Regional Transit Partnership (2017-2025) Meeting   4/24/2025

So can I start now?

Yes.

So Katy, could you unmute and tell us where you're located and your reason for electronic participation?

Yeah, I am located in Richmond, Virginia, and I just got back from this afternoon from Northern Virginia from the National RTAP review board meeting, so I wasn't going to be able to make it to Charlottesville in time.

Yes.

Councillor Pinkston?

Yes.

Supervisor Pruitt?

Aye.

Miss Miller?

Aye.

Director, Pohopow School.

Would you introduce yourself and just tell everybody what organization you represent.

I am with the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation.

And I want to swing around to our left.

Christine Jacobs is a good record, Thomas Jacks.

Mike, you have a new person here today for the first time.

Yeah, I think we'll pass to you.

I've been on the job for 400 years.

And he is filling the urban jaunt slot that's just outside the city and professionally brings some additional transit knowledge based on his role at Coronavirus.

Nick, can you introduce yourself and you can tell us a little bit about yourself?

Well, welcome aboard.

Thanks for being on.

Scott Silsdorf, Director of Parking and Transportation at the VA, Jamie Gellner, Albemarle County Public Schools, Mike Pruitt, Albemarle County City Council, Brian Pinkston, Charlottesville City Council, Diantha McKeel, Almon County Board of Supervisors, Natalie Oschrin, Charlottesville City Council, Ben Chambers, Transportation Planning Manager for City of Charlottesville, Peter Thompson, Charlottesville Area Alliance, Peter Krebs, the Piedmont Environmental Council,

Devin Thompson, Transit Program Manager at Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission Taylor Jenkins, Director of Transportation at TJPDC Lucinda Shannon, Senior Regional Planner at TJPDC, and I staff this committee.

And Dr. Jen Thomas with TJPDC.

Jen Fleischer, Brewer's Health District.

Claire McInberg, General Planner.

So hearing no concerns about the agenda, I would entertain a motion to approve the agenda.

Councilor Pinkston?

Yes.

Yes.

We have a little girl here.

Now they make a second.

All right, Elizabeth, you want to call the vote?

Counselor Pinkston?

Yes.

Supervisor Pruitt?

Aye.

And Director Poposki?

So we have minutes for matters from the public.

We don't have anybody from the public.

We just can't, Randy just came in, so Randy, as you're finding a place that you can use your

I'm the rural representative for John.

We need to go to the chair of the place that you're taking us.

This is the place to be.

but anyway, it's all good.

She's been so wonderful.

Lucinda, do you want me to come out there?

No, I can do it from there because then people can hear you.

That's fine.

Can you hear us all live?

Can you hear us all live?

I can hear you guys.

Okay.

Sorry.

This is the Charlottesville transit plan.

So as I mentioned, we're going to be on track for a very tight turnaround to try to get into an omnibus bill.

So that's what that's going to look like very soon.

So there's going to be some back and forth in that discussion over the next few months, but the key

Have we started speaking with our delegates and our state senator?

Not with them directly, but we were speaking with legislative age folks.

It would help, I think, inform this process.

We're still figuring out what that means because we've never had a

So why don't we take an opportunity, you want to just tell us a little bit about yourself and where you're from?

This is my first time living in Virginia, so I'm excited to be here both learning professionally and learning the area, as her husband.

And you are from a university, are you?

Yes.

So I've seen a lot of similarities with the two-year-old relationship, ABA, Conner, I've already mentioned, the UGA, and Charlottesville.

That's one thing you'll have to figure out, but anyway.

So she's a member of the NES department

She's taken in a lot, learning a lot of transit stuff that sort of feels like second nature to us, but it's a brand new experience for her, so it's great.

Let everybody know where a cat is actually located because there may be some people in this room who do not know where a cat is located.

It's just south of the city on Avon Street.

We like your houses.

Our school bus lot is right next to that as is our

How does microcad, the timing for microcad, and I'm looking at Garland who's nodding his head, so Albemarle County has

So the number of this year for the second year, you would have the start of the third year option.

I just want to make sure that that's included in some of the discussions that you all have over the next year, right?

That's part of the discussion that we will all have over the next year.

No, it was the person that we had, Danny Plummer from the Virginia Dream Business and he said to expect the General Assembly session, remember Brian, this next session, to be transportation heavy.

I've heard that from other sources.

That's the plan.

Yes, money.

Yes, I just couldn't remember the timing in my head, that's all.

I think there's a decision that we make.

Questions for Ben?

All right, thank you.

She is from the Central Shenandoah Plating District Commission, and I found out she was a 9-1-1 down stand.

My co-worker Danielle did an amazing job pulling all this together.

Do you want folks to interrupt you with questions?

Need any other additional information?

Is it Stanton?

But it's managed by us, by the CSPDC.

Is it the SAWPDC?

We do not follow the multiple.

Maybe it's in the report and it's above I didn't see but have you all done the math about how much like to numeritize how much people save like in terms of the air and air it could be numeritized.

We did it based on just those respondents who were actively logging their trips.

But how much you're not spending is something that nobody ever hears.

So these are not electric.

flat distances because once you get onto a hill, it's a hard one.

As an EV owner, I will say it's really exciting to watch your state of charge actually increase without going down.

We let the big guys handle that, but I don't know that we have a pier that would even be going across a mountain, like after a mountain to duplicate what they would be doing.

It's a very different kind of like, it's much shorter run, but they're using EVs, but they've had some different difficulties with those.

It's a pretty good test if you want to tow it back.

We had those original figures and then we applied for chips and that has been decreased, well incrementally, a few years ago.

And we want to take this time to specifically thank Scott and the University of Michigan.

We've got everybody else, walkers, bicyclists, cab riders, who have not only not had to pay to ride, but have been bossed or parked a car, but they've then also gotten this extra incentive.

Or like a static that big?

So would you explain Scott to us, you referenced they gave up something, and I didn't understand quite what it was.

I probably should bring Patrick in here and do a nice update.

In fact, he owes me a report due tomorrow for an Obama Commute update since we've been launched for about six months.

So that's what you're giving out, but then knowing that not everybody can ride transit or walk every single day, we allow them to buy a daily parking permit, but only in a commuter parking, so a JPJ.

Yes.

So they have a brand new road crossing way that cuts through there as well.

Thanks.

just to Crozet and then we could, you know, it's like connecting the routes so we can get people into the city and Albemarle County more often by combining our efforts.

That would be a great connection.

But is this open to everyone, not just commuters?

while you wait for the next bus that comes across because there is that gap because it is for commuters but if you can make the schedule work beyond community needs.

Has that been a barrier for you at all or have you been around every time?

We do have a little bit of a leeway with those workers that are having their own means of transportation when we're able to telework, so we're a little bit more vigilant on calling back service.

To reserve a spot, can you just show up?

So yeah, you just show up to the bus stop and board the bus.

You're not reserving.

How do you manage, like is there ever like too many people?

Only 30 minutes, I can go get a coffee while I'm here for the next class.

And then yeah, is it like a card?

And you can get a change?

There you go, okay.

No, I did not say they're between about 28 passengers, 30, 32.

Mobility devices?

Yes, all of them are accessible, all buses.

How many mobility devices could you accommodate on a given trip?

Thank you for that.

Yes, and always feel free to email me if you need any additional information.

So for the Charlottesville to Shenandoah Valley commuters, the stand crossing seems kind of in the middle of nowhere.

Thanks.

What are the accommodations that they can tap into?

So we do have that program in place.

You're going to give us an update on the regional transit authority.

Did I miss anything else that we're working on for Christine?

Other than that, are there any other questions?

speaking as a representative of a nonvoting member who will still want to have a voice in things, but understanding this is a different organization, it may not be appropriate to be sitting at the table like I am right now, but curious what the process might be.

It seemed that UVA was the most obvious one to bring to the table as a partner, just being the largest regional employer and also a major destination for people in the region.

Those are recorded, right?

There's a Carter page, yeah.

So I'm just making sure that everybody is aware.

Now that we're going to be going every other month, we can also move them into here.

I was just saying that I just want to make sure people knew that they can't get in that door.

It will be a much leaner organization.

But we do have some committees that people could be tapped to serve on.

And we are talking through how to bring an amendment to the bylaws so that that's easier for us to fill those committees.

Any other comments or questions?

They're really great to work with.

And Jamie, you are first on the list at Clark County Public Schools.

So, that's something.

So, thank you for that.

Any questions for Jamie?

What is the software that you're switching from and what are you switching to?

But it's the same software company.

And Scott, UTS.

And so you've probably seen them if you've been on 250.

That's correct, yes.

I'm not much on social media, but follow UTS on Instagram.

I was told, and I haven't been able to verify this, but I was told that that was the highest

So yeah, everybody's looking at it, everybody's enjoying it.

As someone who represents a learning room,

We still haven't wrapped them, notice they're still plain white, but we intend as soon as we can agree on what they should look like, get them wrapped, but we're not holding back on putting them into service.

All right, any other questions for Scott?

I know Kat did that when we got our new buses and it kind of highlighted, hey,

That part of it is actively being worked on by our senior project manager, Ms. Bruce White.

We have what we believe are

And then the scenario talks about more service, 30 minutes for everyone, and then it just be even 15 minutes service on select graphics, five, seven, six.

So you'll be reaching out to Albemarle County for some of the areas that you serve.

Loosen that right shift up by giving them more food and service.

Reaching out to the Board of Supervisors as well as City Council will be appropriate.

So reaching out to the staff.

Yes that's fine but I'm just saying Albemarle County because prioritization from us is also important as opposed to just Impact.

Impact has contacted the City Council.

I'm just saying.

And we are working through the scenarios that City Council

You want to just mention how many electric buses Almonte County Public Schools has.

That's great.

What's been the success rate on them?

We use them every day.

Shorter graphics.

I wrote in one of the drivers was just crazy.

Now, this is not a research study, right?

When she was talking to me she said less noise, less spelling and she just thought that the kids were calmer.

We have looked at propane and other things for that reason because our staff is really interested in more for that reason, for behaviors.

The triple S is for the city, not the school bus, but for the city.

We went on a normal cycle in the morning.

I asked because I was with some executives from New Flyer last week at AFTA and they were talking about how they were already going back and looking at cost changes to existing orders and adjusting for tariff prices and adding timelines and they were already at like something like 18 months or something like that for ordering to go over so it was just scary.

Fortunately because we are here in South we haven't seen that yet.

I'm going to give you another round of applause.

I have seen GRTC where they face a 90% CMT model down there, but I digress.

Any other comments or questions?

Okay, Ben.

Mike, you're on, John.

With, I'm sorry, KFH, is that who has that contract?

No, no, who's got the... Oh, the 5310?

Who's got the 5311, the rural transit, who's the consultant group, it happens to be gender.

RLS, yeah, no, RK&K, sorry.

Okay, gender rule is actually leading the program, so.

Wow, well that's cool, very cool.

looking forward to a number of software advancements over the next year and prepping our team for that now so that we can hit the ground running when the dollars become available.

Yeah, CFO, sorry.

She's welcome.

I don't want to start over.

It still left a lot of questions after our review that we did, but hopefully at least having something more concrete can help to guide us a little bit more.

So we'll still work forward on that one.

public hearing, and then you can also submit any public comments online via email through May 21st is the deadline to have any comments in on the draft SIP, and then that will be approved in June by the TV.

We're hearing some scary changes from SmartScale, but I'll just leave it at that about funding.

Okay, yeah, I'm not, small scale is not really my wheelhouse, but hopefully.

I think it's in Richmond?

Sure.

Having said that, hearing no objections, I will adjourn us to June 26th at 4 o'clock in the afternoon to say a voice.

So I understand that the people they use to log their trips, that's pretty solid type of data.