Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutParking Advisory Board - Minutes - 07/11/2016MINUTES of the CITY OF FORT COLLINS PARKING ADVISORY BOARD July 11, 2016 5:30 p.m. 215 North Mason – Community Room Fort Collins, CO 80524 FOR REFERENCE: Chair: Susan Kirkpatrick Vice Chair: Holly Wright Staff Liaison: Kurt Ravenschlag 221-6386 Administrative Support: Melissa Brooks 224-6161 BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT: CITY STAFF PRESENT: Holly Wright, Vice Chair Kurt Ravenschlag, Transfort/Parking General Manager George Newman Melissa Brooks, Transfort Administrative Aide Nora Hill Steve Schroyer Bob Criswell Michael Short Carey Hewitt ABSENT: OTHERS IN ATTENDANCE Councilmember Kristin Stephens Craig Dubin, Transfort Communications & Admin Manager Susan Kirkpatrick Mark Anderson, Citizen Stephanie Napoleon Lori Feig-Sandoval, Citizen Rob (Last Name Unknown), Citizen 1. CALL TO ORDER Acting Chair, Wright called the meeting to order at 5:30 2. WELCOME AND INTRODUCTIONS 3. AGENDA REVIEW 4. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Schroyer moves to accept June meeting minutes and Newman seconds. The minutes were approved unanimously. 5. COUNCIL LIAISON REPORT None Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 2 6. PUBLIC COMMENT Mark Anderson: I live about a block and a half from the Thai Pepper, the parking in my neighborhood had never been good, but has gotten really bad in the last year. We are outside of the RP3 zone. The zones that have been implemented around CSU have moved the parking issues into my neighborhood. Many neighbors don’t like RP3 program, they think it is invasive. They have to pay to park a car that was free last year. Reading previous meeting minutes, there was an 80% approval rate. I assume that this is from people in the PR3 zone and not the people that have been displaced or the people who now have to deal with the extra parking. The survey is a little bias and not representative. It is classic Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY). It is very territorial. NIMBY is something the City and Zoning Board try hard to avoid. The RP3 map is looking like a two block ring going around CSU and once the ring is completed will it solve any problems or move the parking problems out two more blocks. If I were given the opportunity to set up parking laws I would say 30% of the spots would be set aside for neighbors, the rest is for anyone who would want to use them. This would allow for neighbors to have the chance to find a spot and others would not be forced to move into other neighborhoods. I would suggest revisiting RP3 and make it friendlier for outside parking. Ravenschlag: One change we have made in the RP3 Program to make it easier for nonresidents to park is that there is two hour free parking is mandatory in RP3 neighborhoods. Just like parking downtown. By the end of the year every zone will have two hour parking. If you need to park longer than two hours and are a resident, you can get a permit. If you have guests you can get guest permits by asking to borrow from you neighbors or calling Parking Services to request more guest permits. One thing that is difficult to understand is that the street is a public resource where people can park. We are not trying to make it exclusive to just the residents, but at the same time man ageing it so residents can find parking, and allow nonresidents to park on the street. A lot of the parking demand is coming from CSU. They have availability to park on campus but people are choosing not to buy permits. Their permits have increased significantly this year. In terms of is the program pushing the problem into other neighborhoods, to a certain extent yes. We have seen neighborhoods adjacent to an RP3 ask to become an RP3 neighborhood. There is a point to where parking is dispersed and is not as much of a problem. There will be point people will have to make changes to how they choose to park their vehicle or type of transportation they use to get to activity centers. In this transition phase we are still seeing a lot of the pushing effect on the parking if it stays where it is at we will see neighborhoods affected. Most everything we do is based on public comment and feedback and the whole reason we are doing this program is from public comment and feedback Council received. If they receive feedback from the contrary, they would listen. Criswell: What is the enforcement of zones? Ravenschlag: It is Monday thru Friday 8 am – 5 pm. The citations are slightly different; they are permit violations versus timed parking violations. They are $25. Hewitt: Have you had a lot of negative comments about RP3? Ravenschlag: During the implementation phase of a neighborhood we will get a split opinion. At the last neighborhood meeting we had people adamantly for it and other adamantly against the program. Once it is implemented we don’t hear that. Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 3 7. DISSUCSION ITEMS A. PAB August Meeting The PAB will meet in August and discuss the Parking Enforcement recommendation. B. Review Budgeting for Outcome Offers Ravenschlag: The process called Budgeting for Outcomes began in April where we have results teams that receive offers from City departments. The results team that is made up of City staff and two citizens review and rank the offers. Then transition to the Budget Lead Team, which consists of the City Manager and his direct reports. They then review the budget and make their recommendations that turns into the City Manager’s Recommend Budget to Council. It is delivered in early September late August. Parking Services doesn’t ask for General Funds. General Funds is the City’s sales and use tax. We are considered an Enterprise Fund which we generate revenue through citations and permits. We have a fund that has a reserved balance. Ongoing & Enhancement Offers: Parking Services, Kurt Ravenschlag  73.1 Parking Services: Ravenschlag: This is an ongoing offer and consists of what Parking Services is currently doing today.  73.2 Fire House Ally Structure: Ravenschlag: This one is unique, because this is already happening, but because it is new we have to submit it as an enhancement offer, which is the operating and maintenance expenses. The money being requested would be covered from the revenue from the garages.  73.3 Capital Equipment: Ravenschlag: We are asking for two additional Nissan Leafs and the license plate recognition (LPR) equipment that goes with those. This is part of the enforcement changes that we are trying to make to stretch our resources. We have six Enforcement Officers that do their enforcement activity on foot. Since we have added six RP3 zones it has stretched our geographical boundaries. We are trying to put the officers in vehicles that they could become more efficient without having to add additional officers. LPR is very expensive. We are asking to retro fit the Civic Center and Old Town with cameras and self-service pay stations. The cameras are for enhanced security. Right now there is only one camera directed at the entrance in each structure. Pay stations are so we can retro fit the existing structures to be consistent with the new garage that is being built. They would be self-service structures and transition from an access control entry point and be free flow in and out of the garage and pay at pay stations when exiting on foot. At the pay stations you will enter your license plate number and time limit. You do not have to take a ticket back to your car. It will have a mobile application where you can add time and pay. These are not funded; it is what we are asking for. Criswell: The reserved fund just for Parking? Ravenschlag: Just for Parking. Criswell: What is the $500000 going towards? Ravenschlag: It is going towards the cameras and pay stations. Criswell: Is there a lot of vandalism? Ravenschlag: We don’t have a lot of cases of vandalism. It is more for personal safety. Right now we do not have any way to investigate property damage or assaults. It is best practices to have surveillance systems in facilities. Criswell: With the pay stations you are going towards cell phone use and security you Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 4 are going away from it. When I park I will take a picture of the two vehicles parked next to mine. That is my security against property damage. Personal attacks I have not see any. Are there any reported assaults? Ravenschlag: Yes, but I don’t have the stats on how many have been reported. Criswell: Can you break down how much the cameras are? Dubin: The largest expense is going to be infrastructure. These are ruggedized cameras rated for external use. They would be similar to what we have on the transit system. Hewitt: Are you estimating what is coming from the reserved fund and new appropriations? Ravenschlag: This process asks us to identify what fund we would recommend. Most of these are from the Parking Fund and Keep Fort Collins Great. Newman: The people who are being replaced staying in Parking or other City departments? Ravenschlag: It would be dealt with through attrition or finding other opportunities with in the City. They are customer service and there are a lot of customer service opportunities. Wright: This seems like a great way to go and as a Board we should back this. Hewitt: Will there be a saving not paying someone to be there? Ravenschlag: There is potential that there will be.  73.6 Capital Repair and Maintenance: This is our priority for capital repair and maintenance on the Civic Center and Old Town Parking structures. This is what is needed to be done to utilize the full life of the structures. We developed a three year maintenance plan in 2013 and we have gotten behind on the plan due to lack of funding. We only completed a year of the three year plan. We are asking for the remaining dollars to complete the work. This is not regular maintenance this is catch up and once it is done we should be able to go back to a more reasonable schedule. Some of work being done is caulking and concrete injections in joints.  73.5 CSU Game Parking Management: We were asked to submit as part of the Intergovernmental Agreement with the City and CSU for doing neighborhood parking management during game days. It is reflective of our staff time for the home games. What was proposed in there was a towing program and towing would be at the expense of the vehicle owner. There is potential concern with the president that this sets for doing event parking Newman: Given that you are an enterprise fund why would they turn these down? Ravenschlag: Because there isn’t enough funding to do all of them in the reserves. They would need to tap into Keep Fort Collins Great if they were to fund all of these. That is where they could decide not to do that. Creswell: Looks like the bottom three are carved in stone. Ravenschlag: Also, the CSU Game Day would be paid by CSU so there would be no expense to the City. Criswell: The $400,000 on the Capital Repair and Maintenance, that is to maintain over 1100 parking spaces. It would cost millions to rebuild. Is there an exceptive life of the structures? Ravenschlag: There is, around 50 years. A lot of the money has been going into the Old Town structure because it is older. Newman: It seems like you are asking for funding to better the service for citizen but also a technological solution to a manual problem. It seems that the savings from salaries and benefits would pay for it. Ravenschlag: That population of our workforce has a lot of turnover, like college kids, they are all part time. We feel that could be a source for any additional parking enforcement. Schroyer: Where is the funding coming from to do the monitoring? Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 5 Ravenschlag: Back in June we brought forward the recommendations for the Downtown Plan, which was implement paid parking, modify enforcement, Transportation Demand Management, and monitoring. The focus was on the monitoring and on street paid parking. Council did not want to pursue on street paid parking, but they did want to pursue monitoring technology for Downtown. We will bring an appropriation request this summer to being implementing this technology. Ravenschlag: These all are cost estimates and will be refined through competitive bid. Criswell: Who is qualified to give you bids? Ravenschlag: For the cameras the city already has an existing contract in place. Dubin: Infrastructure is the largest part of the cost. Our IT Department, and basically any time they are doing a job with connectivity in the Downtown area because of the state of the underground utilities. 8. ACTION ITEMS A. Memo to Fort Collins City Council Supporting BFO Offers Wright: The first one is the Willow Street Parking. We did have concerns with this. I think we supported the idea and the big addition with 80 parking. The $700,000 is for design. I would like to support it because of the substantial on street parking, but put a question that seems high for design work. Schroyer: I love the idea but the fee is absorbent. Wright: Melissa will make a note that we are in favor of the Willow Street final design but have questions as to why it is so high. Criswell moves and Newman seconds to support this offer with the reservations about cost. Wright: Trip Reduction and Efficiency Program, this was the one we were not in favor of. They talked about technology application for mobile devices, trying to reduce trip reduction and reduction in parking demand. I think the sticking point for us was that they were hiring an outside consultant. People were commenting that they thought it should be internally staffed. In the Downtown Plan initially the program will coordinate parking planning and management solutions to help integrate on and off street parking with transit, bike and pedestrian facilities. Ravenschlag: I think it is a result of recommendations coming out of the Downtown Plan, TDM. I think they originally named it Transportation Demand Management, but that typically doesn’t resonate with anybody. Wright: This will be left off our memo. Wright: The Downtown Transit Shuttle links Lincoln Corridor, Downtown and CSU. One thing that was discussed was the frequency that it ran. We thought it wouldn’t be successful unless it was frequent enough and mirror other schedules of other bus services. I think we want to support it, but it was the frequency we’re hoping through sponsorship funding. Ravenschlag: That was the intent. The City contribution to it would put it at a 30 minute frequency. The hope was through additional support with private businesses that it could increase to a higher level. Newman: My concern is that if it is funded and can’t get businesses to support; are you going forward with it 30 minutes? Schroyer: You could shorten the line. Ravenschlag: 10 minutes is optimum, but if you were to shorten it to just Downtown and then people can get on MAX to get to campus. However, one seat ride is preferred. There would be revenue if there is a high student population; with our agreement with CSU could be more money. Wright: This will be added into our memo with a comment about frequency. Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 6 Wright: Transfort Sunday Service, this was the most requested service during outreach. These are one of the enhancements that we did back in the last meeting. Ravenschlag: We have submitted this request the last three budget cycles. After MAX opened in May 2014, City Council was hearing from the community that Sunday services was really needed and they tried to fund the service that summer. We had to tell them that we couldn’t do it. We didn’t have the resources operationally to add more service. We had already increased our service by 50%. So they wanted to fund it, but we didn’t have the capacity to do it. I would also like to say that it is scalable; right now this is MAX and twelve other routes. Wright: This is approved. Wright: City Plan Transportation Plan and Transit Operating Plan. This hasn’t been updated since 2011. This seems like maintenance and is well over due. We will include this on the memo. Wright: Budget to run Parking Services, motion to support? Hill motions, Criswell seconds in support. Wright: Capital Equipment included the Nissan Leafs and cameras. Wright motions to approve and Newman seconds. Wright: Capital Repair and Maintenance, this seems to be very needed and standard procedure. Criswell motions to include and Schroyer seconds. Wright: Fire House Alley, is covered by revenue from this structure. Wright motions to include in memo, Newman seconds. Wright: Game Day Parking Management, I don’t like setting the precedent. Ravenschlag: The City has said that we will do it at the expense of CSU. We have a number of events that affect neighborhood parking and we have never provided neighborhood parking mitigation. This could possibly set a precedent that we now began doing that. We have to show any expenses that is why it is included in the Budget. Wright: Motion to include. Schroyer motions and Hewitt seconds. This will be in the memo. B. Residential Parking Permit Program Evaluation for City Council Wright: This is a memo to City Council from us. We wanted to weigh in on the improvements and how it has changed, customer satisfaction and sustainability. Schroyer: How much are these programs taxing your existing infrastructure of your operations. Ravenschlag: Currently quite a bit. We haven’t fully transitioned to our new enforcement practices. We haven’t gotten everyone into vehicles. Schroyer: My biggest concern is how much it takes to administer this program on a yearly basis with the amount of staff you have. Also concerned about when it butts up to large commercial or multifamily projects. Ravenschlag: The deficiency we identified in Parking Services is a planning component. Historically, Parking Services has been focused on day to day operations. In terms of the future and dealing with a program like RP3 that has a lot of complicated elements to it like land uses. Parking Services hasn’t been equipped to deal with this. Our parking issues are going well beyond downtown as we are growing. We need to start building parking into our future planning. As well as managing a program like RP3. This is something we are trying to address. We are hoping to utilize a new planning position to include parking. Schroyer: Do we need to put this under items to consider? Hill: Have you thought about having on every block an area available to everybody? Ravenschlag: No, a concern with that approach you are blocking off available space permanently. That is why we have taken the other approach. This is something we can look into it. Meeting Minutes July 11, 2016 Page | 7 Schroyer: People in the neighborhood would park in the open spaces and keep the “red” open for other neighbors are visitors. The enforcement had tripled and two Nissan Leafs probably won’t cut it. Wright: This program has already evolved and I believe it will continue to evolve. Ravenschlag: The commercial element is complicated and we have tried to draw the zone in Old Town West to not include commercial. The commercial is using that residential area for parking inventory. It is a problem because they don’t have anywhere to go. Wright: Do we want to add and modify anything before we submit it? Schroyer: There should be a sentence in number four or in the last paragraph stating that the dollars and cents being upside down. It is large and hard to maintain. The City can then think about how to fund in the future. Wright: Issues to consider add adapting to commercial residential boundaries. We will include the wording and review the memo one more time at the August meeting. C. BOARD REPORT Hill: Read an article about the redevelopment of where Copper Muse is. That is a private lot, if they get rid of the parking. Do they need to pay for anything? In terms of loss of parking spaces. Ravenschlag: They will have a parking requirement that they will have to meet with the development. Based on what the use is and what they are building the City will have a require amount of parking they will have to provide. D. STAFF LIAISON REPORT 10. OTHER BUSINESS None 11. ADJOURN The meeting was concluded at 7:15 pm Respectfully submitted, Melissa Brooks Administrative Aide Transfort