Transportation Committee - Regular Meeting

About to start our regular meeting of the transportation committee. A little past four but it's okay. At this time we'll have a roll call. Alderman Savage?

Present.

Alderman Sandomater Meyer. And I am the chairperson Janice Alsop Johnson, Alderman. At this time we're going to change the change in the agenda. So do I have the approval to make that change? Okay well let's have the motion to change the agenda please.

You don't need the motion.

This is a new order of the agenda.

And then after you

First on the agenda is gonna be ID 1126 followed by ID 7526.

Madam chair, I make a motion to approve the agenda.

I will second the motion to approve the agenda as amended.

Thank you very much. So at this time

I

have a vote. Aye. All in favor.

Aye. Thank

you. You Aldermans for approving. Transportation department update by director of transportation. Wait a minute.

Approve the first. Madam Chair,

can

make a motion to approve the minutes from March 11?

I will second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Thank you all the persons who made a motion. Now, next on the agenda is ID 1126 from the transportation department. Will you please come forward? Please introduce yourself and state your name and your job title.

Good afternoon, Alderman. Alsop Johnson, chair of the translation committee and committee members Alderman Shandelmeyer and Savage. For the record, I'm Marcus Moore, director of transportation and parking. I have a few updates I'd like to share with you today. We'll hear from a few of other of our partners in parking and a staffer with a dot about some upcoming events I think will interest you.

On Saturday, April 4 Saturday, April 4 marked the season launch of our free all electric trolley service. These trolleys operate on Saturday and Sunday only from 11AM to 05:30. They operate on two distinct different I I two different routes identified as the Maryland Avenue, State Circle, Calvert Street Loop connecting the three garages nearby which is the Calvert Street Garage, Whitmore Garage, and Gotts Court Garage. They connect those with the local businesses on State Circle, Maryland Avenue, and Lower Main Street. The other route is a new one and it's the one that we just started on Saturday removing the one that was in Eastport.

We'll talk a little bit about that reasoning and rationale. This new route actually starts at Park Hillman Garage, goes up Main Street around Church Circle, down State Circle, and down through down back towards our Main Street for market space and all. What we want to do here is try to connect the businesses on City Dock you know with some free service coming along with our magenta shuttle. So we looked at making these changes I provided for you some ridership data of what we had for last year on the shuttles. The two shuttles we just named them the West Street shuttle and the Eastport shuttle.

And you can see for about fourteen months or so what it looked like as far as ridership with a graph and all. And I actually gave you the numbers that showed how many were carried on those particular Saturday or Sundays. And the line that you see there, the blue line represents the West Street and the orange line represent the Eastport shuttle. One of the things to keep in mind about these routes, they are pilot services and we want to move them around to where they can have the best use for what it is we want to do. And basically that's connecting our residents, our visitors with downtown businesses and as we made mention with them, City Dock, trying to get folks down there because obviously there's not much parking closer than Hillman.

And further out, we're still connecting them with the Magenta shuttle and these weekend trolley services. Also provided in that packet, you'll find the map and it kind of describes the route that is being taken. So I'd like to entertain questions that you might have, what it is we're trying to accomplish as it relates to the e carts that are going on there. Some other updates I'd like to share with you about our transit operation is we're in the midst of inserting our EV charging infrastructure at our location on 308 Chicopend Round Road and this is for our ADOT fleet. It's expected to be finished towards the end of this month and this will just be for internal, our buses, our EV vehicles that we actually have and it's not for the general But we'll have more information towards the end of this month as we'd like to have with your support ribbon cutting of that nature.

Regarding the RFP, the request for proposal for the bids for the automatic vehicle locator, that has actually been approved by the MTA and will go out for bid shortly. Maybe as early as the end of this week or by next week. With these bids as we made mention last month, it could be one that's already there that we weren't able to piggyback on that we discussed in January and February of trying to do a piggyback with the county. Anne Arundel County that is. We've been in discussion with our transportation planners, KFH, who did our TDP as well as the county to develop the scope of work to move forward with the FY '26 transportation enhancements.

Some of the two that you had you spearheaded Alderman Savage. There the Bay Ridge Avenue, Bay Ridge Road, Edgewood Road, Circulator, and the Forest Drive transit improvements. We'll definitely have more of an update and need more conversation with you as we develop very clear scope of work objectives with KFH. So we definitely want to bring you back into the fold and look at how this will work and a timeline and all. So before we get to other presentations, I'd like to back up and talk more or entertain questions that you might have as it relates to the eCarts first. Did you want to dig into the data?

Yes.

Thank you Madam Chair. Doctor. Moore, thank you so much for coming in today, going over this with us. So the eCarts last year, we had the West Street route and Eastport the route. Eastport.

That's correct.

We have I'm if I'm understanding cut both of those in favor of these smaller I guess I'll call it a downtown loop and Maryland Avenue. No.

Not not quite cut. The one that was here with the Maryland Avenue, that's still in operation and you can see how strong the ridership was there. That one has worked out really, really well and it's been in operation probably since we were rebuilding reimagining Hillman. The one that has been moved over which is Eastport. So what you see with the we call it the West Street as far as the ridership data that you have there.

Let's say it starts right in front of the Gotts Court garage on Calvert Street, makes that left onto West around Church Circle down to State Circle, makes a right onto Maryland Avenue, left onto PG Street, Northwest Street to Maine, excuse not Maine, St. John Street back onto Calvert. That's been pretty well received covering or touching three garages and getting folks to downtown. The one that we just had some hiccups with would be the Eastport and it could have been because of how long it was. That route was a little longer and transversing some routes that we had it on, we probably could have done a little better.

Our thought versus moving the dials in Eastport is bring those resources back downtown to better help those Eastport City dock businesses, those 12 or 13 there. So, to answer your question, Alderman, the West Street still remains the same as it has been the last two years.

So, the West Street route is what I call the Maryland Avenue route. Yes sir. I just had a misunderstanding on that. But the Eastport route. So in that case I'm looking at some of the average ridership that we were getting out of that and it's our best one was 15 riders a day, but they tend to be less than 10 riders a day when it was operating.

I know there were some complaints on why we stopped running that, but when your average ridership is less than 10 riders a day, that does make sense. That's not a proficient use in resources. But what is do we have another plan to try and service those areas or is it just we gotta go back to the drawing board and figure out something that'll really

Very good questions. And as we move forward to, you know, resiliency, sustainability, moving away from fossil fuel, we just have these two carts right now. And I think one of the other questions in the back of your mind, you know, this eleven to 05:30, why couldn't it be from, you know, 08:00 in the morning to 07:00 at night? It's the bandwidth of the batteries for one and getting them back to our shed to charge them back up. But one of the things we'd love to be able to do as we grow with this type of service is have another card or two maybe next year in FY twenty eight.

So we can reevaluate the needs of eSport because we were trying to get way down to like 2nd Avenue and get them to the shopping center. And the way to get there maybe that wasn't the best way or what we were initially thinking the best marketing way to do that. So to answer your question going forward right now we feel strongly about while CityDoc is being redone that that is the best use of the resources at this present time and what we have to use to accommodate the service.

So the main limiting factor then is just because we only have two carts, we have to be very deliberate in what we run. And if there is something that is not getting that ridership, it's just not worth the time.

Yeah, right now it's good to be able to call it a pilot because just because it doesn't work that way doesn't mean it can't work another way in that same area. So coming back to Eastport, you know, if it's not the summer of, you know, 2027, but clearly after the next year because I'm thinking once CD Dock is reimagined, you got half the parking that you once had and getting people there, that might be a route that we really wanna do. So instead of moving things around, we may actually try to grow and get another cart.

Like to stress, we don't have half the parking we once had. We added all those spaces and more to Mills Hillman Garage. You're right. Don't say that out loud.

Yeah. I guess I should qualify right on the dock. You're absolutely right. They've been moved from City Dock to a parking facility. You're right.

It's downtown.

It's not the That's true.

So what is our eventual target for these eCarts? How many do we wanna have? How many routes? How many carts do we wanna have? How many routes do we wanna have? What would we call a successful pilot program and what would we build that successful pilot pilot program into?

See, the the problem with the e cart, the gym cart that we have right now is that it's no HVAC. And your the response is, well, I'm only gonna be on there five or six minutes, but maybe ten, but the driver will be on there for seven hours. They're a fair weather cart. They don't do well in, slippery weather or when we flood. So we have our limitations, so maybe we look at something else that transverses the city that is eco friendly and it may be something that morphs out of this e cart.

So right now I think we're managing what we have if we got one more to do something else with but I'm not seeing that as a big growth right now. But that could always change.

Going to do cable cars? Is that a good idea? That's a joke before anyone uses that as a hit piece on me. Well, director Moore, thank you so much for the detailed explanation on that.

I hear you calling for a gondola?

As a joke before again anyone uses that as a hit piece on me.

Build the gondola.

Wow. Anything else, Mr. Oval?

Oh, just see if the Oh, I'm sorry. Question. Yes.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Director. Yeah, do have some questions. So this is a free service, right? There's no charge to go on and off?

Yes.

And do you have, and there's one per route? Yes. Okay. Do you know how like, what's the there aren't traditional stations, stops for these, right? That's a How do you hail them? How do you catch them?

Yeah. That is really a good question. Unlike the other free shuttle which we call the magenta shuttle, there are established stops where one would wait. This one you would hail as you would in the olden days of a cab. So being visible, remember we're a little bit lower profile so somebody on the sidewalk is hidden by a higher profile vehicle, just making sure you're visible seen and you would hail it at the stops where they could stop safely.

So many of the places would be good. The pinch points or the friction points would be, you know, people looking for something else as they're coming around church circles to School street to state circle. So certain places they may have to pull a little bit further down because, you know, being a touristy city, you know, moving around and we're a low speed vehicle made out of fiberglass. So to answer your question, you can hail it anywhere you are along this route understanding I may have to pull down 50 more feet into a safe location of you getting on or off.

And so there's no traditional headway in that sense, but do you have like an estimate on how long it takes for them each to do their loop? Like if I was staying in one place, when would the next one come?

That's a really good point. And when we first started this out a couple years ago, we dubbed it and I think we even have it on the side of a 10 trolley. So it could be depending on lights because they still have to follow those signals. It could be as little as eight or nine minutes or as much as thirteen, you know, because I'm stopping and, you know, getting people situated to get back on the road. And it's just like our magenta shuttle.

We've dubbed that ten minutes when there's two out there, but also looking at what's going on in the road catching the lights and all. When there's two magenta shuttles out there, that longer route from Park Place all the way down to, you know, a compromise up Main Street, that is twenty minutes. So with two of them out there, that's your 10. Higher speed. So we have a lower speed vehicle, not quite half the distance, but that's where the ten minutes has come in.

I believe we've measured it a few times and got, like I said, eight minutes and sometimes up to thirteen, and did some mock stops of just, you know, pausing for like, you know, fifteen to twenty seconds to see how it will go. But it'll be interesting to see, especially the new one going into City Dock and all, how that works out with that loop coming back in with the lights that will hit.

Yeah. Yeah. And and yeah. It's my one concern which I think Alderman Schenelmeier get into a little bit is just like how do you see it from a as a transportation expert, how do you see the overlap happening? Does it contradict or do you think it supports the circulator? Because the one route which focuses on Main Street, that overlaps about half the circulator route. Right? It doesn't really stray from it too much. The other one does stray because it actually serves Maryland Avenue and but the other one kinda overlaps. So do you see that as

I think it's more of addition to because it's not that many hours out there and the magenta shuttle will always operate when transit is operating. But the EV cart, even when it's a very nice day out, you can have the torrential downpours which we may have to pull over and wait an hour or pull out of service. A bus should be able to go. So I think you're right with the kind of the redundancy or doubling the hill but I think there's still a compliment. If I don't get this one, I'll get the other one. And we're serving those unmet needs of what we need to do with the businesses down Lower Main Street and City Dock. But your point's well taken.

What what do you see as the benefit of these smaller vehicles over a more traditional shuttle size? Like, is it are they actually easier to get around? Are they just more accessible? I I just don't know. I'm just like, is there a benefit? Do you see I mean, putting the clean aspect aside as far as electric, is there any other is there anything else that gives them an advantage? If costs were not a factor, is there anything else that

would give advantage?

I

I think if you wanna say the sexiness of it, it's the more intimate environment. It's not a bus. It's just closer to the people. It fits the historic nature of the town, I think. You know, back not that many years ago when we had seasonal horse and buggy, you know, kind of tours. So having something different. I think we even had segues for a while. But I think it's kind of something different that will work in a low speed town. I think it's just it's a good complement.

And one reason why I'm asking is because we did get a question from our one of our colleagues about like, hey, I saw this posted but it seems to overlap and they were asking about what's the value to that overlap. And I think you've you've gotten into that. And I guess the other argument would be potentially that this is our busy season, so having redundant transportation options is good. The the one observation I guess I would throw out is, again, this is I just thinking out loud on some of this as I listen to you talk is that I definitely see a lot of value in the shuttle that serves Maryland Avenue Yes. Because that is an area that we are seeking to get more traffic to.

But in particular, I think the other one would be the City Dock area. I'm wondering if we could make a route that connects that focuses on those two at the same time, Maryland Ave and City Dock, and then moving the other shuttle back to Eastport or or Ward 7 as far as exploring the idea of that connector in the future. Because then I feel like that increase potentially could increase the marketing opportunity you would have to say, look, this this route, we could have signage and hail it this way, you know, like you would a taxi to get people from, you know, hey, visit Maryland Avenue or visit Dock Street businesses, And then once you get your marketing person, I think you may have a lot more options available to you.

I think those are really good ideas and it would really work out well for one of the thoughts that you had with the enhancement going to Edgewood Bimby Beach Road. That road is made for something like this even though Edgewood can be a little higher speed all the way down to Yachtsman. I'm afraid of Bay Ridge Road with this vehicle as I am sometimes Bay Ridge Avenue. But one of the things you look at when you're developing a route or system is your headways. And when you're attracting someone, it's like, oh, this is great, but if I have to wait this much longer.

So, you know, your break off point well, ours here typically is anything less than thirty minutes. And most of ours are at that point. The go time, our goal is once we make that reservation that we can get to you in twenty minutes. So one of the things going back to the shuttle where we had the redundancy, you know, you've cut that down. You know, you have two buses coming in within twenty minutes or thirty minutes.

So the wait time is even less. But I like your ideas of what you made mention of connecting Maryland Avenue with City Dock. And we have so many other options like that to do and we look forward, for your support and all what we're looking at with KFH and the money to study some of these these corridors and what type of vehicle makes the most amount of sense. And I think you have some really good ideas that we thought of too. And sometimes we got to just try a little with one and what is a fair amount of time when you look at a pilot. That's the other thing too.

Yeah, and I would so just I know we need to wrap up so I'm going to end with just saying like yeah, hope we do get like a final report or presentation once the pilot's finished. But I'm also curious if if it was a permanent feature, you know, what what you think we could do with signage and and again marketing to really promote it. And that's where I could see value as keeping the circulator focused on Main Street and then have the marketing focus on that. And then you could have separate signs for the e trolley that's highlighting these other parts of town and have a clear distinction.

That's a really good point and we're starting to address that in FY '27 when you talk about signage and way finding and how do I get there from here and that kind of stuff. So that has got to be a whole package that we definitely would want to, definitely will entertain. In FY '27, we're trying to improve on what we have now to the garages and the services that we operate. But you've come up with some very good things to ponder and we definitely will we look forward to presenting this fall once we conclude this season of our e carts. And it's really hard to say that hard stop date.

If we have mild weather all the way to December 1, we're going to run-in November. Generally speaking, we can get to the first week. Some of those years, we didn't have bad weather until December. So starting out now, we probably could have started a week or two sooner. And if we can get eight months out of the year, you know, nine is really, really pushing it. But the more data we can get on what we're trying to achieve is always better. Right?

You have a rough estimate on how much it costs per route?

I don't but I can get that. I I don't. And that's a good question. You know, the passenger mile or pass cost per passenger per vehicle, we can find that out.

Yeah, that's all I have Madam Chair.

Thank

you Madam Chair. Director Moore, have we ever experimented a little bit with like routes and timing? So we have two karts, two routes. Have we ever not run one of the routes for a weekend and put both karts on a single route to see how that impacts ridership and speed? Have we ever played around with anything like that or?

Those are really good options that thinking outside the box is what you know you make some really good decisions there. We've only had them since like January 2024. So no, we haven't. And to answer your question, we tried to spread them out versus putting them both on one. What we were doing at the beginning was trying to elongate one route.

So having the two carts, if we were able to start at 09:00, have to change that midstream and continue on, that was an initial thought. And then we just said, well, let's look at two different areas. But we haven't done that yet, putting two on to decrease the headway. Our thought of putting two on the same route would increase the amount of time that's out there.

Yeah. So my thought process is I would love to get more carts onto single routes. So instead of a ten minute trolley, it's a five minute trolley. But to justify that investment, I would need to know if we put multiple carts onto a single route, does that make a difference? Like, instead of 50 people riding a route, do we then get 75 to a 100 people riding a route because they're seeing these cars go more frequently.

That justifies a wider demand to me. If we're seeing no substantial increase, we should put those carts onto different routes and maybe service it that way. And I think since we're calling this pilot, now is the time to really try and experiment with routes and timelines and frequency.

Yeah. And that makes a lot of sense. One of the things that I'm a bit fearful of because they're fiberglass in that night, you know, that kind of thing. So that was one of the reasons because one of the things we want to look at, when you look at that ridership, what does eleven to 05:30 really accomplish? You know, one of the businesses actually closing 05:30, 06:00, so they're opening up around that nine or ten.

That was the best case I thought during a daylight hour. But maybe it's not. Maybe we shifted a little later but like I said, we've had a few folks that were looking for an address and hit the back of us. Low speed, no one was injured, we just had a cart that needed repair, the vehicle didn't. So those are the kind of things and I think these are really good suggestions to explore. Do we have it right with the time of day? How long we're going? Putting more than one cart out there to decrease that headway? And that's a really big key when you look at the frequency of operation.

Oh, go ahead.

Another question on that. And then just again thinking out loud, you know, I am intrigued by this concept and which is why I'm trying to push to have it looked at for connecting, you know, Eastport and Ward 7, particularly connecting Ward 7 with downtown. But looking at these maps, it just has me thinking more about like, well, is it really needed downtown? Because when you're looking at the routes, they're pretty short. Like, you can walk from Church Circle down to City Dock and I don't know.

It depends on how fast you walk, five, ten minutes. Right? So it's not like it's but if you're trying to get from City Dock all the way out to Westgate Circle, absolutely. I think because that'd be much longer walk, maybe fifteen, twenty minutes. But so I'm just curious, like, just, you know, thinking, like, is it really is it worth the money and time if it's serving an area that you can walk just as fast? Like, what's what's the value it's providing for those areas?

I think some of it look you look at a mobility challenged person without having to be in a wheelchair, a mobility device, moving around. And some of the times when there's a lot of shopping, I know some folks have reached out to us or even wrote a letter. It's like I saw the car coming by, my hands are full, went to eat and I shopped. Oh, that was a need at rest. Because we were thinking about starting the trip nice and fresh.

We came to Annapolis from ABC City, but we didn't think about five or six hours in after ice cream and lunch and all that stuff. Now it's like, I just sit down for a minute and keep going? So it it this is the touristy aspect of it too. So you brought up a good point as far as it's not that far. Really, Park Place to downtown is not that far. A few employees that work here actually like that nice walk about a mile and a quarter or so. So you're absolutely right with that, but I think it's the hop on hop off ability to do that seasonally or you know weather dependent. I think that just adds another flavor for what we're looking at is our rich history, historic city.

Well I mean that's a very good answer and you know I think maybe when marketing is put out, maybe we focus on those who are mobility challenged and because I can see this being a draw to some of my the seniors in my ward, right, who in our ward who

who Yeah.

Who who want an easier way to get around. So yeah, thank you.

Thank you Alderman Savage. Anything else for Anything else?

I'd like to ask Mr. Will Rao, our micromobility coordinator, to give us something here. There you are. I think we can do a what do they say? Control to bypass that one that I got. Did you? Hello?

Okay.

Well, we do have the printed version. Oh, there we go.

Okay. Alright. So, I wanna first of all thank you all for giving me, audience. I appreciate that.

Thanks for coming up.

Yes. If you all I I provided each of you all with a printed version of the PowerPoint presentation as well as a follow-up to our our last, meeting where I presented. There's a document, that details goals and objectives, and, it outlines, aspects of framework for the position, as well as some some deliverables. So, when you get an opportunity I also emailed it to you all earlier. So if you get an opportunity, take a look at it.

So this is just me cleaning up some some private business from the previous meeting. I also, forwarded, some information about crash data and about, non motorist, accidents that you had requested. So when you get an when when all of you all get an opportunity to review some of these things, if you have any questions, please reach out to me, and I'd I'd be more than happy to follow-up. So today, with this presentation centered around the bike pedestrian and micro mobility program of which I'm the program coordinator and my name is William F. Raul for the record.

We will jump into the presentation. Oh, Julian needs to alright. There we go. So today, what what I'll do is I'll give an update on the bike share and e scooter RFP that is in process. I'll give you an update on the Access Annapolis Symposium, and then we'll jump to Bike to Work Week which within that week, Bike to Work Day is an important piece also that I think you all can take part in and or learn more about.

Next slide, please. Alright. Bike share and e scooter RFP. So the purpose of this is, it's an RFP released to solicit, qualified micro mobility vendors. In short, and in layman's terms, this means essentially that we are reissuing a public, announcement to reinvigorate our bike share program.

Previously, was Bird, as you all know, and we had a pilot with Bird that turned into an extended pilot. It was always intended to be somewhat of a pilot to find out the feasibility and also, quite honestly, the ability to generate funding to support some other programmatic pieces. And having done that, we're now seeking another vendor. The focus is on safety, equity, and system reliability. The reason why we say each of those things is because we're hoping that one of the things and lessons learned from our previous outing is that there were a lot of concerns about the safety of those who were on scooters in particular.

And I think we've, you know, addressed some of that programmatically myself. I'm gonna focus on providing safety classes and bringing attention and awareness to not only how motorists operate around people on scooters and bikes, but also how the riders and renters of that service themselves operate. The next is integration with existing transportation infrastructure because as you all just witnessed from our director, you know, the goal is to really connect the entire city and get people from point A to point B. And so for those for those systems to be as integrated as possible and for there to be seamless transportation options for people in the city is probably one of the most smart things we can do. In relation to our existing, buses that we do have, most of them have, bike racks in the front.

And so, we did a demo, with some, some of our council persons, including the mayor, of those, operations that we have on the front of the buses. And the hopes are we can get more people in the city to utilize those bike racks, so that we reduce the the amount of of their travel time specifically on either buses and or bicycles. Next is an emphasis on data sharing and performance metrics. So one really awesome thing about Bird that we discovered that really helped us fine tune this system as well as actively assess whether some of the systems were working properly was they had a dashboard. And this dashboard, though not completely public facing, it provided us with a lot of useful information.

One of which was how many of the scooters and bikes were actually out on the road, how many were rented, the amount of, time that users used per rental on those vehicles, And then also, it essentially provided data on where people were most utilizing, that particular service, and that helped us kind of, frame more outreach and other things around that area. It also will help inform, what we do in this next phase. So the update on that RFP is that, the proposal, review is pending. We moved the due date to April 24, and it was previously April 4. It was pushed out to give an opportunity for some other vendors to jump in the pool.

We did receive some feedback and some interest, but we wanted to just be sure we weren't eliminating our options by having a quick turnaround. The goal with this RFP and the goal with with, the new ramp up is, was and is to have it available in some of our peak months because our peak months, as you all know, for scooters and bikes, is the warm weather. So we're talking spring and summer and fall, the beginning of fall. And so our hope is that we have, these, bikes and scooters on the road by well, before summer really kicks in because that's when people really utilize those services. So what follows the review is the evaluation committee scores all of the submissions depending on the number of submissions that process.

I've I've gone through it quite a few times with some of our other RFPs. It's hard to to assess exactly how long that'll take, but it's it's usually, you know, a pretty dynamic process. So it gets done, you know, rather quickly. And then following that, there's the anticipated vendor selection. And as you as you see on the slide, late spring twenty twenty six is, is our projected, date to begin that process.

Keep in mind, to be fair that it may it may be pushed out a little. We're hoping and leaning towards it being, you know, late spring twenty twenty six. And then following that, there are there are going to be contract negotiations and an implementation plan, that follows. And that will be a very important process because, again, lessons we learned from the last vendor in terms of of of contractual things that are both mutually beneficial but also, you know, provides a good ROI for for the city of Annapolis, which is the entire goal because that investment in time, staffing, and other expenditures needs to be, rational and needs to make sense for the city and ultimately for taxpayers and those who who reside in the city. Next slide, please.

The next is our Access Annapolis Mobility for All Symposium. This has been a a symposium in the works for some months now. It's there are a lot of moving parts with it, so we've had to change the date one time before. But the vision for this, which is what I want you all to latch on to, is is, you know, it's a must for anyone that's interested in equitable mobility and sustainable urban transportation. There'll be a focus on walking, cycling, trails, and access to schools and green spaces.

And, this is a gathering that brings together policymakers. And the policymaker part of it is huge because, of course, we need to further along per our conversation here, further along legislation that wraps around, the current work and the past work that has been done towards resiliency as well as sustainability. And the other is, city planners, obviously, very own, Eric Leshinsky, who works, you know, diligently to ensure that we're connecting trails and, you know, connecting with engineers and MDOT and others to be sure that we complete this process. And I work with them on those things. Residents and also transportation experts to explore how Annapolis can become a more connected, inclusive, and environmentally sustainable city.

So that's the vision for this symposium, to bring together all of those people and to discuss various topic areas. So the next slide talks about the more pertinent information about the symposium. The date is 05/01/2026. The location is the Graduate Hotel in Annapolis on West Street. And the time is in one day, all day.

I say all day, but not literally, but it's 9AM to 3PM. And the reason why is because there's a series of panels and discussions about some of the subject matter that you'll find at the bottom of the slide. We're excited because, we have a keynote speaker, Veronica O. Davis, who is author of Inclusive Transportation. I had put the cover of the book on there, but this is a version I think that doesn't have it.

So that's my fault. But having the cover on there shows you all the book that she's authored, and she's on the speaker circuit around the country, on that particular subject. So some of the panel discussions include policy, planning and sustainability, traffic, bike and pedestrian safety, community level experiences, and what's meant by community level experiences are those who are advocates for safety and for, you know, bikeways and paths and trails that allow cyclists to safely travel from one point to another. The next is trails, paths, and infrastructure, and then the evolution of transportation in Annapolis, which is a talk that will be given by Eric Lashinsky, one of our planners who will talk about some of the upcoming ideas and transformations that will result from some of the work being done in the area of transportation through the lens of a city planner. I'll jump to bike to work week.

And, so bike to work week, in the past has been a collaboration between the city of Annapolis and Anne Arundel County. And our two departments, meaning transportation departments, have worked together to ensure that we're able to pull off an event. Obviously, bike to work week is, well, not obviously. I'll say that, bike to work week is a national, program that happens, all over the country. So in our region, which is considered, the Baltimore region in conjunction with the Baltimore Metropolitan Council, who kind of convenes and provides the infrastructure for bike to work week, we are deemed Anne Arundel County.

And we're Anne Arundel County because, obviously, the city of Annapolis sits within Anne Arundel County, but but it's not broken down by specific cities. So what we've done in the past is we've partnered with Anne Arundel County, which means that we work with their Department of Transportation or their Transportation Department. And we also work with the county executive, the county council, and all of their staff to ensure that we're able to actively pull off this week. So there's a series of activities that will be happening around the county. But our day in Annapolis will be May 15, which is that Friday.

Next slide, please. Sorry. And on this day, what we do is we meet up. In the past, we've met up across the street from the Arundel Center, where, what you know, what which we're now viewing as the opening of the actual formal trail that will go from right beside, People's Park all the way out, to the hospital center, the mall, as well as Waterworks

Park.

So we what we're doing this year is we're we're doing a pit stop, and that's formally registered with Bike to Work Week on their website with a map, and, you can register and and and sign up to be a part of that ride. But this year, we're meeting at Poplar Trail at Taylor Avenue right next to the police department. The reason why we wanted to do that is because, I've always worked with the police department and their bike unit to, you know, for our events and some of our walks to ensure that they're, being seen and they're visible out there, but also, you know, to provide, a visual as to how we can actually get around this city on bicycles. And so that's an 08:30 meetup. This morning in a meeting, we reviewed some of the times and and there's a possibility we may need to move that time earlier.

So, I'll repost a lot of things and, and just be sure that we're able to to get, the exact time that we need it because they moved, this year, they've moved, the bike to work day program, which is going to be at at the Donner Lot. Are you all familiar with the Donner lot? That's right off of Compromise Street, by this circle. We had to move it there because of construction at City Dock. So it's gonna be in that parking lot.

It will be, as always, there'll be speakers, coffee, giveaways, department of transportation will have a tent, Bike AAA will have a tent. Anne Arundel County will have a tent, and there'll be others as well. Some of the other partners like Bike Doctor. And, you know, we're looking forward hopefully to some good weather this year. Sometimes it's a mixed bag this time of the year because of spring because they because you know what they say, April showers bring May flowers.

So, you know, we do have to account for rain. And that's back to work day. There are, I just also, received, I had requested some materials from Baltimore Metropolitan Council, and I'm I'm pleased to say I got 150 bicycle helmets, beginning and, know, broken down into size. So I have children health children's helmets. I have adult helmets of all different sizes.

So what I'll be doing with that and what we'll be doing with that is distributing them, at events and actually framing some, outreach events around, the opportunity to provide helmets and to provide equipment. Because, again, just like last year, the plan is to provide both educational opportunities as well as, you know, safety trainings for riders in this city. So thank you all very much. Are there any questions?

They both will be responding.

Yes. Thank you, madam chair. Miss Ralph, thank you so much for this wonderful presentation. How many proposals do we have on the bike share and e scooter?

Have how many have we received? Yes, sir. We don't that information, we haven't. The last I saw it was three, but I think it's actively open, so I'm not sure if I'd have to check with Mike Gracia.

Are you at liberty to say the companies that have come forward?

No. I was told that we that we can't publicly share that because it gives them undue an undue edge for those who haven't submitted.

And you mentioned there was an evaluation committee that scores this. Yes. So I have a couple of questions regarding that. So who's part of our evaluation committee?

So for each of these RFPs, what they do is they they it's essentially created. Usually it's a team of three, but depending on, where the RFP like who which focus area or department, usually, they collectively decide who's going to be on that selection committee or evaluation. We call it, you know, sometimes called a selection committee as well. So so what would depend in this case, I've asked Eric Lashinsky and Casey Ortiz to assist with this and mostly because they did a lot of the legwork when we first did our pilot with Bird. So they have some institutional knowledge around that area.

And what goes into the

the scoring of each of these proposals and submissions? What are some of the factors?

So we we normally develop a scoring tool and in that tool it will it will glean from previous experiences with, a similar, you know, program. In this case, what we've done is we did our contract with Bird and what happened with Bird, so lessons learned, things that didn't work. And so, you know, we, pull from that and determine those things that we definitely want to see in a program and, you know, in its next iteration. For you know, I'll give a concrete example. One of the things we experienced and can, you know, hopefully forecast changing is the fact that there were scooters that were on sidewalks and on the side of the street.

You know, we got complaints about people leaving scooters everywhere. So what we did is we actively figured out, well, how can we, prevent this from being a deterrent or an issue again? And so in the scoring piece, we look at the services that the vendor can provide to the city and which can provide the most assurance that it you know, that will deal with things like docking, for example. With Bird, we didn't have a an articulated docking program. If you all know what I mean by docking, there there are designated areas where people return after they're finished and their time is up instead of just leaving them wherever.

And and, of course, again, it's not guaranteed that you wouldn't have a similar type of program with a different vendor. But in the scoring, if there's an opportunity to score that and and move one to a higher level because they offer that service, that's something we'd use. So that's an example. The other is is, you know, obviously looking at how how much of the proposal was satisfied by any particular person who is looking to get that contract. So, you know, we would score it along those lines.

And then also, we would, one very important thing is, because of, you know, we're a town of of 40,000 residents and seven square miles, we're not a major municipality. And so one of the things we're looking at is whether that vendor, has a knowledge of some of the variables that exist in a city like Annapolis. For instance, our narrow streets, the size, and the fact that, you know, this may not be the most lucrative market. So we need to have a vendor who understands all of that and is not driven just by the profit margin but is driven by providing quality service. Absolutely.

Mark Smoore, director of transportation and parking. I'd like to add in a little bit to what Mr. Rao is saying. What we also will do with this process is follow the lead of the procurement officer because he's gonna put out a lot of RFQs, RFPs, IBEs to look at each idea of what we wanna bring on whether it's a mobile lift, whether it's a service like this, IT curves to do our microtransit. So with that, he'll convene the selection committee and say what's most important and weight them, you know, for price, experience, and a lot of the factors Will just made mention of and they'll come together and that's not known.

You know, maybe they will ask them other questionnaires but when they get these questions, they'll wait, how did they answer this? Is this fitting in with what we're actually looking for? So each commodity or process that we have a request for proposal out there, the questions might be a little bit different. But price is usually there, but not every question is gonna be weighted the same based on the needs of the person requesting.

Yep. Thank you. Did that answer your question?

Yes.

Okay.

Okay. Savage.

Oh, oh. Excuse me for one second. Alderman Schandelmeier, because of the of where we are in the process, if there are things that that you, would like to, you know, to be considered in some of that, there is time to you know, you can share some of those questions with me, and I'll be sure to to see if we can get them included in the process. Because any of those questions that help us kind of discern or troubleshoot, you know, would be helpful. It wouldn't, you know, it wouldn't be, it wouldn't slow the process up any. So thank you for your interest in that.

Okay. Thank you at this time. But, Alderman Shabb, do you want to ask you some questions?

Thank you, Madam Chair. So on the on the e scooter program, one thing I guess I would ask for to keep in mind during the review process would be, and you mentioned a bit the docking areas. Personally I would like to see like a map of the areas because I would love to see this encompass the entire city as well as into the county. But in particular what I want to get over this comment is just where and how we and they are going to be incorporating and placing these docking areas. And I think the message to Alden Chandelmeyer's point earlier, I think we need to get the message out there that we have an excess.

We have too much parking. And so I think we would be some of us anyway would be very amenable to setting aside converting on street parking to parking for e scooters to make them into a dock area and include the signage and that kind of thing. So I just wanna encourage you to think broadly and not be constrained by, oh, no. We can't go into parking. Like, no. You guys could totally win. We would be happy I think to some of us to enable that if we need to. But we already have some provisions to convert parking into other uses. I'm not sure if our existing code will enable that but we certainly need to know that if you think that's a direction they may propose to go. You. If you think that would be helpful to the program.

Yeah. It actually it would actually help increase the visibility so that people know that they're available, you know, for them to rent, which has always been an issue because they're spread all the way out. If you are a visitor to this city, similar to when you go to Manhattan or or or DC and you see a row of bikes, right, you're like, oh, let let me you know, even if you don't know how to ride a bike, some people are probably like, it would be really cool to ride a bike. So I agree with that. And, you know, thank you for bringing that up.

Yeah, maybe I'll ask the law office about that at some point. So, but I did touch on this as far as partnering with the county, have you had any luck, any conversations with them as far as getting them to partner with us on this so we can get them to because I think the the more we expand the the geographical area, it probably makes it more appealing to the bidders, I would assume.

Yeah. I I spoke with, Tanya Asman as early as today or, this morning, this afternoon, about and and she let me know that she wanted to know where we are in the process and kind of what's coming up Because I think what they wanna do is model a little bit of our process. So the hope is we we had received word before that they wanted to pass on actually partnering with the the process because they were keeping their eyes out for some other things. One of the variables for them or or one of the challenges for them was the the scope of of Anne Arundel County compared to Annapolis. So right.

So for them, it when the vendors that we choose, may not serve the entire county. They may not have the capacity to to right? But if you think about it, it it would if the process were reversed, it it might work a little differently, but it isn't because we're further along than they are, in the process. But but Tanya did say that she does want to be kept abreast of where we are and and to specifically know what our scope is for it because they do wanna, connect. So and to answer your question, they do want to be sure that there's alignment.

Obviously, the most opportune thing is for it to be a seamless connection so that when you cross the city line, you don't have to rent with an entirely different vendor. So that is noted.

Yeah. I I think that's personally, I think that's a necessity. Like, it doesn't make sense. And I hear this complaint all the time with with and I don't mean offense by this. With with the bus system as far as, like, they hit a line. Our bus system does travel across though to his point. I guess that's maybe the should change that because that's the way I think we should go is that these systems should cross jurisdictional boundaries to have a functioning mobility system. They have to. And so I guess the question then may turn into, I think we should absolutely work that in if we if it's not too late. They should go out to the greater Annapolis boundary as far as I don't think they need to go further than this, but as far as the mall and River Road, I think those are essential.

And if if if that means I don't know what the ongoing costs are to this program, but if there are ongoing costs, then let's talk to the county about chipping in money because it's a benefit to them as well, right?

Yeah, yeah. So part of the model for for what we did was with Bird was to limit our costs at all. And so a a a big part of the model is to ensure that the city is not taking on additional costs, that we're actually receiving some some revenue from it. So the goal, and you'll see this in some of the deliverables and, and goals and objectives, is that the goal is to is to I'm incentivized, to create a greater ridership. And so the goal is to and and that incentive is, you know, more revenue that we can measure and say we're growing we're growing the program.

So the, you know, the hope is that the city is giving minimal to none.

Oh, okay.

Well, if that's

the case then

Yeah.

What's is there anything stopping us from just saying, hey, for our purposes, because I don't think it's gonna hurt the program, let's expand it to the greater Annapolis area.

Yeah. I mean, the only thing I can think of that would be a is, like, do we have the jurisdiction of like of of whether a contract that we do extends beyond the county line in terms of liability and where We

do with buses. Yeah. Right? Yeah. So, I mean, it's it's similar. I don't know what the legal answer is to that, but

I I think we would be able to do that. We would definitely just talk to our procurement officer and office of law. But you brought up a good point as far as, you know, route to Salmons Island Road kinda is that dividing line from the city proper and you get into the county. Our buses do it and when we had, another contractor doing, microtransit for us, they were looking at doing that as well. I don't think there will be any problem because, you know, you're looking at insurance. So that's the only other thing that would be, you know, we're we're self insured, you know, how the buses are insured or whatever. But we can explore that and we can, you know, make that call tomorrow and just find

out what what

are we missing.

I guess that's a question one for law office, but two for the for the bidders to say Yeah. Would this be would this make it more appealing or would it be a hindrance to Yeah. What you're trying to do with your goals as far as trying to keep the cost neutral, if not cost positive. Right?

And I think it I think it boils down to to the director's point. I think it just boils down to their ability, which we have to with geofencing for them to essentially just kinda move the border. But but I didn't know legally, you know, whether that would be the case.

Okay. And so let's see. The as far as bike biking, love the plans. And just to get some clarity on the bike to work day, so the meetup is the meetup gonna be at the Donner Lot and then head over to Poplar?

No. It's the, the other way around. And and meaning, starting on Poplar. And and the reason why is because we wanna utilize, the trail part that we that we've been working on, along that route. And then so it will it will come out across the street from the Arundel Center where the county executive and Chris Trumbauer and some others, in the past, it's been Lisa Rodvion, will join in as well.

What we're also working on is getting the mayor and your name specifically came up earlier today, as well as, hopefully Brooks. And, you know, it's it's early, but, you know, it's for a good cause and it increases visibility. And and, the director sitting next to me, he's committed to Okay. Routing the three wheel electric Excellent. Alright.

So, in all seriousness, we will be meeting up. That that meetup on the trail, I one of my goals is and has been, but specifically for this is to get not just those of us that work in the city, you know, staff and those who work specifically on those programs, but what I wanna do is get residents who live along Poplar Trail and residents from the surrounding areas to join in on that so that they can ride down with us. And then we'll meet up with the county executive and others and then proceed. WEE stands for West East Express. So it's WEE.

And it's a, you know, it's a triple entendre. I mean, it means a bunch of different things. It can be the we the we trail, but it can also be the we trail, meaning us, look at us, or it can be the we. And so that's Friday, May 15, so mark that on all of you all's calendars. If you do not have a bicycle and if you give us enough time, we'll be able to find one.

Those who may not know, the WE Trail goes from West Street all the way down to Waterworks well, not quite water, to the mall. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Just one last question on and comment on the bike. So for next month, I think he said, Mr. Leshinsky is going come talk about the mobility Is he and or you going to talk about their overall thinking as far as how to handle and or move forward with the bike master plan from 2009?

Yes, yes. That's I'm excited about that because that's actually in, the work plan for, the consultants that we're hiring on. Okay. Yes. That that they will be updating that bike plan and, I'm probably not Yeah.

I'll I'll on the side of caution, and I won't mention why I'm doubly excited about it, but let's just say it it provides another iteration, right, of of that of that bike plan, modernizes it, and connects it to what's currently happening in future plans for the trail. They will also be providing within that work plan, an updated trail map that will be interactive and and, you know, and will encompass all of the different trail parts that we have right now.

Great. Excellent. Because I get you know, one of the things that was really drilled in our heads on The Netherlands trip was infrastructure

Mhmm.

Infrastructure infrastructure and how you can do all the promotion, outreach, safety stuff you want. But unless people feel like they have a safe place to ride, they're not going to. And so that's why I'm really excited to see what the new recommendations will be on, like, so we can actually put together a map plan for infrastructure, low hanging fruit, what's next on the list so we can really start to push this stuff in the budget. Yeah, I think that'll be good timing. Thank you. That's all I have Mr. New Chair? Acting Chair. Acting Chair.

The timing may change.

Just to reinforce the change time, we're probably looking at, hold your breath, 07:45AM for for the meetup at the first at the first place. 07:45. I know. I know.

You want me to go to an event at 07:45?

It'll be a nice it'll be and and and and no less ride your bike there. But, you know, again, if you need assistance or you need to be picked up and we just need to do a photo op of you standing beside a bike looking like you're going to work, then then, hey. I'm willing to do that.

As long as you got coffee.

Yeah. There'll be coffee and donuts and a bunch of other stuff.

So Alright. I might get up for that.

Alright. I appreciate you all. Thank you.

Yeah. Thank you. If I may, acting chair.

Yes, sir.

We have mister Jason Perola, market president of premium parking. He's got a presentation he'd like to share with you. We do also have mister John Kemp, senior operations manager with Metropolis if you have any questions there. But Jason, if you'd like to come up, we can transition into that segment of our our talk. So we can use this consumer

flicker. Can't use

Got it.

Did Okay. Janice leave for good or It's red.

Yeah.

Automated it. Got it. Hi, thank you for having me Jason Prolo, market president for premium parking. We just have a short slide here and if I'm missing anything from the last session, I lost my notes, so I apologize. Please let me know and I'll send it out after.

This is a graded test. Yeah.

Next slide. I think we have everything, but to be seen I guess. I can't see here. Elevator and EV charger status. So a nice update here.

Not fulsome with completion, but as of two hours ago or so, the final part, the part that we found out needed replaced after the long wait for the first one should be installed tomorrow. So we're excited about that. Right now there are no elevator issues at all in the garage. We did just replace all of the buttons, the Braille buttons inside the elevators and have a little bit of an inventory for future replacements as we see those disappear on the weekends. And then you may or may not have seen them, depending on what time you got in, washing the garage today.

That is to be finished today. It's the last day. They were focused on the stairwells and landings today to wrap that up. They should be done by five. So before we leave here we should see that finished. Next slide. Alright. No updates here on the MVADMV integration and mobile LPR. There's sort of one outstanding piece that leads into all of this falling into place. We had a call today where we talked about that subject. And so this is just sort of on the table, ready to go, and we'll get this implemented once we cross what that next step would be. Do you mind if we

ask questions as we go along? Just wait till the end? Yes, course.

Yes. So this so just remind us and the audience, the importance of this is this helps to enable the drive in drive out? It will, yes. Change, yeah.

There's a decision processing group before that gets there. They're waiting on something. Once they get that they'll do their analysis and take that to sort of final consideration. And

you've probably seen that, well perhaps you've seen, but this has come up a lot recently from the public. This is still very top of mind as far as their expectations on us. We have been getting still getting hammered on this. So what is the timeline so we can set expectations with the public?

Yeah. I think Marcus is best to answer. I have,

know, just

operator. It belongs to the different group.

Yeah. Alderman Savage, yeah, we had an operations meeting with the players, the concession which is Medco, the manager which is Boyd Watterson, and the operator which is premium parking in the city. High level staffers this morning at eleven. And we still owe the the manager information which we promised to get some data points that we're missing by the end of the week, Monday at the latest. They'll take a few weeks in this month to massage that and get back to us.

But that was a topic of today's conversation this morning with the mayor, chief of staff, active city manager, assistant city attorney, myself, and many other staffers as well as premium parking. We do realize and understand that that it's been a while and we had to get some NDAs put in place from law which we got accomplished late last month. But we got a few more steps to go. To answer that question, we should have an answer to how we proceed by the end of the month. So clearly before the next meeting, ATC, we should have some answers there.

So answers as far as how to proceed, is that like financially? Is it pertaining to contract changes? Is it pertaining to time the contractor needs to? Software?

Yeah, those are good questions because what the data will show will be that will help assist in driving the cost chain for the change. The change in technology will require a more or different type of engineering of it or programming. So the information they have, they will come back to the city with a proposal and there could be a cost there. So with that, you know, we'll look at what we need to do and make that consultation. So coming back to do this, you know, the drive in, drive out is what we're talking about, technology change. So that was a specific question that was asked by the mayor, today.

Was there a cost to the city when, Metropolis made that change?

We paid for equipment. It was pretty costly in 6 figures to do the three garages. So along with that, Mr. Kim can probably give us a better idea of it, but that came with the subscription that goes with the Metropolis platform. But yes, there was a cost to go from gated to gateless.

Well, I'll save that question for Mr. Kemp. Alright. Thank you.

And so

it's ready. We can turn it on when it's time. I don't believe that there's any meaningful cost at all to do so. As a matter of fact, think to something you've asked about in the past, we're fairly close to the sort of algorithmic account driven compliance versus just the rigid. Of course, I think that goes into the fee schedule and some code changes but it's all sort of ready to go. We're waiting for the other parties too. Can I just say, and

this is not personally, you've been very very good with us and open? But I kind of find it ironic in that government always gets blasted for bureaucratic delays, yet this is a private company that has all these bureaucratic delays more than the government almost. Seems like kind of a bit frustrating but

Sure. But I have to remind you this is the partners in the concession. It has nothing to do with Marcus' role or premium whatsoever.

Part of our multi government partnership. Yes. And multi government agency. The ultimate bureaucratic conglomerate.

Yeah. We could have done this in thirty days last October. I think the iteration today with the sort of algorithmic account compliance is better today than that would have been. But yeah. Next slide. This is our April mystery shop. Another good shop. The risk management was I think a meter was out of receipt paper. I would have to double check that but I'm pretty sure that was this one. Sort of par for the course, it's actually one of our worst scores over the last twelve months or so.

Maybe even second worst. But not too much to take away from this one. None of the stuff that we saw was really like something actionable that we could use to improve something that we were doing. Next slide. This is the fun one. So the Golden Pass, we did the pilot program for thirty days. It is now over. We had about 100 households that expressed interest and sort of started this process of signing up to access it. We had 20 fully register. There were some takeaways from that.

If we can go to the next slide. So our oldest registered participant was born in 1933. Users were spread out as far as Ellicott City and Baltimore which was cool to see that. There was a lot of them in between there in Severna Park and Severin and Edgewater, different places throughout the sort of Anne Arundel County, Baltimore County area. Resident feedback was more advanced notice.

That's understandable. It was a short thirty day period. You know, I think PR went out three to five days ahead of it as we got sort of approvals in place to do it and wanted to make sure we got it started and done before we got into the April and May event seasons. So we understand that and know that if there's a second iteration of this, we will adjust the timing on communication and make sure we have a few stages with Mitchell. The program serves a non tech literate demographic obviously.

It's for 62 and older. That is up for debate if we adjust that age range. It was a topic on today's call. We haven't made a decision, but it's sort of something everyone's open to. And I believe the mayor is pondering if we want to adjust the age range or not.

From that sort of demographic and the feedback we got as we worked with everybody, if we do do a version two of this, an extended pilot possibly, we'll have about a week or two where we have three hour sessions, three days a week where we're in the office and advertise that people can come in and get help. Because the challenge is really uploading a document like a driver's license or something like that. And just other, know, I think was a good amount, Megan could speak better on this, but quite a few just saw technology and said no, I'm done and didn't get there. So we want to work on setting up a way for them to get this done if we do a version two of this in a simpler way. And probably a lot of hand holding to do it which is planned if we move forward.

Next slide.

I got a quick question on the sign up portion and the more advanced notice. Is it still possible to sign up for the Golden Pass or is that window?

That was a thirty day period that's over now. Okay. Yes.

Do we have an idea of when we're going to reopen those sign ups or?

So that was a pilot and that's it at this point. If we do a V2, it's most likely going to run May, June and July. And I, if we do that, we want to have it in place in the summertime when we have the highest demand and the most events and holidays because we want to hear the feedback on when parking is hard on the street which is what this sort of the genesis of this was to get people the ability to park in front of where they're going with the garages of fallback on Maryland Avenue, Main Street and the garage of course. So we want to see how people value this when quite often in the summer if they come down on a Friday evening or Thursday evening or a Saturday morning, there will not be inventory available. So we want to sort of understand how that's going be accepted and how the buying public, if you will, will perceive the value of it in those scenarios.

It's a lot simpler in March, February than it is in June.

Yes. This is a big discussion point at our meeting this morning. We asked ourselves a lot of questions of what we could have done differently, how we reach out to those that signed up but didn't use, those that used signed up and used. We looked at where those pinch points, friction points went. Inventory is really compressed and that would be during commissioning week.

So, you know, other disclaimers based on availability. Do we want to open it up to the neighborhoods, hybrid neighborhoods that have paid parking? The answer is probably not, but we may want to look at, you know, the downer lot. And to give you a perspective where it is again if you're facing chop tank, it's to the left. That's considered 23 spaces there.

So things like that, how do we get the word out? So we had a really productive call on a few topics that we just talked about, but this one in particular, if we, you know, one of the things people said I think that Megan Murphy Murray and Jason Perola made mention, if I don't sign up on day one, two, or three, I've lost. But if they really looked at $20, what it costs for an hour to park, $3.25, two hours, $6.50. If I signed up with the one week left, I've made out. You know, we all wanna maximize the whole amount, but where does it become net zero?

And you're probably down to your last four days. But what we did was like a Thursday, Friday before we started on a Monday. We like to get seven or ten days prior so people have time to get signed up even though you can't use it until let's just use May 1 as a starting point. But we as this slide indicates, we're looking at doing a little bit longer of a pilot. So to answer your question, we're gonna reimagine, reenergize, and may not call it golden.

We're looking at what state of Maryland says as a senior, but we may look at what AARP says as a senior, or we may look at what driving is in the state of Maryland, License 18. So a few things for us to ponder behind the scenes in a relatively short period of time. If we do all summer, May, June, July, we can report back out in September with what we found in the summer.

I think I had it on my talking points not for our group this morning but for Marcus. I wanted to pull him aside and mention it and somebody else did right in front of me when we got here earlier. We also have to be mindful of the fee schedule and at what point is it not a pilot and it's an extended process. So we're gonna work through the attorney's office and make sure that we are good to go before we push this too far and start to talk about it on a public forum. Next slide.

And this was unfortunately our third member is not here. Both of you have spent a good amount of time with us. This was just a simple slide to throw on for the new committee. So the concession agreement and the roles of premium, we operate the concession area which is called the parking system within all of our agreements that exist. That means that we handle enforcement technology and operations and the city sets policy rates, fines and rules which kind of goes back to what we were talking about with that meeting earlier and the change in the garage.

Next slide. February occupancy. Again, this is a holdover. We saw this one last month. I'd just like to keep it trailing month so we can compare them. We had those storms in February where we extended that free parking for the residents for quite some time as we worked through all of the ice and all the other precipitation types that we got at the January and February. So not much to talk about here that we haven't addressed. Go ahead.

So,

yeah, just a question. It'd be helpful to note on these so we can look back and as far as what you think the 100% capacity days are from, you know, because we had an instance, I think, last month where it was like, you know, I used to just come to garages and making note it was due to to jury duty and stuff like that. And I think we've had other times in like in August where it was just because it was popular that time of month, that time of day. But in this case, are these 100% you think from people parking in here due to snow? This was from the snow.

Yeah. We extended that. I want to say, correct me, I believe almost two weeks if not just over two weeks from that storm.

Just building off of my last point previously where I think we had excess parking, think it's somebody could see this and make a mistaken assumption without any notes that, oh my gosh, parking garage is filled up, we already run out of spaces and I think it's important to note.

That was good context. Yeah. Okay. We could do that. We'd like bad attempt at it at the bottom there. But that context helps. We'll make that happen. Next slide. And then this is our March occupancy. Back to normal. Business as usual. Weekday during the day, very busy. Saturday and Sunday, if the weather was nice, we had nice pushes. I think it's still been pretty cold in the evening, so it tapers off a little bit earlier. You see that 6PM in March we saw it fall off.

Typical March weather though recently. So we'll see nothing but upticks from this point forward for the summer. And next slide. And this is our March residential promo code usage. The other two have been minimal, if any at all. So I've pulled those off for this one. It was about $6,800 in parking that was validated or comped to the residents for their two hour parking. You can see this as usage throughout the month by day of the week and through three hour time blocks. So pretty par for the course on that usage too. No upticks or downticks over time that we're seeing.

Interesting to see, I mean the peaks are lunch hour and presumably dinner hour?

Yeah, a day off you go grab lunch or coffee and on the weekends you kind of do the same. It's good. It means we're making downtown accessible to the rest of the residents if they want to come down here. They certainly don't do it when we're busiest though. And that's it.

Do you have any further questions?

Thank you for

joining us.

Back in chair, would you like to hear from Mr. John Kemp Please. From

Mr. Kepp, thank you for joining us.

Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for having us.

Please say your full name and who you're representing for Ms. Jackson to put in the record.

I am John Kemp with Metropolis SP Plus Annapolis Parking as known in known in town here. So we didn't bring we didn't bring materials here today only because you know at the director's direction we were not really on the agenda. But we'll be sure to bring statistics updates and stats.

Didn't share, I thought you just had questions you wanted to talk about I regarding

thought he had materials or something to present. Do you have any questions for SP?

I'm fine with Wade, you don't have anything burning for this month.

I would, if I may take a liberty, I would just say on the equipment that went in, the older gated equipment at Gotts Court Garage, Nighting Garage got replaced with gateless camera enabled drive in drive out. There wasn't there was no hardware cost associated with that to the city. The city did pay for some signage and sign installation. But no software or camera hardware cost or any of that, including the installation of those. Yeah.

Net total was I'll bring that total next time. But it was it was under $50,000.

Thank you for joining us keep up the good work. Yep. Alright. Director Moore, do you have anything else on your transportation department updates?

That's all we have for you today. Hope we were able to answer as best of our ability the questions that you did have. I know we've taken back some things that we just gotta research. I have them here. But feel free, you know, to email us if there's something else that comes up between now and then.

Alright. Director Moore, thank you for joining us today.

Thanks for having us.

Alright. So the next item on the agenda was ID 7526, Blue Mobility Manager discussion. Miss Anna Ward, however, there was a misunderstanding. Miss Ward was not able to join us today. So we are going to postpone action on that until our May meeting. And last but certainly not least, ID 1226, transportation board update. Aren't you part of the transportation board? Do you have anything to present? Alright. We have a representative of the board who said that there are no updates from the transportation board and I'm going to say no news is good news on that front. So do I have anything else for the good of the order?

No, sir.

Alright. I have nothing on my end. All in favor of motion to adjourn?

So moved.

I will second. All in favor? Aye. You for joining us everyone.