HomeMy WebLinkAbout11-14-12 Pedestrian and Traffic Safety Committee MinutesBozeman (area) Pedestrian and Traffic Safety Committee
Minutes of the November 14, 2012 Meeting
Upstairs Conference Room Alfred Stiff Office Building.
Those Present:
Voting Committee
Members:
Ralph Zimmer (Gallatin County)
Gary Vodehnal (City of Bozeman)
Danielle Scharf (City of Bozeman)
Frank Manseau (Gallatin County)
Non-Voting Committee Members:
John Van Delinder
(City of Bozeman Streets Department)
Liaison Officers:
Rick Musson (City of Bozeman Police Department Liaison Officer)
Paul Griffin (Gallatin County Sheriff’s Office Liaison Officer)
Guests:
Craig Woolard (City of Bozeman Public Works Director)
Quorum: present
NEW BUSINESS:
Ralph called the meeting to order at 12:05 PM.
Public Comment. Ralph offered the opportunity
for public comment on items not on the agenda. No public comment.
Consideration of Meeting Agenda. Ralph offered the opportunity to provide input on the agenda and noted that he
will take some liberties as we have many items to discuss. No additional comments were made.
Minutes. Gary made a motion to approve the minutes of the October 10, 2012 meeting, second
from Frank. The minutes were approved.
Liaison Officer Reports. Sheriff’s Office Liaison Officer, Paul Griffin and Bozeman Police Department Liaison Officer, Rick Musson were in attendance
today, but did not have anything specific to report.
Transportation Coordinating Committee (TCC). Ralph noted that there was a TCC meeting since we last met. He reported on their
discussion of potential changes to the Bozeman urban boundary resulting form the 2010 census, but they chose to postpone the discussion until a future meeting after Craig Woolard (City
of Bozeman Public Works Director) has a chance to discuss the urban boundary with Gallatin County. TCC also had a presentation from Joe Gilpin of Alta Planning regarding a new bike
design guidebook.
Safe Routes to School (SRTS) and Community Transportation Enhancement Program (CTEP). Ralph reported that the new transportation bill re-authorization resulted in a combination of the
three funding sources used for alternate transportation modes (Recreational Trails Program, Transportation Enhancements, and Safe Routes to School). Ralph attended the Joint Engineers
Conference in Helena last week and, during one of the presentations, representatives from FHWA and MDT stated that RTP advocates have been more vocal, so that program is coming out ahead
on funding. They also said that under the new law, those funds cannot be apportioned out to local governments. Therefore under the new program, the projects will be awarded on a state-wide
competitive basis. We need to aggressively pursue projects for our communities and advocate for a distribution of funds similar to current/past allocations. Rick Hixson told Ralph
that Bozeman currently has a CTEP balance that needs to be spent. Craig also noted that they currently have budgeted to spend that money in the coming year.
Ralph also noted that during
the presentation in Helena they commented that the previous federal bill required the State Safe Routes to School Coordinator position. MDT has previously contracted with MSU’s Western
Transportation Institute to provide that person. WTI employed Taylor Lonsdale for that purpose. The new legislation no longer mandates that position and MDT representatives that Ralph
talked with indicated that they were “pretty sure” they would no longer fund that position. Taylor subsequently informed Ralph that the funding for that position was expected to end
June 30, 2013.
Danielle briefed the group on her recent discussion with Dustin Johnson (City of Bozeman Engineering Department) regarding CTEP funds. In addition to the joint application
with Gallatin County for the Oak Street Trail project, the City has submitted an application to MDT CTEP for various missing sidewalk links and accessibility ramp upgrades that were
included on the priority list approved by the City Commission.
Distracted Driving. There was a brief discussion on this topic. City Commissioner Chris Mehl previously told our committee
he would check with the City Manager on the status of the City’s distracted driving education task force and report back to the committee. Frank noted that Missoula also just passed
a new distracted driving ordinance. It used to be text only, but is now the same as ours.
Street Department Report. John reported that leaf cleanup has been postponed until the snow
melts. He also noted street closures for the upcoming MSU pep rally Thursday night and upcoming Christmas Stroll. Rick Musson asked John about the schedule for City plowing because
he had received some complaints after the first big snow storm. John explained that 3:00 am is the earliest shift; they do not have plows running from 11:00 pm to 3:00 am.
Rick also
noted that during this last storm he heard about a lady who was driving under the Rouse I-90 bridge and her car was covered by snow when a plow went over the bridge at the same time.
John explained that MDT does the plowing on the Interstate, but he thought they were required to raise the plow as they go over bridges.
Community Transportation Safety Plan. Ralph
attended the initial meeting of the Community Transportation Safety Plan advisory committee. Goals set during the meeting were something along the lines of reducing fatal accidents
by 25% over five years and reducing the number of injury accidents by 25% over the same time period. Those statements
may not be exactly correct but were as accurate as Ralph and others in attendance at the meeting could remember.
The next steering committee meeting is November 27 at 3:00 pm in the
City Commission meeting room at City Hall. Ralph will not be able to attend and would like either Gary or Danielle to attend.
Upcoming Meeting with Gallatin County Commission. Earl
Mathers attended our October meeting and we had some productive discussions with him. We concluded during that meeting that we would like to meet with the County Commission in much
the same way we met with the City Commission last year. We also agreed we should compile a list of discussion topics before we request such a joint meeting. Gary agreed to lead the
effort to compile such a list.
Paul Griffin noted the item regarding school zones and explained that the Sheriff’s Office has an ongoing problem with the “When Children are Present”
signs that supplement school speed zone signs. Ralph has also heard concerns about the County’s policy to not use reduced speed limits in front of private schools. Area private schools
include Heritage Christian, Petra Academy, many Montessori schools and others. John noted the existing warning plaque saying 25 mph on Durston near Flanders Mill for Heritage Christian
– it is a warning sign, not a regulatory sign. When the new public school is constructed out there, a new regulatory sign will be installed, but it won’t necessarily cover the Heritage
Christian frontage.
Gary also called Chris Scott, County Planner to see if he had any advice for us on items we should discuss. He agreed that transit is a good topic and that we
should bring in business owners located within the County (he mentioned Simms as an example) whose employees use transit service on a regular basis. Another issue is maintenance for
bike/pedestrian projects in the County, because they don’t have the ability to enforce or fund maintenance. We should also discuss County road standards outside of new subdivisions
and lobby for the new Road Superintendent to have expertise or at least an understanding of bike and pedestrian design and implementation.
Gary would like us to take another month to
refine this list before we proceed with setting up a meeting with the Commission. All agreed with this proposal. Gary asked Ralph to send a reminder out to the committee to request
additional input.
Ralph also explained that Lee Provance has been the County’s non-voting (staff position) member of our committee. Lee rarely attended our meetings, but did several
times tell Ralph that if we ever felt like we really needed him to attend for a particular topic, he would be here. Lee recently left his position as County Road and Bridge Superintendent.
Dave Fowler is serving as the interim superintendent. It will be nice if we can get the new superintendent to attend our meetings regularly in the future.
Springhill Presbyterian
Church. Gary recently submitted some comments regarding this proposed new church on Cottonwood Road near Petra Academy to keep the trail corridor that was proposed with the original
Valley West residential subdivision. Craig said that was not an issue during his recent meeting with project representatives, so he thinks they’re ok with providing the trail. Consensus
was that all are in support of advocating for the trail on the back side of the subdivision, in addition to sidewalk along Cottonwood. Craig and John both
thought that the sidewalks were already in the plan and they are not currently planning to develop the side of the lot where the trail would be located.
Next Meeting. Our next regular
meeting time would be December 12th at noon. There were not any concerns related to this meeting time.
The meeting was adjourned at 1:25 PM.
Next Meeting: December 12, 2012 at
noon as noted above.
Minutes by Danielle Scharf
Edits by Ralph Zimmer