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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTransportation Board - Minutes - 02/19/2003.. REGULAR MEETING MINUTES of the TRANSPORTATION BOARD February 19, 2003 5:45 p.m. City of Fort Collins - Community Room 215 N. Mason Street FOR REFERENCE: CHAIR: Christophe Ricord 472.8769 VICE CHAIR: Bruce Henderson 898.4625 STAFF LIAISON: Don Bachman 224.6049 ADMIN SUPPORT: Cynthia Cass 224.6058 BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT: Joe Dumais Neil Grigg Bruce Henderson Edward Jakubauskas Tim Johnson Brad Miller Christophe Ricord Brent Thordarson Heather Trantham CITY STAFF IN ATTENDANCE: Don Bachman Cynthia Cass John Daggett Tom Frazier Randy Hensley Mark Jackson Cam McNair Ron Phillips Kathleen Reavis Timothy Wilder ABSENT: Dan Gould Ray Moe GUESTS IN ATTENDANCE: Everitt Bacon Melissa Bordewin Bob Felsburg Rich Follmer RA Plummer Gary Thomas ., Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 2 of 8 1. CALL TO ORDER Chair Ricord called the meeting to order at 6 p.m. 2. PUBLIC COMMENT None. 3. APPROVAL OF MINUTES There was a motion by Johnson and a second by Henderson to approve the minutes of January 15, 2003 as presenter. The motion carried by a unanimous vote (9-0). 4. COUNCIL LIAISON REPORT None. 5. DISCUSSION ITEMS a. MASON TRANSPORTATION CORRIDOR UPDATE — K. Reavis Reavis stated that the focus of tonight's discussion will be the downtown portion of the corridor. She began a PowerPoint presentation, which was the same one that the City Council saw at their Study Session last Tuesday. Highlights of the presentation were: What Have We Been Doing? - FTA New Starts Update - BNSF Coordination - Alignment Concepts - Grade Separation -Drake - Station Analysis Summary of Public Open House Focus — Downtown Issues - Railroad Related Design Issues - Two -Way Conversion of Mason/Howes Importance of BNSFRole - Ownership of 4.5 Miles (South of Laurel) - Joint Use Agreement on Mason Street in Downtown - Downtown Improvements Influence Use of Remaining Corridor BNSF Objectives - Improved Safety - Ease of Maintenance Safety Objectives in Downtown Area Maintenance Issues in Downtown Area Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 3 of B BNSEICity Dialogue - Started with BNSF wanting full -height solid barrier - Now discussing In -Street Railing (West Side Only), Enhanced Crossings at Intersections, Open Ballast, and Two -Way Conversion of Mason/Howes One -Way Couplet History Why is Conversion Being Considered? Two -Way Couplet Evaluation Criteria Summary of Findings for Two -Way Operation - Improved Travel Time for BRT - Comparable Auto, Bike, and Pedestrian Operations - Less On -Street Parking Impact - Better Vehicular Accessibility - Improved Railroad Safety - Comparable Capital Costs Other Key Factors Supporting Two -Way Operation - Complements Objectives of Downtown Strategic Plan - Public Support Opportunities for Public Input Next Steps - Continue Dialogue with BNSF Refine/Evaluate Alternatives Progress Environmental Assessment Board Questions/Comments: Miller: Will U-Turns be allowed at intersections? Reavis: The U-turn issue is a little problematic. We haven't really looked at that for downtown, but I should mention the left -turn issue from our analysis. When the Master Plan was done, it recommended eliminating all left turns off of Mason from Laurel to Cherry. When we did our analysis, we found that it seems to be difficult to do from a real estate standpoint because there are a lot of locations where people need to be able to make left -turns. The areas where we're planning to allow left turns would be at Cherry, Laurel, LaPorte, Mountain and Mulberry. A U-turn might be a little difficult due to the width of the street. Dumais: If someone leaves Washington's fairly inebriated, is it going to be clear enough that there is a fence there or will the fence blend in too much? I'm a little worried that someone may try to run across the street, even in front of a train and bounce off the fence... Reavis: Trying to put this nicely, before they hit the fence, they would hit the curb. There are some things you can try to avoid and then there are some behavior that sort of defies common sense. Johnson: Gould couldn't be here tonight, but he there was one point that he liked and that was that he liked the two-way much better because of the operation of transit and folks know where to go no matter which direction they're going. Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 4 of 8 Johnson: The second point, with regard to the barrier, near intersections where people are doing left turns, it might have to be marked in such a way as to catch the driver's attention and not be so transparent that the driver doesn't see it if they are cutting the corner a little bit. Reavis: We've talked about what sort of end -treatments would make them visibly appealing — but that's a good point also to make sure they aren't something that someone doesn't see until it's too late. That's another part about having them pulled back away from the crosswalk, so that if someone were making a left turn or a U-turn, they would have plenty of clearance. Thordarson: Would you have curbing on the other side of the crosswalk like is done on a lot of the newer intersection improvements where you have a pedestrian refuge area? There's curb on the intersection side of the crosswalk as well as on the median side where the roadway continues out of the intersection —just to add more of a barrier there. Reavis: I don't know how we would do that on Mason with the tracks through there, but it may be something we could do on Howes, at those intersections where we have center left turn lanes to work with. We do need to do some other work on the enhanced crosswalk ideas. Perhaps it could be done with the decorative pavement treatment or something else to give a sense of pedestrian space. Mr. Thomas: The fence is obviously pretty open from the side and viewed from end on it looks solid. Is there a problem when trying to make a left tum with seeing a train behind the fence when looking down the length of the fence? Reavis: We've looked at that in terms of the design and you're right, you do have that issue when you're looking straight on to it, but again, it's pulled back far enough from the intersection, you're going to be able to see beyond it and also the height of it is about 5-6' and the train is so much taller than that you're going to be able to see it. We do want to make sure that it's not brought too close to the intersection so that it would cause any of those visibility problems. Dumais: Is the height such that people would try to jump it? Reavis: We want it tall enough that people won't go up to it and try to swing a leg over easily. At 6' we think we're safe. Thordarson: Has the railroad expressed a willingness to carry financially some of the improvements given the benefits they're getting from the project? Reavis: It's interesting, one of the things they have expressed an interest in is that if the open ballast were to be done, that's something that I think the RR would take care of. It's something that is that important to them. They really want to see that opened up for their maintenance. I think they would cover that cost. Chair Ricord: First, I'd like to thank Kathleen and the consultant for the presentation. It really helps us visualize some of the challenges, changes and issues that you're struggling with right now. Secondly, I'd like to express support for the two-way couplet. It seem like most people are supportive of that that I've talked to. As far as local circulation goes, that will improve. I'm having a little trouble visualizing what happens here (referring to map on wall). It looks like the railroad will actually be raised. Reavis: We've been struggling with that from the graphics standpoint. It's actually an illusion of the way this is drawn. The elevation of the track will not change from what it is today. Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February'19, 2003 Page 5 of 8 Chair Ricord: Who will take care of the trash and debris that collect on the fence railings? Reavis: Primarily the City will be responsible for that. Ricord: Council member Weitkunat brought up the potential for Art in Public Places and I thought it was a good idea. It could be very interesting visually. Felsburg stated that the theme issue will be one of the topics of next week's meetings. Johnson: As part of our education plan, we should think about the connection between the Downtown Strategic Plan and this project. We need to make sure that there are 1- 2 board members at every meeting next week as I believe it would be effective and I would encourage everyone to do it in a way so that you're listening to the public, for instance, if you're hearing questions coming up that we might be able to answer straight away and then you should let those of us who will be working on the tax campaign hear those so we can get the correct information to the voters right away and not be surprised. Volunteers came forth for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday night's meetings. Staff agreed to email flyers to the board. The board decided to take an informal vote on supporting going back to the two- way couplet and everyone was in agreement. b. TRANSPORTATION MASTER PLAN — M. Jackson Jackson and Bacon gave a visual presentation updating the board on the project, with emphasis on the Preliminary Transportation Analysis Summary that was prepared to summarize the findings of the scenario analysis in terms of key transportation characteristics. Board Questions/Comments: Henderson: How is congestion defined and can it be related to LOS? Bacon: The way we define congestion is by a letter grade, for instance, LOS A-C = uncongested, easy movement in the traffic stream. LOS D = Growing congestion, more limited movements. LOS E-F = Congested, indicates failure in terms of mobility. Henderson: Are you going to make any attempt to validate for the people, that they visualize E and F as congestion versus A and C and that sort of thing. Bacon: We try and tailor it to Fort Collins because we realize that congestion to someone who lives in Los Angeles as compared to someone in Laramie, Wyoming are two different things. Trantham: How helpful were the modeling results being that they were all the same? Does that mean if we contract our GMA then we are responsible for fewer facilities fiscally? Jackson: What it means in mind is that if we contract, we lose the opportunity to gain any impact fees or any mitigation from development that's going to occur to the degree that we have the GMA that encompasses these areas of big impacts. Trantham: So what is the model sensitive to? How far would you have to expand the GMA or would it ever be sensitive to that if you took it all the way to ... 1-�, -"N Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 6 of 8 Bacon: It tends to be sensitive to a lot of those things, but when we're talking about very small nuances, in my opinion anyway, of a GMA boundary and the fact that development won't necessarily stop outside the GMA just because you don't call it the GMA, the model can be sensitive to those things. If you look at today versus the future, the model is obviously sensitive to the growth in the future because you see how much that's changing over time. The issue to me, isn't whether the model is sensitive or not, it's are these alternatives significantly different from a transportation standpoint or not and I think our results are that they are probably not very different. There might be other reasons to do GMA contraction/expansion, but transportation isn't one of them, at least in my opinion. Johnson: I think we're going to have a robust discussion about this sometime. I think that clearly it depends on the ratio of your cost versus what you take in. What I really want to get at is that you brought out a statistic that I'd like to ask you more about. The average trip length — how do you define a trip? Bacon: A trip is defined as a distinct origin and destination. Johnson: In the way we collect fees, we talk about impacts for street Oversizing for 1 mile, so you can see that what we're basing it on is way out of kilter. That's probably what has led us into this enormous capital deficit that we're trying to deal with right now. As we go forward, I suspect that one good thing for the community to do will be to do an accounting for how much we still fall short based on this kind of a trip length and actually ask that Street Oversizing takes into account, not the one -mile .. but something that reflects what the average trip length is. Bacon: Just to clarify, the model calculates different trip types. A commute trip is different than a shopping trip etc. Commute trips are longer so they weight that number a little higher. c. DOWNTOWN STRATEGIC PLAN — R. Hensley & J. Daggett Hensley stated that there are three documents that staff would like feedback on. These were included in the board's packets. Hensley went over the Market/Urban Design Framework (formerly "Policy") Working Paper, which is a draft of the policies that will shape the future of downtown Fort Collins. To a large degree, it provides the context for the transportation effort in the Downtown Strategic Plan. Daggett then introduced the proposed policy statements/questions related to Parking, Bicycle/Pedestrian, Freight Delivery, Traffic/Circulation, and Transit/Multi-Modal. Board Ouestions/Comments: Trantham: Do you have any information from other cities such as Portland and how they balance their employees who need to be downtown versus people who go there to shop. How do they do it? Daggett: That is a work in progress at this point. We have six peer cities that we're gathering information from and that is not back yet. We will be happy to bring that to you when we have it. ,o- Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 7 of 8 Johnson: Could you remind us of how many parking spots are in the study area? Hensley: 9,300. Johnson: That's where some of the things under P3 come in to play when you talk about public/private partnerships and see if you can find some way to use a lot of these spots that might be open during the day. I think that one thing I brought up today was kind of the incongruity of parking is that every time we make a parking structure or parking lot, we have one less reason to go downtown. A comment I have for P2 is that I think we should be talking about long term and short term for the two bullet points there. I think those are your goals. Another thing about the parking structures downtown is that a lot of people have no clue where College Avenue is when they get in there. We need to have maps or signage pointing to College and list the shops and what not; it could be a friendly way for people to know where to go. Grigg: We need to make it so that more people are willing to walk a block or two instead of trying to find a spot directly in front of their destination. Johnson: In terms of a continual bikeway, look carefully at the ways to link Jefferson with the potential of reaching all the way to the southeast corner of the city. There was a motion far Chair Ricord to prepare a memo stating the board supports the draft policies and the direction the plan is going at this stage. There was a second and the motion carried unanimously. Hensley asked for confirmation that the board is comfortable with leaving the paid parking topic on the table for further investigation and discussion. Chair Ricord offered to include that in the memo as well. d. TRANSPORTATION CAPITAL FUNDING STRATEGY — Finance Subcommittee Johnson gave a brief report on the previous night's City Council meeting. The next meeting of the campaign committee is Thursday, 7:30 p.m., at Perspectives. 6. ACTION ITEMS a) ELECTION OF OFFICERS - All Chair Ricord stated that he did not desire to accept nominations for another term. Bruce Henderson was nominated and elected Chair and Heather Trantham was nominated and elected Vice Chair. 7. REPORTS a) BOARD MEMBER REPORTS Johnson: DMU. The DMU demo was great. I was encouraged by seeing it. RTA. Would like to see the board get an update on this, perhaps in April? Staff needs to ask the MPO to come. Transportation Board APPROVED Regular Meeting Minutes February 19, 2003 Page 8 of 8 Thordarson: DMU. I talked to Mary Warring and found out that about 500 people went through the demo car. Open House. We learned a lot from having the open house at the mall. People seemed most interested in the Mason Corridor graphics. So I think the larger, splashier visual aides are the ones that are going to draw the most attention. Henderson: Trails. Last month when we talked about the potential change to the bike path that was going to route around Paragon Point — can someone get back to us with more information on the status of that? Bachman: I checked with Parks staff and it is in their purview. I didn't get a lot of new information. Council did hear this issue in a Study Session, but the homeowners still see this as an impasse. This will be discussed at the February 26 Parks and Rec Board meeting. Henderson: I'm the liaison to that board, so I'll attend the meeting and speak during public give the transportation board's input at that time. Trantham: Modeling. I included in your packets some reading material. Modeling has always been a pet issue of mine. I wanted to make this more comprehensive, but then decided to just do it. b) STAFF REPORTS McNair: Cone Zone Report. The report was distributed and Johnson suggested that it be placed on the City's web site. 8. OTHER BUSINESS None. t 1111-10 Chair Ricord adjourned the meeting at 9:45 p.m. Respectfully submitted, 4�� Cynthia Cass Executive Administrative Assistant City of Fort Collins — Transportation Services