Transportation Board - Regular Meeting

Thirty. Welcome, everyone. First order of business is approval of agenda. Does anyone have any revisions to the agenda? Alright. The agenda is approved unanimously. Is there any public comment for items not on the agenda? Alright. Next item is approval of minutes. Does anyone have any changes or corrections to the minutes?

Alright. Minutes are approved unanimously, which brings us to the first presentation, Denver Steel's Improvements Project phase three. Mister Ulla Bari.

Hello, chair, members of the board. Thank you for having us this evening. I wanted to introduce Jeremy, who you guys all have met before, but he's gonna be doing the presentation this evening. So we'll stand by for questions if anything comes up afterwards. Thank you.

Good evening, mister chair and members of the board. My name is Jeremy Lawn as Eric presented. I am the project manager assigned to this project for the roadway portion, and Lucas Motoya will be the project manager for the utility portion. Go to next slide. So this project supports the quality of governance, operational excel excellence, and quality of life.

Next slide. So this project is in the Denver Denver Stills area. Phase one was done about ten years ago. Phase two is currently under construction, and phase three is under design, and it should be out to bid in July. And the roads that will be affected for phase three is gonna be 34th Street, 35th Street, Cuesta Drive, Ridgeway Drive, and Pueblo Drive. Next slide, please. The background of this project is

can make it a little bit bigger.

That's as big. So the background of this project is it is a joint project with Public Works and Department of Utilities. The roadways the roadway section is based off of a pavement condition index with a pavement index of forty forty six point five, and the scale of the peak PCI index is one to 100 with one being a dirt road and 100 being a newly paved road. It is programmed to be the physical program is programmed to be in twenty twenty seven capital improvement projects at 3,800,000. The utility is programmed in DPU ten year ten year plan at 1,200,000, and this project is also in gonna going to include the broadband installations for future fiber optics.

Next slide. The scope of this project, it's gonna be a reconstruction project with four inch asphalt with targeted items such as to be installed or replaced with curb and gutter, valley gutters, sidewalks, dry pads, ADA compliant ramps, broadband infrastructure, and this project has been done in in house. The water system is gonna be the only utility system only utilities address in this project, and this prod this was also designed in house. Next next slide. And it is scheduled to go out for bid in 2026 and completion of spring or summer twenty twenty seven.

The proposed staging areas are on DP Road, Olive Street near the Family Strengths Center, the Ridgeway Play Lot, Sycamore on the intersection of Diamond Drive. Next slide, please. The accesses that will be affected are gonna be the trash and recycle pickups, the school bus routes, the mail and delivery residential access, and senior centers meals on wheels and emergency services with the fire department getting updated weekly on what the project's going on. Next slide, please. The work zone and clears and detours will be clearly marked.

This project will be phased in sections to minimize construction and maximize safety. Vehicles, bicycles, and pedestrian access will be maintained all times. Working hours will be normally from 7AM to 5PM. Next slide, please. We're here to today presenting meeting with the public for this project.

We have reached out to the local media and put in cone zone. And recently, we put door hangers on the in the residence two days ago to let the public know about this meeting. The cone zone will be updated weekly. A forty eight hour notice will be distributed with any water shutoffs or any disruptions. Next slide, please.

And for any comments oh, any comments must be be received by 04/17/2026. And here here's the address for comments. Public works department 1 Thou 1000 Central Avenue, Suite 160, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87544. Phone number is (505) 662-8150, and the email is gonna be lecpw@lecnm.us. Thank you for your time, and any questions?

Thank you, mister Lujan. Are there any questions or comments from the board? To be fair, this is the third phase. Yeah. Anyway, so we'll go to public questions or comments. And typically, we don't allow questions in public comment. But since this is a public meeting, any members of the public can ask questions. And if you if you

do want to, come up to

the podium and state your name.

Thank you. I'm Lawrence Tickner. I live on Ridgeway. My question is on the current phase two project, the sidewalks are being taken out. The other side of the road, there's survey markers going into people's yards.

I'm wondering what's gonna happen in people's yards because it's some egressed several feet, three to five feet into people's yards. Some of it's taking out plantings, possibly taking out plantings, fences, and things like that. So I'm wondering what's happening on the opposite side of the road from the from the sidewalks, and are things are gonna be returned to the way they were? What's what's that? What's the reason for that? Thank you.

So those markers that you're seeing across the side of where the sidewalks are at, they are markers for the curb and gutter, like, foot offsets. So with they're not going into the into the vegetation or any further besides where the existing sidewalk used to be. It's just a reference that way the contractor could know where to place the sidewalk back in place where it was at.

There's there's no sidewalk there?

No. But for the curb and gutter, it's gonna be the curb and gutter that's gonna be placed back in place where you you see those stakes? So it's, like, offset of, like, three feet or so. So it's just telling the contractor that that's where the curbing gutter was at three feet from that stake.

Oh, you're saying the curbing Yeah.

It's just

is three feet in from that stake.

Yes. It's just the offset for them to know where they took it off from. Understand. Thank you.

Thank you. Yeah. I'd like to add can't hear a word you're saying. I'd like to add

you. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah. So what I was telling this gentleman was Yeah.

You need to go.

So what I was telling this gentleman was those stakes that they are put on the roadway off the roadway. For those stakes, they're supposed to be to mark for the contractor to come back to know where to place the carbon gutter. And so those stakes are gonna stay in place. It's gonna be, like, three feet or five feet, wherever they marked on their stakes to show them where the Kumbregartner used to be. So it's going back to existing existing roadway construction.

Can we comment from Zoom? I don't

see a raise hand button. Sorry.

Hold on. Does anyone else in chamber have questions or comments? Alright. If you're if you're on Zoom, if you can use raise hand function. If not, that person who just spoke, go ahead and state your name and ask and ask questions.

Hi. Thank you. This is Katie Bruhl. I don't see a raise hand button. I'm in the, whatever phase is happening right now. And, Larry, I will tell you that definitely people's plantings are being dug up. Definitely people's yards are being dug up. I don't know if you've walked around the neighborhood, but a bunch of my plantings were dug up and killed, and the neighbor's yard was completely, like, bulldozed all the way to his house in one section. So if there's something that you care about, I would say move it.

Thank you, miss Pearl.

Yes. And we are trying to protect everybody's property with their flowers and stuff like that. I've talked to the contractors to make sure they take care of it and put flags wherever they need to to protect them. And I will bring it up to the contractors again, like, reminding them be safe out there with their people's properties.

I'll just add, mister chair, that in cases where there is some landscaping remediation, we will ask the contractor to to address that.

Thank you. Is there anyone else who has questions or comments?

I'm right behind you. Oh,

I'm sorry.

My name is Cheryl Kuske. I live on Pueblo Drive. In our neighborhood, we typically have one side of the street that has a sidewalk on it. The other side has bits and parts of a sidewalk, but it's not contiguous all the way around the streets. And I'm wondering if there's any way a resident can request I'm on the non sidewalk side, but I would like to have some sidewalk in front of my house if possible. We have just rocks there now. Is that possible to request in the scope of this program? Or is there any plan to have sidewalks placed on both sides in this phase three?

Yes. Could you please send us a comment on that one so we could get that one addressed?

I'm

sorry. Like a written comment? Okay. Yes. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, miss Koski. Anyone else? You have to come up to microphone and state your name, if you can.

My

name is Kris Judson. I live on Pueblo Drive as well, upstream from the Cross Street. I was at the last meeting like this that's been quite a while ago. And they told us some things that were planned at that time for that part of Pueblo Drive. I haven't heard anything since. I've heard rumors. There's markings out in the street. There's markings on my driveway. But I don't know what they mean and I don't know what the plans are. If they're going to move the sidewalk onto my side of the street, that's going to make a big difference in my property.

And I'd like to, you know, know what's going on. That's why I'm here tonight. So far, we haven't talked about particulars like that. But I'd really like to know, well, where the sidewalk's going to be. If it's moved over to my side, that's going to make a difference. There was a mention on the about the cans being moved. I don't presently, as far as I know, have a can. But if they're going to put one on my property, I'd like to know that. Because I can't come and make comments to people if I don't know what's going on. So, I'd appreciate a lot more information. Thank you.

And to for about the project that's going on now. Right now, they are working on Ridgeway, and working their way down from Ridgeway, Cuesta, and then the Pueblo Drive. And the sidewalks are there. They're gonna be existing sidewalks, same sidewalks, same width. There's not gonna be new sidewalks on the opposite side. There's not enough room, but it's gonna be the same as what was before. And for the water cans, they're gonna be the same sequence. The water cans that you're talking about? Water meters. Water meters? It's gonna be from Ridgeway, Cuesta, and Pueblo. So yours will get to you.

And what if I need to know about it

every time?

We will let you know, like, when they're gonna shut it off two days before prior. Or If you're

gonna put a can somewhere in my property

We're put

that'd be great

or it might be awful.

It's the water meter that's next to your house, and we're gonna It's in the back of my house. Oh, it's in the back of the house. Lucas, do wanna address this one?

So if it's in the back of the house right now, that means that the waterline, it goes around your house and to the back. So we would pick it up somewhere along the property line wherever it's going into your property and put the water can there. And put the water can there in that place. To someone. I I will get your address. Fine, but I don't know. I'll get your address and your phone number. Thank

you, miss Judson. Anyone else? We have a a comment that says from Jay Lynch. Is there a plan to ensure the road, Cuesta, is graded correctly so that there are not flat areas for water and snow collect?

Yes. They will crown the road as they go there. It's they're not at that portion. They're gonna be grading Ridgeway this week, and then in a couple weeks, they'll be hitting up Cuesta. Oh, phase three? Phase three will be addressed and fixed.

Thank you.

Can you provide the comment location where that place that

What was what was the comment?

Can you provide the the Oh, it's on

these new messages on the

Okay. 3000. Okay. Right. Thank you.

Oh, thanks. Sorry about that. Alright. Any any more questions? Alright.

Another question. Are you doing asphalt for one street at a time, or will all of them be done once all the other work has been completed?

Go ahead and answer. Yes. They're gonna do asphalt one one straight at a time for now. Like, next week or two weeks of planning on doing asphalt and ridgeway for the first lift. And then once they're done with every street, they're gonna come back and do the final lift on all the streets.

Thank you. Alright. Any more? Go ahead.

Chair, we'll stay here after this meeting. So if any of the public would like to have a one on one conversation and ask questions, we will remain here afterwards to we'll go out on the other side of the doors, they can come talk with us about any questions they have. Excellent. Thank you.

And with that, we'll go thank you, mister Lehon. With that, we'll go on to the next presentation with which is mister Barella, Atomic City Transit Saturday service pilot program update. And thank you to all the members of the public who attended.

I

forget all the time. Good evening, chair and members of the board. Thank you for allowing us to present today. Just a quick introduction again on myself. I'm James Padilla, transportation manager.

Been with the county seventeen years, and I welcome all the new transportation board members. And to the existing that are returning, hello again. But yeah. So in the 2025, we conducted a pilot project to provide Saturday service within Los Alamos County. And so our goals were to just test innovative ways to provide better service, different mobility options for the community, not only during the week, but also on Saturdays and even potential Saturdays Sundays.

But it was just to, know, collect data, see what how it would be used and the over mobility and the need for Saturday service. The operations consisted of on demand services with reservations. It was until capacity was filled. It went for 13 Saturdays and started on August 2, ended on October 25. The hours of operation were from 9AM to 05:30PM, the last pickup.

The staffing, we were able to use existing supervisor that was working for Bandolier on Saturdays to oversee the service. We had to bring in dispatchers to provide dispatch service to take calls, take, you know, schedule rides, assist with our mobile app questions. And it took about three drivers occasionally to to provide the service. Occasionally, just two drivers. And the service area that we provide a service, we have two different zones.

So it's in our new software we set up in zones. And so one zone was the Los San Luis area. Excuse me. And the other one was FireRock. And, also, in between both zones, you could schedule a ride. And it was door to door or curb to curb. And so the basics of the service were just on demand. People could share rides. It was based on capacity. And so some of our little marketing tools that we utilize with our new app is we created a little video.

Our senior management analyst worked with our CPR division with the county, on creating a little video that I'm gonna play here for you, and it was a little video just to show our our riders how to use our mobile app to schedule rides. It does have music in the background. I just don't have it upset. Don't think it's a boring video. You should have sighed.

I could sing if you want. So it was just one of many ways that we utilized and worked with the community on how to use our new app. And at this time, I'll go ahead and introduce our senior management analyst, Anna Brunson. She's the one that helped us put this little video together with our CPR team. And she'll kind of continue on our presentation with the next couple of slides.

Anna? Thank you, James. Hi all. I'm Anna Brunson. I've been with the county for almost a full year now. And so this is my first transportation board presentation. So it's nice to put face to names. As James was referring in the previous video, what that was showing was a step by step how to book. So you would put in your to and from. You would put in what time of day that you wanted to book.

And it is a same day reservation on Saturday's services. So with that, we wanted to be able to promote a really ease of use ability to book. And so that's where this the Spare app comes into play. So I think about 75% of those trips were were booked through the app, And then about 25% were taken by our dispatchers day of. So we did a bunch of public outreach before, during, and after this movement, this pilot.

I did work cross departmentally with the PIO team, the library, and commerce board of commerce to let people know what was going on, to collaborate on events that we could cross collaborate and promote. And so some pictures you're seeing to the right of this, that's our Saturday bus service banner that was created by the PIO team, Rachel Freeman. And that was posted in White Rock. It was also posted on the Diamond Drive pedestrian bridge going ways. And so that was posted before, during, and until the very last day of service on October 25.

With that, we also I referred to promoting with local Saturday events. So you're also seeing below that, Ride Atomic, which is the Atomic Con that happened at, the Mesa Library. We did offer services for that event. We saw very good, reaction to that as well. We also cross promoted with the Bear Fest. This the little bear, you'll see him. He's inside of a little bus. And so that was a pretty fun one to do as well to just ride the bus, take your ride to and from Bear Fest. And then we started this pilot promotion on the day of rodeo. And our PIO team and I came up with a funny little save a horse, ride Atomic kind of promotion just for that event.

So we had fun awareness around that leading up to these events and also during these events cross promotion on social media and on our websites. But prior to that we did have a table at Farmers Market to help promote that this was going to be happening. We promoted on the day of rodeo as well. The banners were taken down, of course, as soon as service was up. Social media posts were done.

And also the Los Alamos reporter did an article promoting this service about a few weeks in, which was very helpful. And that was all during and through. And then post we had a survey which I'll go into in just a minute. So I want to give you an indicator, a few indicators, a few lenses of how the service was met and how we how we actually were able to meet the public need. So I'm going to do that with talking about trips and riders.

And then we'll move on to where destinations, what trip purposes, and then the timing of these trips. And just helps us understand how this was used so that we can really formulate whether how and how best to implement it full time. So first is here as trips and riders. So on the graph here you're seeing a bar graph with three different colors. You're seeing a blue, which is indicative of the Los Alamos to Los Alamos just within that zone one.

Then you're seeing a red bar that is going to be showing trips between Los Alamos and White Rock, either starting or ending in those zones. And then the orange is within White Rock, that smaller kind of second, I think it was zone B, that we saw. So across the x axis, the horizontal line, you're going to see at the top every week we have broken down ridership in terms of trips. So the number of trips, for example, August 2 is the first column. You're going to see nine in the blue.

So that just means that we had nine completed trips within the Los Alamos zone itself. Ultimately, across all 13 of these weeks that you're seeing, we had a three fifty nine completed trips outcome. Which keep in mind this is thirteen days. I know we're saying weeks, are Saturdays which is a pretty great outcome for our community. That then moved four seventy one riders.

So what that means is multiple people could have been on that same trip. Right? So that really increases efficiency for our service if we can get multiple, as it is a rideshare service, if we can get multiple people people on board. Because of this, between these dates of August 2 and the twenty fifth, we then found there were three fourteen new rider profiles that were created. So there's a lot of interest in this on demand service in general.

And then 96 unique riders. And what that means is, yes, we had 471 bodies on the bus, but 96 people were truly utilizing this service repeatedly as well. So that's one insight into how this functioned. The next insight I want to give you is around where people were going. So on the left side and the right side, have two different zoomed in heat maps here.

On the left you're going to see the Los Alamos zone. And on the right it's a little lighter blue zone in White Rock. And so what you're able to see there is the biggest circle jumps out at you in Los Alamos. That's Smith's Los Alamos. So a lot of people are utilizing grocery store runs.

Potentially employees are taking trips to work there. That's a little harder for us to understand without doing one on one interviews. But then also you're just seeing a spread across neighborhoods. You're seeing a lot of movement on Central which also if people are moving around and spending their dollars on Saturdays also helps the county additionally in that way. Total is 44 trips were made to the Smiths Los Alamos.

And then right underneath that we start seeing a high ridership under the public library. Speedway in Arkansas, people have to get their snacks on the weekends. And then Mountain Vista, people were coming back and forth from that community quite a bit using this service. And you can see these are just the top ones. We have it all the way down to, you know, Metzger's.

We had some Duane Smith auditorium visits, Sugar and Cream Cafe. So people are moving around, they're being social, they're shopping, and they're doing other things as well around that. So that kind of helps us put us into a new category here of why people were using the service. So what you're seeing on this screen is two different visualizations. One is a table with light blue down to dark blue kind of emphasis.

That shows that lighter the color, the less number of trips. The darker the color, the higher number and volume of trips based on trip purpose. So, the trip purposes that we had highlighted were social, shopping, other, nutrition, employment, education, and medical. So, is going to be something like the library or sala. Public places that are not necessarily private residences.

Shopping. That's a big one for Smith's. Any public place that we can do kind of some kind of commerce there, that was what we labeled shopping. Other is literally we couldn't figure out exactly where they were going but we didn't want to pry. So with that nutrition, it seems a little strange here. This is a 5,311 funding term. Basically these are just restaurants. Employment. We know this because we know our writers. Our writers didn't say, hey, I'm using this for work.

It's like we know they work there and they're going. So there is an element of knowing a community that kind of helps specify this. A few education. We had a very dedicated person going to UNM. And then we had a few medical trips as well. So these categories were defined by address. And then of course they're very highly affected by unique riders. So if we had one person, I think, used this service about 14 times. So you can see how that will change the volume of trip purpose as well, or how it will affect it. So overall, on the right side you're seeing a pie chart.

You're seeing that broken down. All of the trip purposes, shopping, and social make up both 36% each. So that's about two thirds of the entire purpose of this service was going towards shopping and social, which are really great determinants of overall whole health. And then after that, other categories, social employment or something else could be what other is defined as. But again, without doing the one on one interviews, we probably wouldn't get that level of detail just from this data.

And then the final lens that we can look at for this is the timing of these trips. So this graph that you're seeing here, very similar to the one on the last slide where it showed a graph of information. Lightest blue is the lower volume. Higher blue or darker blue, excuse me is the higher volume. And so you're seeing this laid out by service day per weekend. And then there's a little flip here happening where the PM is showing first one p. M. To five p. M. And then nine a.

M. To twelve p. M. And this is a really interesting piece because this is where we get to see how effective those event promotions were, how much people wanted to use the service for social influence. Again, unique rider trends could definitely be one indicator of one person going to Smith's every weekend. Will increase that number at, let's say, eleven. 9AM to 12PM is typically when we saw the most trips to grocery stores. People want to get that done with their day in the morning. And then more social things, especially if you look at October 4. And that was the Arts and Crafts Fair.

So that had a higher ridership around 02:00. And then August 30 was a very high ridership. We had 47 that day. And so you're seeing a lot in the morning and then quite a few in the afternoon because that was also Atomic on. One thing I do want to bring to your awareness is that overall for all thirteen days, over half of those were shared rides. So 59% of those were shared rides. Which really shows a great efficiency aspect of people utilizing this and being able to get where they need to go. And we are based on capacity, not cost. So you will get a ride if we have capacity. You're not prioritized by paying more such as Uber or Lyft.

With that, four or more trips per hour is like really gold standard for very efficient that was a very efficient hour for us. And so overall, we are also very proud to present that we were 98.6 on time performance. And that also is matched with our unique riders reusing this service. It's reliable. It's dependable. It's going to get you there on time. And then ultimately, this is the post survey. So this is what was going on afterwards. So we put a survey out. It was open for about three weeks and it was promoted several different ways.

There were also physical printouts of this at the libraries and at the municipal building as well. There were several questions asked, but really the value of this was to get the qualitative data that our quantitative wasn't giving us. So we actually had 157 respondents. And 90 of those were people that did not use the service at all. So that was a really great lens for us to look at and see what was going on. So the three major questions that were very helpful to us was, why didn't you use the service? What would make you consider using the service? And is there anything else we should know? So why didn't you use the service? As you read top to bottom, that's the highest volume to the lower volume.

So these are the top six or seven answers why they didn't use it. A lot of people have cars, walked, biked, didn't eat it. They were out of town. They had scheduling conflicts. Their health itself doesn't allow them to be as mobile as they want. And then there were some two interesting ones. Uncertain of reliability and feeling guilty and scared of the unknown. I've never done this before. I don't know. And that's a very real feeling, especially in public transit.

So, that was very helpful to us to know how to really engage the public and how we can formulate our education in public outreach. More feedback about what would make you consider this service would be if they didn't have a car, community events or errands, schedule reliability. They wanted shorter pickup windows. Originally, they were thirty minute windows. They are now reduced to fifteen, so we have already been able to adjust that. Later service hours and more public awareness. And then last of all, anything else we should know? The number one answer was thank you and please keep doing this. Advertising more downtown. Later services were suggested to help minimize DUI.

More movies, dinner opportunities. There was some eco suggestions about using smaller buses. But mostly appreciation for seniors, those who live with disabilities. Again, the long pickup window which we already have adjusted. And then praise for the helpful drivers who may be having this on Sunday. So, overall, the summary of this TLDR is most of the feedback is just highly supportive. Most people that did ride were doing it for convenience and doing it for green. It's Thursday night. I'm sorry. They were doing it for environmental purposes.

So with that, we have and will continue to, you know, bring awareness about this program. This also switched to a higher ridership on our Monday to Friday service of this program. So other than that, it gave us a lot to think about. It gave us a lot to talk about. And so James is gonna come back up and discuss the next steps of how we take all of this information and just figure out and formulate what we do with this and how we potentially implement this full time. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Brunson.

All right, Mr. Chair and Board. Yeah, so as Anna was saying, it was highly used. It was pretty popular. And so what are the next steps?

And so we still continue, excuse me, with ACT to to be short staffed with drivers. It's been a challenge to keep drivers on and retain them. And then funding for this service, so for long term and to make it sustainable. So we're in the process now of trying to bring on a consultant to help us model this out and what it would look like for future and and for it to be sustainable. We're also seeking funding from NMDOT, hopefully, fully funding, but at least eighty twenty match that we can bring this consultant on and help us model a Saturday service and potentially even Sundays.

And with that, I'll stand with any questions, mister chair and and board.

Thank you, mister Baralla. Questions or comments from the board? So I have one. So I noticed one of the things I've heard in the community is people, you know, when ACT is down entirely. Right? Like, night. Right? So is there any thought about that?

Yes. As demand so that was one of our questions in the survey chair. And we had don't know. Anna might know a little bit more percentage how many wanted later service. I think

high volume. I don't know the number.

Yeah. But there was a request for us. So, you know, just for the pilot, we did nine to 05:30. But, yes, we definitely are looking at, you know, how many survey results we got that, you know, if we need to extend from nine to 8PM or so, yeah, we are looking at that.

And I I I know the community is really excited about this. I heard about it from lots of people during the during the whole pilot phase. So thank you very much.

Mister Chard, just a quick question. I'm I think it was said, but I'm not positive if I've heard it correctly. So this pilot program was an on demand reservation. Is there a chance that this will just became a regular schedule if fully implemented?

Yes. Mister chair and and board member, there is potential even, you know, in in in original models for weekend service. There was even models of fixed route service. But due to driver shortages and everything, we just did the on demand for now. But, potentially, as as it grows and it's needed more, there is potential of adding fixed route service, you know, possibly between here and White Rock or certain areas of the community, and the rest can be micro transit and on demand service. So yes.

That way, if we see, like, a fixed area like Smith's or Sala or wherever, we can have stops there for those weekend trips.

Yeah. We can even dedicate you know, potentially dedicate one bus. It's just Smith's bus type thing. Know mean?

Mister chair and board member, thank you for the for the question. Kinda made me think a little bit that, you know, James and Anna, you know, pulled off a really and our and our drivers pulled off a really neat pilot project pretty seamlessly, but it was, you know, pretty challenging, you know, behind the scenes just because of driver shortages and all that. And so we were able to to do this with the existing staff. It was funded, you know, by council as a pilot. And and, fortunately, you know, we did have drivers that, you know, volunteered to work some overtime to see how this pilot would work.

So that that is a challenge, and it was a huge benefit to use to utilize the on demand service method of of doing this as opposed to a like a fixed route. The good news going forward is is we're working with one of our consultants to put together a study in how this could be, you know, further developed and implemented. And so we're hoping to get more information out of that study to to see what, you know, further challenges and other mechanisms are to be able to roll out a program like this, you know, in the most seamless way given, you know, all the challenges with with staff and with, of course, funding too. But, yeah, but those are the the good things that are coming out of this. So so there will be more to come.

Yeah. You guys tend to make most things look easy. That's why people's expectations keep going up. So thank you.

Yeah. Mister chair, I I would add too that, you know, this study could also kind of look at ways to reconstruct weekday service to be able to provide resources for Saturday service. So that's one potential too.

Two questions. One, just in term just for my information about how much does it would it cost for this program to be implemented in the future? Like, how much did this program end up costing? I know there was overtime and all this other stuff that you were saying. And then my second question is, and maybe this will be a preface to what you're about to say, how many drivers are you guys short? Because I I think the last figure that we got was a year or so ago, and I'm not sure if that number has changed.

Mister chairman or member Mook, so on average, I calculated it cost us about $59 per hour to provide this service. And staff shortages, currently, we're short three full time and two limited term. And in the next two weeks, we're gonna be shy on another two drivers. So we're gonna be a total of seven drivers now.

And it fluctuates quite a bit from, you know, week to week or month to month. Yeah. It just depends. At at times, we've been fully staffed, and then it changes again. So perfect.

Thank you.

Thank you so much for your presentation. As a frequent writer of the bus service, I always welcome more information about how things are going up where you guys live. As a member of the inclusivity task force for the past year, I saw that transportation was it came up frequently as the pathway by which lots of different people engage in our community. And many people in the data collection process that we engaged in indicated that one of the most accessible services we have in town is our transportation services. First of all, we have a free service.

When I first became interested in working on this board, it was because twenty years ago, I worked with the staff person who was directing transportation back then to design this service. And so Saturday service was down the road like twenty years. I was like, no, that'll never happen. And here we are. And so we all get older, but it's a very celebratory moment for me to hear from you all that we piloted this project.

My question is, do we do we really need to have a consultant to continue on? I mean, we've already showed it successful. Could not we devise a system based on what we've already shown to be successful? I'm just I see this as sort of also a pattern in county government that we do a lot of studies and and a lot of money gets spent that way where we could be putting that money toward the solution. Another pilot phase even would be probably preferable because the reason I didn't ride the bus during that whole period was that I've programmed my life not to ride on Saturdays.

Like, it's if you if it's if you if the bus doesn't ride then then it's not some place I yearn to go. But I'll if we had a service, I

would

expend to wanting to go to those places. So in effect, we could use the money to extend the pilot period and extend the service and build the service because as we know, you have to experience it in order to continue riding it. Anyway, I'll stop there. Thank you.

Member Edwards, this is Keith Olson. Just to let you know that the reason we wanna hire a consultant is we've been pouring over this data for the last few months since the end of the the pilot project. We recognize it's a valuable service. The challenge is not money necessarily. It's, human resources as in the the people to fulfill that service.

And as James mentioned, our our current challenges is maintaining a a driver number to maintain our existing services. So the reason we feel we need a help from a consultant is that we wanna look at our existing fixed route services that we provide and see if there's a way we can change that model. Is there some of those fixed route services either completely or certain times of the day change those to on demand services when ridership's low or or not predictable and see if we can reallocate those driver resources that would be on those weekday services to free them up for a Saturday service. So that that's a very complex problem to to look at and solve. And, you know, I think James and Anna and the the transit folks are great and and know a lot about transit by having that outside look of experts on the on demand service models come in and help us see if we can rebuild the our existing services to free up those driver resources.

You know, we could say, yeah, Saturday service will hire new drivers, but we can't even hire enough drivers for existing services. So we're trying to see is there a way we can change that model. So, yeah, we're we're kinda, like, jumping at the bit trying to have a solution, but, unfortunately, we we do need some help to make sure that when we do move forward, it's a sustainable system that we can maintain as reliable. And, you know, we don't want to start something and say, oh, sorry. This Saturday, we have no drivers.

We're not running it. So it's kinda I know you've waited twenty years, and we just ask a little more pay pay patience. So if, you know, the the time frame where look we've got the scope of work from the consultant, their schedule, if we can start this in the next few weeks, we'll we should have some concrete answers July, August time frame. And if that, you know, we may be able to replicate what we did last year from the August, October if we can find a solution that's sustainable and fundable.

Could I ask Thank you. Could I ask a follow-up? Do you already have someone identified who would provide this expertise? And what would the estimated cost of securing that type of data cost the county?

Yeah. So we're we're looking to use one of our on call engineering consultants. So Stantec, they did the transit center study for us. They've got some really high high performing transit experts on their staff. So we've we've reached out to them. They've provided with a scope. It is expensive. It's about $80,000. DOT has indicated that they they'd be willing to help with some of the funding towards that from the federal funds. So we're reaching out to DOT right now to establish how much of that funding they would be willing to provide for that study.

And one more question. Does this process of securing the consultant's a consultant's blessing, does that really make it happen faster or for us to get service going? Like, maybe that's too speculative a a question, but I'm still stuck on it with $80,000 that would I don't know if I don't know the figure for how much it cost to operate it for one day. But, yeah, just always wanting to know are our county dollars being spent to the maximum that can can our dollars perform?

Yeah. They can.

And if I if I may, member Edwards, just again, we don't have the resources to implement it, so we could have that $80,000 dedicated to provide the Saturday service. But what we found last year when we were using existing staff on overtime, as we approached the the end of the program, we could see there was burnout happening with those drivers. So it's it's a it's not a sustainable model. It was okay for those thirteen weeks towards the end. So it's not something that we could use that model of having drivers sign up for overtime on a long term thing.

So I I believe having bringing in experts who have dealt with these types of issues in multiple communities, they can you know, we could eventually maybe get there, but it we've we've already spent since October trying to come up with different models ourselves, and we just it would take us probably another twenty years to do what these consultants can do in, you know, six months. So I think it is a a good use of these resources to get us to an answer sooner rather than later.

Thank you.

Hope that helps.

Thank you. And I and I will add a little bit that the study will really inform us, inform our decision making in how to proceed. Because the last thing we wanna do is is is, you know, try to implement something and then it doesn't work, and we're changing schedules and having to let the public know, like, this route has changed or you know? So it gets very clunky if we're changing, you know, bus routes and bus schedules all the time, and and it just gets the public a little bit unhappy. So we really want this study to help inform us of a and and make good decisions on how to implement it and and particularly with within our existing staff, or do we need to supplement our staff to really make it successful?

So this will, you know, help us, you know, really inform our decision making on how the best path forward would be. So thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank you for a very informative presentation and very nice graphics. It was easy to understand all the issues with this. I have a couple of questions. You said the program cost $59 an hour to operate on the weekends. How does that compare with weekday cost per hour per rider if you can divide it by the number of riders so that it sort of normalizes it? Do you have that data?

Mr. Chair and member, I don't have that data at the top of my head, but it it does vary from fixed route services to on demand. And on demand can, at times, be a little more costly than fixed route services. So this consultant that would come in and help us will be able to help us forecast those numbers a little bit better than what we could. I hope that answers your question.

Well, not really, but that's okay. Have you thought about I understand the HR problem in getting drivers, but have you thought about a bonus for weekend drivers in order to attract people who want to drive on the weekend?

Chair and board member, yes. So for the last five years, we've offered a sign on bonus for drivers. And in the most recent recruitment, we did not offer a sign on bonus, and we actually got more applicants without a sign on bonus for for our regular services. So we're we're seeing that you know, we're losing a lot of drivers with a sign on bonus, and then they're having to pay it back. And we're spending a lot of time and effort and money in training drivers that are leaving, you know, within a year. And so we're trying a new effort without a sign on bonus, you know, somebody that's more interested in not coming because of those sign on bonus, but that they actually wanna drive.

So Well, that wasn't exactly my question. I I think you said that the problem was getting people to drive on the weekend. So suppose you offer them a higher rate of pay to drive on the weekends.

I don't the the issue isn't specific to weekend. It's drivers Oh. Create, you know, full stop. So as James said, right now, we've got five five vacancies, you know, that that, I don't know, the average is probably three or four. You know, sometimes it gets down to one vacancy, and then within a month, we're back to five or six.

It's a very fluid situation. And and so, yeah, if if it was a you know, we were thinking of models of just having a Saturday scheduled. You know, maybe it's someone who works during the week and they wanna just work a Saturday, but, again, it's that becomes an unreliability. You know, we're trying to build a a model that's sustainable and and isn't isn't on the ebbs and flows of whether we can find or not find someone to fulfill that thing. So, you know, that may be what we end up doing is having drivers that that all it is is a Saturday shift for them.

But, again, we the model we had, we had about we had three drivers, and they kinda staggered up. There was one driver early, three during the bulk, and one at the end. But, you know, to sustain that, you probably need four or five actual drivers on that Saturday schedule to ensure that you always had those three. So it's it's kind of a numbers game, and we really wanna flush out how we can reduce the number of needed drivers during the week so that we always have that flexibility of having sufficient numbers for the full service that we provide.

Yeah. I understand. One last question. You said this was capacity driven, not money driven. How many do you have statistics on how many people could not get a ride because you were overcapacity for that particular trip?

Hello. Yes. No one was denied a trip during this timing. And I think part of that is because when you introduce a new service, it does take time to kind of bite and take on. But if people were actually denied, they could have taken a look

I just wanted to add. Usually a consultant is hired to understand the problem better. And I think the problem has pretty well been established in that we don't maybe there's a challenge in recruiting drivers. But I don't really see the nexus to a study that would be conducted of this pilot project that would lead us to more data and resolve the problem of shortage of drivers. That is something that is a HR problem across county for different jobs.

We have different challenges for the positions and then different tactics we use. But I think we have those tools on board in our county. And I would rather see the money rather than go to another study to actually perpetuating the service which would yield more data and then we could take it from there. But I don't see how an outside consultant is gonna yield more shed more light on the issue of how to recruit qualified drivers to the service.

Mister chair and member Edwards, I I will just share that, you know, because we receive FTA formula funding money, it is required of us to conduct a service plan study every five years. And so our last one was in 2022, '23. So we're kinda up now at 2028. So I'm taking this opportunity to do a service plan at this time with this kind of this funding to be able to kinda jump ahead, and so it won't be due for another five years. But it'll help us kinda overall see our current operations, what it would take to do Saturday service.

And, you know, we've had a really great partnership with Stantec and some of the other studies they've done with us, and they're very adverse into hiring processes and and trends around the nation and and what's, you know, keeping drivers away. So I I'm very looking ahead and excited that they can come in and kinda give us a new vision. You know what I mean? We're in a unique area here. Us, Espanola, Santa Fe, we all compete for the same drivers and that. And and it's who who's offering the best. And so, hopefully, this study can help us do that, accomplish something that's required by FTA, and, you know, it'll be required a little later down the road. But those are my visions in this. So thank you.

Can I Thank you for that clarification? And it sounds like what you're envisioning is not only a process that reviews the Saturday service but beyond, in which case that makes sense. And I do truly appreciate your clarification because as a layperson, I don't have the knowledge that you do about all the boxes that need to be checked. But I thank you again for clarifying that.

You're welcome. And believe me, our our community and the services we provide are in in our best interest in how we utilize tax paid dollars. We look at all of that board.

Alright. Thank you, mister Brundson.

Thank you.

Alright. So I forgot to do roll call, and so we have to do that online. So I'll do it real quick. In attendance are member Edwards, member Muck, chair Hampton, member Chappell, member Lisowski, and member Connolly. Not in attendance, member Geppard.

The next item is election of chair. So does anyone have any nominations, including self nominations?

I nominate David Hampden as chair.

I second that nomination.

Are there any other nominations? All in favor, raise your hand. Unanimous. Vice chair, any nominations or self nominations?

I I nominate Joshua Mock Mock, the vice chair.

Alright. And I remember Gepard said he was interested also. So are there any others? Alright. So we'll do a quick just state the name of the person you want as vice chair, and I'll start with this end. Member Edwards?

So I can vote for one of

the Yes. Just one.

I vote for Josh Muck.

Alright.

I think I have to abstain, don't I? No. I will vote for myself, for Joshua Muck.

Muck?

Joshua Muck?

Muck? Joshua Muck?

Alright. Unanimous, six zero. I just wanna say that we don't frequently have contested elections on these boards. So when we have an opportunity to have someone who served the board so well as member Muck for the last two years, and in in the case of mister Geppard, someone who served the board as a member of the Bison Working Group, including doing research and providing reports. He's done that on other boards too. So I think this board's in in good hands. So thank you, guys. And with that, councilor Han, do you have an update for us?

Chair Hampton, I think we've been having some audio video difficulties. Miss Romero, any update on that?

I'm not sure. The Zoom is still working, but I I don't know.

Alright. Well, no no council liaison report, chair support. I just wanna thank member Connolly and member Gebbert for joining us. You complete us. So thank you. Anyways, and that's all. And does that do any of the board members have a report?

So I just wanted to say that I've been down into the Denver Steels area, and the amount of work that you guys are doing down there is is extensive. I I I had a little bit of trouble the other day trying to get a trailer out of one of the roads that was definitely blocked as opposed to having through traffic. But other than that, you guys are doing a good job down there. I got to see the contractor. I believe it's TLC was putting in some main water lines and everything. So it's it's looking good over there.

Anyone else? Alright. Staff report.

Thank you, mister chair and board members. I will be brief. I'll just mention a few things. You may have noticed driving around downtown, you see some more wayfinding signs that our traffic and streets crews have been installing around town. I think we have about 19 signs up right now, so we're making headway.

We got quite a few more to go, but, but they are, continuing to put those signs up, so they're doing a great job. Our street crews are currently working on the road in Rindy Hunt and BioCanyons, get those roads prepared and regraded should we need those roads for fire evacuation. So great job to them. We are currently awaiting to hear from National Park Service and get a contract in place for Bandelier Service. The Bandelier Service is gonna be modeled a little bit like last year where it was internal within the park, but the dates are gonna be spread around the calendar.

Normally, we wait for the park service to do the press releases and public announcements since it's their program. So we're just kind of on pins and needles waiting for for for them to give the word, and and we're we're ready to go. And then lastly, I'm not sure if we made it a point to say, but so sorry if I'm repeating what we might have said before, but I don't think we did. But I wanna thank Keith for being, you know, kinda spearheading this. We received a 4 and a half million dollar grant for reconstructing the Kanyala, the Boy Trail in White Rock from Rover to Overlook.

So thanks to Keith and staff for putting those grant applications together. It was part of a DOT press release or news story that was in the post about a month ago that listed that had a list of projects around the state. And so, you know, fortunately, Los Alamos was on that list and and great job for for getting that funding for that project. It's been part of our bike plan. And so we're looking at enhancing that trail currently.

It's a crusher fine trail. We're looking to make it wider, provide a hard surface, and make it more of a multi use trail like the rest of the Canelo Del Buoy Trail that runs to State Route 4. And that's it, Mr. Chair. Stand for any questions.

Thank you. That grant is great news. Questions or comments?

Yes, Chair. I have several questions and comments. I was going through the staff report, I just wanted to ask a couple of questions. One was well, actually, just express excitement that you're going to be installing the rumble strips on 502. I think that's exciting.

I will say I'm hearing from community members as well as staff where I work at being able to see all these great signs going in. And I don't think we quite realized how much work you'd already done in installing the bases around. I don't think we realized that so that the signs are very visible. So along that note, I wanted to ask about the Kenyatta Del Bui Trail, which how exciting. And, you know, it's as a White Rock resident, we're very excited to hear that that's going to be coming to fruition or at least is going to be worked on in the coming years.

Wondering if signage and wayfinding pedestrian level as well as maybe didactic signs had been discussed or if you all are interested in helping tie in that sort of thing while you're doing the upgrades and getting ready to to do all the studies and everything that's required to get ready for that. Just since you're dealing with wayfinding signage that you've been working on for so long on this larger scale that if there's pedestrian level desire, where at what point in this project would you incorporate that?

Thank you, member Connolly. So great question. That and that's something that we can look at and take in during the design process. So that'll obviously be the first part of the project is is to get a consultant, get a design put together, and have those con conversations, public engagement, get some input about, you know, things of that nature. So we'd love to hear about that, you know, once we start that process.

Great. And then I had one more question, I believe, related to the bus service with Bandelier and knowing that I think there's quite a bit of momentum now on the White Rock food truck pad and how you think your conversations with Bandelier, I know it will still be, sounds like, internal service provided rather than from the visitor center to the site. Has that started to impact, or are you all having conversations about how that impacts the plan on the development of that site? I don't know how to ask that succinctly. So

The the quick answer to that is yes. We are talking about that and the potential impacts to that project. So we're waiting to see what the cost the construction cost look like, and then we'll be having those discussions with the county manager to see what the best path forward. Is it something we kinda pause for the moment to see how Bandelier service, you know, may or may not impact that and, you know, what comes next. So it is something we kinda have our pulse on right now.

Great. Thank you so much.

As you know, I'm interested in the airport. And I'm curious about two things. First of all, the construction of the T hangars. That is apparently an ongoing construction project. And I'd just like to know what an update on the status and timing of that might be. And secondly, there was discussion of a relocation of the road and construction of a new access area to the terminal. And I'm wondering what the status of that proposal was.

Okay. Thank you, member Lisowski. I'll take the second one first, and then I'll ask mister Wilson to give you an update on the taxiway on the t hangar project. So on the taxiway and the and the taxiway relocation and access road work, we're awaiting a grant agreement to come through so we can begin working on that design. So there is gonna be more to come on that, you know, hopefully soon, and I can't remember exactly what the timing may be of that.

I don't know if mister Wilson might be able to recall that, but I know we do have it programmed in in in the in the near future so that we can begin design work. And then, of course, we'll have public meetings and engagement and talk to the airport community about it. And then I'll go ahead and let mister Wilson address the the

Just on the roadways where I I believe that we're kinda, like, what we would say the 30% level of design, which is kinda conceptual laying out alignments and stuff like that. And I I know when I talked last talked to Gary, he was waiting for the submittal from the design consultants on that. I believe the timing for construct construction's around about 2028. And then on the t hanger project, we're having weekly meetings right now with the contractor that was chosen to construct. As of this week, they're expecting to start mobilizing in the next two to three weeks.

The t hanger structure has been ordered, but it's kind of one of those items. It takes a while to get done. Right now, the expected delivery of the actual hanger structure is not until August, but the contractor is planning on getting everything that they can get done starting in the next two to three weeks so that it's ready whenever the materials for the hangers are are delivered. They can start placing them and getting it on up.

That construction project is gonna be near where the fuel farm is. I want to encourage the county to have them not block access for aircraft to the to the fuel farm during that construction project?

Yeah. That I think I I'm not overly familiar with the design plans, but, yeah, that there there'll be as with all airport projects, they'll have the low barriers and and access to the fuel fuel tanks will be maintained.

And yes. Member Lesowski, there will be traffic control to to manage air traffic around the fuel farm to maintain access to the fuel farm.

Thank you.

Alright. Thank you. So the next item is upcoming agenda items. So our next meeting is April 2. Do we currently have anything scheduled?

Mister chair, I'll ask miss Romero if she might have a recollection if we have something planned for the April meeting currently.

I'm not quite sure if Pete is ready for the EV fleet, the matrix that we were gonna provide.

Okay. So that's a maybe on the on the EV fleet presentation.

So Alright.

And with

that,

we're adjourned.