Metropolitan Council - Regular Meeting

staff uh same process. Uh once they have given their presentation, I will look to the chair, the applicable chair, which is transportation and infrastructure, which is uh chair Evan Seagull. Uh once she has had a chance to ask her questions, I will turn it over to uh vice chair Spain for any questions that he has and then open it up to the body. So Mr. Bla, you have the floor. If you could introduce yourself and the folks that you have with you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm Steven Bland. I'm the CEO for WeGo Public Transit, which is both the Metro Transit Authority and the Regional Transportation Authority. With me to my left, your right, is our deputy CEO for finance administration, Amanda Vandergrift. To my right, your left, is our Metro Transit Authority Board Chair, Gail Carr Williams. We also have our chief of staff, Lindseay Gansen, uh, in the audience, as well as our brand new director of legislative relations uh, taking over for Eric Byer, Amanda Cleland, in the audience. So, if you haven't met Amanda yet, I'm sure you will uh, in the coming weeks. We're very fortunate at WeGo to have a committed um, group of five Metro Transit Authority board members. So, I would love it if uh, with your permission, ma'am, if our chair Gail uh, can open the presentation. Go ahead.

Thank you, Steve. Thank you, Madam Chair. Budget and finance. When it says push, thank you, Madam Chair, and members of the budget and finance committee. As Steve said, my name is Gail Carr Williams and I am the chair of the board of directors of the Metropolitan Transit Authority of Nashville and Davidson County doing business as we go public transit. Uh, as Steve already introduced all of our esteemed MTA we go staff and I'm grateful that they are all here. When we talk about Amanda and as most of you know, our longtime director of legislative relations, Eric Byer, recently retired. So, it's great to welcome Amanda and hopefully you all will have a chance to work with her as well as you did with Eric. Um, so I'm now in my 23rd year on the MTA board and I am particularly pleased to appear before you this afternoon, but don't be mistaken, I've been pleased to always appear before you, but this year feels a little special. It's an exciting time for we go public transit as we have partnered with this council, Mayor O'Connell's office and other metro departments to undertake service expansion and project initiatives that I barely could have imagined when I started my board service with MTA. I think we may have had antique license plates on our buses. I'm not certain. All these initi initiatives are thanks to the mayor's choose how you move transit improvement program which was approved by this body and by almost 23 of the voters of Davidson County in 2024 annually. Choose how you move funding

will allow us to expand service by about 7% without placing an undue burden on the general fund. We were able to undertake this level of service expansion during the current fiscal year and will be able to continue to do so in the 2026 2027 fiscal year with this body's adoption of mayor's budget proposal. These service additions should continue to accelerate our strong yearover-year wrership growth. For the quarter ending March 31st, total wrership on the WeGo public transit system was up over 15% year-over-year. Early indications so far point to even greater wrership gains in the current quarter. And while I'm pleased and proud of all our initiatives and writers growth, I'll exercise the privilege of chair to specifically call out the journey paths. Journey Pass, funded through Choose How You Move, provides free bus passes to income eligible residents of Davidson County. Since the Journey Pass pilot began last year, over 10,000 individuals have registered at 78 registration events and have taken over 1.5 million trips. But to me, more important than the numbers and statistics are the stories. Folks have literally broken into tears at registration events, calling the program lifechanging and saying they no longer have to make a choice of using limited transportation dollars on trips to the grocery store or trips to the doctor. But to be clear, while Journey Pass and the added freedom it has provided 10,000 plus of our most vulnerable sentences is

a significant contributor to the wrership growth we've experienced over the past year. It's not the only reason. Factoring out Journey Pass trips, we are still experiencing a 7% growth in monthly wrership alone. That would be the largest periodic increase in writership on the WeGo public transit system in memory. Additionally, I would be remissed if I did not share with you that these accomplishments are not what they are without the dedicated, professional, and committed staff at WeGo. Our drivers, mechanics, our planners, our customer care team to our CEO next to me. They are exemplary. Each and every one of them was prepared for the moment. I am very proud of them. But before I turn it over to Steve Bland, I want to thank you all for your time and your attention and let you know that we enthusiastically support Mayor Okonnell's fiscal year 2026 2027 proposed operating budget allocation to we go public transit. Thank you very much. And Steve, I'll turn it back over to you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh well this madam chair thank madam chair a little confusing for me. Uh anyone who's ever worked with Gail over the years knows she's an impossible act to follow so I won't try. Uh again my name is Steve Bland. I'm the CEO of WeGo Public Transit. Just echoing what Gail said this that the support of this and prior councils uh Mayor Okonnell and prior mayors has allowed WeGo to expand its role and success in the community. The additional funding that has already been generated by Mayor Okonnell's choose how you move initiated is expediting the the pace of this progress. Yell already mentioned the ridership gains we've experienced uh over the past year, but ridership gain while it's important is only a trailing indicator for many of the initiatives that have progressed because of your approval of the mayor's 20 FY226 budget. uh and will continue to accelerate with Mayor Okonnell's FY20 2026 27 proposed budget. Last year, your support for the mayor's allocation to we we go allowed us to improve midday frequency on our route 6 Lebanon Pike, improve Saturday and Sunday frequency on our routes 23 Dickerson Pike, Route 50 Charlotte Pike, Route 56 Gallant Pike. Improve weekday evening frequency on our Route 55 Murphreey'sboro Pike and Route 56 Gallatin Pike. Improve Sunday frequency on the 55 Murphy'sboro Pike. Improve Saturday and Sunday evening frequency on the 55 Murphreey'sboro Pike and 56 Gallant Pike and allowed us to institute new school year services to McGavoc and Glen Cliff high schools. If approved, this year's mayor's budget proposal would fund plan service expansion scheduled to start on July 5th of this year. Uh this past year, under the capital spending plan approved by this body, we received the first delivery of expansion buses funded by

choose how you move. So we're now in a position to actually expand peak hour service where we were limited before that. Um, with that you will see improved frequency all day on the 18 airport route, our 34 Opry Mills route and increased service on the 76 Madison connector and 79 Skyline connector routes. We'll also be expanding our increasingly popular Belleview and South Nashville we go zones, including an expansion at South Nashville to serve Overton High School, which was a direct request uh that we received during the public engagement period. We're also very early in the stages of planning for our January 2027 service changes and anticipate more expansion with adoption of the mayor's budget currently under consideration or even more connections to Nashville International Airport, improved frequency on additional routes in our system, possible new circulator routes in Southeast Nashville, and all of these are part of the overall choose how you move transportation improvement program. The budget would also allow for us to continue expansion of our crucial we go access door-todoor program for individuals with disabilities. Ridership on access has pretty much increased in lock step with fixed route uh ridership gains at about the 15% range that Gail mentioned. The budget supports the additional positions necessary to expand this service. scale touched on the operators, the mechanics, the service personnel. Part of our capital program uh under choose how you move is a pretty significant expansion our stop improvement program that includes both stop and shelter improvements, but also in many cases the pedestrian access and ADA accessibility features that make getting to a bus stop easier. Our target is to accomplish 50 of these projects a year in the operating budget. That means we have to bring on more stop and shelter maintenance crews. Our target

for trash collection at those locations is once every three days and cleaning every quarter. Um, which is what we try to target. And I know I forewarned Amanda that uh our bus shelters are probably the number one call she will get from this body uh within your individual district. So, we appreciate you keeping us up to speed on that. Uh, finally, the approval of this bo this budget will allow us to implement our first ever transit ambassador program. Transit Ambassador program will dedicate staff to supporting our most vulnerable populations by connecting individuals experiencing distress who happen to be in the transit system with crucial social services in areas like mental health, substance abuse, and homelessness. The partnerships we've been able to build thanks to um various metro social service agencies and the Journey Pass program we think will be particularly effective in getting this off to a running start later this year. And with that, madam madame chair behind me, um that concludes our presentation and we welcome your questions.

Thank you, Chair Evan Seagull. Thank you, Chair. Welcome. Um it's good to see all y'all. Um I have a few questions. Um well, I have several questions. I'm sorry. I just try to understand. But on the MTA reserve fund, I noticed that that had been funded the previous two years, but it's not funded this year. Is that because it is fully funded at this point?

It's funded at a lower level than in the prior year because because essentially as uh sales tax collections under choose how you move kind of move in faster than we were able to deploy projects that enabled us to get a jump start. So we expect under a graduated period that those requests will go down uh each year. Target overall for the reserve fund according to best practices in our industry is about three months of expenses. though. And one thing that that's allowed us to do um folks who deep dig into the deep depths of our budgets every year in this process will know that typically part of the budget ordinance has been um approving us to go out and borrow money on a short-term basis for cash flow purposes. So, one of the things the establishment of the reserve funds allowed us to do is we no longer have to do that. So, we're saving a few dollars on our interest costs.

Okay. So it's now we're just going to keep the three months industry standard, but I guess we're not quite there. Um so we'll you know we'll continue to adjust an annual proposals, but this certainly um the proposal in the mayor's budget certainly gets us on our way.

Okay. Um I I and then on the choose how you move operations, it's 10 and a half million. I kind of have some just general questions around like Journey Pass and the increase and I'm just like big bucket. Is any of that 10 and a half million to cover Journey Pass lost revenue or is that all just expansion of services and the ambassador program and everything else? The 10 is pretty much service expansion.

I'll let Right now we're assuming about four million of that would be part of Journey Pass. Um, but it's going to fund service expansion. It's just going to be reclassified as fairbox revenue. Uh, because it directly ties to each ride that's that's um, we're assuming using a journey pass.

Oh, okay. That makes sense. Um, and then I know that right now that journey pass is just tied to whether you're getting social services. Do we have a timeline on when an income application? So, somebody may not be getting social services, but they're income limited. I think probably young people in particular or some of our older population probably fall into that bucket where they might not be in our system getting assistance, but they do have limited incomes. Do we have a timeline on that?

I couldn't give you a hard date. what we've worked with uh the mayor's office, mayor's choose how you move office and our social service partners is now that we we've essentially it started a bit earlier than this, but you'll all recall it really ramped up in November with the suspension of the SNAP benefits. Um so the goal was always to have about six months of hardcore experience so we can start assessing impacts. So, we expect to be uh producing an evaluation of pro I'll call it progress to date and usage patterns over the next month or two and then with that hopefully be able to report back madam chair to your committee um as well as to the mayor's office on on you know what the timeline might be. But I'm not anticipating that that should be an extensively long um process you know that that we're not talking years we're talking more like months.

Okay, that's helpful. Um I I several years ago. Stopped pretending I had a crystal ball. Maybe I should have pretended sooner than that, but like or stopped pretending sooner than that, but like that's when it really just like busted. Um, and I know none of us have a crystal ball on gas prices, but I am curious how is that affecting we go and how are you thinking about that in the context of this upcoming budget?

Um, there's an old saying and I I think I probably use it more than anyone given the choice between being smart and being lucky. Um, I'll take lucky. We participate with the overall metropolitan government in the city of Franklin in a fuel hedging program and that fuel hedge locked in literally just before um the current environment. So, we're actually for 80% of our fuel supply, both diesel and gasoline, we're locked in um at extremely reasonable prices through through June of 27. So we're not there will be because there's 20% that essentially rides with the market there will be some impacts um but generally speaking for this upcoming budget um we're fairly well protected now madam chair to your point with crystal ball FY28 um and I think I can safely speak for our metro finance director if we knew the answers to all of that um we probably we'd probably go to Vegas. I definitely have more questions about that, but we don't have to ask them today. But I'm just like very curious as to how that works. Um, absolutely.

And then I noticed that some of what was unfunded was about $700,000 in um inflationary requests related to wage increases. I think that's collective bargaining wage increases. So, you are locked in on those and I'm curious how you're going to accommodate those wage increases. um as early as tomorrow um our our staff will gather on. I mean it it's it's a large budget and we're confident that we can find savings in other areas. One of the things we've been able to do with the earlier year choose how you move first year choose how you move funding. I think a lot of the members here are know that we've really historically been short on our operator staff. So, one of the things Choose How You Move has allowed us to do is expand our recruiting staff, our training staff. Project we actually had before Choose How You Move was to double our CDL training lot. And for the first time, certainly in the years I've been here, we're actually at full staff. So, one of the areas we expect will help us out is a reduction in overtime expense.

Great. Um, and then my last question or sort of set of questions, you talked about everybody wants a bus stop. I learned very early on in this term, we don't capitalize everything at a bus stop. There may be bus stops that are capital expenses, but a lot of what we're doing at bus stops for improvements are not capital expenses. And I am curious um kind of if you could talk a little bit about what the plan is on the well where where is the line on the capital expenses and what is the plan and and I you know those capital expenses I think kind of fall in that choose how you move bucket of spending but on those that become more operational small two-seater benches stuff like that that that is not capitalized how are we accounting for those and how quickly are we able able to kind of roll those out and get those in place.

We piloted a few new things over the last couple years. One, you mentioned the echo seat, which is essentially the two little seats kind of embedded um you know, in the poll. Um you're probably seeing more of the smaller realtime digital um units uh at a number of the stops. So, as we sort of test that technology and customer acceptance of it, we expand on that. Um, so that's definitely something beyond the the target of 50, what I'll call project stop improvement and expansion, you know, which generally isn't going going to include urban gutters, sidewalk, um, accessibility ramps in addition to the shelter. In some cases, things like retaining structures and all of that. Um, above and beyond that, we'll be ramping up more of the echo seat and the uh, real-time digital signage applications. And we welcome uh frankly one of the best sources we have for where should we go next is you know when individual council members know of a location within their district. So please feel free to call me but Amanda will probably get back to you faster.

Can I just say like all of them? Just all of them. All of them. Just all of just all of them you know while we while we're trying to be lucky, right? Yeah. That'll be a target. Yeah. Um I I appreciate that. I think it'd be really great if as a body we could get more details on that like sort of what that budget looks like, what that timeline is because I know we've talked about this a lot on the INDOT side for example, what's quick build versus not quick build. What's the cost if we have to pour foundation versus if we don't think as a body um we get a lot of requests for that and knowing how to support we go in that process and work together would be really helpful. If we're pouring a sidewalk, it should be the depth you need. Yeah.

For whatever it is you want to build. I definitely want to give credit to to the folks at NDOT. There's been an a tremendous amount of coordination. Um so in some cases, if they're doing a broader pedestrian improvement or a sidewalk project, they're working closely with us to make sure that it accommodates shelter or stop improvement. In other cases, if we're saying, well, we really have to do a stop because, for instance, as we add more cross towns, we're working on a location now at Thompson Lane and Murreey'sboro Pike, which is a very difficult intersection, very complicated stop, but it's also the intersecting point of two major routes. So, we prioritize putting that in, work closely with not to say, well, while we're in here, what else can we do to improve the overall conditions? So, I have to give credit to the folks at NDOT for um for really working closely with us on that.

And I guess just one last thing along those same lines, too, now that we have waste services and water, like who's picking up trash, where is always like a really surprisingly complicated question, but I also get a lot of requests for trash cans at bus stops because people get there and they have a cup in their hand, they want to, you know. So, I think that is also an area where we could probably work better together. If you see a shelter with a trash can, for sure it's ours and it's on our pickup list. Now, to your point, many of the individual stops that don't have shelters, you'll also see cans. Some of those are ours and if we install them, um, then they then they are on our collection list because essentially, similar to what solid waste would do, our our staff run routes. So, you know, stop on Gallatin Pike that has a shelter with a trash can gets picked up and then a stop on Gallatin Pike that doesn't have a shelter with a trash can would get picked up. Um, but we definitely know, again, I forewarned Amanda that shelters and stops are council currency. Um, so, you know, please uh really any of the members let us know any issues you have with an individual stop or a collection of them. Vice Chair Spain, you have any questions?

All right, Council Member Allen. Thank you, Madam Madam Chair. Both Madam Chairs. Um, and thank y'all for being here. And I'm so excited. I don't I don't even have to look at my watch now to catch the number three bus. I just know it's going to be coming in 10 or 15 minutes. So, it's fantastic. Um, I'm close enough in that I can catch the A or the B. So, I I love having that that kind of frequency and look forward to having everybody say the same thing about about their route. So, thank you'all for the improvements that you're making. Can you just explain um what part of choose how you move sh is showing up in your budget and and what part I guess is just all capital and signals that showing up in the mayor's budget separately? How those two sort of interact?

Um I won't speak specifically to signals. That' probably be a good question for NDOT when they're here. Although I will say there is a lot of interactivity on projects and for instance, not specifically to choose how you move, but we were successful in getting a $2 million federal grant for um the Murphreey'sboro Pike Smart Corridor. Um so a lot of what that will fund are basically improvements to signal software and the transit signal priority um measures that really NDOT's more involved in you know what we end up paying for. Basically what we do with with choose how you move is so an over the overall program that was adopted by the voters is essentially our bible I guess for lack of a better word. Um, and then what we do through our planning process is try to sequence what those improvements are. And and a good example of that is because of the lag between when funding was approved and when we can get new equipment a priority on off- peak service improvements, expanding access on demand to weekends, that sort of thing. So, we generally have um extensive contact with Miss Susman and her staff about what's coming up. And what's coming up could be stop improvements. What's coming up could be service expansion. What's coming up could be transit centers where which we have several um sort of in various stages of the pipeline. So it's that dialogue and then we will um we we don't and what the way our board treats it. So we start with that planning exercise for service and capital projects. That filters up through our board um with a service improvement plan and a capital plan. Then that filters up through the metro process through things like CIB and whether it's regular CSP type funding or specifically through choose how you move as well as uh the greater national regional CA council and the metropolitan planning organization so that we can access state and federal funds

that so a lot of layers when I'm sitting in the back that's sounding I'm looking at Steve Ryder that's sounding like a real government bureaucrat sort of an answer but I guess I've been at this too along. Fair. Fair enough. But there's money coming from a number of different directions and y'all use it.

And basically what we're trying to do is leverage and maximize, as you might guess, there are projects that are more or less attractive to the state or to the feds and what we're trying to do. And frankly, one of the areas where choose how you move is tremendously helpful is by being able to demonstrate that local commitment. It's easier to get federal government, state government to say, "Yeah, if if you know, we know that you have the local share available." It's it's quote easier to say yes.

Excellent. That's great. And then can you talk about the I think it's called We Go Ride. I lose I lose track of the names. the program. I mean, we've got some big companies now that are that are moving here. And at one point, we required anyone who was asking for incentives or whatever to to be presented with that option, but but now they're all just coming. I mean, maybe the state's given incentives or whatever. Are are we capturing all of those? And does that show up in the budget as kind of a fixed revenue on the front end or how does that show up in the budget

where we go ride? And I'll let Amanda point to you specifically in the in the charts that you have where it is. So, we go ride generally is going to show up as passenger revenue and we sort of separate out what I'll call our retail passenger revenue, which is somebody with a quick ticket or paying $2 from wholesale. Wholesale could include the stride program that Metro National Schools does, the university programs, we go ride. Um and that program with the with the implementation of quick ticket really took off. Historically, one of the complaints or criticisms we heard from the business community was just the old passes were difficult to administer. You sort of had to hand them out individually and kind of keep track of them and RTA and MTA were different and some people want to ride an MTA bus, some people want to ride some the same people want to ride the train. With Quick Ticket, it it can all be managed online. So we were able to expand over say the last three years. We've gone from about eight eight or nine we go ride participants to over 40 um and that continues to grow. Um including I think some of the high-profile um economic development um you know candidates that have come to town recently. Amazon for instance is part of that program. Lance Bernstein is part of that program. we're talking to a a more recent uh um announcement that that we're very optimistic about.

Uh and then one one final question. You mentioned circulators in other parts of town. Is there any chance a downtown circulator is ever coming back or have things changed and everybody can just jump on a scooter and we don't need it. But it seems like it would be a handy thing to have.

So, um I know probably a year or two ago you all had briefings from NDOT on the connect downtown. um downtown circulation plan. There were a couple things transit that was a very broad plan on really almost everything from loading zones and and ride share and all of that. Our specific interest on the transit side generated a few things. One was the transit priority corridors. Um the secondary downtown hubs, so beyond the Elizabeth Duff Center at we go central, so hub, eastbank hub. Um and as we sort of build out that network, we do expect that there would be a renewed um benefit to having something really connect kind of connecting those those facilities in particular.

But that's probably not reflected in this year's budget because we got to build the other ones. Okay. Um all right, that's all my questions. Thank you very much. Thank you, Council Member Vo.

Thank you so much. Thank you, Madam Chairs, and um Steve, and everyone for being here. I really appreciate it. Um just like you all talked about the journey pass, so many of my constituents have been able to benefit um from um these 1.5 million trips. And so with that, you know, so many more people taking um the bus, can y'all tell us um how much does it cost to install a bench um at the bus stops? So a bench itself is is cheap. Generally speaking though, the expense for that matter, a shelter is an installed shelter is only about 12 or $14,000. Where we run into expense is what we have to put under it. So every every stop improvement we do has to meet federal ADA requirements. for example, um you know, our our bench is just from a liability standpoint and we work closely with NDOT. We we whether it's NDOT, TOT, Metro Water, um all of the permitting agencies, we have to follow the same permitting requirements, you know, really that a private developer would. So, we have to be in a position to be able to secure. So that generally means there has to be sidewalk or right of way and we have to be able to meet the clearance requirements of that. In a lot of locations where you have pretty much a narrow sidewalk, you know, the street front and then a building right up against, it's challenging to put, you know, infrastructure in that right of way and maintain the clearances required by the ADA. So a bench itself is super cheap. you know, when I say super cheap, it's, you know, in the realm of what you all are looking at in the over the next couple of weeks, it's super cheap.

Um, thank you. And with that, do you have like a plan or a schedule like you said? So, if you're aware of some stops, it's very difficult, but if there's others that you can make improvements like I had one on Murphy'sboro Pike, y'all improved, but you temporarily moved the bus stop down the street, right? But it caused lots of issues and the church was vandalized. And so I'm just trying to understand like what the priority is and if we can improve on that and when we um talk about adding the benches and having a great experience for um our riders while they wait.

Yeah, I think some of this comes back to chair Evans Seagal's um question about the echo seats as an example and accelerating the deployment of that's not a perfect solution. It gives you a place to sit. It doesn't protect you from the rain. It doesn't protect you from the sun. Um but certainly an improvement. Um so yeah, those are and you know and to I guess to pat somebody not somebody in our organization on the back. Um you know we're at just around 350 sheltered bus stops now. 10 years ago we were under a hundred. Um so that continues to be you know a work in progress. Um so ideally you know in in a perfect world we'd have some version of amenity at every bus stop. But on the other hand, there are a lot of bus there's 1,600 bus stops in the system. As we add more service, there will be more. And we have bus stops that might not see a boarding in three or four weeks. So, you know, that tends to be a balance of what do our counts look like, particularly boarding counts. You know, generally folks as they're getting off the bus aren't as excited about, you know, taking a seat or being out of the they're kind of off to where they're going. But what do our boarding counts look like? What is the adjacent what are the adjacent uses? Is there a school or a health center or or a retail complex? Um constructibility. Um and then just you know prioritizing along some of the and a lot of it again does come back to requests. Um one of one of our board members rides very regularly and has taken specific note of this. So I've been getting pictures about every other day. Can you look at this stop? So, and again, we would welcome in any of your districts, there's a specific location, we know that, hey, this afterchool program moved here or whatever the case might be where we might be able to bump something up the the priority list.

Grant, I appreciate that. Um, and just was wondering, can y'all tell us um when you believe that you'll be able to increase to 247 service? Ah,

really good question. Um, one of the precursors actually the ambassador program is a key precursor to that. Um, because obviously and particularly at some of our major facilities like um the Elizabeth Duff Center, the Dr. Patton Center um it's a different sort of an operation when you are never closed. So we want to make sure that we have the proper support mechanisms in place to make sure that those those facilities and the people using them and our employees, you know, can have a good experience. It's not really a matter of I we obviously don't need extra buses. We've got at 2 in the morning, we got plenty of buses available and even now to the point of staffing, we'll be getting there. So, it's what we're doing right now is peer benchmarking with other cities that do 24/7 to see what they're dealing with. And believe it or not, it's a surprisingly small number. Um, some cities that you would expect like New York, Chicago, LA do it. Other cities that you might expect like Washington DC does not have 24-hour service. Um but peer cities for instance Cincinnati started it not too long ago and that's a pier that we're looking at. So part of our issue it's that is less of a resource issue than it is making sure when we roll it out that everybody has a good experience with it.

All right. Thank you. Um I have maybe two more questions. Um I have taken the Fourth Avenue when y'all did the bus um the pilot lane uh the pilot last year. Um just wondering if that is in the plans to be permanent and if so um when would that happen?

Oh, if that were up to me. Uh we continue to work particularly with NDOT and Metro Police. The the biggest challenge it worked extremely well and we have the data um and we'd be happy to share it, you know, whether it through be through the transportation and infrastructure committee or elsewhere, but the data off of our operating um speeds. The biggest challenge with it really is is the staffing resource of enforcement. Um so having officers, you know, basically um you know, working those lanes, maintaining those lanes and especially the intersections where you tend to have people kind of turning in. Um so it's my understanding that um some of in addition to the police who were doing it last year um now we'll be in a position not before not too long where NDOT's enforcement officers may be able to help with that as well and and I've indicated to um to Philip Jones that certainly were happy to help with some of that if if that helps to expedite it because if you've tried to get from central down into your neighborhood ood at 10:00 on a Saturday night. Um, well, I pro would probably just walk to KVB and and catch the bus down there, but but it can be a real challenge.

Um, thank you for that. And I wanted to ask um before cuz I could take the bus to the airport and but it was only frequent once an hour. So, I wanted to know are y'all increasing um the frequency from the airport and could you talk a little bit more about details regarding that?

Yeah, on July 5th the 18 um airport bus will go to about 20 minute course service during most of the day and then 30 minutes later at night. Right now it's 40 minutes during peak and 60 minutes off peak. And what we're looking at, what we kind of like to do before we commit to what so that's July 5th. We typically do our service changes, service expansion July and January. That's based on our collective bargaining agreement. So before we quote commit to January, you know, we want to kind of get some experience with the July changes just to make sure if we need to make adjustments, we can account for those. But I do expect we'll have other airport connectivity options that we'll be putting on the table for the January changes as well.

Great. Thank you. This is my last question. Um, can we go prioritize um some capital spending um budget on some buildouts that also overlap with vision zero and the high injury network um goals? Yes, I I mentioned earlier we definitely coordinate very closely with NDOT in particular, Metro Planning in some cases and then also in the development review process. I have to give NDOT another pat on the back. To be honest, when I first started here, um stuff would get developments would get approved and and then after the fact, well, can you put a bus stop? No, not really. Not the way you you did this. but they've been really good about engaging us on the front end. Both metro codes and planning um and then developers incorporating some of those change. In fact, number of our bus stop improvements have been privately funded through the development process, you know, which is a big win for everybody. Um but yeah, we absolutely do that. And I would call in fact uh probably a good example and it's not far from your neck of the woods is this Thompson Lane um Murreey'sboro Pike stop improvement which definitely is incorporating things like upgraded crosswalks and sidewalk connections and those types of activities. So when we do a major project like that or or if NDOT's doing a a not even a major project but a project involving a bus stop you know we've seen at our project manager level really excellent coordination but we'd be happy to talk to you about any individual project and I think the Thompson Lane Murreey'sboro would be you know kind of a good example of where that kind of comes into play.

Yeah I definitely have um one specifically on Msboro Pike but we can talk about that later. Thank you so much. Thank you, Council Member Cash.

Hey, thank you. Um I've got a couple of questions. One I think got answered. Um I I want to ask about I I want to um agree with what council member Allen said about West End. like it is not only great for me that I don't have to wait very fre very long at all to get it. Um like sometimes I'll see one go by like 3 minutes after the last one went by. But but generally it's about 10 minutes. But I also love being able to tell my constituents that no, you won't have to wait that long for a bus. Like it will if it's 10 minutes then you know it it will not be 10 minutes unless it's you late at night or really early in the morning. Um, so I I appreciate that and I kind of want to ask I know this is kind of a capital question but it relates to operations and I want to know about West End really but kind of but just in general with Choose how you move and and your long-term plans or near-term plans like what are we what are we seeing where are we in getting like either BRT dedicated lanes or semi-dedicated lanes and what kind design or or I don't know if that's the right word, but but kind of configuration whether it's a lanes on the side or a lane in the middle um with dedicated stops or dedicated like uh

Right. Yeah. Yeah. What can you tell me about about that? Especially West End.

Yeah. Well, West End is certainly in in the choose how you move program at least as far as 31st um for what's fra framed as the all access quarters which includes those types of priority measures, pedestrian improvements, what have you. The specific sequence and and I know periodically we we come with ND do and the choose how you move office to do updates. So that's a collaborative process with choose how you move. We are um actively working with the choose how you move office and end dot now on getting consultants on board to do the early planning on the Nolanville Pike corridor. So we expect that process to be underway this year. Um the rest of the specific sequencing um I would probably encourage I'm happy to to give a take but when Sabrina and the choose how you move folks come a lot of that's sort of the the back and forth we're having with them and with NDOT. So those are, you know, on the all access quarters, transit, transit priority, dedicated lanes where we can do them is going to be an important element, but those are going to be really broad mobility projects for pedestrian infrastructure, roadways. So I do not want to pretend to be the the quote expert or or our group to be the expert. That's going to really require a team effort.

Thank you. Um, a couple of smaller questions, I guess. uh this is I guess a suggestion but um maybe you can give me some feedback. So I I'm glad to hear that there are more airport um routes coming. Uh I also want to add that one of the things that I as someone who's taken it at least three times from the airport. uh finding it can be really difficult and like there's just a one of the regular little bitty signs that you see on you know on the side of the road when you're right there you can see it but the but the we go stop at the airport at the airport is like way in the back of a parking garage that you you know that there's a lot of stuff going on and I get that maybe they don't want you know like advertising but they also want visibility I would think we want visibility so Are there efforts to like

make that stop at least more easier to find whether it be visual or instructional or

Right. We are working with the airport and actually did receive some funding under the choose how you move capital side to do improvements at the airport stop including improved wavefinding. We do have to work with the airport on what their constraints are and what their regulatory environment is. And then the other issue at the airport is whatever we do at this stop is essentially temporary anyway because with the construction of the new rental car facility essentially those functions will be moving there and we have our our planning group and our project group has been engaged with the airport's design staff on that facility. So, we're cautiously hopeful, optimistic that u we'll have some short-term improvements that are what I'll call relatively low dollar investment. Uh maybe more than a bench but less than something else. Um and then longer term as they transition into the new facility that there's a little bit more, you know, that we're essentially that transit is much more easily accessible. Yeah. Um there

I mean bells and whistles is nice but uh visibility is kind of just important especially like you can see how thick my glasses are like absolutely it took me a little while to find it. Uh I mean and I kind of knew um I mentioned the word advertising. I've noticed in the last couple of years that um there used to be like some advertising whether it be like commercial advertising or um metro ccentric advertising in the you know at the top in the kind of that that bar and I I've been on a lot of buses lately that there's nothing and I you know I'm not you know I wonder if there was a conscious decision to

uh just like stop doing that and collecting advertising revenue and which I revenue is always good but at the same time it seems like that space could be used by people who um need to know what's going on and they're sitting there and they're you know just like I wonder if you can work out something with like some of us some of the metro departments to like you know when there's an election coming up there's something that just details the information or social services here's how you can connect or right uh various things like Uh yes and it and it might add a little color to the bus too

there. Um so there's a long-standing council resolution on the participation of metro uh and metro related agencies in that program and that is very much still alive. It probably isn't as I guess top of mind for some of the metro affiliated organizations as it was when we had what I'll call an outside advertising firm selling. uh probably about three or four years ago, we transitioned over from um what I'll call the traditional transit advertising where to be to be honest, we were getting, you know, windows covered up and all sorts of what I'll call negative side effects to what we call our community impact partnership program. And that's where we're doing things well like the the partnerships with Nashville SC, uh the partnership with the Titans. We have a partnership with T DOT and N DOT on the vision zero program and several others of those. So those are very much um still something that we're pursuing and want to grow. Um but certainly if there's a need um I just had outreach last week from a metro affiliated agency that was interested in doing something inside the bus and and we put them in contact with our with our person who handles that.

Thanks. Last, if you're comfortable, um, you mentioned a a board member that regularly rides MTA. Can you name him or her so we can uh elevate the And I don't mean to say that our other members don't. I know Gail, by the way, Gail would second your comment on the three. That's her regular bus, but it's actually Iran Thompson uh with the Urban League who is uh in a very good way. Ron, if you're watching, um, texting me pictures and and reports from the system quite frequently. Ron Thompson is is the hero of the day. Thank you. Council member Copen.

Thank you uh, Chair and thank you uh, for your hard work and for being here. I I'm going to have AI after this analyze how many times the word journey pass and benches were said uh, in this in this meeting. I'm going to add to that uh, for both of those. Uh thank you echoing my colleagues um sentiments for Journey Pass. I had a meeting with Room in the Inn and some residents there um actually about uh benches and Journey Pass uh funny enough but um they were they couldn't be more excited about how much Journey Pass has changed their lives and their ability to access and where previously you know staffers in the end would have to pay for rides for them or things like that they're able to really really access the city. So thank you for that. Um and you know I echo the sentiment about about the benches. We've seen these wooden benches go up, which has been really great. Um, and I've seen so many people use them and enjoy them. Um, have have y'all worked with NDOT and the Tactical Urbanism Program to look at putting more of those benches um in in stops on a temporary basis?

I can't say that we've worked with the group that's been doing those and I there's a lot in my neighborhood and I always chuckle at how creative um the designs are because I guarantee you on a government bid we wouldn't be anywhere near um as creative. A lot of our focus has been more on um you know what we were talking about earlier which is our planned infrastructure whether that's a significant stop upgrade like a major shelter pedestrian project or the echo seat um which is sort of the the seat embedded into the bus stop pole um sort of thing. So I honestly can't we'd be happy to u work with both NDOT and uh and you know the groups that are doing the tactical urbanism for sure. We've done that in the past on on some of the what I'll call popup stop projects.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. I think and then tactical urbanism I think would be a good tool for this because um and I appreciate um Lindsay on your team and and answering much of my questions about this earlier. um you know obviously at 50 you know 50 stops you know a year or so we're going to be be here a while trying to get all those in and that makes sense why we have to do all that infrastructure but you know in the meantime I think there may be hopefully ways to more quickly provide um adequate seating for people um for the uh there's a question about the soro transit center can you give me an update on where that is um we know that the 8th Avenue connectivity has been really is a piece I've been advocating for um connecting north neighborhoods through downtown and so would love to know where That's where that is.

Sure. Where we are on that is so typically for the transit center projects, we start with what I'll call the needs document where we work with our operating team and our both our internal and our contracted um project and engineering consultants to basically design what I'll call the ground plane or the transit center. Sobro's obviously a more uh complex project because you know we're say for instance with the Dr. patent center. We could do that. We're pretty much self-contained because we we access the land and it's a transit center because that's going to be a much larger facility. Obviously, we'll be working with, you know, mayor's office, metro planning, you name it. So, where we are with it right now is we should have the um what I'll call the transit center needs document completed within the next month or two and then we'll confer with um you know metro planning mayors off end dot traffic impact uh analysis has to be a big part of this to start working on a what I'll call the you know a project execution plan including who's actually you know responsible to lead on the project. It could be us. It could be another entity.

And so it sounds like couple months for the needs assessment. And then how far out? I mean, is the stop is the completion potentially is it is it years out? Is it decades out? I mean, give me give me a sense. Obviously, we can't pin it down yet. And I and I and I apologize for hedging, but I don't apologize too much

because it's conceived as a joint development project with something going on top. The actual timing is probably dependent more on that that market assessment which is, you know, we're going to be working and relying on other folks in the metro universe because it's typically not, you know, not where our strong suit is. Um, in contrast with I know we're working with council member Gamble on what I'll call a simpler um facility um you know up in the skyline area that you know I could be a little bit more maybe not entirely date state date certain um but have a little bit better idea of what the what the steps are but we're happy to chat with you you know individually about it and sort of where we are and certainly when the when the needs document comes out be happy to meet with you on Sounds good. Thanks so much.

Thank you, Council Member Evan Seagull.

Sorry, just so I think there's been a theme tonight. Um and um one thing I that occurred to me when you were answering Council Member Vo's question on benches. Um, Council Member Allen said something to me in the middle of it, and a lot of us live or work or in parts of town where there's more sidewalk coverage than other parts of town. Certainly, not everybody in town has sidewalk coverage, if any. But for those of us who do, I think it would be helpful if we could get some basic information on what the general everything else being equal, knowing there's an exception to everything specs are for the placement of an echo bench or a bench. And then I think the shelters actually have different depth concrete than the sidewalk. So a sidewalk may never be able to support that without additional work if my understanding from prior conversations is right. But just general specs, if we're looking at a stop, how deep does the current sidewalk need to be for you just to plop something down on it? Because otherwise, we can't prioritize our own ask. And that'll keep you from having to go out and measure everything and be like, well, it's only 3 ft. We can't do anything.

We'll um I know Amanda and Lindsay are back in the back of the room taking notes for us to formally respond to the questions. Um so, we will absolutely get that to you. A lot of information is contained if you go on our website a few years back. We developed uh what are called transit design guidelines and it's really intended for every everyone from planners to developers to public and public um sector organizations to say okay you know what do I need to incorporate a bus stop in here or what does a what's it what's what's included in a transit center or that type of thing and I'm sure when we when we get you more detailed information one of those pieces of information will be a link to that particular report.

Council member Gamble,

thank you, Chair, and thank you all for being here and for your presentation today. I'm not going to press you on time like my colleague for the North Nashville Skyline uh neighborhood center. I'll just say the Skyline North neighborhood is really excited and and anxious for that uh neighborhood center to come to fruition. My question is about trash and um there are I've noticed more trash cans at bus stops with benches. The question is, do you have a plan where you are adding trash cans at most if not all uh bus stops? And in regards to the Skyline Commons area uh that we're trying to develop, there is always a lot of trash and I'm always on the property owners about cleaning up trash. But is anywhere in this budget is it in repairs and maintenance services where you calculate

funding for cleanup of the bus stop areas?

Yeah, this does assume an increase in the number of crews, stop shelter crews and the stop shelter crews. Some are assigned to trash collection. Some are assigned to the quarterly cleaning which is like an overnight pressure washing. some are to the repair, you know, so whether that be graffiti or broken out glass panel or in some cases. Um I know we were dealing with one where the car destro a car destroyed the shelter and it just needs to be removed and replaced. So yeah, th this budget if approved or if adopted by the council, we would be adding a couple crews on the stop and shelter. And I will add uh can't get super time specific, but on Skyline, we did get some good news. Two weeks ago, when we use federal money in a project, we have to go through the federal environmental review process and we got our environmental clearance on Skyline uh two weeks ago. So, we can now we now it becomes more time certain. Uh, and we're, as I mentioned to you, I think in one of the other committees, we plan to sit down with you in the near future on schedule and layout and all sorts of issues associated with it.

All right, I have a a question. What is the current plan for improving safety at high need stops, especially lighting, shelter, ADA access, pedestrian crossings, visibility, cameras, and coordination with MMPD when incidents occur.

So, it varies with the stops. Um, generally when it's a major stop improvement, there's a lighting enhancement. Um, things like cameras are generally in the in the major transit center issues. Um, we continue to work on what I'll call the the a the continuum of safety environment. And that continuum starts with our operating employees. And that could be a bus operator, could be a custodian that's both observing and uh reporting any activities that will incorporate the transit ambassadors um who might do anything from tell European tourist where the bus bay is to get to the um Opry Resort um you know or working with someone who's who's having some challenges. There are contracted security which is unarmed security. Their primary role is to enforce our code of conduct, you know, which tend to be the quality of life types of things. And one of the things that the choose how you move funding's allowed us to do, we've expanded total security. Um, I'll call it coverage, but it's basically the number of hours of security that we have by about 65% including for the first time ever in Nashville, our mobile um security patrols, which you may have seen the cars marked. Archangel is our provider, but in addition to the cars, which will go out, for instance, if we get a report of something happening at a stop, um they will go and inspect stops along a route, but they also include onboard rides of security officers um with a trailing car, um you know, to help support in those. And then of course the the partnership we have with Metro Nashville Police. Um we've worked with police for well over 15 years through their secondary employment unit. Chief Drake has appointed Captain Brian Williams to be the transit police liaison to MTA. And if I've given NDOT a

lot of shoutouts today, certainly Chief Drake, but without a doubt, Captain Williams has has done an amazing job of getting to know our system, our operation, you know, and really working with us to try to enhance, you know, that continuum. Um, we're we're fortunate that the incident, what I'll call the incidents of criminal activity are very rare relative to use of the system, but we want to keep it that way and knock it down. Um, so it it really again starts with our operators and our operating employees and kind of runs the gamut. Um, and if there are specific locations that any any of the members or your constituents have a concern with, please let us know and we can we can work to try to deploy resources.

Thank you. And the last question from me, um, you mentioned earlier about being fully staffed, but in your budget, um, questionnaire, you said you had 45 unfilled FTEEs. Have you since filled those positions?

Most of our openings are what I would call um, transient openings. So when we do the council questionnaires or for instance, when we report to the board, it's a snapshot in time. So when I say that, you know, it's fully staffed, there might be a vacancy, you know, we report that fully staffed and then somebody resigns the next day. So most of the 45 are what I would call the normal, you know, we have now we're at about 500 operators. So you are going to have some turnover from time to time. The positions I would say that are most challenging for us to fill probably wouldn't be a surprise. It's generally our technician positions. So those are skilled positions. Again, expanding the recruiter and the trainer uh positions has been important. We also have a licensed mainten maintenance apprenticeship program that basically in a three-year period, folks come into that program. And after three years of a combination of classroom, laboratory, and and real world experience, they graduate into the mechanic program. and choose how you move has allowed us to expand that program from three apprentices at a time to nine apprentices at a time. In fact, I'm not even sure Gail knows this yet, but our board meeting next week will be graduating our most recent class of four apprentices. So, we'll at least be down to 41.

Thank you. And I want to open it up for uh final questions. Chair Evan Seagull. So, sorry. Um, just every time y'all talk it makes me think of something else. It's good. It's good. Um, I know we're working on um, we get a lot of emails on MTA feedback and I know y'all get a lot of emails on MTA feedback and we're working on um, putting a system in the hub that works with your feedback form, I think. And I was just curious what the status of that is at this point.

We get you an update. Our director of customer care has been working with Nashville on that project. So, we'll let me get an update and not I'm learning that I better not say too much or you'll have another question. No, I'm sorry. Any additional questions from our for our we go folks? Seeing none, thank you Mr. Bland. Thank you, Madam Chair Gail and others and for the work that you do. Good to see you. have our final um department hearing with our public library. So, library folks, y'all can come on