https://otter.ai/s/ruCbPd-nSpusKu9IcXl_MQ
0:00
All right, six o’clock by my clock over here. So why don’t we call the meeting to order and start with the roll call.
0:11
President, David Rose,
0:17
jack Livingston.
0:19
I’m here for a Michelle.
0:22
Here. Interstellar
0:27
here. Liz Osborne here
0:31
giovane.
0:33
Here.
0:34
Councilmember Peck.
0:36
Here.
0:40
Wonderful. Thank you very much and
0:44
grateful to have our two newest members of the transportation advisory board. You’re part of a great team and we’re able to help the city along might navigate in a good direction. Do you want to just maybe do a quick introduction for each of you just so we can know just a 62nd overview of some of what inspired you to join and and a little about about your background there. Liz, do you want to go first?
1:18
Sure. I have lived in Longmont for the past 28 years raised my kids here. They’re all grown up. Last one getting married this fall. And I decided that I was at the beginning of COVID. I was doing some genealogy looked at what my grandparents are doing in their lives at this age and they were involved in their community and I realized I need to step up my game. So I signed up for this.
1:43
That sounds great.
1:45
Awesome. Well, welcome. And, Joe, you want to go next and give us a little 62nd overview. Sure, give it my best shot here. So spent a lot of time Forgive me in advance in California has been in Colorado. for 21 years now, in Longmont for just about 11. My as my wife says, I like to comment about things quite frequently and said, Why don’t you actually go take action? That’s what brought me here.
2:16
Sounds good. We look forward to your frequent comments. All right. Sounds good. Tyler, do you want to offer any words of wisdom there? Or basically? What would be helpful from from your perspective for the new advisory board members?
2:38
Sure, you know, thanks for the opportunity. I think one of the big things is just to really help kind of navigate some of the big picture items that we see from the city. I think we’ve got a city staff as a pretty good team. And these people you see on the call of Jim, Phil, other staff around this word, got a great team here. So we were all professionals was what we Do so appreciate some of the big picture guidance from the school group and direction. So look forward to all of your participation this year as we move through this and I think we’ve got some fun projects or some pride topics on the horizon here that you guys will get a chance to weigh in on and help shape some future projects on Watson. Thank you all for your participation.
3:21
Joseph,
3:22
bad.
3:28
Weather pretty well covered it. Nice job.
3:33
Jimmy lanches Introduce yourself there for for those who haven’t met yet.
3:37
Yes, I’m genetics that I am the director of engineering services. So I work with Phil and Tyler and Ben, who is somewhere in there. I think I saw him in here for transportation, traffic streets. And we have a CV we have a tip presentation that will go into next year. So hopefully will appeal to To bring you up to speed, provide you some good information about what we’re looking at for next year and in future years.
4:06
Wonderful. Thanks. And Phil, since you’re an active member of
4:11
the staff updates there, just give a quick welcome from your side there in a bit of background in the types of areas that you get involved with.
4:19
Thanks, Neil. Yeah.
4:21
Phil Greenwald. I’m a transportation planning manager. So we work more on the planning side than Jim and Tyler do more of the engineering piece of it. But we all work on planning. We all work on the engineering piece. So we’re all in this together, as they say. So, Ben Ortiz also works as the transportation planner for the city. So all four of us who are talking, as Jim said often so if you ever need anything, feel free to give any one of us a call. We’re always trying to be available. I wasn’t very available to Tyler today, but we all try to be we try to be available to each other so and to use so feel free to reach out emails or are probably the best way to get on. have us if you have questions, if something comes up that you didn’t really understand, or we used acronyms, we use a lot of acronyms in this business. So you’ll hear a lot of tip and step and, you know, ci, ci P and, and Dr. cog and c.so. If those things are just too much Feel free to stop us at any time we, we kind of use them like it’s a different language and we kind of forget that every knows our language. So let us know. Thanks about the maps.
5:36
Some thanks and incense we actually have, you know, with our two new members of the advisory board is probably for the existing advisory board members just to give a really, really brief introduction, maybe just 30 seconds to introduce maybe starting with Courtney Michelle, just so that Joe and and Liz least know who else is on Transportation advisory board with you.
6:02
All right. Hi, I’m Courtney. Michelle. I’ve been on the Transportation Board for a year now, although we missed several meetings due to COVID. So I still feel like I’m new. So welcome to the new v group.
6:14
Awesome. Thanks and your day job. I do hair as a living. Yes. Excellent. Excellent.
6:23
David, do you want to go next?
6:25
Hi, there. I Dave droge. I’m a
6:28
systems engineer at Keysight open leveling, we’ve been here in LA in Longmont for just over 20 Well, almost 20 years. And I also have a daughter getting married this fall
6:40
next month.
6:43
And I’m an avid cyclist and, and enjoy being a member of this team.
6:49
Awesome. Thanks, David. Alright, Jacques, let me turn to you and
6:55
give a quick little overview.
6:57
Sure. Hi, I’m Zack
6:58
Livingston. I’ve been on the Transportation Board about a year and a half now, I don’t know it seems to have flown by.
7:06
I’m losing track of the months. My day job. I’m a finance manager for the state of Colorado,
7:12
specifically and with the Division of Child Support Services.
7:16
Awesome, thanks. Set an extra next.
7:23
Hi, I’m Sandy Stewart and I am retired. I’m very interested in transportation, whether it’s walking or biking or driving or riding a bus. And so I’m just glad to be a part. I’ve been here about a year on the committee and then along on about 3132 years. Thank you.
7:44
Thanks, Sandy. Well, and for that, the two new members there, my name is Neil Lurie. It’s a pleasure to have a chance to welcome you to the transportation advisory board. I’ve been on the board now for two years. JACK I agree. It does go fast. And I’ve been involved in transportation issues for about 20 years, just as a curious citizen, increasingly getting involved in trying to our communities make thoughtful decisions best that we can. My day job, I run a nonprofit in Boulder called resource Central, and we have about 70,000 family members per year, conserve natural resources, primarily water, energy and reducing waste. So doing this anybody on the transportation transport, I think that was everybody. Awesome. So and looking at the agenda that was posted there, it looks like the next step is officers, I’m assuming that we’re looking at the 2020 election of officers, not the 2019 election officers as in the agenda for anybody who would be willing to Then he’ll lead the transportation advisory board, either as a chair or vice chair
9:08
to the next year.
9:19
Silence is deafening.
9:22
I’d like to make a motion.
9:28
I’d like to make a motion to kneel continue serving as chair or at least
9:33
no longer co chair. And that jocks becomes co chair
9:41
is co chair vice chair.
9:44
Vice Chair
9:44
next second.
9:47
I think that was it. I was gonna volunteer for vice chair. So yeah, I’m
9:52
good with that. And I think Neil would be great as chair.
9:56
Appreciate that. Any discussion?
10:05
I would agree with those two choices.
10:08
Okay. And Joe, it looks like you wanted to add something.
10:14
I’m sorry, you’re still on mute there, Joe. Okay.
10:26
Every person you challenge there, but the thumbs up sign is universal. I
10:35
know one other thing real quick if you need to chat. There’s a chat function in the box as well. Anyone can communicate through that as well. You want to type anything in and responses. Well, that works too.
10:48
Well said, Well said.
10:53
Great. I’m happy to to help in that way. It’d be helpful for the advisory board additional discussion before vote on the motion.
11:05
All right. All in favor?
11:08
say aye. Aye.
11:12
Any opposed?
11:16
Any abstaining?
11:19
All right, the motion carries.
11:22
Thanks, you guys. And thanks to Egypt for being able to
11:27
support the the advisory board there your leadership help as well. Appreciate it.
11:32
Absolutely. Thanks.
11:35
All right. So I think we have opportunity to approve the minutes. I was actually a little bit confused by the minutes because the minutes that I saw were into the June meeting. I did not see the July minister, anybody actually see the July minutes in the packet.
11:54
Yeah, I just looked at it about two hours ago because I had the same
12:01
It’s in mind.
12:03
You said both in there.
12:06
I hit Oh, okay. I can hear you.
12:12
Okay, I had March minutes in my packet but I downloaded and I have July now.
12:22
Tyler on Friday when he saw that minutes were in that he needed update and then he did. Okay. Later.
12:33
Okay, great.
12:36
There was a mixup. We had the wrong minutes uploaded Thursday when the email went out of use for that it was corrected Friday morning so I should have sent a follow up email to say minutes or amended the correct funds or cash
12:52
ologies for that
12:54
with a mixup, would it make sense for us to be able to I I’m not sure if there may be some other folks there that haven’t been able to see the minutes just yet. Would it make sense to be able to seek to approve the July minutes during our next transportation advisory board meeting there once others have had a chance to review it? Or maybe, maybe it’s a non issue? Is there anybody else that hasn’t had a chance to read the minutes just yet? Aside from our new advisory board members,
13:33
okay, well, then why don’t we move forward, move forward with their emotions to approve the
13:40
transportation.
13:43
Alright, so moved by Sandy. There a second.
13:48
David, you have a second one.
13:51
All right, any discussion?
13:56
All right, all in favor, say aye. or raise your head
14:04
Any opposed? abstaining?
14:12
Okay, the motion carries
14:15
next to cross
14:15
it. All right. So communication from staff.
14:24
Sure, we’ve got a long list of items to talk about or share updates with items from staff but not not a whole lot tonight. One thing I’ll add our signal at Mountain View and Alpine, we’ve talked about many times, we’re going to be turning that on here later this week. So getting that one done, excited to get that one done. It’ll be good even though schools not going to be in session to take advantage of it. It’s still done. It’ll be ready as soon as kids are back in school. So that’s what I have. I don’t think there was anything else from staff unless filler. Jim wants to chime in here real quick, but we’ve got a pretty big agenda to get through tonight. So
15:01
Okay, sounds good. If no other communication from staff will go the next agenda item there. Are there any members of the public wishing to be heard before we move forward?
15:22
Okay, hearing none, we will mark floor to the to the next agenda item then action item. Looks like we have the Capital Improvement Program. So,
15:34
Phil, is that your baby? sure what’s happened to it? Oh, that
15:42
would be me. Hey, Jim. It’s all yours. All right, so we’re going to bring up a short PowerPoint. If you consider 100 slides, short PowerPoint, except I gave it away that there’s only 17 so we want to provide you some information this evening on the project. Post 2220 Oh, did I screw that up? That should be 21 to 25 Capital Improvement Program focusing on street fund and transportation Community Investment see.
16:13
Next slide.
16:19
Tonight we’ll be asking for recommendations to options that you recommend city council adopt the funding from the street fund and transportation Community Investment Fund for the transportation projects as presented by staff in the 2021 2025 proposed Capital Improvement Program, or Option two is to recommend city council adopt the funding from the street fund and transportation investment fee fund for transportation projects, as presented by staff in the 21 to 25 proposed capital improvement program with revisions recommended from the transportation advisory board. So we’re gonna start out With just a little bit of background on ci p, which is the capital improvement program, it is a planning document that we utilize that covers the city’s capital infrastructure needs over a five year period. We run it for five years. But it’s important to note that anything
17:17
pretty much
17:18
beyond the second year can be is variable covers our capital projects, which involve new new projects, more new infrastructure or replacement of existing infrastructure or just improvements, infrastructure. And some of that infrastructure can be in the capital improvement program that goes in front of council, beginning in September covers a lot of components. It covers water, sewer drainage, does not necessarily we will focus tonight on our transportation. So it’s it’s kind of a scaled down version. If you have any questions about other areas or components, we can always speak offline. Tyler and Phil are always available to answer all your questions about water and wastewater should you have any of those questions the ccip does cover are met and unmet needs, it is a dynamic document, it is subject to yearly or semi yearly revisions, it should be fluid and that what we program in now for next year a year from now may not may have changed for some reason. So, you have to understand that what we talked about today can be is subject to change and can be changed. So, it is basically as we indicated a planning document and it was really important also is it is coordinated with the city’s operating budget. And we’ll talk a little bit add in some of the future slides when we talk budget.
18:53
So what how do we select our projects, it come from a variety of sources and a combination of sources First and foremost, most is for transportation is envision long line with our multimodal and our comprehensive plan, which covers the roadway system, transit system, and some of our active transportation, our bicycle and pedestrian systems. We also look to some of our master plans and studies, which can include our Longmont roadway plan. The Parks and Rec and trails master plan covers some of our trails for some of that active transportation. We also have the enhanced multi use corridor plan, which pushes bikes and pedestrians. We recently within the last two years completed the Southwest operations study that covered a whole bunch of things including cars, making room for buses, bikes and peds. Part of that our CI p includes some of our asset management. With that those plans aren’t aren’t necessarily published, but we plan five to 10 years in advance for asset management, what roads we’re going to pay what country We’re going to replace as part of those those roadway improvements. Also, our bridge bridge inspection reports on a two year cycle c dot inspects all of the bridges in the state produces a document for our bridges. Currently, most of the bridges in the city of Longmont are in really good shape. We have one that is starting to show some signs of wear and tear go into a structurally deficient phase. So we’ve included it in within the next four to five years to start working on.
20:31
And then
20:32
the last thing for sappy selection is course funding. We’re limited in what we can do and funding does become a major player as we put together our RCP program. So in focusing on our transportation funding, the primary source is street fund. That gets funding dollars from the street fund sales and use tax. State Highway use tax, the automobile tax, those are the numbers kind of broken out in that, that pie chart. And there’s also important to note that there is a miscellaneous category. And you know, normally we kind of brush that over because it’s only like $500,000. But miscellaneous includes grant funding. So the miscellaneous component is what’s called inter governmental which is usually comprised of some type of grant funding. Some interesting come some street cut dollars permit inspection fees. This year, we have about 3 million and that is made up of mostly some of the component of quiet zones. As well as Tyler went out and got a grant from C dot turns out to be about $100,000. So that’s in there as well. We get about some money also in the intergovernmental area from funding some of our Some of our operations which includes our crossing guards, as well as an agreement with the school district, we did provide you in your packet, a fund statement for the street improvement fund. And it shows pretty much our revenues that break out some of these dollars in that pie chart. And then it shows some of the projects as well as some of our operating in that chart you’ll see that we dedicate kind of below our operating and maintenance is about is about $610,000 goes to fund transit. That includes the long month free ride via the flex bus. So that is broken out within the budget. You can see that in that fund statement. So just a real quick component, you know, $14 million next year’s budgets coming out, coming from the sales and use tax. It is a three quarter cent tax. If you Funds improvements and maintenance. A little history initiated in 1986. But it was it was the five year sunset clause. So it has been periodically updated every four to five years. And then in 2014, was was extended for a 10 year period. Last year we went in and, and through a voter referendum, we got a permanent extension 2019. So, we will no longer have to take those increments back every five or 10 years. That also enables us to be able with a permanent extension of that to be able to bond for larger projects off of the out of the street fund. So just some quick project types that we we programmed in. So they can be asset management and we’ll see one of those options. With one of those out in the middle and a few more slides could be cast capacity improvements could be intersection improvements. safety improvements, multimodal, which involves missing sidewalks, trails, Greenway connections, bike lanes, bridge improvements, traffic signals, or a combination of those where we may in a case of this year, where we’re doing an asset management project on ninth Avenue, west of hoever, between hoever and airport, we also are undertaking some bike lanes. Another example currently underway this year is also pike road. But pike road also includes a traffic signal and includes some intersection improvements, some safety improvements. So some of our projects are just dedicated to one project type they are involved over multi, multi topics of project types. So just breaking out kind of looking ahead into 2021 in our projects, We break it out we have about six projects. That may not seem like a lot, but that total is about $60 million. So one project is and they go from from our street rehab, or our transportation system management. The Boston Avenue connection required zones, Boston Avenue Bridge over st moraine. And then we also threw in the same frame Creek improvements. We have money from transportation dedicated to that project.
25:29
And I’m glossing through that list, in part because I’ve broken them out to talk about each one. Sorry, street rehab program. This is dedicates a certain set of mountain dollars for basically for the rehab of our city streets.
25:50
Why is that important?
25:52
With 350 miles of roads in the city, along with 692 miles of sidewalk so program is our citywide program for asset management. It is a data driven, where every few years we evaluate the condition of the streets through a consultant, who does some radar analysis, does some visual inspections, drives through all our city streets, builds the data but helps us build a database that shows what conditions our roads are in. And then we take that tool plan from it, what roads can we afford to repave so and it is just repaving it’s a combination of rehab, some options, asphalt overlays, one option, crack sealing, to extend the life of your asphalt, some chip seal in some areas, lesser expensive option that can get five to 10 more years of wear out of your asphalt and then other preservation techniques on a smaller scale. It could involve complete roadway reconstruction. We’re doing a little bit of that online where we go got the road open and the whole base courses is falling apart. Have to rebuild some of the road from the bottom up. We also includes concrete repair. So whenever we go into rehab history, we also look at what the condition of the sidewalk is the crossings, the ADA compliant curb ramps, we make sure everything’s up to code meets current standards. And that is the work the physical work out in the field is is contracted services for that work through a contractor and we every two years put that put that contract out to bid as well as our Concrete Work as well. So, one of the bigger ones in terms of kind of the amount of work we do is our translators. GRP 11 is the transportation system management. This covers a lot of our safety multimodal and some of our minor capacity issues. Some of the projects we’re currently working on is the sunset road diet. We are looking at that right now, that project is going to be kind of a challenge because Phil is currently working on a grant, which while we don’t have currently have money for construction in the future years, we have an opportunity to chase a grant. If we get that grant that will will change that. That project may move that forward for construction a few more years. We also have ninth Avenue multimodal improvements. I mentioned earlier the knot section of ninth Avenue from hoever. To airport we’re also looking at a road diet from over to Main Street. That may involve some striping changes that can provide some bike lanes in that area. So we’re currently in the planning stages and hopefully we’ll be able to execute that next year. We always have school safety improvements. Prior to the start of school we do some evaluations and in around our schools to make sure that the pedestrian areas are See for our kids. And so we may have to throw some of those in. We always have funding for that. We also look for funding for new traffic signals. Currently we’re we’re looking at 66 and Alpine or possibly clover basin and for them, those are close to meeting morons. So at that time, we want to be able to have funding available, should they meet warrants. We always have some funding set aside for traffic, neighborhood traffic mitigation. That’s one of our current ongoing challenges with residents in some of the local neighborhoods where get it gets some complaints about speeding through their neighborhoods, we always we have a program that looks at that where we can work with them to mitigate some of those challenges. We also have high crash intersection improvements based off of our crash report, currently looking at 30 Alpine as a intersection that may need some some improved We have we’ve had some higher, higher level crashes there. And it also in Tyler may have to jump in at this time to tell me what an HSI p grant is.
30:10
It’s a cover signal, number of intersection
30:16
surgeon highway safety improvement program. And in really what we did, it’s federal dollars available. The focus of this pot of money was primarily non roads, not on the state system. So we looked at a lot of the intersections where we have a lot of left turn crashes that could potentially be mitigated by some type of left turn protection. So we’re seeing more and more of the flashing yellow arrows love them or hate them, they have proven safety benefit to them. So that was a big part of what this grant will do is allow us to install a handful more flashing yellow arrows that also installed backplates on some of the signal, signal heads to help make them more visible. A lot of times sun glare can be a contributing factor in some of those rashes will signal head is washed out with the sun. And I think that backplate around it just helps to maybe shift some of the Sun so you have a better chance of seeing that with dry to catch the signal and and doesn’t sound like a big cost item but add it all up it’s going to be a thank you Jim mentioned before it’s an 800 and some thousand dollar grant from Sita we have a component to match its total projects a little under a million dollars. But we also have to replace a few signals to be able to get the distance we need to get electronero in the right place. So combination of new signals, a couple locations need new cabinets, new poles and some wiring so
31:44
it all adds up in the end. Pretty good. Storage isn’t.
31:53
So real quick, I’ll carry on talking about about some signals. So threw out some miles around the city I threw out miles of sidewalk. It’s also important to note we have 97 traffic signals in the city Longmont. After Next week, we’ll have 98 and then later on in the fall we’ll have 99 because we have two signals under construction. We’ve got 68 School flashers to pedestrian flashers for fire station flashes, 49 radar signs, on our signals, we got five PTC cameras, that’s pan tilt zoom enables us to to monitor traffic at several of the higher higher traveled intersections. So you throw this all together and it starts to to to add up in terms of kind of the maintenance needs. So you know, I love I love capital. Everyone thinks capital who thinks improvements thinks what we’re going to do to you know, widen the road. To build a bridge, that’s the fun stuff. The grind is the maintenance but that’s what keeps your your residents moving. Whether it be through cars, bikes, pedestrians, keeps them safe. Sometimes you can even make an argument This is more important than sometimes then why widening roadway because this this is what people expect from ta B and from Council and from city staff, a sound infrastructure so that they can get from point A to point B. Without You know, sometimes stopping at a red light. And I’m sure Tyler’s heard that any number of times he said he had too many red lights. So one other thing to add on our our, our traffic signals. I think a good portion of them are on. About 55 of them are on a intelligence system that communicates with it and can move traffic faster.
34:00
Quarter, one Ninth Street. They are all okay.
34:09
So yeah, we all have our signals are all connected we can control them all remotely from our, from our desks basically the part I think Jim was talking about was adaptive. So all long over can Bratton, Mainstreet, all those things are signals and running what we call adaptive control. So they don’t have a fixed time plan like a traditional signal.
34:32
But they’re more adjusting to real time demand of traffic.
34:39
All right, so next slide.
34:47
So one of the other projects we’re we’re have been working on is the GRP 92, which is a Boston Avenue connection which will get a new crossing. East End of Boston Avenue bound by an A down off of price road will connect into across the tracks. New East West Clint collector ties in for the BRT connection for the future first and Main Street project. Currently, we’re undertaking some conceptual design this year, going to final design next year for construction the following year. coordinating with BNSF and PVC and it is coordinated with the quiet zone projects. BNSF requires that for every crossing that they will approve city has to or the municipal agency has to close to other crossings. So it’s coordinating with with our real real quiet zones and that we’re closing several crossings there to create quiet zones and also to help us get this crossing. So we have some conceptual design career. We’re working on some property acquisition now. So it is a pretty, pretty interesting project.
36:07
And I think if I can Jim don’t need to steal it over here. But in terms of importance of this project and some of the things to consider with this one this ties in ultimately, the the first and main transit stations going down southwest corner first in May. And this is the preferred route for that BRT has a Dr. Phil talked about acronyms earlier. So I’ll try and explain them as I CAN bus rapid transit is working with RTD to get a faster bus service here to warm up. And this was their preferred route was coming down Boston to make this connection to get right in to that transit station of Maine. So it is an important collector connection for the city also has implications on the bus system as we talked about this one
37:03
That brings us to quiet zones.
37:08
last few years Council has heard a lot from our residents. They initiated a program wherein we had undertaken a study and they approved some funding in the budget to undertake some design get started in construction and then to leverage our dollars, city went out in and was able to obtain a grant from the Federal Railroad Administration. To make this project more viable. It is an $8 million project. We got a $4 million grant. Currently design is underway it will create quiet zones at 16. intersections throughout the city and a quiet zone could include closing a crossing. So we are working towards getting to construction original Committed to AV construction going on at the tail end of this year. But that pesky grant got in the way. And when someone wants to give you $4 million, you want to make sure you you get everything right. So we’re looking at construction in early 2021. Include, start at the Third Avenue crossing, have been working with BNSF. We’re working with PVC and currently we are we’re finalizing the FR a grant agreement, and should be bringing that in front of council in September October for their consideration.
38:32
And if you have Tyler wants to add anything.
38:38
I think one thing that I would say about this and early on, is what can this board do? I think this is a good example of here’s something that the TV over the years previous boards really took up as an issue and really made this one of their priorities and I think we’re seeing the results that them being persistent in pursuing an issue that This has made it to the top of the priority list and we’re able to get it done and move forward. So exciting seeing how the TV was able to influence that, and exciting on a personal level to be able to get this done a great project online.
39:15
See Joe’s question here, what constitutes a quiet zone?
39:19
Good question. So, quiet zone is sort of misleading and it’s not a silent zone. We’re simply looking to eliminate the train horns. So there’s still the noise trains by themselves are noisy, they’re big, large metal vehicles that absolutely make a lot of noise. What we’re trying to do is implement safety measures, so they don’t have to blow those out in the horns each crossing. Typically what those treatments are are going to be some type of gates medians flashers. handful of treatments are required in each crossing to replace the safety loss by blowing the horn in the eyes of the FAA, Federal Railroad Administration and BNSF. The form is most effective Same device possible. It’s very loud, as we all know, we can probably hear it through the extensive town. It’s instant feedback, it’s easy for the operator to know confirm that it’s working. So failure rate is pretty minimal. So that’s why that’s what a quiet zone is. If you have any more questions, happy to talk with you more about that.
40:33
So next project TRP 118. That is the Boston Avenue Bridge over the same terrain. Both the graphic below and the photo to the to the right is the view kind of from the trail or from the creek looking looking west. So this project design is currently underway. Construction to begin later this year, early 20 21 this project is critically important because it will expand primarily the the channel out, widen the bridge, lengthen the bridge, so it’ll pass the hundred year 100 year flood, but it also serves as a financial match for the Army Corps of Engineers project which is upstream of of this, this structure. It will provide improved flood protection for the area and enhance the patent bike improvements as well.
41:31
And then if we want to jump over to the next slide.
41:37
So I wanted to also throw in, we throw in about $30,000 a year for DRM 31 resiliency for a project from the street fund. And so kind of why is that important? Why is it in a transportation update? Well, part of the project we’re finishing one of the last bridges
42:01
Previous and the graphic you see in front of you
42:05
from kind of the right going left, city reach one and two a. Those portions in in in the kind of the yellow and in the red are complete city reach two B’s under construction. That includes the crossing of BNSF railroad bridge over the creek. We’re starting an Isaac Walton design is underway. Phase Two is the Army Corps tomorrow night there we are taking an agreement from the council for their consideration that has a partnership with the Army Corps of Engineers for them to design that one reach and then actually constructed as well. So are they never do anything for free. So part of our match it’s $15 million project is that Boston Avenue Bridge project. What’s important with that is that they are actually doing all the work for the design. In construction and it’s not being they’re not just handing us a check for the work they’re actually going to do it takes a load off of staff. And we can continue moving the project forward. The overreach to the west is still kind of in the evaluation stage, although we are currently doing a cost benefit analysis, so that we can apply for a grant this fall, which hopefully will will get us working towards the next phase. So back to my original statement is why is this important? Well, resilient, same for rain also does have a trail along it, which is part of what the $30,000 helps with. But it’s also important that we replaced several bridges. So when you have a waterway flowing through your city, and that is subject to flooding, nothing will wreck your transportation system, like a flood. So if you’re not prepared, and your bridges aren’t carry that hundred year storm when it occurs, and it will occur again We will be able to weather it in a resilient, safe manner and keep our transportation system, keep our emergency vehicles moving and keep our pedestrians keep our traffic moving through through our town. So that’s kind of the importance of why why it was included in in this presentation. So some of the challenges and there you can add to this list I’m sure there’s there’s many more. One of the some of the things we want to know is with our street fund with our transportation network with our TCF is we constantly see changing public needs for transportation. We were driving earlier this year towards pushing more people into buses, working on a train system and then the COVID-19 hit and that chased everybody away out of public transportation for the short term. So we have to get back to that because that will take Take a lot of the stress off of our transportation grid and our network of getting people out of cars into buses onto bikes. One of the other challenges is funding of the local transit service. Okay, increasing costs. We see ride free going up, we see the via service, they are constantly asking for $4 flex bus has increasing costs, as well. So that’s the funding challenge. Quality of life challenges. Whether it’s traffic mitigation, congestion management throughout our city,
45:34
climate change will
45:35
will add a component of that changing dynamics of again, going back to the first one moving people out of cars. What’s that going to look like for our changing transportation system? Believe it or not, the street system is still growing. There is development coming in the city that will add to that they will build certain roads for their So that they can, you know, build homes, then turn over the city. That’s part of our growing system. We’re not really cities really not building new roads, but developers are. Our roads are aging. Okay? Part of that tarp one is is kind of addresses that. But as those roads age, we have to provide a good quality product for our residents. So that they can get to their work to their to play to, to and from wherever they can under COVID, which are some of the impacts the biggest impact to COVID will be to our budget isn’t just the short term we saw in a downturn in the sales and use tax. We have projected that our revenues into next year while our economy recovers, have will decrease. So our we’re already looking ahead for future years that we’re going to lose about $3 million worth of revenue out of the streets. If that doesn’t come into play, Then we may have an opportunity to take on some projects that are in on that are currently unfunded. We won’t know that until partway through the year. Right now we project our revenues, we’ve anticipated decrease in those. So we’ve adjusted accordingly with this capital improvement program for the next five years.
47:22
So one of the other the last challenges if I didn’t list here, go back is
47:28
the slide to the right.
47:30
Go back. Come on.
47:32
Get rid of questions is the the intersection of hoever and 119. So the challenge we will face is that we went with partner with Boulder County, c dot and put in a grant for $26 million project. So in the coming months, we should hear whether we get that project or not. And if the grant is approved, then we have to figure out how to How to move that project forward.
48:02
So
48:04
kill any questions, you can pledge for the grant. It’s all your fault.
48:11
So with that, um, I can open up the questions.
48:15
And then the last slide after questions goes back into the options for recommendations.
48:26
All right. Thank you very much, Jim. I appreciate that. Any clarifying questions or comments from any of the transportation advisory board members?
48:35
I have a question.
48:38
Go for it, David.
48:40
So thanks, Jim, for the overall
48:43
look.
48:45
Briefly, can you tell us what projects we’ve reduced funding on because of the expected reduction in revenues.
48:58
I’d have to work up that list.
49:01
We took out
49:03
we had some missing sidewalks as a project, some component or components of that. We took that out. We also took out Emacs. In the next year, we reduced our TRP. One. We also reduced what’s an email? I’m sorry, email. It’s both I use corridor. Thank you, Phil. Thank you. So um, we did have a lot of money dedicated Emacs next year. But we took that out, we took obviously sidewalks out, we cut down TSM the transportation system management. So in future years, two years out, we probably wouldn’t be planning for any traffic signals. We said some of the paving dollars, we pushed out a couple of projects. As opposed to doing them we delayed them rather than cutting them out.
50:03
And, Jim, by the way, there is a question that Chuck listed in the the chat section there.
50:12
Do you see that there? Do you want to jump to a recap it is that the
50:16
tarp appears to show an increase gap in funding versus need over the next five years. And he plans to close that gap. That that’ll just depend on what we do with funding. So we could we can look at no one likes to hear about it into next year as we prep for the future years, we can talk about a rate increase. That is in this atmosphere currently, with COVID-19 people out of work. That would not be anything I would recommend. I think we have to get past that get in economy back to normal, get people’s lives back to normal before we
50:47
could look for that.
50:48
One way to offset the gaps is to constantly be pursuing grant opportunities that we can if we have fun projects on the books that We can move forward on if you get a grant for them that can free up city dollars that can be shifted over to other other areas.
51:11
Thank you. Okay, that answers my question. And I just want to congratulate you on working with the Army Corps of Engineers. That’s a great way to leverage other resources. I kind of get the feeling when I look in the next couple of years, you know, kind of our base need the number of miles of roadways, the maintenance, cost of traffic signals. That base level looks like it’s increasing it. I don’t know, I could be wrong, but it just looks like we might have more choices as we take care of our existing assets. Is that pretty accurate?
51:47
Yes.
51:48
Okay, good work. This is great.
51:55
Great, any other clarifying questions or comments?
52:07
So we’re going to be making a recommendation to city council. Is it based on what you were you just showed us? Or is it based on the 25 different projects that we were sent
52:23
by?
52:26
Tyler Tyler sent in our packet.
52:35
I have to ask Tyler what 2525 projects.
52:40
We’re focusing on the next year’s tip. Tonight.
52:47
components. The
52:50
2021
52:54
tip program
52:56
covers a number of projects several years out.
53:01
So we’re looking at basically next year, because in two years, if we get additional funding, the 20 2020
53:13
tip project will look may look
53:15
slightly different.
53:19
Just clarification of the projects that were included in the fact that those are all of the active transportation, CIPS, all the CIPS that have street fund dollars going into them as what’s included in the pack. It’s a combination of funded, partially funded and unfunded projects that you’ll see the sheets for. So there’s definitely some of them that are unfunded or we don’t have the money to do those right now. The funded ones I think, funded, partially funded ones are the ones are really looking at right now. I think unless there was something that he had questions or concerns about. We can look at the other ones.
53:59
Tyler Before you set up or gym for that, I guess probably better for Jim, quick clarifying question. Are there existing grants that you think are, you know, similar to the 119 hoever Interchange that significantly shifted our activities? Are there any other major pending grants that you think we have a decent chance that that could have a probable chance of shifting or our list here?
54:38
The only,
54:39
I think currently
54:42
that will maybe may adjust some of the dollars here there would be the sunset
54:49
project that I think Phil’s looking at a grant now for that.
54:53
That is a project currently that that we had in our budget
54:57
under TSM.
54:58
Earlier in the year, we kind of took it out, put it on hold for now. But knowing that there’s a grant available, we’ve been able to look at ramping it back up. And, and sometimes grants are challenging in that, you know, they always usually always require a match, just depends on what it is, but they’re also they they’re limited, like c.in. This case, see God has dollars for use for grants, unfortunately, he has to be tied to a C dot roadway system. So in this case, we’ve been working on Sunset, that was a road diet we finished last year that kind of fell into it that that’s the only project that kind of applies. You know, you’ve got other you know, and what you also have to look at is in future years and with this with the budget noted in the fund statement is we’ve got a lot of things going on. Okay, even though there’s there’s a kind of a a what we anticipated downturn in the economy in next year, you know, in that intergovernmental item. In that fun statement, we got $12 million coming in. Okay. And the reason for that is we’re gonna be doing Kaufman street improvement. So that’s a $6.8 million grant.
56:17
We’re working on 6600 grant dollars now.
56:21
So there’s, there’s a, you know, you throw in the RSVP stuff where we’re constantly trying to leverage our dollars. You know, RSVP is kind of a really good success story, because we’re taking on what is basically over $100 million project right now we’ve spent about I believe we’ve invested about 85. And over half of that is with federal, whether it’s Army Corps, whether it’s female, whether it’s HUD, you know, the city’s city residents have only had to pony up through through bond sales. You know, I think about 40% of that. So excellent. If you’re trying to leverage our existing city dollars, we’re trying to be responsible stewards of the limited resources that we have.
57:09
So, it is constantly a challenge.
57:12
Thanks. And just to clarify RSVP, I assume that’s resilient same brain process.
57:16
Again, like Emacs, it is an acronym sorry. It is the resilience savoring project so great.
57:23
All right now we have a still have a full agenda, any additional clarifying questions before we seek emotion.
57:32
We can always if you have questions after the fact we’re always here, email it’s always best or call us. We will certainly be able to provide you more information should you and then the full budget will be going in front of council for in September, for their consideration. That includes this tip. So Joan, I’ll be seeing you again in a few weeks when I do the whole CIE whatever everything including what some of these slides, you’ll see a repeat
58:01
Great. Well, I think there was
58:06
what Jim presented.
58:09
The main questions are ultimately do we seek to be able to provide the transportation advisory boards endorsement recommending in support of the staff recommended capital improvement projects? Or is there a compelling need to build to make any amendments there their emotion that and we would like to entertain?
58:37
Sandy.
58:40
I so move that we accept the plan that Jim just proposed to us this evening. To City Council.
58:49
Great, so emotion. Great. So just to clarify, Sandy. So you’re making a motion to be able to support the the staff recommended For the capital improvement programs that’s presented, right.
59:04
Yes,
59:04
great, right. Who is that?
59:07
Yeah, sure. Okay.
59:10
Great. Any discussion?
59:16
We wanted to
59:19
comment on it.
59:20
I do. Can you put the options back on the screen? Yeah, I just had a
59:26
if
59:27
Jim could explain that second option with that last part what just return everybody understands it, I don’t understand it.
59:50
So the
59:52
the base of the only difference between the two options is in the language. In the the second option has the proposal Capital Improvement Program with revisions recommended from the transportation advisory board.
1:00:06
Okay, thanks for explaining. Yeah.
1:00:11
Great. And, Jim, if you can put it back to the view before, just so we can see everyone’s votes more easily and save a little strip on the top of the screen here. The Tyler’s dropped. There we go. Thank you, Tyler. Great. So we have a motion to support the staff recommendations for the capital improvement program. We have a second. At this point, are there any additional comments or discussion?
1:00:42
Okay, all in favor, raise your hand or say aye.
1:00:46
Aye. Aye. Aye.
1:00:48
All right. I think that makes everyone there. Anybody opposed?
1:00:53
Any abstaining?
1:00:56
All right, welcome, Jim. The Motion carries.
1:00:58
Thank you all.
1:01:02
All right. Well, I think you know, Far be it from us to not want to make sure that we’re thinking about capital improvement programs looking forward. But without looking back here. Looks like there’s some updates going to 2019 Capital Improvement Program. So Tom mica and Tyler, Europe
1:01:27
new I think there’s a chance you may have an older agenda.
1:01:31
Okay, well then, disregard that.
1:01:40
Next thing we had on here and four items was a work plan update, if that’s what?
1:01:45
Perfect, perfect. I just linked here, so
1:01:50
forgive me for the station. All right. We’re planning
1:01:57
for the each year.
1:02:00
Each year, January, we usually sit down and meet and talk about the the upcoming year’s work plan. As we’ve got two new board members, new chair and vice chair, good opportunity just to put this in front of you to see some of the things we’re working on we’ve worked on, and a good opportunity, if there’s things on here that you want to make any minor adjustments to understand that this year has been a little different than normal years. kovas definitely had an impact on the meetings we’ve had, we’ve really gotten direction from our city manager to minimize these meetings if there’s no real action items. So it was we’ve tried to condense and really make the best use of your time to really bring items to you that we need an action on. That said, I’ll give you an opportunity if you’ve seen this or want to talk about it. Want to make any comments. Happy to talk about that. Otherwise, the informations there. If you want to look at it and see kind of where we’re going.
1:02:57
The end of the year, Neil, I think
1:02:58
one of the things that you wanted Was traffic mitigation. So it’s still on there still, we’ll still have a sessions dedicated to that to talk about that and maybe some potential updates to that program. Anything else? I think really this this is one of the bigger. One of the bigger things that this group does every years is the recommendation on CFP is a very important program that the service city provides appreciate you guys’s back on that as well. With that, if there’s no questions, we can move on to the next item. If you have questions, feel free to
1:03:34
take a quick one Tyler
1:03:37
addition it’s more
1:03:43
the TV I heard Now a couple of
1:03:49
buses around town.
1:03:51
I think we really are gonna have to look at that over the next 12 months. I keep hearing about flex ride costs going up. We have the ride free long model costs are going up. So I see us on here, and I’m just kind of going but that’s, that’s I think that’s going to be a good one for us to really dig into and try to figure out.
1:04:16
Okay.
1:04:22
Chuck, just clarify, though, is that related to proposed changes to the work plan or just clarification that will we have a discussion or to do our due to
1:04:33
the public, you could have gone to a phone.
1:04:41
Don’t just my comment is more than just, yeah, I’m just hearing more and more importance on that. And I’m glad to see it on there. Great.
1:04:53
All right, any other comments or clarifications on the workplane
1:05:01
All right, do we need do we need a motion for the to approve the work plan for the coming year?
1:05:09
I’m not looking for emotion at this point we did we took the motions said in January that we approve the work plan and it was either January or February reading. I think now it’s definitely in light of all the changes. We’ve had an opportunity to make changes if we need to, but not necessarily need a motion to revamp this thing here.
1:05:30
Alright, Tyler, let’s keep marching forward to the passenger
1:05:34
rail.
1:05:39
Good evening, everybody. Hear me?
1:05:40
Yep.
1:06:01
Front Range passenger service programming, they’re there they’ve got an
1:06:05
interesting
1:06:07
as is kind of an interesting, interesting program that really shows how we can possibly do passenger rail in the future. And so we’re gonna turn it over to Spencer and I see Randy Goldberger is on the phone as well. So both of those gentlemen have been working on this for a number of years. And I’ll turn it over to Spencer to talk more about kind of what’s going on with this and kind of the promise that it holds for the future. there
1:06:33
for a sec, I’m getting your slideshow loaded up.
1:06:36
Sounds good. In the meantime, Phil mentioned, my name is Spencer dodge. I’m the liaison with the Southwest. Didn’t say legislatively created entity a few years back, Randy, I think Randy, Robert is on the phone as well. Randy, do you want to introduce yourself?
1:06:56
Hi, everybody. Yeah, I’m Randy. Rob Berger. I’m the project director for was a Southwest chief in Front Range passenger rail commission. And we just like to thank you folks for giving us an opportunity tonight to give you all an update on what’s going on with the Front Range passenger rail project.
1:07:21
There we go.
1:07:23
Great. So we’ll go ahead and dive in. We’ve done many of these presentations up in town, the Front Range over the last year and a half or so. You may have seen this information, some may have not. On this slide, you can see kind of missionaries that make up our body. One key note here, a change over the last few months is the addition of DJ Mitchell. He is the passenger, I’m sorry, the Vice President of passenger rail operations for BNSF Railway. He just came on board Oh about five weeks ago. These are some of the other members of the Commission Next slide, please. So the Southwest Chief Information fashions rail commission is kind of a two pronged mission. Starting off this was originally the Southwest chief commission full stop. And that work was to preserve Amtrak Southwest chief service across Southeast Colorado down Trinidad mahanta. A couple of years ago, the legislature did add the minor task of facilitating the development of front lines, passenger rail service as well. So I’m gonna have two missions there. The vision that has been developed over the last several months with the help of stakeholders up and down the Front Range is seen here. So really developing passenger rail service that serves Front Range communities. Public to Fort Collins is a critical component of Colorado’s future. providing a safe, efficient and reliable transportation option for travel between major population centers on the front range and create a backbone for Connecting and expanding rail and transit options in the state and region. So a little bit more complex than just commuter rail a little bit more strung out along this 180 mile corridor. throughout the project, we’re keeping close tabs on the federal agencies and in coordinating with its federal agencies. We don’t have a lead agency identified yet, quite simply because we don’t quite know where their alignments gonna be. So we’re working really closely with Federal Railroad Administration, Federal Transit Administration and the Federal Highway Administration. We’ve had three different calls, but those Missourians certainly and April 2, beginning of April.
1:09:39
Next slide, please. Okay,
1:09:42
we also received a crazy grant that we applied for back in October of 2019. You see here, this is the Southwest chief through car service to Colorado Springs feasibility study. You might say, Well, why am I telling you about a Southwest chief? You guys are up there in Longmont. But this is kind of we view this as a potential kind of first first leg first usable option for Front Range passenger rail. So I’m partnering with C dot and Pueblo county in the hunter in Colorado, Colorado passenger rail passenger Association. We successfully applied and received a $225,000, Chrissy grant and this will look at some of the different landmines in an operating procedures for that Southwest Chief, the Park Service.
1:10:29
Next slide.
1:10:34
What you guys actually, I’m outlining this with my mouse, but you can’t see my screen in that bottom southeastern corner of Colorado. Yes, down there. That solid line is the current lineman of the Southwest chief and that dotted line is the potential rerouted or through card service on that Southwest seat. That’s what that Chrissy grant is going to look at
1:10:58
the baby So, last
1:11:02
quarter that we’re looking at specifically for Front Range passenger rail, it’s a really thick line. Currently, we don’t really know where exactly the alignment is going to be. So we don’t, we don’t want to be too prescriptive. So just to give you kind of a visual of the quarter, north to south that we’re talking about here.
1:11:21
Next time,
1:11:22
I feel like I’m moving quickly, so if anybody has any questions, please feel free to interrupt me. It won’t hurt my feelings one bit. I mentioned earlier that we’ve been working with stakeholders from Fort Collins. Yes, correct. Chrissy does stand for consolidated rail infrastructure and safety improvements. That 2019 grant. It’s not specifically an improvement, but there is a track in there that provides for planning studies and operations studies. So that’s the kind of big same part of me that that comes from Good question.
1:11:54
stakeholder engagement
1:11:57
you know, with 180 mile corridor, There’s a lot of context, different communities, different problems to solve. So we didn’t think it prudent to kind of have that same conversation all at once every single time. So we broke this up into three different segments North, Central and South. This is really to provide project information and obtain feedback at a local level. I’m so looking at regional and local stakeholders here. We have our next round of those mid September 15 through the 17th. I think we’re going to start Randy correct me on that Tuesday should be the north and then Wednesday should be the central unless in a particularly interesting location. Some of your context, relates closely with boulder and RTD in the north line, and then also with Fort Collins and getting back and forth between Fort Collins. So that’s kind of you guys have slotting in kind of in both North and Central sometimes. But so keeping in mind that it is a male quarter, it’s important that we do have quarter wide conversations And so we also have been holding quarter stakeholder quarter was held one of the late December or I’m sorry, early December, late last year. And we’re going to hold another one in early fall of this year. And this is really to kind of look at stakeholder base recommendations for cohesive and quarter wide project systems was kind of big overarching questions.
1:13:23
slide please.
1:13:26
So in the in this planning process, there’s many, many, many steps. And we’ve just recently wrapped up kind of the first level one evaluation in this initial Alternatives Analysis moving into level two. So level one was really what are the possibilities and what can we do? What are the what are the options? And once we look at those, we kind of weeded some of those with fatal flaws and impossibilities out and have moved into level two evaluations and how do these alternatives compared to each other. And then after that, we’ll issue a notice of intent. Then advanced to meet the next slide and I can talk. The next slide will be Yes, on that level one evaluation. So we started by reviewing a lot of the existing studies of existing freight rail and highway rights of way. We really wanted to make sure that we weren’t reinventing the wheel. You know, there’s been a lot of work a lot of homework done over the last few decades, looking at for average passenger rail in many different ways. So we didn’t want to ignore all that work. So we kind of took all of that in it sure we’re considering all of the previous great work that’s been done. So those quarters and looking at the freight rail quarters, Union Pacific and BNSF Railway I’m intimately familiar with, as well as some of the highway quarters along I 25, e 470, around Denver and usat five as well. So the engineering done was to often optimize alignments to improve speeds or minimize impacts them throughout the level two evaluations already have that Done. That work is, I think all the way done completed at this point as we are in level two. And the goal is really to understand how they exist, and how a horizontal and vertical geometries, physical locations and rightaway availabilities, availabilities can interact with or for adjacent passenger rail systems. We also looked at quarter travel times, broadly estimating those giving existing and future populations. Some of the corners that we looked at, there’s two in the south, that big along I 25, and 25 roadways as well as in that BNSF Freight Corridor. There are two in the north segment, the BNSF corridor as well. And then again, I 25, highway rights of way. And then there’s four separate ones in a central segment. That can that includes the 470 route going around Denver, I 25. The freight corridors and Randy help me out I’m blanking on the fourth one Have a written down
1:16:00
here. The fourth one was the basically the alignment that was evaluated during the North I 25. commuter rail update back in 2015.
1:16:10
Yep. So again, playing on some of the homework that’s already been done in the state of Colorado. And really we are engineers work to optimize and refine these, looking at geometric refinements such as, you know, smoothing out some of those curves along along the south. A lot of that was vertical as well, less than the North segment. I think, although when you get to the Big Thompson Canyon is river there’s there’s some of that work as well, but really wanting to understand the highest activity station areas, you know, where that where these big usage stations gonna be, and how can we connect those to give us the best ridership and the best service along the front range. So these next few slides, these are I don’t think that we can overstate these enough fees come from Amtrak. Amtrak has proposed a capital capital grant program, which could really help to fund the initial Front Range passenger rail service. So what they’re proposing is investing $2.3 billion of Amtrak money, a federal money structure. And then over the course of the first five years of that operation, slowly 20% each year shifting that towards a state supported service. So this looks like you know, really connecting for Collins, Boulder, Denver, Colorado Springs, with some of those intermediate stops in between, and really kind of providing a big injection of capital funding to get us going here on this next slide. I think the next slide is the Yes. So again, this is another map. You can see some of these intermediate stations Loveland Longmont, little 10, Castle Rock, the Air Force Academy. Online is indeed on there. And you’ll notice many of you will that that alignment certainly does look a lot like the RTD line down has been in the works for? Well, maybe since before I was born. I’m not quite sure on the exact date. But again, this is kind of the alignment we’re looking at. This is what we’ve been focusing on as well. And the next slide is just kind of a very 2005 app not quite since before I was born, not that young. And so you can see this is kind of an initial just for,
1:18:24
for example, purposes.
1:18:29
Just kind of a timetable. And I have a question and I’ll exam and I’ll, I’ll address that real quickly. But for example, this is what they’re kind of proposing as as the operating service is a couple trains outbound and then a couple transfers northbound as well project. When do you expect to find out if you may be likely to get an Amtrak ramp so that grant is contingent upon the appropriations bill for fiscal year 21. It was passed in the House and it’s sitting in the senate Now waiting, waiting, waiting on a conversation around that. We’re not sure. We really don’t know. Hopefully that that gets passed before the November election. Certainly before we get too, too deep into the 20 or 20. budget meeting the done so we’re not sure at this point. We do know that September 30. Yes. So what’s that 567 weeks now? I think there’s some other other bills. You may have heard that the senator are looking at right now trying to get past so they’ll have to get to it eventually. But I just don’t know if we’re going to be in there or not. We do know that Amtrak is singled out the Front Range passenger rail corridor. The What is it? Nashville to Atlanta, I think the Virginia triangle and then the Texas line as those are their four priorities right now. They really want to focus their capital money on that. Sorry. The National Network goes. So we are a priority for Amtrak. They’ve talked with us many, many times, Randy and I had to sit on this information for several months. And it was very, very difficult. But yes, we can, we can let folks know now that Amtrak really wants to focus on these medium range corridors, Front Range passenger rail, being one of those priorities puts us in a good position, given that we’re already along the process of planning out both capital and operating, kind of where we want Front Range passenger rail to go kind of jumping ahead of that.
1:20:35
Next slide, please.
1:20:38
And I want to leave you off with a bit of stakeholder engagement information. Many of you have seen these numbers. We have these were both both of these surveys done last year. The online Metro quest was an often we had close to 7000 respondents and really, really strong positive numbers, you know, 95% of respondents. passenger rail service could help address transportation needs 92% would be interested in using the service if it were available. I think it’s remarkable. This was an opt in survey. So you know, we might have been preaching to the choir a little bit. But even so giving 92% agreement and 95% agreement among almost 70,000 people I don’t care about the question is, it’s gonna be really hard to do that, no matter what. So, we we recognized that was an often and not so scientifically valid. So then we commissioned a scientifically valid survey 600 responses, these are all likely voters. And what we really were interested in was, you know, what’s the ballad appetite for this? So we asked very general broad questions, you know, would you support a Front Range passenger rail service project that would have regularly scheduled train service to major population centers, Fort Collins and Pueblo 81% supported that only 12% oppose that to a certain degree and then We ask kind of the big question of it says, Well, you know, how are you going to pay for this? Did you ask about sales tax? So yes, generally speaking, would you support or oppose the sales tax increase to fund a frontline passenger rail service regularly scheduled train service between Fort Collins and Pueblo with an estimated cost of $5 billion? That is $5 billion a number. It’s it’s a very, very, very high level estimate that we really only use for purposes of asking a question. And so that was about 61% total support, which was really key. Um, you know, our pollsters there, they they’d never, nobody’s really ever pulled these kind of ballot questions for a frontage passenger rail service. And given at the time, the lack of publicity and marketing and stakeholder engagement we had done they were shocked. They couldn’t believe that we had such high support. Do you see a question there is their data regarding forecast passionate volume. That’s one of the one of the efforts that we’re undertaking right now on through this survey survey. We should have, certainly by the end of this year, I hope should have some of those initial ridership modeling numbers. But but we’ll get that since I don’t have it yet.
1:23:13
And I think that is probably the last slide I have.
1:23:19
Yes. So again, Randy is our project director down there. If you have any questions, email me, I do have a family’s passions real specific website, you can get all kinds of information there. A little more detail on the things that I’ve talked about tonight. Randy, I think I heard you in there. Did you want to leave any other final comments, thoughts?
1:23:42
No, again, just thanks to all of you in Longmont. I know you and Phil Greenwald, especially has been a champion for your community about this project. I was involved in the north I 25. commuter rail update back in 2015. I was the project manager for the consultant team at that time and That’s when I got a chance to know Phil pretty well and and now as in my new role as Project Director for the commission continues to be a real pleasure working with Phil and the other folks in the long run area. So don’t be shy continue to give us opportunities to provide updates to this group or others within the lawn mowed area. We’re, that’s that’s what they pay Spencer and I to do. So. Please, please don’t be shy. And, again, thank you for the opportunity and you got any more questions Unless Unless you need to move on with your agenda. Spencer and I are are here to answer some more questions if you have anything.
1:24:39
Great. We have time for one or two questions there if there’s something Top of Mind here.
1:24:48
Yes, Councilmember pick
1:24:51
up your mute there.
1:24:55
Thank you, Tim either Are you wanting to know and I put it in the chat if we can get a copy of the slideshow.
1:25:01
From Randy or
1:25:03
Absolutely,
1:25:04
yeah. Thank you, Randy.
1:25:09
I’ve got it, and I can send it out right now.
1:25:12
Fantastic. Thank you. Easy enough.
1:25:18
Any last questions? Yes, any? I’m just
1:25:24
curious, do you have any idea what it would cost to go from Longmont down to, let’s say, Denver?
1:25:33
As far as
1:25:34
cost an actual ticket price or costs to build, yes.
1:25:40
Pick a price.
1:25:43
You know, in the next kind of phase of planning, right now, we’re doing a very general, we need to just figure out where we’re gonna put this and how we’re gonna run this. But then we’re gonna move into the kind of those very, very specific operating questions, you know, how much is this going to cost? What’s the ticketing structure going to look like? What’s the fare structure gonna be? gonna look like? So? I don’t have that number for you quite yet. But that’s kind of in that next stage of planning.
1:26:09
Okay, are you going to be able to use any of the existing rails that let’s say that Burlington Northern, the free rails, are you going to have to build additional rails
1:26:20
to run this train?
1:26:23
Yes or No, I think it depends geographically where you’re looking at, and certain places, you know, the only option might be to, to run on the same freight lines and other areas where there’s a little more space, we might be able to build kind of a third track to focus just on families, passenger rail. So I know that’s not a very specific answer either, but it’s kind of all of the above.
1:26:44
Okay, thank you.
1:26:46
This is Randy and I’ll jump in right there to. Again, we’ve are very fortunate to have both BNSF and up as members of this commission, and we’ve had three really good sit down meetings with just the project. team in the class one railroads, the latest being just last Wednesday. And again, both class ones are very cooperative and, and I think by us bringing them into this project early. They are they are committed to trying to find a way to make Front Range passenger rail a reality. So we’re very fortunate in that regard. I know BNSF got beat up quite a bit in their discussions with RTD on Northwest rail. We’ve actually got a meeting set for next week with Mater with RTD Ville is also one of our bosses on on the commission, he represents RTD and we’re going to sit down with Bill and his staff and and start having additional conversations about how Front Range passenger rail can partner with RTD not only in the north corridor projects, but also coming up through the Southwest corridor. That’s going to be a key access point for Front Range rail to come into Denver from the south. From Castle Rock, so both Southwest corridor and northwest rail are going to be good opportunities for some kind of partnerships with the RTD. So we’re looking forward to those.
1:28:12
Spencer and Randy, thank you very much for being able to educate us about some of these long term plans. These are indeed, looking far ahead there. But they only become a reality if we start making plans and thinking better now. So we’ll keep our fingers crossed on some of the funding opportunities and keep us posted as we go forward. Thanks, guys. Thank you. Great looking forward on the agenda there. It looks like our comments for board members if I’m looking at the right agenda this time. So we’ll just go around in the order that people happen to pure on my screen. So Sandy, you are up first on any comments from your side?
1:28:58
Yes, that is really impressed with the Front Range passenger rail that perhaps they could get something done that we haven’t been able to do with RTD to get the bus, I mean not to rail up and down through the Front Range Front Range. But back to the CHIP program. I really appreciate all the work that went into it. I read every single one of those 25 proposals and the thought the maps the whole connection with whether it’s a comprehensive plan, envision long thought whatever it might be, just appreciated how they wove everything together. I was sad to see so many things unfunded but, but I know that we’re working towards getting things funded. So thank you all for your your work and the projects that you’ve done. So thank you.
1:29:56
Wonderful. Thanks, Sandy. Courtney, do you want to go next Uh, in the comments from board members.
1:30:05
Sure. I’m also very excited about the potential for rail. Glad to hear that he is in communication with the other groups. That was one of my questions whether they were involved in that or not. So very excited and echoing Sandy’s statements that there’s a lot of work going into all the projects that have been going. I mean, some of the dates on those projects date back many years that they’ve been ongoing and just nice to see that they’re still always in progress says it would always do it as it will be. Thank you.
1:30:42
Awesome. Thank you. David, you want to go next.
1:30:46
I’m not sure I don’t have anything new to add. I just, I
1:30:50
certainly appreciate all the work that
1:30:53
bill Tyler and Eve were doing to
1:30:56
pull us together especially with our changing needs. Screams that we’re having right now.
1:31:03
challenging times indeed. Yeah. Thanks, David. Chuck Europe.
1:31:12
All right, thank you. Um, I guess I’ll echo the rail service sounds really encouraging. I’ve lived in two regions where we’ve had north south Regional Rail through Amtrak, and they both have worked very well. So I can just throw that in there. The latest theory I lived was the Vancouver, British Columbia to Eugene, Oregon, north south, which is very similar. It goes along the I five corridor, and I used it many times. And yeah, so I’m encouraged by what I seen in the past, and at that same model would work here. I think it would be great. Oh, beyond that, I just want to say thanks to our staff for getting that traffic light in and Alpine and Mountain View. very encouraged by that have been watching the progress for the last couple of weeks. Thank you. And then also just a quick shout out to Jim, for that presentation, very detailed. Lots of information there. And you know, there comes at a time when you look at your experts that you have on staff, and you go, Yeah, he knows so much more than I do about all the nuts and bolts that are going into there. And I trust that this was the right decision to make. So just thanks to our staff, they do a top notch job and try to balance between taking care of our office that we currently have, and looking for the future.
1:32:45
That’s all.
1:32:46
Well said. Thanks, Chuck. All right to our new transportation advisory board members. Just a little bit of context here in this section, the agenda we usually just reserve some time if there were either any transportation Issues of special note, from your perspective, any follow up on past issues, and clarifying questions or things you’ve seen around town that you thought would be helpful to bring to the attention of our talented transportation staff. So Joe, I’ll start with you. Welcome, man. I can hear you just fine there any comments that you want to add for the good of the order?
1:33:22
But I think from my perspective, there is a tremendous amount to unpack from a commentary standpoint was the presentation great information helped a lot. I don’t think I’m really in a position at this stage to contribute or add a lot of comments. Give me time.
1:33:39
Sounds good.
1:33:41
All right, Liz. Any questions or comments on your site?
1:33:46
I really want to echo what everybody was saying about the wonderful work that staff did and also, I found that Front Range rail presentations fascinating and exciting.
1:33:57
And that really was it
1:34:00
Sounds good.
1:34:03
Sounds good. Only comments I’ll add is just to add to reinforce the point that we really do have are fortunate in Longmont to have some really talented staff members on the transportation team. And it gives us great confidence there as they’re presenting the issues. They’ve done their due diligence on different issues. What I would encourage just for, especially for new transportation advisory board members are window of time oftentimes goes faster than the time allows for so as you’re thinking of different comments or clarifications during that presentations, and over the next year, or two or three, I really encourage you and everyone for that matter. And just to really be thinking about, you know, what are the one or two most important issues to be able to raise because, certainly for every topic, there’s an opportunity to ask clarifying questions that can get into the weeds there. So I’ll do my best to make sure that We can enter meetings on time. But I definitely encourage everyone to really think about how to prioritize the questions so we can get to the most important issues. With that, I’ll hand it over to Councilmember pick.
1:35:12
Thank you, Neil. Um, I just want to reiterate what everyone said I, I think we’ve got the greatest transportation department and they’re so easy to work with. And I love this board. I just say I do you guys. You care. And it really comes through. But I want to give a real fast update on what’s going on with RTD. If you don’t mind, the RTD board has whittled it down to three finalists for the director. And they’re going to be giving videos because we’re in this covid craziness that will be available to the public and you can comment on them there. There are three women who are all incredibly qualified for the position. We don’t know yet when those videos are going to be made available to Public. But what I would like is, if you so if you feel as passionate as I do about the rail to make sure that when they are being considered for this position that they understand how important the rail is to us, whether it’s partnering with the Southwest chief and Front Range rail, or tender or finishing our line. The other thing is I think, I asked No, I’m sorry. I did I asked for a letter from the board about the feiss account the fast tracks internal savings account that you support, keeping that hole and not putting it out for a bus operation. So I want to thank you for that. And it looks like they are the board is leaning toward keeping that hole and not taking it but there is one point that was put to me after working On this for five years it was new. There is I think it’s called the rubber tire fund or option where money is taken out of the fast tracks fund for bus operations. And the board is considering over the next few years, it’s about $20 million a year. So that should have been fast tracks fund all of this time, which would have been a huge portion of the cost of all the unfinished corridors. So that is being contemplated to keep that those dollars coming out there at the cost of $20 million a year. We need to keep on top of that and see if the board is actually going to do that. I know they’re in a huge funding crisis. But these are two different funds that we that we voted on. So that is a good thing to keep that so RTD Through governor polis and faith winners in that gray have formed and accountability RTD accountability committee and this committee is to do a deep dive into all aspects of RTD to for the management, for funding for financial revenue, whatever. So, just FYI, that that is in they had their first meeting yesterday, or today this morning. I’m getting my days mixed up. I also met with Randy Greenberger a couple of times and Bill Van Meter and I’m very excited about this Front Range Southwest Chief, and from my conversations it looked like unless that’s changed, that the Northwest quarter would hook right into that when you saw that on the map where it kind of made that triangle into Longmont in Boulder. That was part of the Northwest corridor. So we need to keep on RTD to finish that. And just as a venting. I am frustrated with art. CD in that they have a that the Southwest chief in Front Range rail has the BNSF director that we’ve been trying to get communication with for all these years. And they have got him on their board, DJ Mitchell. So that frustration as soon as I saw that, I thought, are you kidding me? We’ve been asking RTD for five years or more, please is in contact with ej. So that did happen right before COVID. They went to Fort Worth and had that big meeting. So I am hopeful that this will all come together. But I do. Our city does need tab to be part of that support group and advocacy. So I want to thank you very much, and anger by.
1:39:54
Thank you so much.
1:39:56
All right. Well, in the last few meetings, we’ve had a pretty Need for people to keep others in the loop about transportation related meetings? any info on upcoming transportation meetings on the radar?
1:40:09
I don’t have any at this point little Do you have anything coming up with Kaufmann
1:40:17
think with Kaufman dollar, but I did want to mention the there’s been some, excuse me meetings that have been happening for the, what’s called the first and final mile along state I have 119. And unfortunately, all the English speaking ones are now complete. But there is on Wednesday at five o’clock, a Spanish only speaking event that’s open to the public. And it’s really kind of a new idea during this time of COVID where it’s really difficult to do kind of translation services as easily as maybe you could, with, you know, with a group of people in a more of a open house setting where You could ask people if they if they’re more comfortable in Spanish speaking and then be able to speak to them directly. And so we were going to try this out, it’s going to be interesting to see how it works. And so we put the invitation out there, it’s been on a number of different stations. So if any of you are hooked into the Spanish speaking community in Longmont, or along the corridor, quite frankly, it’d be great to get the word out even better than what we hope we’ve done. But this will show us something for sure it’s going to be a good proof of, you know, is this is this something that could continue and is something that’s, that’s needed, and I hope there’s a trust level that third is built in as well that you know, this is something where you can feel very comfortable. Just as as most of us would in an English only kind of presentation so the English ones went very well. There’s probably twice as many more people that attended than we usually do. For an open house, so we had two of those. One was an evening one, like the five to six that we’re gonna have Wednesday for the Spanish speaking and the other one was a noon, have a lunch hour eating, we had 70 at the evening one and 35 at the lunch hour one. So that is probably about twice as much as we get. So this formats proven to be quite effective for people coming to participate. It’s much easier, right? You’re writing for house and you can just turn it off at any time. Or you can stay tuned in and ask questions. And there’s some fun little survey things that happen on your, on your smartphone and things. So we’re watching very carefully. So as we start the Kauffman street project, which will hopefully start before the end of September, that we are doing the same kind of outreach and hopefully getting more more and more people to tell us what they want in that corridor. And that’s the busway corridor from first to ninth. It’s fully funded with a with a with a federal grant. And so we’re going to start design Again before September 30, will be the kickoff we need to start spending money before the end of the this fiscal year, federal fiscal year so that’ll happen and then that will happen. And then in the fall, you’ll start to see the public outreach events probably before Thanksgiving. And we’ll probably be a gap in this format and if we can show the transition early next year, you know, spring of next year, we’re hoping to go back to some of the more traditional formats but I think you all understand where we are on that. Great
1:43:33
gift appreciate
1:43:36
some will honor items for upcoming agendas. I see that we have traffic safety fund countywide sales tax, Front Range, passenger rail, neighborhood traffic mitigation and, and crash Report. I’m Tyler and Phil, do I have that right? That’s all happening next meeting or is that happening in upcoming meetings.
1:43:56
This would be upcoming meetings. Not necessarily all in there. and arrange passenger rail we did on that one as well. That was tonight so we won’t be doing check.
1:44:07
Sounds good.
1:44:09
Well, we have
1:44:12
great to see all of you
1:44:13
with that.
1:44:16
Thank you, everybody.
1:44:21
Thank you. Well
1:44:25
thanks, Neil. Thank you.
1:44:27
Good job.
1:44:32
Thank you Dale next month
Transcribed by https://otter.ai