Council Transportation Committee - Regular Meeting

We will call the council transportation committee to order. Today is 03/04/2025. It is now 06:00. 06:30. 06:30. It's open. Okay. 06:30. This is a hybrid meeting allowing public comment both in person and virtually. Instructions for addressing the committee virtually may be found on the posted agenda. Will call, please. Roll call over. The public works director will take attendance. I will call.

Committee committee chair McAllister? Here. Committee member Hicks? Here. And let the record show that, the mayor, Kameh, is absent today.

The force this, that we're now able to go on to oral communication. Item number three, this portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the committee on any matter not on the agenda. Speakers are allowed to speak on any topic for up to thirty minutes during this section. State law prohibits the committee from acting on non agenda items. Would any member of the public on the on the line like to provide comment on non agenda items? If so, please click the raised hand button in Zoom or post election. We will take in person speakers first. Staff will display the timer on the

screen. Where

does that screen?

I'll show the screen, but no one has their hand raised. So

I'm just But nothing first. So anybody in the public would

like to speak on any particular item on our lead gen?

Seeing none. And we don't have any virtual speakers. Seeing none, we will close public comment, and we will go to the consent calendar. This is 4.1, approving minutes meeting minutes. The minutes for the 10/29/2024 meeting are presented for approval tonight. Would any member of the public joining us virtually or persons like to provide comment on the minutes? If so, please click the raise hand button in Zoom or post the elector. We will take in person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes. Okay.

So anybody would like to comment on the list? Seeing none, we close that out. We'll we will now take virtual speakers.

No hands raised. Chair.

Do we have people?

Yes. There are attendees.

Okay. Thank

you. I will now bring the item back for committee to work deliberation and action. Are there any corrections or comments on the minutes?

No. But I would like to make a motion to, accept the minutes.

So I will second it,

but I'm gonna abstain because I didn't really see any of these minutes. So

I don't know. Do we need two votes for it?

I think we do because we have one committee member asking.

I think we do. So I think either you vote for it or we bring it back next time. Next time. It's your choice.

Could you project them? Because I can't see. Your turn

to comment on them

is over. So you that's your choice, chair. You either vote for it or we bring it back next. It doesn't matter.

Yeah. Let's just bring it back.

Okay. We will do that.

Okay. And now we move on to item five, new business. 5.1 Moffett Boulevard, Complete Street, 5824 Over 3. Item 5.1 is the Moffett Boulevard, Complete Street. Staff presentation will be conducted by an assistant engineer. Go. Thank you.

Alright.

Good evening. So we'll get the presentation started. Good evening, committee members. My name is Nancy Chen. I'm assistant engineer with the public works department presenting on the Moffitt Boulevard Complete Streets, and with me tonight is Robert Gonzales, principal civil engineer.

So as we get started, here is the aerial sorry. I think one going too far. The aerial photo shown here that illustrates the project area with the project location highlighted in green. The project location adds extra level of complexity due to project right of way coordination. So here we see that, that we need Caltrans coordination throughout the corridor from the SR 85 on ramp all the way north towards Clark Road that's shown in purple.

SFUC's Aqueduct runs through the south end of the roadway by Middlefield Road shown in the dark blue, and Moffett Airfield and NASA are to the north shown in the orange. PG and E also has a substation located just Northwest of the roadway by Lyon and a tower easement running parallel with Stevens Creek Trail. And, additionally, there's a Stevens Creek Trail crossing that's just east of SR 85 running parallel with the highway that's shown in the later blue here. A little bit of project background to look at the timeline that this project has taken so far. In 2015, city contracted with BKF engineers to conduct a bikeway feasibility study for the corridor as part of planning.

In June 2022, a virtual community meeting was held to gather input on bikeway alternatives, and BPAC was also presented the complete streets checklist for the OGAG three grant application for review and comments. At the beginning of 2023, the city was awarded 3 and a half million dollars through the OBAG three federal grant. To secure the grant, council adopted a resolution to provide local support and committing matching funds and stating assurance to complete the project. And this past June, city council authorized professional services agreement with BKF for design services and provide construction support, and the design was kicked off this past fall. So as mentioned, this project is federal is a federally funded project with one Bay Area grant funds.

The scope of the project is dictated by the grant application, and project design must be approved by Caltrans local assistance to meet the grant scope. The city will start coordination with Caltrans local assistance in the coming months and estimating to construct the project in 2026 to meet the grant timeline requirements. City committed in the resolution to complete the project as described in the grant application within the funding deadline in order to receive the grant funding. Funds need to be obligated by January 2027, which means design and Caltrans approval must be obtained by then. In terms of the project scope, the elements include, first and foremost, pavement rehabilitation of Moffett Boulevard.

And in conjunction with that, we will be installing class four bike lanes with vertical separation, class two bike lanes at the pinch points, green conflict striping at driveways, bus stops, and intersections where there's turning turning conflict. There's a sidewalk gap closure on the east side of the roadway between Leon Drive and Stevens Creek Trail. Medium modifications will be made to accommodate the bike lanes, buffers, vert floor elements. Currently, along the roadway, there is a sidewalk gap on the east side between Stevens Creek Trail and Leon Drive, and that's shown in the upper left picture. There's pin pinch points noted in the bottom two pictures at SR 85 under crossing and The US 101 over crossing.

Moffett Boulevard is also a designated truck route and bus route requiring minimum 11 foot travel lanes. There's also limited right of way along the project location as we previously mentioned in the project location slide, and that constrains the space that's available to us. Access MB has also identified this segment of Moffitt to be a high level of stress for bicyclists and recommends bike and pet improvements along this corridor. So in order to accommodate the continuous bikeway along the corridor, removal of approximately 18 parking spaces is proposed on the east side of the roadway adjacent to the Willow Park Apartment Complex. A parking study was conducted in August 2024 along the entire length of the project, and only one vehicle was observed throughout the study with adequate off street parking available.

And we'll be bringing the parking remove item to council for consideration later this spring. And so staff also evaluated input provided by residents from the June 2022 community meeting and the costs associated with the preferences to identify an appropriate scope for the project design phase based on available budget and right of way. What is pictured here are examples of the vertical elements and not necessarily the exact item that we will be installing. Based on existing constrictions of right of way, flexible post delineators, which is on the left, where similar vertical separation is proposed along most of the corridor. Whereas space permits, rubber curved islands similar to those installed on Liang along with vertical elements are proposed along the roadway, and that's an example of that on the right picture.

Over the next slides, I will be walking you through segment by segment the proposed improvements and cross sections along the border. We'll be starting from the south at Middlefield Road and move north to Clark Road and the city limits. In each slide, we'll have an overview layout, a cross section of the existing conditions, and a cross section of the proposed improvements. So here we are. This is the first segment of the proposed design.

Please note that the cross sections are not showing vertical elements, but vertical element vertical delineators or similar are proposed throughout the buffers except where turning movements conflict. And travel lanes are maintained at a minimum of 11 feet throughout, but there is proposed lane with narrowing in order to accommodate the bikeways.

So does the top one the current and the bottom one's the proposed?

Yes. So it the top is the overview, and then there's the current, existing, and then the proposed. And that'll be the structure for every slide. So here in segment a, we're at Middlefield Road on your left and heads towards SR 85 to your right. There are no existing bike facilities. So in order to make room for the bike lanes, buffers and vertical delineators, center median modifications are proposed along with lane with reductions. Green conflict striping will be added where driveways okay. Sorry. That will be added where driveways and bus stops are conflicting. The intersection of Middlefield Road will be completed in the Middlefield Road Complete Streets project, and that design will be coordinated as the project progresses.

In segment b, we approach the S R 85 under crossing, which is a pinch point. There is adequate space for bike lanes, buffers, and delineators in the existing shoulder in the southbound direction. However, in the northbound direction, median modifications are proposed which will need Caltrans approval in order to accommodate the bike facilities. A small segment of rubber curve separation is proposed in pink where there's adequate width to provide extra separation between the vehicles and bicyclists. In our next segment, segment c from SR 85 under crossing to Liang Drive, the sidewalk gap closure is shown in blue connecting Leon Drive to Steens Creek Trail.

Vertically separated buffered bike lanes will be added to the existing shoulder in the southbound direction. In the northbound direction, the existing buffered bike lanes will add new vertical flexible post flexible post delineators are similar and conflict striping as traffic approaches Leon Drive. In the next segment, as we approach the US 101 Ramp, the bike lanes end as it approaches that intersection due to an exit the existing median width. Medium modifications will allow for bike lane to continue through the northbound direction approach, and rubber curve vertical separation is proposed where there's additional width in the roadway shown in pink to provide better separation between vehicles and bikes. Vertical delineators and buffers will also be added in the southbound direction.

In segment e, we cross over US 101 at the pinch point. The vehicle travel lanes will be narrowed to accommodate six foot bike lanes on the Caltrans overpass bridge. However, due to the limited width, the roadway will not be able to accommodate buffers or vertical elements. An extended conflict striping area is also included adjacent to the right turn pocket onto the US 101 Ramp shown on the right side of this slide, which is the north end of the segment. In segment f, the last segment as we approach Clark Road and city limits, there are existing bike lanes, and the project will add buffers with delineators, mostly maintaining the alignment to meet the intersection outside of city limits, which is shown in the red dotted line.

And now I will be handing it off to principal civil engineer Gonzalez, and he will go over the February 26 feedback meeting and their feedback and their next steps.

As assistant engineer Chen noted, we went to be we went to be back on February 26. We provided them with this information. The $3,500,000 grant, we went through this before, but I just wanna make sure we're emphasizing this was a competitive grant. We presented, the best scope we thought was, deliverable under, you know, very specific grand conditions. So we knew what the what the allotment was for the local agencies.

We wanted to be competitive, so we we developed that scope with that in mind. We also shared with Deepak the the overview of the scope, and we went over the next steps. Scope does include pavement pavement in this project, as well as the class four bike improvements and the pedestrian improvements. So the next step would be tonight with the CTC, and then we'd like to move forward to final design. This project we see as really the first step, in delivering these really important corridor improvements.

I won't I won't read the whole slide, but we gave this, we presented this to BPAC, and they deliberated, and they came back with two motions for for consideration. Motion one was for BPAC to request that the city evaluate a potential road diet for this segment. And then motion two was for BPAC to recommend specific design elements without substantial cost increases. So at the a portion of the top one also mentioned specifically noting that BPAC does not wish to substantially delay the project or endanger the grant funding. So I wanted to make sure that they, were clear about that.

Some of the recommended improvements that they are identified identifying, moving right turn lanes to the left of the bike lane in certain locations, adding an additional curb cut from the Stevens Creek Trail northbound onto Moffett Boulevard northbound, evaluating new crosswalk southbound of State Route 85 on ramp, narrowing the left turn lanes consistent with NACDO, adding crossing improvements, including ADA compliant curb cuts, advanced stop bars, and improved lighting, and improved lighting specifically under SR 85. So the BPAC meeting really was a project update, and this was a lot of information for them for us to provide to them, and they gave us a lot of feedback as well. So the initial staff evaluation. Staff has done this evaluation. There are some items that we can include without substantially impacting the scope, the budget, and the grant funding.

So specifically elements such as adjusting the bike lane configuration at right turns to eliminate conflicts, adding curb cuts at Stevens Creek Trail northbound from Stevens Creek onto Northbound Moffett, and including advanced stop bars and ADA curb ramps. However, changing the project, including other scope elements, has been evaluated by staff, and we see this as as a a much substantially higher risk. Risk to the schedule, risk to the budget, and very importantly, to the, to the grant funding. So the climate for federal grants has changed substantially since we applied for the grant, since we were granted the grant just over the past few months. The project scope changes will initiate a new review of grant applications.

So Caltrans is the administrator at the state level. Locally, Metropolitan Transportation Commission, is our liaison. They would be, that would that would open up additional scrutiny by MTC and by Caltrans. So we see this as a substantial high risk of losing the three and a half million dollar federal grant, opening that door again. Staff is very concerned that their project may be deferred or completely eliminated.

And the the project scope I mentioned before does include, pavement. So the pavement condition will continue to degrade. The longer it takes, the more it will the part will slip into that further degradation phase. So based on this information we're we're sharing with you now, we want to we wanna move project forward into final design and deliver the project.

And this one. Thought there was staff recommendation.

Yeah. I

did. Okay. There we go.

Alright. So we we review the design concept for Moffett qualified complete streets, and we would recommend that you direct staff to advance the project into final design. This would include the, elements that we we cover on on previous slide that would that we could add to those, such as the curb cuts, that would not that would not impact cost, schedule, or budget. Those are minor improvements that are at the purview of the local agency and wouldn't have to go back and be written. So in terms of next steps, we can proceed with final design.

Our consultant would then go and initiate discussions with Caltrans, from the design coordination phase. Caltrans will be wearing two hats during this project because so much of the project is within Caltrans corridor. They will be looking at this for, through their design eyes, through their design manual. In addition to that, the next phase will begin the environmental clearance project, the grant funding requirements. That also requires Caltrans coordination.

So we'll be beginning that pro process after this. We anticipate completing final design by the 2025. The second to last box there, Caltrans grant review process. That is a hard stop on design. That puts the the project into Caltrans' hands for their review.

So that is a, a technical review as well as an administrative review to make sure that we are meeting our grant requirements. Way back at the beginning of the slide, there was a commitment slide about what the the local agencies, the city was committing to in terms of signing agreeing to this grant. Those elements there are checked off the boxes at that at that phase when Caltrans is going through the grant review. And then we would hope to start construction in 2026, which is consistent with the grant timeline.

So I'll move questions.

Well, thank you. Committee. Do you have any questions, committee,

first? Yes. I do.

Go for it.

So you said, Mr. Gonzales, you said at some point that this is the first step. What is the second step?

So the second step is to be determined. Really, we've got some internal processes such as the active transportation plan that are really designed for community feedback and community elements of what is practical and feasible for this for this location. So this was the first step. It was scoped based out of the 2015 study and by community feedback and by feedback feedback. And those next steps would be an evaluation of multiple projects. The ATP is a citywide evaluation. And so that would be essentially beginning with, like, a needs assessment evaluation of what's feasible. But it's its own kind of process. And the next step would come out of that process.

So I'll tell you. I'm asking because I've gotten a lot of community feedback on this particular item, and so I'm wondering how much we could do on this one and how much we might be able to do in the future. It sounds like you're saying we may be able to do some things in the future.

Well, the best part the ATPs dictate priorities and scope for these future projects. So, like, in 2015, there was a study for the roadway. And out of that study came multiple projects, probably identified projects that were higher in priority and lower in priority. So that dictated to staff where we should be implementing our resources that create that helps create the projects in the CIP. So this would be the same process from ATP as all of those projects would be evaluated. All of those projects would be presented to the community and to BPAC and to this body, and they could be prioritized at that point. So depending on the priority, the the remainder of these benefits would be weighed against improvements on Rengstorf, improvements on local streets.

Might be a little more specific. So if the future desire and is what comes out of the ATP is to do a road diet and implement class four bike lanes. Right? Right now, what we're doing is doing what we can within the confines of the schedule and the grant money that we've received, also within the right of way limitations that we have. But, again, if that planning document, the ATP, goes through its full process and it says we should do something along this right away, we have that in our, you know, in our minds that what we're doing right now could be a first step, like an interim improvement. We're still making things better. And eventually, we'll get to whatever shakes out of the ATP.

So some more questions. Have you been doing I'm gonna ask this question and then, add a caveat. Have you been doing traffic counts on this road? And my caveat is traffic seems to be in a lot of flux in terms of certainly during COVID, there was likely much less. And then we've also we're changing when and whether you can cross the train tracks, which impacts Moffitt.

So some of the changes are long term. Some, I don't know how much, you know, the the work from home or work partially from home, return to office, or new construction in that you know, in the area that this road leads to. In some ways, traffic counts count this year. It might be different next year. But have you been doing traffic counts?

So the project was scoped in the 2021, 2022 time frame. So at the time, we were basing the the the the elements and the improvements based on traffic at that time. So it was it was the same thing. It was in flux at that point as well. I'm not aware of of traffic counts going on right now, but that would be that would be different. Like, that wouldn't necessarily change the scope at this point. The scope was defined back when we applied for the for the grant.

And will

this be somewhat consistent with in terms of the bike lane and sidewalk with what we're doing on Moffett, on the other side of middle field, between middle field and the train tracks? What's the diff how similar will it be? I know that people in the living within the Moffitt precise plan area and working and so forth interested in that area really wanted to be very cater very much to active transportation and making that comfortable and so so forth, making it a, you know, a pleasant place to bike and walk. How different will this be from from that portion of Moffett?

So staff is working very closely with the planning department and with the staff involved in the Moffitt precise plan. We were involved in the kickoff. We provided them all of the information that we've seen today in terms of what the scope is. This project will be considered part of their existing conditions as they develop that policy assistant public works director Arango.

Yeah. Hi. Ed Arango, assistant public works director. Thank you for the question. As principal engineer Gonzalez mentioned, we are coordinating with the community development department on the Moffett Boulevard precise plan as that is just initiating.

We don't know what the Moffett Boulevard corridor is gonna look like between Central Expressway and Middlefield. As we are developing that, we'll have more information later as we'll share with council and community development. We'll share with council proposed street configurations and what the core elements may look like. But, again, this is something that is a first step to improving the the this component of Moffett, and we can come back, at a later date, again, based on what the ATP says and what council priorities are. We're coming to you at the end of this month to to start talking about the CIP.

There's gonna be a lot of balancing between projects and identifying priorities because there is a lack of funding and unrestricted funds as well as there's not enough funding to maintain our existing PCI throughout the city. So we're really trying to balance, many things here, and this is an effort to really do payment maintenance, improve the bike lanes, and then we can come back once that we have more information with regarding the Moffett

precise plan,

what that looks like, and how this can integrate with that.

So there may be a striking difference in the beginning.

There may be. Yes. Again, it's it's, too hard to determine now what the Moffitt quarter's gonna look like between Central Expressway and Middlefield. But once we have that information, then we can kind of next step is, okay. How do we integrate the two segments? Okay.

And then tell me, when you measure the PCI, you to me, the bike lanes, what we call bike lanes, used to be parking spaces and gutters for the street. So often, to me, I don't know a lot about measuring the PCI, but the the pavement looks much worse in the bike lane than often. Not always. Sometimes there's topples in the car lanes. But often, it it looks much worse in the bike lanes. Are there different measures, or do you pave it differently if you've decided to make a bike lane? Like, often there's a seam in the gutter that's hard to bike on. Do you close that seam? How does the paving work

on the bike lanes

in the carway?

Starting with the evaluation. The evaluation is done manually by somebody who is trained trained to do this. Mhmm. So recognizing that that closest to the curb is often the bike lane or often a parking lane. They are trained to treat that as part of the paving section.

So their job is to find a representative location within the paving section and essentially measure out every defect in that location. So if if it's the street segment is from the 100 block to 200 block of Castro, they pick a representative sample within that area, and they measure out every single defect, whether that's, alligator cracking or cracking or road based deformations, whatnot. And then they score that from 100 to to zero. So whatever that amount is, that represents that segment from 100 to 200 block. And they do that for every single segment of the of the city.

They do not unless we unless we actively work or communicate with them, they will not just distinguish between closest to the curb or furthest from the curb. They're just looking for a representative location. So it could be that other areas of the of that segment are much worse. Some of those areas could be much better. That's that's kinda how the evaluation works.

And from there, it's our job as engineers to go out and verify that and select segments for improvements and then prioritize those segments. So a section like this, we could identify Moffitt as, let's say, the highest third in terms of priorities. And then we would be working with transportation and our other groups to to identify other things that we could deliver along with that. And that's that's really how we came up with the grant application in the first place was we saw that it was a good opportunity to deliver pavement improvements as well as transportation improvements.

She had a question about seams. Do you wanna get into that? Or I can address that. Sure. Yeah. So she had a question about seams and paving unraveling basically at the seams. Right? So, generally, what happens at the beginning of a project is there's a kickoff meeting, preconstruction meeting between staff and the contractor, and the contractor will lay out a plan for how they propose to do, I'll call them, passes of asphalt along the roadway. And, generally, what they try to do is they try to make it such that the seams, where they're abutting a couple of different passes together fall along a lane a a striping line. Right?

And so that's generally not within the wheel path of a car. The wheel path area of a car is generally where you'll start seeing the pavement start to unravel and deteriorate just because of the wear and tear it's getting under the wheels of a car, by keeping it under a striping line. It's kinda hidden, and it's sort of out of the way of generally where cars are traveling. And what about where bikes are traveling? Generally, what they try to do is a is a one pass between the gutter and the first travel lane inclusive of the bike lane.

And so this is at let me see if I read it right. It's at 35% design chain design phase. Is that where we're at? Okay. So, yeah, I'm trying to get a sense of how much you could change at 35%. Let's see. And has there been, any talk of reducing the speed limit?

Not at this point. That would be a discussion that we would be having with traffic after the improvements are delivered. So one of the slides several of the slides showed lane narrowing. Mhmm. So that's an example of something that could be adjusted at this at this section of design. But narrowing the lanes naturally reduces overall speeds. And then you can go back and you can do a speed survey.

Okay.

And if if you're narrowing lanes or making that sort of change, is it true that it doesn't add expense much expense because it's just paint that's being changed? Or

In the absence of the pavement improvements?

Yeah. If if you're making a design change

Oh, in the design. Yes. That's correct.

11 feet to, you know, more for whatever.

Yes.

More for one lane, less for another lane. It's just repainting, so it's not really you're not paying for any it's not like adding a curb or adding a medium with trees or something

like that.

If I understand the question correctly, is it is it the type of design change we can make at this point without affecting the design cost? The cost. Asking about? So that's exactly right. So for a good example of that would be the size of a buffer. If there was a six foot bike lane with a five foot buffer, a very natural comment back would be like, let's reduce the buffer and give the cyclists a little bit more room with the bike lanes.

Okay. Okay. Those are my questions. Thank you.

You you had me thinking about some stuff. Hi.

Ed Arango again. I wanted just to add on to the responses we heard from staff regarding change of lanes. We talked about bike buffers, bike lanes, but also the travel lanes. Currently, travel lanes are at least 12 feet, and then some sections are 14 feet. And you saw the cross sections from when it was from the presentation and in the memo.

We're reducing down to 11 feet. We really find that 11 feet is the sweet spot. Once you get to 11 feet and below, it doesn't really accommodate the variety of traffic that we're expecting along the board. So if there's truck traffic, it could be large delivery trucks, it could be trash trucks, which are up to 12 feet wide when you include the side mirrors. And we wanna be sure that we're accommodating those vehicles such that they're not infringing on the adjacent lane. So when we look at lane widths, we find that 11 feet really is a sweet spot for this.

K. Thank you.

That's it. Okay. It's good questions. So I am rather confused on all the timelines that I heard. So you got a grant, and there's a deadline to get that used. Is that grant just for completion or just getting to a certain stage? What stage do you need to get completed or a timeline on that one?

Yeah. Thank you for that clarifying question. For the OPEC three grants, the city competed for it and won for the construction phase. So other cities will compete and and and and get grants for the design phase. We didn't do that. So the design phase is locally funded. So we have the time we need to deliver the design phase. However, when you get the construction grant, that puts you in a a kind of a clock to get started on the construction phase. So there's a there's a there's a there's a clock that begins where the grant funding becomes available for obligation, and that's in the that's in 2026.

Okay. So that's independent of the design. If we don't do anything, the clock starts on '20 the twenty sixth Right. To your setup. K. Then you mentioned something about that's three point five. Is there a cost just to get us to the construction phase?

Yes. We are actively in design. So we we have we're under contract with

engineers. Okay. And are you within budget? Yes. And was this so I also heard that in 2015. So this project was in the first, brought up in 2015. And now we're ten years later. Did I

Did you miss something?

Yeah. I heard you say 2015.

That's why

I was just curious.

That's correct.

So 2015 was a planning study.

Okay. And

the planning study is one that identifies and prioritizes different types of projects. So yes. That's okay. It

was the earlier version of the ATP at that time.

Okay. So yeah. I okay. At '23, you got 03/2005. So where what is the budget right now? Or so when was this design and implementation of applying for a grant? When was that budget, money appropriated or

determined? That so I don't have the exact dates in front of me. I can come back with those precise dates, but I can give you an overview right now.

Yeah. But I'm trying to bigger picture, I'm trying to figure out how the money is being appropriated.

Yes.

And is it gonna be there? Are we gonna have enough money? Or is the initial budget was one amount, and then now it's this. And that goes back to what you were saying earlier about the ATP plan, and, and I'm just trying to figure out overall. And this is all so I apologize. No. That's okay. We're not totally getting all these pieces. And then you, so one thing I'm always concerned about is we get a budget in 2020, a time when when to do it. Now we gotta start reshuffling the money again, reappropriating money just to get to this point to get to '26.

And then we're not even sure that this project will meet the level of of fiberitization if the with the ATP plan. Is that okay? So help me. Give me a little background on ATP plan that is going to determine the trajectory of this program. But we don't have an ATP plural gram yet, so how can we determine the trajectory? Stop me if this Let me let me stop me. Stop me just long. If you get Let me

start with an overview with, how we identify and and and identify candidates for good for good grants, and how we've how we program those in the CIP. So the CIP is built out of strategic plans, out of council priorities, out of regulatory priorities. It all goes in there. It's all prioritized every two years. When an when an OBAG grant opportunity shows up, we could be anywhere in that process.

So our first thing to do is to look through the CIP for good projects that are already funded and identified as in the CIP as priorities. We did all of this work already to strategically develop a CIP every two years. So we take that as a first step. We go we look at the criteria for OBAG. We look at what is already funded, at least for design, in the CIP, and we identify identify good candidates that way.

That way, we know we're competitive with grant, requirements, and we also know that we have local funding matched already as we go into this into the project. We're not asking for council to identify funding at that beginning phase for design or for the matching funds for construction. So at that point, we've we've we've done kind of the homework. All of those projects that are that are good candidates already went through a feasibility study.

So there's money in the CIP for what you're doing right now?

There's money that was, appropriated from the CIP for design, and there's money for at

least at least Appropriated. Correct. Does that mean it's a veil? Yes. Okay. Because sometimes one word means that, yeah, it's there, but good. Okay. So you you got the budgeted oh, okay. Anybody could cut me. So you got the 2015, I was mayor in 2015.

And so I'm trying to think back of what was decided back in 2015 is still appropriate in twenty twenty, twenty five. And when Allison mentioned the traffic count of this, again, reserved where it's not I'm asking myself how they're gonna do they really applicable? If you okay.

I I'm

spinning it now. I'll just

If I can

go with it.

If you wouldn't mind just Sure. Let me answer that. One of the pieces of your questions regarding the $3,500,000. The $3,500,000 was the grant fund components. As part of the grant application, the city was required to come to the table with matching funds. We did. We came to the table with, roughly $1,500,000 of matching funds

for total project budget

of approximately $5,000,000. Any cost escalations or additional scope elements or cost rise is borne by the city. The grant is for $3,500,000 and not to exceed. Anything beyond that, the city needs to provide the matching grant. So we identify the $1,500,000. We appropriate that to the CIP, which means it's actually sitting in the CIP for this project, and we're spending a component of it for design as, physical. So I hope that kinda gives you some more clarity there.

Can I can I add some context

as well? Always add context.

Is that alright? Appreciate it. Yeah. So in 2015, the bikeway feasibility study that was produced, that said in 2015, this is how we in Mountain View want our bicycle network to look like. Right? We have certain streets that are arterial streets. They don't have bike lanes. We want bike lanes on these streets. You know? With this is how we anticipate a bicyclist to be able to get around town. That was our planning document. Right? That sets the foundation for us to actually be able to go out and get grants. Or as we repave streets, we look take opportunities and say, oh, look. We can we can do something easy here with some striping.

Right? That's our that's our planning document. It is fully our intent to bring in this project within the available budget. So that means the local match that we have as well as the grant monies that we have. So the consultant is aware of this number. Right? They've been fully aware all along from concept, and they'll be aware. We'll make sure they're continue to be aware throughout design that this is our our limit, and that's our it's our intent. The nice thing about this particular project is you can see, you know, there's sort of layers upon how we do this. Right?

The first layer is repave and put down some striping. The second layer is put in some vertical elements. If there are abilities, on the staff side, if it looks like there's some crazy escalation in paint or whatever, right, coming up, that we can make some adjustments to still deliver the intent of the project, which is majority class four bike lanes on the facility, class two at pinch points, but still deliver the intent of that project, at the end of the day. And, again, we don't wanna meet or we don't not said that wrong. We don't want to jeopardize, free grant money that's coming into the city, and we don't want to delay this project until the ATP is done because that project is not scheduled to be completed until '26.

So that would set us a full year behind, on design, and then we would be in jeopardy of loss of those free grant funds.

So you answered one of my questions because it sounded like you mentioned that this process was gonna have to wait for the ATP to prioritize it. You're saying we're gonna move ahead without having to worry about the AT.

We we are seeking your recommendation tonight to the council as a whole body to proceed with final design, creation of plan specs and estimates with the intent to go out to construction bidding. If the ATP comes up with a different different vision for what this corridor should look like, at least what we're implementing right now is sort of a first incremental step. We can come to that other vision sometime in the future. But it will have backlinks. It's a good thing.

So in 2015, they identified certain aspects of this. Has it how often has it been updated the vision of anticipation of what this is gonna be? Because I know when we were back at 2015 and so forth, we were looking at a bus lane going up shoreline, which was then, therefore, eliminating the exit onto S R 85. So does this have anything to do so with that expecting more traffic come this way if the bus lane is, continued on? By the way, is it paused, or is it the one the, you know, directional bus line up showing line?

It's a future unfunded phase.

Correct. The the center run fund, phase along with the closure of the S R 85 is is is unfunded at this point. So we'll deliver the other parts of the portions of the project. To go back to your your your original part of the first part of the question. So the project was scoped in '22. The the Okay. The study the study was done in '15 to identify the corridor as a priority. The scoping was done in '22 just as we were developing the grant application.

Okay. So was it studied with the anticipation that if '85 exit was eliminated, that the traffic would increase on the street?

We're not proposing a a road diet so that it it was never considered, a restriction. And I think the the important thing that we were anticipating was expanding the pot the left turn pocket onto the onto the on ramp in in this location, which could still be done. Yeah.

Okay. That's I'll always yeah. That's fine. Thank you. So does any members of the would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person would like to comment on this item? If so, please click the raised hand button in Zoom or post electing. We will take in person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes.

Hi. I'm Phil Lecter. So I live over in, Wagon Wheel, and I work at Moffett. And so I I ride this road pretty much every day, and I I walk in private pretty regularly. Because of the return to work thing, they was the heaviest traffic I've ever seen, so I'm sort of getting to, your question.

I just hit these are just sort of sort of random points as we're discussing here. The, paved there's a there's a funny paved path that's off to the side. So there's the sidewalk between Leong and 101. I don't know if that's, like, legitimate. It goes, like, 80%

of

the way between Leong and Leong, and then it just sort of stops in the middle of no place. And I don't know. That's probably not something you can incorporate at this phase because of your funding constraints, but it might be something that,

I don't

could be incorporated at some point. It's a little bit removed from the road, so it might be a bit byte path or sidewalk or something. Going over one zero one, you talk about seams. The there's this cement to asphalt as you go north where you have, like, one foot of cement, and then you get asphalt, and it's yeah. There's a lip, and it's sort of unpleasant to ride on.

Probably the place I most fear riding is when I'm going the other direction, southbound, or the 85, and the cars are coming from behind you and want to turn in front of you to and the other thing, you you're talking about the different barriers

you could have.

And so you did a little reconstruction there on Leon, and they have those little plastic sticks up on here. I don't know what you called. But those things are just always knocked over, which doesn't make me feel great because I'm just knocking him over. But, but yeah. So I I don't know that that's a great, you know, barrier there. So those are those are just thoughts that I had as as you guys were discussing this. Thank

you. Next, please.

Hi. So my name is Daniel Hulse. I work at, NASA Ames Research Center. I'm not here to represent them any official way, but just as a person who uses this bike infrastructure regularly since about 2019, I'm really glad that this is actually getting looked at from a bike perspective, and I very much like the, you know, the protected elements, the amount of space that you're giving the cyclist and and all of that. I think there's some really good intent there.

However, there is one problem of the existing bike lane that stays in this design that is going to drive me crazy over the next however long until it gets repaved again, if it doesn't get fixed. And that is that, if you are going into the center, you cross, you you have cars crossing over the bike lane in order to turn onto the highway at which point they're going to go really, really fast. And so that this is just an incredibly dangerous situation, and it's unavoidable. There are a lot of other, like, unsafe things that you can avoid. You can't avoid that.

And it's exacerbated by the fact that you've got a light on both sides where you have to stop and then, like, ride up a hill, which is the overpass. And then you get to the top of the overpass, and all of a sudden, you're going fast, and it's pushing you straight into this intersection at a higher rate of speed than you probably wanna go, and that light is gonna, like, turn off. It's gonna turn red, like, immediately. This happens all the time. Right?

And you've got these cars at that intersection that are merging over you. So what I would really if there is one thing that you fix about this and you can fix, I would like you to address the deal, and there are many different ways of doing this, of the cars having to go into a, like, turn lane over the bikes. If there's a way to get the bikes over to the side, that's great. If you do my idea and have a cycle track on one side where you can go both ways and totally skip, I think that's a great idea too. But please fix that because, you know, I don't think you're gonna immediately change this when you have an active transportation plan.

It's gonna be twenty more years till you repave again, and I would like you to fix this. Thanks.

Thank you.

Okay. Do we have anybody virtually who would like to speak with us?

Yes. Bruce Englund. Thank you. Hi, everybody. Bruce England, Wisman Station Drive. There's been a lot of discussion among community members about the nature of this project that I want to comment on. I also want to say that at the BPAC meeting last week, even though the bulk of what they commented on wasn't in the staff report that you looked at. They really spent a lot of time considering the different elements that might be considered for this project, including drawing from public comment. So they did talk about doing a potential road diet in there. That can be a reduction in the number of lanes.

It can be the lane width, including 10 feet for the inner lane, not 11 feet. But what we see regularly in Moundview, unfortunately, is still a focus on making life okay for vehicle drivers and less so for people who are walking and biking and yet we're moving in a direction where we're we have an active transportation plan being developed and. We want to have a healthier Community than we might have today, and the way to do that is to emphasize the active transportation elements. So it certainly was disappointing to see the way that this project played out, where it really looks like the focus was primarily on making life better for vehicle drivers over active transportation. I will say, though, that it's great to see this project.

It's just the request through be packed to ask the questions about whether the funding or the grants would be compromised due to some changes, you know, particular changes. It's reasonable for those questions to be asked. It doesn't mean that people are kind of putting the kibosh on the project. They're saying we should really have solid answers to these questions from those who are providing the grant money and other funding. That's it for me. Thank you.

Thank you, Bruce. We appreciate your questions to us. Hopefully, we got them answered for you. I will now anyone else would like to speak virtually?

Yes. Caleb Adams. Caleb?

Hi. Can you hear

me? Yes.

Sorry. Sometimes these things take a second for us to get audio. Yes. I've been working in Mountain View for about four years now. Five years, actually. I in Mountain View for four years. And I bike into NASA every day from just around the downtown area, from the Caltrain station and the downtown area. And this path you've identified is the only way to obviously do that. No one's gonna go twenty five minutes out of their way to go to that gate, which, by the way, with the return to office orders, is the primary gate the only gate to go through. So people are going to do that.

And I've seen many, many coworkers so I go in all the time. That's just by the nature of my work. But I've seen many coworkers now coming in and biking in, including today. And one of them was like, oh, I'll follow you along this route. And I said, it kinda sucks.

It's not great. And, you know, there's a few points along this that I've had really close calls with over the last four years, five years biking through. One is under the bridge where I didn't necessarily see that you had a protected lane there. I've had somebody cut me off at exiting highway speed and and stop in front of me and then be on their phone without noticing that I was going under the bridge as a cyclist. That's an incredibly dangerous situation if we don't have a protected bike lane under that bridge.

The second area is going over the other bridge that, someone already mentioned. You spend all this time biking up to the top, and then you start coasting down. And I'll tell you what I do. I actually barely move going down that bridge because that light is on such a hair trigger that if if it's green and I go and I'm at the top of the bridge, I'll have too much speed going through the next intersection to stop before a car hits me. So I actually approach it slowly knowing that it's about to turn red and then stop when the light's green, which is also still dangerous because I'm a bicyclist in the middle of a road waiting for the light to turn red.

But I just know it's gonna turn red because I've been doing this for years. So that's incredibly dangerous. And I warned my coworker about that this morning. Funny you say you identified that one car, where those 18 spots were. I know exactly that blue SUV I bike by, like, every day. If that person has a problem with this, I will literally drop off a six pack of beer there every week for

them just

just to let us do this. And I I also just wanna say, like, look. I'm an NASA guy. I understand that changing the scope of stuff for can risk your federal funding for this. If if it comes to it, you know, just get it done. This will improve people's lives. We probably won't have another chance for something like this for four more years, five more years if you risk that federal funding. So I really support that. That's all I gotta say. Thanks for your time.

Thank you.

April Webster.

Thank you. We have a rare opportunity to shape the future of Moffett right now to build safer street that prioritizes people over cars and truly serves our community. And right now, we're at the beginning of stage of the design, and it is a critical point where public input can and should still drive meaningful change. It is a key moment in a complete streets project when community feedback plays a vital role in shaping that final design. We do not need to wait for the ATP to be done.

This is not an MTC requirement. And so far, the only feedback we've gathered was prior to the project being awarded the Obey grant. A public outreach meeting for Moffitt is overdue, and we need to and we look forward to one soon just as Caltrans did for ECR. We have a full we and we also have time. We have a full two years, in fact, to refine the design, not one.

I'm fortunate to have worked with MTC for the past two years as the cochair of their active transportation working group, and I worked directly with the MTC Complete Street policy lead. And I reached out to the MTC OBAG three grant manager, Thomas Arndt, this past week about the deadlines. And he said, I quote, the obligation deadline for OBAG three funds is January 2027, which means that the city should start construction by early twenty twenty seven, not 2026. If stat city staff decide to pursue a traffic count or anything else as part of the track project development but have concerns about meeting the grant deadline, they can follow-up with MTC staff directly to discuss the timeline. The OBAG three deadline should not prevent the city from reevaluating and or modifying the project design to address public input.

If a road date has been put on the table, but if it's infeasible, we really should at least follow modern design standards. Even Caltrans is upgrading ECR with bike lanes that follow 2024 DIB 94 standards. They have 10.5 inner lanes, and then for the outer lanes, it's 11 feet. They don't you don't need the inner lanes even on a busy commercial street like ECR. You only need the outer lane for, buses, garbage trucks, and large trucks. This is from VTA. This is from Caltrans. We do not need 11 on the inner. And, and we also should address the unsafe speed on, which is 40 miles per hour on ECR. We should do that now.

Even sorry. On Moffett, ECR is even lower at 35 miles per hour. And AB 43, which was passed in 2021, allows reduction without having to meet the eighty fifth percentile rule. So we should definitely drop it. And right now, our priorities seem a little bit off that we're doing pavement and then thinking about bike lanes. This funding is for a Complete Streets project, not repaving, not just repaving. And we are recipients of the coveted OBAG three funding. It is our responsibility to ensure that we create infrastructure that is complete as possible. Thank you so much for the opportunity.

Thank you, April. Yes.

Celia Pamer.

How many do we have in the queue?

One more after Celia. Hi.

Yeah. I'm Celia Pamer, fifteen year resident of Mountain View, and I agree with everything that April just said. Second it, I have to say I'm I'm really disappointed with sort of the lack of community input on this project. There's a single meeting. People who know me know I will laugh often when people complain about lack of community input because a lot our staff does a really great job of doing community input, but somehow seems like this project kinda slipped through the cracks, and we haven't had a lot of chance to give input.

In fact, the only meeting was in the summer when a lot of people were out of town. And so I hope that we do do that. I think there is interest in a road diet, and it should be fully considered. That street has very low traffic levels. Even before COVID, I used to always take that route back when I drove up from San Jose as my commute, and I always took that route because there was very little traffic there.

So, I don't think it's just low because of COVID. It's always been low along that route. And I hope we we really put people first and really make it a Complete Streets project. I said at the BPAC meeting, I'm really shocked that this design met Complete Streets standards and expectations for a grant because to me, it looks like paint. Even plastic bollards, they're not protection.

And I'm sort of curious because I heard in passing that these were called class four bike lanes. But with the number of conflicts, I'm pretty sure they can't be called that. A class four bike lane has to have I I don't know the exact standard, but a certain amount of, like, protection from conflicts. And so I'd be curious to see if they actually met those standards. So, yeah, I would like to see this die design be people first instead of car first. And, hopefully, we can, upgrade it and make it even better. Thank you.

Thank you.

There are more hips in.

Okay.

Valerie Fenwick.

Hi there. Valerie Fenwick, over twenty year resident of Mountain View over in Rex Manor. I will, admit that I mostly only ride this part of Moffett, for connecting with the Stevens Creek Trail, and that would usually be exiting just the way that it's configured. But I I do bike there a lot. I also drive there, like one of the other speakers said, just because it is so low traffic.

If that's how I wanna get to Highway 85 or 101, I will actually come all the way over from I live West Of Shoreline, and I will come all the way over there to, kinda just be away from the traffic and the craziness. So, I really appreciate considerations here. I don't wanna do anything that could risk funding, but if there are potential opportunities for a road diet or any other additional, like, curb cuts or bike lane improvements, in particular lighting improvements for any under the bridges, I think as much as we I think Big Pack gave really great and specific actionable feedback that seemed like it would be doable with within the scope. I understand why we do this as part of a repaving project because a lot of the, well, a, the pavement there is really bad. I drive on it.

It's really bad. So I understand that if we're gonna be repaving anyway to get bike improvements out of it and pet improvements is really important. So any of the side there's a one sidewalk gap that is being addressed as part of this project. There is one that is not, and anything that can be done to get those complete sidewalks because those of you who walk know it's a lot longer to go out of your way to cross the street down another intersection than it is to do on your bike or with a car. So really, really, I don't wanna delay anything here, but if it is possible to reconsider any of those great recommendations from the VPAC or lane reductions, road diet, or anything else that we can consider here would be greatly appreciated.

I'm looking really forward to having actual bike lanes through more of this corridor. So thank you.

Thank you, Valerie. Hope to see you on the performing arts committee. Fingers crossed.

May I read?

Good evening. I'm glad that this route's gonna be improved to be made safer. I just wanna echo well, I wanna repeat, I guess, a request that I made at the BPAC meeting. And I'm bringing it up not just for this project. Possibly, it's not gonna fit within the budget or the timeline.

But when it's possible when it's impossible to have a buffer between the the cars and the bikes, I would like to see more consideration given to raised bike lanes. Because raising the bike lane doesn't take any width away from the road, but it separates the cyclists from the from the cars. I think that's pretty important. So in the places where we have pinch points here, I guess I wonder if that's an opportunity. I also wanna suggest, agree with what was said earlier about having the, middle lanes, not necessarily have to be 11 feet wide.

That would give a little bit more space to the cyclist also. Thank you. And I'm just again, I'm making the comment about the raised lane, not just for this project, but I I think we need to be start thinking about future projects in the in the same way to see if that's an option. Thank you.

Thank you, Mary. And

that is all for the raised hands.

Oh. Yeah. Good.

So we have one in person.

She Marys. Not the same person.

I hop on the end

of the queue.

Yes. Eli

Hess, Fairhaven Court. Just want to echo what a couple other community members have said about supporting the move away from car centric infrastructure, whether that's through a road diet. I'm really making sure that this is a place that people can bike and want to bike, because many of us use it every day. Thank you very much. Appreciate what you do. And if you have to get it done, get it done however you can.

Thank you. Thank you for coming out tonight. Okay. Thank you all. I will now bring this item back for the committee comments.

So

with all this

community input, I'm wondering whether I'm wondering I wanna get this moving forward, but I'm wondering which things that we've heard from the community we could incorporate much as as feedback made sort of a list of items. In particular, some of the things that I've heard well, I'll start off by saying I would love to have raised bike lanes. I don't I'm thinking that probably wouldn't fit into the budget, but I'm glad it was drawn up, because I think, just as Ms. Gadio said, they are a good way of, making people safer, feel more comfortable biking without needing

a

lot of horizontal room for that. Or she need money for it. But but I would like to have that as part of, you know, the language that we use and the thoughts that we have when we do these things. So I'm wondering here's some of the things I'm wondering about, and I'm wondering if you can tell me which ones are,

you

know, possible and not possible in the the short term. One would be, making the inner lane 10 and a half feet instead of 11 to give a little more room to the, sidewalk or and or bikes to, particularly, the bike lane because, you know, they're bicycling next to fast traffic. So that's one question. Another is fixing the difficult interchanges that people brought up. It would making that one lane a little narrower.

I don't know that that would help. There was a cycle track was brought brought up that sounds like more of a major change, but you've hit that wrong. Or any other ideas you might have to make those interchanges safer. So road diet for inner inner lane, fixing the interchanges in any way. Somebody brought a community member brought up to me quick curbs instead of plastic bowlers. I don't know if that's possible, so that's

a third third one.

And then somebody said something about making a left turn pocket deeper.

I don't

know if that's important or possible. And I guess the last one is the last one is, would it be possible to have a community meeting at this point? Or so those so those are my

five things

Thank you.

That I'd like to know, you know, in response to what the what the the community has brought up.

Are you asking staff to get back to you or wait till we get to counsel?

I'd like to know if any of those like, if the five things, if any of them are easy to do and could be added kind of in the way BPAC made their list, and then staff honed it down to a shorter list.

Let me start. I'll you back to Let's start.

So we're happy to look at the interlanguets, unless I see some conflict with pinch points or obedience or something like that. I think that's an Okay. That's an easy one to to give direction to our design staff. The quick curves, we the the examples that we gave in the slides were, were typical examples like flexible posts, but there are a lot of variety of vertical elements that we can incorporate. We're using we're we're delivering multiple different types of vertical elements on California.

Mhmm. So we could act easily look at other options for this one. So the the community feedback was was heard very clearly that flexible posts. Once they're knocked down, there's no protection there. It's it's a visual element as much as as as a physical barrier, we could we could make those more robust. Yeah. Some of these would require evaluation, which makes it much more challenging to incorporate in incorporate it to the budget. So for example, the 101 Interchange, that's a Caltrans facility.

We need we would need

to work with them on any proposed changes there. One of the proposed changes was moving the bike lane to the other side of the right turn lane. That is also an uncomfortable position for cyclists to be in. Maybe this is maybe this is something that needs to be taken back to to our consultants and discuss further, discuss with transportation, discuss with traffic, so we we get, staff's involvement in some of that discussion.

K. I guess the last one, is it worth having a community meeting to talk about more robust, solid type things or fixing the interchange? Yes.

Ed Arango again. I was going through your list. You noted five items. I caught a sixth one in between there. I I I think you might have skipped over. Just wanna clarify the cycle track.

Well, that was a way of, I think, a way of dealing with the interchange of Understood. Right? Maybe I did find you.

Yes. A cycle track component as part of this project would be a major scope change.

Yeah. That's what

I So it's more on the infeasible side than it is on the feasible side for us to do that. And then, you mentioned sorry. For school, engineer Gonzalez mentioned the interchange. Left turn pocket deeper. I'm

not sure if staff maybe

you can clarify.

So I mentioned that. I don't know if you got a public comment on that. When I mentioned it, it that is a more car centric

It is.

Mitigation based on the development of the bus lane project. If the bus lane project is on hold, we wouldn't necessarily need that for increased left turn traffic on to 85. So that that that doesn't really fit into the bike centric theme here, but that was what I was that was my intent was to at least acknowledge that that was at one point a project element for the ship for the bus lane project. We didn't include that in the here.

I know it's a problem I've had as I drive around that I feel like I'm blocking traffic because I can't get into the pocket. So I'm not in the lane I should be, and I'm blocking other people, and it's backing up traffic. And it is a

good thing. Fair. Okay.

And then you had a question about community meeting.

Yes.

Did you wanna try?

Would that be worth it to talk about more robust, pollards and so forth, or do you feel like we've gotten to the end of what we can do with with this?

Based on what we heard today, I see value in the community.

So I think I just wanna clarify. Staff presented the project to feedback last week as you heard. We're here tonight for CTC. We're getting a lot of community feedback. Actually, I wanna take the approach that this is a part of the community input process. We've gotten a lot of good feedback.

Right now.

Yeah. And we've evaluated did an initial evaluation just based on feedback. All the comments you're hearing from the public tonight were echoed at the feedback, and we wanted to take an initial pass at what if our evaluation is of this and what is feasible that won't cause project delays, budget concerns, and then, again, jeopardizing the grant. And so the three elements were that we looked at, can you speak to those?

Budget.

Sorry. The three elements that we evaluated that we can evaluate, which already spoken to

is Narrowing the one lane.

Right. We're gonna evaluate that.

Looking at more robust

Vertical elements.

Something more robust than the plastic bowl. Yeah. Vertical elements. And

The weaving. Yeah. Bike weave. The bike weave. And then as part of B PACK, we also noted there's elements from the b pack feedback that you dodge that spoke to I'm going off memory here. The adding curb ramps as part of the project. They've brought up the weaving as well. Advanced stop bar, they'd like to see advanced stop bars in front at the intersection locations to stop cars ahead of the crosswalks. Mhmm.

Adding curb ramps at the Stevens Creek northbound exit as at the intersection with Moffett to make it easier for cyclists to weave right into the bike lane rather than having to exit into directly into traffic, and then also adjusting the bike lane configuration at right turns, in particular at the Liang Intersection. That was identified as a as a kind of a scary intersection as a cyclist, a lot of stress, and that is a free turn movement for for cars going on the right direction. So looking at that configuration, if that could be made more safe for

you or Michael for side hoists.

Yeah. So I was assuming that so I if I were to make a motion and if I were to hope for council member McCallister's support, I would say I would support all the changes that that you value that BPAC suggested and that you said were were feasible. And I would add making the inner lane 10 and a half instead of 11 feet to give more room and safety to bicyclists or active transportation, looking at more robust vertical elements, and seeing if there's any way to improve the I mean, maybe you're calling it the bike wave, but the one zero one interchange. Those would be the three things I did add.

We only want to be sure that we provide some flexibility that we can evaluate those elements.

To evaluate those.

To really make sure that they make sense.

Yeah. Those are the three I would add to evaluate.

Okay. My comments are gonna be much less and much more confused. So I'm getting back on my horse here and trying to figure out everything, but, I'm all in favor of moving this project forward. I do hear I do see some, hurdles that are will have to be worked out, the timing, the, integration of the funding and so forth, and the just the internal mechanism of how you're gonna get to this project. I'm also concerned a little bit that we don't know exactly what we're gonna do on Shoreline, if that will have an effect on this because it would have a major effect If traffic is closed off, you're gonna get a lot more cars going through there so that even though we're gonna have bike lanes, we still probably have increased traffic.

And so back to council member Hicks' thing was their traffic count. I mean, a count of actually how many people are using this street.

That could be a priority.

I mean, we have a lot of streets that need to be looked at over, you know, coming up off the CIP that you mentioned. And we can put a lot of time into this, and then all of a sudden say it doesn't reach where we want it to be. But that's to be determined. I've learned early on in my short time back. I've learned to trust what I've heard tonight, and I trust staff to incorporate as much as possible that's reasonable and that's financially viable.

I'm also very concerned about timelines being extended too long. I think based on what the assistant's public works director said and some other things, public input will be continually come in. I don't know if we need another meeting. We've had three. This might be the fourth meeting. It's going forward, but they are still gonna be taking public input. Correct? Okay. I see that as a yes. And so that's what I like. So I will entertain a motion to move forward with this. Exactly what is that you're looking for on this one? To proceed with it? Do I need a reader, or we just or if someone needs it?

Oh, so we reviewed the design concept from Moapa Boulevard, Complete Streets, direct staff to advance the project into final design incorporating the proposed elements.

From that EPAC made and that you evaluated and then the three that that I made as well.

Yeah. Do want me to read those out loud?

They were just one. If staff already has them, then that's fine.

Yeah. We've got them.

Okay. Because they're only gonna be evaluated. Correct. Okay. I make the motion. You second it, or you second

second it.

Okay. Do we need a roll call to vote on this, or can we just Oh. Oh, we got script.

Let's do a roll call just to Yeah.

Are you ready to vote?

Can I take a breath?

Chair McAllister? Yes. And committee member Hicks? Yes. K. Two. For yes, member, absent.

Oh, this is you. Guess. Okay. We will now close 5.1 and move on to 5.2, a citywide transportation demand and management coordinates update. Item up two is the citywide transportation demand management coordinates update. The staff presentation will be needed. Subtitled by then. Oh, wait. And that's that transportation planner. And we'll and our transportation manager.

So now is this a is there any action or is this?

No. This is this does have an issue.

Okay.

Just a second to pull up the

Good evening,

CBC members. I'm Ben Pacha. I'm a transportation planner in the public works department. Tonight, we're also joined by Dana Pencioli, the city's principal planner, and the transportation manager. We're also here representing city staff in the project.

And joining us virtually, we have, Julia Wein, associate at Steer Group, and Natalie McCarville, senior consultant also with Steer. So staff is here tonight to update CTC members on its progress to develop a citywide TDM ordinance with city council identified as a strategic priority in fiscal years 2023 to 2025. For context, the basis for TDM and Mountain View was first established in the the 2030 general plan that in turn gave rise to the specific TDM provisions that are required in the city's precise plans and sustainability action plans. The TDM ordinance also seeks to align with existing policies used for development review such as the city's MTA handbook and BMT screening analysis that are important for understanding transportation impacts related to CEQUA and setting required chip reductions under greenhouse gas emissions reduction program or GGRB. Currently, TDM requirements have been imposed in absence of a citywide TDM ordinance.

This has resulted in a piecemeal approach and varying levels of chip reduction targets as seen on the bottom left legend. The TDM strategies required of these existing projects have also been non standardized, which the TDM ordinance seeks to address by improving the TDM planning process and selection of measures. Reviewing the project's work plan, staff is in the current project phase to focus on developing the ordinance framework seen here in blue. We previously brought the project vision and tools to c to CDC in 2024 members had voiced their support for the project's objectives. Particularly, members had voiced their support, to focus on building and flexibility into the TDM strategies to reflect hybrid work and ensure TDM requirements stay with the development.

Members were also interested in using metrics to count overall trips versus just peak hour trips as a way to address greenhouse gas emissions from transportation and reduce overall VMT. Next steps after tonight will include finalizing the framework elements in late spring, and staff will then begin work on drafting ordinance language for council adoption in 2025. And to set the stage a bit, staff is breaking the following recommendation to CDC, which is for members to review and recommend the proposed framework for the transportation man management ordinance to the city council. As we'll soon discuss, the framework elements will include the average daily trip reduction targets, the tedium toolkit of strategies, and provisions for monitoring and enforcement. Over the course of the project, staff has engaged key stakeholders and advisory bodies to get a broad understanding of current practice with TDM, as well as how requirements could be further streamlined and made more effective under the ordinance.

For example, key insights were gathered from the Downtown Business Association and the TMA, including a host of one on one interviews with developers, employers, property managers, and community members. Also, at January's community workshop, staff heard from members of the public who voiced support for on demand services like microtransit and potential cash incentives to increase active transportation, like by commuting to workplaces in lieu of driving. Collectively, the input gathered thus far has been used to guide the direction of the project project, including its vision and goals for the TDM framework. To remind everyone, staff presented the project vision to CDC in 2024 where the team ordinance will seek to reduce single occupancy vehicle trips for new development and increase use of multimodal transportation alternatives that are sustainable, equitable, effective, and respond to changing demands. The goals of the project is outlined at the bottom.

We're informed by existing conditions analysis and stakeholder input. Most notably, the project vision helped to guide development of the TDM framework. The various framework elements can be distilled into three key policy areas seen here, including applicability at the top, and this touches on who will be required to comply and what criteria used to screen projects subject to the ordinance. Secondly, requirements as seen in the second row, this section concerns what key metrics projects will be subject to for compliance purposes as well as how they will be how they will demonstrate their intent to comply by submitting a TDM plan. And thirdly, at the bottom, we have monitoring and enforcement.

This addresses how staff and key stakeholders will effectively monitor the ongoing effectiveness of TDM performance as well as consider enforcement mechanisms to support compliance. At a high level, the TDM framework seeks to operationalize TDM requirements across the project's lifespan. From the entitlement phase, when a project is sponsored by a developer, to the post occupancy phase, when the city later certifies new buildings are ready for occupancy. Moving from left to right, initial projects will be analyzed based on trip generation assumptions and estimated net new average daily trips. This would be done using the city's VMT analysis, transportation impact studies, and multimodal analysis handbook.

If proposed projects generate upwards of 200 average daily trips, they would be required to reduce vehicle trips by adopting a TDM plan. And following one year post occupancy, property owners will be required to submit an annual team report that will attest their compliance with ADT targets or face potential penalties assessed by the city. So starting at the very beginning, we'll first discuss, project applicability. The teething ordinance, once adopted, will apply to new projects seek seeking entitlements by discretionary approval by city council. Projects will will be reviewed on the basis of expected trip generation assumptions and potential to generate over 200 plus net new average daily trips.

Such project review is consistent with the city's VMT policy and multimodal handbook. Additionally, on the right, the current regulatory environment is such that state and regional laws require employers with more than 50 employees to provide TDM resources, which typically include commuter benefits and parking cash out incentives. It's intended the citywide TDM ordinance will support these employers in meeting such state and regional TDM requirements. Additionally, it's important to note that all TDM requirements under the ordinance will fall to the landowner and run the land as may be triggered by a change of ownership or in case of sale. For those existing projects, landowners or properties that were entitled prior to adoption of the TDM ordinance may participate in the TDM program on a voluntary basis.

And for question two, this addresses what land use categories will be subject to the ordinance. This may include multifamily residential and nonresidential projects anticipate anticipated to generate over 200 net new average daily trips for ADT. For typical nonresidential projects seeking entitlements, this may include office, medical, retail, restaurants, industrial, and manufacturing. Furthermore, a mixed use residential project may be accepted from the ordinance if its proposed retail space is less than 50,000 square feet, and this is to be consistent with the city's VNT screening process. Staff, with project consultants have used standard trip generation rates to estimate average daily trip volumes based on various criteria.

For guidance, the project team used the Institute of Transportation Engineers trip generation manual by ITE, and this is the most commonly referenced and utilized practical guidance for predicting vehicle trip rates. For example, a small project small office project rather of 30,000 square feet will typically fall within 200 to four so 499 average daily trips. And for medium sized projects, roughly for office of 45,000 square feet typically fall within the 500 to nine hundred and nine eighty two range. And for large office projects over 90,000 square feet, this would fall in the 1,000 plus ADT. And these trip generation assumptions by project size are consistent with the city's existing MTA handbook MVMT policy used for assessing transportation impacts.

And question four, what TDM performance metrics will apply? Average daily trips or ADT as a metric standardizes the city's approach to reduce single occupancy vehicle to from new developments. Furthermore, ADT is comprehensive in its methodology to gather vehicle trip data beyond peak times and reflect evolving travel patterns, post COVID. It also aligns with the city's s b seven forty three policy of reducing total VNT and associated greenhouse gas emissions. Projects will be required to implement tedium strategies that reduce ADT to the following levels.

30% reduction in ADT for small for small projects relative to ITE trip generation rates, 40% ADT reduction for medium sized projects, and 50% ADT reduction for large projects. Such thresholds were informed by the city's existing precise plans as well as case studies of similar TV programs in San Francisco, San Mateo County, Redwood City, and San Jose. Prior to entitlement, prospective applicants will required to submit a TDM plan for city review. Specifics of the TDM plan will then be included in the conditions of approval preceding adoption by council. In this proposed framework, TDM plans will be comprised of three types of strategies.

Starting from the left, mandatory strategies will provide a supportive structure necessary to implement TDM, and this may involve submitting, required annual reporting and providing city contact or providing the city contact details with the site's project manager. Whereas whereas core strategies in the middle, offer an array of flexible, proven trip reduction strategies that applicants may select from to develop the project's TDM plan. Some examples of core strategies are transportation subsidies and vanpool incentives. And lastly, auxiliary measures there on the right, when paired with core strategies are complementary and more effective at reducing trips. Some examples of auxiliary strategies are way finding improvements and transportation related marketing events.

And, this chart gives a sense of the range of strategies across project sizes. And then as an important programming, attachment to this report includes a detailed list of TDM strategies and their estimated levels of trip reduction. And now moving into the monitoring elements of the framework, this slide illustrates the various reporting activities that projects would be responsible for, which are organized based on project size. As you'll note, the burden of monitoring activities is less for smaller projects, and this is meant to reflect feedback that staff has received, given that smaller projects typically have fewer resources to comply with ongoing monitoring requirements. And to support compliance efforts, staff has proposed pathways to enforcement on account of projects failing to either provide the required annual reports and or the or and or meeting the required ADT targets.

Note, small projects will not be assessed a penalty for not achieving its 30% ADT reduction target, and this is meant to reflect the proportion of impact to size of penalty. And the proposed penalty structure does reflect existing practices, which have been imposed on projects already entitled. Furthermore, the penalties will apply based on project size and will be in proportion with the level of noncompliance with the ADT target. And an important note there on the bottom, staff is currently working on developing alternative methodology, to calculate a penalty based on the number of trips in excess of the ADT target. So staff will further develop, this approach in coordination with stakeholders.

And for next steps, following tonight's CDC meeting and input gathered, staff will present the recommended TDM framework in a council study session in June. And upon finalizing the TDM framework, staff will set about drafting ordinance language, for council adoption, which is, tentatively scheduled for 2025. So this ends my formal presentation and moves us into CTC consideration of staff's recommendation, which is to review and recommend the proposed framework to the city council, And we welcome members' feedback

and input at this

time. Thank you. Councilmember Hicks, any questions?

I do have questions. And I have to apologize. I'll say I think I was here during I was on this committee. Was it the sustainability committee? It was this committee when went over it, Christian.

Right. We brought the draft vision and goals to CDC in early twenty twenty four.

Okay. So it was this committee, not the sustainability committee. It seems like it applies to both. So, you know, I both love this concept, and I'm also kind of confused by it. So I'm gonna ask some background questions. I I guess my big question is, do do we find that these strategies I mean, you say there are lists I didn't look at the list of strategies and impact. Do they really have the do they generally you know, in the projects in Mountain View or ones you've benchmarked with in other cities, do they really have the thirty, forty, and 50% impact?

Yes. They can. They can if if they're implemented in a way that is thoughtful.

I see. Do you know anything like what percentage of them do, or or maybe another way of asking it is when you say thoughtfully, what are the thoughtful ways and the the thoughtless ways of it?

The thoughtful ways of implementing it are when companies embrace it as part of their core mission or something that is meaningful to the company. So for example, Genentech embraced their TDM strategies, and it was part of on on the regulatory side, it was there was a trip cap on the freeway on ramps, but on their side, they were able to reduce the cost of parking supply. And so the company, you know and and also provide commuter benefits that they found to be meaningful to their employees. And so they Can you tell

me how that works? How do you reduce your parking supply? That's something you have to do when you're building the project.

So as they move forward

and see, you don't need it. Yeah.

So as they move forward and were planning development for growth

I see. Development for growth.

They were able to provide less parking because they demonstrated that they had reduced their trip generation on, you know, per square foot or whatever. So yeah. And so having kind of that internal and I think that Google, Intuit, they provide very thoughtful TDM in Mountain View, Stanford, obviously, in Palo Alto. There's a lot of companies that have

So those are the two I always hear about, but I wonder about the, you know, about other companies. I got those.

I'm I'm sure that there are other ones that Great.

I would say the test that we could look at are the TMA members Mhmm. Have been widely successful. That's who we've imposed team requirements on consistently since we've approved their entitlements. And so we have seen from the annual team reporting that they submit on an annual basis, the levels of effectiveness that they've been able to achieve and the the mode shift from getting people out of cars to using more sustainable modes of transportation. And in North Bay Shore where we have more stringent teaming requirements, it's been really successful.

So Google, for example, they run a a private commuter shuttle. And historically, pre COVID, about 35 of their employees would take the private shuttle system, and then a mix would take it take incentives for active transportation for bike commuting, and then also use a number of incentives for vanpool and carpool. So collectively, when they stack those measures, they do achieve a significant chip reduction and non SOV mode share. And so this would be intended with the ordinance to kind of standardize a lot of these requirements for the trip reduction side of things for setting the targets, but also making wider knowledge available for the levels of for these TDM strategies because there are a number of them, and in coordination, tend to complement others when they're implemented in a thoughtful and meaningful way.

And and another thing I can say is that in contrast to VTA that plans for the whole region, these companies know the exact origins and destinations of their commuters, of their of their affiliates. So whether that's their contract workers, their employees, their students, or whoever those affiliates are. And so they're able to really target their strategies and put a van pull exactly where they know that there's a This is the larger companies, you're saying, not the smaller. Well, companies have that information for their employees. So even smaller companies can can pinpoint things that they wouldn't have as many people, but they have that information as opposed to, like, public agencies where we are basing it on more general information for the region.

And what about apartments or residential? They don't have that kind of information. Do you

have different They may not have as much information on the on the destination side. Right. Yeah. So do you

have different goals for them?

Residential projects, the TD measures might look differently. Mhmm. So depending on the annual reporting that they submit, it might be that a number of occupants don't own cars at all. So in that case, providing transit subsidies would probably make more sense or providing on-site car share where, you know, cars could be rented out on a daily basis or weekly basis. Providing those kind of options to supplement car ownership would probably be more of a a meaningful option for those. So the idea is to provide, like, a robust list of TDM strategies for all types of developments to kind of pick and choose and mix and match based on the variety of of occupants that we're finally

There are good examples of residential in Mountain View as well. So I'm thinking, for example, Madera Apartments near the transit center. They have a carpool on-site. They have a range of different strategies. I'm not sure what they all are now. I knew them a few years ago, but they might have changed. But they had demonstrated lower levels of vehicle trip generation and parking. Okay.

Thank you for updating me on that. I have more questions. But because I'd heard of the success of Google and the shuttles, but other you know, I'm not as familiar with other and Stanford, other places. And I'm interested also on mixed use. You said it would possibly be exempt. I could think of reasons why. I mean, you want like, certain uses will generate a lot of super parties. You know, a lot of people driving and leaving throughout the day. But can you explain more to me the expand on that a little more so I understand how mixed use would be treated?

Right. So a residential project that has a mixed use component of, say, like, a shell site of 50,000 square feet that's for retail, the idea is that those are mutually supported uses and that a number of those trips would be internalized within the project site itself. So it wouldn't generate beyond an excess. If you were to expand the size of that use, it actually could, because it could attract more regional travel behavior. And in that case, beyond 50,000 square feet, TDA requirements would be imposed on that use as well. But less than that 50,000 square feet, it would just be the residential portion that would need to provide a TDM plan based on its ADT trip check.

Seems like to some degree, would be an incentive for sometimes they don't wanna include the the mixed use component, and that that also reduces trips within the whole neighborhood.

Right.

You The drugstore or whatever Mhmm. On the Ground Floor. People who live nearby not in that apartment might be able to walk, okay,

or

bike. So there were BPAC had a bunch of questions. Let's see. They that I didn't fully understand. They requested the ordinance support and incorporate VTA efforts currently underway to establish an equitable VMT program mitigation program for Santa Clara County. What is that?

So this is a current effort that's being developed by VTA, and it's to establish, as we mentioned, an equitable VMT mitigation program. So they've done an extensive engagement process to understand, in areas of high need, what types of trip reduction strategies would be most helpful for them. And from So there

they might be different strategies in those places.

And I think the ones that they were able to hone in on were BAMP incentives, subsidies to purchase ebikes, and transit improvements. Now the option would be for enough of jurisdictions to opt in to participate that developers in any of and within Santa Clara County would be able to mitigate their VMT and opt into VTA's program and pay into either using a VMT bank or a VMT exchange. The specifics haven't been really full it been fully fleshed out yet. It's still kind of in its conceptual phase. So I think the comment for me was to opt into the system once it becomes once it goes online, essentially.

As of right now, it's it's hasn't been fully fledged yet. But we are participating in talks and negotiations, and we'll bring it to council once once we're ready to have that study session and fully flesh out what those applications would be as of right now.

We don't have to include it in our motion. You're already doing it.

Right. Okay.

So that's fascinating. And they also some members expressed interest in information on cost implications of implementing these strategies and a concern that they might burden new development. When they expressed that interest, what did you tell them?

Oh, I can't remember what I told them, but what I would like to tell you is that I think it's important to think about where we're starting from. Because currently, we we routinely impose conditions of approval on development that include TDM requirements for sizable developments. But there's a bit of a lack of consistency, and our goal is to make it more consistent so that they can basically fill out a checklist rather than having to provide a full report. We expect that this will be less costly than our current practice. So I think that this is a cost reduction measure for developments moving forward, that it's more consistent.

It's it's more simple. We hope that it could be just submitted online and not so individualized.

The the goal is to really reduce the transaction cost because, typically, projects don't actually know where to begin with TDM. And most often, the case is they have to hire outside consultants to develop a TDM plan. And, hopefully, with the TDM toolkit, they'll just be able to turn to that and understand, okay. This is what my impact is. This is the reduction measures that are needed and kind of reduce the burden on on outside kind of expertise that might be needed.

So this is an important guide to kind of shore up what we already impose and make it much more transparent and and consistent. So doing that, we hope to reduce the transaction costs and also kind of increase the role of the TMA in stepping in to support the monitoring and reporting aspects so that kind of when projects are ready to occupy, they also don't need to hire consultants to to produce the reporting and and whatnot. The idea is they could rely on the TFA to kind of standardize all of that and and use somewhat of a platform so you can put all of that data. Because right now, it's just me kind of doing a lot of data entry. So it's not it's not as sophisticated as to spend all

that stuff. And they may be able to provide economies of scale as well. Would you all that sounds great. And would you also be able to inform them as, you know, this as multiple developers do this, how much they might be able to cut their parking? Is that information that this could generate over time?

So parking has been a point of interest in a lot of our engagement and understanding how this could be addressed on a site level. And there are parking measures that are included in the tedium toolkit, which are things like unbuckled parking, shared parking, and parking cash out. So these have been known to reduce trip regeneration. But beyond that, there's kind of a larger conversation that needs to happen in the city level and setting parking policy, which is how do we manage parking at the curb level and and the right of way, and how do we manage potential effects of overflow parking if none if not enough parking is provided at the site level. Right.

So, you know, coming into play are issues of, you know, price parking or residential permit programs, things like that of nature. So I believe larger conversations are happening at the city level. But

Yeah. Maybe the way I should have asked the question is, can you give us at the city more information as you see projects roll out? Like, if they do measures x y z, they really need less parking. So maybe it's me who needs that information, not not the developers.

Yeah. So

Yeah. We Diana Pancholi, principal planner with the city's planning division, we regularly see that in development projects when we are assessing what kind of parking, proposal is coming and what kind of TDM measures that they're proposing for considerable, like, sizable projects. So that is something that staff can, you know, point out when you're presenting the projects to you, putting it for council consideration.

Potential provisions here that could also include in the framework that for sizable projects over a certain size that we require some kind of parking study within the first year of occupancy to understand how parking is being utilized, whether or not parking has been provided, whether the team measures are effectively reducing demand for parking and whatnot. So that's kind of one lever we have and we're discussing, but, we need to kind of further develop in the framework.

And, occasionally, we do look at, we talk to some of our established developers in the city to kind of see how their existing projects are going. For me, it is and Serratos and others. And they provide us good information.

I don't see how they're both working together. Good. And do you see with the so we've been contacted by Waymo, and they're gonna start doing AV ride hailing. And, of course, we have Lyft and Uber already. Do you see that impacting impacting this at all?

Maybe it's no different than having Lyft and Uber available. But if it's much cheaper, then maybe I know already my family, for instance, we have two to four adults depending on which kids are home. But one small car, and we take because we can take Lyft and Uber a lot. So do you expect AVs to change, you know, reduce the need for parking or change what you're looking at here very much?

That's an excellent point. And I'll just refer to some things that have been discussed by Jeffrey Cohen who managed SFMTA, and he kind of looked at EVs as the promise of the technology to replace car ownership kind of in the way that Uber and Lyft were kind of pitched. But what we there's also concerns too that are being hedged, which is AVs are kind of being used for personal convenience at the cost of system efficiency. So Yeah. Sure.

It's AVs are something that we're watching, and it does hold promise in reducing the need for trips or car ownership per se, but we see them still generating trips in and of themselves. And the goal of the ordinance is to reduce vehicle trips. And to the extent that it's not increasing the efficiency of those trips is something that we worry about.

I think in terms of the relevance for the TDM ordinance, one thing that this conversation highlights is that when we're taking the trip counts, we've referred to them as driveway counts. Yeah. And so assuming they're coming through a driveway and parking. But I think that we wanna when we actually write the language for the ordinance, we wanna make that a little bit more expansive. So if somebody is pulling up in, you know, an AV and getting dropped off and then leaving, that's two trips, one in, one out, regardless of where they stop. So I think that we do wanna capture that in the in the counts. It may know, I think we use the term driveway counts as convenience, but we do wanna be more expansive in the in the legal.

I see that they might reduce the need for parking at apartments or the need for parking at an office, but not the number of trips that are being taken. And if you're doing driveway counts, that's where it impacts it because nobody's going in the driveway and parking, but you have the same so that's that is what my question is in terms of how will it change

it.

Yeah.

And I think that's also true for, I mean, what's going on in my neighborhood. I live a couple blocks from here. So there's a big when a big office was put in near me, the parking garage is empty or almost empty, but our streets are all parked up. Because. Nice street. Mhmm. And walk in the sun and park in a parking garage. But if you were doing driveway counts, it would look like very few people are taking their cars to the office when really many of them are. So what do you do about that, the accuracy of driveway counts, or do you just just something else?

Right. So driveway counts provide a lot of good data, but it's often corroborated with commute surveys. So we also require sites to regularly survey occupants and employees, understand what their commuting habits are. So to the extent that AVs are included as an option for how they get to work, that's kind of captured in the results so you could see among the spread of employees that are commuting in, what the distribution is across each mode. So that is hopefully uses a kind of a way to assess the validity of the driveway counts if it actually matches and whether different method methodologies need to be considered to to shore up the the driveway counts and if there needs to be field observations for really understanding how people are coming in and using the curb.

And that was a situation that you were asked actually earlier about places where there was less thoughtful TDM. So there was a there was an example in a neighboring city where a developer had submitted a TDM driveway count, which looked great, but they had told all of their employees that they didn't have a parking permit that week. And so suddenly the neighborhood was full of people parked on the street. And so the city actually, in that city the city staff actually went out and did a count of, like, basically a cordon count around the area that fed into that development and and based on that. So it wasn't strictly driveway, but it was clear that these people were going to that development.

That they hadn't cut SOV use. Yes. They were it was smart.

That was the accuracy, and I guess backing it up with the survey works. And now I'm gonna ask my evil questions. So what about so the purpose of TDM programs is to make better use of the roadway and also cut use of fossil fuels. What about incentivizing electric vehicles and compact vehicles to because compact vehicles use the road much less and electric vehicles reduce fossil fuels. But I don't see TM, you know, I don't see them addressing those in any way.

So do you have any comments?

Right. So there are twin purposes, which is the sustainability then, which is we wanna reduce transportation related greenhouse gas emissions. They typically compose around 60% of our inventories and our community generated. So we understand that bit. But, also, through our requirements through s p seven forty three to reduce VMT, We also need to understand reducing VMT is another portion. So sometimes those are opposites where EVs are still generating trips nonetheless because they are vehicles. Typically, EVs are part of the strategy, but they are the entire strategy.

Oh, so they are part of the teams?

They could be. So sometimes companies will offer preferential parking for certain types of vehicles. Typically, it's like van pools and then car pools. It might be EVs and could be compact vehicles potentially, I guess. I I actually haven't seen compact vehicles in that preferential parking, but that is a strategy.

I mean, because I mean, huge vehicles, single people in huge vehicles is, you know, in terms of road erosion. Mhmm. And anyway. So, yeah, I think it's also a matter of equity that I would encourage you easy EV charging because a lot of the a lot of the lower income people I know, particularly if they work in Mountain View, they live in San Jose or something, they're very unlikely. They may not be served by a van pool, and they may not be able you know, they may have kids that they're dropping off at childcare and multiple trips, and they're not gonna take mass transit.

But they also can't charge EVs because they live in an apartment that doesn't have EV charging. So charging at work would be the only way they could they're gonna drive, and charging work is the only place they could charge. So I think that might be comments or questions. So what do you think? That's my last one.

No. That's a great point. And EV ownership is cost prohibitive, and especially without the tax incentives that might be going away, even more so out of reach for people. So really understanding on an equity basis how can we meet those needs is an important piece of that. And so that's the whole kind of piece of the puzzle is that the TDM list of strategies is is robust enough to incorporate equity components and are off Yeah.

Now they probably would be selling their Tesla for cheap. But I would

also add that the city also has an EV an EV action plan. So that that's kind of going in parallel. That also is a council strategic priority, I think. So, yeah, that's the comment. Yeah.

Also mentioned that adoption of ebikes is higher than adoption of electric vehicles. And so to the extent that the city already on in its efforts can subsidize

Should I?

In the city, it is?

In the oh, I'm sorry. This is generally speaking, I think, in The US, but I can follow-up with a specific statistics. But would you say the city has made strides in subsidizing e bike ownership with its their program that's operated by sustainability program. We hope to support that.

Those are all my questions. Thank you.

Thank you. I remember when I hate to say I'm an old man, so I came back. A lot of TDMs started when Google started building, and I we were involved with those, and they were having traffic counts at various entries. And then if they got to a certain point, we had to we had to shut down and do different things. Reading through this, I don't it's sort of very interesting. It's very similar to what we started out back then when all these companies would come through. So I wanna start off with one question. You're looking at developments and so forth. So anybody that's existing is exempt from TDM?

Well, currently, we do impose TDM on projects we've already entitled, but there are varying requirements as far as the TDM strategies that we've set and the the various TDM measures that they've adopted. So the ordinance wouldn't apply to them, but they could participate on a voluntary basis. Okay.

I think Diana has additional commentary.

Yeah. Right now, in the absence of a TDM ordinance, there are certain projects which are voluntarily offered, and that's why the condition of approval for the entitlement will show a TDM condition. Or there are projects which are under certain precise plans which have a TDM requirement, and those particular, you know, projects coming under those precise plan will have a TDM condition. So those are some of

the

projects which have existing TDM conditions requirement.

So anything in North Bay Shore is under the TDM there?

Yeah.

And East Wiseman?

Yeah. Yes.

Can there is there anything that we can do with schools? Because they do a lot of traffic coming and going. So they're not a developer. There is not that. Is there are we working in unisys with them to try to reduce traffic?

Yes. I can speak to that. So the the city has a Safe Routes to School program where we work on both education and helping the students to have safe practices and be aware and and also for the parents. And it also includes encouragement activities, so encouraging mode shift. We've this is active at all of the public schools. We've offered it to all of the private schools, but the uptake on the private schools is hasn't exactly happened yet. So yeah. So but there there are strategies also for for schools. And if they were to come in as a development project, they would also be subject to the TDM requirements.

I'd also add too that since we've expanded the service for the community shuttle, we've seen an uptick of ridership from our schools, particularly Crittenden and Graham. And demand has actually exceeded capacity, and we've had to, unfortunately, bump a number of students. It's fairly cost prohibitive to run a sweeper service following their usual service. So we've reached out to the school district to try to engage them to see if they might be able to, you know, contribute funds. That's an ongoing conversation, but that's one piece of it.

But as far as in the development process, we know that Saint Francis recently expanded, and they've had to submit a TDM plan that would help reduce the excess trips generated by that the the net new trips being generated. So that's on a condition of the certificate of occupancy that they recently received. So we'll be following up with them, you know, when you're post occupancy of that extension.

K. Let's see. We had to find this clarifying regarding monitoring tenants turnover and lack of efficient tools of okay. So this is on page four. Let me see if I can figure this out. Do you see it's the first paragraph? And while the city has successfully established TDM requirements at the outset of new development, ongoing monitoring and reporting have proven challenging due to lack of enforcement mechanism. Turn tenant turnover and lack of efficient tools for staff are accurately tracked. What are we doing to, be able to track better?

Developing this ordinance is one strategy. There has been a number of staff turnover for our projects, which we lose a chain of custody of information. We don't necessarily have the information to follow-up with sites. Right now, we're trying to develop kind of a dashboard where we input all of the sites with TDM requirements. We set when their annual TDM reporting is due on an annual basis to follow-up with them.

Right now, it's somewhat ad hoc. It's based on various states of when they receive the certificates of occupancy, so it's not standardized. The idea with this ordinance is that we'd be able to create an online digital platform that benefits front users as well as end users that regularly automatically tracks when that reporting is due. They submit that reporting, and it determines on our side whether or not they're in compliance. Because right now, it's it's ad hoc. We don't have a very streamlined measure for for tracking and monitoring.

Yeah. There was a I was following up on a comment from a TDM community workshop that says support for bus speed improvements such as track transit signal priority. So and that's an investment on part of the city. Is that something that's is being considered, transit signal priority progresses?

This is something that we've been thinking about. The MTC is currently working on a transit priority policy, and we're tracking that. We need we're we're trying to figure out how to incorporate it into what we're doing in transportation.

Okay. So that would take some Now did you I'm reading this vision on page five based on the following vision was established for the ordinance. Is that the current vision that we're going with?

It's current vision. Yes. Okay.

So the first line, could you help me understand? To reduce single occupancy vehicle trips for development. Mhmm. It's just there. And then it's what is single trips for development? And it says increase use of multiple transportation alternatives. But what does it say when you say to reduce single occupancy vehicle trips for development? So for development projects that come through the city, we're trying

to reduce the single Okay. Keep it vehicle trips.

Good. Yeah. Sweet. Okay. The other question I have is so people that are 50 or more, Existing projects that have been entitled prior to the ordinance adoption will now be subject to the provisions under the ordinance. And I think you mentioned something that they are voluntary. So was there any credit or recognition if they voluntarily do something for us? In a way, if you go?

If they voluntarily participate, I think it would benefit those sites on the benefits we previously discussed, which are the reduction in transact transaction costs and improved efficiency for delivering TDM. They were to perhaps join the TMA dispensing those services. So it's more so, I would say, on the benefits for cost implication and efficiency as opposed to credits. When

was the last time the institution of transportation engineers trip generation manual been updated?

Yeah. I'm not sure. They update it regularly. They're on the eleventh edition.

I wanna say it's every few years on a regular basis, but not every single type. Yes.

What's the words I want?

Land use.

Not every single type of land use is updated wholesale throughout the book.

I'll just add more information. Think 2021. Yeah. Thank you, dad.

Oh, you meant right. So the last time I we this came up, it was, like, five, six years, and I'm going again. That's why I was asking. So it's good to see that it's being more updated along that way. So, also, again, one thing I've my general question is compliance. A checklist format for the TDM will provide applicants with the flexibility and consistency to reasonably comply with the requirements of the sort. So are we looking for a reasonable compliance? Is that a way and is that measurable?

Reasonable compliance, I think, at a baseline level would be submitting the annual TDM report that attests to them implementing the TDM plan that they that was codified in the conditions of approval. So that's a reasonable expectation is the reporting that's submitted. K.

I'm gonna have a look. Right there. Okay. And then

yeah, that's compliance.

If a project fails to comply with requirements, the reporting time periods will be extended upon compliance until compliance is achieved. Who monitors that?

I mean, it'd be at the moment, it'd be me. So Yeah. It's an ill inelegant system, but

He needs to find himself.

Thankfully, we're bringing on an intern to help me with monitoring, which should definitely be, would be helpful.

Oh, yeah. Again, on first year of occupancy, projects will demonstrate compliance by providing the annual TM report as part of ongoing monitoring requirements. What is the percentage of compliance? At this

point, I would say it's about 50%.

Okay. There's, penalties will be tied to by project sizes. Follow small projects. No penalties. Medium projects. Some money, large projects. How much money has been collected?

Zero. Zero.

But do we have the penalty right now?

Yes. Yes. Okay.

Maintain the teaching requirement's goal to promote efficient use of roadway capacity while reducing traffic congestion. How do we how do you define roadway capacity?

I would say most of it will be in North Bayshore where we have a trip count policy. We've set sensitive sensitivity requirements at the gateways during peak period, directionally. So really understanding how that's performing over time with the information of the TDM, ordinance would would be a point of interest.

Okay. Thank you. That's the end of my questions. We will

move to

Would any member of the public joining us virtually or in person like to provide comment on this item? If so, please click the raised hand button in Zoom or approach the lecturer. We will take in person speakers first. Each speaker will have three minutes. Anybody? Public comment? Anybody here? Oh, I'll

go for it again. Electra again. Forty five year resident. This has all been super interesting to me. This is all new to me. I I was here for the first thing and thought I'd stay, and

then,

I like this concept. I I'm a little nervous, and there was a lot of talk here about, like, how do you actually measure stuff? Because, you know, you can do, like, the driveway counts, or then you get the problem. And people people are gonna gamify, you know, or game out anything you try and do.

Sure. Not the right thing.

I I do think you have to do that. I I also like, two years ago, my wife and I, we had a car that wouldn't pass smog, and we couldn't agree on what else we were gonna get. So I started biking, and I was like, I don't really need a car. Heard. Right? So and one thing that sort of changed my perspective on a lot

of the power pipe things.

I used to sort of think of EVs as being, like, a big step above cars or something in terms of environmental and, increasingly, I think of them as more of a small step above cars because they still it buys into that whole, like, you have to drive lifestyle thing where, and you you when you're biking around, you're looking at all this space, and there's just, like, all these cars in parking lots and all this with I mean, cars are a horrible land use, thing. They're you know, partly also just, reading up on various social things. They're they are part of the reason that you get segregation and you get separations of of stuff here just that, people can so, you know, I'm you know, I I do like EVs better than cars, but I I think I don't generally think that they're that big of an advantage. Well, another thing about them is that, it turns out some very large percentage of everybody's into microplastics now that they've sort of discovered that we have lots of them. But, like, a lot of them are from car tires, and EVs actually generate more of those than than regular cars.

It's heavy.

Anyways, those are two comments. Thank you. We will take any virtual speaker.

Mary Dadio.

Good evening. I'm hoping I can have a coherent train of thought here. I I do agree. I especially agree that capturing accurate vehicle miles traveled for Uber and Lyft and for automated vehicles is incredibly important From what I can tell based on Google AI just now, Uber and Lyft are increasing vehicle miles traveled, which is not the direction we wanna go. So I these are so convenient.

I I think they're gonna be with us, but but, we really TDM is just ever more important because we we don't wanna increase the vehicle miles traveled. And similar to the comment the other speaker just made, for purposes of TDM, I I I'm a huge proponent of EVs. I love my EV. I don't understand why anybody drive anything other than EV, almost, but, I don't think they should be given a pass or given encouragement. I'm talking about the cars relative to gas vehicles.

Again, when we're thinking about vehicle miles traveled, because we're we're adding 11,000 plus units, or we will if we're gonna meet our what's been mandated. If it's still two and a half people, 2.4 people per housing unit, that's almost a third of our population, an increase of a third a third, again, of the population we have today, and there's just not space on the roads. We don't wanna keep adding car lanes of traffic, and and so all this stuff is gonna put pressure on us to add more space for cars when really we need to go the opposite direction. So just whatever we can do to really really improve our TDM. I'm excited to see the standards that are being set and just really important that that that we count Uber and and Lyft and, move vehicles properly.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mary. Someone else? That's all. Okay. Thank you. I will bring the item back to for committee comments and action.

So I'm just I'm ready to move this forward as proposed the staff proposal. Okay.

My comments, I support TDMs. I think they're great. But if you can't, verify it, you're spending a lot of time, and staff time is important to me. And when we say yes I mean, we started again back when when school was coming along. We're having a tough time. At least with them, they had a choke point so we could count it, but you're putting this stuff out there. And this is a lot of effort on the staff. I appreciate all the steps. And then I looked at your your checklist that somebody could say, boom, boom, boom. And if we don't have staff to make sure that they're in compliance, we're not gonna get our goal set.

So I'm looking at this as, well, how are we gonna make sure that this thing is staffed and there's credibility in what we're doing? As a small business person or a business person and I've been on the council, I don't like laws put out there that aren't enforced. And it just takes away from all the good effort and intentions that we're trying to do. So let's move forward with this. But once it gets to counsel and I I would like to see some ways you're a very proficient young man, but you do have limits.

And for everything that you see here, I really don't see people doing what they're supposed to do, and we need to do that. Otherwise, it's it's, again, a waste of money that we do. And we had this is a very big thing for us to reduce greenhouse gases. So, I'm all for moving it forward, but I gotta see enforcement in this.

So is that a motion, John?

I'll make the motion. This is the motion to

Okay. To

recommend those.

I recommend that the oh, there there.

I didn't mean to cross it out. Meant the. Sorry. Right.

This CTC recommends proposed framework for the transit transit transit demand management ordinance to city council go forward. And I I would like to put in there that there's safeguards to make sure that things are enforced because of compliance. And, you know, I'll leave that up to you, but maybe you could put a goal in there. That's good. It's you're not gonna catch everybody, but try to put a goal in there that let's see if we can attain it because that's good for us. It's good for the residents. It's good for them that somebody's watching.

You're a second. Yeah. I second. K. We're gonna vote by voice.

Voice. Okay.

Call in.

Committee member Higgs. Yes. And the chair of the desk.

Yes.

K. We'll pass this to zero with member Kamaye Abstin.

Yeah. We've been sitting here for two and half hours. Can you just take a five minute break or should we plow through this?

Yeah.

How much we

It'll take yeah. That will take us to six minutes will take us to 09:00.

Okay. Six minute break.

Thank you.

See you. Okay. We were going to now item six, key project updates. Gonna do 6.1 Castro Street and Grangedorf grade separation projects. Item 6.1 is a staff presentation for an update on the Castro Street and Grangedorf grade separation projects.

The staff presentation will be provided by Joy Hunton, senior civil engineer, Robert Gonzales, principal civil engineer, will be available to answer questions. Please help me with names as of the time. Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening, committee member and chair. My name is Joy, senior civil engineer in public works, and I am here joined by Robert tonight, principal civil engineer. And we are here to provide updates on the city's two grade separate projects, Castro Street and Ring Circle. As a refresher, staff presented information on the two grade separation projects, to city council, including status, benefits, and cost in January 2024 due to the limited funding sources and a very significant funding shortfall for the Castor Street project.

Staff recommended to city council to prioritize Rainsdorf Avenue. Council supported this recommendation given the following. There is an interim solution for Castro Street. Brainsdorf is more challenging for pedestrians and bicyclists compared to Castro, And prioritizing brings towards means that the city would focus our funding resources, including our share of the city, the measure b funds towards Rainsthorf, which then helps reduce the funding shortfall for the project. As Rainstarve has need by clearance, there are federal grant opportunities that Rainstarve can pursue, and the project would be more competitive with a reduced funding shortfall.

What does prioritization mean for the two projects? For Rainstorm, it means completing final design and right away acquisition, considering value engineering options to further reduce the funding shortfall, and constructing the grade separation project. For Castro, it means staff would explore implementing interim improvements, I'll share on the next slide, constructing the city utility relocation project to prepare the city utilities for the future under crossings, completing the final design of the undercrossings, and obtaining NEPA clearance to be eligible for federal funding, which has been suspended since October 2024, and constructing the undercrossings when funding becomes available.

What's NEPA?

It's the National Environmental Protection Act, which is our equip the federal level equivalent of CEQUA.

Like, not

required for any federal bodies.

With an unknown timeline for construction of the Castro Under crossing, city council supported proceeding with interim improvements to the Castro Street Moffett Boulevard Central Expressway intersection. The improvements will permanently close the railroad crossing to vehicles while retaining the existing at grade rail crossing for bikes and peds and also convert the Evelyn Avenue at Castro for westbound traffic only with bike accommodations. The improvements will reduce vehicle conflicts for bikes and peds and allow the elimination of the railroad signal preemption for Central Expressway, which helps reduce the bike and ped wait times to cross the expressway. On to the new updates and next steps for Castro. Since the last updates to the CTC in October 2024, Caltrain is executing a design contract with HNTB, the design consultant for the Castro interim improvements, and staff will be returning to city council in fall twenty twenty five with updates on the two great separation projects including Castro.

On to brainstorm updates. Since the October 2024 update, the city has received updated project costs based on the 35% design, which I'll share updates on the next slide, and that we are continuing our effort on value engineering to evaluate alternatives to reduce the cost, which, will include reducing scope and, evaluating the project schedule. In January 2025, staff received announcement of results of the FRA, CRISI, and RCE grant programs, and the city's project applications were unsuccessful in both programs. Staff has requested, meetings with the FRA to gain better understanding of how we can improve our application in the next round, to improve our competitiveness. And staff will be providing updates to city council in 2025 and ask council to authorize for Rankstorff Avenue to proceed with design.

And then as to Rankstorff grade separation updates, as mentioned, city received updated project costs on the 35% design from a construction manager, contractor, and also a third party estimator. And as a refresher, when the project was presented to city council in January 2024, the project cost was at $3.25, leaving us with a shortfall of 31,000,000. At the time, we thought that we could close the gap with value engineering and pursuing grant opportunities. The latest project cost is at 53 or $453,000,000, leaving us with a shortfall of 159. Since receiving these updated costs, the project team has been tasked with value engineering and evaluating cost reduction options to bring the project cost down, and we will be sharing frequent updates with the CTC.

And, also, we'll be providing, updates to city council in fall

in the fall. And that concludes my updates for tonight. Thank you.

Thank you. Alright. So with the Ring store, again, I was here, and it was, like, a $120,000,000. Dreams. We were fighting with other cities. I was also on VTA. We're we had we were getting our money because we were the ones shovel ready to go. Right. And, that was nice. So are the costs do we try to get the design going, or do we go for the eminent domain to get the property? Is there a one is there a sequence that we're trying to do that we really can't do anything until we get the property, or do we just go

So the the city has a multipronged approach here. There there's there there's a balancing act here. We want to demonstrate progress to our, potential federal, partnerships. So we do wanna show progress either in design or in property acquisition. There's also a balancing act using eminent domain as a tool.

We have legal constraints and policy constraints. We wanna be able to move into project construction during a certain time frame if we are gonna use that as a tool. So we haven't decided on that. We would we would bring that back as a policy decision to this body or to counsel if we were to go in that direction, like, if they're clear, our recommendation. But at this point, once the value engineering is done and we have a better idea of how much project costs we can kinda control and move down, we'll have a better idea of what, federal strategy we've accomplished.

If I can just add, you know, we've already started property acquisition for several pieces. At this point, we're about 35 design. We're gonna be completing 35%, I'll say, with the value engineering. Our next milestone then would be 65% design. And at 65%, that's really when we're gonna kick the rest of the right of way acquisition into high gear, so to speak. Right? Because then we're we're really trying to sequence the timing of getting that right of way with the timing of construction. At that point, we will know more if there are some properties that we have not been successful in just simple negotiations, and we would have to go to an alternate strategy such as limited domain. We're not there yet.

No comments. No. Public feedback.

Just an update.

Okay.

What's the utility? I didn't understand what that was in the in the first part of the update. Castro? For Castro. What is

Oh, for Castro.

So did you hear

me? There

are a lot of utilities at Castro And Central Expressway, and in order for the undercostings to be eventually deconstructed in place, we had a separate c c CIP that would then relocate some of those utilities, water, sewer. Okay. And it's in construction. It's in construction phase.

Okay. Thank you, Steph. Appreciate your updates. Gonna be at the hard road to get that money maps. Okay. We will go on to 6.2 active transportation plan. Oh, I'll get to it.

There it is.

Item two is a staff presentation for an update on the active transportation plan. The staff presentation will be by Allison Boyer, assistant public. Oh, that was funny. Lucky. I am.

They're all excellent.

Here they are.

Sorry. Hello.

I do not have

a staff presentation, but I do have an update. Our APT is going to be back next week on Tuesday, March 11. So that will be on an update on the holistic network maps as well as the an update on the scoring criteria that was previously presented. And then we will be bringing it to CTC on April 1. So you will be seeing that here in the next month. And there was a meeting that was sometime this week that was diverged? Diverse that. We were going to show the updated maps, but we are going the idea is that those

will be shown at BPAC

a week later. Rather than trying to do the community outreach, get that in a report, get that to BPAC, then get that

to

you, could be the kinda it combined to the public outreach with the BPAC meeting. Oh, so they're

not gonna be two separate. They're not gonna two separate meetings at this time.