Traffic Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. Call to order is 11/19/2025 meeting of the American Commission is called to order. Would Madam Santos call roll call roll for determination of quorum, please?

Commissioner Burst. Commissioner Chavez. Commissioner Limogianis. Vice Chair Bercharts. Chair Valdez.

Present.

Let the record reflect all members are present.

James, would you like to, lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance, please?

Please stand.

We'll now be moving on to approval of the agenda. Are there any changes to the agenda? None heard. And showing. And showing.

You can have a motion to approve the agenda motion.

Second that motion. You

motion it on the

Oh, that's right. Oh,

the thing.

Sorry. And can you announce the name of the person?

Motion, Burchardz. Second that motion, Limoganez.

Okay.

Commissioner, commissioner Bertrand has made a motion to approve the agenda, and commissioner Lemiguez has made second. We'll

not

be moving on to the engineering department administrative vote. Oh.

We'll need to make a You're right. Sorry.

Okay. Motion passed. We will be now be moving on to the engineering department administrative updates.

Oh, we need to do the public comment any public comments or non agenda items? If

they ask for that. Oh,

okay. Alright.

Excuse me. Oh, good evening, honorable honorable chair and members of the traffic commission. It's great to see you all again. Before we begin, I'd like to give a warm welcome to our two newest commissioners, commissioner Chavez and commissioner Beers. We look forward to your input and engaging in healthy discussions with staff, residents, and your fellow commissioners as topics are brought forward.

At this time, I'd like to provide a brief recap of our active CIP projects that were recently completed, are currently in design, or in construction. The following projects were recently completed. We completed a full four way traffic signal at Washington Avenue and Weeping Willow, pavement rehabilitation and asphalt overlay of Myriad Hot Springs Road between Whitewood Road and Margarita Road. We also did pavement rehabilitation and asphalt overlay of Clinton Keith Road from our Westerly City limits to Grand Avenue, and we did slurry seal of approximately 25% of our residential streets and a few collectors, just recently. Projects that are in design.

We have a new traffic signal installation at Jefferson Avenue and Magnolia Street, a traffic signal modification at Clinton Keith Road and Nutmeg Street for the purpose of a protected left turn phasing for motorists turning out to Clinton Keith Road. We anticipate design for both of these signals to be completed in the first quarter of next year. We have the pavement rehabilitation and asphalt overlay of Jefferson Avenue from Los Alamos Road to Nutmeg Street. We anticipate this project beginning in construction, in summer sometime summer of next year. We have Menifee Road, which is currently in design.

Menifee Road is currently a 500 foot dirt road between Clinton Keith Road and Los Alamos Road, and our plan is to construct the road with asphalt and base with AC dikes. And lastly, we have Whitewood Road project, which is the addition of another travel lane going northbound from Hunter Road to Clinton Keith Road. So then it'll it'll be four two lanes in each direction, so ultimately four lanes. And lastly, projects that are currently in construction. We have the pavement rehabilitation of Los Alamos Road, Antelope Road, and Elm Street.

And you've probably seen the right turn pocket at Alta Marietta Drive going into the Sam's Club Plaza. That's currently under construction. And a little bit further to the east, we have our main project, the the widening of Myriad Hot Springs Road from Margarita Road to Winchester Road, that's widening Hot Springs from four lanes to six lanes. With that, that concludes the engineering department updates.

So Senior Civil Engineer also?

Yes. Mr. Osoff is the Senior Civil Engineer. Anything else to add? To

We'll now be moving on to public comments. At this time, we'll take public comments. Any person may address the traffic commission on any subject pertaining to city business, which does not relate to any item listed in the agenda or consent calendar. Normally, no action may be considered or taken by the traffic commission on any matter not listed on the agenda. Speakers are limited to three minutes. Madam Santos, are there any other member any are there any members of the public requesting to speak?

We do not have any non agenda public comments at this time.

Thank you, madam Santos. We are now moving on to cons consent calendar approval. Okay. Items on the consent calendar are considered routine and may be enacted by one motion and vote. There will be no discussion on these items unless specific items are removed from the consent calendar for separate motions.

Are there any requests from the commissioners to pull consent calendar item for discussion or abstaining from voting? No.

No. No.

Okay. Call for a motion to approve the consent calendar. Motion, Burchard's. Commissioner Burchard has made a motion to approve the consent.

Second, Limo Ioannis.

Did you happen to click on the motion on your tablet?

No. Didn't see it. Hold on.

Does the first person initiate it? And

then Mhmm. Okay. Oh, on the floor. Sorry, I was on the agenda. My bad.

Thank you.

Okay. Commissioner Namibia has made a second. Please vote.

I'm sorry the motion carries unanimously.

Thank you. We're now moving on to discussion items.

Thank you, Chair. For the residents in the audience or anyone who's watching, live on TV, my name is James Ozoff, senior civil engineer here at the city. I'm the primary traffic commission liaison and point of contact. It's my pleasure to introduce tonight's agenda item. The discussion item is for Kingwood Road signing and striping modifications as it pertains to the installation of a designated pickup drop off lane with appropriate signage.

Being a discussion item, at the end of the presentation, staff will have a recommended action that the commissioners may discuss and ultimately vote on. Staff has prepared a brief presentation for tonight's discussion item, which will be given by our traffic engineer, Ms. Ida Edgington. With that said, I will now turn it over to Ida. Thank you.

Thanks, James. Good evening, commissioners and chair and vice chair. I'll, go over briefly the proposed new signing and striping near Buchanan Elementary School. Just to give a brief background, Marietta Valley Unified School District contacted the city to explore some options to help address some traffic congestions and concerns they had near the elementary school. They came with a couple of options they wanted us to explore.

One was the feasibility of adding an exit onto Torrey Pines Road from the Vintage Park Parking Lot. So right now, where you see the one arrow, that's where Vintage Park Parking Lot is, and Buchanan is just west of that or east of that. So the idea is to have parents utilize that parking lot as a pickup area, and they will just exit off of onto Torrey Pines Road. That was one option they asked us to study. And another was to allow pedestrians a pedestrian walk way from the school playground into Vintage Park as an additional access point to the school.

So where you see the number two, the option is to have pickup drop off on Kingwood Road and have pedestrians access that area to enter the Buchanan Elementary as a secondary entrance pedestrian entrance. So the reason for this request was that the district their redistricting is expected soon and they significantly increased enrollment at Buchanan Elementary is what they're expecting, which this area already experiences heavy traffic congestion. So they brought up some options that we can take a look at. So the first option to add an exit onto Torrey Pines Road that creating a direct connection between the park and the roadway is not actually feasible due to the significant grade difference between the parking lot and Torrey Pines Road. As you can see in the picture in the bottom left, there's a great difference there and it will take lot of work to make that connection happen.

And in addition to that, there will be because this is a parking lot, that would create a lot more congestion to the circulation of that parking lot if we were to have an exit onto Torrey Pines Road. So the second option was to create a walkway from the school playground onto Vintage Park. So as you can see on the bottom left picture, the idea is to allow parents drop off at the blue area from the on Kingwood Road and the pedestrians will follow that blue path onto across the park onto the school. But this would require connection, an ADA accessible connection between the current sidewalk where it ends onto the school. So Marietta Valley School District will install this walkway, a concrete walkway, the ADA accessible, and also a gate to where it would be closed off after school hours.

So this is a much more feasible option. Right now, Kingwood Road is wide enough to accommodate two lanes and as well as a designated parking lane. So this is where we're proposing the new signing and striping on Kingwood Road. So it's just a blow up of that area on the proposal. So for the signing striping, we're adding a bit on Kingwood Road between Torrey Pines Road and Tennyson Road.

So in the northbound direction, the proposal is to provide a 12 foot travel lane and then a 10 foot parking lane, which will be designated as a passenger loading only during school hours. This area, which is about three hundred feet or so, would be restricted to regular parking between seven a. M. And three p. M.

On school days and is just going to be a designated passenger loading area. And then for the southbound direction, there will be 22 feet left for a travel lane and a parking lane. And the reason we're adding the center lane stripe is to make it easier for it to flow on either direction. So our recommendation is to install a designated pickup drop off lane, which is that 10 foot lane that's shown with the appropriate signage, which restricts parking between 7AM to 3PM for regular parking and will be designated as a passenger loading only and a center lane stripe between Torrey Pines Road and Tennyson Road. And that is the end of my presentation.

Thank you. Questions. Commissioner

Chavez, you can start. At this time, I don't have any questions related to this project.

Thank

you for the presentation. Just so I'm clear, the walkway, it sounds like MBUSD is handling that. That is a separate budget from independent of what we're voting on today, correct?

Correct.

Okay. And then currently, is parking allowed along the area where the double striping is going to be added?

Yes. So it's not designated or signed, but it is wide enough to accommodate parking along the street.

Okay. And I understand letters were mailed to the local community.

Where

is there any feedback received?

We have not.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation. When would it start?

Probably in a couple of months. It would be the striping is probably going to be when school is out of

Are they going to do the walkway prior to the striping?

That is a good question, yes. So in that case the timeline could be longer because the walkway would have to be constructed first. So I'm not sure when that's going to be done. But yeah, that would have to be done first to have that pedestrian connection.

What's their timetable? Did they give you a timetable if we say, yeah, cool, good to go, how long they would take?

Unfortunately, I don't have the timeline. I don't know if you

Yeah. We don't have a timeline for that. But we can say that the easement and construction of the gate that was described was taken to city council previously and was approved. So this is kind of the second part of it. And once this is if this is approved, then it'll set the wheels in motion to get everything going.

Perfect. Thank you.

Thank you very much for the presentation and, that's all I have to say.

I only have one question. So I know that I can't can't pick up what the, street there is. But has there been consideration to that size street, as far as signage parking added? Does the study include that traffic flow that's going to be through there? Is that a throughway or is that a dead end?

So this is let me go back to the map. So the Tennyson Road or I guess So which side if that's the case, that one is a dead end and creating a connection from Tennyson is much longer than the Kingwood Road.

I guess it would be North End Road.

North End Road leads to a gate. Just at the very bottom left corner of that image leads to a gated neighborhood. Okay.

That's right.

Okay. And that was my question because obviously with added traffic there, you were going to want to take shortcuts and all that. So if that's the case, there's gated area, shouldn't be traffic, but that was also kind of taken into consideration, assume.

This is, I guess added traffic would be a traffic study that the Marriott Valley or the district would have had done. But this is really to just ease the current situation and maybe in the future when they do increase their students that having this designated drop off area might alleviate a little bit of Torrey Pines Road traffic.

Got it. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it. That's all I have. Madam Santos, are there any public comments regarding this discussion item?

We do not have any public comments for this section.

Are there any additional, commissioner comments?

So can they go when they exit Kingwood and they go north on Kingwood, they go is it west on Torrey Pines to exit to? Or they just have to go back on Torrey Pines to all the congestion we're trying to alleviate?

Yes. So if anyone is coming from Kingwood, it's it would be their normal whether they're turning left or right on Torrey Pines Road. But it is just the striping is the loading areas only on the I guess that would be on the East Side of Kingrid Road.

So they have to go out that way. They can't

just Yes. There will be no U-turn or anything else.

That's it. Thank you.

I have a question.

If I can interject just really quickly. So North End Drive that you see there does dead end as Mr. Rosoff had indicated. It dead ends and where it dead ends actually dead ends into the city of Temecula, which is why there's a gate there to prevent I'm not going say the mixing of residents, but the cut through traffic of myriad of residents into Temecula's residential neighborhood, if you will. I believe that's the reason why that gate was put in when Temecula constructed that neighborhood or that side.

If you were to turn up, go up Kingwood and then turn left on the Torrey Pines that goes deeper into the neighborhood where there really is no exit. The exit to get out of the neighborhood would either be to turn right on Torrey Pines. If you did turn left on the Torrey Pines, you would have to wrap around to get on to Sugarberry, which then returns back to Tory Pines and then exit the neighborhood on Tory Pines or the other option would be to return back on Kingwood, turn around somehow in the neighborhood and come back on Kingwood. So the natural progression going around the school, if they were dropping off their children going up Kingwood, would be then to turn right onto Torrey Pines to exit the neighborhood over at Margarita and Torrey Pines, if that makes sense.

Yes, I have a comment. Question. Will residents be allowed to make a left, turn off of North End Road, during this, proposed time? I know that the striping goes all the way through, but is that gonna be restrictive for those residents?

No. They they should have a full full movement there. We can I mean, the striping is a it's an exhibit, so we can finalize it to where there's a break in between the center line?

Thank you.

To the other photo where you had the 44 foot

sorry, that one.

Yeah, that one right there. Are we putting a crosswalk or anything like that going across to North End? Can you see a look? No, nothing

like No, they would have to go to the intersection of Torrey Pines to

I was just thinking if I wasn't trying to sit in that traffic because we went there, I would be going Torrey Pines. But I would be trying to go out towards Kingwood to date and get out that way so to prevent the people from lining up on the other side. You know what I mean? Because there's only one egress if you're going out that way versus or you have people lining up on Kingwood, having their kids cross, and then they're going out towards date. You know what I mean? That's what I would do if I was trying to get out of there instead of sitting in traffic on Torrey Pines to go all the way to what is that to Margarita.

I wish I had a bigger map

of this.

I apologize. I I thought because I couldn't see it. But I just remember when we went to school there a couple back, and that was a nightmare to get out of there. But I'm not trying to complicate it. I'm just trying to play devil's advocate for it. That's all. I'm good.

That's kind of where I was going with this is that North End is I mean, there's already residents living there, right? And, I mean, it's just the nature of the traffic flow, people are going to want to park or line up that street just to prevent doing that. And going to what he was saying is that, is there going to be any kind of signage or anything? This is not to wait or whatnot. That's the designated part that they need to go to not wait on North End and create another bottleneck there?

I mean there's not currently a proposal for that, but we would just have to once this is installed, we would just have to see how traffic is moving and how it's functioning and if there's any edits that needs to be done. Then at that point, we would have to analyze it because people's patterns change and so we would probably have to see that once it's installed and if there's going to be any improvements that need to be made at that point, we can. Okay.

That's all I got.

Just to clarify for myself, I understand it makes sense what the city is proposing. At the end of the day, unless I'm misunderstanding this, we're not changing traffic flows here. The only thing that's changing is restricting parking. So cars are still gonna go the same way they're gonna go. The only impact that we might see from this is if that pedestrian walkway occurs, the hope is less folks will drive because they'll walk to school. Right?

So Right. They would utilize Kingbridge Road.

Yeah. So what we're talking about here is no impact on what intersection people go to, and that's completely separate. And and we'll just have to wait and see. I think at the end of the day, the issues with a lot of our schools here, it I I don't know if it's something that we can fix with roads. I think it's more of a culture of helicopter parenting where parents no longer let their kids ride their bikes and walk to school when everybody wants to drop their kids off.

And I I believe when these schools were designed, they were probably designed with the expectation of more children independently taking themselves to school. So I don't know how we can really stop all these traffic jams from occurring from school other than encouraging less parents to drive their their vehicles to school, especially since they're built within neighborhoods and you're limited to how you can widen the roads. But nonetheless, thanks for confirming what I what I was thinking.

Is there any more discussion? Okay. Call for a motion and a second.

I'll motion to approve. Bircherts.

Can you

I'll second to approve Limoganes.

K. Please vote.

Motion carries unanimously.

Thank you. Okay. We'll now move to commission member announcements or comments. Now is the time for any commissioner to provide any their comments. We'll start with, Commissioner Travis.

I didn't say this earlier, but, thank you for the presentation. I have no comments.

No comments, but thanks again for the presentation and your hard work on this.

Thank you.

Thank you very much for the presentation.

And, I just want to second that. It's a good presentation. Thank you for all the information. I'm sure there's going to be a lot more, coming out of this once we, once it gets installed. It's the inevitable growing pains with the growing cities. So thank you very much. Okay. Next, German, without any further business, this meeting is now adjourned. Thank you everybody.

All right. Thank you.