Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

All right, y'all thanks for joining.

Thanks for taking the time. Come meet on the. Lane, um, project and. That's part of the traffic on the neighborhood street traffic calming program. Um, my name is Chase. I'm an engineer with more compact than not in the traffic calling program. So, the agenda for the meeting tonight, we'll, we'll go through a few slides and talks about the program generally, um, and discuss. And your point specifically, and some of the data that we went out and collected as part of this process. We'll talk about the typical traffic common toolbox and different tools that we use on projects with program on. And then we'll go over the preliminary design concept and the next steps. The speeding is being recorded. We're in person here at the Southeast Community Center at the public library branch. But if you're viewing this online after the fact, there's a survey open right now. We really encourage you to go scan the QR code here, go to engage.nashville.gov slash traffic calming. And we definitely want to hear your feedback. So traffic calming, specifically in the context of the NSTC programs, we focus on residential streets, so not like bigger roads, but really neighborhood streets where it's mainly residential. We focus on physical solutions and really the main goal is, you know, there's a speeding issue on the street as it stands today based off the application and the data that we collected. And the goal really is to mitigate that and lower speeds on the street. So a little bit larger perspective on safe systems approach. So the safe systems approach is basically a framework that's in place, put in place by the USDOT that talks about kind of multiple, basically takes a comprehensive look at improving roadway safety on our streets and roads. And the NSTC program hits on a lot of those, the main one being safer speeds. Generally, the idea is, you know, as speeds increase, chances of a serious injury occurring also may increase, as you can see by the graphic up there on the screen. And so the traffic calming program really hits on the safe system approach and also the Vision Zero goals that Metro National has for our streets. A little bit about the program generally. It's a pretty popular program right there on the right side. You can see this is a lot of view of the traffic home and tracker. Um, which is on Metro's website where you can kind of go see. Um, different traffic only products, like, in different in various stages, whether or not they've been applied for, or for this meeting into some things like we're in right now, or if they don't, it's like that. Uh, but it's not about cases over 600 applications. Um, as of this past spring. And spring 2026 selections that we went through earlier this year were part of.

Other 25 neighborhoods that were selected.

This project is actually part of the fall 2025 selection. Um, there were some scheduling some scheduling difficulties that have gotten us to this point, but ultimately, this was part of the fall section of last year. But we're happy to be here now doing this meeting. So, then really like to put a plug in for hub Nashville. If you haven't heard of it, or you said before, it's really your 1 stop shop for getting in touch with. With Metro and dot on any issues that you're seeing retreat. So, if you haven't been able to check that out, really encourage you to go there to connect with. And not in Metro and things maybe that are outside of the scope of what we're talking about here tonight as far as the traffic program goes. I'd like to hit on just a little bit of like how this is a data driven process. So whenever we have, whenever the applications come in and we actually, we go through the process where we filter those applications based off of multiple criteria, but really the thing is we go out and collect data, speed and volume data, which make up the largest percentage of that prioritization calculation, and then also account for Nearby, like, parks, schools, crash history and things like that. Ultimately, all these things are weighted in the calculation amongst those. Over 600 streets and the top 25 for that cycle are selected. Or were selected and move forward and become a project as we are here today. So, today we're talking about baby roof lane and specifically from mountain view road to eagle view Boulevard. Um, so this is this is the data that was collected out on the street last year. So, um, 85th percentile speed. Um, 35 miles an hour on about 1600 vehicles today and a. Available with the street from 26 feet to 38 feet. So pretty well, let me say it's a lot of vehicles a day on the street.

Wow.

Yeah, so the traffic calling tracker, this is a snip for a minute that shows the, that shows Bay River Plain and the extents of the project. So you can see highlighted there in yellow. And so, yeah, typically you'd like to like to stop here and just hear from folks here in the room on like what your living experience is on Bay River Plain and how you, how you experience the street.

So definitely want to turn it over to you. People who walk have to walk on the street. So like fast cars could be dangerous, people walking on the street.

I was nearly hit two days ago just hitting my mouth because two cars decided they were trying to press each other with their engines as they were passing each other.

And toward Eagle 2 on the right, there's like a nursing home. Yes. for work they fly on that street but i mean i'm not just blaming it on them because i mean they're going to fix them and put a third apartment complex on that street at the dead end and uh you know there are people that speed on that street yeah i mean since since we no longer have a dead street since the downpour is all the way through the contract falling i think like over here yeah and

So it's not just the volume that we have, but now we have people racing through there. You have motorcycles racing back and forth. Cars, as I said, racing, just speeding and driving their engines as they go.

I do like the cross streets, though. I mean, I much prefer to go that way to get to Bell Road than Mount View.

It's nice, but I mean, if I had to choose, I'd much rather say for street. About the time that I went to apply for this, somebody else had beat me to it. So I'm glad that we're getting these traffic calming measures.

It's just as dangerous to walk on a street now. When parents are dropping off their kids at Eagle Hill Elementary and picking them up, they block traffic. You have to go in the wrong lane to get past the blocked traffic.

Yeah, that's how people, yeah.

It's just, you know, It's bad.

Where's the school, right? The school. Yes, yes.

Okay, okay. Gotcha. Okay.

Yeah. But for sure, you know, because when I moved over there, it was still the dead end, of course. And You said it was just with mercy homes, just like Darren was explaining, like, when they would have shift change, you would really know because they would be rushing it back and forth. But now that we're experiencing that every day, all day long, and just the fact of. When I'm coming out of my town home community and turning left. You know, I'm almost holding my breath each time.

Which way?

Yeah, turning right.

I'll show.

Yeah, so.

I just want to get a sense of which way you're going.

Where it looks like an L, this is us right here. And you're trying to take a left.

Trying to take a left. And then there's a slight curve. And so, it's hard to see.

Mm-hmm.

A little bit, because you just don't know. You know, somebody's coming up, you know, make a group and like I said, almost holding my breath each time, you know, to turn left. And it just really happened to watch, so I always. You know, I think the state risk in that aspect really needs to slow down.

I connect her area for sure. My neighbors had a 2 car collision in their front yard. are so tell them how fast they were which house is yours i'm at 2971 so it was 2973 so we're right in front of that what's across the street it's the one of the town homes okay i know where it is yeah okay yes

definitely, you know, something that needs to, of course, be addressed. I don't know if I have any minutes. Yeah, people are being addressed for sure.

Yeah, thanks for the feedback. Thanks for the experience. Is there anybody that's joined us online?

Okay.

Sounds good.

So, yeah, thanks for providing that.

So, before we get into, like, the concept that's, like, that we currently put together just based off of, like, the desktop review, we'll go quickly through, generally, the toolkit. Um, so these are just typical things that we would propose as part of the traffic calling project. The 1st, 1 being the speed questions. So. These are about three inches in height. They're about six feet in length. So they're not like a speed bump that you'd see like in a parking lot that's designed like five or 10 mile an hour speeds. They're more designed for like a 20 to 25 mile an hour speed for folks to go over. You see we saw them at 20 miles an hour. And they had those gaps between to allow like emergency vehicles to straddle them and not be needed and things like that. And we do, that's the width of the six feet. The lengths, they can vary just based on different distance, but generally they're long. Similar to that, speed tables. So again, it's another vertical measure in the street. Don't see these proposed nearly as much really because we tend to lean towards the gaps to allow for emergency vehicles and larger vehicles, things like that. So we talked about a couple of vertical measures, speed cushions particularly. So I wanted to focus a little bit on the impact that those have. So vertical measures referring to the speed cushion. We've installed a lot of these as part of the track economy program throughout Metro Davidson County. And so in 2025, we actually, like I mentioned, we go out and collect data on a lot of the streets beforehand. And so last year, we actually went out and collected accuracy data on a lot of those streets to really quantify the impact of these and how they really do reduce speeds. So you can see that. I'll just read off of this table. So the average speed of 50 miles an hour, average of around 30, I'm rounding, but around 33 miles an hour before has an eight mile an hour drop to around 24-ish miles an hour. All the way up to the 95th percentile speed. So the folks who were speeding the most are traveling the fastest. You see an even bigger decrease of almost 10 miles an hour getting down to those, you know, not all the way down to like maybe like a 25 or a 30, but really kind of down on that how low they're speeding.

So that's why we focus a lot on vertical measurements and speed patterns because they are, they're perfect for work.

Another tool in the toolkit that we use whenever like a speed go-to or a vertical measure might not be viable is a radar speed feedback sum. Generally, like we have, like if you're entering from like a higher speed environment to lower speed environment, we might put one of these ahead. Or if you have like a grade difference, a grade you can't put another vertical measure or something like that, we'll discuss about radar speed feedback sum. The downside, though, is that, you know, it's not an actual road, so it doesn't people could ignore them or just.

So, they're not quite suspected, although you do still see it.

Narrowing so. Narrowing is essentially like, where you put edge on striking in and try to narrow the road a lot more like officially constraints environment from the folks traveling on the street. Um, typically typically result in smaller reductions in speed. It's a little bit. For more purpose, but generally narrow somebody's like, not bad people slipping with them. So. We typically, we like to do that whenever we have larger or wider streets. So, a lot of times when we have a really wide street. We're able to narrow enough to where we might create a short what we call a slow, safer shoulder on 1 or both side of the street. really allow for um a place for people to walk and move the sidewalk so we definitely would like to do that we potentially could we have to we'd have to go back and look so and i'll get a look i don't think I don't think that it's proposed right now. It's not proposed, but the width is between 24 and 30. I saw that. Yeah, I saw that the width looked, at least was listed on the PowerPoint as being, and that's based off of, like, we look at Google Maps and get, like, a typical width, but we'll actually have to be speeding you out, not today, but in the field and, like, get actual measurements. And so there's potential if the street's wide enough that we can create, like, even if it's, like, a three- or four-foot walking path, like, that could be something. Bull belts are similar to narrowing, just at intersections. So the same idea, you provide people a little bit less space, a little bit more visually constrained, make people kind of not, don't let them take a turn super fast, kind of slows people down at intersections while they're making turns. Also provides that bottom right image, kind of shows where if you have parking near an intersection, of offset that um to give folks a little bit more sight distance chicanes um chicanes Essentially, never travels and force people to go through as opposed to just going straight down the street. So, it provides that deflection and slow folks down. The drawback to that all the times are there. You need a lot of space and most time whenever there's a lot of space, there's not 3 parking and people sometimes don't like giving up their on street parking. So that can be that's that's a drawback to those, but they are useful. Pitch points. are similar to a chicane where you are diverting that path of travel, but it's just down to one lane in each direction. So you force a yield condition from folks. So if somebody going in one direction, one has to yield to the other if they come at the same time.

And then traffic circles.

So traffic circles on some of our largest intersections we find can be useful if we have enough pavement to do it.

Okay.

So this is the current concept for Baby Ruth Lane. So we put this together generally based off of a desktop review. It's like looking at Google Earth and looking at where we thought a good spacing of speed cushions and other measures would be. So just starting from Eagle View here, so you can see the school where North is pointing left here. At that stop sign, I believe this is a big hill here, so it wouldn't be suitable for a cushion. then but moving to the right we've got basically four evenly spaced cushions between about right here and then four evenly spaced cushions down to the mountain view road yeah up in point this is okay you got one right before right before the driveway for pinnacle heights and uh this one yeah yep and uh you got one

Right after the driveway for the first condo complex. Yeah, and you got one right after the driveway of the second condo complex. Wait, wait, wait. No, it's like the border between our condos and the next condo. That's where the second one is. Okay, and the third is by the White House. Oh, correct. Well, that's the 4th. Yeah, the 4th 1. okay. 1 before the pentacle heights driveway and there's no driveways between this 1 and stops on right? Driveway to the apartment complex. Right? But, like, in here, like, there's no, there's no other 1, right? You got you got this apartment complex and you got this apartment complex and the speed bump will slow people down before those intersections. Then you got 1 after our driveway. And you got 1 after the. At the board well.

And this was, is this that curb you were talking about?

Right here?

Yes, right there.

So folks coming around here.

This is after the first set of condos. And then this is after our condos right here. And this is on the other side where the White House is.

That's on the second one, the one I was talking about.

This one?

Yeah, I'm going with those locations.

Any other thoughts?

I'm not sure about your own experience, but do you think people around you help to approach nursing homes? You know, sometimes when they're coming around that curve and they're going, you know, pretty fast, sometimes they're like, oh, you know, trying to make sure. It seems like it's kind of, I'm not sure, it's just hard to see sometimes because of that field. But I've experienced that before too.

And Mercy Home being this facility here.

Yeah, that's Mercy Home.

Yeah, and they come out right here.

So this is the dead end? This is where the dead end is?

Yeah.

I didn't realize there was that much of a curve. Yeah, okay.

But they pretty much blow through that stop sign. This one? Yeah, it's like non-existent. Because it's, you know, right.

It's basically like a left or right turn. So people just do that.

Yeah.

Gotcha. Okay. Okay. Any other comments that sounds like we feel pretty good about the location is there any. Any other feedback or anything else? I think we. Talk a little bit about shoulder to shoulder and that potential that we can evaluate.

Yeah, my. I mean, not only concerned about those types of questions that I used to see, uh, motorcyclists. Yeah, I mean, I get I can see that I get the importance of the emergency. We have a lot of emergency vehicles that kind of restaurants.

So, like, whether I turn around or turn left, I'm going to have. Two of those helps to go from my house.

Yeah, the ones that have the. In the middle, it's not like it's a. like a high traffic where you have to make sure that you're always on your side, either right or the left. And so I'm just concerned that people will be doing like one wheel on the speed pad and one wheel still on the pavement and not only getting that full impact, but it's how it's designed.

Three inches, yeah. And we try to space them, and Carlos is probably going to be in the back of the other ear, but we try to design them so you don't get much value in trying to straddle it that way.

One will happen, the other is still going to go a little bit faster. If you hit it too fast, you're going to feel it.

is uh we typically do it around three feet uh but the max i can't do between each question is four feet uh and then so that makes it uh where if one wheel is on one from the other if one wheel is off the other wheel has to uh besides those like at two degrees for the emergency vehicles that can gap it but besides that like

So motorcycle, I'll just have to get a motorcycle.

Yeah, that's all I have to say. I mean, we can just, like you were saying, we can maybe just go straight.

But if you hit it real fast, you're going to feel it. It's going to be unpleasant. Yeah. Is that what you're telling me?

I mean, I think that, I mean, we get a lot of feedback in meetings from folks who maybe would oppose to say, I don't want to go over these because I don't. And you're right. I mean,

you know, we're getting, you know, most of everybody. People on bicycles get, yeah.

And so as far as the solid ones, how can we see about getting those?

Like the ones that we did ourselves.

Yeah.

You know, I haven't been a part of a project where we've done tables specifically because we do, we hedge sort of much towards questions because of the emergency vehicle aspect. Like for things like that. I can certainly look into and get back with you. Maybe we can exchange contact information. And I'm sure my email address is here. Maybe you can give me your email and I can kind of reach you about your answer to that one. I don't want to tell you.

Yeah, because I'm sure that, you know, with all the conversations that y'all have had, that they bring up the same type of concerns, maybe, about just having their lives. So that's why I'm just kind of wondering why the pass is close to just the tables across the board.

Yeah, yeah. It's mostly due to emergency vehicle considerations and things like that. I haven't run into personally much asking for like the whole table as opposed to questions which is why yeah but you know thank you so the next few slides i'm going to go through like about three or four slides that talk about the process and then we'll stop again for questions Um, but I'll run through these quickly, so we talked about, um, the application. Prioritization and selection and so now we're here at the 1st neighborhood meeting. So, after this, we'll actually, we'll go out in the field. Take measurements, like, we'll go out and make sure that we're because they're. Their design considerations as far as like, where driveways are, we can't be too close to a driveway or this or that. So we'll go out and measure all of that and kind of hone in. We'll put together a final design plan or a draft final design plan. And there's an option for a 2nd neighborhood meeting. We can talk at the end of this if we feel that that's relevant based off of kind of the feedback that we've gotten so far. And then we'll move into those plans to be posted on Metro's website and we'll have an online balloting process, which I have some slots on here in a minute.

So, a little bit more on balloting.

So this is a sample ballot. You'll essentially, when the plans are posted on Metro's website, you will receive, along with all the other property owners on the street, a ballot card similar to the one that you received to advertise this meeting. And it'll have a unique ID just based off of your residence on the street. And it will give you a QR code and a link to the website to where you can, and it will look like this, to where you can go and actually cast your ballot. Um, the voting is open for six weeks and that the voting close date will be very clear, clearly printed on your mailer. It's a yes or a simple yes or no vote. And if two thirds of respondents vote yes, the project moves forward.

It has to be two thirds of people who respond. Yep. So this is the ballot zone.

It's a little funky because I think there's some HOA land and I think the school kind of touches the very end of it there, which skews it a little. But essentially, and you can read the bullets on the screen, the residential properties, churches and schools would get one vote. Only properties directly on Baker's would get a vote. that property would get the vote like the owner of each condo the owner of each home that would go to yeah so i think and i think you can see those the common buildings outlined but yes and then they get preparation eligible for this or this or how many votes does an apartment should be it depends on how many owners there are if it's one parcel with an apartment complex on it it would be one vote

so like me and my neighbors at my condo i have more bugs than a department complex outstanding um stop here too um for anybody online i think

Everybody here got a mailer, which is great. If you believe that you should have gotten, if you're seeing this online after the fact and you think you should have gotten a mailer invite to this meeting, definitely encourage you to reach out. Our contact information is later on in this presentation. Want to make sure that we get you what you need and get your vote passed whenever the time comes.

Yeah, so here we'll stop for questions.

What happens if you don't have a two-thirds carry?

yeah well typically so we'll do what's called a plan b so the vote is really for whether or not we have vertical measures like placed in the street so whether or not you get a ski cushion or a table or whatever what have you um but we can't go back if the vote is no and do what's called plan b which is basically measures that aren't affecting the physical street so most most time it looks like it's peaking at some in either direction

so is there any um like signage or anything where you can put a long baby roof to create some type of awareness i mean even though that you know these are sent out i mean um just so everyone has that constant visual that hey you need to thought yeah

and go out and like advertise more than like sending the meals out. But we definitely encourage y'all to engage your neighbors. Get the work out. And hopefully, you know, there's like, it is posted on Metro's website and all the secret rules posted there. So hopefully you have a really good discipline.

Okay. And just to confirm, if no one else but the three of us end up voting and two out of the three of us vote yes, we're gonna get corrupt.

Maybe we could get Garner to send out a letter to everybody or an email asking everybody to vote for Columbus Meatball Humps. We'll slow people down, maybe deploying, making it safer for the children.

I think that, you know, regardless of whether you participate or not, for the meeting, I think that the majority of the people on that street wants it, really, really wants it. Yeah, especially the ones that walk up and down the street. I mean, they are scared. People with kids, people with dog walkers, just walking around the house.

We have a lot of people, even with dangerous citizens right now, that walk down the street.

Yeah.

My view is that dangerous people

I don't see how they even...

Some people do walk in.

I know.

I'm sorry.

They go to the 6th and 8th apartment complex. Those people, they don't have a car and walk.

So, Carol has just showed me on the chat, Zephoria, which I think was actually the app. Project it's on it's online on the chat and she says currently we have an issue with the end of the road being a dumping point but it gets for speed bumps it's hard for residents to pull it out of the driveways and she asked can we get a traffic light at the end of a cruise lane and not the road So, what I would say to the traffic light is that's. That's outside of the scope of the traffic calling program, but as I shared a little bit earlier on hub, Nashville would be where I would where I would point you all to go to to make requests such as that.

Yeah, I see your point though. Yeah. Where is it? So, if you go, there is a line.

I mean, I think that's certainly something that you could submit to Hub Nashville and somebody that did not will pick it up and take a look at it. I mean, traffic signals, I mean, I won't bore you with like technical mumbo-jumbo, but I mean, there's a process that you have to go through and collect data and it has to be in several see if it's actually more different from a traffic volume perspective, but yeah, definitely would point you to Nashville.

That light on Franklin-Limestone has really helped down.

What was that?

The light on Franklin-Limestone, down Mountain View is the best. Yeah, you know, it's not attractive for it.

Where is that at?

Franklin-Limestone is the very top of the hill, it might be more towards Cashew Crossing. Yeah, that's right before I got there's a light there.

This is also asked someone helping with the vegetation control. Again, not to be a broken record, but I would, I would point you towards sub Nashville for that as well. she hear what you said i think so i think she can hear us i'm trying to get towards the laptop so she could hear it okay carlos anything else on the online just said thank you yeah for sure for sure thanks for joining yes i heard you guys there you are sweet yeah thanks for sending this thanks for thanks for applying thanks for being online

I didn't think the term of sound on. Sorry.

All right.

Any other any other questions at this point? I guess. Meeting 2, um, it's kind of up to you guys if you think that we, that it's necessary to have another meeting. Um, what that would be like, I said, we'll go out and be able to collect some data. We'll put together a final plan. given the feedback that we've gotten tonight it won't be too much different from what you see it'll just be kind of more blown up view um so and once those are posted online so you can call us reach out and ask questions but if we feel we need to necessarily we certainly we want to create our own signage i mean would it be something that we could use like for

or we can direct them to, you know, your website, so they can get some more information.

So you're asking if I can connect you or who?

Yeah, but we've already heard to, like, share this on the community. Would that be allowed? Would that be okay?

As far as you said, the QR code and the link here, I don't think there would be an issue with using that.

Feel free to share the links or

their hoa next to each other that same kind of complex are we going to have different schedules the qr code will send you to the same place but what you're what girl is mentioning is like you want each person to have a unique identifier so you'll have like it'll probably say like vr or bigger vr dash like my number and each of those

Can you guys repeat what you said about the HOA? Because the townhomes on the very end across from Murphy Homes don't have an HOA.

I'll speak into the laptop. They're duplexes.

I don't know what you're talking about. They're duplexes.

after the duplex but there's no hoa that's what she's talking about yeah and y'all are talking about in regards to like helping advertise yeah she doesn't have an hoa yeah i don't have a hoa our uh hoa um for those six uh homes town homes dissolved a while ago years ago

But as far as, like, as far as in getting y'all's neighbors, I mean, it's yeah, I mean, it's a material for you to. Go around and share and get the word out as best as you see fit as best you can.

So, is this something is this project going to go through or because we've, we've been requesting speed bumps since you guys before you guys even open the dead end. Um, oh, I basically flying.

yeah yeah so this is the this is the first the first meeting and at this point like we'll go out and we'll do the design and it's going to go forward to the design and it'll be posted and it'll go and it is going to move forward through the balloting process but that ballot process that we could be a yes or no um but yeah i mean the project is moving forward through the through the program how long is it going to take So the ballot, without another meeting, the ballot will begin in the next like four to six weeks. So we'll post, yeah. And then after that, you know, the balloting will be open for another six weeks and then it'll be either approved or not, or pass or fail. If it's passed, it'll be put in the construction queue and But, I mean, we're coming and end up serving through it. I don't have an exact on what the construction would be. But it would be put in the queue with the rest of the projects.

So, we still got a vote and having the speed bumps. Is that what you're saying?

Yes, yeah. Hmm.

Okay.

It has to be the majority of the neighborhood. Is that what you're saying?

It has to be two-thirds of people who respond. How many? Two-thirds. Okay. I don't know if Tasha

Natasha is online right now, but I know she's 1 of the ones, which is the, the town home that's connected to me. I know she's she's put a yes for it as well. So I'll see what we can do for our area.

To try to get everyone to chime in because we need them. All right. All right. Any other questions right now?

So, when will the ballots go? Is that something you guys are sending an email or in the mail?

It'll be, it'll be in the mail. So. Once we, once we have the plans done, um, we'll get those posted. To Metro's website, and we'll send out ballot mailers. They'll look, they'll look like this. That's on the top left. So, it looks similar to what you got for this meeting. Um, okay. This will go out sometime. Like, I said, I said, yeah, around like, around 6 weeks from now.

Okay. Well, you guys said something else out before the actual belly comes out, like, reminders or upcoming, like, information on it before.

Yeah, the only other the only other touch point that we would have. For the battling process would be if we did if we did another meeting.

Okay. Okay. All right. What else? Anything else? I think I'm good.

I didn't have any other questions. Thank you.

Okay. Okay. All right. Well, really appreciate y'all's time and being here and going online. QR code there will take you to trafficcomment.national.gov. I also want to say thank you to anybody who's viewing this after the fact on the YouTube page and sticking with us. Appreciate you joining as well.

Um, and yeah, just so for showing up that you're going to mail us the balance. Yes. Do I just got to check my mailbox?

Yep.

Right.

Okay, well, with that, we'll, we'll close the meeting. Thank you. All right, thank you. Thank you. All right bye.