Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Be upfront. Mhmm.

Do you need me to go back to inside?

What do I have to hit? Can use the Oh, just forward that way? Okay. Technology.

All right.

Well, good evening. I'm Patty Pakala, planning manager with the Parks Department, and we're here just to give you an overview of our Pathways 2035 Countywide Trails Master Plan update. This is just a courtesy kind of presentation for your benefit and information. We heard through the grapevine that there might be some interest in what we've been working on, and so we wanted to bring it to you. It's in a draft format right now. We don't have we're not at a final stage, but I'll go ahead and, oops. That's not the one. How do I get that the one? How do I forward?

You just click it.

I clicked the right one, not the left. Oh, left one? Okay. So, so this is an internal, document that we're doing on with staff and with the members, the departments that assist the Trails and Blueways Council. So on the project team, we have my team from the Parks and Rec Department, which is myself, Robert Boyd, David Kreger, Janelle Pridemore, and Katherine Gonzalez.

And from Department of Transportation, it's Bryce Barrett, and from the planning office, Yolanda Hipsky. Why this update is needed? Well, in the mobility chapter, RT 9.2 called for the development of a trails master plan, and we put that in the mobility chapter when it was updated because we really hadn't done a comprehensive trails master plan since 1993. Trail planning in Prince William County started with the park authority back in the nineties through the trails and greenways master plan, But that was primarily focused on greenways following some of our stream corridors, and that was where the trail planning went. And it was all mostly under the parks department.

In 2008, there was the update to the comprehensive plan. And in that update, we started to look at the roadway network as well, and the shared use path and other trail network. But we never really even in that document, we never really combined them. They were still mapped separately, so it was really hard to see the overlay of the complete network. And so we've also had increasing interest in blue ways or water trails along our streams and rivers, and that's been mentioned in the parks and recreation, open space master plan.

And so, again, it was recommended in the mobility chapter in RT 9.2 that we go ahead and develop a plan that covers both active mobile or all active mobility, rec trails, and the blue ways. So where does this fit in the plan? Obviously, you have the comp plan at the upper level. The small the comp or the big plans, the comprehensive plan. In the comprehensive plan, then we have goals for other department plan.

So like I mentioned, we have the parks, recreation, and open space master plan. That is our department level plan that coincides with the parks chapter. So this is the department level plan that coincides with implementing some of the goals in the mobility chapter. We intend for this to be a ten year plan, a little outside the four to six year timeline in this document, so that it'll coincide well with the updates to other plans, like I mentioned our parks and rec master plan is done every ten years. That was last done five years ago.

So this is a nice filler in between. Five years from now, we'll do the parks plan again, and ten years from now, we'll do the trail plan again. We also do in the parks department, we do our needs assessment survey, so some of that information helps feed this plan. The county strategic plan helps feed this plan. And then the intent of this plan is that it will help drive future planning for capital improvement program for our trail related projects.

The PROs, which is our parks, recreation, and open space master plan, setting up continued again in the five year. And then also looking at capital maintenance budgets, and other budgets for implementation of the trails network. So the plan scope, we wanted to identify the gaps in the system. The mobility chapter identifies very in pretty good detail all of the transportation gaps. It does not identify a lot of the recreation gaps, and we've been working to update that and get more information on the gaps in our our recreational trails network.

And then, like I said, we also wanted to add blue ways to this analysis. This is the first time we've undertaken as a county really kind of looking collectively where launch locate hand carried launch locations are on our different waterways. So we wanted to identify those gaps and then work out a priority station plan in order to look at how we're going to fund them and move move them forward and create a system for that. So through that, we identified the gaps, like I said. One big change we made on the recreation side is if you look in the comp plan chapter, we have our planned and existing and planned.

We added a subcategory for our recreational trails that is proposed. So there's a distinction there in that existing is obviously existing. Planned is something that we have been planning and looking at for a while, and have a secured way to move that forward. So either an easement, a land dedication, or other rights where we can move that onto construction. A proposed trail would be a gap filler that we don't yet have that identified mechanism for moving it forward.

So we would have to do either a land acquisition, easement acquisition, or other agreement to fill that gap. So that was a level of analysis that we were able to complete in this process. And so all of that came we have Bryce and Robert will be describing our prioritization process, which then drove us to look at, some general, very high level cost estimates. And then moving forward, we're gonna look at more of the maintenance needs. We were hoping to kinda lump that in this plan, but it became too big.

So there's a goal to move the plan forward. We will be doing a similar study of this, particularly on the rec trail side, to develop that maintenance plan for future CMP funding initiatives, that we have it all built in the system. We kind of know what our priorities are from year to year, and it can continue to feed budgets. So now, Robert will go ahead and describe the process.

So for this plan, the the trails are split kind of into two main categories. There's recreational trails, which is anything that's outside the road right of way, and then active mobility trails, which Bryce will go into that covers everything within that road right of way. We when we set out to find the prioritization criteria, we did a lot of public outreach, and then also sort of looked at some of our county initiatives that were existing and created this rubric. We then weighted each of those criteria based on the importance that they received throughout our input process. The heaviest weights for recreation trails were that they create that the segments increase trail system connectivity so as they connect and fill gaps in the existing trail system, that they connect to a regional trail.

So there are three regional trails in the county, the Potomac Heritage National Scenic Trail, US Bike Route 1, and the East Coast Greenway. So segments that connect to those were given a higher priority. And then if a segment was identified in that public outreach process, either through our online survey, online feedback that we received through the website, or in one of the two public planning shreds that we held, those were given a higher weight. And then we had several other criteria as well that were weighted slightly lower. So when we ran that prioritization on the 140 segments that we had on the recreation side, which is about a 118 miles of trail, that's all of the planned and proposed segments.

We achieved a pretty good distribution of the of the trails. We felt good about where the the scores were falling out. We didn't have any extreme outliers or them grouped too low or too high. And they also and just spot checking some of the the segments that we knew were important to us already, like the Palace Creek Greenway, the Potomac Heritage Trail gaps that we've already studied, and the the Flat Branch Greenway, those all scored very high. So we felt good about the the the rankings that we came out of this prioritization with that they were in line with what the public was looking for and also what the county has already been working towards.

So to break this down into a more manageable chunk over the ten year horizon of this plan, we broke them down into three tiers. The plan will be to focus on these tier one segments over the next ten years. So that's 55 total miles of trail added on the the recreational side, and this is a this graph is showing the breakdown by Magisterial Brentsville District has the highest number of or the highest number of miles of planned and proposed trail in tier one, which makes sense because there's just not that much existing infrastructure there right now. So it makes sense that we're going to focus out there in the coming years, all the way down to the Woodbridge District with about three miles of trail where we've already got a lot of our greenways established, and we're really just sort of focusing in on those last couple of gaps. Breaking it down a little bit more, these are the top 10 segments from our ranking.

We're really happy to see that all seven magisterial districts are represented in the top 10. There's a good mix of short segments, the the lengths there and miles. There's a good list mix of short segments that are under a mile and then segments that are up to to five miles. And the the way we broke the segments was based on the planning status of them. We wanted to make sure that we were only referring to a segment as planned or proposed to properly weight it and rank it.

Also a mix of surface types. Those surface types are, you know, long range planning at this point. We're not a 100% sure that that's what they will end up being, but that's what we think. And the the fact that most of them are natural surface is reflected in all of the segments. I think about 90% throughout all the segments we're planning to be natural surface.

We're not gonna be doing a lot of paving, but there are some segments in there that are. So the cost estimation on the recreational side, there's a lot of unknowns when we get into building these trails through the woods, through streams, along the sides of steep river banks, whatever we have to do. But we know that we need to establish and provide these rough order magnitude cost estimates at this planning level for for things like grants and and just budgeting issues. So what we did is we looked at recently completed projects that we've that DPR has completed and also projects that have recently had engineering level cost estimates completed to develop a range of cost per mile of trail. There's a little bit of sticker shock.

425,000 to $6,000,000 per mile of trail is the range we came up with, and that's intended to cover everything from a simple natural trail through the woods, which would be the low end of that, to something that's more complex like a boardwalk through through wetlands and and repairing effort areas, trails that have bridges, things like that. I will say that the low end, that $425,000 per mile is only about $80 a foot. So if you break it down a little bit more, it's not quite as bad as it seems. And these are intended to just be sort of a first step estimate. We're intending these to be a wide range that we can start a conversation with, and then when a segment is brought back to us for more evaluation, we can narrow that down.

Then finally, I'll touch on Blue Ways because that was a big part of the the planning process. They're just a little bit different than the recreational trails or the active mobility trails. Unfortunately, we won't be building any new streams in the county. So instead, we were focusing on access points. Through our public outreach, we figured out that the common paddle is about two to three miles per trip.

So what we then looked at is where in the county on our blue ways, which are essentially are all of our streams, our navigable streams, where are there areas that are within two to three miles of an existing launch. So the map on the right, all those areas that are in red are farther than three miles from a launch. So we're looking that's where we're looking to target or target launches so people can put their kayaks, their canoes in, and paddle those comfortably. The map on the left is the same analysis run but with the county owned parcels highlighted and included as launches. So if you specifically look at Broad Run, you can see that we take that full red stretch and turn it mostly green just based on the county parcels that we already own.

So that's what we're gonna focus on in the next ten years with this plan is trying to evaluate our existing county owned parcels for water access and where we can put kayak and canoe carry launches. I think with that, I'll turn it over to Bryce. Good

afternoon, everybody. Bryce Barrett, Prince William County Department of Transportation. I'm gonna kinda walk us through a similar exercise to what Robert did except for focusing on the active mobility component of our analysis. So here's the same chart that Robert showed, but I wanted to highlight some of the differences for when we did the prioritization exercise for active mobility. So the primary difference was we added another criteria that wasn't really a part of the recreational trail prioritization, which is the one at the bottom, safety.

Now that isn't to say that safety isn't important at parks, but when you're talking about active transportation, we're talking about a different kind of safety because we're talking about how these trails interact directly with motorized users or our existing road network. So we recently have our adopted comprehensive safety action plan. So that was the primary data set that we utilized for adding that additional prioritization score. And we gave that the heaviest weight in our exercise. The other aspects that are different are we weighed some of the criteria differently.

So our primary focus was connecting to transit facilities, regional trails, connecting to public facilities, the destinations that people could use for commuting or as an alternative to driving. Those were the most weighted segments that we moved forward with. Just looking at the breakdown, there was around 200 total segments of planned facilities. That's after doing some normalization, combining segments, creating logical termini for them and making sure that we cover any gaps or any longer segments that are included in our mobility chapter. It's around 290 miles, so it's not a small amount of trails that we need to build.

And the distribution shows that about 20% kind of float up to the top. So that's what we used in kind of determining what our tier one facility so our tier one is the 40 highest scoring trail facilities in our mobility chapter. This is looking at kind of a breakdown per magisterial district of those tier one facilities, so those top scoring 40. You'll see that there is a fairly equal distribution amongst all the magisterial districts as far as the segment count, the number of segments, but the miles that would be required to complete those segments is significantly larger in Brentsville and Gainesville. And that's because from a transportation perspective, we're talking about more rural roads where there's not existing bicycle or pedestrian infrastructure to build on.

Whereas in the Woodbridge district, is where we had the lowest amount, 3.17 miles, that's where you're really focusing on closing gaps and connecting to the facilities that are already there. Looking at the top 10 facilities for the active mobility components, the key things I wanted to highlight with this is that all magisterial districts were represented here. If you see on the right, Coles is not shown on the list. But if you look at Number 8 Holy Road, that facility actually is in Coles. And that's because a lot of our roads cross multiple magisterial districts.

And based on the percentage of that facility that is contained within a magisterial district, that's how we assigned a primary magisterial district. In the data, we did assign secondary magisterial districts so that we can track some of that information. But that's a good example of while it's not explicitly listed here, every magisterial district is included in this top 10 facility list. Moving on to cost estimation, we did also deviate from the parks department a little bit on how we determine our cost estimation. And there's a number of reasons why.

First, a lot of our facilities are going to be in VDOT right of way. That means they need to be built and designed to VDOT standards. It means we have to go through the VDOT process of permitting and approval. And it also means that we kind of have a better understanding of exactly what that trail will look like. You know, it's going to be a 10 foot shared use path.

It's going be a five foot bike lane. Whereas parks might have a little bit more flexibility based on topography or existing conditions where they can narrow or widen that facility. So we looked at it as from a pure cost perspective, we were comfortable providing essentially what we believe that cost is so per mile to build these different types of facilities. So for shared use path is about four and a half million dollars per mile. For a bike lane, it's about a $125,000 per mile.

And for Shero's, it's about $6,300 per mile. Then in order to kind of expand on this because this is a very like perfect conditions where you don't have any outside scenarios. This is just the construction cost and the length of the facilities that we were grading. We can come up with that construction cost estimate. Then we can add in some of the other assumptions that we know based on other projects that we work on which is how much does it cost for the design, engineering, and permitting.

Well, we know based on previous projects, it's about 40% of the total cost of the construction. And then in order to accommodate some of the other factors, we then applied a complexity ratio after that, which is looking at trying to capture those other situations that we frequently encounter when you're building new facilities along a roadway, which is the availability of right of way, the need to do utility relocation or movement, the need for storm water facilities, environmental constraints that may be involved. All of those factors, we can reasonably assume that based on the complexity of specific segment, they could be anywhere from a 20% to a 60% increase in the total cost of the trail facility. So that's the analysis that we did and we broke it down for for our trail segments in our our appendix. So you'll be able to take a look at each of those.

One thing that I would also like to note is that, you know, we took logical termini based on unconstructed portions. So going back to some of the top 10 facilities that we identified like Minnieville Road here on the top, you'll see it's a 3.2 mile segment. Now when we pursue funding to actually build this, we will likely need to break that up. We're not going to most likely come forward with a project to do three miles of shared use path all at once. The sticker tag will be extremely high just by going off the construction cost of $4,500,000 just to build it.

So this gives us a good starting point. It gives us a good understanding of kind of that planning level estimate and this gives us something that we can talk with supervisors that we can take a look at when we're evaluating grant applications to identify potential funding. And it's something that as we break up the segments that we think are manageable based on identified funding sources, we can then do further feasibility studies, drill down on what the actual cost of those facilities would be especially based on the real world conditions that we didn't have the capability to do countywide as part of this effort. And with that, I'll pass it back to Robert.

So in addition to the constructing these these trail segments, there's several other action items which I've listed here that'll be included in the report that are things that we wanna move forward over this ten year, plan. They'll move at different paces. You know, some of these things we could potentially complete, like updating design standards, manuals, and others are more wide ranging, like just improving the on road bicycle facility network. So there there's a list of these that cover everything from implementation to just more planning efforts that'll be moving along with the construction of these trail segments. So the ten year plan, as I've said, is the is to focus on these tier one segments, and that's 55 miles of recreational trail and 95 miles of active mobility trail, over the next ten years.

That's what staff is going to focus on to feed things like the CIP, the, potential bonds, general funds, and and any grant opportunities that, DOT or DPR are able to pursue. We'll also be beginning work on those action items, specifically the blue the Blueways plan and identifying what we're calling low hanging fruit trails where we can hopefully bring in our robust volunteer groups to help us out with some of the very simple, the trail projects that are on that list. The fact that we're focusing on tier one trails does not preclude us implementing the lower tiered trails. There are a lot more there's a lot more miles of trails outside that tier one. So if there are opportunities to implement those, if there are funding opportunities that come forward, we will look into those and and keep them moving forward.

And ultimately, the funding will drive the implementation. I think that is all we've got. Any questions?

Ahead, Commissioner Ross.

Put up the presentation, like slide one, and start paging through them, and I'll yell stop. Okay.

Start with the analysis or all the way back to

the No. Just go forward now. Okay. It's there.

Okay.

Are the scoring results included in any of the GIS files that, you know, are exposed to the public describing the locations of these trails? And or if they're not, can you put them in?

Yes. They can be. We have them in in GIS files. That's where we've pulled it all from to do our mapping of them. Yeah.

Okay. Just did a quick look at the one where I thought it might show up Mhmm. That is available to the public. And I didn't see it, so you might just need to transfer the information into the public facing files.

Right. It'll that'll be part of our report wrap up when this is all there'll be a lot of GIS data that we'll start to push out as part of this. Great. Okay.

On the safety, a low score means you don't need a trail because people rarely get wounded in that part of the road network. Is that right? Yeah.

So the criteria the there was a number of criteria that went into developing the the high injury and the high risk networks that were identified in the conference of safety action plan. The low score meet is meaning that we don't have an observed or high frequency of crashes occurring along that segment, or at least within close proximity of the trail segment that we used.

Okay. I'll let the next person go. Thank you, chair.

Commissioner Scheifler?

Do you have a general cost estimate for the tier one trails?

So For

all like, what is the

For hours, it's that 55 miles times that range, which is, off the top of my head, I think it's, I think it's about 30 ish million to about 90,000,000, I think, somewhere in there. I have it. I can get it for you.

Okay. I'm just trying to understand from you know, we're talking about building the tier one trails in the next ten years. You know, what are we looking at? You know, what is the expected need from the the board? Are we talking like we need, you know, 10 to $15,000,000 a year to be able to complete this? Or I know there's a bond involved, but potentially, but what are we estimating that the need is for these trail Tito Orange Trails to be complete by 2035?

So it will be on the lower end because for at least for recreation, I'll let I'll let Price speak to his as well. But on the for recreation, it'll be on the lower end just because most of our the lower end of that range, just because most of our trails are natural surface, easier to build trails. The intent is not necessarily we're we're not expecting to get all of these all 55 miles built in the ten years. That's our hope, but it's gonna be a big ask. And I think it's gonna be an even bigger ask for for DOT.

Speaking to the active transportation trails, our tier one total was around 350,000,000 to 450,000,000. So and that was around 95 miles of trail facility. So realistically, looking at the ten year horizon, it's not just the fiscal constraints that are gonna be an issue for building out that network. It's actually the the the the the and the the sheer amount of trails. So 95 miles would be very difficult to to physically build within that ten year period.

But there's value in looking at those top 20% trails anyway because not all of them will be selected for us to move forward with project prioritization. Prioritization. It gives us a list that we can kind of keep in our back pocket, engage with supervisors, identify their priorities, and also, you know, continue to evaluate grant opportunities for.

Yeah. And if I may just clarify on the on the rec side again, I think Bryce and Robert covered it, but the the goal isn't to necessarily build all of those miles. Like Bryce said, it's to prioritize them that those are the higher priority, but we never know what's gonna come forward for us. We get a lot of easements through, proffer dedications, and so that will continue that could potentially continue to drive some of that where the the cost is lower because we got the land and and, you know, the building, they may build it for us as part of a proffer. But it's to it's to drive that focus for the grants, the tier two and three.

I mean, all of it as a whole network is to drive it in any way forward that we can. So, again, we just tried to identify some type of priority instead of having to look at a full list of a 140 or 200 segments each time we're asked. We wanted to be able to be more forward in those conversations.

But the goal is to to try to do it. I mean, it's just a matter of, you know, obviously, there's there's constraints. But, again, I think that how you know, it's good to better at least have something out there that we're trying to to meet in general. So I think that that's good. This is definitely a good goal. And, again, I think that as as a as a trail user, I'm excited to see, you know, the the opportunities here as they come along. So

Yeah. And as Bryce mentioned, some of the segments are just I mean, it was a mapping exercise, so some of the segments are very long, but they could be broken down. So we could be we could be building a portion of one of those priority segments at least. We know that the whole corridor is a priority, but there may be a smaller section between two points that we can get the funding for and get that done so that we're continuing again to make headway on these because we also are, we're all the parks department is always being asked to provide new trails, and we wanna be able to say, we now know we hadn't we hadn't really quantified. We we have always said, well, we have about 60 miles of existing trail.

Now we know. We have 82 miles of existing trail, and we now know we have x number of miles of trails to be built and trails that we wanna seek. So it was a good exercise to get all of that information.

Yeah. So I'm excited to see how this plays out within the CIP and, you know, figuring out, you know, how how this is gonna prioritize as kind of forward. I think the bond thing's gonna be an interesting exercise in general. I had a question about sidewalks. Are they I mean, is is sidewalks, are they being addressed? Because, again, those are areas where, you know, my favorite sidewalk is the one we're still missing on Telegraph Road. That way, I didn't get in. But I'm trying to figure out how that how the sidewalk gaps and things like that play into this, you know, master plan.

Yeah. So the master plan was primarily viewed as kind of a next step in implementing recommendations from the mobility chapter of the the comprehensive plan. So the comprehensive plan primarily looks at bike facilities or shared facilities. That's why you have your shared use path, bike lane, sheroes, things like that. Sidewalks weren't specifically addressed.

We do have GIS data regarding sidewalk and sidewalk gaps. We did a gap analysis that included sidewalks as part of the comprehensive safety action plan specifically around transit facilities. So that's something that we're definitely aware of, and we'll continue to advance our planning efforts to kind of incorporate that into a document like this because, you know, sidewalks obviously play a crucial role in in in the trail network because, you know, recreational trail users and and cyclists even in in the county can use a sidewalk if if they so choose to. So it's something that is not incorporated as part of this trails master plan, but it's something that we we do have an intent to continue to expand on in the future.

Okay. Alright. Commissioner Sherman?

Sure. Good evening, and thank you for the presentation. I try to mountain bike as much as I can on some of these trails, I do appreciate the effort and the energy you're putting into this this particular study. And I I just had some general questions having gone through some of these trail planning efforts. One, how how are you treating trails on federal property? Just totally ignored? I know there's been an extensive effort by the National Capital Planning Commission to try to improve trail connections on federal land where they meet, you know, other properties. Just curious.

Sure. Definitely not ignored. There we're not including segments on federal property as part of our prioritization, but there was a criteria that was connecting to public facilities

Mhmm.

And that the the federal and state parks were included as that. So we're trying to connect people to the parks, and then once they're in the parks, National Park Service can put the trails where they want to.

Yeah. No. No. That's easier said than done, but

Yeah. I do

encourage that collaboration.

Yep. Yep. We're we're building a large trail segment in the Featherstone Wildlife Refuge right now that we're really excited about. So we work well with our national federal and state partners.

You mentioned Crawford Trails. How how are how is that captured as part of your effort? Like, an you know, when when a trail is proposed as part of a a development

Sure.

That mapped but not funded? I'm I'm just trying to understand how do you treat, you know It

is. Because we

probably approved I don't know.

So so once we once a plan is approved sorry. Once a rezoning case is approved, at that point, we would, in our data, change that plan to or that trail to planned. And it wouldn't be the the the cost estimation would come out. So for the ones that we know are coming, like, there's there's some chunks in in Vent Hill that we know are coming, though the cost estimate for those was not included. So we basically just zeroed those out, and we'll continue to do that as cases come through. And either trails are proffered and built for us or just we're given the land. We'll continue to take that in consideration.

And do you add the the trail into your GIS as part of that mapping?

Yes. Yeah. As long as it's see those connections. Yep. As long as it's public, it'll be continued. We'll continue to track them in our GIS. And it's also really important on the front end that we do have planned trails where there's not development yet because that helps us get those trails when the development comes in.

I have a couple more questions. How do you define a segment?

So segment is just a piece of a piece of trail. So a a length of trail, it could be anywhere from 50 feet to to five miles. And the way we split ours is based on that planned versus proposed. So if we have the basically have the land for it or don't. So we we we didn't use a specific length or anything. We just broke it up on that because that helps us with our prioritization and also the the cost estimate.

And lastly, as part of your analysis, I'm just curious, are you comparing you've mentioned eighty eighty two miles, I think.

Yeah. 83.

How does how does that compare to similar size counties in population?

We didn't do that specifically as part of this this plan. We have looked as part of other efforts, and we are we we compare well. It's it's tough to

No. It's not always apples to oranges. Right.

Right. We compare well. And that's, like, if you the

Just sheer number of

facts or anything, there there's they have a lot more trails. They have a lot more people. They're larger. So we we have looked at that, and we we feel like we're pretty much on par with where we should be.

Thank you. Yep. I

have a couple questions, but I'll send them an email because mine are more focused on protecting RPAs and wetlands.

Sure.

I've seen some trail projects that haven't taken that into account. Okay. So I just wanna see how that's planned for the future. I'll go to commissioner Ross.

Do it do any of the trails in the plan, especially the higher priority ones, require CPAs to be made before we can convert a chunk of land to a trail use?

It shouldn't. I don't think that there's anything that precludes a trail from being built on any specific type of zone or any zoning. I think the closest thing we've had to the trail being involved in the CPA was with the flat branch in Route 28, which we were able to work through with Bryce.

Yeah. That's what I was gonna mention. There were some trails that we've done some studies. Flat branch comes to mind because that wasn't in contemplation during the mobility chapter because it was a different type of facility at that time. And then the rail with trail project that we did a feasibility study with city Manassas Manassas Park, that also wasn't comprehensive plan facility. But because the board had invested money into doing these feasibility studies and then supported it since the adoption, we did include it in this exercise. And one of the recommendations that we have in the end of the plan is to take a look at those some of those segments that might not be contained in the mobility chapter and bring them forward for consideration as a mobility chapter update in the near future.

Okay. I'm I'm thinking that with all the development pressure in the county over the next twenty years, We might even need a new designation that says proposed trail to protect some of these connections that are not gonna be built for a long time. Let's see. On the blue ways, you mentioned working on places where you have existing, I think right away might be the right term to convert some of the red to green.

Yes.

Was it a hot topic? Is there an easy answer to the question of should we maybe connect all the segments first for the same reasons I was just alluding to, to protect them from development pressure before we then upgrade all the segments that we have control over.

So with blue ways, we're just talking about the streams. We're talking about paddling in the waterway. So there's no need to beyond just the environmental protections, there's no at least that I'm aware of, there's no way to close off that access. What we were just looking at is the places where the county already owns parkland that touches the river or the the stream. So I don't I don't know that we need to

Okay. So maybe not on the blue ways. Similar question for the the land trails.

Yes. So

Get control of it before we build a trail somewhere we already control. Get control of a patch of land before we build a trail in some place we don't control. I mean, we do control.

Yeah. And and that's what we continue to look at as our in our day to day jobs wherever we can work at you know, we've gotten we coordinate with the town of Dumfries, and we're working on a connection into Prince William Forest Park. And so if we need to seek an an easement to make that happen, we're we're constantly doing that. So we're we're trying to protect where we think when we have the opportunity to do so, we are trying to get in there and protect it for a trail, for our future plans.

We're trying to come for the right compromise between doing both, I guess.

Right. Right. And we don't and and just for everybody's clarity, it's been very clear from day one. Since 1993, the parks department does not condemn for trails. We don't take land for trails, so these are all negotiations.

We work with the landowner to get the easement, or, like I said, land dedication or other type of agreement, to do that, and we've got many miles of trails outside of parkland that follow our green our Greenway corridors, which primarily follow our Blueway corridors. That's the land version of the water trail. And so we we have extensive networks of easements. We were very blessed in the early two thousands as Broad Run developed. We have tens of miles of trail out there along or easement along Broad Run.

The park authority never had the money to build the trail. The developers were giving us the easement, but we didn't have the money to build the trail. So right now, we know we've had all of that just sitting there waiting to be built, and so now we wanna, you know, begin again to move that forward. We're working with our Trails and Blueways members, you know, to look at what they can potentially help us build with volunteer support, And so that's where we want to start implementing those is we've got the resource there. We just need to get that final step done.

Thank you. And thank you, chair.

Commissioner Scheifler. And we

County or even the city of Manassas on opportunities, you know, for certain projects or certain priorities to really connect to other regional trails? Because, like, the ICC six trails, one, I know Fairfax County did everything, but then I don't know how those how those things come about or how those will get prioritized.

Yes. So the the connecting to other jurisdictions wasn't a specific criteria in our ranking, and that's mainly because there's a lot of that is the reality is that most of those connections are going to come with a transportation element. We and the the ones that aren't, there's very specific areas that we're already aware of. If there's going to be a crossing, it's probably going to be, you know, from Ben Lomond Park over to Bull Run Regional Park, things like that. Yeah.

So nice one.

Yeah. So we didn't specifically look at the integers the the connections across Bull Run. With the towns and the cities, we did work with them and take their plans in when we were, doing doing our our initial analysis, and we've distributed copies of the plan to them as well as we've been going through

the Yeah.

So, like, let's say, I don't see, like, a potential, like, landing spot at, like, Blooms Blooms Park

Right.

Where there I think there might be a trail going over the area through that that rail to trail project. I'm just trying to understand look at it to make sure that is it really a gap there? Or are there opportunities to really make sure that there's a good understanding of, like, this is something maybe to other jurisdiction, but this is something we always talked about, like how it could really connect with our network as well. Because again, I think that's important, especially for these cross jurisdictional ones. Do a lot of boat launches along the river. Okay.

Thank you. Thank you so much for the I love how it's prioritized and I think the visual is gonna be a huge help. So thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

On the county wide master trail plan. We then did an agenda review, and now we will do the pledge of allegiance. If you could all stand. Madam clerk, would you please call the roll?

Vice chair justice? Here. Commissioner Landrum? Here. Commissioner Ross?

Here.

Commissioner Scheifler?

Here.

Commissioner Sherman?

Here.

We have quorum. Is there anybody signed up for remote participation?

There's no one signed up for remote participation from the Planning Commission matter. Okay.

Do we have anything on the consent agenda?

Chair Justice, we do. We have the briefs and resolution for Planning Commission public hearing dated 03/11/2026.

Would anybody like to make a motion to approve those?

So moved.

Second. Moved by commissioner Ross and seconded by commissioner Scheifler. Madam clerk, would you please call the roll?

Vice chair justice? Yes. Commissioner Landrum? Yes. Commissioner Ross? Yes. Commissioner Scheifler? Yes. Commissioner Sherman? Yes. Motion carries.

Excellent. And do we have anything under expedited agenda this evening?

So, chair justice, we we have, three items, for the expedited agenda. Item 11 a, rezoning twenty twenty five dash zero zero zero one three Linden Lake rezoning. Item 11 b, rezoning 2023 Dash 000128319 Bethlehem Road and item 11 c special use permit, SUP 2026Dash000 19 International.

Okay. I'd like to go ahead and open the public hearing. And we will start with item 11 a that is in the Gainesville district. Before we go to commissioner Ross, do we have anybody signed up to speak?

Okay. For this, we have no one signed up. Is there anyone in the chambers that would care to speak? Do we have anyone online that is ready to speak? Then chair, we have no one.

Alright. I'll turn it over to you since it's in the Gainesville District.

I recommend we close the public hearing for this application.

The public hearing is now closed.

I move that the commission recommend approving the application entitled rezoning R E Z 2025 Dash 00013 Linden Lake rezoning subject to the application conditions state dated 03/02/2026 and subject to the additional condition that the applicant will both investigate and report to the Gainesville supervisor's office, whether creating a pedestrian connection to the directly adjacent shopping center is practical and will be implemented.

Second. Motion was made by commissioner Ross and seconded by commissioner Scheifler for rezoning R E Z 202500013 Linden Lake Rezoning. Madam clerk, would you please call the roll?

Vice chair justice? Yes. Commissioner Landrum?

Yes.

Commissioner Ross?

Yes.

Commissioner Scheisler? Yes. Commissioner Sherman?

Yes.

Motion carries. Alright. We'll move on to item 11 b, rezoning R E Z 2023000128319 Bethlehem Road. Is

there

anybody signed up to speak?

We have no one on the sign up sheets. Is there anyone in the chamber? Seeing none, is there anyone remote? No? Back to you, chair.

Alright. Since this is in the Brentsville District, I am gonna turn this over to commissioner Scheifler.

Thank you. This item I, move to recommend approval of rezoning.

Can you close the public hearing? Close

the public hearing.

The public hearing is now closed.

Do you have

03/10/2026.

Okay.

I

move to recommend approval of rezoning R E Z 2023 Dash 000128319 Bethlehem Road with proffers dated 03/20/2026. '10. '10. Sorry. 03/10/2026.

Anybody for a second?

Second.

Motion's been made by commissioner Scheifler and seconded by commissioner Landrum to approve rezoning REZ 2023000128319 Bethlehem Road. Madam clerk, would you please call the roll?

Chair. Point of order. Brief discussion, if I may. Sure. Okay. On behalf of commissioner Carroll, he did express before tonight's meeting that he's disappointed because he believed this application deserved a CPA. With that on the record now, let's vote.

Excellent. Madam Clerk? Vice chair justice? Yes. Commissioner Landrum? Yes. Commissioner Ross? Yes. Commissioner Scheifler? Yes. Commissioner Sherman? Yes. Motion carries.

Excellent. We're now gonna move on to item c, special use permit SUP202600019, international police supply. Is there anybody signed up to speak?

We have Mike Tucker signed up to speak in favor of the application. It's not required that you speak. We could go ahead and vote. But if you care to, now is your time.

You

go back to the little podium behind you, directly behind you there. Pull the microphone close to you and tell us which magisterial district you are in.

I'm in the Coles District. Thank you. Yeah. I I live in the neighborhood in question. Mister Guz is my neighbor. I walk the streets all the time. That that's, you know, a gray hair exercise. I'm always out on the streets. And I go by his house two, four, six, eight times a day. It's always quiet. He's a perfect neighbor. He's explained to me what you know, we we had the questions since I saw the signs of his yards he had advertised. And I just say, I I I believe in what he says. It's not gonna see any difference in the neighborhood. And so as a neighbor, I would welcome this change for him.

Thank you. Is there anyone else in the chamber that would care to speak? Clerk, do we have anyone online? Then chair, I recommend we proceed.

Okay. Because this is in the Coles District, I'm gonna turn it over to commissioner Scheifler to be chair so that I could call for the vote.

Okay. Now I'll turn it back to you to make a motion.

Excellent. I'd like to close the public hearing, and I would like to make a motion to approve special use permit SUP202600019 international police supply.

Subject to subject to conditions 03/06/2026.

Subject to the conditions 03/06/2026.

Thank you.

Thank you. Anybody for a second?

Second. Alright. So a motion is made by, vice chair, just Vice chair of justice and second by commissioner

Lanham.

Lanham. Sorry. Not on the

list here.

Special use permit 2026Dash00029International, Please supply.

Vice chair justice? Yes. Commissioner Landrum? Yes. Commissioner Ross? Yes. Commissioner Scheifler? Yes. Commissioner Sherman?

No.

Motion carries. Alright. Moving on. We are at number eight, public comment. Do we have anybody signed up to speak for public comment? And this would be for items that are not on tonight's agenda. Commissioner Ross?

There's no one on the sign up sheet. Is there anyone in the chamber that would like to speak about in public comment time? Clerk, do we have anyone online?

No.

Then, chair, I suggest we proceed.

Thank you. And number item number nine, deferral or continuation?

Tier justice, we have no items for deferral or continuation.

Moving on to planning directors time.

Good evening. Members of the commission also wanted to note, welcome to our newest commissioner, commissioner Landrum, Tanya Washington, director of the planning office. I just have some brief updates. I first wanted to share that tomorrow afternoon, David McGettigan, who's our deputy planning director, will be the featured speaker of a multiple American Planning Association state chapter webinar focusing on regulating noise from data centers and sharing Prince William County's experiences as well as talking about our updated noise ordinance. He is going to be speaking before planners who are members of the the APA chapters, state chapters for Virginia, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and North Carolina.

So very excited that Dave will be sharing, again, the experiences of our county to other colleagues along the Mid Atlantic. Next, wanted to note that, as I'm sure you all have probably been reading, Governor Spanberger has been signing various bills that have been coming out of the Virginia General Assembly. They were very active this year with regards to land use bills, and they've all gone through various versions of moving forward or not or various changes. And so I, throughout the session, supported the county's legislative team in reviewing and providing feedback on various bills. And so we're continuing to track the ones that are being signed by the governor and looking at which ones the county will need update our zoning ordinance or make any other changes to incorporate the bills that get passed that affect land use.

And then lastly, I just wanted to mention I'm not sure if I mentioned it already this year. So you may recall, last year, I noted that I was the co chair of the Metropolitan Washington Council of Government's Planning Directors Technical Advisory Committee, along with another planning director in Maryland at the time. The Planning Directors Technical Advisory Committee is comprised of planning directors and other staff from COGs 24, 25 or so member jurisdictions across DC, Maryland, and Northern Virginia. So this year, I am the chair of the Planning Directors Technical Advisory Committee. So thank you.

I get to continue in that role. And essentially, what we do is we meet regularly throughout the year to discuss regional land use issues that affect all of our jurisdictions, to learn from each other, as well as to hear from external speakers on a variety of topics. And so I just wanted to note that because I will be continuing in that role this year. The vice chair we have a vice chair who's from a community in Maryland, so very excited to continue to support that effort. So that's all of my updates for today. Excellent. Congratulations.

Thank you. That's cool.

Let's see. Item 11, all of that was on the expedited agenda. So we're gonna go to item 12, planning commission procedures, and we'll go up and down the dais. Anybody have any old business? We'll start with Commissioner Sherman.

Not old business, but I would like to congratulate Director Washington for being on the planning director's board. And I think she's been a bit modest. That is a very robust, August group of planners, which share a lot of knowledge. And I've said on those for years as a participant and observer. So I just think it's a well deserved honor, but also a lot of work.

Congratulations. I did have one question again, if I may. Sure. Concerning legislative agenda, would planning commission get a brief at some point on sort of the bundle of land use decisions that are coming out of the state house that we might at least get an information presentation?

I can follow-up with the county's legislative team to see if that's something that can be arranged.

Thank you.

Commissioner Sheikh.

It seems like I missed the party for ten minutes. Maybe can we set aside a few minutes for maybe thirty minutes only to work on the bylaws. Is that possible today or should we

Yeah.

So in the agenda review, we talked about the different the version that came in from commissioner former commissioner Moses Ned, and we're going

to take the next two weeks so that we all have time to

review that because there's several of us that haven't reviewed that completely, and we'll put that on for next meeting.

Alright. Sounds good. Thank you. Does that work? And to Planning Commission. You. Good to be here. Thank you. Looking forward to work with you.

Commissioner Landrobe, do you have any old business?

No. Do not.

There we go. Commissioner Ross?

None. Commissioner Scheifler?

None. On to new business. Commissioner Scheifler?

I had a similar question to, commissioner, Sherman about just kind of an overview of what has passed the general assembly that may affect the planning commission.

Okay. Just kidding. Alright. Commissioner Ross, new business?

No new business. Thank you.

Commissioner Landrum, new business.

No new business.

Commissioner Shaikh, new business. Commissioner Sherman, new business. No? Anybody have anything for commissioner member's time?

I'd just like to thank my appointing supervisor, supervisor Jeannie Lacroix, for appointing me to the Planning Commission. I'd I'd certainly like to thank the board of county supervisors for voting to confirm that appointment, and I'm I'm certainly grateful for for their trust and and for the public trust that that represents. And I'd like I'd just like to express I'm also grateful to my new colleagues on the kind welcome that I've received and just express how how much I look forward to working with all of you over the coming time we have together. So that's all I've got.

Excellent. Thank you. Anybody else for commissioner's time? We're good. Alright. Perfect. And, obviously, we'll share emails and everything, but anything you need as far as process and all that good stuff, you can reach out to any of us, and we'll we'll help you out. Perfect. I'd entertain a motion to adjourn the meeting. So moved.

Second.