:29:27
    I mean, seriously.
  • 00:29:28
    Talk to a pedestrian.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:29:34
    talking about it all and the idea behind using the term multimodal is that they're all looked at equally so instead of historically where we've put all of our focus on private vehicular travel I think this multimodal planning really looks at it as an integrated system that has all of those things.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 00:29:55
    And I think you got about a little bit in the dark, but I just wanted for our discussion for the public to make sure we have an understanding.
  • 00:30:03
    It's like affordable housing.
  • 00:30:04
    It means something different to everybody, so talking about multi-modal transportation plans.
  • 00:30:09
    So, yes, I do agree with that approach.
  • 00:30:14
    Just a couple of kind of high-level thoughts.
  • 00:30:18
    For the public, again, we're talking about CARTA.
  • 00:30:21
    at Charlottesville Albemarle Transit, we're talking about the transit authority.
  • 00:30:27
    And I will say one of the, that is already established and working, and one of the things I noticed, and I'll just mention it now in the pages that we have here, it says, develop a regional transit authority.
  • 00:30:42
    To develop a regional transit authority.
  • 00:30:45
    The word develop I got hung up on a little bit because that's kind of already done.
  • 00:30:51
    I would say we have one.
  • 00:30:53
    So as you're going back and redoing this or updating it, I think recognizing that the authority is established and is working and looking at it through a little different lens of getting to one, what do we want that to do for us?
  • 00:31:13
    And so I can save that.
  • 00:31:14
    I've already said that for that point.
  • 00:31:22
    Anything missing?
  • 00:31:24
    No, not right off the top.
  • 00:31:26
    I have some other comments I want to make as we go further.
  • 00:31:30
    But I'll just let this go right now.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:31:34
    Supervisor Brown.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 00:31:36
    Thank you very much.
  • 00:31:38
    OK.
  • 00:31:40
    So if we're focusing on the screen first, then yes, definitely the needs are different.
  • 00:31:51
    One thing that jumped out in the earlier presentation, which I was trying hard to take notes on because I didn't have it.
  • 00:31:58
    It was mentioned that rural area roads are only for getting people to the growth area.
  • 00:32:02
    But there are rural area users who never come to the growth area or rarely.
  • 00:32:07
    So their uses within are equally important.
  • 00:32:10
    And so I would just hope you will take out that caveat that this is trying to say.
  • 00:32:19
    And in the development area,
  • 00:32:22
    Lots and lots of people need more than bikes and pedestrians.
  • 00:32:24
    We're talking about seniors.
  • 00:32:26
    When I was on crutches, I couldn't be doing anything but get in my car.
  • 00:32:31
    So I want to be sure that there's a perception that I hear about in the public that all we're worried about is bikes
  • 00:32:42
    which has been so focused totally in the other direction for 50 years that there's sort of a little payback going on here but continuing to be balanced as you just described and all users working together I think will help to get that education level out there for everybody.
  • 00:33:01
    The second bullet, much more than recreation, much more than tourism.
  • 00:33:10
    So there are different sorts of users and I'm seeing Albert over there because we've met multiple times on Ridge Road but there are many other roads like Ridge Road where there are local people who walk out of their kitchen, go for a walk on the road and have one set of issues of people cutting through, speeding, throwing them in a ditch, etc.
  • 00:33:27
    And then there are other roads which are very popular because they're on some list
  • 00:33:32
    like the running cruise list, you know, you gotta go here, it's like Blue Hole, before you graduate you gotta go take your case of beer and go out to Sugar Hollow.
  • 00:33:40
    Well, I wish those lists didn't exist, frankly, because they cost everybody a lot of thing.
  • 00:33:44
    But there are other roads who, which are, when we've done surveys, as we've been standing out there,
  • 00:33:52
    the grand majority of the people are driving in from somewhere else some in the city, some in the urban ring, some in Waynesboro or someplace else and parking their car here or there wherever they can find a space half the time in the travel lane which creates issues for the police department and VDOT so sorting out sort of how we can better have rules that will allow sharing of these facilities in a safer way
  • 00:34:19
    I think all the different types of roads in the rural area, speeding is absolutely the number one safety issue, maintenance issue, accident issue, you know, all the different departments because of the trouble that people find themselves in when they try to go way too fast on whether it's a paved road or a gravel road in the country because of the historic layout that we've had of cow paths that ended up getting paved.
  • 00:34:45
    I don't expect that those design features will change because I don't think that's financially or even possible or even desirable, frankly.
  • 00:34:55
    I think there would be a huge amount of rebellion if people said, oh, we're going to turn country roads into all looking like urban streets.
  • 00:35:02
    I mean, I think that's a nonstarter.
  • 00:35:04
    And I'm not sure that that's suggesting that that's what you weren't putting in there.
  • 00:35:08
    But it is one of the things that people, when they're leaping to the wrong extreme, see in some of the wording.
  • 00:35:17
    So I think guardrails for me would be just taking care.
  • 00:35:25
    We can't, everyone, every site is different.
  • 00:35:28
    And we have to just, I think, take our step by step.
  • 00:35:33
    But there are some, I'm hopeful that there will be some guardrails that can be created in consultation with Bea and ACPD that will help the safety features.
  • 00:35:50
    on these 80-mile bike rides around the scariest roads that I've ever been on in White Hall District, the 810 loop.
  • 00:35:58
    And I would dream of taking a bicycle on those roads myself, because I know how scary it is in a car to meet somebody on the road.
  • 00:36:06
    But people love to do that, and good for them.
  • 00:36:11
    But these roads are challenging, for sure.
  • 00:36:14
    And so I'm concerned about that.
  • 00:36:19
    Multimodal.
  • 00:36:20
    This is sort of a new term in here, so I'm glad to see that it's happening, but I think the confusion about duplicit duplication is there are different layers.
  • 00:36:30
    Federal has the long-range transportation plan.
  • 00:36:32
    That's one thing.
  • 00:36:33
    State has their thing.
  • 00:36:35
    We have our things.
  • 00:36:36
    We've basically done with pages from 2015 comp plan to see how there was overlap.
  • 00:36:43
    So everybody's been doing their own little chunk.
  • 00:36:46
    and totally different responsibilities from my perspective.
  • 00:36:49
    And so I think we just need to focus on in our lane and try to do the very best job we can on that.
  • 00:36:58
    Let's see.
  • 00:37:00
    Rural area goods, of rural area roads far more than just movement of goods.
  • 00:37:05
    I do not support having our rural roads designated as just for truckers, people getting
  • 00:37:18
    and places like that.
  • 00:37:20
    Local users, I think, justifiably feel left out.
  • 00:37:23
    If that's what I understood you to say from some of the input, I can see that.
  • 00:37:29
    So I will stop there and come back soon.
  • 00:37:31
    Missing things later.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:37:34
    OK.
  • 00:37:34
    Ms.
  • 00:37:34
    LaPisto-Kirtley?
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 00:37:35
    Thank you.
  • 00:37:36
    Regarding number one, I generally do agree with the approach
  • 00:37:49
    You support the investigation program to support active recreation.
  • 00:37:54
    I'd like to know from you all what you consider recreation.
  • 00:37:59
    Your definition of recreation may be different from my definition of recreation and what someone else's.
  • 00:38:06
    So I'm not quite sure what you mean, what you're looking at when you say recreation.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:38:22
    Bikers, Walkers, Runners, and this is something that I know our team deals with a lot on these rural areas.
  • 00:38:28
    As Supervisor Mallek mentioned, it's a big user on a lot of our rural routes is that we see people that go out there specifically to do those activities, but there's a conflict there, whether it's the parking or it's just people
  • 00:38:44
    choosing to do that on roads that are high volume with vehicle traffic and that creates a safety conflict, that kind of thing.
  • 00:38:54
    So our idea here is that we should be looking and identifying where people are going, where we think it's appropriate for them to go, and
  • 00:39:09
    They could be identifying places where the recreational users can park and leave their car for the day if they want to go out and do a bike ride.
  • 00:39:19
    So that's the kind of program that we're looking at.
  • 00:39:34
    That can be anything.
  • 00:39:35
    I think gravel road riding has become very popular, so they make bikes that are specifically designated for that now that are in between a real mountain bike and a road bike.
  • 00:39:47
    We hear that a lot when we talk about our paving programs.
  • 00:39:51
    There's a lot of people in the county that don't want us paving these roads because they love riding these gravel bikes on paved roads.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 00:40:00
    and that is good.
  • 00:40:02
    I have some real concerns regarding rural roads because we're also talking about in here maybe widening the road for bikers or extending the side of the road.
  • 00:40:22
    It would be extremely hard.
  • 00:40:23
    In fact, a lot of the cars can't even see the state of the road with the current width.
  • 00:40:31
    Or trucks, same thing.
  • 00:40:33
    But how do you widen that?
  • 00:40:36
    If we could do it, I think that would be great to have a separate area for bikers.
  • 00:40:42
    I guess that I'd have to see where that's being.
  • 00:41:02
    I guess my concerns are safety concerns.
  • 00:41:06
    Having cars and people riding bikes without a delineated area for bikers, that scares the jeepers ahead of me.
  • 00:41:19
    And if the roads can't be widened, OK, they can't be widened.
  • 00:41:22
    But maybe if areas were identified where this was safe, or in gravel roads,
  • 00:41:37
    So it would be
  • 00:42:04
    Yeah, I'm not sure what I would think of what kind of guardrail.
  • 00:42:07
    It would be the type of the road, frankly.
  • 00:42:10
    I'd have to see that.
  • 00:42:11
    That would be the type of the road that you would be suggesting.
  • 00:42:16
    Given the next step on the recreation, I do believe in the recreation.
  • 00:42:21
    I know Supervisor Pruitt touched on
  • 00:42:38
    I do like the multi-modal transportation plan as soon as it be really regarding bicycles.
  • 00:43:01
    pedestrian and bicycle I totally agree with in the development area I'm really concerned in the rural area even pedestrian I don't want to see people walking along 20 or even riding a bike along 20
  • 00:43:22
    Anything missing that will probably come up with some more of my notes.
  • 00:43:27
    Oh, I did want to mention, you had mentioned about the cul-de-sac and you had said there would be a connector to go through to another development at the end of a cul-de-sac.
  • 00:43:37
    And correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought I read that it was for pedestrian and bikes, not so much cars.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:43:46
    I was referring to comments that we heard from PC so that had not made it into the chapter yet but I did want to bring it up that they wanted us to focus on potentially adjusting regulations to eliminate cul-de-sacs and dead ends or new subdivisions
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 00:44:13
    There's a pedestrian bike connection.
  • 00:44:17
    It's part of it also.
  • 00:44:19
    I wanted to clarify that.
  • 00:44:21
    Thank you.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:44:22
    Thank you.
  • 00:44:23
    I'll take the approach.
  • 00:44:27
    What I'm grateful for is just answering these questions first.
  • 00:44:31
    And I certainly do agree that there are different approaches required.
  • 00:44:34
    There are some things that I think are potentially missing.
  • 00:44:37
    For example, the development area talks about greenhouse gas reduction, but it doesn't
  • 00:44:48
    areas and I'd like to see that included, but I do agree with the approach.
  • 00:44:52
    As far as support and active recreation on some rural roads, to the extent that it is already happening and it's already somewhat supported because there are already designated parking lanes at White Hall, Fisher Hall, and others,
  • 00:45:08
    You know, trying to make sure that that's facilitated would be a really nice thing for the community.
  • 00:45:12
    At the same time, I recognize that one of the things that we're doing here is three notch trials, discussions of that which I think are high priority and may in some respects replace some of these other opportunities or offer new opportunities that become more popular.
  • 00:45:28
    If they're made available.
  • 00:45:29
    So I would prefer that we get that done than that we identify a new place where we're going to try to do some support for people using a rural road, especially ones that aren't currently.
  • 00:45:42
    I wouldn't go out and create new ones.
  • 00:45:44
    And I also would be very sensitive to the guardrails, very sensitive to those who have to use those roads.
  • 00:45:53
    and what imposition there may be because there are certainly some where we know that people just go out there and park up and down the road, make it very difficult for the users who live there sometimes because they don't know that suddenly they've got regular road races going on or something.
  • 00:46:10
    And then a multi-modal transportation plan.
  • 00:46:13
    I obviously thought when I was reading this that in some respects it will replace this document and flesh it out in many respects.
  • 00:46:22
    There are other things that are also in here and that are referenced that need to flesh it out like the Safe Streets for All, which I think should probably be referred to as Move Safely Village at this point and references.
  • 00:46:36
    And then the Saferage to Schools was also one of the other plans mentioned that gets incorporated into the Southern
  • 00:46:45
    There's some things that already exist, I guess is what I'm saying, that are approaches that flesh out some of what is going into this transportation chapter.
  • 00:46:58
    So I guess I do share with those concerned that we
  • 00:47:04
    worries so much about planning and getting a transportation plan together that we may miss opportunities to get things done.
  • 00:47:11
    And I noticed, I was very interested in what I saw in the effect of some mentions of low-plan and no-plan projects.
  • 00:47:19
    And so I would like to understand that better because – I've never heard of that.
  • 00:47:24
    Well, it certainly sounded to me like it's very efficient if it's in the right place.
  • 00:47:30
    But obviously I have to understand it better.
  • 00:47:32
    So I'll leave it there and let you respond to that if you may and then we'll go through and I would suggest maybe the next round we could focus on the development area once and then focus on the rural area once and that way we can at least
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:47:53
    I was just going to address the low plan, no plan.
  • 00:47:58
    This is a program that we've seen working in Lido County.
  • 00:48:03
    I think maybe Fairfax or Loudoun also does this where they, it's a small project.
  • 00:48:11
    It might be just, it might be putting in a handy hat, right?
  • 00:48:16
    We've already got the details ready for it.
  • 00:48:18
    It's a simple construction project.
  • 00:48:21
    A contractor has built a hundred of these, and it's a low-cost, low-plan type of project that we can execute quickly for a small amount of money.
  • 00:48:41
    We're exploring, you know, we don't know exactly how it would work, but it is a program that exists out there that we're trying to explore and learn more about.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 00:48:49
    Thank you.
  • 00:48:52
    I want to go back through the order and this time focus, I hope, on the development area
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:49:27
    just like figure 12, tech 4 on such and such page of the multimodal transit plan?
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:49:36
    Yeah, I think that a modal emphasis map would be a part of that.
  • 00:49:39
    It could be done separately as well.
  • 00:49:41
    But I think if we were to do a multimodal transportation plan that we would want to have a modal emphasis map as part of that.
  • 00:49:49
    So it could be combined.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:49:55
    I'll say the modal emphasis map might be one of the first parts of the plan that we focus on right out of the gate so that it does help inform where we spend our investments and such and make some decisions on projects that VDOT may be proposing.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:50:15
    For y'all viewing this as kind of like an initial thing, one kind of descriptive document to inform a normative document that follows
  • 00:50:24
    Does that make sense?
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:50:27
    I think so.
  • 00:50:28
    I think the way I think of it is it's literally a map saying all things being equal, we have limited right of way on a given street or road.
  • 00:50:40
    On a particular road,
  • 00:50:43
    Are we focusing on a bike lane?
  • 00:50:46
    Are we focusing on needing sidewalks?
  • 00:50:50
    How does that right of way get split up?
  • 00:50:55
    Sometimes we're limited on that right of way.
  • 00:50:57
    We have to make hard decisions.
  • 00:50:58
    So that's what that mobile emphasis should delineate, is what our emphasis is, what we should be focusing on.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:51:12
    I want to make sure that when we're talking micromobility, which I see in 2.11, when I hear that I'm thinking like a bird scooter, I want to make sure I'm thinking the right thing and if there's other things that are being actively contemplated.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 00:51:43
    I think in this case we were thinking scooters as well.
  • 00:51:46
    We don't all look to the rest of the team, but we were thinking scooters.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:51:52
    E-bikes.
  • 00:51:52
    I should just raise this, and I don't know that this needs to be reflected specifically in a comprehensive plan.
  • 00:52:08
    and the black suburbs of D.C.
  • 00:52:15
    which has a very robust microtransit infrastructure.
  • 00:52:19
    Constellation of private actors, a very robust constellation of private actors.
  • 00:52:23
    My experience of micromobility is quite sour and negative.
  • 00:52:29
    And I think that you could very easily see that translated into some of the further out suburban edges, fringes of our development area.
  • 00:52:39
    Because the effect is when these are privately led
  • 00:52:43
    Operations, they are going to do collections in areas that are higher density, which results in the accumulation of literal detritus in further out communities.
  • 00:53:00
    communities that are less affluent than your, I mean that's maybe not as strictly true here, but that was definitely true in DC, right?
  • 00:53:06
    People who can afford living only 30 minutes out from the urban core rather than people who can afford living in the urban core.
  • 00:53:16
    I don't know, and this is just a challenging intersection of government and private actors that I think is hard to plan around.
  • 00:53:22
    Just the general economics that plays into this,
  • 00:53:30
    I only raise that because this is something I feel like weirdly alone on an island being skeptical about micromobility and microtransit companies.
  • 00:53:39
    And I would just raise that for your consideration to any kind of planning activities that goes off of that.
  • 00:53:45
    But that's mostly just, I'm not suggesting any changes on that, just a bugbear for your consideration.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 00:53:55
    not a policy, sorry, a regulatory framework for micromobility that we put into place a number of years ago and that was really becoming a popular thing and it's a permit system so right now we won't allow any company just to come in and put their micromobility devices around the county.
  • 00:54:17
    They have to get a permit to do that and so we can strictly
  • 00:54:21
    control what that permit allows them to do and make sure that we have contacts.
  • 00:54:27
    Not to say that it's not a danger, but we do have some guardrails on that program already that I think we could probably utilize if we had to expand.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 00:54:38
    And just some additional context I did not know.
  • 00:54:43
    Objective three is kind of all the constituent action.
  • 00:54:46
    This is another one of these things where I think we can be more specific and, frankly, do some more work on the front end, thinking how we want to delineate responsibility between regional planning organizations and the county.
  • 00:55:00
    And I don't see that being done here.
  • 00:55:01
    I actually don't even, I didn't clock any reference until 4.2 to any kind of regional planning organization.
  • 00:55:09
    And it seems to bear really actively.
  • 00:55:14
    I don't have a specific recommendation on that because I think that's a more fulsome discussion that I would think.
  • 00:55:19
    I would hope staff would have the expertise to lead on that, but I hope my point is well taken.
  • 00:55:24
    There is going to be overlap and I think we could probably identify some of that overlap in the front end and deconflict who's carrying what bucket.
  • 00:55:37
    I have many other outstanding lines of your concerns.
  • 00:55:42
    One thing I will say during our previous discussion on what's missing, something that flagged me, which is when we talk about active recreation.
  • 00:56:01
    And in that ambit, I would say, at least I as a supervisor, the constituent concerns I hear about active recreation and about safety on our roads is almost always from the perspective of people who are ambling on their own residential area and roads.
  • 00:56:18
    And that is both in the rural area and in the urban area.
  • 00:56:22
    People who are in Mill Creek and concerned about the school that has started routing its traffic around and to use an intersection
  • 00:56:33
    who want to take a half-mile constitutional down James River Road in the morning and are concerned about the speed of that.
  • 00:56:41
    Those are, I think, really distinct concerns and those that bear on the person who wants to take a 80-mile bike ride through beautiful parts of White Hall and driving through historic dyke or whatever.
  • 00:57:00
    I think there might need to be kind of some framework for identifying those as discrete problem sets and classifying them separately.
  • 00:57:06
    I'm not sure it's helpful to think of them all in a single block, because one is going to bear on really specific, isolated, like, here is a residential area that people go walk through, and it should have certain protections or concerns for keeping in mind.
  • 00:57:20
    And another would be like, here's a significant stretch of really isolated road that we might want to have certain considerations or planning structures in whether or not we're doing something that might interrupt the recreational capacity of that really long stretch of road that is used by endurance athletes and tourists, right?
  • 00:57:42
    And I'm not sure we
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 00:57:58
    I'm looking at my notes.
  • 00:57:59
    I'm almost terrified to try to figure out how to deal with it.
  • 00:58:03
    I have a lot of very general notes, and I have a couple of some of the actions that you have that I've noted.
  • 00:58:11
    So I'll just start, right?
  • 00:58:16
    One of my overarching notes is, how are we dealing with the disconnect between Crozet, Pantops, 29 North, those areas to the airport?
  • 00:58:31
    That's what I'm saying.
  • 00:58:32
    And I just named our population centers for the most part, right?
  • 00:58:36
    But how are we getting through this?
  • 00:58:39
    And if we need nothing else, one of our main goals should be figuring that out because we don't have it right now.
  • 00:58:50
    So that's just kind of a... The other thing I would note, again, as a kind of a big concern I have is
  • 00:59:02
    I don't see a lot in this document about working with, and I know this is difficult, but working with the city and UVA, and specifically the city at our entrance quarters.
  • 00:59:19
    If we don't figure out, with VDOT and the city and us and our entrance quarters, how to make all of that work, we just are going to be, you know,
  • 00:59:31
    We had a report back in 2012, I keep quoting, from TJPDC that said, if we don't address the entrance corridors, if the city, the report said, doesn't address the entrance corridors into the city and county lines, we'll be grilling gridlock by 2025.
  • 00:59:49
    And here we are, folks.
  • 00:59:54
    And I'm just saying that.
  • 00:59:57
    We can do all we want in the development area around traffic concerns and bike and pedestrian.
  • 01:00:02
    We don't figure out how to work, get the city on board with us and work better together.
  • 01:00:06
    I mean, I had a call at one point from a community, a citizen in our community a few months ago.
  • 01:00:15
    They have gridlock on pantops.
  • 01:00:19
    I called Kerry, VDOT, to see what was going on.
  • 01:00:24
    she sent someone out to look at the gridlock was actually down at the bridge right at the city county line it took VDOT's person 45 minutes to get there to investigate what was going on only to find that the city had shut down the intersection without telling VDOT what they were doing
  • 01:00:48
    I'm just saying, and it works both ways guys, I would suggest that we buy VDOT a helicopter so that they can helicopter in to these areas to deal with the gridlock and VDOT just shut them down and said you can't do this, we have to figure out how to do this better and I'm not blaming the city because I'm sure VDOT makes mistakes too I'm just saying that if we don't figure out how to work better with our partners, especially these areas where we haven't
  • 01:01:17
    intersections and connectivities.
  • 01:01:20
    It's all for naught.
  • 01:01:22
    Synchronized lights comes to mind.
  • 01:01:25
    Just think about how our traffic would move better if the city and the county lights were synchronized, or if the city was synchronizing the lights on their side and the ones that impact us in the intersections.
  • 01:01:42
    So somehow or another, wrapping our arms around this and getting everybody is going to be
  • 01:01:47
    and boy that is a rock up a hill, I get that.
  • 01:01:52
    But it's really going to have to be done because we are one community like this and our intersections are just so tight.
  • 01:02:01
    Enough said about that.
  • 01:02:02
    I could go on about that for hours.
  • 01:02:05
    I was a little concerned about, and I'll just kind of point out a few things I was concerned about.
  • 01:02:10
    Investigate county funded programs to supply local businesses with bike parking infrastructure.
  • 01:02:17
    I'm on 2.5, okay sorry.
  • 01:02:20
    Citing and installation upon request.
  • 01:02:27
    I'm not sure, am I reading that right?
  • 01:02:29
    We're going to give, and I'm all for businesses, and I love to have, but it says investigate the cost of a county funded program to supply local businesses
  • 01:02:44
    I'm one supervisor who is a little concerned about that.
  • 01:02:55
    Maybe there's some sort of cost sharing, but I'm just putting a red flag on that one.
  • 01:03:00
    Your proposal I might not absolutely, but I have questions.
  • 01:03:05
    I'm just reading my notes here.
  • 01:03:09
    Sorry.
  • 01:03:14
    The 2.8, I made a note.
  • 01:03:20
    UVA, again, I'm getting back on my high horse, but we really have to figure out whether it's through RUPIC or whatever it is to get UVA to help us be on the understanding what they're planning so that we can react without us having to react after it's already done.
  • 01:03:42
    And you know exactly what I'm talking about.
  • 01:03:46
    I mean, we find out about it after it's already been approved by the Board of Visitors, and then we're trying to play catch-up and react when, in reality, while they get to do whatever they want because they're the state, somehow or another opening those doors and trying to convince them to let us know so that we can at least be prepared.
  • 01:04:04
    All right, I'll get off that house.
  • 01:04:07
    Let me see my next notes.
  • 01:04:13
    And I've already talked about developing a regional transit authority, so I've talked about that already.
  • 01:04:24
    Improve transit stops to enhance safety, comfort, accessibility, prioritize stops, movements, low income, and underserved areas.
  • 01:04:31
    That's all part of that transit work.
  • 01:04:34
    And one of the biggest complaints I hear in my district around the cat stops certainly is ice and snow.
  • 01:04:44
    in trying to figure out how perhaps to encourage CAT to handle their snow removal.
  • 01:04:51
    It seems like to me they could be able to handle snow removal at their stops.
  • 01:04:57
    If a person can get all the way to the bus stop, they shouldn't be falling down and standing in the streets.
  • 01:05:05
    That's a very practical suggestion, but it's something that really impacts our citizens.
  • 01:05:11
    And I had synchronized lights.
  • 01:05:13
    I've talked about that.
  • 01:05:15
    requiring connected developments.
  • 01:05:19
    So this gets back to sort of the cul-de-sac piece that you were... I thought we encouraged connections all over the county.
  • 01:05:29
    And yet, that's the one thing we hear from citizens and we're often saying, okay, you don't have to have a connection.
  • 01:05:37
    And how do we get at that seriously?
  • 01:05:40
    I mean, now,
  • 01:05:45
    because often they don't even want bicycle and pedestrian connections.
  • 01:05:50
    They're all not in your head.
  • 01:05:52
    So if somehow or another, if we could, I thought Fairfax at one point just said, if your proposal doesn't include a connection, then we're not even entertaining it.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:06:07
    Yeah, grand idea.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:06:08
    I mean, I thought that's what Fairfax did.
  • 01:06:10
    They got so tired of the fights over connections to neighborhoods in their work of trying to get a connected community, and they just said, we're not going to entertain it if it's not connected.
  • 01:06:18
    Now, maybe you wouldn't want to say that we're vehicular, but certainly for bike and pedestrian.
  • 01:06:23
    I mean, I'm just saying.
  • 01:06:26
    So, stressing connections with our
  • 01:06:31
    I have people all the time that say, I don't like that roundabout at Whole Foods.
  • 01:06:33
    What am I going to do?
  • 01:06:35
    Well, there are four other ways you can go.
  • 01:06:37
    I'm just saying.
  • 01:06:42
    Really?
  • 01:06:42
    So let's, folks, that's the whole idea of having different connections is that you just don't have to go one way.
  • 01:06:49
    You can go other ways.
  • 01:06:52
    All right, let me get back to my rants here.
  • 01:07:00
    All right, so I'm at 4.5, which is the pedestrian outlet street, so that's good.
  • 01:07:09
    Prioritize the safety of students traveling, so this is 6.5.
  • 01:07:15
    Prioritize the safety of students traveling to safer and
  • 01:07:20
    Yeah, we have students now that are walking in the urban areas in the road because there are no sidewalks.
  • 01:07:28
    Or it's just like with the bicycles.
  • 01:07:31
    You walk or you'll be on your bicycle and all of a sudden the connection is gone and you're out in the street.
  • 01:07:38
    So prioritizing some of these, and I especially think Safe Routes to School is a good place.
  • 01:07:44
    These connections to schools where students are required now by the school division to walk.
  • 01:07:51
    we ought to have those connections prioritized.
  • 01:07:56
    And now I'm down to 6.7, collaborate with police and VDOT to refine the county's process to respond to speeding complaints and proactively reduce speeds to improve safety.
  • 01:08:12
    That's an interesting conundrum, because I hear folks often saying, we want the speeds reduced.
  • 01:08:21
    and yet when the speeds are reduced, they come back and say, well, that didn't make any difference.
  • 01:08:26
    And VDOT has very specific rationale as to how they set the speed limits, and I don't want to do a workshop on that right now.
  • 01:08:40
    But I do think that when I see reduced speeds to improve safety, I'm not sure just reducing those speeds really gets at it.
  • 01:08:47
    It would be interesting for VDOT to talk at some point about that.
  • 01:08:52
    Kevin, you know what I'm talking about.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:08:54
    Yeah, I think we can be more specific about that.
  • 01:08:55
    I don't think that the idea is that we're going to go out and change the sign to reduce the speed limit.
  • 01:09:02
    We want to reduce that.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:09:08
    So thank you, because when I saw that I thought, that's not going to work, it doesn't work.
  • 01:09:13
    There's a rationale as to how they set the speed limits to begin with, and it's pretty sensible.
  • 01:09:25
    Traffic calming, I would love to see us in some of these areas where we're seeing a lot of speeding look very holistically at traffic calming programs.
  • 01:09:35
    But it doesn't mean that you have to go in and take a whole lane away.
  • 01:09:40
    There are things you can do.
  • 01:09:42
    And there are, I think, some states and some communities that have used art for traffic calming.
  • 01:09:53
    And I don't see anything in this whole document about art.
  • 01:10:00
    Maybe it's there, but I just missed it.
  • 01:10:03
    But even the feds,
  • 01:10:06
    Department of Transportation at the federal level has said that they are approving now art on roads, art in different areas.
  • 01:10:15
    You can use art on crosswalks.
  • 01:10:18
    I mean, let's think.
  • 01:10:20
    I mean, Kevin, I talked to you a few years back about Solomon Road in Inglewood and that huge wide road over there.
  • 01:10:28
    And people are flying down it.
  • 01:10:30
    And if we had a pedestrian area where people could walk that had some art going down it, you would have some traffic.
  • 01:10:37
    and a safer place for them.
  • 01:10:38
    So just think a little bit differently, maybe.
  • 01:10:41
    And I'm digressing, and I apologize.
  • 01:10:43
    But I am looking at traffic calming, but maybe in a different way, looking at other options besides just making the road tiny.
  • 01:10:59
    Develop a long-term maintenance plan for street trees and right-of-ways.
  • 01:11:02
    I would love to see that.
  • 01:11:06
    If 29 North is any example, we need to figure it out because all those trees planted up there, all those years ago, then they either died or, I guess the fumes from the traffic, I don't know, and then a bunch of them we dug up because we put infrastructure where they were and they were in our way.
  • 01:11:23
    Yeah, yeah.
  • 01:11:28
    So, I think looking at that would be wonderful.
  • 01:11:31
    A tree program, street trees, and maybe not just in our, I was at 29 North, but in our, on other roads as well.
  • 01:11:40
    I think that's a great idea.
  • 01:11:41
    That gets to our urban area in shade and trees, right?
  • 01:11:46
    So, cooling.
  • 01:11:49
    Here's the public realm around bus stops, such as, oh, there's art, art installation, and I actually started, so I didn't see it right there, so yes.
  • 01:11:58
    Obviously, I agree with that.
  • 01:11:59
    Let me see, I'm getting close.
  • 01:12:04
    I think I might be through.
  • 01:12:07
    This is all rural, so I'm good.
  • 01:12:09
    Yep, I'm good.
  • 01:12:10
    Thank you.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:12:14
    Alright, so we're on to the chart.
  • 01:12:19
    Alright.
  • 01:12:21
    Now, I will send you these so you don't have to scribble all the time.
  • 01:12:33
    many places where neighborhoods, park and chamber, hilltop places that have already suffered 20 years of drive-thru trucks getting through to the new subdivisions that were built on interior land without its own street access.
  • 01:12:50
    Really important to do.
  • 01:12:53
    Glad to learn about no plan.
  • 01:12:54
    And while I'm thinking about that, I will jump over to
  • 01:13:06
    I was concerned about that and thought why I can get a business grant to do that and things like e-bike vouchers and things I just
  • 01:13:19
    I'm very concerned about using tax money for things like that because even a $1,000 voucher, still somebody has to come up with thousands more to buy that and that's just a very limited clientele and I'd rather not be trying to separate out people for that.
  • 01:13:36
    Let's see, 2.8.
  • 01:13:41
    What can we do about getting UVA to participate?
  • 01:13:43
    For the last 10 years, the county has caved numerous times and allowed the university to get out of paying for infrastructure like the sidewalk in front of Old Abbey Road between the ECC and
  • 01:13:57
    whatever closer in.
  • 01:13:58
    That somehow became our business when they had promised to do it when they tore down the Kluge hospital.
  • 01:14:03
    Fontaine, they promised to do it for the rezoning on Fontaine Research Park and now we're getting stuck with using our dollars for that whole Fontaine reorganization.
  • 01:14:14
    So if we have some sturdiness in our standing up for ourselves on that, I think that would go a long way to do that. 2.11
  • 01:14:27
    I'm very concerned about the whole scooter thing on roads that are not just 15 miles an hour.
  • 01:14:35
    I'm very concerned always when I'm driving, even at 30 miles an hour, that a bicycle is going to fall in front of me and I'm going to kill them.
  • 01:14:42
    So in these narrow confines, it's just a real concern.
  • 01:14:45
    And the way people fly on the scooters and have nothing to hold onto, they're just standing there.
  • 01:14:51
    So anyway, I'm showing my old age here, I guess, but that worries me.
  • 01:14:58
    We're having so much trouble keeping our speeds down in the development area as well as the rural area.
  • 01:15:04
    Very few people go 35 in the places they're supposed to go 35 in the development area and it's difficult.
  • 01:15:12
    And the litter of these abandoned scooters all over the place at the county border still I see them.
  • 01:15:18
    So I went out at Airport Road and Prophet Road the other day and I thought, wow, that was a long way out of town.
  • 01:15:24
    So I just get annoyed by that.
  • 01:15:29
    I appreciate the success that CARTA is doing and I think that as we develop more governance involvement for the county that makes our dollars seem more well represented, that would be great.
  • 01:15:46
    3.2 microtransit, I think fees should be associated with that.
  • 01:15:49
    I don't think we can continue supporting the MicroCat for free for millions of dollars a year for a few people without any means testing.
  • 01:15:59
    to make sure that people who can afford a ride should be able to pay for their ride.
  • 01:16:06
    Because I see a lot of great ridership, but I'm not sure that it's benefiting people who really need it to get to PVCC for training for job skills or anything like that.
  • 01:16:14
    We've tried at the Workforce Center to link people with that program.
  • 01:16:28
    and for not having any shade for a lot of these places in the summertime.
  • 01:16:31
    It's so debilitating and there's no place to even stand except under the brambles nearby.
  • 01:16:37
    So I look forward to those kinds of improvements too.
  • 01:16:40
    4.1, I have written down synchronized lights in all caps because
  • 01:17:13
    all you need to do is fill out the process.
  • 01:17:16
    But it is incredibly frustrating even for Park Ridge Road which has a 25 mile an hour speed limit on it.
  • 01:17:22
    People's animals have been killed, kids were almost run over at the bus stop this spring.
  • 01:17:27
    enforcing this or somehow getting the highway furniture, as what they call it in Europe, things in the road to make people go around.
  • 01:17:36
    I mean, I said to Bea LaPisto 10 years ago, I'll just bring you an 800-pound hay bale and you can put it right in the middle there.
  • 01:17:41
    You've got plenty of road width and people will just have to drive around it.
  • 01:17:44
    And yet, now the cost for the laws roundabout is, what, 10 million bucks?
  • 01:17:50
    I mean, we've got to find a better way to do this.
  • 01:17:57
    We have adequate right-of-way and we need to just change the paint on the road or put one of those portable peaches mounds in the middle to force people to go around delineators whatever but we've got to find a way to put structural changes in these roads
  • 01:18:29
    But since we can't do that yet, we really have got to use all of our brain power to try to figure out a way to structurally get changes in these redways to make people hear a little bit about themselves or somebody else
  • 01:18:53
    I've seen it myself except on somebody else's phone, but there is all sorts of bicycle and running software that generates all sorts of data about where people are using roads for these purposes and so I don't think we need to hire a consultant, we just need to get the data that's already out there in the public sphere and be able to incorporate that information as we're planning things better.
• • 01:19:14
    6.5.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:19:15
    This has been a crisis.
  • 01:19:23
    These were all built in the late 1700s, early 1800s.
  • 01:19:26
    The road is 12 feet wide.
  • 01:19:29
    Talking about art, it was a perfectly beautiful 20 foot diameter or 12 foot diameter kaleidoscope painted on the road and it did slow people down and Beedot painted it over because they decided it didn't meet their requirements.
  • 01:19:42
    I mean, that was crushing.
  • 01:19:43
    But where St.
  • 01:19:45
    George crosses, Beedot will not protect them.
  • 01:19:49
    Make a crosswalk that had been there for 50 years beforehand because there's not a
  • 01:19:53
    Little ramp down on the other side.
  • 01:19:57
    Well, people have been crossing and walking on the road because there's no sidewalk on the other side anyway.
  • 01:20:03
    But anyway, this has literally held us up for 10 years.
  • 01:20:05
    And we've had numerous meetings with delegates and everybody else, and nobody will push the needle off top dead center here.
  • 01:20:11
    But we've got to figure out.
  • 01:20:12
    That's just one example.
  • 01:20:13
    I'm sure there are hundreds more throughout the growth areas where small things like that need to be done.
  • 01:20:18
    And maybe that's a no plan.
  • 01:20:26
    into the road on St.
  • 01:20:27
    George North and be able to then qualify for that crosswalk there.
  • 01:20:39
    6.7 I had circled where appropriate at the end and said please take that away because it's you know there's no place where it's appropriate for people to speak so let's think about design changes are really what's
  • 01:20:59
    And so while there are not a lot of places where that would work, it certainly is just one example.
  • 01:21:05
    I've already talked about the hay bales, the street trees.
  • 01:21:12
    I mean, if we want people to walk anywhere, we've got to have sidewalks.
  • 01:21:16
    We have a summit.
  • 01:21:31
    7.7 I just said grant funded on
  • 01:22:05
    And it'll come back to us for decision work.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:22:08
    Yeah, you're right.
  • 01:22:10
    And then it has to come back to us for a decision on what's going to be done.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:22:14
    And then we have to decide what we're going to do at that point.
  • 01:22:18
    And maybe we may tweak it as far as what you, Supervisor Malek, said.
  • 01:22:25
    It could be for those people who can't pay for it or have a sliding scale, that type of thing.
  • 01:22:32
    Traffic calming measures, super important.
  • 01:22:36
    We are limited by VDOT, I mean we can't, I mean I appreciate what you're saying Ann, regarding sticking a bale of hay in the middle, but you know, someone runs into that, it's not VDOT approved, and we're gonna get sued, and I know you were probably, you know, I was talking to VDOT
  • 01:23:02
    maybe work with the state because VITA is not gonna, unless things change they're not gonna budge and I just want to make sure that we can get some things actually through and done but maybe work with them maybe they can tweak a little bit and I do agree with traffic calming as far as putting things in the middle of a road but maybe they get some proof I've seen it done before
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 01:23:36
    A jersey barrier?
  • 01:23:38
    Is that what you're thinking of?
  • 01:23:40
    Those large concrete?
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:23:42
    Concrete or even like a going in the middle of the road with the curbs and everything that forces oncoming traffic to and you have signs
  • 01:24:07
    I find that VDOT is not very up on the latest traffic calming measures and maybe we can
  • 01:24:34
    We can't change the signal now because that's all going to be done in 27.
  • 01:24:37
    So we're going to redo that whole thing.
  • 01:24:40
    But I think it would be important to work with the city of Charlottesville to say, because I've asked them, can you synchronize?
  • 01:24:50
    They say that costs X number of dollars, whether or not they're going to do it.
  • 01:24:54
    But I think this would be a good time to maybe push them saying, we're doing our part.
  • 01:25:10
    Let's press them to do this.
  • 01:25:14
    So when our project is done, theirs is done also, I think that would help, I think.
  • 01:25:21
    Okay, so going through here.
• • SPEAKER_04
  • 01:25:43
    I think we're thinking just of a fund that might be added to on a regular basis where we could potentially go out and do some of those low plan, no plan type of projects.
  • 01:25:58
    So it would be an annual contribution.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:26:01
    Which I agree with and I like an annual contribution.
  • 01:26:08
    and then someone says hey you promised it'd be a steady stream we're holding you to it and then we got to raise taxes that's what I don't want to do but I do so I think you get the picture 2.5 once again I think was brought up before
  • 01:26:30
    We ought to work with businesses and especially any new businesses to have them as part of their development that they put in by parking and infrastructure and things like that instead of us paying them to do that and work with the businesses to do that.
  • 01:26:48
    Hopefully they're not paying anything.
  • 01:27:08
    6.1 fine placemaking streets with activity centers, appropriate design, speed.
  • 01:27:17
    Well, it doesn't concern me, but VDOT does this.
  • 01:27:21
    I mean, we have asked VDOT numerous times, can you reduce the speed on this road?
  • 01:27:28
    And they will do a speed check, then they'll come back a month later, and they'll say no.
  • 01:27:33
    So it would be really, really nice
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:27:54
    We can work to design streets that would reduce speeds.
  • 01:28:08
    transit calming and place-making these are things that we're all talking about.
  • 01:28:15
    What Supervisor McKeel mentioned with art that ties into this place-making street so landscaping anything like that that makes a street more inviting to pedestrians and also reduces the speed of vehicles.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:28:29
    Can we put in here then traffic
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:28:38
    Yeah, let's look at that and figure out how we can tie it because it's mentioned in other places how to tie it in.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:28:44
    Okay, 7.2 I love trees
  • 01:28:59
    29, you all know because I've called you about it, where residents call and say the line of sight, it's a signal, 29 and some of the others, the line of sight is blocked by a tree.
  • 01:29:14
    We all remember that horrific accident that happened way back.
  • 01:29:18
    So I think, I'm not saying don't plant trees, I'm just saying make sure that when we do
  • 01:29:35
    And speaking of trees just for I know this is not this is a presentation but as you're driving along and you want people to be able to see
  • 01:29:49
    the stores, be it retail, be it restaurants, commercial, whatever, but if you want people to see that I think we need to be cognizant of where we place trees along busy roads where they block signs, where they block businesses, especially restaurants and such.
  • 01:30:14
    Notice how I was able to slip that in there?
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 01:30:29
    I note that this is in development areas and the words in development areas appear in two out of all of the actions in the entire list of the seven objectives and I was kind of curious that I went through why that and in one case it's because it was given with micro transit which is in the development area and not in others but then in the other case it's six point
  • 01:31:03
    I'm a crossroads operator type of roads in the development area and I don't know why is that in the development area only because I will bring that up in the rural area as another thing for the crossroads community so I'm jumping ahead a little bit but I thought that you could comment on it here because it's odd that only those two places in the development area were used.
  • 01:31:22
    I was also looking for some
  • 01:31:25
    So consistency within the document that I noticed that, you know, 1.2 has developed the modal emphasis map to identify bicycle facilities that link Dementia County City and I think it's been mentioned that UVA should be included in that.
  • 01:31:39
    Then 6.8, specific
  • 01:31:52
    Virginia along major corridors.
  • 01:31:54
    So I was trying to figure out what the difference was between those and why we have a separate action except for this mobile emphasis map which I didn't fully understand or even discussed.
  • 01:32:07
    Again, I do agree with a lot of the comments about making sure that you don't just expect
  • 01:32:27
    When we get to micromobility, I certainly hope we do learn from others' mistakes in this area because it's become controversial in a lot of rules of making sure that's done in a way that doesn't create hazards.
  • 01:32:41
    I heard a lot of these comments made in one form or another pretty clearly.
  • 01:32:55
    4.4 that says collaborate operational improvements for major corridors 29, 250, and 64.
  • 01:33:01
    Hopefully there's some place in the document where we recognize that we want local alternatives for those roads as well because
  • 01:33:11
    that becomes a source of belief.
  • 01:33:13
    I know that there's a comment made in the text about how adding lanes doesn't actually reduce congestion.
  • 01:33:22
    I found that a curious comment.
  • 01:33:24
    I'm not sure how that exactly couldn't work, but I do agree that adding lanes creates additional barriers as well, but having sort of alternatives is actually specifically mentioned in that same paragraph that says adding lanes doesn't help.
  • 01:33:38
    It says, you know,
  • 01:33:47
    You roads and bridges can expand the network a bit.
  • 01:34:14
    And then I'll just add just a final comment.
  • 01:34:17
    This was made by one of the people writing in that where it says in objective seven, not in the actions that are in the objective, including reducing greenhouse gas emissions partially
  • 01:34:41
    Interlocally, without just particularly reducing vehicle arms drown in the use of single occupant vehicles.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:36:05
    I'm just saying, I read the same thing you did and I go, wait a minute, and then I realize that if you make it wider, they will come.
  • 01:36:16
    Thank you.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:36:16
    Just quickly, two things.
  • 01:36:20
    Nods all will live essentially.
  • 01:36:27
    VDOT is very, very, for lack of a better word, conservative.
  • 01:36:32
    There are dots that do things that VDOT does.
  • 01:36:35
    And all I'm saying is to think about that because perhaps we could look sometimes at what other states are doing, what other dots are doing, and go to our representatives and say that this is happening in
  • 01:36:52
    and other states.
  • 01:36:54
    And when I say dots, you know what I mean.
  • 01:36:59
    There is no doubt that VDOT is among the most conservative and resistant to change many of the dots around.
  • 01:37:07
    Just saying, just to put that in your – and you all know that, I'm sure, but at some point they really need to be able to do that.
  • 01:37:16
    the past.
  • 01:37:17
    Having said that, one thing that I do that really had a successful and I wanted to point this out to you because you all probably remember the meeting where I was so frustrated about trucks not using, ignoring the through truck and actually VDOT did what I asked and I think at least on the around the edges it's helped some.
  • 01:37:41
    Instead of having that
  • 01:37:43
    Road Restriction Route number 68493.
  • 01:37:47
    They went in and on my signs put Georgetown Road.
  • 01:37:53
    Let's get them to do that more often because when people are, truck drivers are driving, they don't know what State Route 6426 is, but they know Georgetown Road more likely.
  • 01:38:07
    and it has actually helped.
  • 01:38:08
    They went into Barracks Road in Georgetown Road area and all of those through truck restrictions, they put in the name of the road.
  • 01:38:17
    They can do it.
  • 01:38:20
    Just something to think about.
• • SPEAKER_02
  • 01:38:46
    of course if you don't have shade like all the multimodal transit in the world doesn't really help you.
  • 01:38:51
    I might suggest that there's reference in I think two different actions to street trees.
  • 01:38:58
    There's not a reference to climate or heat islands or anything of this sort and I'm not sure that street trees alone are an adequate tool at all times to deal with
  • 01:39:11
    weather and climate concerns that citizens happen to create an obstacle.
  • 01:39:15
    The two kind of dueling examples I can think right off the top of my head, right?
  • 01:39:20
    The city's new Avon Bridge project, which I adore.
  • 01:39:23
    It's beautiful.
  • 01:39:25
    Its street trees will probably eventually become robust in offering shade, but right now it is still an onerous task to cross that bridge in the summer.
  • 01:39:35
    And I doubt it experiences as much traffic as it should in the summer.
  • 01:39:40
    On the flip side, like naturally planning around pre-existing shade and climate concerns we can look at like biscuit run greenway, the proposed biscuit run greenway where you have natural cooling coming off the riverbed and you have complete shade already in existence and it connects to like an employment center to a residential center but it's also deeply climate vulnerable to flooding like December and January it was not usable in its current state
  • 01:40:10
    I guess I'll just raise this all to say I think concerns around climate and environment need to be proactive.
  • 01:40:17
    This is our big resilience, but buzzword for this calendar here, right?
  • 01:40:22
    We need to actively be planning around the real experience, like experience of climate and weather that people have.
  • 01:40:29
    And I'm not sure that's captured by the statements we have right now when we're talking about multi-voltages specifically.
  • 01:40:39
    All right.
  • 01:40:41
    So I think Chair Andrews already kind of alluded to this and his desire to talk about it.
  • 01:40:49
    But so we talk about, in the intro, we talk about the desire to prioritize and emphasize planning around safety concerns in the rural area.
  • 01:40:59
    And then I look at where we're most realizing that for our actions.
  • 01:41:04
    And I mostly see 1.1.
  • 01:41:07
    And I look at that, and it seems to me that it still does not catch what I feel like are the resident concerns I hear the most related to safety in the rural area, which is around normally intersections that VDOT has already said
  • 01:41:26
    because we do not have the kind of traffic, we do not have the kind of incident or fatality data that would give us cause to invest in it in such a low throughput area and so we don't care.
  • 01:41:39
    I can think of like three specific intersections off the top of my head.
  • 01:41:42
    There's one on Secretary Sands, there's two on James River Road, one at the James River Road intersection on 20 and the other at the really wonky Warren Ferry intersection.
  • 01:41:53
    I get complaints about those roads frequently and VDOT on each of those has said we don't care because there's just not the data showing it and so I would suggest that if this is something that we do that we want to wean it as a priority on safety concerns related to rural transit
  • 01:42:22
    but I don't see that kind of concern contemplated in the comprehensive plan currently, in the draft that's before us and I know that is certainly something I hear about a lot and especially if we're trying to figure out how to energize pockets of the rural area for service delivery or like key services so that people don't have to exclusively drive into the development area to live their lives and that's going to be
  • 01:42:49
    The required tool in that toolkit.
  • 01:42:52
    I mean, like, making intersections.
  • 01:42:54
    The kind of thorny nest of intersections around the Green Mountain Storm at Keene, right?
  • 01:43:03
    That is already a mess, and if we're trying to, if we're envisioning that as a place that people might experience community
  • 01:43:10
    in some kind of planning document.
  • 01:43:12
    We don't have the accompanying transportation toolkit to kind of handle that right now.
  • 01:43:18
    Because the existing roads, I mean, the response I might sometimes get to talking about crossroads communities is our roads aren't equipped to deal with that.
  • 01:43:26
    That's dangerous.
  • 01:43:28
    And in its current state, that might be true, right, with significant more traffic right there.
  • 01:43:37
    1.7.
  • 01:43:38
    This is unique to the rural chapter, and I'm actually not clear why.
  • 01:43:43
    So this talks about the need for an equity lens in evaluating transportation infrastructure projects.
  • 01:43:52
    So there's two things here.
  • 01:43:53
    One, that seems like it also applies to the development area.
  • 01:43:56
    Maybe I missed it.
  • 01:43:57
    Maybe it's there.
  • 01:43:58
    But I don't think I saw it.
  • 01:44:09
    And the other thing I would raise is I think it's correct to flag equity in the term, in the universe of transportation.
  • 01:44:19
    I think equity normally and primarily implicates concerns about disability.
  • 01:44:39
    This happens around transit planning and I think we are implementing an equity lens that might be something that should be considered there.
  • 01:44:48
    Making sure that equity lens does not entirely constrain itself to thinking about accessibility in the terms of disability
  • 01:45:23
    Love every time I see the word Three Notch Trail Shared Use Path.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:45:51
    You didn't hear what he said.
  • 01:45:53
    Looking at the action items under the ones right now, wider shoulders may be implemented.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:45:57
    I thought I was told years ago that there was an agreement with VDOT
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:46:20
    that when they paved roads, they would add asphalt, I would love to say acid fault, but asphalt, as much as possible to the edge of the road.
  • 01:46:34
    Obviously, we have rural roads that there's no way that they could be wide.
  • 01:46:39
    It would cost hundreds of millions of dollars if you took Garth Road and tried it, right, having said that.
  • 01:46:45
    But we had some sort of an agreement.
  • 01:46:48
    that when they paved, they would not just pave that area, but they would widen it as much as possible.
  • 01:46:55
    Now, it may get into the substructure underneath and not being able to do that and they say, well, that won't hold up, it'll crack, and I get all that.
  • 01:47:04
    But I just thought we had an agreement with VDOT about
  • 01:47:11
    And I had noticed occasionally, maybe it was Carth Road, it looked like they paved Carth Road at one point and went further out with the paving than I would have expected.
  • 01:47:32
    So I guess looking back at that or thinking about that,
  • 01:47:39
    and like I said, they may have stopped it because if you go out and just put asphalt down further out and you don't have that substructure underneath to support it, then you end up with a big mess.
  • 01:47:49
    So, I do remember that.
  • 01:47:52
    Okay, having said that.
  • 01:47:54
    So, wider shoulders is what I circled there.
  • 01:47:58
    On 1.3, I took a big X and said new roads should be for agriculture and forestry purposes.
  • 01:48:06
    So,
  • 01:48:07
    I don't think that's even realistic.
  • 01:48:08
    Help me understand.
  • 01:48:10
    Is it because we had so much pushback in some of the logging trucks?
  • 01:48:16
    Is that why that is?
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:48:19
    I think that the idea behind that is just distinguishing that we are not building roads to enable future residential growth.
  • 01:48:31
    So we're trying to separate the more rural activities that we want to support in the rural area.
  • 01:48:40
    And that's why we would build roads as opposed to building roads for residential development.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:48:46
    And I'm not, it's not that I'm against forestry or agriculture, I just thought that was interesting and I don't see how you... That was confusing to me, so I put big X's across it.
  • 01:48:58
    I'll leave it there.
  • 01:49:00
    And again, the regional, developer regional transit circle, I've already talked about that.
  • 01:49:05
    3.3, collaborate with the Alabama County Police Department and VDOT to refine the county's process
  • 01:49:16
    respond to speeding complaints and proactively reduce speeds.
  • 01:49:20
    Again, that gets into that reduced speeds and enforcement, right?
  • 01:49:25
    So we know we have a lot of speeding on rural roads.
  • 01:49:29
    And I'll tell you, I get a lot of complaints from people on a couple of the roads in my district, Garth Road specifically, and some out in Free Union, about from
  • 01:49:40
    vehicle drivers, cars having to wait while all the bicycles, you've all heard this, the bicycles come around, come down and the cars are behind the bicycles and there's a lot of friction on those roads between the cars and the bicycles, especially on weekends.
  • 01:49:58
    It gets back to the economic development bicycle piece and you're going to put a lot of bicycles on these roads for economic development and tourism and it's conundrum and how we work that out.
  • 01:50:12
    Not that I'm against either, but there is a conflict.
  • 01:50:18
    Albemarle County Police Department, though, and VDOT, to respond to this, the police department says that there's nowhere to pull over crimes.
  • 01:50:32
    What I hear all the time from the police is,
  • 01:50:36
    I don't know if there's something that can be done about that because that's what the police are saying is they can enforce the speed limits better if there was a pace for people to pull over.
  • 01:51:08
    And again, safe routes to school.
  • 01:51:13
    That's an obvious, I've talked about that in the development area.
  • 01:51:16
    That's a given in both.
  • 01:51:20
    Create safe wildlife crossing areas.
  • 01:51:26
    This really reminds me of Afton and their research council.
  • 01:51:32
    Did you know the work, the studies on Afton and to see where
  • 01:51:38
    I'm just wondering if the transportation research council could help us in figuring
  • 01:51:58
    We have worked with the research council on that.
  • 01:52:00
    Yeah, yeah.
  • 01:52:00
    We're all geniuses.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:52:26
    Bridgette was her name, they did that program and put up the fence on the section of 64 the Bay Area, and they've also, I've seen the presentation that she has where she looked at it going all the way up to Afton as well, and they have identified key places.
  • 01:52:43
    The difference there is that there's fewer existing crossings in that area, so it makes it much more difficult.
  • 01:52:51
    On the section they fenced, there were a lot of places they could direct
  • 01:52:55
    The White Wife too, but that didn't happen.
  • 01:52:58
    It wasn't as often as on the other section, on the Western section since before, but I think working with them is a great suggestion.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 01:53:05
    I would try them and see what their response might be, even if it's just helping us to identify the areas.
  • 01:53:11
    And then they are really good at coming up with solutions, you know, so I would look to them.
  • 01:53:17
    Okay.
  • 01:53:18
    And
  • 01:53:24
    I guess that's really, Jim, right now all I have.
  • 01:53:29
    I think some of these were really good and I just don't have comments.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:53:56
    Garth Road was the primary example.
  • 01:53:59
    Every seven years we're going to be hitting this road and they have a special machine that packs stone under the outside edge and then they pave over the top of it instead of just putting it in air.
  • 01:54:09
    So that helps to sub-base, to build up a base.
  • 01:54:13
    But anyway, about 2009 in the recession, that... We ought to go back to that.
  • 01:54:19
    So we need to revitalize that.
  • 01:54:40
    and others will still make problems for us.
  • 01:54:43
    But anyway, the 1.1, I always, the congestion on regional routes.
  • 01:54:52
    I mean, if this is focused on the major highways, that's fine.
  • 01:54:56
    If it's saying we're going to be using congested as an excuse to make people go faster in rural roads, then we've got a good problem with that.
  • 01:55:03
    So I think that it's focused on those three.
  • 01:55:13
    I definitely referred the discouraging of new roads, but was this referring to roads on private property and explained to me because my question mark was what does this mean?
  • 01:55:26
    Because we're not building roads in the countryside for developers either.
  • 01:55:32
    On 1.3?
  • 01:55:32
    1.3, yes.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 01:55:42
    I think this is really looking at... Paving existing gravel roads, that's one thing, but... Yeah, both paving existing and discouraging new... It's really something that's tied to, I think, our land use policy, our growth management policy, is to discourage the road building for residential.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 01:56:04
    So this would be in the planning stages, so like the thing that came to
  • 01:56:10
    changes instead of a super long driveway.
  • 01:56:14
    They were going to bring in extra things along the way.
  • 01:56:17
    That's another situation where there's continued development, major subdivisions in the rural area that we're going to have to deal with because it's not necessarily helpful.
  • 01:56:27
    OK.
  • 01:56:29
    Number four, I just put a great big star.
  • 01:56:30
    Hooray, hooray.
  • 01:56:32
    Please continue on on that.
  • 01:56:37
    We have not mentioned enough.
  • 01:56:40
    that does not exist and has for 30 years, take your 20 years for house door to door for rural area residents with disabilities or anybody who needs transportation so that has not been mentioned about continuing to work with them but that's
  • 01:57:10
    to work, they just cannot drive for whatever their personal situation is.
  • 01:57:14
    And John has allowed them to function for years and years, and it's wonderful.
  • 01:57:19
    So I didn't want that to be forgotten.
  • 01:57:23
    Yeah, I'll be 3.3.
  • 01:57:26
    As others have said, if you get the cohort in the morning on Garth Road going east, and the sun is shining in the car driver's eyes going east,
  • 01:57:39
    and up and down all those hills on Garth Road, it's literally 25, 30 minutes for these packs of drivers.
  • 01:57:46
    And I have met with bicycle groups almost annually for years.
  • 01:57:51
    Oh, it's not us, you know, it's all those independents.
  • 01:57:54
    But I'm thinking, curious, I saw all these people in your group.
  • 01:58:01
    it creates tremendous hostility and I think in the rural town halls which I've had for years and years this is a primary concern because drivers are concerned they're going to mow down by mistake a whole bunch of people they cannot see afternoons going west exactly the same thing from the Meacham's River going up there's a 15
  • 01:58:25
    There's just no way to see what's going on.
  • 01:58:27
    So that is a great concern Our people have been at these meetings with me to try to help And the bicycles have said in response to Greg Jenkins years ago saying well, what do you need from the drivers?
  • 01:58:42
    Well, we don't even know they're there So be pure horn, but you know people feel like well, maybe they shouldn't do that
  • 01:58:53
    but when they look back over your shoulder like this and see that you're there and there's a long line of cars and still do nothing to pull over that's where that hostility level happens and there's nothing you all can do anything about that but it's a concern that I think education as various groups you know pretend to work together will be helpful.
  • 01:59:13
    and in the General Assembly this past year, while Virginia carried a bill that did get almost $500,000 for the wildlife crossings developed and they, I know with that same extension west on 64, they had some projects on this side of the mountain and also in the valley that we're trying to support for.
  • 01:59:32
    So that's another good, in addition to the research council, they have maps and maps and maps of all the research they have done about the
  • 01:59:45
    Let's see, 4.2, absolutely, I know the Plenty District for years off and on has worked on rerouting 76 off of the most dangerous places.
  • 01:59:56
    I mean, 250 is not fun, and a lot of people have started rerouting themselves through Batesville and come out to Equits Road and then up the mountain that way, but Newtown Road is no
  • 02:00:25
    bicycle commute also.
  • 02:00:27
    So in addition to the recreational people who want to ride in the middle of the day or whatever, there are people who, if they can solve a few logistical hurdles, would love to be able to bike to work.
  • 02:00:39
    And it's just not possible right now.
  • 02:00:42
    In the shower.
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 02:00:43
    I used to have them coming into my office asking if I could use my shower.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:00:49
    I mean, I biked to work, but it was in downtown Boston.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:01:28
    Yeah, I think this is really just looking at how the frequent access points on rural roads and maybe addressing the site distance issues, things like that, when you have a lot of access points where you wouldn't expect to have cars coming into another major road, come up with a process to evaluate those.
  • 02:01:56
    managing all those access points.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:02:00
    Wouldn't that be also consumer complaints?
  • 02:02:08
    There's no way you're going to be able to work for all, you know, line of sight access points all over for everything.
  • 02:02:37
    But I do know that when the winery wanted to enlarge or have a wedding venue, there was a line of sight.
  • 02:02:45
    They were kind of on a curve, and so they had to cut down like four or five big trees.
  • 02:02:52
    And they hated to do that, but that's what VDOT required in order to have, if you wanted to widen the entrance a little bit, to have a line of sight.
  • 02:03:08
    OK, that answers that.
  • 02:03:11
    1.4, the last sentence, wider shoulders may be implemented to provide space for recreational walking and biking.
  • 02:03:21
    Are you thinking of, I can't think of anything in my area on a rural road that you, first of all, that you could widen it and that, I mean, for recreational walking or biking, I wouldn't
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:03:44
    I can just imagine it's a tool in the toolbox that we would use when appropriate.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:03:51
    Should that happen?
  • 02:03:52
    Should it come up?
  • 02:03:55
    Got it.
  • 02:03:57
    Alright, 1.5.
  • 02:03:58
    Last sentence.
  • 02:04:01
    Collaborate.
  • 02:04:02
    Well, you're talking about significant transportation improvement for goods movement.
  • 02:04:08
    So we're talking about trucks.
  • 02:04:13
    When you're collaborating with the economic development to identify primary priority routes, is that where to tell large trucks to, roads to use?
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:04:26
    Yeah, I think so.
  • 02:04:27
    But I think it's focused primarily on our primary routes that are already being used.
  • 02:04:34
    So things like 29 and 215 access to the 64.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:04:44
    We have talked to economic development about
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:04:58
    about making sure that when we're planning improvements to roads like 29 that that is one of the considerations that we're making is how it's utilized and how it's effectively used by companies that want to ship goods.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:05:32
    I mean, I know I don't have the only roads that are heavily traveled with oversized trucks where it's totally restricted.
  • 02:05:42
    I know other areas probably have that too.
  • 02:05:46
    And that's just really... We've looked at that a lot.
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:05:49
    It's been a big problem that we've run into.
  • 02:05:51
    It's not... Five years I've been working on that.
  • 02:05:55
    We'll look into it and see if there's something we can do.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:06:03
    or McKeel mentioned cutouts you know in roads maybe that's that so the police can pull over because right now they're doing it either it's the beginning or the end okay 2.1 I love it
  • 02:06:39
    Dr. McKeel mentioned about airports, so I mean maybe there needs to be a, do we have a concerted effort where someone can get from their home using maybe MicroCat and then to a bus that takes you to the airport.
  • 02:06:54
    Pardon?
• • SPEAKER_01
  • 02:06:55
    There are no buses to the airport.
  • 02:06:58
    MicroCat does service the airport.
  • 02:07:00
    Yes.
  • 02:07:04
    So right now you can take Microcut.
  • 02:07:06
    If you're within the Microcut zone, you can get that to or from the airport.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:07:13
    I would think that's something we would really want to expand, either to get CAT or a small bus.
  • 02:07:20
    I can't imagine there's a ton of people, but to be able to get Microcut or a small bus or a regular route.
  • 02:07:28
    Because they fly out early in the morning.
  • 02:07:31
    It's always early.
  • 02:07:35
    at 5 o'clock, 7 o'clock.
  • 02:07:38
    And you're not going to have a lot of traffic at that time.
  • 02:07:40
    That would be a perfect thing to have a bus go up there, right?
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 02:07:44
    You do need access from the community to the airport, I think, somewhere around.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:07:48
    Yeah, I agree.
  • 02:07:53
    3.3, helping the police.
  • 02:07:56
    Again, we can have a legislative.
  • 02:07:58
    Maybe the legislative issue of photo speed cameras will pass this time.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 02:08:17
    but just an overall comment about improving safety on roads.
  • 02:08:20
    I want to talk about the major roads and I don't know where this will go in because I think it goes in elsewhere.
  • 02:08:28
    I don't think there's been much comment about dangers associated with, and this is something with climate change happens more and more, flooding.
  • 02:08:37
    There was a mention before about rerouting
  • 02:08:40
    Roads have flooded, but I think there are other ways to just at least identify them, where they flood, warning signs up prone to flooding.
  • 02:08:50
    This is one of the things that I think has been really dangerous with some of these big storms that we've had these roads that have become, if not impassable, very dangerous to drive at high speeds because you can plane
  • 02:09:04
    and if it's possible to sometimes work not just on the road but on the grading around it because the, whether it's Moores Creek or one of the other unidentified or intermittent streams, it may be some way to work on that that's much less expensive
  • 02:09:26
    and along with these storms come debris and whether we can not only help figure out how to identify
  • 02:10:02
    In 1.4, Utilize Rural Rustic Roads Program to Determine Appropriate Road Change I'm confused because I don't think the Rural Rustic Roads Program determines
  • 02:10:14
    appropriate road paving.
  • 02:10:15
    That was more our unpaved road policies and how we educate people and help them decide whether they think it's appropriate or not to pave the road.
  • 02:10:27
    And it's not just a question of whether they're eligible for the Real Rustic Road Program.
  • 02:10:33
    So that language confused me.
  • 02:10:36
    But in the same vein, it also reminded me that I would like to see us
  • 02:10:40
    and encourage VDOT to do, if it's possible, to count more than just vehicles.
  • 02:10:46
    So there have been advocates telling us, you know, some of these roads are used for a lot of different modalities and if we can start to count that, it would be helpful in identifying, and this goes back to the recreational, but it also very much impacts ruralistic road programs. 1.6
  • 02:11:15
    vehicle traffic.
  • 02:11:16
    Obviously, this is only about through truck restrictions and not local truck, which may be there.
  • 02:11:26
    2.1, notice again that this says within the rural area.
  • 02:11:28
    It was almost identical to the previous section where it said in the development area, but it's really the same point made in two different places.
  • 02:11:35
    And those are the only places where that qualifier appears in these otherwise two separate sections.
  • 02:11:42
    Let's see.
  • 02:11:57
    A general comment that I think has been made, and I'll just emphasize it, whether it's in 3.3 or elsewhere is recognizing traffic calming measures in crossroads communities.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:12:54
    Airport has refused to have buses for 20 years so this is something where we can
  • 02:13:21
    talked to our county executive who represents us on the authority and also our commission appointees, airport commission appointees, because parking for cars is a huge moneymaker's view.
  • 02:13:33
    And every time I've tried to get over that hurdle, they've smacked me back and said, no, no, we're not going to do that.
  • 02:13:39
    So that's just a little background I wanted to share.
  • 02:13:43
    I disagree that we should not have trees so that people can see the signs on the buildings because I want people focused on
  • 02:13:49
    driving, not looking for the signs on the buildings and those big pedestal signs or the signs that were put up during the 29 Solutions work that told people well in advance where various features were, were wonderfully successful.
  • 02:14:05
    So I would prefer that approach as opposed to trying to have people looking like this for where they're going to turn off for fast food.
  • 02:14:16
    Access points, 1.3.
  • 02:14:19
    when I was fussing at VDOT years ago about a permission which they had given for a rural driveway on an absolutely, incredibly dangerous situation where there was like three seconds between when one could see the bus, school bus approaching.
  • 02:14:35
    I went there and sat in it to wait for the bus and literally that was the time interval that you had in order to pull out or not in both directions.
  • 02:14:45
    And I was told at the time that if
  • 02:14:48
    Albemarle County Development Department gave an approval for a subdivision for a lot.
  • 02:14:53
    VDOT could not deny access.
  • 02:14:56
    So I will push that burden back on CDD to say this is really important that when rural lots, especially because they have seems like fewer planning requirements than urban projects, if those are going to be allowed, that element has to be taken into consideration first because
  • 02:15:16
    It's only a miracle that we haven't had more accidents at some of these places that are just so, so dangerous.
  • 02:15:21
    So I will just provide, that's just a little history for that.
  • 02:15:25
    And just recently, more people called about losing mirrors because of the trees that are cut off at the edge of the pavement as opposed, you know, they get pushed over by a truck in the car in the other direction and lose the mirror on their right-hand side.
  • 02:15:38
    And they're getting real tired of it because it's been there for three years now.
  • 02:15:41
    So I think that we all have to
  • 02:15:44
    to push on the cleanup crew for that.
• • 02:15:46
    1.5.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:15:57
    Transportation routes.
  • 02:15:59
    We had a huge problem with the early teams with, I guess it was just as the mapping GIS stuff was getting started.
  • 02:16:13
    huge numbers of 18-wheelers servicing grocery stores and convenience stores in the rural area.
  • 02:16:18
    I'm most familiar with the northern-western part of the county, but 33 come over from Harrisonburg, 810, 743, and then hit all of those super hairpin turns and just incredible damage to the roads as well as
  • 02:16:38
    Trailers falling off and capsizing on the side of the road because their rear wheels fell in the, golly, they are on Advance Mills roads.
  • 02:16:45
    I'm sure Bart is familiar with that corner on his way home.
  • 02:16:51
    So it's more than just the main roads because they will not stay on the main roads anymore.
  • 02:16:56
    And the one saving grace for the Advance Mills area is the way the bridge was designed with the absolute 90 degree turn
  • 02:17:07
    to get onto the bridge and not improving too much 740, 641 from Advance Mills over to where it joins up with Burley Station on the other side because at least three or four times a year a trailer will still belly up there and can't get unstuck and has to get a tow truck to get up onto the high level because they won't believe the truth but that's another lack
  • 02:17:43
    18 wheelers on this road.
  • 02:17:45
    Don't come here because you won't be able to get out.
  • 02:17:47
    And maybe I don't know what other languages one would choose for the drivers, but I know that many drivers have had a terrible time because they get stuck and then they have language barriers even ask for help.
  • 02:18:00
    And that's really a difficulty for them as well as for the neighbors.
  • 02:18:05
    So I'll stop there.
  • 02:18:05
    Thank you.
  • 02:18:09
    I'm just going to mention regarding the tree
  • 02:18:34
    If you lower one tree, you can still have some greenery, but you can move one or two trees so that people can see the sign that's on the side.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 02:19:10
    Do you have what you need from us?

3. From the Board: Matters Not Listed on the Agenda.

• • SPEAKER_05
  • 02:19:47
    And I was really pleased to see that Andrea Copeland has been named.
  • 02:20:05
    And I'm getting to this to ask, when we talk about transportation, I guess I'm specifically talking about the development area more.
  • 02:20:16
    But I hear from some of the chamber businesses that their employees can't get to work, or they're struggling to get some of their employees to work.
  • 02:20:25
    So do we reach out to the chamber
  • 02:20:28
    as one of the groups that we're talking to when we're looking at, because I look at these focus groups and I didn't see specifically business, but that should just be a suggestion and I don't, here she comes.
• • SPEAKER_03
  • 02:20:44
    I think it's a great, sorry, Abby Stumpf, director of communications,
  • 02:20:54
    I think it's a great approach and something that we've been considering is how we can going into the final stretch of the CC44 engagement process really sort of target into we may not have contacted really like hyper targeted versus the broad net which we've been doing and so the Chamber, some other stakeholders and community groups are definitely going to be on our list of some targets
• • SPEAKER_05
  • 02:21:20
    And I think it will help now that they have a permanent CEO named, and she's at that job.
  • 02:21:26
    But I would suggest with businesses trying to get employees, the Chamber would be a great group to work with.
  • 02:21:34
    And kind of out of context for what we're doing.
  • 02:21:37
    I'm sorry.
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 02:21:37
    It's appropriate to make that announcement.
  • 02:21:40
    Supervisor Malle.
• • SPEAKER_06
  • 02:21:43
    Oh, thank you.
  • 02:21:44
    I understand that this week VDACS is supposed to be treating the fire ants.
  • 02:21:50
    in Hollymeade.
  • 02:21:52
    I'm not positive because of all the rain.
  • 02:21:53
    This may get put off again.
  • 02:21:55
    But anyway, this is still, please, please, people who have not seen the pictures on the mound.
  • 02:22:20
    and also on, wait a minute, here we go, the Albemarle Amateur Radio Club will be participating in the national amateur radio event known as the Field Day, noon to noon, June 28th and 29th at the early school volunteer fire department.
  • 02:22:34
    They've been doing this for at least a decade and it is wonderful fun and family oriented.
  • 02:22:40
    Kids especially get a big kick out of talking to somebody in Australia or something.
  • 02:22:45
    So I would encourage people to check it out.
  • 02:22:49
    Thank you very much.
  • 02:22:52
    Yesterday morning I had the honor of attending a ballet recital at Stony Point Elementary School
  • 02:23:06
    She developed it, Sarah Claiborne, who is the wife of my planning commissioner, Cory Claiborne, for Charlottesville Ballet.
  • 02:23:14
    They did a presentation on incorporating the environment because they did a whole ballet
  • 02:23:27
    and it was fantastic.
  • 02:23:30
    The children, grades K through 6, were just enthralled with the whole thing.
  • 02:23:37
    And then afterwards they got to dance, they were jumping up and down.
  • 02:23:41
    I was jumping up and down, everyone was jumping up and down.
  • 02:23:44
    It was really, really a sight to behold.
  • 02:23:48
    The kids were so well behaved.
  • 02:23:50
    And I love the way that they tied in not only the ballet, but also with
  • 02:23:57
    preservation will, unfortunately, you can't preserve the old work because it's extinct now.
  • 02:24:03
    And so, but it lets children know what can happen.
  • 02:24:07
    And I, the fire ants, to follow up on that, the fire ants are on 29 North, East, and West.
  • 02:24:15
    I've notified the Hollimede HOA, I've notified the
  • 02:24:22
    Forest Lake's HOA and also Bentomar HOA so that they can tell everyone what to look out for.
  • 02:24:30
    And also our delegate, Amy Lawford, she is aware of the situation also.
  • 02:24:35
    And I think you heard from probably, I'm going to say all, at the risk of saying all of us, that I think traffic calming, be it
• • SPEAKER_08
  • 02:24:52
    and other matters.

4. From the County Executive: Report on Matters Not Listed on the Agenda.

5. Adjourn to June 4, 2025, 1:00 p.m., Lane Auditorium.