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MPO TPC/TAC Board Minutes - 10/13/2005F WICHITA FALLS METROPOLITAN PLANNING ORGANIZATION Technical Advisory Committee Minutes Thursday, October 13, 2005 Voting Members Present. Danny Brown — TxDOT, Director of Trans. Planning and Development Dave Clark — City of Wichita Falls, Dir. of Community Development David Lyne — City of Wichita Falls, Engineering Tech V James Kelley — TxDOT, Area Engineer Joe Anderson — TxDOT, Director of Construction Karen Montgomery-Gagne — City of Wichita Falls, Community Development Planner III Mark Beauchamp — City of Wichita Falls, Traffic Superintendent Tim Hertel — TxDOT, Director of Operations MPO Staff., Donnie Arbeau - City of Wichita Falls MPO, Transportation Planner I John Burrus — Acting Director of Aviation, Traffic and Transportation Lin Barnett — City of Wichita Falls MPO, Transportation Planner III Tammy Marlow — TxDOT, Transportation Funding Administrator Highway Needs Committee Members: Visitors: John G. Bendele — TxDOT, Austin (TPP) Field Representative Jon Moller — Citizen /Stakeholder Mike Beaver — TxDOT, Transportation Engineer Absent. 1. Welcome & Introduction Mr. Barnett called the meeting to order at 10:02 a.m. and welcomed everyone present. II. Approval of the July 13th TAC Meeting Minutes Mr. Barnett asked for comments on the minutes. There were none. Mr. Clark motioned to approve the minutes. Mr. Anderson seconded the motion. The motion was unanimously approved. RECEIVED IN CITY CLERK'S OFFICE Date -Q(, By Time :O E Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 1 of 6 III. Review and Comment Regarding TPC's July 27th Meeting Minutes - No Action Required No comments were received. IV. Review and Prioritization of the MPO /City /TxDOT Transportation Project List for FY 2006 Mr. Brown began by explaining the process for, and the reasons behind, prioritizing the MPO's transportation project list. He commented that the MPO had wanted to create a focus on transportation priorities, inside the MPO area, for quite some time thus the reason for the early August mail out of existing transportation projects to the TAC and TPC members, and the MPO stakeholders. Project nominations were due back into the MPO staff office by October 1, 2005 for inclusion into the prioritization list. Mr. Brown stated this was the MPO's first attempt at developing some type of process for ranking area transportation projects high, medium or low by consensus. It would be the TAC committee's responsibility to rank the projects and then present them to TPC for final approval. He stated this process would become a very useful tool for identifying high priority projects that were previously ranked in a lower position. Mr. Brown began by locating on the display map, and briefly discussing, 32 TxDOT projects for prioritization. Mr. Kelley asked if the list was inclusive. Mr. Brown stated that even though all projects should have come in during the project nomination phase, he would not exclude any last minute additions to the prioritization process. Mr. Brown also went on to say that if anyone was not comfortable with this particular process there was always room for change and improvement. Mr. Brown then proceeded with his presentation. After Mr. Brown presented the TxDOT projects, Mr. Barnett then presented 14 project nominations from the June 2005 Environmental Justice Transportation Projects public meetings and 23 City of Wichita Falls public works transportation projects. Project EJ 3 was a project already scheduled in the TxDOT list as project number CSJ 0043 -09 -107 (TX 9 in the FY 2005 project list). A notation to the list was made indicating the project was nominated by the citizenry at the June 2005 public meetings. A notation was also made that EJ 12, the extension of Wenonah street south into the Callfield Reliever project, was now a part of the City of Wichita Falls' new TIF District 2. Project EJ 9, signage problems at Old Iowa Park Road and Central Freeway North, had already been addressed by TxDOT and was noted as such. At the end of the presentations, Mr. Brown asked that special emphasis be applied to the hike and bike trail project in the list in order to promote its completion. He also asked that the section of US 82/277, from FM 369 to Holliday, be included as a 4 lane divided highway project to be known as "the gap" job. He stated this area was becoming increasingly important in the planning process and needed to be addressed. Mr. Brown then asked everyone to take their time and rank the projects. A 15 minute break was taken in order to give everyone time to rank the projects. The lists were then collected Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 2 of 6 for tabulation. The results will be presented at the October 24th TPC meeting. V. Review of the November Transportation Improvement Program (2006 -2008 TIP) Revisions Mr. Barnett discussed two revisions made to 2006 -2008 TIP. The first revision was to FY 2008 by State Category and was done to move CSJ 0156 -04 -080, construction of the Kell West Main Lanes, into the FY 2008 funding year in order move the project up in the letting process. The second revision was to the Federally Funded Transit Projects section of the 2006 -2008 TIP. Funding for Section 5310 — Service for Elderly and Disabled — Transit was added at a total cost of $502,373 over three years. Mr. Barnett asked for any comments or changes to the revisions. None were made. Mr. Clark motioned to approve the TIP, as presented, for forwarding to TPC for approval. Mr. Anderson seconded the motion, which was unanimously approved. VI. Review, Discussion and Recommendation of the Revisions to the Public Involvement Policy (PIP) as Required by the 2005 Triennial Review Findings Report Mr. Barnett stated the reviewer for the Wichita Falls Transit System's (WFTS) Triennial Review had found a deficiency in the Procedural Notices and Processes portion of the MPO's Public Involvement Policy. Under the Transit Routes and Changes section the reviewer stated the PIP was deficient in the definition of a major service reduction. The reviewer informed WFTS that it needed to revise this paragraph and submit the policy revision to FTA. Mr. Barnett asked for comments or corrections. There was a minor grammatical correction to the paragraph where the word "following" was replaced with "preceding ". Mr. Barnett also stated the Speaking Engagement Opportunities, under the Environmental Justice Section, had been updated to accurately reflect the most recent efforts of the MPO to make contact with the public and present transportation issues. Mr. Brown motioned to approve the PIP, as presented with revisions, for forwarding to TPC for approval. Mr. Anderson seconded the motion, which was unanimously approved. VII. Review and Discussion of the Final Report on the June, 2005 Environmental Justice Public Meetings Concerning MPO Roadway Projects — Excludes Transit Mr. Arbeau handed out draft copies of the Final Report on the June 2005 Environmental Justice Transportation Projects public meetings. Mr. Barnett briefly summarized the contents of the report. Mr. Brown commented that a clearer definition of Environmental Justice should be included in the introductory section of the report. Mr. Barnett stated he would work to improve that part of the report so that it could be easily understood. Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 3 of 6 7-. Mr. Barnett suggested forming a subcommittee of TAC members to inspect the report for corrections and changes before presenting it to TPC at the October 24th meeting. Mr. Hertel agreed stating that it would be a good idea to do that in order to catch any problems with the document. There was general concern around the table that the recommendations on the summary sheets might commit TxDOT or the City of Wichita Falls to a specific action. Mr. Brown and Mr. Lyne both agreed that the report should be viewed as another tool for analyzing the viability of a specific project and that the recommendations should simply be viewed as just that, recommendations. Mr. Brown asked Mr. Bendele for his comments on this issue. Mr. Bendele stated that FHWA has, since 2000, been working towards developing an analytical tool for EJ purposes that can be shown to the public. He stated that the report would give the MPO the proof it needed, when confronted by the public, that steps had been taken to identify any potential adverse impacts from the proposed projects. Mr. Bendele reiterated that the report is a tool that can be shown to the public and that any recommendations about specific projects would be viewed in that light (as recommendations only) by FHWA. The TAC members agreed that a subcommittee should review the project summary sheets of the document.' Mr. Brown recommended the report be forwarded to TPC for their approval contingent upon the findings of the subcommittee. If the changes were minor then forward it to TPC, if otherwise, then send it back to TAC for rework. Mr. Brown made a motion to forward the document to TPC for approval pending the subcommittees review. Mr. Hertel seconded the motion, which passed unanimously. Mr. Brown commented that the MPO staff had done well on this particular project considering where the MPO was one year ago. Mr. Bendele also commented that he was very pleased with what the Wichita Falls MPO had accomplished thus far on Environmental Justice procedures and analyses for area transportation projects. VIII. Other Business: a. Discussion & Overview of Progress on Local Transportation Projects — City and TxDOT staff (Quarterly Review) TxDOT Report: Mr. Kelley discussed three ITS projects; US 287 (Fisher Road to Clay County line) concrete overlay project with safety illumination; SH 240 overlay project from Burkburnett St. in Wichita Falls to Wichita St.; Loop 473 Novachip project was starting; Cyprus Ave. drainage project — bridge was completed; FM 171 at Plum Creek — problems getting pre- stressed beams; the Direct Connect Falls Flyer project pre -con meeting would start November 2nd and construction would begin shortly thereafter; over $19,000,000 of overlay projects, within the district, will be let as of the December letting schedule. ' Mr. Hertel, Mr. Burrus and Mr. Barnett would meet the following Tuesday in order to have the document ready in time for hand out at the October 24th TPC meeting. Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 4 of 6 r City Report: There was no report by the City due to the City Engineer, Mr. Jeff Hogan, accepting a new position with another city. Because of the short notice, Mr. Lyne did not have time to prepare a project update list for the meeting. A list will be prepared for the October 24th TPC meeting. b. MPO Quarterly Financial Report (3rd Quarter — April, May, June) Mr. Barnett informed the board that expenses were slightly behind schedule, but that invoices from the Traffic Signal Optimization Study were beginning to come in and should help the MPO make its minimum expenditure requirements. c. Progress Report on the Traffic Signal Optimization Study of the Kemp Boulevard and Southwest Parkway Traffic Corridors Mr. Beauchamp stated work on the study was approximately 75% complete and that Kimley -Horn was in the fine tuning stages of the process. He did state that he had received numerous complaints about the signal timing pattern at Kemp and Kell and that he and Kimley -Horn were working to fix the problems there. Mr. Beauchamp stated this intersection was the key to the whole progression and that it could bog down the whole system. He stated the weekend timing plans and the event timing plans would be implemented next; this in preparation for the holidays. d. Update on Scheduled November Transit Public Meeting Mr. Barnett informed the board that the MPO was currently in the process of securing a meeting room at Sikes Senter Mall for an early November public meeting for transit users in order to gather more information on the transit system. A brief presentation was planned along with the hand out of questionnaires to be used in the information gathering process. The results would be presented to TAC and TPC early next year. e. Other Mr. Brown introduced Mr. Bendele as the new TxDOT (TPP) MPO Field Representative for the Wichita Falls MPO. Mr. Bendele replaced Mr. Tim Juarez as the MPO's field representative. Mr. Bendele greeted everyone and stated he would try to attend the Wichita Falls meetings as often as possible and that he looked forward to working with the Wichita Falls MPO. Mr. Brown then informed the board that the City Manager, Mr. Darron Leiker, who was the former interim MPO Director, planned to recommend to TPC the appointment of Mr. Barnett as the new, full -time MPO Director for the Wichita Falls MPO. Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 5 of 6 IX. Public Comment on Anything Not on the Agenda Mr. Clark asked if someone could find out what the plans for US 287 through Decatur entailed for the future. He commented that direct access through this area was becoming increasingly alarming and that he expected to see signal lights be put into place in the very near future. Mr. Brown stated that TxDOT would find out the answer to this question. X. Adjourn The meeting adjourned at 12:40 p.m. Lin Barnett MPO Transportation Planning Director Wichita Falls MPO Wichita Falls MPO TAC Meeting October 13, 2005 Page 6 of 6