Citizens Transportation Advisory Committee (2013-2026) Meeting   5/20/2020

All right.

And thankfully, Tim reminded me that we have to read the statement.

So here we go.

The governor has declared a state of emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the nature of this declared emergency makes it impracticable or unsafe for the Thomas Jefferson Planning District Commission to assemble in a single location.

This meeting is being held utilizing electronic virtual communication with the Zoom software application

and in accordance with virtual meeting procedures and policies as outlined in item 4.0-01 of the Virginia State Budget HB 29 as effective April 24th, 2020.

All right.

And now we're officially officially in session and I am going to share my screen so that you can see our meeting packet.

Oops, that looks like my, that's not right.

There, does that look right?

Perfect.

Okay, so normally Tristan as our new chair would be leading this meeting.

Great.

So we normally have time for matters from the public, but we do not have any members of the public joining us today.

So we will move past that.

Next, we would normally do meeting minutes, but I apologize.

I still haven't gotten our meeting minutes drafted from January.

So those will be available along with this meeting's minutes at our next meeting.

So now we're going to move into the MPO documents.

Sure, so the Transportation Improvement Program, the TIP, is up on the website and it's up on the screen now.

We did have a public hearing in the March Policy Board meeting and we had a pretty lengthy discussion about some of the

Details of the programs that are in the TIP and since that it was updated and I added in some more descriptions to the blocks that kind of give more of a description of what the projects are.

So this is a four-year project.

It goes to 2024.

It lists out the projects.

It's kind of like the budget for what the state is going to be spending their money on for funding transportation projects.

It's up for review and comments.

And then I think that Jessica, this committee can make a recommendation to the policy board in the next week's policy board meeting.

We're gonna ask the policy board next week to approve it and make it official.

So just a quick jump in before we have any more discussion.

If we had quorum, we could make an official recommendation.

It could be something that you can vote on.

Without quorum, you guys can have a discussion about how you feel about the tip.

You can ask questions.

You can decide amongst yourselves that you have sort of a pseudo recommendation, although it wouldn't be official.

And Tristan or Stuart or I can share that recommendation with the policy board at their next meeting.

Is that?

There's probably a way.

All right.

It's kind of a dry document.

Oh, OK.

I'm the host now.

So let's see.

I don't think I can.

So if you just scroll up to the beginning of the tables.

So it's broken out into the VDOT road projects and then the two transit projects.

So these are the VDOT road projects here.

Just scroll to the beginning of these, Jessica.

So this is the cover kind of for the VDOT projects and it says how much that we're going to spend in each category and it also lists the funding sources and most of the funding is from the federal government so if you can scroll to the next page Jessica please

So these are the interstate projects.

So some of them are grouped together.

So this one is, oh, is microtransit is a new one this year.

And it's a innovation and technology transportation fund that is statewide.

So I think it's stuff like, you know,

Unfortunately, I don't know a lot about it, but I think it's like

Software and Technology to Reduce Congestion.

So measuring how many cars are on the road and then maybe doing congestion pricing and stuff like that.

It's kind of more looking into the future of transportation in that way.

It's run by the state, so it's not really kind of related to the MPO.

It's just a amount of money that every area is putting in to that project.

And then these primary projects after the interstate project are specific projects.

So you might recognize some of them.

Route 29 widening and corridor improvements was part of the Route 29 solutions project that has been going on for quite a while.

And that money is, they don't have like any money allocated in there.

So you could see like the FY 21, 22, 23, and 24, there's no money in there.

So there at the moment, this project's not funded.

We would like it to be funded, but we have to,

apply and try to find funding for it.

I think that we're working on one of the SMART SCALE application is going to address the 29 project and so hopefully we will get money to the tip and the state funding as well.

So like the next one is Rio Road grade separated and you can see that that one is funded for 2021.

Keep going, Jessica.

Let me see.

And then some of these, like this one here, it says in the MPO notes, it says

The project's been completed and they're just waiting for closed out.

So this was completed before 2021.

It was completed in the previous TIP.

So we're just trying to, we have to keep it in there until it's closed out.

It's just kind of a record thing.

Just a request real quick.

Let's see.

Yeah, so these are like landscaping and just some improvements to intersections.

Next page.

And then I guess we can go keep going to the transit projects.

So actually stop here.

So the project, these are groupings where they've grouped things together too.

And so this is a lot of bridge maintenance and stuff like that.

And that's just kind of like on a schedule and it just happens automatically the state.

besides what needs to be updated, they kind of have a list of what they need to do and it gets done.

So those are like the bridge and things like that and they're grouped together.

If you have a question about a specific bridge or maintenance item, you can ask me or Chuck from VDOT and I'll ask Chuck and we can find out more information about that.

and then scroll down to the transit projects.

So the transit is broken out by CAT and Jaunt.

So this here, this is good right here.

The transit summary lists the programs that they're funded through.

So FTA is the Federal Transit Administration, and these are all the different funds that are available.

And then it lists the amount that we expect to get in the next coming years.

Good question.

Sure.

In the last MPO meeting that I went to, we were discussing some options on 29 around, I think it was hydraulic.

Yeah, so it won't be reflected here because it's not funded yet, but they did decide to apply for a 29 project within the hydraulic intersection area.

grouping a bunch of them together as a SMART SCALE project.

So every two years, the state has money available.

It's $20,000 for the Culpeper District.

20 million, 20 million.

20 million for the Culpeper District.

So that's not very much money.

If you look on the MPO website, there's a smart scale workshop that we had that has a link to the 29 hydraulic project.

And that has more details about the project that they decided to go with.

They are, like I said, they combined a bunch of them together.

So, you know, they were considering doing an update

Okay, that's okay.

Chip, I just want to, I think this, SMART SCALE is on our agenda for later in the meeting.

Good, yeah, good.

I will say regarding the tip, if you'll look on page 24, there are two

Route 29 projects on there that one's $10 million and one is $8 million.

Those two are committed that should we be awarded the SMART SCALE projects this round, that $18 million will be contributed to those projects.

But that $18 million can only go to

the Route 29 and hydraulic improvements.

It can't be moved anywhere else.

Chip, do you have a sense if we did not get recommended funding in SMART SCALE if we'd still be able to immediately use that money to pay for some subset of the projects?

Any new projects have to go through SMART SCALE.

All right.

Do you want to go down to transit?

So and I guess, you know, then there's two sections where the next page just thinks.

So Cat, I added this summary here that kind of talks more about what Cat's planning to do in the next coming years.

Even though they're not expanding they want to increase their fleet because it takes a long time to get a bus and they need to plan ahead and replace older vehicles that are not going to be working anymore.

So we added that summary there and then if you scroll down

Jaunt added a bunch of stuff, explanations.

That's still CAT.

So this actually, this page here, they talk about they're replacing their revenue, their buses.

And then Jaunt added a little summary to their project, but then keep scrolling.

They

added in a bunch of descriptions here about the funding that they're seeking and why they're funding it.

Lucinda, one of the fairly sizable, I mean it's not huge, but it's still sizable, but very important.

CAT has in the tip new rider counting mechanisms, technology.

They have for quite a while not been able to calculate their ridership very well.

because of faulty equipment, the wrong equipment, something.

And so the Department of Rail and Public Transportation has agreed to fund new ride counters for all of CAT's buses.

We attempted about two years ago to produce monthly ridership reports for CAT and Jaunt.

and their numbers were so far off.

I mean, there would be 30,000 ridership variances just on the free trolley alone.

The comment is that I think that the jaunt is so much stronger

than the CAT in the way it's presented.

It's staggering how much clearer it is with what they're asking for.

I don't know whether that has any bearing on what will ultimately happen, but just a comment.

And then the second one is kind of building on Chip's point, and that is, do we have any sense of what's going to happen to how the counts

Well, currently, and it could not have come at a worse time,

This year was the first year that the state has begun to really base a transit systems grants on their ridership numbers.

hats was already decreasing to a point

that DRPT funded the difference.

CAT would have lost money from their previous year's funding, but the state filled that gap for the current year, knowing that it would be really hard for a system to lose money, lose revenue sources.

It's kind of really up and nobody knows next year because all the systems will be so far below what their ridership quotas were.

Whether DRPT will honor the current regulations or whether they'll give some type of a waiver.

But of course the other part of it is with the state budget being lower than what it normally is,

They're going to be looking to cut funds, too.

Yes.

You've got, I mean, I think the last numbers I heard, CAT was down 60% or more.

Nationally, one of the numbers that's scary for me is that with a national survey, 57% of the people who routinely ride public transportation have said they will not ride public transportation as the COVID wears on.

They don't want to be with large numbers of people in a contained space.

Yes.

Luckily, both Jaunt and CAT have received very close to one year's operating

funds through the CARES Act, the supplements from the federal government.

I think CATS was in the neighborhood of $7 million, and Jaunt was over $3 million.

So that's going to make a huge impact and benefit to the two systems while they're going through this transition.

And I'll just let you guys all be aware that this will be discussed at the RTP meeting coming up next week, Thursday.

Yeah, I'd definitely like to hear that.

Great.

No.

So the TIP does get amended and updated as the state reallocates funds to projects.

Great, thanks Lucinda.

So this is Stuart.

Hopefully it's final.

It's not approved by the policy board, so it could change.

If people have comments or questions and asked to make a change, it could change.

Any other questions?

Does anyone want to make a recommendation?

Jessica, I think our bylaws say that any recommendations would come from the individual members, like as a group.

A group could still be considered a vote, but

Okay.

So Chip, would that leave us in a position where individual members need to email the policy board to state their position?

I would say the easiest way would be to email you and let you just put them together.

Okay.

So the policy board meeting as noted on the agenda is coming up.

Oh, wait, do I have this right Lucinda?

It's May 27th.

So I'll amend this and I'll include it in my email that reminds you guys about the RTP meeting.

Sounds good.

All right.

Any other questions, concerns regarding the tip?

All right.

Thanks.

I'm going to pull it up on my computer.

I'll just be very good about letting you know where I am in the document so you can roll on, Jessica, if that works for you.

Sure.

So basically, every year when we get funding from the FTA and FHWA, which is filtered down through the state organizations of VDOT and DRPT, one of the things we're required to do is create a work program about what we're going to be doing with that planning money.

And so this document basically goes through our plans for projects and cost allocations, how our time is going to be utilized,

and what this MPO money is going to be funding.

There's a whole process involved in putting this plan together.

We have submitted it both to VDOT and DRPT for an initial review.

So they've already received it and it meets their criteria.

And then there's a process that we go through to let the various MPO committees review it and then the MPO Policy Board

Holds a public hearing on it, which is also scheduled for next month.

And

and they officially adapt it.

Again, just like the tip, this is our best guess on where we think that the allocation is gonna go.

It's very possible that through this process, we're going to end up realizing some projects are gonna be more work than others or something might come up that's not on our radar right now that ends up being a really big priority.

And so there's a process where we can have another public hearing to amend the document if we need to,

So the first couple pages of the Unified Planning Work Program are background information, its purpose, you know, what the MPO is, the requirements that it's supposed to reference, that kind of thing.

What goes into the work program, the kinds of things we're supposed to consider.

This is pretty boilerplate, but if you haven't, if you don't know much about the MPO and about the

The types of things that we do, this was really good background information to get sort of a broad understanding and what all these different documents are.

On the bottom of page six, I do want to mention that one of the things that is included in

And like the MPO guiding documents is a public participation plan.

And we're also required to have a Title VI plan.

And I just want to mention that because we are going to discuss strengthening our public participation plan here in a little bit.

But it is important to note that we do have a plan to make sure that we consider and

You know, not just check the boxes, but really strive to make sure that we are being inclusive in our planning efforts.

So if you go down to the next page, which is page seven, the top of it says funding.

That just explains where our funding sources come from.

10% local funds, 10% state funds, 80% federal funds.

So the MPO includes the city of Charlottesville and the urbanized portions of Albemarle County.

Every locality in our planning district contributes based on their population into a fund to support the PDC.

And so there's an equation that we go through and that's what provides the local fund match for the federal and state funds that we receive.

If you scroll down to the bottom of that page where it has the program funding by source, you'll see that we've broken it up into how much we receive

through the PL, that's the VDOT money.

FTA is the DRPT money, so that's for the transit projects.

And then at the bottom, it has that total, and that's for our work.

And then there's the VDOT money, and that's basically to support the work that VDOT staff puts in to support our programming.

And then there are three main categories.

You'll see the funding by task in that table right below.

There are three main categories that we break all our tasks up into.

Task one is administration, so things like meeting management, making sure the website is updated, making sure that we process all the documents that we're supposed to, that we put this plan together, that we

in our staffing committees, that kind of thing.

Task two is the long range planning.

So that's things like the long range transportation plan, any sort of like bigger scale project we put in that.

And then task three is a short range planning.

So we'll go through what we're including in those tasks, but that's the general breakdown.

And it shows our funding allocation based on this proposed work program in each of those areas.

So if you scroll down, there's just a page about the projects that we've worked on this past fiscal year, the coordination of the Route 29 solutions.

We've been doing a lot with SMART SCALE.

We had some really good public engagement.

We've been doing a lot with some bicycle corridor evaluation that's been sort of incorporated into SMART SCALE, but there are some additional efforts that have been underway there.

Regional Transit Planning, that is the work that we do to support the Regional Transit Partnership, as well as other aspects of what we do related to transit planning, including cooperation with the planning districts out in Waynesboro.

And then the tip, which Lucinda just covered, performance measures.

We talked about that.

I'll talk about those again.

here shortly, and then the Regional Transportation Revenue Study.

This was a project where we were evaluating what other areas Lucinda was working on this to determine other areas of the state to determine what opportunities there might exist to increase the types of revenue and revenue sources to fund transportation projects in our area.

There's a lot of background research being done and then the

the General Assembly passed some new laws that would increase the gas tax revenue that was being collected and then we got hit by a global health crisis.

So that project is we're just trying to get what's already been done to a point where we can formally kind of wrap it up for now pending

additional information that comes as we work through our response to COVID-19, what that might do to change our budget, what that might do to change people's travel behaviors, that kind of thing.

There's sort of a lot that's up in the air right now.

So we're going to take what we have, put a cap on it, and sort of have that to come back to when we're in a position where

That makes sense.

So that's what we just finished.

So then we'll get into, if you go down to the next page, just the administrative tasks.

These are pretty normal.

Every year we do this, these all are always are in the documents, just things that we have to do.

You know, complying with regulations, making sure that we submit the documents, making sure that we're invoicing.

That's A.

BEA committees, staffing, that's what pays for Jessica and Lucinda and Chip and me to show up to these meetings.

Information sharing, that's maintaining the website, attending webinars and seminars with both

The Crushed Jurisdictional Communication covers this as well both with localities in our area and also with other MPOs across the state and VDOT and that kind of thing just to help make sure that we all know what we need to know to continue to service the organization.

And then public participation has been a really important one, especially as we've been talking about

Changing the way we do outreach in light of the pandemic when we can't have physical meetings, you know, the standard was kind of you have two hours in a room and you put a notice in the newspaper and whoever shows up that checks your public engagement requirement.

And really that's not, while that standard and that technically meets the requirements for a lot of

What we have to do, we found out through the SMART SCALE webinars that there are a lot more opportunities with the virtual meeting that makes it more accessible to a lot of people.

We had 64 and 74 on the two meetings, respectively, I think.

So there was really great turnout.

We had really good engagement.

And the other thing we really want to make sure that we do is that we are

Meaningfully engaging.

and making sure that the needs, and I know this group has highlighted this as a major concern, highlighting the needs and making sure that those needs are considered in more traditionally underserved communities.

And so we really want to look at how we're disseminating information, building relationships and contact lists with organizations and agencies that work with or in neighborhoods that

that have contact with minority groups, people with disabilities, low-income households, that kind of thing.

And so that's something that we're going to update our public participation plan to make sure that that is covered a little bit more effectively, but we're also going to spend some time looking at our practices in addition to see what we can do to improve in that area.

And then F, online resources.

That's just sort of the maintenance of the website, making sure that we have ways for the public to access that and that information gets shared.

So before I move on, are there any questions or comments on the administration part of it?

Just wanted to give a little break.

As far as the long-range planning, we talked about a couple of different projects.

One of the things is that as we've been learning as we go, because we have a lot of new staff members, we realized that there's a really good opportunity to make information more digestible and accessible to people.

by simplifying the way that it's presented so that you don't have to go to a highly technical document to be able to understand what the purpose of some of these programs are.

So we have funding allocated to develop the series of what we're calling 101 primers or one-pagers.

And the idea is that these will be a series of just informational documents that are about a page that

at a very high level provide background information on the various programs.

So if you're new to a committee or if you're trying to explain what a performance measure is or what a tip is or something like that, there will be a document that summarizes what it is, why we do it, why it's required, that kind of thing to just make it a really easy entry point for people to understand what it is that

what the purpose of this effort is and how it's useful and what it's used for and hopefully provide, reduce a barrier to engagement by simplifying and making it just really just easy to glance over and access versus you know words in a long document at the beginning of a page where you have to sort of brace yourself to kind of go through something that you feel is going to be a little bit more technical

It was very clear that we needed to do a better job of communicating safety performance measures.

And there are other performance measures that we have to provide updates on regularly as well.

And so we wanted to include money in the budget to spend some time really diving into the purpose of these measures, what the implications are for meeting the measures or not meeting the measures.

Why they're important, how they're used, that kind of thing.

And so we set aside a significant portion of funding to be able to conduct this analysis so that the next time this comes around, we'll be able to communicate and share that information.

We heard you all loud and clear that it was confusing and we didn't understand why.

We were just going along with the state and that kind of thing.

So we really want to spend some time so that we can answer those questions more, I guess.

Satisfactorily in the future.

Jessica is going to be working on doing some bike and pedestrian counts, working with VDOT to create some, to use some innovative technologies like counters and things like that, but also coordinating hopefully with a volunteer basis to get additional information.

And then if you go down to D, this is another one that was really important is equity and transportation.

We really wanted to spend some time thinking about what factors do we need to consider and identify which communities are most likely to be disengaged and overlooked in the planning process.

And so some of the things we want to think about are, you know, what are the criteria that would establish somebody as living in a community that is largely underserved?

Is it income level?

Is it race?

Is it not a native English speaker?

Those kinds of things.

So we'll be spending some time and you all will probably be enlisted to help us develop what that criteria is.

And then we'll start overlaying all these additional criteria to see which areas have more than one of these factors and start building sort of a map to help us show where we really need to make sure that we're being really intentional about including those communities in our planning process, especially when projects are likely to impact them or be in close proximity.

There's money in the budget to support regional transit aerial planning that supports the RTP largely.

You know that we want to assist with with John and the transition from Greene County to John, which would have connections with Albemarle County.

We're doing work to hopefully get some additional funding to support the planning process for the Amtrak station in Charlottesville.

And then there are some other various intercity projects that we're supporting.

We also put in some money for an electric vehicle charging station needs assessment.

So as electric vehicles take up more and more of the market share

We want to start working on identifying where the charging stations are and where the gaps are so we can start trying to identify places where there might be opportunities to support that infrastructure.

And then the last one under long range is the Route 29 North Corridor Study.

And this would be a combination of urban and rural funding to help support

Improving transportation patterns through northern Albemarle County and into Greene County and making sure that that's a coordinated effort.

So then just real quickly, the short range projects are, a lot of it is just continuing to work on improving the transportation improvement program.

Lucinda did a really great job of adding in some of those additional notes to make it a little bit more accessible to explain what those projects are and what the funding will cover.

So that was really helpful.

It makes it, I think, a little bit easier to follow if you're not familiar with it, or even if you are.

Short range project planning, this is mostly going to be supporting the finalization of the SMART SCALE applications, but we also use this to attend quarterly meetings with VDOT and the other NPOs, which are just topical, you know, as needs are, that's a good opportunity to sort of stay up to date on changes and regulations and policies and reporting.

Travel demand management that helps support ride share,

Regional Transit Partnership we talked about already.

And then just we have general funding for on-call services.

So Albemarle or Charlottesville called us and they need something.

Yeah, I think one of the things we put in the Rideshare Work Program actually was to look at that there is a separate grant opportunity specifically for telework coordination or not telework, but

employer outreach programs.

And so one of the things we'll be looking at is can we secure, can we find additional funding to support those programs?

Rideshare itself, Jessica can tell you better than I can, but Rideshare itself is very specific about what you can use those funds for.

So anything outside of those very, very, very specific guidelines, we have to fund through a different way.

So this would help support

I think you will see a lot of promoting work from home in the next few months.

You'll see a lot less with the ride share type of promotions

Do you all have any other questions?

So this is scheduled for a public hearing with the MPA Policy Board next Wednesday at the May 27 meeting.

Hopefully, they'll be at a point where they can adopt it at that point.

And this will formally become what we work on for the next year.

So Chip and Sandy, correct me if I'm wrong, but CTAC again can make a recommendation regarding the UPWP and would that also be done like on an individual member basis?

Great.

So feel free to ask Sandy any other questions you have right now, but also if you have additional questions that come up later or you would like to make a personal recommendation as a CTAC member,

Please feel free to email me.

And again, I will send out an email reminding you of the upcoming May 27th meeting.

So just get me your recommendation by about noon that day.

If I could just make a quick comment.

Yes, please do.

Some of these in past years, I just want to applaud you all.

I think that both in terms of clarity of presentation and in terms of content and trying to sort of spread beyond

the norm.

I realize these are unusual times and that they may not be as successful as we would hope.

Because of that, we have no idea what the variables are.

But I think these, as I reviewed them earlier, look like two quite handsome documents.

Thanks, Tim.

All right, if there aren't any other questions or comments, we'll move on to SMART SCALE updates.

We are going to probably go over what I had initially hoped would be a one hour meeting.

However, typically these meetings go until 8.30.

So I think if you have to bow out early, please feel free to do that.

We can't make any official votes anyway.

But for those of you who can stick around, we will continue with the conversation

about SMART SCALE and then really briefly on membership.

So SMART SCALE, Chuck, did I see you are on this call?

Sure.

This is Chuck Proctor.

I'm the co-prepared district planning manager and the SMART SCALE point of contact.

We submitted 42 applications across the district.

I think the MPO and the Albemarle County and the City of Charlottesville and the PDC each submitted four applications each and they've all been received and I've done the initial validation on all of them and they're proceeded to central office for the final review and validation so we should be getting their response back probably next week at the latest

and then we can start developing the final applications for submission in August.

We had a meeting, I guess the MPO and the Albemarle County and the city and the TJPDC had a public meeting last week on Wednesday and Thursday where they presented all of the projects for public input and Lucinda can probably fill you in on some of the details but we got a lot of comments back on the

projects.

And we're going to go through the process of reviewing those and providing some answers to all the comments.

So more to come on that.

We could go through the individual projects, but unless there's some specific questions about some of the projects, we can move on.

I would love to if you guys have time.

I'm going to try to share my screen and see if I can, yeah.

And I'll show you guys a page on our website that I think might be really helpful in looking at the projects that we submitted.

So as I said before, through SMART SCALE, every two years we can apply for the funding.

It's $20 million.

And so we did a workshop last week.

It was broken out into two different sessions, Wednesday and Thursday night.

And there's a total of 16 projects that we can submit, like 16 slots for proposals from our area, from the MPO area.

So we did the MPO and the TJPDC projects first.

Each entity can have four, there's four slots for the MPO, there's four slots for TJPDC, there's four slots for the City of Charlottesville, and there's four slots for Albemarle County.

So we did eight on Wednesday night and eight on Thursday night and you can see on this webpage there's a link to the recordings from the sessions and Chuck and representatives from the city and county and Jessica all

did presentations and went through each project.

So these proposals are like a pre-proposal submission and the final submissions won't be submitted until August.

So currently we're having an open comment session

where people can provide comments and here you can see on the screen of how you can provide comments on the different proposals.

It's going to be open, the comment period is going to be open until the end of May and we had a tremendous response for the sessions.

We had, as Sandy said, 64 on the first night and 74 on the second night and

On the website, there's a table with links to each project.

So we've received over 100 comments and questions so far.

We're going to combine them all together, kind of put them into categories, and then have general answers to the questions and post that on the website after the

the comment period is closed so it won't be until the first or second week in June that that'll be out it'll summarize kind of the feedback that we got so if you click on these links and I'm going to click on one that's been it's received a lot of comments so so if you each link you can click on and it'll open up a page that Nick created Nick was kind enough to make these really nice pages for us that

show a map of the project and kind of what's proposed for it.

And then there's a short description.

The cost estimates are really rough because this is just a pre-submission.

They haven't worked everything out yet.

So costs are going to change.

TJPDC is submitting this one on behalf of the county.

So that would be the you if you had comments you send them to me at Sandy at TJPDC and then we have a section here where you can provide a comment and you know submit it they don't get posted immediately because we screen them and then here's the comments you can read the comments that other people have submitted so

We're collecting comments via phone, email.

I think CTAC specific input would be better, more influential.

I don't know if Sandy or Jessica have any other

I have a question.

Go ahead.

As a Planning Commissioner, even though I don't know that it's really going to have any bearing as an Albemarle County Planning Commissioner,

I'm receiving a great deal of comments, both pro and con, for the Route 20 shared use path.

And I have a question for Chuck.

10 years ago, I don't think something like this would have even been considered by FHWA and the crash zone standards and those sorts of things.

And I applaud the flexibility in highway design that's occurred

over the last 25 years.

Yeah, we're taking that into consideration.

And we're installing curb on that entire section of road.

Right now, it's an open ditch section.

So as part of the project, we would be raising the median as opposed to having a lower depressed median.

And we'll have to work with the tree groups and the Journey to Hallowed Ground folks to make sure we can be responsible about the vegetation and the trees and make sure those are taken care of appropriately.

if the project is funded and moved forward.

So I know that Jessica is working with them through the committee, bike ped committee, and trying to, as that process, if it's funded, moves forward, we'll bring them into the discussion and work with them as much as we can to preserve as much of that, relocate it, replant, whatever we need to do to try to preserve

The aesthetics of that area as much as possible.

But I mean, we're limited as to where we can put the facility along that corridor.

The median was one of the options because you don't have to cross bikes and pedestrians across a free flow interchange ramp, which is that's going to create more problems than what this would create.

So that's why we ended up opting for this

Depends on the cost.

The part of it is, I know originally we were looking at using existing southbound Route 20 bridge to cross the road because we got it restricted down to one lane.

But in evaluating the structure, we're going to have to redo the deck and to end up putting the barrier across that bridge.

So we're looking at options and we're finding it's probably going to be cheaper to put a new bridge between the two bridges and run it straight up the median all the way as opposed to transitioning out into the road and then back onto the median.

So those are some of the options we're looking at right now.

Thank you.

But those are going to be costly items.

Yes, that's the project we're talking about.

Is there any way in which we could learn how we might avoid cutting down all the recently planted trees?

That is a big concern raised by many, many people in the community and many of the groups that work to get those trees planted.

So we are trying to work with them to see what options we have to preserve the trees,

Is there a standard width for this path that we're looking at that we're having to follow that would require... We're looking at a 10-foot path with 2-foot shoulders, so basically a 14-feet wide area.

It can be reduced.

We can go down to eight feet, but we want to try to make it as pleasant and comfortable trail for all the users to utilize.

And would there be any appreciable difference in the impact on that greenery that people are providing so many comments on?

Yes, we haven't really gotten into that part of it yet.

We may be able even to meander it through.

We're just not at that stage in the detail of the design.

And that's something that if we get funded, we can work through going forward.

We do have the bridge piers on 64 that are in the middle of the median that we're going to have to go around also.

So we'll just have to work, if we can get it funded, we'll work through those items with the community to come up with a concept that's going to be hopefully acceptable to everybody.

Cool.

I just wanted to ask, for the hydraulic 29 package, is the $18 million the leftover plan to all be applied to that one project to bring the cost down to, I guess it'd be $6 million or so?

Or is that kind of split up?

That was the consensus, and that's what we were planning to do.

I haven't heard otherwise.

So I know they did submit the Hillsdale South project too.

And we're actually working on those final estimates now for those projects.

So we should have something more finalized on those in the next couple of weeks.

I also, we got the initial results of the VISM analysis and with the simulations.

So we're going to be

Not to belabor you with any more questions, but on the Hillsdale Drive South extension and with the roundabouts, I heard that during the one meeting I went to for MPO a month or two ago before all COVID hit,

There was questions about how we could have something that would interrupt the flow that would allow those roundabouts to occur.

I believe that there was questions about that.

When we did the analysis, there was some software.

When I followed up with Baker, the consultant that did the roundabout analysis,

They were using the 2010 software as opposed to the HCM6 software.

When we revised the analysis, it actually ended up working fine compared to the signal.

And we didn't have that problem.

In the final presentation or the 20, I guess the third, second presentation, it shows the results of that analysis, which is much better than the original, than the first analysis that was done.

work through most of those issues that we originally had.

We've also modified the concept to try to shrink the footprint a little bit from what it was initially proposed in the initial last round of SMART SCALE to where it fits in that space a little bit better and has less right-of-way impacts.

So hopefully right now we've got a good concept that's going to work well for the area and

Any other questions about the process or any of the projects or how any other questions about the public meetings that we had?

Okay, so as we discussed if you have any comments that you want to make on any of the projects just as

yourself, you can go ahead and make those comments directly on the web page that Lucinda showed you.

OK. And Jessica, do you want to show them the projects from the 14th as well?

I don't know.

They might have comments about those.

And I can talk to them since Kevin's not available.

Lucinda, you're still sharing your screen.

Can you move us to the city and county projects page?

Yeah, sure.

Here's the city and county projects.

So if anyone had any questions about these projects, Chuck is offering to answer some questions right now.

A very quick question about the Belmont Bridge.

A little bit.

I know something about it.

The East project, it's High Street East project, goes from 9th Street around to 10th Street, I think.

And Belmont Bridge basically ties into it.

I know that the High Street project is doing a lane reduction, a road diet, so to speak, for that facility.

and adding bike and pedestrian facilities.

It's going to be one lane in each direction with a center turn lane at some of the intersections and bike and bike lanes and then I think wider sidewalk on the east side.

And I think the Belmont Bridge project is they're looking at doing a similar type of project and reducing the width of the bridge to provide the additional

bike and pedestrian, better bike and pedestrian accommodations across the bridge.

So they should marry up nicely.

I don't know specifically, because I haven't seen the plans on either project recently.

So I don't know exactly all of the details.

No.

Well, yes, partially.

No, what I'm interested in from a regional vehicle movement standpoint is actually the 250 East

East of Pantops.

And I've seen startup dates for that and the Belmont Bridge at about the same time.

Because we had so much commuting traffic from the south on Route 20 and from the east of Blue Manor that goes over to 64 and then 250, I'm concerned about what kind of congestion issues we might have

in that greater Belmont, Woolen Mills area from how vehicles are going to try to find their way through.

OK, that's a separate.

Yeah, I understand what you're, he's referring to the DDI project conversion at Shadwell.

Is the project, I guess they're going about the same time because they've got

In with design builds they're doing all as a package project where the Belmont Bridge is a regular design bid build and it's actually getting ready to go to advertisement or is it just been awarded I don't know all the details but I'm not sure how that's all going to be managed I know we're not planning to close or restrict any of the lanes with regards to the DDI similar to the DDI conversion that was done at Zion's Crossroads

They maintained all of the lanes for the traffic in all the directions all the time.

So we're going to end up doing the same thing at that location for that project.

Tim, if I might.

Or Chuck, if I might just chime in, because I had those same concerns, Tim, and asked the project manager, Chuck, I can't remember who... Kyle Jones was managing it, but I don't know...

It was, yeah, it was him.

yeah who underneath him is actually overseeing it yeah it was a conversation but but the project manager was there and he confirmed that both of those right now were scheduled to be under construction at the same time and he confirmed what Chuck said is that the intent is to keep all of the lanes of 250 open but my concern is even everybody knows once you put orange cones and barrels out

You start to get a slowdown of traffic, and I believe it's going to have a major impact on Fifth Street coming into town.

I don't know.

I can't really answer that question.

I mean, we're going to do what we can do to keep the traffic moving.

Part of the problem with Pantops is it's not necessarily the interchange as much as it is 250 itself.

You've got 250 east of there.

You've got two, three two-lane roads dumping into one two-lane road.

So that backs it up from Shadwell all the way to the interchange.

And then at the interchange, you've got the interstate and the people coming in 250 all merging together.

So from there in, it's always congested.

And it's been that way for a significant amount of time.

You're right.

I think some of them may shift over to 5th Street.

from Route 20, but I don't necessarily think you're going to have people from Pan Top shifting over, but definitely from Route 20.

Although to get to Belmont Bridge, you've got a two lane road on Monticello Avenue that goes up to Avon Street where you make the right to go across Belmont Bridge.

That's still got some capacity constraints.

So you can't really get as much volume to Belmont that you're going to lose.

It just depends on how much lane restrictions they put on Belmont Bridge.

But they should maintain one lane of traffic in each direction all the time.

All right, any other questions, comments?

OK.

The last thing I want to talk about, we cannot vote on, but I just want to put the idea in your heads.

Membership.

So right now, membership for CTAC is on a rolling basis.

So you get appointed from either the city, the county, or the MPO.

And then you are in your position for three years from that date.

That means that we have people starting and stopping their terms all over the place and it's been really difficult to keep track of.

I really appreciate all of you giving me all the information that you did indicating

When you were appointed and when your term ends because that was information that we didn't have all in one place as staff transitions happened.

But even so, now that we have all the information in one place, it's still a tricky thing to manage.

And it just means that we're constantly on the lookout for new members.

We're constantly introducing new people to

how CTAC works and all that stuff and it is still hard to manage.

So what I'd really like this committee to consider is moving everyone over to a single start date and for their term because it would just make it a lot easier to manage moving forward.

So in order to do that, that's something that we would have to have, according to our bylaws, a two thirds vote in favor of

because it would be changing our bylaws.

So it's something at this point to just think about.

And I will make sure to add it to our agenda for our next meeting, hopefully when we'll have enough people there to make a decision on that with a formal vote.

But did anyone have any initial questions on that?

Again, the issue of the appointees

that are representing different bodies, you'll have to coordinate the dates and it won't be able to be a three-year run if it's an Albemarle County Planning Commissioner because of the elections and people filling out other people's terms.

OK, so we'll definitely look

Yeah, sorry, I wasn't really clear on that.

But yeah, I would just like to have, yeah, perhaps it's January.

We know that that is a start and end date for folks as opposed to just being random throughout the year.

But we don't need everyone to, we wouldn't necessarily have everyone start like three years from tomorrow and go for that.

I do think with Tim's comment, he's right.

Not arguing to choose a constant date to begin.

I think it would probably have to be like a February or March date because like an Albemarle new

Board of Supervisor members get appointed, they may appoint a Planning Commission member who would then be represented on this board.

Will they make those changes after January 1st?

And technically, those that are continuing on, we can't continue on.

We have set dates that end at the end of December.

after those elections.

And so, as you know, there's often, as Chip has just said, a month or two hiatus between appointments.

Again, that's only happening every two years because the staggering of supervisor elections every two years.

So I think right now I'm looking at the website.

We've got four vacancies.

Yes.

So we have four vacancies, sort of.

One thing I'll clarify is that according to our bylaws, if you are a CTAC member and your term expires, you actually can continue to serve as a voting member of CTAC until your seat is replaced.

So if your term has ended and you

and you still want to participate, you can as the voting member until we find someone new.

Unless you're appointed by the city or county, then it's the appointing body.

So that's something we should talk about a little.

No, no, no, no.

I mean, it's just, these are all those little, just in small details that we just have to consider in this kind of a change.

I think it's really good too.

I just, you need to realize that those two positions when they are

Those individuals are not going to, on their own, be able to make the decision to continue.

Great.

So it sounds like we have some really knowledgeable folks who can help us work out these details.

So I'm looking forward to doing that with you guys next meeting.

All right.

Any other questions, concerns?

We don't have any members of the public, so we don't need to finish with that.

All right, we're all set.

Thank you for sticking around, guys.

Thank you for attending our meeting.

And I will follow up with an email with all of those requests for recommendations that I'm hoping to receive from all of you.

Thank you.

Thank you.