Transportation Commission - Regular Meeting

Thank you. I mean, how many years?

Once it's perfected, we're going to see.

It shouldn't come through then. Yeah.

And I think there is a switch. I think it's been delayed, honestly, by now.

Okay, audio's on.

All right, audio's on. So I want to ask once more, we just did roll call. Commissioner Welcher, can you acknowledge that you are here, please?

I do acknowledge I'm here.

All right, good.

So we do have... Well, could we hear her? I got a thumbs up from Kevin.

Did you get a hand raised or something? Yeah. Okay. Okay, good. All right, then let's start with the election of officers. Kevin, could you please announce who you have nominated for chair?

For the position of chair, so far I've received one nomination. The nomination is currently for Vice Chair McGill. We can accept any nominations from the floor. And if we see none, Vice Chair McGill would become chair automatically without a vote.

So are there any other nominations from the floor? And Commissioner Welcher, raise your hand if you do have any. Seeing none, we have a new chair. So you should pass it down.

Yes, I think that's to get a little bit.

Okay, okay. So the gavels now. Yes. And thank you, Chair Stach for all the many dedicated years on commission, but also us here. I also want to thank that Commissioner King for filling in for both of us last time. Thank you, Chair. So she left.

Okay, so we will move on to the election of the Vice Chair.

Thank you, Chair McGill. As of now, I have two nominees for the position of Vice Chair. Commissioner Stach and Commissioner Williams have been nominated to serve as Vice Chair for the coming year.

Can my nomination be? Can my nomination happen now?

Do you have a nomination to give us?

Well, I believe we can.

It's never happened before, but I believe we can set a precedent with your nomination. And therefore, under the current process, which we just went through, Commissioner Williams would become our new vice chair for the next year. Thanks for volunteering, Commissioner Williams.

Thanks. We're moving right on through. So I have a motion to approve the agenda. Second. Second. And so it's been moved and seconded. Anybody in the chat? It's a message that we have approved the agenda. Let's move on to written communications. Kevin, you forwarded all the written communications we've seen since May 14th, right? Anything else that we don't have, okay? So we should have those, and that's it, right? There's nothing else for us to review, okay? Let's go to oral communications. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Yes, other comments are limited three minutes per person very next door. HAB-Masyn Moyer- Staff Kevin will keep time and comments must relate to the city and all view government business and the ball some responsibility to transportation mission so haven't placed call speakers in their sign in or contain.

Chair McGill, we have currently six people signed up. The first person to sign up is Diana Leo. I don't know. There's Diana. Okay.

Thank you.

Good evening, Chair McGill and Commissioners. My name is Diana Leo and I'm the Vice President of Government Affairs for the Bellevue Chamber. We appreciate the Commission's work on Bellevue transportation planning and we support the staff's recommendation to update the bicycle and pedestrian level of traffic stress measures. That's a sensible data refinement. However, we have serious concerns about the proposal to amend the volume to capacity ratio performance targets, and we want to be direct. Relaxing these targets should be a last resort, not a first step. For performance targets, for a reason, they define acceptable levels of service and create accountability. If we simply lower the bar to match existing congestion, we aren't solving the problem. We're normalizing it. That's not planning. That's accepting failure. Before any targets are changed, the City should demonstrate that it is genuinely exhausted alternatives, capacity improvements, parallel corridor enhancements, transit priority strategies. A small number of intersections are projected to exceed targets. That's a solvable problem, not a reason to rewrite the standard. And if targets do change, that must be accompanied by real compensatory investments. Higher congestion at key intersections has downstream consequences. Longer queues, term restrictions, degraded transit reliability, a piecemeal approach puts Bellevue's long-term growth vision at risk. We are asking the Commission to direct staff to return with an evaluation of engineering alternatives, multimodal count data at the affected intersections, and a meaningful public engagement process before any target changes move forward. Additionally, I want to note that we reviewed and appreciate the staff report on the Pactoria and Eastgate neighborhood area plan transportation policies, including the engagement reports. In the survey that was conducted for the neighborhood area, there is a question about what would help respondents get around more easily.

We appreciate the notion about congestion neighborhood area, find updates as you move them through the process.

Thank you.

Thanks.

Give me a moment. Chair McGill. I think we have some technical issues we're trying to work through.

Okay.

So I don't know what the technical issues are, but something's happening.

Yeah, the only sound that they have is coming through your computer and not through these microphones.

Remote people only hearing from your microphone.

Oh, this system should be on. So turn off the timer for a sec. Then I can have access to the system with this mouse.

yeah okay so there's the audio right so so go to your audio settings and then go to echo cancelling speaker conference room up there yep all right hey how does the sound work now

My microphone. I testing are the people online able to hear me?

Someone other than Kevin. Go ahead.

All right, people online. Can you hear me?

Yes. Good. Now.

Good. All right. Thank you.

The next speaker is Maria Frost.

Welcome, Maria.

Okay, good evening, Chair McGill, Commissioners. My name is Maria Frost. I'm the Vice President of Government Affairs at Kemper Development. Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the proposed amendments to the mobility implementation plan. First, we want to thank staff for the recommendation to eliminate the 20% speed limit multiplier and revert to the posted speed limit when calculating pedestrian and bicycle level of traffic stress. This is a common sense correction that ensures our data accurately reflects actual conditions on the ground. Conversely, We have significant concerns regarding the proposal to weaken volume to capacity ratio performance targets on several regional corridors and freeway access points in PMA 2 and 3. Staff say that because some corridors in residential areas carry heavy regional pass-through traffic, local demand management isn't effective and widening roads is too costly or would be detrimental to active transportation. Their solution is to lower the bar to, quote, better reflect the function of these roads. We strongly disagree with this approach. Bellevue's Comprehensive Plan Policy TR21 explicitly states we must design arterial improvements, including vehicular capacity, to serve citywide travel demand in addition to regional travel demand. It does not give us an escape hatch if the regional travel demand is heavy. Even if staff reason that they've exhaustively modeled these intersections and concluded that no amount of capacity work will bring any of them into compliance with existing VC targets, we urge the Commission to ask for the data, ask for the alternatives, and ask for the cost estimates. Weakening the VC performance target is not the answer. It does not move a single driver. It does not reduce a single minute of gridlock for Bellevue residents and businesses. It simply papers over the problem. Looking at the agenda memo, it does not appear that traffic congestion relief is a priority. We are asking the Commission to make it one. We are not asking to turn these arterials into multi-lane highways. We are talking about localized operational bottlenecks and the cut-through regional traffic that is already spilling. and to establish neighborhoods degrading safety and quality of life. Bellevue is uniquely positioned to lead with innovative, technology-driven operational improvements that make this better for everyone. We know the solutions exist because Chris Breeland did a great job presenting some of them last year. We respectfully ask the Commission decline further analysis that would weaken the VC performance targets, direct staff to keep the existing targets as our standard, and instead focus on sharing documented evaluations of operational and engineering alternatives to meet those targets, including a cost-benefit analysis for each corridor, which we have not seen. Staff should also provide empirical pedestrian and bicycle count data at these intersections to substantiate claims about potential impacts to active transportation. Let's have that conversation and the transparent engagement with the community so we can prioritize these projects and actually solve the problem to keep our residents and businesses moving. Thank you.

Okay, thank you, Maria. Kevin, who's next?

David Bonifan is next.

Welcome, David. Thank you. Hi, Chairman. Hi, Traffic Commission. I'm a resident of the Maiden Bower neighborhood. And like many areas in Bellevue, we're experiencing a high volume of cars speeding through on Lake Washington Boulevard and also being hit with the custom exhaust noise really, really loud. It's gotten really, really bad down there. So with that, I'm here to ask you for your help. We need help on Lake Washington Boulevard from old town all the way down to northeast eighth um it's become unsafe it's a situation that now requires an urgent action um as you know maiden bower this is a compact residential pedestrian corridor yet we see daily speeding hear illegal exhaust noise at all hours it literally feels like a 24 7 racetrack is running through our neighborhood It comes down through Lake Washington Boulevard. The speeders go down 99th to the park, do a U-turn and come up. They go to the Maiden Bar Park Overlook, do a U-turn, come back. They race across the bridge. They come back and they turn left on 100th and race up towards downtown park, past downtown park. We see zero police enforcement in our area. I hate to say this, I'm a little embarrassed by it, but I have over 300 complaints and emails into the city on the My Bellevue app and emails, and we get nothing. I used to get calls back from the police department. I don't know if they just are... I know everyone's busy. I love Bellevue Police, so don't take me wrong. I love the city of Bellevue. I've lived here 12 years. But we need a lot of help. Residents on both sides of the bay, they're awakened at night. The sound travels across the bay. I walk over there all the time. And the daytime noise just disrupts basic quality of life. Pedestrians and cyclists are forced to endure reckless drivers, and they're passing by them at lethal speeds. Someone's going to get hurt, and Maiden Bower's got phase two coming up as well. I'm going to speed this up real quick. The noise is relentless, and honestly, as a neighbor, and I live in the View condominiums, all had enough it's just gone on way too long so what i'm asking for um the streets you know again it's just it happens all the time all the time and i've kind of cut through this but my suggestions are we need speed enforcement we need someone to install fixed speed cameras and photo radar to site drivers who exceed or race through the corridor we need sound enforcement cameras that will ticket people with illegal exhaust. We'd like to see the speed limit, and I know this is under discussion, but reduced to 20 miles an hour from Old Bellevue down to 99th, and also install some soft speed bumps and so on. And in closing real quick here, You know, I keep up on the Bellevue News, or at least I try to, but approving 37 new traffic camera locations but leaving this corridor out was a glaring oversight. Statistics alone don't capture what's happening on our streets. Maiden Bower and the downtown core face daily speeding and noise problems, and while the community has been patient, we need action now. Anyway, appreciate anything you can do. We need your help. I'll get in front of city council and keep pushing it forward. But the neighborhood is just it's bad. It's really, really bad. It's not getting any better. And I know that there I'm sorry, I'm out of time. Can I have five seconds? Just there's a stop sign or a four way stop that was supposed to go in on 100th and first right on the southwest corner of the park. Be great if that could come in. That would that would solve a lot of issues, noise and speeding. So thanks for the couple extra seconds. I appreciate your time.

Okay.

Scott Lampe is our next speaker.

Okay, welcome, Scott.

Good evening, Chair McGill and Transportation Commission members. My name is Scott Lampian. I'm also here representing the Maiden Bower Bay Neighbors Association. I actually served on the Transportation Commission from 2010 to 2019 and want to thank you for your service in supporting the transportation needs of our wonderful city. Tonight, you will be reviewing the 2026 Mobility Implementation Plan update, which the City Council recently supported and which, given the proposed reduced speeds in the vicinity of Maiden Bower our group also strongly supports. As was noted in the Council presentation last week, speed is the highest contributor to serious injury crashes in Bellevue. One change to the proposed speed limit changes our group recommends is the extension of the proposed 20 mile per hour speed limit from Main Street and 100th Avenue west one block to the intersection of 99th Avenue northeast and Lake Washington Boulevard. The prior speaker spoke to that as well. This would provide two safety related benefits. First, it would provide additional safety for pedestrians crossing Lake Washington Boulevard the heavily used lighted crosswalk at 99th and second it would reduce vehicle speeds on the upper curve section of lake washington boulevard which was frequently used unsafely as a racing type environment which you just heard again this is our one minor ask or my minor ask on this but i want to thank you once again for your service and for the opportunity to provide hopefully constructive input on how to provide a safe environment for all modes of travel in our city. Thank you.

Thank you, Scott.

Vic Bishop is next.

Welcome, Vic.

Hi. My name is Vic Bishop. I'm a 50-year resident of Bellevue, a former Transportation Commission member and chair, and a retired professional transportation engineer. Congestion is the problem that we got to deal with. We need a priority list of capacity improvements, not a request to lower the standards. I'm going to refer to the council direction of comprehensive plan policy TR20, which is aggressively plan, manage, and expand transportation investments to reduce congestion and improve the quality of travel experience for all users. That's your job. Come up with a list. The recommendation of the staff is to review the VOC standards for intersections as a way to change the standard for congestion rather than increase capacity. That's nonsense. We need to increase capacity. I'll use the... Data provided by the city to demonstrate my point, this attachment to the letter that I sent today shows the projected 2030 congestion from 2019 to 2030 transportation facilities plan. It indicated that 37 intersections by 2030 and three areas called mobility management areas would fail to meet the VOC standard at the time. I interpret that standard to mean that at a failed intersection, a driver would have to wait through a second green light in order to get through it. That's what we called failed then. This attachment showed a dismal picture of congestion in Bellevue. What have we done? Well, we've done quite a lot, but we've not done very much at all for the failed intersections. What we have done for intersections is change the standard. The next attachment shows how the standard reflects. It's the results from the Wilberton subarea FEIS. Magically, the intersections failed were reduced to eight, from 37 to eight. Well, not quite magically, we just changed the standard. And so the new standard is A driver has to wait for the third green light in order to get through before we call it failed. And so we only have eight in 2024 that actually failed, according to that standard. What nonsense. This standard carried forward to 2045 shows the plan would create 18 failed intersections as shown on this drawing. They're all on 148th, Northeast 8th, 116th, and a couple on Coal Creek Parkway. we've not fixed the failed intersections, we just changed the standards. Now you're being told that it is too expensive and therefore impractical to fix the intersections. So let's change the standard again and provide a realistic target for the function of the arteriole in place. The city's data demonstrates that our road system is suffering severe congestion at a lot of locations. It's not good enough just to lower their standard. Make a list. Do your job. Thank you.

Thanks, Fred.

Alex Zimmerman is the next speaker.

Thank you. Welcome, Alex.

My name is Alexander Roman. I once spoke with you guys. A very interesting kind of degenerative idiot. Is this who speaks? Idiot too. Typical. Almost 15 years. For 15 years I was talking in the council chamber. So City of Bellevue is not ready for traffic. 15 years I was talking. What's happened now? Dead jump by 200% for one year. Look how many buildings built. You understand? You freaking cretina. It will be worse. It never will be better. You look what is doing Mayor Muhammad. More. Who signed document from not legal name. He acting like a criminal. It's a felony. You support them. So you are felony too. A partner in crime. It's exactly who you are. You don't understand. They are right now in critical condition. Another building, another dead end building is exactly what is will be happen. Bring another thousand and thousand drivers. And 50% of drivers come from India and China. They are freaking idiots. You see how they drive? It's not matter what is you doing. Nothing will be changed. It's only one way for stopping this. Block city totally. No transportation in city. No car in city. And you, what is you doing, cretina? You support consul. Consul are pure idiot. 15 year I talking about red light camera. 30,000 red light camera every year. I give you classic example. $5 million per year for 15 years is $75 million. 50% go to Arizona. And I'm talking about this 15 years. Who's a freaking idiot? They told you, oh, red camera will change life. Nothing changed. And nothing right now. I see speed cut by five, by 10 miles. You freaking idiot. You cannot change human mentality. You understand? City not ready this. And every year, every month, every day will be worse, worse, worse. Why? Because you are criminal. You are killer. You are bandita. You are degenerative idiot. You cannot come to council. You don't talk in them. Stop in this. Enough Bellevue. No more people. No more building. It will be nightmare. Is this a nightmare right now? So why are you not doing this again and again? It's only Alex Zimmerman talking about you are a criminal, a thief, a bandita, stolen money. I'm not talking about money. We're talking about $100 million for nothing. I'm not talking about this. I need more time. Viva Trump! Viva New American Revolution! Stand up, slave and happy cow! Stop enacting like degenerative idiots! Talk to consul!

Time's up, Alex. Yeah, time to finish. I know. I know you did it.

I know you did it.

I know.

There's one person online who has his hand raised. And the audience too. Okay, so let me... Joe would Brett KenCairn, Do you want to provide a comment to the Commission. Brett KenCairn, i've unmuted you go ahead Joe.

Thank you. I find the comments of the last speaker racist, sexist, and anti-American, and I wish you would put a stop to them. Moving along, I would encourage Bellevue to consider being more multimodal and encourage more transportation or multimodal transportation like all those beautiful Lime scooters and bikes of Redmond. I believe Redmond is the smartest city with the smartest city council because Redmond promotes getting around through clean, green electricity and protecting our planet. And I just really think that we need beautiful bike paths. And we also need, in Bellevue, more 711s close to the sexy light rail stations that you have. I really wish you well. And I really wish you'd kick out that person, Alex Zimmerman. Thank you for your public service. You deserve better.

Thank you. Evan, we have someone in the room.

Thank you. Come on up, introduce yourself. Thank you.

Good evening, everyone. My name is Heidi Dean. I live in Newport Hills. And tonight, even though I don't live in Factory, I am here giving comment on the NAP because they don't have any neighborhood associations down there. And I've looked at the plan and all of the engagement, and there's been very, very, very little from Factorio residents. So upon review of all the documents, it's clear that the NAP policies were not written with Factorio residents in mind, but rather with the dreams of anti-car urbanists who do not live in that area that want to control the outcome of the NAP process via the online surveys and the tools, the online tools. And Eastgate's NAP reads much the same. And if the Factorio draft NAP and its policies were truly reflective of Factorio residents, it would have included policies aimed at mitigating traffic congestion, which is a huge concern of those living in Factorio and those in adjacent neighborhoods such as mine who frequently travel to and through that neighborhood. But instead, the policies focus on increasing biking, walking, and transit. And while encouraging those things are nice and should be included, they are not what will solve the traffic congestion problem that plagues Factoria. More frequent buses will not decrease congestion. It just means more buses sitting in that congestion. And it's the same flawed logic that our planners want to apply to Newport Hills. with our limited ingress and egress. The mobility survey questions were 100% written to drive respondents toward bike ped transit policies while ignoring traffic congestion solutions. None of the survey answers addressed traffic congestion and instead respondents had to know enough to use the other option to write in their comments. Yet traffic congestion is mentioned as a huge problem in Factorio in the engagement report. So the question becomes why weren't the policies, the mobility policies, fully multimodal and addressing traffic, vehicle traffic congestion. But let's talk for a moment about vehicle traffic congestion as it relates to the MIP, because I want to plus one everything that both Maria and Vic said. And if Eastgate resident Michelle Wanamaker were still alive, she'd be here to remind you that simply changing the way that you measure volume to capacity doesn't mitigate traffic congestion, it just creates the appearance that intersections aren't failing as badly as they actually are. Factoria's southern border is Coal Creek Parkway, and that's a PMA-3 arterial. So massaging the VC numbers for that arterial will only add to the problem on Factoria Boulevard, and it will also add to the problem of cut-through traffic in my neighborhood, Newport Hills, especially for vehicles that are traveling northbound. So I would ask you to have staff come back with real traffic mitigation solutions rather than figuring out ways to massage the numbers and add to those policies in the Factorio NAP. Thank you.

Thank you, Heidi. Kevin, are there any more people that would like to make comments?

There's no one else online that has raised their hand to provide a comment. I see none in the audience as well.

Okay. Thank you. All right. Let's move on to communications from City Council, boards and commissions. Deputy Mayor Hamilton's not here. Are there any reports from commissioners? Okay. All right. So, Kevin, let's move into staff reports. Do you have a staff report?

Excuse me. A couple items to report tonight. One is that several of you, well, all of you except for one, have a gift box and a card from the Bellevue City Council in thanks for your service on the Transportation Commission. And it's not that Vice Chair Williams isn't thanked, but Vice Chair Williams went to the Boards and Commissions Appreciation Event at which she was handed these items in person. So again, if Council Member Hamilton was here, he'd probably have a word or two to say in thanks, but the expression of appreciation is at your table. With regard to upcoming projects, the commission previously recommended that bicycle network facilities be improved on Lake Washington Boulevard, 100th Avenue Northeast, and Northeast First between 100th and Bellevue Way. And in addition, your recommendation included reducing the speed limit on Northeast First to 20 miles an hour. That project is imminent. The notice to proceed has been issued, and construction is expected to start in early July. So that's a good implementation of a really important component of the Byte network. And last but not least, just a reminder to check your emails. I can't, you know, sometimes you don't check your work emails as often as I check my work emails. But please do from time to time. I sometimes need a response to make sure we have a quorum for the night. So thank you. Great. Thanks, Kevin. Any questions for Kevin?

Anybody? Okay. Okay, we do not have a public hearing tonight. So we'll move right into the study session. And our first item is factory and Eastgate neighborhood area plans. We have Zach Lucan, the senior planner and community development department. And he'll describe the great neighborhoods program and the transportation related policy amendments under discussion for Eastgate and Factorio. Commissioner comments and input are welcome. No action is requested today. Welcome, Zach.

Thank you very much.

Set up here.

All right. Good evening, Transportation Commission and our new chair and vice chair and members of the public. My name is Zachary Luckin, senior planner with the Comprehensive Planning Group within Community Development, the City of Bellevue. And I'm here to talk about the Eastgate and Factory neighborhood area plans and specifically as they relate to transportation issues and policies in those neighborhoods. So we launched this work program in August of last year with Council, and our direction was to update the neighborhood area plans for both Eastgate and Factoria. And over the last eight months, we've talked to over 1,200 people at 31 events. People have shared their feedback and ideas for the future of Eastgate and Factoria. The feedback is used to create the draft neighborhood area plans and the policies that you see today, which lay the foundation for the future of both neighborhoods. The policies you see tonight were shared with the public earlier this month, and we're in the process of talking to community boards and commissions, and we'll be returning to planning commission later this month on the 24th to share the full draft plan and updated policies. So this meeting is for information only. And although we do invite discussion on how the draft policies support mobility and access in these neighborhoods, we are not looking for a formal recommendation. But your feedback from the study session will be shared with Planning Commission as they consider different inputs and will be providing direction on the plans to staff and any revision to those policies. So our agenda for this evening, we have the neighborhood area planning process. I'll go over our process to date as well as the engagement that we've done, our scope elements, another more in-depth view into community engagement, and then we'll look at the draft plans, policy, and concept maps for first Eastgate and then Factoria.

Zach, just a quick question. If people have questions, would you? be okay if we interrupted or do you want to save until the end?

So after each plan, after I go up to policies for each plan, I have a discussion and then I'll go to the next neighborhood. So I do have time built in. That'll work. Thanks. All right, so some background on the Great Neighborhoods Program. It was initiated by city council in 2018 to update all 16 neighborhoods of Bellevue, many of which hadn't been updated for several decades. The primary objective is to develop neighborhood plans that are relevant, community-driven, and reflective of both citywide and local priorities. The planning process was done by engaging community members who live, work, and play in both neighborhoods, and their input shapes the plan outcomes. These plans serve as a guide for decision-making that informs how the city will partner with others to realize a 10- to 20-year vision for the neighborhoods, and we have completed four neighborhood plans over the past few years and are currently working on updating these two, Eastgate and Factorio. So a little bit about the structure and the breakdown in relation to the Comprehensive Plan. Neighborhood Area Plans are part of Bellevue's Comprehensive Plan Volume 1, which is the city's guiding policy document for how the city grows and develops over the next 20 years. The vision, goals, and priorities in the plans describes what the city wants to achieve, balancing clear direction and flexibility to respond to changing conditions within these neighborhoods. There can be several ways to implement these policies, such as investing in new facilities, creating new regulations or ordinances, or supporting programs and partnerships. As an example, a policy around transportation could result in a future project being added to the MIP or some other project around wayfinding and streetscape improvements. And just relating back to the mobility implementation plan, we've vetted these policies with our subject matter experts in transportation to make sure they are consistent with the MIP, identifying system gaps and priority areas for improvement. And the neighborhood plans are also an opportunity to provide further direction on local non arterial streets as well. So this could include improvements to the bike pedestrian network, sidewalks and intersections, transit connections and other key corridors. So a look at our planning boundaries for both neighborhoods. Eastgate and Factoria follow the I-90 business corridor, which is historically our highest concentration of mid to large-size employers and hotels outside of downtown. The Eastgate neighborhood area includes both north and south of I-90, as you see on the map. It's a large geographic area made up of a myriad of uses, including lower-density residential areas, apartments, light industrial, retail, parks, offices, and Bellevue College. Bordering Eastgate is Factoria, bound by I-405 and I-90 as well. And this is predominantly a commercial employment center known for Factoria Mall and T-Mobile headquarters, as well as numerous professional services, retail, and restaurants, many of which are international. Beyond these commercial areas, there are pockets of residential neighborhoods to the southwest and then up the hill to the east. A little bit about our process. So the neighborhood area planning process is divided into four phases, as you can see here. In the previous phases, we've worked with the community to identify values and develop the draft vision and policy priorities that should be the building blocks of their draft plan. We are now currently in our refine phase, where we have developed the draft plan policies for community review. We're returning to planning commission again later this month to review the full draft plans, narrative, and the concept maps that you will see later. We aim for a final review and adoption of the plans with city council at the end of the year. So neighborhood area plans are organized into five sections and relevant policies to this commission can be found in several of those. The first we have is neighborhood identity. These policies strengthen the physical and cultural elements that anchor the neighborhood and make it unique. Next is mixed use and neighborhood centers. These policies support the evolution of mixed use areas so that they're convenient to go to, attractive to be in and have unique offerings for the community. Then we have community gathering spaces policies. These support developing, enhancing, connecting people to both indoor and outdoor gathering spaces. Then a particular interest to this group, we have mobility and access policies, which inform future capital investments around streets, sidewalks, bicycle facilities, trails, and transit infrastructure. And lastly, our environmental policies support enhancing the community's natural areas. So a little bit about our Discover Phase engagement. As we mentioned previously, we've had extensive engagement to date. The Discover Phase took place in late 2025 and focused on identifying values, opportunities, and challenges in both neighborhoods. The team engaged community through events and platforms that reach residents, business owners, students, and others in both neighborhoods with an emphasis on groups less likely to participate in the planning process. Activities included tabling, questionnaires, workshops, and walks with the community. And these events are summarized in the engagement reports that are attachments in your agenda materials. Then onto the define phase, which took place earlier this year, and it focused on developing a draft vision and a set of urban design concepts and policy priorities. During this phase, we held a workshop with a range of hands-on activities, providing people of all ages and ability levels the opportunity to identify public space improvements and provide feedback on our draft vision statement and policy moves. To supplement our workshop, we also had smaller workshops and tabling opportunities in community spaces throughout the neighborhoods and some even led by community members themselves with their groups. And I'd just like to use this photo collage to really emphasize that this plan is again shaped by community. We've heard from many diverse voices and perspectives in different settings from classrooms to apartment common spaces and even some busy arterial intersections. So now let's take a look at Eastgate. So we've heard from the community in Eastgate that they value safe, natural, diverse, and economically prosperous neighborhood. Neighborhood assets include mature trees, which largely define Eastgate's residential areas, streams, and open spaces. Another asset is its parks, both within the neighborhood and those that border it, such as Robinswood. And people really appreciate the convenience of being able to access transit, grocery stores, restaurants, and coffee shops in the neighborhood while being so close to wilderness features like hiking trails and streams. And people also just really enjoy the sense of community there. And it's common that people will visit neighbors while going for walks throughout the neighborhood. And that's something that they really value. So based on the values and assets, the team developed a vision statement for what Eastgate will look and feel like in the next 10 to 20 years. It focuses on opportunities for Eastgate's diverse communities to thrive and connect, enhancing Eastgate's natural, recreational and commercial assets and creating hubs for community to gather on both sides of I-90. This vision for Eastgate sets the foundation for some of the draft policies around transportation that we will be reviewing tonight. A quick read-through of our vision statement. Eastgate is a convenient, safe, and welcoming neighborhood where its diverse residents, businesses, and student population can thrive and build connections with one another. Its tree-lined and well-maintained residential areas are the heart of the neighborhood, and people from all stages of life are seen walking, biking, and taking transit to experience the area's natural beauty, outdoor recreation, and retail and entertainment offerings. Mixed-use areas on both sides of Interstate 90, as well as Bellevue College, anchor the neighborhood as vibrant hubs for living, working, gathering, learning, and fostering community. So now we're going to take a look at some of our policies as they relate to transportation. We're going to start with the mixed use neighborhood center section. And these policies seek to help Eastgate Center evolve into a place where people can easily access transit, housing, shopping, places to gather, and services. And the policies in this area achieve this goal by coordinating with government agencies, transit providers, and major institutions on planning and capital investments, specifically in relation to transportation. Now onto mobility and access. These policies seek to provide safe and convenient access to mobility options and connections to destinations within the neighborhood and across the region. And as we take a look at these policies, this helps accomplish this goal through congestion relief and traffic calming, as well as building out and providing enhanced access to trails. And again, these were all in the materials that I provided. To keep going with mobility and access policies, this is also accomplished through providing more active transportation connections and improving pedestrian safety. As well as through improving wayfinding and advocating for improved transit service and amenities. In addition to these policies, a key element of the neighborhood area plan are our concept maps, which you'll see in a second, that locate and visualize opportunities for improving gathering spaces as well as mobility and access and our right of ways. Improvements are supported through policies and community feedback to help inform where these opportunities could be. Going from left to right, top to bottom, some improvements that are explored include improved pedestrian crossings, enhanced active transportation connections, streetscape improvements, and through-block connections. And here is a look at our mobility and access concept map for Eastgate. where we can work to create a cohesive vision for active transportation and streetscape improvements. Again, as the name indicates, these maps are conceptual. These are not a potential project list by any means. More highlighting general location and type of improvement. as well as some partnerships that we could use to implement these things. So the pink lines indicate arterials that we want to prioritize for streetscape enhancements like landscaping, lighting, furnishings, or other pedestrian-oriented features that make it more attractive, safe, and comfortable. The orange target symbols throughout the map represent intersection crosswalks and mid-block crossings for pedestrians to cross high-volume arterials to get to their destinations. The light blue dashed lines represent potential through-block connections to improve pedestrian circulation by breaking down larger blocks and development sites. And then tying these elements together are the dark blue dashed lines throughout the neighborhood, which highlight opportunities for improved walking and biking connections to safely and comfortably travel between these destinations. So our discussion for Eastgate, again, rather than looking around specific policy language, we want to understand if we're missing any of the opportunities or priorities from your perspective and looking at the intent of policy. So the question is, for Eastgate, do these draft policies provide adequate local direction to inform project concepts that implement and supplement the MIP and other investments to support the neighborhood area's vision? And if it helps, we can... take a look at the map while we have discussion. Questions?

I'll go first.

Just one quick question on the wording of the mobility access. It says coordinate with WSDOT on projects along and near Interstate 90 to relieve congestion and minimize traffic impacts during construction. Are we talking about relieving congestion in general or just during construction?

The intent is both.

Okay. Thank you, Chair Beagle. So in thinking about how this data impact the MIP and the decisions that we make for the TFP, I think it would be beneficial if you were able to say how one particular neighborhood prioritizes or deprioritizes particular things in the comp plan. So, for example, if it was like bridal trails, then they might say something like, well, we'd like to prioritize horses and maybe deprioritize some other things. Right now, when we look at the TFP projects, it's difficult for this commission, I believe, to really get a firm understanding of the sub-area plans and understand how that impacts the priorities of the projects within the TFP region. So being able to say, yes, this is a priority, but this is a non-priority, I think would be really helpful. So that's one piece of feedback. Because otherwise, I look at the priorities and the policies, rather, and it's unclear to me how that's different or how it's really being reframed from what's already in the comp plan. And there are some specifics that talk about specific projects, and that's good. But having a general idea of what we should focus on in each sub-area would be helpful. And I have additional comments, but I'll see the floor.

I do have one quick response. I certainly hear you. I think that's where the concept maps come into play because we can talk about the need for active transportation, improved intersections, but this is where we're pointing out the specific priorities from communities because they directly inform these maps. We did mapping exercises where they could draw on the maps so they could identify challenge areas, areas for improvements. So like we can see specific intersections, we can see specific streets through block connections that are missing or that need improvement. So I think that's where the rubber really meets the road. And we can say, okay, these are policy priorities, but they're just language. This is where we can see the where. And so hopefully that can inform some of the other work, the MIP and other programs.

That's fair. I would say it would be nice if the policies also captured some of that prioritization.

Okay. Other questions?

Just a comment when you're talking about community engagement. Can you quantify that as far as what percentage of the total population for the people of Eastgate that don't have any proto-associations are being accounted for? Out of 100%, are you looking at 60% feedback? Are you looking at 70% feedback? How can you say that this is a true representation of what's best for that community? Because this is publicly funded, and so there should be accountability of voices so that there can be accountability of tax dollars.

Certainly. We have a number of those individual touches. That doesn't mean those are unique individuals. Those are number of times that someone engaged. If somebody engaged multiple times, we are unable to tell, for instance, if you submitted an anonymous survey, if you showed up to a meeting, if you're different than that person. The raw number doesn't really indicate it, but what we did is made sure we did our due diligence to go to various Not just, you know, we certainly worked with, like, for instance, the Eastgate Community Association. We went to the Eastgate Supportive Housing Campus. We were, and we went across, you know, multifamily apartment buildings throughout the neighborhood, tabling in the common areas. We put out newsletters. We went to some supportive housing and elderly senior homes. We did, we went to Bellevue College. We went to their student day. and see what else did we do. Again, just tabling and community events. We put up flyers in almost every store that I could get my hands on. We went into Newport High School and some of the other schools and we taught a planning course and we did input that way, making sure that we're putting up our survey, the QR code, pretty much everywhere we could. We did mailage to every single address. So everyone who we could find who would listen, we did our best to do outreach to them. We don't have a specific number percentage because we just aren't able to calculate that. But, I mean, my personal goal and the goal of the team was we want to, A, we started by doing an equity analysis to understand who are all the different groups. Let's translate everything. Let's go to where they're at, meeting them where they're at. We understand that not everyone can come to City Hall, can come to South W Community Center, but we're going to come to you and try to, you know, work with people you trust in your networks to engage in ways that work best for you. And so that was our mission throughout this. And obviously you're not going to reach everybody, but I think we did a pretty good job at at identifying and connecting with some of those unheard voices that we don't really engage with that much in other ways.

Thank you for that. So it sounds like it's very possible that a smaller majority or a smaller minority of people could be speaking for the majority of the population. So I guess what I'm looking for is something more quantifiable. How many exact people live in Eastgate and how many people exactly down to the number have actually had the opportunity to have output or input into this program? Not so much as far as the methods that you're communicating, but more so the quantifiable data of how many people are providing feedback and is everyone given the opportunity to provide that feedback? Are you looking for 60% to say this is a good representation? Are you looking for 70%? But it sounds like it's a very small minority of people that are having the input for the majority of that Eastgate neighborhood.

Yeah, we're certainly nowhere near 60%. I mean, I think the average survey response is 2% or 3%. We far exceeded that. I can guarantee that. I mean, the other thing that we want to acknowledge is that while everyone was aware, for instance, every address received a mailer inviting them to a workshop, inviting them, you know, to respond to a survey, not everyone has the capacity to. And, you know, part of it is we need to understand that this isn't a priority for people, especially those who are under-resourced and they don't have time. You know, so we did our best to make them aware of it. You know, a lot of folks, they reach out and say, hey, I can't come to your event, but can you come to us? And then we did that. But again, unfortunately, I don't have a raw number for you. And if I tried to estimate, it would kind of be disingenuous on my part. Yeah.

And I would just ask that maybe for follow-up, that that is something that is a metric, because I think it's key, especially since the majority of people in Eastgate are drivers. And so they're going to be less concerned about those other modes of transportation. And so if you even just factor in the number of drivers and things like that versus just number of people that, of course, everyone wants other modes of transportation. But again, to have that as a metric, I think would be key.

Appreciate that. Okay, thank you. Other questions, then we'll go here and then we'll go there.

related to the question from Commissioner Keilman. So one concern, another concern that we heard that I thought I would just get your response on had to do with the survey itself and some feeling that the survey was in some way more tuned to other modes than drivers. So if you could just speak to that.

Sure. I mean, myself and my team, we created the survey. I mean, not to get into the specifics, but for instance, if you make multiple choice, like if you make more than three or four options like this statistically, like people just will stop scrolling and won't answer the question. So we took our initial very open ended without predetermined responses, community feedback from the kind of the visioning where we understood challenges and opportunities from people very early on. And we kind of had, okay, we understand here's people's top five concerns, and we had those as options. And then we also had an other option. And then we're understanding that, you know, we have complementary efforts. For instance, you know, there's works that Park does. Public safety was a big one, but we understand that our police service addresses public safety. That's out of scope. We understand the MIP has targets for things like congestion. So, you know, we did our best to put the priorities we heard from communities as those top options, but still allow an other option where people can articulate, you know, additional needs that weren't in there. And that was very effective. And a lot of people use that extended response option to elaborate on some of the things that they'd like to see in the neighborhood.

Okay, so I think I heard maybe that there's you were in some ways, you were focusing on gaps that weren't covered by other things like, for example, the MIP and so that might explain why. In some cases, something like drivers wouldn't have shown up as high in the survey.

That's certainly one. I mean, when we look at Factoria, for example, we heard congestion was an issue for a lot of people. You know, we articulated that both in policy and a narrative. And you probably know that there's a very unique challenge in Factoria where to expand the right-of-way, it means claiming private property. I think there's already been some road widening there recently. And that's pretty much the only area that we really heard that is a major concern and we've heard it some select other areas there's a lot of construction intersections in eastgate and such but um we i mean acknowledging it is and will continue to be a challenge thank you hey commissioner ting all right so two pieces of feedback here um first off

For the community feedback, I would suggest having some sort of affinity map. You did a little bit of this exercise for the neighborhood scan. It helps provide, I think, the reader with a higher level view of understanding what the feedback is rather than just having a list of jumbled, you know, this, that, and the other thing. So... kind of went that direction with the neighborhood scan but it still wasn't enough even with neighborhood scan to be able to get um an understanding of how those themes aligned and the the importance of each theme the second piece of feedback i have is again amplifying with the past two commissioners just said with regards to the survey i think it's really important that you include all of the options and so for example with Community gathering spaces, you know, things like clean and safe, I understand you can't guess in advance what are the most important options. But once you start to hear that you're getting feedback that this is important, especially if someone took the time to write it in, I think you should integrate that directly into the survey so that you will get additional feedback. Because as you know, if it's not listed as an option, people aren't going to think about it. especially when you look at the getting around survey, this is a multimodal survey. So I understand you can't include everything, but because it's multimodal, I'd highly suggest you include all of the modes. Otherwise it looks pretty bad. So I don't know what you can do to address that in the existing data, because I don't know if you can go back and gather. You're not going to do more surveys, but certainly moving forward, I'd say let's make sure when it's multimodal, it includes all the modes. And then when you get feedback that there's some new themes arriving, please include them in the survey.

Yeah, no, I certainly appreciate that. And, you know, that's important to hear. Always opportunities for improvement and continuous improvement is a goal of our neighborhood planning. We are going to be embarking on our next two neighborhoods, Lake Hills and West Lake Sammamish, kicking off later this year. So next year we'll be back to this group and hopefully you'll be able to see some of those changes implemented.

Great, thank you. And do you have an opportunity to field questions with regards to specific policies or are we moving to Factoria? I mean, I can talk about some. I mean, just do you want me to ask now or later is my question.

If they're in relation to Eastgate, we can talk about them now. Otherwise, Factoria policies are next.

Okay. I'm sorry. This is a Factoria policy. Never mind. Thank you. Sure.

I do have an Eastgate comment question. Yeah, Nick. Go ahead. So on the information here where it says Eastgate open-ended questionnaire responses, how did you get this information?

Can I see what you're looking at? Yeah.

It says Eastgate open-ended questionnaire.

So...

How did we get those responses?

So that was either our mailed or online survey we did. We made sure to mirror them. So we mailed the survey to every household and then we posted it online, did social media, next door newsletters, working with community groups, Bellevue College. Again, everyone who we could get an email list to send it out.

Well, what I'm getting at is, is I live in Eastgate and, and getting to your point about, are we getting information or getting responses from Eastgate residents? I would say this is really good and really good information because everything that I read in here, I'm saying, yes, yes, this is what we experienced. This is what we see. This is why we love Eastgate. And so I would, you know, I would look at that information maybe a little bit more, you with more heavier, because this, to me, feels like this is eSkate information, pretty good stuff.

OK, other questions? I have a quick question. Can you go back to your vision for eSkate? And I just wondered, no, the actual vision. It sounds like what you did is collected information and came up with the vision. Have you had any feedback on the vision or do residents get the opportunity to look at this vision and give you some direct feedback? And if so, what did you hear?

Yep. Um, so we put out the vision, um, at our first workshop. Um, and then we iterated on, on it, uh, several times based on community feedback. This was also, we had our online survey with our policy moves, um, in addition to the vision statement. So people provided comment on that there. Um, Specific to this, I was not the plan lead for Eastgate. I'm the plan lead for Factorio. I think some of the things that we wanted to highlight are the natural features and that people really value, like tree-lined streets, the sense of community that they have, convenience and safety, I think, were big ones as well. Those are really the main themes that we had come up, and we tried to hone in and prioritize those based on some community feedback as we progressed.

Okay. When I was looking at this for the first time, it sort of hit me that, again, back to the multimodal question, you don't have people seen driving, right? But in fact, most of them probably are driving. So I kind of wondered the exclusion of that mode from this vision statement sort of seemed a little bit strange to me. So I wonder if you ran this by people in that area, if they would want to add that or if they would see that it was excluded?

Um, I mean, we did not hear that feedback. These are aspirational statements. So people acknowledge there is somewhat, it's very auto dependent currently. And the vast majority of the community members we heard from across all different venues say, we want to move away from that. We want to be able to have safer and more convenient transit access, walking and biking options. So I think it's recognizing of a place we'd like to be at, not just where we are now.

Okay. Okay. Kevin, and then we'll come back to Commissioner Ting.

I just wanted to note that Commissioner Welcher had his hand up for a bit and then took it down, and I'm not sure if Commissioner Welcher had a comment.

I think Commissioner Ting kind of highlighted some of what I was going to approach. But, you know, anyway, I'm doing this virtually, so I think a lot of the other comments that I would have added have already been made, and I'll add more in factory. Thank you.

So just to clarify here, then you're saying that the majority of residents in Eastgate would prioritize bicycles and pedestrian facilities above vehicular improvements. Is that the feedback that you received?

I would say that that was accurate, that they would like to see this as the vision as opposed to an auto-dependent neighborhood, certainly highlighting the convenience of I-90 to get out of the neighborhood to other amenities and amenities on the other side of I-90. But from what we heard, from what aspirationally people would like to see, it is a focus on alternative modes of transportation.

And does that translate into we should invest in these alternative modes based on your read of the feedback? That would be the take, yeah. Very interesting. Okay, thank you.

Just a follow-up comment, because I do think it's maybe not responsible to say the majority of when you're not capturing the majority of.

That'd be my biggest... That's why I said the majority of respondents, yeah.

Even more so, especially if this leads to monetary investment of taxpayer money. I would just... I think it's irresponsible to say that as well. That's my comment.

Okay.

Sorry, clarification there. So when I was talking about the majority in Eastgate, I was not talking about the majority of respondents. I'm asking based on all the data that you've seen and your inherent understanding of Eastgate, Do the people in Eastgate want more ped bike investments or do they want more vehicular investments? Not just the respondents, but I'd like to know if you can make a statement about the people in Eastgate, like what they believe.

When I say respondents, the participants of the events that we've held, the surveys we had, all the people that we interacted with as a team, What they have articulated as their value and aspirations for the community. Okay, fair. Largely that they would like to see more of a prioritization of alternative modes of transportation.

And do you believe that the respondents are representative of the population of Eastgate? I mean, there are a lot of people who live there, yeah. So you believe they are? I do. Okay. Good to know. Thank you. Okay.

Okay.

Well, we're giving you lots of feedback. I know that's what you asked for. Appreciate it. And so appreciate you taking the feedback. Yes, Commissioner Rubin.

I don't know how this plays into transportation, but a lot of us talk about the safety in the area since the shelter got opened up. And I've even had personal encounters and experiences with being unsafe because of, I don't know if it's from the shelter, but since the shelter opened up, there has been more and more instances. So how do we address that?

I mean, it's certainly an ongoing challenge. I know we have an interdepartmental working group, both our homelessness outreach, our affordable housing group, as well as Bellevue PD. They've improved monitoring. We've got more touches in a working group directly, having more frequent communication with the people who run the shelters and supportive housing there. So I think it's about a combined effort, collaboration, communication. We've already seen a big improvement, as you may have noticed since then. You know, the scope of neighborhood planning can't really do a whole lot in that realm because so we can focus on the things that we do have, you know, our purview. is around, which is, for instance, like lighting is a big one, you know, better designed pedestrian-oriented things to make people feel safe. But I know the city holistically has had a concerted effort to collaborate more and communicate more to address these issues in real time.

Did you say 2% to 3% was the amount of responses that you received?

No, that's typically what I think the city of Bellevue usually gets in a survey.

And what was the percentage of respondents that you received?

For Eastgate, I would have to look that up. I can go back to our total number. And then we can do some of the math there. I don't know the population of the neighborhoods combined off the top of my head, but.

I think the summary is just if majority is being used, then I would expect that number to be, oh, we received 80% or above feedback on these surveys. So anything less than that, I don't think would be fair to you.

Again, I'm not saying we heard from the majority of residents who live there.

I'm certainly indicative of what that neighborhood wants.

And just a kind of a follow up to that. Do you have a threshold that you look for to know that you've reached enough residents? Is there a threshold within the city of Bellevue that you try to achieve or, you know, given this number of residents, we want to hear this many comments. I realize you can't attribute them. You know, sometimes one person will make multiple comments, but. Do you have some kind of criteria there where you say, okay, we're done, we got enough?

Yeah, in our engagement plan, we'd try to set up some aspirational metrics. I think we were shooting for about 5% of that, 5% of the population within the neighborhood.

So maybe that's something when you get the data, we could set that up.

Yeah, I would have to talk to our engagement team and get the breakdown between both neighborhoods so we can separate those out. Okay.

Okay. Okay, no other questions. All right. Thank you, Zach. Let's move on to Factorio.

All right. So when we talk to people in Factorio, They value a safe, diverse, accessible, and affordable community. Neighborhood assets include its diverse and international retail options. Many people come from across the city, the east side, and across the lake to enjoy Factory's diverse cuisine and shops. Another asset is its convenience. People have many places to work, eat, shop, and access services, and so people can meet most of their daily needs close to home within the neighborhood. It also has great highway access, as well as access to the Mountain to Sons Greenway Trail, making it convenient for drivers, transit riders, and cyclists to get to. Factoria's vision statement focuses on fostering a global, vibrant, and walkable residential and commercial community that brings together a mix of people, new housing, and retail opportunities. And like Eastgate, there's an emphasis on active transportation, transit, and trail connections. Factoria's vision statement reads as follows. Factoria is a locally rooted, globally connected neighborhood and a major employment center that welcomes people from around the world to live, work, shop, and learn. Centered around its vibrant commercial core, Factoria is anchored by a strong network of local businesses and diverse retail offerings with affordable housing and nature-oriented gathering spaces that bring people of all backgrounds together. A walkable, pedestrian-oriented design complemented by strong access to transit and regional transportation networks supports Factorio as a connected and thriving community. So we'll start with our policies as they relate to transportation for mixed use and neighborhood centers. Again, these policies hope to help Factoria's centers evolve into places where people can easily access transit, housing, shopping, places to gather and services. And these policies help achieve this through pedestrian safety and public realm improvements and coordinating with transit providers on future investments in mixed use areas. Policies in mobility and access seek to provide access to mobility options and connections to destinations within the neighborhood and across the region. These policies help accomplish this through active transportation network and pedestrian safety improvements. Also done through traffic congestion or congestion relief and traffic calming. as well as to providing wayfinding and partnering with transit agencies to improve services and access to high capacity and regional transit facilities. And here is our concept map for mobility and access. Again, noting the key intersection improvements are the orange dots, our streetscape improvements and the pink lines, light blue being our through block connections and then active transportation connections in the dark blue dotted lines. And so I'll do our prompt for responses and I'll go back to the map here. So do these draft policies and the concept maps for Factorio provide adequate local direction to inform project concepts that implement and supplement the mobility implementation plan and other investments to support the neighborhood area's vision?

Yeah, quick question. Actually, two. So in reading the comments written by the people who had responded to the survey, safety was clearly a big theme of it, and as was improving the gathering space of the mall, that feeling. I know these are both big asks, but has anything particular with respect to whether it be police presence or anything like that been talked about for the safety aspect? And then secondly, has there been any discussion about any kind of modifications to the mall?

Yeah, so I'll start with public safety. Again, similar response outside of like urban design improvements. I think just the combined efforts of our housing folks, homelessness outreach and police, improving the monitoring and communication and response times is how that's addressed. You know, we don't have specific public safety policies. It's a lens through which we do our planning. um in relation to the mall we did talk with the mall owners and kimco a couple times um you know they acknowledge that this is a major community destination and while they don't have immediate plans for improvements they certainly acknowledge that the community does desire them i think a big piece in that is they're kind of waiting for the future of high capacity transit in whatever form that takes to uh to help them kind of guide future investment and whatever extent that might happen but there is no immediate plans for improvements um but a potential collaboration between maybe our arts department or economic development to be a go between between the mall folks and local artists you know people who want to host cultural events i think that's a big opportunity and that's why we say we want to leverage factory mall as as a place for community gathering

Commissioner Welcher. Yep.

I was just going to ask Commissioner Welcher, if you have a contact question.

So, yeah. So I want to just add, well, of course, the mobility components and supporting safe access for everyone not in vehicles is, you know, is great, both, you know, in Eastgate and here in Factoria. But I want to highlight in Factoria that, you know, defining conditions seem to be going through these responses is congestion, right? And, you know, I believe that wasn't even one of the selected options. I mean, people put that in there. So given that the report's finding is that congestion is the defining description for this area, what are the draft policies going forward where we can add some sort of vehicle flow component to this? Because it's like there just doesn't seem to be any meaningful focus on that in what's been provided so far.

I mean, the policies that we have to address that are somewhat limited because of the options there, providing alternative means of transportation, better circulation throughout the neighborhood. If we can coordinate on washed out and future improvements, I don't know if that's a guarantee. I think the big pinch point is people coming off the highway onto Factory Boulevard. If there isn't an option to expand Factory Boulevard because of private property reasons, I'm not sure that there's a lot of other options. We've articulated it as a need. We certainly have the MIP to hope to address that, but that's the extent that we can really take a look at that through this plan.

Okay. Kevin's got a response as well. Sure. Thank you.

I just want to take some pressure off of Factorio and Eastgate a little bit with respect to congestion. And both of the statements suggest that Factorio and Eastgate supplement the MIP, not duplicate the MIP. The MIP has performance metrics for performance. intersection and corridor travel speed. And so there's no need to burden Factoria and Eastgate with duplicate policies that are already in the MIP. An intent with both of Factoria and Eastgate is to look at the network, see how the network works, look at the gaps that aren't on the arterial network that the MIP covers, but on those interstitial spaces where you need a connection, like if you had a pet or a bike connection between these neighborhoods, it would make walking a lot shorter to get to the services that are in Factorio Mall, for instance. So I think as a subject matter expert on these teams, I tried to provide a little bit of counsel as to not duplicate the MIP, but to look at the neighborhood level connectivity that is needed to provide for that network that helps everybody get around.

Comments, questions? Sure. I will say the one thing on Eastgate is there are some pretty big projects going on there right now for traffic. We're right in the middle of it. We don't know what it's going to turn into, but I think everybody I've talked to, we feel pretty good about the stuff they're doing for traffic congestion in that area right now.

Okay. Kevin, to your comment about modal, you know, covering all the modes and completing the network. I had a question on this chart. Is this graph more aspirational or is it sort of situational like where we are today?

No, these are concept maps are aspirational. The types and locations of improvements we would like to see based on our community feedback.

Okay, so am I interpreting this right? When I'm looking at Factoria and as a bike rider, there's a section right there that's missing. You can see it's 124th and then there's the gap. So you've got a bicycle facility and then you don't have anything and then you have a great trail, right? So you've got this little gap in between. So when I'm looking at this map, what are you telling people? Are you saying, Hey, we're not going to, Look at that. It's not part of our aspiration.

So the dark blue line, which is filling that gap, is active transportation network. So we're saying we want to see a completion of that, which is also currently in the MIP, I do believe.

Okay. So the way I should look at this is the solid lines are sort of your existing. Right.

So there's, yeah, there's the existing conditions with the yellow line is, and then below urban design opportunities, that's our aspirational improvements of which there is existing bike lane. I'm part of that road, but we can still see active transportation improvements across the whole road leading all the way up to the trail connection.

Thank you.

Other questions.

Oh, commissioner tank.

Thank you. So can you jump to a policy slide with Factoria Policies? So there was an interesting community question that was submitted regarding SFN24. And yeah, the top guy right there. And I'm curious, when you talk about improving safety and access, specifically, what is the safety and access concern that you're trying to address?

Sure. So this came out of a lot of the feedback we heard around... The road, I believe it is Southeast 36 outside of the T-Mobile and the AAA headquarters. And we're talking about traffic at peak hours. So there's two ways to get out of those developments. One is signalized, one is not. So people are backing up all the way trying to get... off of Victoria up and people coming up the highway. And we have a backup of traffic. People have no way, especially in the area that's not signalized, to get out onto the street. And then we have a turn lane where people are driving all the way down as if it was another one way, which is a major safety issue. You add that to people, pedestrians and bicyclists, trying to come in and out of that. So we heard from quite a few people that that was a concern and an opportunity improvement to, again, try to alleviate some of those safety issues issues during specifically peak hours outside of those larger got it so it's really safe you have cars hitting other cars is that cars and other cars but also car pedestrians and like our cyclists um people crossing to get on the mountains to sound greenway got it okay thank you yep other questions about factory

Okay, Commissioner Tate.

Just one last comment. Again, with the surveys, same feedback as earlier. Affinity exercise would be really nice to help give us a high-level view, and also the same comment about the surveys being multimodal. Please include all modes.

Yeah, we appreciate it. In terms of the affinity map, we were talking internally with the group about ways to better visualize the feedback we've gotten, so have thinking about it, and we'll certainly take that into consideration. I appreciate that. Thank you.

Great. So is this the end of your presentation?

Yeah, I just got a quick wrap-up slide here. So for next steps, following this meeting, staff will consider and incorporate the feedback into our final draft policies. And then the final draft policies for both neighborhood areas will be completed and included in the review drafts to planning commission later this month. So again, I really appreciate everyone's time and feedback. It means a lot. And we look forward to next time we're here. Thank you very much. Great. Thanks, Zach.

Appreciate it. Okay, we'll move on to our next topic. 2026 Mobility Implementation Plan Update. Kevin McDonald and Chris Breland. Oh, there he is. Okay. We'll describe required MIP amendments resulting from council direction to change speed limits, as well as operational amendments on which they seek commission direction. So welcome, Kevin and Chris.

Thanks, Chair McGill. What always happens when we adopt a plan is that it becomes sort of obsolete the moment it's adopted because circumstances change, some of which we may have anticipated and some of which we may not have. So what Chris and I would like to talk to you tonight about are some of those changes that will cause us to look at some of the components of the mobility implementation plan. So I appreciate Chris being here. He's been involved in every step of the mobility implementation plan and even prior to the MIP looking at our methodology for analyzing the quality of movement throughout the city. So for tonight, there's four scope topics that we'd like to talk with you about. The Council is about to adopt new speed limits, and that's an important component of the MIP, and we'll seek your recommendation to amend accordingly. The other three are... potential actions that we'd like to seek your direction to do further analysis and to provide a recommendation for you one is looking at one of the key performance metrics for both pedestrian and bicycle mobility and that's the the speed limit factor that's in the mip should we re-look at that performance target The other is to look at regional arterials and intersections near freeways and to determine whether or not the performance target and the outcome of analysis should give us further direction on how to address those locations. So we'll go through each of these separately. So with respect to the the speed limit last last Monday or Tuesday Council had a study session and at that study session provided direction for staff to return next week or on June 23rd with an ordinance to change the speed limit and to change means lower the speed limit on many arterials in Bellevue the ones that were looked at were arterials that had a speed limit of 30 miles per hour or greater and the the map that you see on this slide identifies those corridors where council has provided direction to change the speed limit so what we'd like to do is to incorporate the change in speed limit into the into the maps, tables and figures of the mobility implementation plan. And again, it affects the pedestrian level of traffic stress and bicycle level of traffic stress because they use speed on the arterials as one of the primary metrics. As you can see for both PLTS and BLTS, the speed and volume of traffic are common factors performance factors for each of those modes. For pedestrians, the buffer between the sidewalk and the street and the width of the sidewalk are important components. And for the bicycle level of traffic stress to supplement the speed and volume of traffic, the type of bike facility leads you to a bicycle level of traffic stress calculation. so what we'd like to do is look at the speed and see how the speed limit change affects the performance of the pedestrian bicycle modes what you see in the map is the existing conditions for the pedestrian mode the blue lines represent an arterial that has a sidewalk but that the sidewalk and the buffer combined don't meet the performance target And in large part, as far as we can tell, the performance target is not met because of the speed that is used in the calculation of the pedestrian level of traffic stress. So we want to incorporate the speed limit that Council adopts to see what change might occur on this map and in the other statistics that we use to measure bicycle and pedestrian level of traffic stress. So what we'd like to do, then, is to seek your direction to update the maps and tables and figures to reflect the changes to the speed limit that the Council will set on June 23 and then we'll seek a recommendation from you to incorporate those changes into the MIP.

So, Kevin, would you like to get feedback as we go?

Yes. With each of the four topic areas, I'd like your feedback. And a slide like this will show up at the end of each of the four topic areas. Okay.

And just for clarification, the second point you're going to talk about is going to talk about the one.

The metric.

Removing the 1.2 down to. Yes. Okay.

Yes. This is just the speed limit.

Okay. I have no problem with this.

Are you seeking a vote? A head nod is fine. Consensus of this one is probably fine. The other ones, you may need a vote.

Anybody have any feelings against this? Okay, Commissioner Tank.

I'm going to squeeze in a comment here that's peripherally related, so please humor me. In terms of people obeying the speed limits, we've heard community feedback about people that are drag racing with noisy exhausts. And what is the best way for us to think about traffic calming or other structural things, or perhaps enforcement things, to help people obey the speed limit? We can take this offline, but I think it's something that we've heard from the community that it would be great if we'd figure out some action.

I've already made a note to myself to talk to our neighborhood traffic calming staff about the issue on Lake Washington Boulevard. With respect to enforcement, of course, that's police and not transportation. And to the extent that they have been made aware by the public that has commented to the police department already, I'm not sure input from the Transportation Commission or from transportation staff would have any bearing on the amount of enforcement that they do.

Okay. Fair enough. So maybe it's up to us to create a traffic calming type of solution in the future, in the far future, given our budget, but still in the future.

Up to transportation staff to consider what options might be available for traffic calming and then work with the community to implement those options. All right. Thank you. Okay. Okay.

Yeah. And I had sent this to Kevin, but it might be interesting for others as well. So my first thought was, you know, we used to use this metric, which was 1.2 times the speed limit. And now we're talking about moving to speed limit. And it felt to me like if we could have some way of determining the actual speed through these locations that might be a better metric. But then it also occurred to me that that's a harder target to keep track of and to forecast perhaps. So, but if you could just share what your thoughts were on that.

Okay, let me defer until topic number two, which is the speed limit factor that we'd like. Oh, this first one is just the speed limit. It's really as the council changes the ordinance that changes the speed limit, we have to incorporate that change into the MIP. So that's just a head nod concurrence. We're going to do this and we'll bring back the information in July with how that looks in the MIP.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay. I think we are, yeah, we give you the head nod on that one, right? Nobody's objecting to that. So let's go to two.

Okay. So the second topic is the use of speed limit factor as one of the primary metrics for the pedestrian level of traffic stress and bicycle level of traffic stress. the intent of this metric was to approximate the actual speed that people, the high-end actual speed that people were driving, because we didn't have data available citywide that could inform the performance target on every arterial. So we said, okay, in the absence of that actual data, is there an approximation? And our consultant team at Farron Piers looked at best practices we developed the speed limit factor, which is 1.2 times the adopted speed limit. So we applied the speed limit factor to the pedestrian and bicycle level of traffic stress calculations. What we have found, I think, is that the speed limit factor doesn't really match reality. And this table that Farron Pierce put together demonstrates that on some corridor, these select arterial corridors where the speed limit factor was applied, doesn't match what the high end traffic speed is or the 85th percentile speed. So just with the small sampling of data that we have, we know there's a mismatch between the speed limit factor and the performance of the arterial. The result is that the performance of the bicycle and pedestrian network is perhaps not not reflective of actual conditions and what what we'd like what we'd like to do is have a look at the left column in these tables, the speed limit factor, which is, again, 1.2 times the adopted speed limit, and to see a couple things. One, if the change to the adopted speed limit changes the maps, tables, and figures, and especially using the new adopted speed limit, does changing from speed limit factor to speed limit have an appreciable change to the maps, tables, and figures. And we'd like to seek your concurrence for us to return at a future study session to review that result of the analysis on the MIP and maps, tables, and figures.

Okay, questions?

Yeah, a couple questions. My memory from previous meetings was that Generally, we know that there are a majority of people that are going above the speed limit by a little bit. And I know my own independent research on this indicated that well. But it also seems to be a variation between small blocks of city streets as compared to a more open. And that actually, again, with very, very limited data, seemed to tell the same thing. That on something like a Lake Hills Connector, a 148th, a Coal Creek Parkway, if the speed limit's 35, it's pretty easy to go 41. It really, I think we've all done it ourselves when there's not a lot of cars, you can just kind of go easily. Going through downtown Bellevue where there's a potential stop sign every block, and if it's 25, I'm not going 30. I don't think most people are. I mean, maybe two in the morning. So I do think there's a distinction between how much the speed limit, if it is being exceeded, how it's a different and more crowded section as opposed to an open road. So maybe a little bit of breaking that up and looking at those two differently would benefit. I'm a little concerned in just saying, no, we're just going to assume everybody across the city is driving the speed limit. I can see where 1.2 might be too much in certain areas, but I'm also a little hesitant in just saying, nope, everybody's driving the speed limit, and that's how we're going to build it into all of our models.

So let me respond to that briefly again. I'm Chris Braylon. I'm with the consulting firm. Nice to meet you, Commissioner Williams. Everyone else is tired of talking or hearing from me at this point. But there was a debate when we initially were discussing this around the speed limit factor within the staff team about how to consider this. Because the idea is that, well, level of traffic stress is based on sort of the perceived feeling that people have out there. I was always a little reticent to move towards the sort of the speed limit factor because the original sort of research kind of baked in. They're all based on speed limits. And it bakes in the fact that some people in many communities are going faster than the speed limit. But the research was based on speed limits, even though people drive faster. So it has a little bit of a bias in there. But staff brought up a good point in the initial discussion where we sort of were, uh convinced that well let's let's look at this condition and certain instances that and cole creek parkway is a good one it's design speeds quite high if you're out there walking people are probably not driving the speed limit now is 40 miles an hour people can go significantly faster than that so let's take that into consideration so the original level of traffic stress research from the Mineta Transportation Institute was based on speed limit setting with the acknowledgement that not everybody's going the speed limit. And when we brought in the speed limit factor, one of the issues that sort of emerged was this, the especially in PMA1, where we really cannot meet PLTS1 under the existing conditions, even though the sidewalks downtown are quite nice. They're about as luxurious as you can get for a sidewalk standard. And the reality is when we finally got data that people aren't driving as fast as the speed limit factor would suggest. So this was all triggered by the fact that Not everywhere do people drive at the speed limit factor, and the original research was more based on the fact that some people are exceeding the speed limit. How many? It was never determined. That was never an empirical part of the original research, which is why we brought into that research in the first place. We have more extensive citywide speed data now, but we have it now because Franz, our friend Franz Lohenherz, got a grant to collect speed data all over the city. That's not reliably collectible. That's very expensive to collect that type of data online. But it gives us a snapshot to verify, well, what is actually going on? And as the slide noted, particularly in PMA1, we see the fact that the speed limit factor is really not valid in PMA1, whereas other areas, it might be on a case-by-case basis. It's not universal on the data that I reviewed. In some cases, it is. In some cases, it isn't. I hear you. It's a good thought to think through, well, how does this vary across the city? We could do a little bit more research on that. But I think the idea is that whenever the city goes through and does a capital type of a project, we're looking at a sidewalk project or a bike lane project, the practice is to collect the actual speed and then consider, well, what is the actual experience out in that location versus this more planning tool of the MIP, which is just to say at a global level, where should we be trying to draw our attention to That's, I think, the distinction. I think the idea of collecting more refined data when it's available is great, but the speed limit factor sort of is relying on something that empirical data, when we had the luxury of collecting it at a citywide level, didn't support at a universal level. What we do know is the speed limit. That's it's sort of set by code. And that can be a reliable planning first step with a supplementary, let's actually collect the speed as a second step if there's any capital projects that are being considered. So I think that's sort of our thoughts process for why we're bringing this forward is that we don't anticipate the city having reliable, affordable speed, true speed data across the entire city on a regular basis.

And it makes sense. I mean, we can't have all data at all the time, but you're talking about for the future and we have to make a decision now. And so for the decision now, At least I don't feel comfortable with just saying everybody's going to speed limit or else we would never have a speeding ticket in the city of Bellevue, Elvira ever. And we know that's not the case. So I do think a little bit more work is needed. And like I said, I think we're saying the exact same thing that, yeah, downtown Bellevue between second and fourth, people are probably not going past 25 miles an hour. It's a short block and there's, you know, tighter space and all that. But on other roads, people are speeding. Yeah. And I think just saying, no, we're going to say Coal Creek, everybody's going to speed limit, to me that doesn't sit right.

Okay. So, but your question for us is, do we agree that you should continue to study this and bring it back to us, right? Okay. Commissioner Tink?

I agree it needs more study. I'm generally supportive. I'd like to make three quick comments on that. First is, I think there is a reflection of reality. So you gathered more data, and the data are pretty clear that we have... an overestimation of speeds based on visual data that Franz or others have done. So I think that warrants us to continue this investigation, and it's worth looking into. My second point, though, is I would, and I'm sure you already know this, but the feedback I'd give is we have to be careful about artificial speed limits. I would much rather prefer for us to see natural speed limits in the sense that if you've got a road that you can go 40 miles an hour but we put a speed limit of 20 people are still going to go faster right so i still like the idea of traffic calming and figuring out in the future whether there are structural ways so that people don't feel like this speed limit is making me go slow instead it should feel like hey i'm going the natural speed that i think i can safely support and that is the actual speed limit um I'm thinking that's a general press practice, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but it feels like a much better way of getting people to slow down rather than just putting up a sign. The third point I'd like to make is we have this interesting artifact in our scoring system with the BLTS and the PLTS where things don't necessarily flip because they're binary in the sense you've got green, you know, one, two, three, right? you know, 1.5, which is one of these things that I was really asking for in the past. But because we don't have a 1.5, I understand it's going to make us hard to score projects and say, hey, we've got these two different projects, and one of them is actually going to get us to a green, but because of the scoring system, it's not, and therefore we can't judge it against other projects, which also don't get us to green, but actually have no impact. So I guess what I'm trying to say here is, because of our scoring system, I think it's good for us to adopt this new system because it helps us understand the reality of our system in a much better way. We understand which projects are actually going to make a difference and what is the actual state of our system. So I think these are all things that we should consider when we look at the change in the speed limit, sorry, the speed calculation. I think it's worth additional study and I'm generally supportive.

Okay, other comments or questions?

The only thing I would do to add to the first statement under that is consider changing the metric, not just only to the adopted, but also look at would maybe a 1.1 or a segmented view of the city also be valid. In other words, just only don't look at we're going to go to the speed limit and that's it.

Okay. All right. Get the feedback you want, Kevin, and you'll bring it back.

Yes, the ask was to return with an analysis that changes the metric. We can perhaps do sort of a side-by-side comparison with the actual adopted speed limit and sort of other factors, including Commissioner Ting's comments about traffic calming. Traffic calming is a way to... determine the project concept that addresses a performance target gap right so if you're if you're if you are um at a performance if you're striving for um bicycle level of traffic stress three for instance and there's a couple a couple miles an hour speed limit difference you can maybe um Dave Kuntz, address some of the issues with traffic calming rather than more robust intersection in infrastructure for for the bicycle mode so anyway, the direction is for this particular topic to return with an analysis of. Dave Kuntz, A dot using the adopted speed limit rather than the speed limit factor.

And I, and I would repeat my ask of also in between they're not just only. The speed limit, yeah.

All right. Any other comments, Commissioner Williams?

Just I would echo Karen. I think it would be interesting. And even if we don't have the actual data in places, I like the idea of, you know, what makes more sense. But something like saying, okay, well, this area has, you know, it's a dense area. There are a lot of traffic lights, people, you know, we can make some assumptions about this is going to be a lower speed area. But these other areas with wider open spaces are, Those are places where we can assume higher actual speeds.

Okay. It seems like a bit of a math exercise, and I think we can do that. Okay. The third topic is the situation that we face along arterioles that perform a regional function, and those arterioles that go through performance areas performance management area three largely that in the 2045 forecast year do not meet the 0.85 performance target so when when when the the transportation commission recommended performance targets for intersections in pma3 the commission recognized that these are largely residential areas with some commercial nodes and that there's relatively limited mobility options within um PMA three relative to to other locations in the city and that a lower volume to capacity ratio target was appropriate to support the neighborhood. That is more heavily reliant on cars than perhaps a. Neighborhood in PMA one or PMA two, where there's higher density and more walkable locations and more mobility options. As as we, as we looked at the. performance of corridors like 148, recognize that these corridors perform a regional function and the neighborhood context of 148 within PMA3 may create a misalignment between the performance that is expected at intersections along that way and the V over C that is adopted. So the MIP always asks us to take a look. It doesn't tell us what to do. So we have looked at some of these intersections along some of these regional corridors, like 148th. And we've identified what the performance target gaps are and looked at some of the options. What are the options to address the performance target gaps along intersections like this? And really, there's two ways to address a performance target gap that uses two methods. metrics, the volume and the capacity. You can either address the performance target gap by changing the volume or changing the capacity. On these regional corridors, there's relatively limited options for addressing the volume of traffic because a lot of it is regional in nature and it is serving land uses outside of the city. An origin or a destination is not within Bellevue. But that traffic can use those corridors. So we're looking at the volume of traffic that's part of the V over C calculation that is influenced by others. So then we look at the capacity part of the equation. And addressing the capacity part of the equation looks at expanding the footprint of the intersection, adding a turn lane or adding an additional through lane. And when, hypothetically and theoretically, you look at expanding the capacity of the intersection by expanding the footprint of the intersection, you buy land, you encroach on environmentally sensitive areas, You may have to buy a building because there's a building right there. So we wanted to look at these corridors and see if there is a different approach to understanding their function and understanding what the performance target should be. So without... necessarily providing information to you now about what we think the options are. We're asking you to give us direction to study those corridors and the intersections along those corridors to see if the V over C performance target that is established in the MIP is the correct one and to see what options for addressing congestion along those corridors might exist. The staff is prepared to do an analysis of those intersections to look at the, resulting volume to capacity ratio of capacity improvements to see what kind of improvement we can get if we expand the footprint of the road. Because like I said, we're probably not going to be able to address the volume side of the equation. So we'll have to look at the capacity side of the equation. And when we look at the capacity side of the equation, what are the implications for that? So we're asking you to give us a heads up to study those corridors and those intersections and to share with you the results of our analysis.

Comments? Commissioner Raboon?

Just a quick question. When you're looking at 148th and everything that's going on there, do we take into account things we can do on 140th and 150th to kind of help? Because I know 148th is pretty jammed up. I might be cutting over to 140th or 150th because we're all going the same direction. Mm-hmm.

Chris is our analyst, but those parallel corridors, 140th and 156th, if we're talking strictly about 148th, are options that people can take, and the volume to capacity ratio on those is generally consistent with the performance target at this point. Other corridors like Bellevue Way, for instance, or Coal Creek Parkway do not have a parallel option. So the circumstances you described, Commissioner Rappun, are particular to 148th, but I think we can do the analysis on the parallel corridors.

And I'll just briefly note that the results, the 2045 results for 148th, the way that the model works, 148th is congested, as noted in that map. And the 156th, 140th, there's pockets of congestion on 140th, not on 156th for the most part. The model distributes traffic based on what's the fastest time to get from point A to point B. So it's already built, baked in that 148th is congested. We would have to sort of nudge people with something other than a travel time to tweak them over to those other corridors. So we could certainly look at the other corridors, but the congestion is sort of... some respects reflects reality that if something's slow people tend to shift their routes that's baked into the results that we have today but that doesn't mean that we couldn't look at um you know what could be done on those parallel quarters but it's unlikely to resolve the issue on 148 because for a lot of people that is the fastest route even considering congestion just to follow up on that i guess what i was getting at is

so on 156 there's like a four-way stop instead of have like maybe a roundabout would kind of flow traffic through there faster so maybe that could offload some of the 148th volume to help out everything going down that road that's a fair uh a fair point we can sort of take a look at some of those more uh granular improvements on those parallel routes commissioner ting

So you talked a little bit about this, but what is the definition of a regional corridor?

When we look at the arterials in Bellevue and you look at the few that span the length of the city, Those few pop out at you, like 148th, like Bellevue Way, Coal Creek Parkway. And the other part of that sort of calculation of what's a regional corridor is, does it serve a driving, a drive shed that is larger than the city of Bellevue? Are there origins and destinations largely outside of the city? We've identified 148th, Coal Creek Parkway, Bellevue Way as typical regional corridors within the city, but maybe not all the regional corridors. We would have to look and see if there's other candidate corridors that might fit the definition. Those are the ones we came up with.

I'm still a little fuzzy. Are these regional corridors used by people that are driving through Bellevue?

Yes, they are people with an origin or a destination, an origin and a destination outside of the city of Bellevue. So, for instance, 148th, you know what those, you know, I-90 is the southern end and Redmond over Lake is the northern end. And there's a lot of traffic that goes between.

How do these regional corridors impact the side streets per Commissioner Raboon in terms of overflow traffic?

It can get into that. We haven't not studied that in great detail, but in work that I've done, sort of unrelated efforts to look at if we were to sort of change traffic patterns on roads like 148th or Bellevue Way, how much side street traffic could be diverted. There's a bit of a nuance between what a neighborhood street is versus what an adjacent arterial would be. Bellevue's got... It's a blessing and a curse in that the neighborhood streets are largely disconnected. You can't really drive. It's not a grid. You can't drive large distances in a lot of locations because the streets are what we call in our office loops and lollipops for the most part. They're very circuitous. So there's less diversion from those major streets for regional traffic. If you're going from Redmond to Sammamish, you're not as likely to drive through on some of the very local residential streets to try to cut around 148th. But there's adjacent arterials that do pick up some of that overflow. We do see that. So as an example, for 112th and Bellevue Way, Bellevue Way tends to sort of pick up more of it, but some people shift over to 112th on the other side of downtown. So we don't have a detailed analysis of those sorts of conditions. But from a very localized perspective, there's not a lot of local traffic that even can get through for more than a few blocks on local streets for most of the city.

But for example, 148th, which is a major concern for us, people take 140th and 156th. And so wouldn't changing the VC ratio for what we consider a regional corridor of 148, wouldn't that naturally start to push people over to 140th and 156th as 148th slows down?

That is exactly what's reflected in the current analysis for 2045, because we don't have any projects outside of what was in the TFP to address the V over C issues on 148th, which is why they're all showing up as yellow. So you can see the result of how much traffic may spill over to 156th and 140th. It's already in the results. So that analysis has been done.

Okay, so 140th and 156th are starting to look like regional corridors as the traffic off of 148th spills out to those two guys. What's to prevent us from turning those into highly congested?

So again, it gets back to some semantics. Traffic, regional traffic may push local traffic away, but it doesn't necessarily state that traffic from, again, say Redmond to elsewhere on I-90 would use 145th or 156th because it all kind of funnels together at the I-90 interchange. So we would have to do an analysis to say how much regional traffic shifts from one to the other. But just because there's some congestion on one route doesn't necessarily mean the regional traffic patterns change. It may change how locals use this.

Well, anecdotally, just for me, I used to live on Somerset, and I would drive to Redmond, and I would basically take 148th, 156th, or maybe 140th, depending on whichever one had the least amount of traffic. So I agree with your earlier statement that traffic will flow through the least restricted or the least congested path. And so I'm very concerned that by creating a new designation of regional corridor, we're essentially... inviting traffic into the parallel routes within our neighborhood. And so I think that's something that we should pay very close attention to. I have more comments, but I'll yield the floor to others.

Yeah, other questions?

Just a follow-up for the ask for tonight to study more. I have no problem with, you know, proving that. But just with a caveat or just an awareness that We humans always want all of our dots to turn green on the map, and it doesn't mean it's going to be green on the ground. So we have to keep the realistic, maybe 1 48th is going to be a thorn in our side for the next 5, 10 years, and we're not going to get to green because we can't do the changes on the ground that are really needed. And just the VOC, maybe 0.85 is the right thing, and it's just going to stay yellow. So I think we just have to be careful about being lured into, well, if we just change our number, we can get to go to green on the map. And not saying that that's the way you're going to go, but I think it's just human nature. So I would just say, let's kind of all keep that in our thinking.

Mike, do you have a response? I've been debating whether to chime in here.

I mean, when you start to look at corridors and investments along corridors and capacity, you really want to look at you know, not just is it you're turning it to green, but what are you really doing? You know, it's been a while back, but at one point we were looking at should we add another southbound lane on Bellevue Way, the south part as you go past the, you know, South Bellevue Park and whatnot. And what we saw, a lot of what happened was you were pulling traffic off of 405. In terms of the system, what happens? Basically, there's all kinds of pressure going south every afternoon. If you just increase the pipe on Bellevue Way, you're drawing traffic off of 405. That's really not what we're here as a city to do, to serve that regional traffic. You know, some of us are going to want to use our routes, but, you know, do we want to just keep spending our money to serve regional traffic? You know, policy-wise, I think we generally say we don't. So that's just, you know, kind of a broader picture, you know, in terms of, you know, getting to green would have its own implications, because it wouldn't stay green very long, given the regional movements that want to go south.

Are there comments, Vice Chair Williamson?

Yeah, so along those lines, as I was looking at it, I had the question, and I know some other people who commented earlier, public who commented earlier in a way you could, it, it feels initially like, okay, well, we're changing the target to try to make it look better. And I wonder if that's my, my first thought and what I asked Kevin was, is, well, maybe we need two numbers. One that says, you know, here's the target that's realistic given that this is a regional route. And then here's what we'd like it to be. I don't know that that's the answer. But yeah, I guess my... What would drive us to change it or to lower it, to make it look better? So if it is bad and we've decided we're going to let it be bad, why not let it be red or yellow?

Here's what we offer to bring back to you. Is this an analysis of the... capacity improvements of those intersections and the resulting V over C based on the addition of that capacity. So we can see what the addition would be how much the addition would make an improvement to the V over C. And then what are the trade-offs related to that improvement? Trade-offs could be in terms of money, like millions of dollars for the intersection, or environmental degradation, or degradation of the pedestrian network because we've created a wider intersection, so there's safety implications for the pedestrians. With your direction, we could come back with that analysis and show you what the outcome would be of fixing the C in the V over C equation, and then have a discussion about what to do about that information that we generate through that analysis. And there's probably half a dozen options that we could talk about around the table. Say, what should we do about it? Again, the MIP tells us not what to do, but where to look. And so we're looking here and we're trying to figure out what to do.

Okay and so what I'm hearing from that is you know one option might be to say we're not going to do anything we're going to let it be yellow.

Could be.

Okay.

Commissioner Ting.

I think our standards should reflect what our goals are and we should also reflect the reality on the ground. I have grave concerns about lowering our standards and lowering the bar to say that hey, let's just make it easier to pass. I think what we should do is we should be honest about what the situation is and if it's yellow or if it's red, Well, there's a reason why it's yellow or it's red. We may not be able to do anything today, but maybe there's some creative solutions. And I think part of the problem is I lived right off of 148th for several years, right next to Bell Red and 148th. And traffic was bad then, I can only imagine what it's like now. And for someone to come by and say, hey, we figured out how to make it green, that feels disingenuous. It feels like there's a lack of transparency, there's a lack of accountability. And we end up doing what people say, how do I put this? we shouldn't take the easy way out. Like if it's red, if it's yellow, it's red or it's yellow. And I would urge us to really stick to our guns and say, we may not be able to do anything right now, but we're not going to paper over and say, hey, you know, it's fine, don't worry about it. So in my opinion, I would keep the metrics the way they are, because this is a neighborhood. It's like you might call it a regional corridor, but people live there. And I don't want to have like, I would not want to live in a place where like, hey, it's fine for people to cut through Bellevue going from, you know, East Quarter to Redmond and back. If I live there, I don't want to be in a regional corridor. I want to be in a neighborhood. I want to be with streets. I want to be in a PMA3 zone. So that's why my strong opinion would be let's keep the standards the way they are and let's look for new solutions. Let's look for innovative solutions. And if we can't figure it out, at least we're being honest. So I would urge this commission to not lower the bar. Let's stick with what we've got. We've already lowered it, if you guys remember, from the LOS ABCD. We've done that multiple times. If I have a vote, I'm going to say, let's keep the bar. Let's not lower the bar.

Are there comments? I think I would just chime in as well, just to say that, um, on this topic, we've heard from a lot of different, uh, stakeholders. We've, uh, we've heard from business owners, we've heard from the chamber, we've heard from residents, uh, people in the neighborhoods. And, um, so I think we're getting some pretty strong feedback that there's, it feels like we're lowering the standards and what we really need to do is, uh, look at, hey, maybe it's going to stay yellow, right? And just so my my what I'm seeing is just a lot of really strong feedback. And so I would suggest that you when you come back, you figure out a way to address that. Because we we need to reflect the stakeholders in this community. Other thoughts?

Your direction is to come back, do the analysis and come back. Okay.

I would add to that, not just do the analysis, but help us understand why change the metric? Because you help us understand. So bring that back as well, right? So I think that's one of the fundamental things that we have, right?

The what to do question remains to be answered. Commissioner Ting's suggestion of having a different color on the map may be red. It says we've looked at this. We've determined that this is the ultimate configuration of the intersection. It's red, you know, and we're done with it. We may not even need to change the view of our seat, but let's do the analysis, develop some options for addressing what we understand to be a performance target gap and see what the commission would like us to do with that. Okay. Other comments, Commissioner Ting?

So just to get a clarification here, so is the direction to not change the standard but look for additional solutions or something else? The direction is to do the analysis and come up with options. Okay, so not to change the standard.

Is that the recommendation? Not at this point. We're not offering a recommendation yet.

We can make a recommendation if you'd like to. I mean, if we all feel like you shouldn't change a standard at this point but you can study it, I mean, that's something we could look at, right? But it's up to us to decide.

Go ahead. I would just like to get a read of the room for the other commissioners to hear, you know, what your opinion is, whether we should investigate changing the standard or whether we should, you know, hey, let's stick to what we believe.

Commissioner, Vice Chair.

Yeah, I'm happy to have the staff come back to us with recommendations. So I think you're right. I mean, we're all indicating we would prefer not to change the standards, but if you come back with a reason that seems like we should consider that, then I would be open to that.

And I would second that. And I think we just, we've all said that if it needs to be yellow, it needs to be yellow. And changing a standard needs a really good reason, I think is where we

Yeah, I mean, a pretty high bar to change the reason. Personally, I haven't seen the reason to change it yet, but I want to maintain an open mind here. So, yeah. Other thoughts from other commissioners?

And bear with me because I might have a, it might take me a while to articulate this clearly, but I do agree with Commissioner Ting. I think we need to allow the current standard to be upheld and And so I don't see any reason to further study this more because at the end of the day, it's not going to change what's actually happening at the intersection. So that's my comment.

Okay. Well, I could say a bunch of stuff, but I'm just going to reiterate everything you guys just said. So I concur with everybody here.

Okay.

So in sort of the same topic area but different locations. We've got some intersection locations that serve a regional function in that they provide access to and from freeways. The MIP has identified these locations as performance target gaps. We're seeking your direction to investigate those performance target gaps to look at the way improving V over C may encounter constraints, what other options there are for these locations. This is just a sample of the locations that don't meet the performance target gap at intersections that do provide for freeway access. So what do you do about that? The MIP asks us to take a look. What do you do? So we're asking you to give us direction to analyze these locations and to develop an array of options that might give us an indication of what we should do.

I think it's a ditto from what we just said. Different constants.

Yeah, it's basically the same type of feedback of, I think we should first and foremost look for options, talk about different projects, creative solutions, and then hold the standard, right? Let's not lower the bar. That would be my feedback.

And I'd also like to reach out to Commissioner Welcher just to give him a chance to... to weigh in on where he is on this. Is he still here? He's still here. Okay. Well, he's had a chance. Commissioner Ting and any others?

Yeah. So one final comment on this. One of my concerns about creating a different type of corridor, which has different V to C ratio standards, is that we're really thinking of a new way of looking at the map, right? It's no longer PMA1, PMA2, PMA3. It's now This very interesting thing of we've got a corridor that's going through that's going to create spillover effects on 140th. And then does that turn into a different PMA zone? And then what do we tell the neighborhoods about what they're getting? So it might seem like a trivial thing, but the reality is once you introduce a new scoring system, you are changing the map. And land use is based on the people that use the land, which is residential neighborhoods. So I wouldn't want to be the one that goes to someone and say like, hey, congratulations, you are now in a priority corridor, sorry, a regional corridor, because I think that would be a failure on our part to acknowledge what the reality is of where they live.

Okay. Good discussion. Other questions or comments? Okay. Okay.

They have your direction. So on July 9, we'll come back with, with maps and tables and figures that incorporate the speed limit change, and the results of our analysis to change to the speed limit factor. And then further into Q3, we will look at the corridors and intersections by freeways. That's it.

Okay. All right. So our next item on the agenda is approval of the minutes. Is there a motion to approve the minutes?

I'll make a motion.

Second. It's been motioned and seconded. Does anybody object? Okay, so the minutes are approved, and we don't have any unfinished business, correct? Okay. So it's time to review the Commission calendar. Kevin, do you have the calendar you want to show us?

I don't have the calendar I want to show you, but the previous slide shows July, September, and October agendas that include the MIP update. Okay. And there's significant time in each of those agendas to have a robust conversation about amendments to the MIP.

Okay. Are there any of those meetings where we are going to absolutely need a quorum or from your perspective?

I know a meeting doesn't exist without a quorum. Yes.

Okay.

So yes, we need a quorum.

Okay. So that's it. Any other points? Then we are adjourned at 8.45. Thank you.