Mobility Committee Meeting Transcript – 10/04/2017 Title: ATXN 24/7 Recording Channel: 6 - ATXN Recorded On: 10/4/2017 6:00:00 AM Original Air Date: 10/4/2017 Transcript Generated by SnapStream ================================== [3:08:30 PM] >> Kitchen: Good afternoon we're going to get started. I'll do the minutes when councilmember alder is here. Do we have citizen communication? Looking to our staff. Do we have any citizen communication signed up? Donna, do you know if we have any citizen communication? The way it works is three minutes. Uh-huh. Ok. >> Well, thank you. My name is Bobby colmineti. Ride Austin is the local nonprofit ride share. There is a couple of reasons why I wanted to come and thank you. One of the things we're committed to doing is continuing the fingerprinting of our drivers. We have a new process that has been put in place to take the existing chauffeur license infrastructure and allow our drivers to apply through that process. That is great. We want to continue to do that. We think it is a very important process to have fingerprinting. And we would love to work with the committee and ground transportation to facilitate maybe making that easier for folks. Second thing being, we would love to partner with the city for more ways to partner with [3:10:31 PM] the service we have in place. Also with the pick up service, using another ride share app. We would love to be that partner there. As well as I came here also to listen to some of the things that are on the agenda around autonomous vehicles and autonomous vehicles research. We're working with a large oem that wants to come to Austin -- original equipment manufacturer. A large car company -- I can't say who yet -- who wants to come to Austin and drive research in the autonomous vehicle in Austin. We're interested in working with the city and the plans you have there. >> Kitchen: Thank you very much. We look forward to continuing conversations. >> Of course. >> Kitchen: Let's see, we'll go to approval of the minutes, do I have a motion to approve the -- oh, we have one more? Ok. I'm sorry Hayden. >> Is this on? I'm Hayden black walker, I'm an urban planner, I'm an elected member of the advisory council. I wanted to speak to you as a public citizen. I wanted to put something on your radar. The pedestrian advisory council met had a briefing from the transportation and fire department. It is a briefing we first requested last March. It was great to hear that information. And the issue is the fire department needs basically in a nutshell, wider roads, wide roads, 25 feet clear on the road to maintain response times. We know now about the width of roads and wider lanes make faster traffic and increase traffic fatalities. Last year, five people died in [3:12:31 PM] fires but 79 people died in traffic. It is a hard balance. I don't pretend to have the answers. What I wanted to do was put it on your radar. The international fire code with the local amendment adoptions were on your agenda for last Thursday. It was pulled at staff request. One of the things it looks like happened is that fire code as it is currently adopted has a requirement for 25-feet clear on all streets. That means parked cars out of the way as well. And it also listed exceptions to the rule. The new fire code that was on the agenda for last Thursday, all of those exceptions were removed. So I think there was a lot of concern in the community about how we the fire marshal said there will be public opportunity to comment on it before then. I don't know what that looks like yet. The pedestrian advisory can be public safety commission don't meet again before November 2, so the slide deck is on the website and does have a lot of great information. >> Kitchen: Thank you for bringing that to our attention. Ok, we will move on to the approval of minutes. Do I have a motion? Councilmember alder moves approval of amendments, second, councilmember Flannigan, second. Those are approved. We will take things out of order. We will start with our two briefings, we'll start first with the campo briefing. This is the campo call for projects and overview. [3:14:40 PM] >> Good afternoon I do have a presentation. >> I appreciate y'all having us. My name is Ryan Collins, I'm the short range project manager for campo. The project call we have coming up is scheduled for January 1 -- the first week of January, I think it is around January 8. We will spend the next few months getting with project sponsors. So I wanted to to do an overview. This is the time line, we're finalizing the criteria we're using. This will be brought to the transportation of the policy board. We're working on the executive committee that has been reviewing it, putting it together. The technical advisory committee revised it last September 25. We have taken all the comments and finalizing the criteria to bring it to vote on the 16th. And after, that we will have project workshops for the sponsors to get prepped for the call. We'll have the sponsors prepped for the call and January we'll issue the call. I want to go over the process. Right now, the funding available, we have estimated $400 million that we'll be allocating to this, majority of that is category 2, which is proposition 1 and 7 funding, that is txdot highways. And we'll have about 135 [3:16:41 PM] million of that is category 7. That is over four years. And category 9 which is Ta set aside. That is construction and pedestrian -- >> Kitchen: How much is in category 9? >> I'm sorry. >> Kitchen: About how much is in category 9? >> That is about 10 million. About two-ish a year. 2.5, excuse me? On the roadways, its, transit and active transportation. The reason we have them blocked out is because during the -- and vice versa. So basically roadway will compete against roadway. And we're also in talks of doing an additional category for other products that don't necessarily fit this category. So we can give people - - sponsors the opportunity for products that don't necessarily fit into these criteria. The process is made. >> Question. >> The four hundred million is over four years? >> Yes. >> Thank you. >> So the project selection process is mainly made out of three things. The first is project readiness. Once we take a project through the readiness criteria and deem it ready, we will take it through the timing factors and cost-benefit analysis. Those are scoring mechanisms and those will give you the product score. A product readiness is when a sponsor applies for a product, apply for the fiscal year phase of the project. Preliminary and construction. They will select the year they want the funding allocated to them. We will basically take the project readiness will basically assess and make sure that project is Teed up, ready to go. So when they have the funding they can do what they need to do with it. It will entail concurrence [3:18:44 PM] from text dot and a lot of times, if txdot is supporting that they will get, you know, good to go on that. Also, I guess the match -- excuse me. The project match, we'll make sure that is set aside and ready to go as well. Planning factors, that is the big thing the executive committee is working on. These are objective database criteria that each project has to meet. You can answer like a yes-no. They address the performance measures that we're required to meet through the fast acts, map 21 and hb20 or house bill 20. There is performance measures in those that our selection process has to meet. So like safety and preservation, and congestion mobility. These are planning factors that mirror that. We make sure as the project is scored that they have certain attributes that meet those goals. If it addresses a safety issue -- they'll have points assigned to each factor. Excuse me, I should have stated that. If you have a project that addresses a safety issue, you will get the points associated with that. And the project sponsor will just provide the supporting data behind that. And just verify that data. To make sure the points are correctly allocated. Second part of the project scoring process, the cost-benefit analysis, this is freson Nichols is working with us on this. We'll work on the analysis of the project, putting into the model, get a modernization to understand exactly how much, how well that dollar is being spent on that particular project. So these two factors will go into the project scoring. And then workshops this is basically we'll do an in depth four-hour workshop throughout the region. We'll do four of them prior to the workshop and also one after for the products that are awarded. The first one will be here in [3:20:44 PM] Travis county, holding that at tti institute. So that would be the for the sponsors here in Travis county, namely city of Austin, Travis county. So in that role we'll jump in, go through the funding, federal and state funding processes, go through eligibility requirements for each particular type of funding and also go through planning factors, cost-benefit analysis. We'll go through the application, and we'll score some projects live. Dummy projects, just to, you know, take everybody through the process and then answer any questions. Then also through November, December we'll hold ad hoc webinars to make sure all the sponsors are gearing up for the call and everything like that. That's basically it, if you have questions I would be more than happy to answer them. >> When you laid out the four categories, you said that transit projects wouldn't compete with roadway projects, what does that mean? >> These categories? >> Specifically when you said you didn't want transit projects or active projects competing with roadway. It makes it sound like the division of dollars -- >> I guess I did state that incorrectly. Basically, we'll fund it as a bucket -- basically the scoring mechanism, I guess, is different for each type of project. That is the better way of saying that. The criteria for roadway are going to be different for active transportation projects or transit. In order to score those accurately, we have to keep them separate. >> At some point, the projects will be compared against each other? >> Depending. >> So the Ta set aside, that can only be used on active transportation. You know, those -- we're trying to -- I mean -- >> You see -- my curiosity about this. If there are different sets of criteria for different projects, but unless the division of dollars has already been divided, how we will we compare a transit project versus a roadway [3:22:45 PM] project for the amount of money that could be for either? >> I guess in the cost-benefit analysis will -- in the scoring would -- I don't know, that's a good question. We'll -- I know -- >> Think about it. >> There is the Ta set aside. Y'all only have funding for that particular type of project. Comparing a transit and roadway project. I guess the stpmm funding is the only one that is 135 million. That is flexible and we can spend that on any of the categories. That will be a challenge there that we'll need to address before we go through the call. >> It is valuable because it is important for the community to understand that Austin is not the only city with transit, Round Rock is paying for their own buses, cap metro to Leander. It will be important for us to better understand how that portion of the money will be decided for the different categories. >> Good point. Thank you. >> Can you speak more about the criteria? >> Yes, the planning factor or cost benefit. >> Whatever we needed to keep in mind as we propose? >> The planning factors are probably the easiest thing. I should have brought a copy of that. There is one hundred points allocated for each -- on the roadways, a hundred points and each factor you get five or 10 points. For each factor it goes to -- I guess goes to the project, you will get the points for it. I I've got them right here. One of the -- the first one is if it has gone through a planning process, you get 10 points. Another one, congestion, mobility. Regional specific facility, five points or 10 points. If it removes a barrier or addresses a bottleneck in the system, it gets five points. Each one it continues to add up to the point on that one. >> Councilmember, the big [3:24:45 PM] picture is that campo is moving toward the similar processes that federal highway administration has for other mpos to have a scoring criteria based on performance metrics that can be tied to regional goals or other performance goals with some kind of scoring system that folks decide on what to weight and rank each of the categories. The categories have been presented to the technical advisory committee a couple of weeks ago. Some of those have -- comments have been taken on them. They're still being revised. Still very much in development. They've been in development for a couple of months with the executive committee at this point. That is all the material that we can present to y'all, we can provide y'all so you can have that in detail. >> Will we have that before we are asked to vote on this at campo on October 16. I will not be really happy to vote on this if I don't know what the criteria are and haven't had a chance to talk with our technical staff on that criteria. >> Yes, ma'am, absolutely. >> And in advance? >> Yes. >> Because we have had some times where we haven't had that material. So I want to make sure that we're on the same page with that. What role will some improvements that cross jurisdiction play in those criteria? >> So there is one specific scoring criteria that has to do with regional connections. So that is worth approximately 10 points. I mean, I will look that up right now and see if I can pull that out for you. >> Troxclair: How does this differ from how we have done it in the past. >> There hasn't been scoring like this in the past. There has certainly been no cross benefit analysis. >> I think it is a positive direction and a little bit surprising that we haven't done this before. I look forward to looking at it in more detail. Thank you. >> Kitchen: And I would like to ask that -- I know the criteria are out there now and they've been shared with the [3:26:46 PM] executive committee and the tag. So I'd like to ask that you send them out to all of us. I'm sure the rest - - we're all on campo. I'm sure the rest of the campo board would like to see them now. The other thing I would like to ask for and I don't know if this has been prepared or not, I would like to see a comparison between the criteria and what the tag comments were on it. >> Absolutely. We're preparing a comment disposition of all -- >> Kitchen: Good. >> We'll individually address every single comment they had. You'll get a red line version of the tag meeting. You will see the changes compared to the earlier one in 2015 or 2014, excuse me. >> Kitchen: Ok. Do you have a date when we'll get those? >> Either Friday or Monday. I know the board materials go out on Monday. We're trying to get it out on Friday. We have to finish the disposition. One thing I do -- I know we are bringing this to vote on the 16th. As we go through the process, but if there is something we miss or intend to do better, we will bring it back to the board. It is a continual process of improvement. The tag and executive committee every time they go through we find something different. It is a very new process for everybody, including us. It is a major step forward in the transparency and objectist. >> Kitchen: Ok. And the last question. The workshop you referenced, is that a public meeting? >> It is for any eligibility project leader. It is for those filling out and going through the process. If we need to hold more, we're happy to do that. We don't want to blindside anybody. We want to prepare everybody over the next couple of months. The best projects out there get into the process and we're able to select those. [3:28:47 PM] >> Kitchen: Thank you. >> Troxclair: I actually have a question for our staff, you don't have to get up. I want to make sure that we can have another meeting put on our calendars as we had several months ago about this call so we're ready. That we can be on the same page with you all on that. >> Absolutely. >> Troxclair: Moving forward. >> Rob spiller, Austin transportation department. Our plan is to come to council before we submit those proposed projects. At least the initial list. So we'll work with you to make sure that happens. >> Troxclair: I guess I was hoping we could have a similar meeting like the one we had -- I don't know when it was, a few months ago, with the criteria in hand to be able to see where that was leading before it got all the way -- >> Of course. >> Troxclair: I think we have the mobility committee members and perhaps one of our board members as well. >> All right. Yes. Let's move on to item 6. >> I'm mara-andrews I coordinate the plan for the transportation department. We had some slides. [3:31:27 PM] >> Ok. There we are. I'm mar Andrews with the department of transportation air quality program. I'm joined by -- >> Zack bomber with the office of sustainability. >> So today's presentation we want to provide an overview of the city of Austin's -- with the office of sustainability. We'll give a brief discussion on the primary pollutants each program is established to address and how the programs coordinate and complement each other. So the air quality program and the climate protection program have a relatively long history of working together and making the most of the cobenefits of both programs. There are three areas in which the programs have benefitted from joining forces. Education and outreach, training and in reporting. Both programs are dependent on the community taking action to reduce emissions. So outreach, education, training become very necessary parts of this program. And over the years, we have had a lot of success working together and informing the public of ways that they can both reduce their carbon footprint and help improve air quality. Another place the programs intersect and work together successfully is during recording and tracking. >> Yeah, because we're tracking air pollutants like nox, and boc and ozone and CO2. We can measure the pollutants so we record through numerous difference mechanisms, through the city, sustainability [3:33:27 PM] report. Key pour indicators, community climate plan, state of the environment report. And numerous reporting reports to boards and commissions over the course of the year. >> So ozone and climate change. I will give you a brief overview of the air quality program. So what is ground level ozone? The clean air act actually requires EPA to set a national ambient air quality standards, which is the maximum allowable concentration for dangerous air pollutants, and the only pollutant that central Texas has ever been in violating is ground level ozone. In the air quality program here at the city of Austin was established over 15 years ago. To help the city address and meet that federal standard for ground level ozone. And ground level ozone, I think in this illustration, it lets you know it is distinctly different from the ozone in the stratospheic level that actually helps us by protecting us from harmful ultraviolets. Why is ozone a problem here in central Texas? Elevated ozone levels here in central Texas can hurt the lungs of children, seniors, and adults with chronic respiratory problems like asthma and bronchitis. The health effects include impaired lung function, shortness of breath, triggering asthma attacks, hospitalization and even death some in some situations. There are here in central Texas over 600,000 people in our msa that are vulnerable to elevated levels of ozone. Since children make up about [3:35:28 PM] 25% of our population here in central Texas. Almost 10% of them suffer from asthma already on days when ozone is extremely high, can you usually see that reflected in school attendance, hospital visits from children. And seniors make up about 8% of our population here in the msa. They're also extremely vulnerable to high ozone levels. This slide illustrates how much of on-road mobile services impact the air quality. You can see from the pie graph here, mobile services account for over 50% of ozone precursors here in central Texas. In the city of Austin's air quality program has been strategically located in the transportation department so it can align with policies and programs that affect vehicle emissions. This graph illustrates, I think it gives a really good graphical illustration of what the really problem here in central Texas is. This lets you know how many days over the past few years has been -- and moderately high for people who are vulnerable to asthma attacks and respiratory distress. Over the past couple of years, it looks like we were -- in 2016, there was actually only one severe day. So 2016 was an actually mild year. We're not at the end of the 2017 ozone season yet, but we'll add those to the graph [3:37:29 PM] for the next presentation. This slide lets you know why ozone is a regulatory problem for central Texas. This is a 19-year snapshot how our region has designed values, compared to what the federal standard is. It does a really good job of going down from the standard. In 1985 we were teetering on the line. The standard was lowered again in 2008. Almost at the same rate we were reducing our harmful pollutants. Now that we have a new 2017 standard, which is 70 parts per billion you will notice the current design value is 60 parts per billion. We have been very near nonattainment, which is why the air quality program in the transportation department has been working on this for 20 years. >> So we will switch gears and talk about climate change because it is a slightly different challenge. Emissions of greenhouse gas are primarily CO2, carbon dioxide. As we know because of industrialization of human civilization, burning coal, oil, natural gas, creating cement emissions have increased dramatically over the past 150 years, emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere are an issue because we have the natural greenhouse gas effect, which makes our planet habitable, gives us weather, keeps the planet warm. But the challenge is as we add greenhouse gas emissions to [3:39:30 PM] the atmosphere, CO2, methane, nitrous oxide, others. It is increasing the greenhouse effect, increasing global temperatures, increasing the ocean temperature, changing the climate of the planet. So climate change is an issue over the long-term, climate change will end up making higher temperatures for our area, extends periods of drought, flooding risk of wildfire. This is a long-term change, not an immediate change. This is not something that effects us tomorrow. It is also important to note the sources of greenhouse gas emission in our community, it is part of the generation and use of electricity in our community. The second largest source is transportation sources. So over 35% of the emissions come from those sources. So as we use natural gas, as we use coal, as we use oil, when we burn those compounds they directly create CO2 in the atmosphere, which accumulates over time. So some of the key differences between nox and ozone and C O twovr 2 and oo -- CO2 and ozone and why they're different. With nox, emissions immediately effect local human health. When you walk outside, breathe the air, you are affected by it. Only if the conditions are right. High ozone days, we have a lot of the same emissions every day. High ozone are combination of sun, heat, wind direction, a lot of things. The pollutants are small and it focuses on daily breathing of the air. It is important to note that the regulations and clean air act have been successful through implementing technology in vehicles and power plants at reducing the emissions of nox and vocs while still using fossil fuel. In terms of CO2 and climate [3:41:34 PM] change they don't affect us immediately tomorrow. Emissions are large, talking about millions of tons of emissions and not tens of thousands. And the effect is over the long-term. CO2 and climate change, fossil fuels are the problem, you can't just put on the catalytic converter to capture the CO2. You see when you have zero CO2 emissions, whether you are using an electric vehicle, the air quality emissions and issues basically go away, too. There is overlap there. I'm going to briefly talk about programs in the office of sustainability that we're implementing about climate change and Farrah will talk about the air quality programs. As you know, city council adopted the target of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. Council adopted a plan to address those emissions. It is involving Austin energy, waste emission, all sectors of our economy. Basically transforming how we interact by not using fossil fuels over the long-term. These are the four sectors of the plan, transportation and land use is a huge focus of the plan. There is I think 40-some actions in the plan related to transportation and land use. Our office does not implement those projects. We simply work with other parts of the city organization to track implementation, track progress, report back results and report on how we're doing. A key part of the community climate plan is ancillary or co-benefits that are created. If you ask anybody on the street if they have seen CO2 or care about CO2 emissions or people are taking action individually because of climate change, most aren't. [3:43:35 PM] People take action because it saves money, because it makes the air cleaner, makes the community cleaner. It creates benefits beyond CO2. A lot of times, air quality -- there is more of a selling point with air quality and making the air cleaner on a daily basis, than avoiding climate change which would happen 50 or 100 years in the future. A brief time line, our office of sustainability and the city has been working on the climate change issue since 2007. We have been continuing to move down the road, developing plans, implementing plans, tracking progress and the key message here is that the office of sustainability is really focused on planning analysis, tracking, reporting on our targets and helping the city organization and public take the action that will get us >> Just wanted to share with you some of the efforts here in central Texas that the air quality participates in to reduce ozone. There are four key elements to the air quality program, and it's really divided into three clear audiences. We try to address our internal audience, which is all of our city employees. There's I think a little over 13,000 of those. And then we have city-wide programs, and then we also participate in regional partnerships. And then we're also a part of our msa's federal clean air plan. So internally, to get our employees knowledgeable about actions they can take to reduce ozone emissions and help improve air quality, we offer subsidized transit passes, free B cycle passes. We have a program called commute connections, which lets them know all of the benefits that the city [3:45:36 PM] provides to employees that could help them save a trip or reduce their emissions. There's also the smart commute incentive program, which is a pilot program that incentivizes employees to take actions that reduces ozone and saves trips by giving them vacation days. There's a lot of outreach associated with the internal program, and there's a lot of studies that talk about how employer-led incentives have a huge impact on positive behavior. As far as our citywide programs I understand the city limits of Austin, we do a lot of marketing outreach and radio ads and social media and also targeted digital ads. We also have incentives through your program called test your aqiq where we challenge citizens to see very simple air quality questions and they can win gift cards and other incentives -- this is the bulk of the effort of our program, working through the coalition, over 20 elected officials sit on that board we also work with a business government partnership organization and then there's the commute solutions program. We see the bulk coming from our federal air quality plan, which is now the ozone advanced plan. It was designated to address the 2008 ozone standard and help us get in attainment or reduce our ozone emissions in advance of the new standards. [3:47:36 PM] The city of Austin committed to over 30 measures in this plan, and the goal is really to avoid non- attainment, reduce high ozone, and minimize the cost to the region of potential non-attainment designation. And there's one more year left in this plan,. So that's the two programs. My contact information. And if you have any questions, we're available for those. >> Thank you. Did we have a speaker that wanted to comment? Are y'all okay if we take our speaker first? Y'all stick around because we have questions for you. I'm here to raise questions that will start a more robust dialogue. There may not have been a dialogue on this aspect greater correlation or efficiencies I'm not talking about such as a business person would talk about and slashing jobs and that type of thing but please hear me out and I hope do you ask me some questions. The air quality program started in spring of 1993. When I saw the article in the newspaper, I called that person who is a ph.d. And he was with the city for two years and moved on to greener pastures. Since that time I've been very engaged in this matter and I cared deeply about it because it's about health and this is one of the areas [3:49:37 PM] where government can definitely engage and do good with the right funding, right staffing, et cetera. >> I know the reasons it was there and I do understand the reasons why it is where it is now. That decision was not scrutinized from a standpoint of what is the best. >> -- While creating synergies that would set higher standards. Questions that come to mind to me, some of these were advanced before this hearing took place through councilmember kitchen's office. Has there been sufficient air quality and climate progress? By what standard is progress being evaluated? Should the city of Austin climate plan or climate protection plan become part of or fully integrated into the regional air quality plan called ozone advance, [3:51:37 PM] I'm aware one is a local plan, one is a regional plan to improve planning, budgeting, implementation and oversight. Should the coa air quality program and transportation department become part of or fully integrated into the city of Austin climate program, the office of sustainability to, again, improve planning, resource, operational efficiency. >> Kitchen: If you could finish your thought. I think we can see the questions here but if you want to highlight one or two of them, then we'll have -- >> Okay. Yeah. The collaborations are important. Please read that question, and I'll conclude with the last question, does the city of Austin have a knowledgeable and active senior management person who can manage the internal/external air quality and climate program opportunities. If not, should we seek one? >> Kitchen: Ob. All right. Thank you, Mr. Johnson. So do we have questions? Anybody have -- okay, I think what you're asking, Mr. Johnson, if there's some ways in which we can have more synergies between y'all's departments? Is that what you're asking? So it's just something for us to explore, right? , Right, is what you're asking, right? >> Yes, but I want it to be a robust discussion that does not end with this hearing. I've set up most of the air quality hearings in the last 20 years. I've worked behind the scenes with council, set them up. No offense to anyone. If questions are not asked they fall short, and the improvement potential is not there. I've put in the equivalent of over three work years on air quality with the city and with the regional partnerships, gone to every clean air meeting from 1994 to 2005 and all the clean air coalition meetings some of the some of the last ones in the last year and put in a tremendous amount of time so I don't want this to fall short. I respect these folks, I work with them but I want to be the foremost advocate and [3:53:41 PM] foremost critic of these programs in order to drive progress. >> I can you speak a little bit to the efficacy questions that were raised? >> Yeah. I mean, I guess in terms of meeting targets, I mean, with air quality, we're -- the goal is to be in client -- to be in compliance with federal air quality standard, which we are. With climate we have long-term targets and interim targets that are established by the community climate plan, and we're on target to meet our 2020 and 2030 targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions so, I mean, it seems that with the staff that we have that we are being effective. >> Alter: And in terms of coordination I just want to say I'm on the clean air force task force and I think my colleague, Mr. Flannigan, is on the clean air quality coalition, and to the extent that we can be a resource and be working with you, I think there may be some room for improvement in terms of that communication so we can be most effective in our roles in those forums and I don't think that's really something to go into depth here on, but I think it is one area where I know I would be willing and able to participate more fully than we are at this point. >> Thank you, yeah. I think that's a great idea too. >> Kitchen: Okay. And anybody else? >> And then I would just ask, I think that -- I think it's a good window ask about whether or not there's anything that we can do from our perspectives to assist you all in what you're doing. You know, in terms of [3:55:41 PM] planning or resource allocation, operational efficiencies. Is there anything that we can do to help you do your jobs better, help you coordinate better? I can see from your presentation that really the different focuses that you have, you're actually coming at this from different angles, and it makes sense to me to have -- to have this function in the transportation department as well as having a separate sustainability function. That makes sense to me. I think, though, it's worth asking whether there's more that we can do as a city so I would just look to y'all to think about that. You don't have to answer that right now, but think about that and let us know if there's ways that we can improve, and I would say the same to my colleagues since y'all are very involved. Okay. Any other questions? All right. Thank you, all. Mr. Johnson, I thank you for bringing that to our attention. I think that you've raised some interesting questions that we can pursue, and we'll go from there. So thank you. >> Thank you. >> And if you have any copies of your questions I'd be happy to have those so we can digest them a little further and see if our respective roles there are appropriate places to be moving forward with them. >> I would like to bring up three years ago I talked about the community climate plan and the climate plan itself, the broader climate plan, being folded into the air quality plan when the citizen was advancing that, you mire through the process and there's not an understanding of why that might be beneficial. I'm not saying that it has to be done or should be done but it should be considered. >> Kitchen: Okay. An update on the mobility bond implementation program, the criteria for prioritizing corridors and the sidewalk improvements. [3:57:54 PM] >> Good afternoon, councilmembers, Richard Mendoza, director for the department of public works, joined by Mike Trimble, we'll give you an update on both the corridor implementation and sidewalk mobility bond implementation plan. If we move to the second page on this slide, push this button, right? We're going to start with corridors. I'll hand it over to Mike to begin and I'll follow-up with the sidewalk guides thanks. Good afternoon, mime Trimble, director of the corridor program office. I want to give you a brief update on kind of where we're at with the bond and corridor programs overall. We continue to move forward with our local mobility projects, sidewalks, safe routes to schools projects in the near term. We're also busy at work in development of the corridor construction program, as you recall, council passed the contract with the voters that had stern stipulations for how we put that together so we're actually working on putting that prioritization model together. Council directed us to prioritize potential investments for the corridors, using several outcome and priorities in the contract with voters. We will actually be briefing council on that next week at your October 10 work session. So we will work - - walk through in a much more detailed way our proposed prioritization model and, again, looking back to strict adherence with the contract with the voters and so we'll be able at that point to kind of walk through that, also talk more robustly about some of the next steps we have, and then answer any questions you may have. Beyond that, we will begin pivoting quickly to development of the corridor construction program, using the prioritization model, and what we're planning to do is to come back to mobility committee in November. What we'd like to do is have a work session with the committee to talk more about some of the factors we need to look at when putting together the corridor construction program because beyond the raw scoring with the prioritization model we need to put together a feasible phasing work packaging of the program so I want to talk to more about [3:59:55 PM] some of those considerations, utilities, right-of-way issues, those types of things. Just to let you know some of the things we'll have to look at to put together a proposed corridor construction program to bring back to you February 18th. That's kind of where we're at right now. A lot more to follow next week and I believe we'll be getting some materials to you later this week as backup for that briefing. >> Kitchen: You read my mind. So the backup for the briefing would give us the information about what the prioritization methodology -- >> That's correct. >> Kitchen: What you're proposing as that? >> That's correct. It will provide the information on the indicators and metrics we're proposing to use as well as the approach that we would use in the -- applying the prioritization model to the corridor program, recommendations coming out of the plans and investments. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you. >> With that I'll turn it over to Richard. >> Thank you, Mike. So I'm going to give an update on the sidewalk program and the prioritization model that's used to develop that program. But before I get into following slides, I have a couple more slides than Mike did, I want to go ahead and report the status of the local mobility sidewalk program for the fy17. That program kicked off constructs in may of this year, and I'm happy to report that thus far we have either a little over half of the projects either completed or under construction. That represents about 40 separate project sites throughout the city in all council district so we are on track to complete the early-out phase of this local sidewalk mobility program. So little background information. Our department manages various -- four major types of sidewalk work, and they're depicted on this slide. The first major type is new construction and rehabilitation. I like to call rehabilitation sidewalk replacements. So these are the sidewalks you're familiar with [4:01:55 PM] throughout the city. They're in such dire condition they can't be repaired. They have to be pretty much totally replaced. So that's the first category of work. These represent of course new sidewalks, also includes bus stops. We partner closely with capital metro, as you'll see on the following slide, to do work around some of the major transit stops. The next category of work that we are engaged in is your basic repairs. These are the sidewalks that we can do either by grinding or lifting to eliminate a trip hazard, and also facilitate an ease of disability access. Third category is general maintenance, obstructions to sidewalks. These can take forms of debris in the sidewalk or vegetationial overgrowth in the sidewalk. Then finally we are required to adhere to the American disabilities act and we have a Ada transition plan that basically says we're prohibited from discriminating to equal access to any improvements in the roadway, meaning if we affect improvement in the roadway we have to assure there are Ada compliant researches and sidewalks so we don't discriminate equal access and opportunity to that improvement. Those are the four major categories of sidewalk work that the public works department is engaged in throughout the city of Austin. How do we pay for those various categories of work? On this slide basically you'll start at the top with new construction and, again, rehabilitation or replacement, major replacement of the sidewalks. Those are basically capital investments done in our capital budget, and they're funded through various means, general obligation bonds is one of those. Sidewalk fee-in-lieu, collected from developers that apply to make payment in lieu of construction sidewalks around that development. That goes into a pot of money for other sidewalk improvements. Grant funding, and then other funding as I mentioned earlier, we partner with [4:03:56 PM] capital metro and txdot for federal funds and apply quite routinely. Maintenance and repair, primarily funded through our operating budget. We come to you every year with an ask and through the budget process, the department of public works in this area is funded through the transportation user fee and we do have a program amount of money that's set aside for those lifting and grinding both by internal crews and contract crews and to clear obstructions. Then finally the Ada transition plan, those requirements are met -- can be from a combination of either/or, either operating funds or capital funds. It just depends on the nature of the work and improvement that's going on in that vicinity. I did want to share with you a current snapshot of how we are resourced to fund those various types of sidewalk work from across the different types of work that we do. If you look across the top, primarily all sidewalk work in the city of Austin is funded either from the city or within our partnerships with capital metro or through federal grants that are administered through txdot and we apply and of course work through campo for some of those funds as well. If you look at the top right, let's begin with the 2012 bond. That bond passed $25 million in approved sidewalk rehabilitation money. We have about 600,000 of that remaining today. So most of that has been expended and reinvested in the community. Of course the 2016 the recent passed 37.5 million sidewalk program approved by the voters, which we're executing on now, all the way to the right the sidewalk fee-in-lieu, right now that balance is about $1.8 million. We program about a million dollars a year, and I'll talk towards the prioritization process on how we go about defining and prioritizing and identifying those sidewalk improvements. [4:05:56 PM] And then of course across the top there was 1-time funding with capital metro related to the quarter cent election as well as greater Austin for another million dollars and to the right was txdot grant for north Lamar sidewalk approximates. That city work portion of our match is actually beginning now. So north Lamar we're beginning to complete that project. Rehabilitation of sidewalk improvements right now our current funding levels -- capital metro has recognized that we have to do more than just build new sidewalks and missing gaps. We need to ensure there's good repair around the major transit stops so they have partnered with us from the quarter cent we have 560,000 identified for those rehabilitations or replacements, and then through the build greater Austin, 1 million of 1-time funding for that program. Then even further than that they fund $2 million a year on an annual basis working with the department for identifying major sidewalk replacements around high-traffic transit stops. Then if you go to the bottom, I do want to stress that right now in terms of the maintenance and repair -- and these are the eliminating obstructions, eliminating trip hazard, just taking care of sidewalk needs in a more immediate fashion, right now I'm funded and my annual operating budget of $1 million, that's funded through the transportation user fee, and then also we receive a 1-time funding from capital metro to address repairs around their transit stops. So what's not shown -- I'm sorry, go ahead. >> Kitchen: I want to interrupt you for a second here. Thank you. I've made this point before, and I want to talk to you more about it today as you go through this. The 2016 bond did not [4:07:57 PM] differentiate between new sidewalks and rehabilitation. The language -- to my mind, we didn't have that discussion as part of putting that bond -- those bonds on the ballot and the language doesn't differentiate either. So I've been quite concerned about us only putting the 37.5 million in the new sidewalk bucket, particularly since if we look across we don't have much money in rehabilitation bucket. So and to my mind, that can -- that can make a -- I mean, the goal we're trying to reach is people being able to get around. And if our -- our prioritization needs -- it may be just as much of a need to rehabilitate a sidewalk as to have a new sidewalk. So I'm wanting to ask you why we -- as we go through the prioritization models -- and you can explain that as the prioritization criteria, are we doing that separately, and are there different criteria for whether we need a new sidewalk or a rehabilitated sidewalk? >> Councilmember, selection and prioritization criteria for new sidewalks and repair of existing sidewalks are the same. >> Kitchen: Right. >> And these were adapted in the sidewalk master plan last fall. So it's the same criteria. >> Kitchen: So why do we separate these buckets in terms of separating the 2016 bond? Wouldn't it make more sense -- this is sort of rhetorical for my colleagues, but it seems to me that it would make more sense to say where is the need, whether that is a new sidewalk or a rehabilitated sidewalk? So do you -- >> No. I completely understand. In fact I had this conversation, my assistant director and I yesterday with the adap folks. [4:09:59 PM] >> Kitchen: Right. >> They shared some of their concerns as well with the program. Not just in -- they -- and they understand the need to fill in the sidewalk gaps but also how do we connect to that improvement if that's not in a state of good repair. So in my conversations with them, I shared that we do have this one and a half million a year, and I do anticipate coming forward with increases, incremental increases because it's not where we need to be in terms of rehabilitation and repair. We know that. But also working with them to understand where the most critical locations are and when we do go out and fill these gaps with the current renewal bond, which is mobility, we look to the side connector points for any opportunities to ensure that there is ada-compliant access to that improvement. So that's the approach we're taking. We're taking it from a mobility improvement standpoint, but understand that that improvement in and of itself, if there's not safe access to that, doesn't meet the overall objective. So we're conscious of that, and we are going to be working of course with councilmembers and with the disability community to ensure that through this variety of resources we're addressing it going forward. >> Kitchen: Okay. I'm just kind of letting you and my colleagues know that I'm going to bring a proposal that the 2016 bonds be considered for both new and rehabilitated sidewalks, and I'm going to propose also that the criteria that we do our evaluation -- you're also using same criteria, and so that we do our evaluation going forward to determine where we use this money that we do it based on needs across new sidewalks and rehabilitated sidewalks. So I just want to let you know I'm going to bring that forward. >> Thank you, councilmember. I did want to mention that [4:11:59 PM] one thing that's not depict here are the other sidewalk improvements that are occurring with some of the parallel mobility programs. The corridor office is going to improve sidewalks. Many of the safe routes to school projects that are being planned across all the council districts involve sidewalk and school crossing and ramp improvements. So there is other work that's going on. Developers, they're required, with the development, to improve and provide pedestrian safety. So this is pretty much just a snapshot from the department and the managed perspective with the sidewalk work. >> Kitchen: Okay. Go ahead. >> I wanted to ask a clarification question. I'm not sure if I heard this right. When you were talking about the Ada transition plan, I thought I heard you say that you were making improvements where you were improving the sidewalks, making sure they were accessible. Are you also doing that in other areas where we have existing sidewalks that are not accessible? >> So the Ada transition plan, as I understand the American disabilities act, is we don't have a requirement to go out and make all of our sidewalks Ada compliant right now. >> Alter: Sure. >> That would bankrupt us. >> Alter: Right. >> But we do have to provide Ada compliant access to a road improvement, that could take the form of an overlay, take the form of a signal improvement, intersection improvement. When we program for our other maintenance work in the right-of-way, we have to ensure that we're also planning for any adjacent sidewalk repairs or installation of Ada ramps or if they're existing old Ada ramps that are not to the current standard, we need to bring those up to the current standard as well. So that's other work that's going into pedestrian safety [4:13:59 PM] that is not programmed like in the rehabilitation buckets. Up until, I believe, 2014, we had replacement and rehabilitation money from the old 2006, 2008, 2010, and some '12 -- of course those funds now we've only got 600,000 left. We are moving forward with completing a thorough condition assessment analysis of our sidewalk network. We've got about 2,400 curb miles of sidewalks. So we can get the condition ratings on those in anticipation of a possible 2018 renewal bond, which would be specifically planned to go towards replacement and repair -- and rehabilitation. >> Kitchen: Yes -- I'm sorry, go ahead. >> Alter: If I might. So if I'm a citizen who is disabled and I have a sidewalk that's making it difficult for me to get around but it's not near a road improvement, what are my options for getting the obstacle addressed? >> So the first thing I would -- would advise would be to report that and to -- into our 311 system. So we do have -- our sidewalk office in public works is a standalone division. We've got engineers, we've got plan ears. I've got some in-house crews. We have some operations and maintenance money that we can go out and assess these on a customer service request basis. And if -- there was one, I believe, that my peer reported to me, Mr. Spillar, of a root up heaving a sidewalk. We were able to at least make it safe, using asphalt or the grinding or lifting. It's not meant as a permanent long-term repair. It's not the full [4:15:59 PM] replacement of the sidewalk segments, if you will, but it is something that would address that immediate need in terms of facilitating that disabled person to be able to pass or reducing the risk and exposure to the city for any trip and injury that might occur because of that. >> Alter: And then just to go back to the bond, that would be the bond that the -- the piece of the bond that would deal with sidewalks you're suggesting might have a piece for rehabilitation of sidewalks in it? >> I like to say replacement instead of rehabilitation because you really can't rehabilitate a sidewalk in my view, other than just tear out the whole broken piece and put it -- pour in a new slab. But, yes, ma'am, that would be our plan. >> Alter: Okay. Thank you. >> Kitchen: And not to beat a dead horse but there's no reason why we can't do you? Replace with the bonds that we have in hand instead of having to wait for new bonds to do any replacement, precisely for the kinds of situations that my colleague has brought up. I don't want to be in a circumstance where you have to go hunt for money to take care of a replacement for someone who has an Ada problem or some other kind of problem like that weapon I just -- and maybe we can have another conversation off-line but I'm not understanding the reasoning behind separating these buckets like this. So. . . >> Okay. Now I'm going to talk a little bit about the prioritization models across the three major types of work. First as approved by the city council in the sidewalk master plan last year, that criteria that we do use to set up our sidewalk plans going forward are in alignment with that. And just broad picture, for [4:18:02 PM] new sidewalks and major rehabilitation, there's two we automatically weighted factors, primary factors. Those are pedestrian attracters, where are folks wanting to walk to, and pedestrian safety. And they're weighted accordingly, 56 for attracters and 44% on safety. Then you can look at other pie chart on any side and see the further break down of those criteria are calculated. Just a few quick notes on that prioritization model. It is consistent of course as I said before with the master plan but also with our Ada transition plan, which the public works department has committed to. It does address nonfunctional higher priority sidewalks. We focus on those sidewalks near street alteration projects, transit, schools. We address reasonable modifications as requested by persons with disabilities, working closely with them. And the distribution is throughout all council districts. Based on those priorities within the master plan coupled with the needs and condition and also a constructability. Sometimes all things being equal, one sidewalk will have physical characteristics that make it more difficult, expensive, costly long-term to construct versus maybe another quick win sidewalk. Then there's also -- will continue to be coordination opportunities with other programs, like corridor program. >> Kitchen: Can you remind me what the attracters are? I know I've seen that list. I'm just not remembering. >> Attracters. Let me give -- I think the next slide is an example. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Of what those can be, so you can see proximity to -- these are schools, parks, libraries, shopping centers, transit stops. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Another -- that would be -- this is an example of two potential sidewalk [4:20:02 PM] projects that get scored. And how those scores would fall out, given the pedestrian attracter and safety score. Safety we look at accidents, pedestrian fatalities, obstructions in the sidewalk network, and this is an example of how we look at that sidewalk project from a quarter mile radius of that core and how that would score out. It's very objective in nature and follows to the letter the prioritization criteria in the master plan. I just want to end with this slide, and of course I understand this is the need. We have 2,400 or so curb miles of sidewalks, of which we estimate now, based on a partial condition assessment, 80% of that network being functionally deficient. We're going to have to take a multifaceted approach to get this addressed. We also know that in terms of the gaps in sidewalks to -- in the network to provide connectivity and increase safety for gaps identified, and the 2016 bond is only accomplishing between 40 and 60 miles. So the need is great but that's not unlike many major cities in the United States, we just have to work with the community and make sure we're investing the money in the most valuable places for the return on that investment. So that concludes my presentation. And I'm here, and I have staff members here to answer any questions you might have. >> Flannigan: On the chart where you listed new and rehab and then there was repair and then there was maintenance, what is sidewalk maintenance? >> So sidewalk maintenance deals with primarily [4:22:05 PM] obstructions in the passageway of the sidewalk. So there could be a tree limb that falls over on the sidewalk. There could be overgrowth that's grown out and obstructed passage of the sidewalk that now is -- folks are having to walk out in the street and around creating safety issues. >> Flannigan: It's different than, say, road maintenance where if you do it on a regular basis it prohibits or eliminates the need for future reconstruction of a road but in sidewalks it's inevitable that they need to be replaced at some point? I mean, I'm trying to get a sense of if we spend $37 million building new sidewalks what is the future impact that we're looking as opposed to fixing the sidewalks that we have now for connectivity, which would be my preference, but if we're adding a bunch of new sidewalks, new infrastructure, are we some number of years from now going to to have to replace it all again because that's the nature of sidewalks? >> Sidewalks typically have a life cycle longer than flexible as facility pavements. Typically the concrete we use under a good designs, you account for the drainage should last 50 years. The maintenance that we program for is basically to maintain clear passage of that sidewalk. And we got sidewalks in this city, especially in the inner older parts of the city that are in excess of 50 years. So those are the ones that are now requiring various either stages of repair, sometimes we can use asphalt to level up a trip hazard as an interim measure. We have a lifting technique where we can inject -- drill a hole in the sidewalk, inject a slurry seal and it will lift up the sidewalk, level up the joint so that eliminates the trip hazard. Or we can grind an uneven joint. There's uplifting, there's various soil conditions throughout the city. You get movement. Tree roots can affect the conditions of sidewalks or [4:24:06 PM] premature damage of sidewalks. We have to work closely of course with the forestry division if we have to impact any trees on a sidewalk repair. But ultimately like everything else our roads, our bridges, they reach the -- you know, the end of their life cycle. They either have to be -- most likely replaced. >> Kitchen: To help me visualize, can you move to that last one where you had the visual? >> Yes. >> Kitchen: Yeah. So that slide -- is that a D or an F? Hopefully it's not a C. >> The one on the bottom? >> Kitchen: Yeah. >> It's D minus. >> Kitchen: Okay. And is this an example of where you would replace or you would -- >> Yes. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Yeah, I would replace that sidewalk. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Yeah. >> Alter: We also have sidewalks in other parts of the city, like in our parks. Are they included in these numbers? >> We do. I'm sorry, I didn't -- >> Alter: Are they included in the numbers in terms of calculating replacements and prioritization? >> Not internal to parks, councilmember. The sidewalks internal to parks are maintained by the parks department. >> Alter: Okay. Even though they're often built by public works? >> Yes. Mm-hmm. >> Alter: Okay. Thank you. >> Kitchen: What can you tell us about the cost of sidewalks? And what's happening now in terms of thinking about less expensive ways to either build or repair? Is there anything that we should know about that? >> Yeah. I mean, it's costly to tear out a broken sidewalk and replace with new sidewalks. Many times it can be more costly than installing new sidewalks because you have the demolition and then you have the waste material that you have to haul off. [4:26:06 PM] Costs vary widely. You can have constraints due to right-of-way, if you have to purchase right-of-way, that can increase the cost significantly. If you've got a lot of profile difference, you have to install retaining walls, that can get expensive. Drainage, sometimes you install a sidewalk, it could obscure the natural flow of the drainage. You need to account for that. So I don't have a cost per square foot, like a standard number that I can share with you right now. In a perfect situation. But other cost-effective means of addressing our sidewalk needs are like the temporary repairs we do with the grinding and the lifting, that is many times on the order less expensive than the total replacement. Although it's not meant as a long-term, permanent fix to the sidewalk. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you very much. >> Thank you for. . . >> Kitchen: I think our last item is the electric and a ton vehicle -- I'm so sorry. Who is our speaker? >> [Off mic] >> I'm sorry, sir. I would have called you earlier. I didn't realize. >> No worries. I just haven't been up here for a while so when I saw this come across my email, I was excited to open my big mouth for the first time in a few years. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> See, the last thing I actually did advocacy-wise was I had a nice conversation with the developers of the independent and the shoal creek convention center has taken on that project and, [4:28:09 PM] the janga plaza, the right-of-way between the downsized substation, looking forward to that, looking forward to the 28th opening up finally the lower shoal creek trail improvements. I know you all discussed mainly the sidewalks and some other issues with mobility bond. I just wanted to say a few words in support of urban trails and bikeways. I believe most of you know I had something to do with the Lance Armstrong aka cross town bikeway and they thrilled to see completion of that project now within sight with the endeavor development. Very soon. We have some great new -- some great leadership also from the shoal creek conservancy now putting on the map, taking that trail up to the domain, connecting it with a completed walnut creek trail system. There's some other projects, I know Ms. Kitchen is involved with Kate mason Murphy on the idea of a westbound increek trail along the railway that was been on the map and now back on the map with the urban trails program three years ago. As well as as well the Bergstrom spur possible urban trail along that up spur that went to the old air force base. And just to point out, imagine that loop, that grand loop that's just recently put out there connecting a extended shoal creek trail, a completed walnut creek trail, back down to the east side and the cross town bike way, imagine a parallel to that, a south Austin trail network, a west bouldincreek trail, a Bergstrom spur, and a country club creek trail. I kind of like calling that 14 squared, like 4 miles by 4 miles by 4 miles. [4:30:11 PM] So under this mobility bond I'm very much looking forward to the completion of the country club creek trail, also word from the urban trails program with capital metro portion of design documents, a red-line trail from Kramer station down. [Buzzer sounding] Wrapping up, I would just say let's do more of the same. I just spent some time in Minneapolis celebrating 35 years of the Minnesota coalition of bicycleses I cofounded as a 22-year-old. We had a whole bunch of important people there, including 25 year serving Minnesota bike coordinator and 22 term serving 44 year serving state representative Phyllis Kahn, who had a lot more to do with -- than I did about Minneapolis becoming bike friendly. I was in Austin, Texas. Support to all of you and let's look toward the next pot of money that can fully implement both the bicycle master plan and the urban trails master plan. I thank you very much. >> Kitchen: Thank you. Okay. We have our next presentation. >> Councilmember, this is Robert spillar from Austin transportation department. I'm not so sure it's so much of a presentation but more of a discussion with you. >> Kitchen: Okay, okay. >> The question item, and I am joined by [indiscernible] From Austin energy to help me talk about some of these items to give a insurance we're moving forward with this. The item is electric and autonomous vehicle infrastructure opportunities available for current transportation investment improvements and into the future. So it's just a general update on where we are. [4:32:12 PM] >> Kitchen: Okay. >> As you may know, the city manager has enabled us to move forward with the selection of a new executive, an assistant director in charge automated vehicles, electric vehicles, and shared vehicles because as part of our research we realize that it's very important that all three of those come together in a single effort as we start to think about how to use this new technology to really solve some of our urban problems, congestion. This goes back to the discussions we've had on many occasions that if everyone just simply trades in their gas human-driven car for an electric automated car, we really haven't changed the traffic model very much. We might get a little bit more efficiency out of the roadways but we're really right back to the same congestion problem we have. But if people are able to let go of their automated electric vehicle and share that with somebody else and use some of the new shared technology capabilities in cell phones and call your car and then send it away then we are actually removing cars from the roadway, which could then put us back into an equilibrium with the capacity that we have. As we move forward with that selection, I would like to tell you I believe we will have interviews by the end of this month of interested candidates, and so we're very excited about that. So hopefully early November I'll be able to come back and introduce somebody to community on that item. In terms of the other activities that are going open, of course you know we've come to council several times over the last several months -- was there a question? I'm sorry. >> Flannigan: I just -- I think it's important to note that if people are still single occupancy vehicles and then calling them and then sending them away, that will end up with more cars than people on the road. >> Yes. If everyone owns their own automated car and controls it -- >> Flannigan: Even if they don't. They will literally be able [4:34:13 PM] to be more cars than people on the road. >> Right. >> Flannigan: And we'll be able to have in theory less parking or parking in different places, but it won't reduce the need for roads or the congestion. It might increase congestion. >> Right. And that is in -- >> Flannigan: It's important to remember that. >> Kitchen: More than one person in a car is what we need. >> That's where the shared concept comes in because we can change trips together. >> Flannigan: I appreciate the adding of shared to that focus because I think sometimes -- >> It's very important. >> Flannigan: Sometimes people think autonomous vehicle is some magic solution but if implemented poorly can make traffic worse. >> Right. You know, the city of Austin has had the pleasure of participating as part of the Bloomberg organization with other worldwide cities all facing the same issue and everyone has come to the conclusion that if we don't move towards a shared environment, automated vehicles could make life worse because there would be that phenomenon of, hey, I'll have my car circle and wait for me. To exaggerate the issue. But to certainly frame it easily, it is a possibility. We've also -- yes. >> Alter: I just wanted to clarify the three areas under -- electric vehicles, autonomous, and shared. >> Electric, autonomous, and shared. >> Alter: Okay. You said that really -- it's kind of a mouthful. You said it pretty fast. Just wanted to make sure I got it right. >> Yeah. We actually shorten that usually as the ebab shared but that doesn't mean much to a lot of people. So -- [ laughter ] That's right, it's a mouthful regardless. But it really brings those three concepts together. I've been to council recently representing the transportation department and the city to make possible various automated technologies, for instance, delivery devices, personal delivery devices. We are headed towards a request for interest but we're certainly open for business. We have not been approached by anyone, but that's certainly a possibility in the near future. And we're also pushing the [4:36:13 PM] shared piece of that. One of the strategies we're looking at is it's hard to push all three at the same time, but we can make advances in each one of those independently and it will converge at sometime in the future, and so just as we are advancing our knowledge and experience with automated vehicles we're also doing that with electric vehicles and then the shared side, we're talking about bringing shared electric scooters to town, much like you can think of the car share programs like car to go or zip car. Imagine small electric scooters available for use. And similarly electric bikes and a much larger emphasis on bike share, much bigger than the B cycle. In all three of these areas the technology is advancing quickly in terms of going from a docked system to station to a dockless type system, and we think there will be opportunities for Austin shortly. In terms of upcoming investments, there's certainly opportunities. The mobility bond, the corridors, I think there's some real opportunities there. We've -- those corridor studies will affect a number of signals and so we're looking at technologies that we can bring into the signal system in advance of maybe them fully being deployed. You've heard us talk about deploying bluetooth and new controllers along signals so that we can do transit prioritization and other techniques. But having those signals be able to talk to future cars we're going to get ready to experiment with the technology called dsrc -- please don't ask me what the acronym means but it's a new communication technique between the signal systems and vehicles and potentially between vehicles and vehicles, and it is one of the two new standards that the federal government is exploring. The other is of course 5g, which we have several companies in town looking to [4:38:15 PM] experiment with 5g as well so we can get some experimentation. But certainly those new investments in corridors as we rebuild the signal systems in those corridors give us a real opportunity to invest in the technology that's within those corridors. We're bringing that part forward as part of the prioritization process. We can't preempt that. But certainly for replacing a signal, we can certainly envision what we might need in the future. Our current signal controllers, the computers we run each signal with are -- you know, they were really modern when we put them in but they're sort of at the end of their capacity so there's new computers coming out daily that will allow us to expand the capabilities of those signals. Transit opportunities, we've already talked about the av and ev operations. With regards to the new automated transit pods. We're looking at an opportunity to partner with capital metro, as well as Austin community college, perhaps in the pleasant valley grove environment, grove street environment. Where we think that there's unique opportunity to save public transit as much as 20 minutes on a route in terms of having to detour off of pleasant valley to serve a major community college and then get back to the route, could we do that with a different technology and create a transit focus at pleasant valley where we know there's high demand. That's one thing we're looking at. We're also talking to you heard the term oems, original equipment manufacturers, those are your gms, chryslers, mer saidys, BMW and so forth not just about electric cars but piloting automated vehicles. Everybody is interested in Austin as you know -- Google was here first but we know others have come to town and shown councilmembers and the mayor various forms of [4:40:15 PM] automation and I think there's a lot of excitement there. Carl is going to talk to you about electric vehicle charging technology and I'll let him talk about that. But I think the opportunities are good. We're including it in the prioritization process. We're looking for other opportunities to use our operations monies to bring new technologies in. And then also the data side. You know, we are working with our partners at national association of city transportation officials. You've heard the term nato to make sure we are consistent with national and international policies about open data standards. We believe we are actually leading the charge on open data, but we want to make sure that as the oems, the original equipment manufacturers, start to express what data they would like to see, that we are consistent and open with that. So I think there's going to be a lot of opportunities. I know this conversation is just an initial discussion. I'll turn it over to -- he has some pictures for you. >> Thank you, rob. Good afternoon, councilmembers. I'm Carl with Austin energy. I'm the manager of electric vehicles and emerging technologies. I do have two which were backup slides but since I will be talking I'm going to to go ahead and cheat a little bit really to answer the question of what are we doing in planning for this future state is what I'm going to answer, but first I want to give you a one slide snapshot of how we got to where we are today, and then the map that shows where your infrastructure is with the potential synergy with the new smart corridors being planned as part of the mobility bond. So this slide here on the left part is just showing the growth and usage and kilowatt hours of the public charging network. So here in Austin the trademark is plug-in everywhere. Very good numbers there. And then the graph on the right or the chart shows the [4:42:16 PM] growth in installations of charging ports. Now, our strategy to date has been what I call market driven, which means we don't go and buy and site where level two go. We have retailers and workplaces and other interested partied that want to bring charging to their residence or customers or what have you and they ask how can you help us. How we help them is with a rebate and turnkey operation. If you look at the chart there, is this year's growth exceeds the previous three years' growth combined in charging ports so we're definitely seeing an uptick there. So right now we have 600 charging ports at 172 locations. So if I could show next and last slide. So this is a map, and I apologize, this is pretty busy, especially when I see it up on there. But a map of showing your infrastructure. So this is without -- this is just naturally where the infrastructure lays in correlation to the corridors so that the yellow is actually the new corridors being planned. So you can see there's almost a natural synergy there and peppering of hosts who have come to us and say I want to put charging stations at my location. So overall it's not bad, but it's definitely by accident because the smart corridor overlay was not available or even a concept as we've been rolling things out since 2011. Now, the potential possibilities is around the DC fast charging network. So those are owned and operated, much more expensive to deploy and they've topped off cars in minutes versus hours. So you're seeing a photograph there much a team member plugging one in on electric drive but that dual standard or -- charges all makes and models of DC fast in minutes is what we're deploying at the locations you can see there. So I have asked the team -- yes, ma'am. >> Kitchen: At the locations with the lightning bolt or whatever that is? Those three locations? [4:44:16 PM] >> Those are the three existing. So the middle one is electric drive and the top two are the Nissan dealerships. So the north and south is first generation. Primarily prompted by Nissan. The middle one is our concept of owned and operated and then the black squares are new sited locations. >> Kitchen: Got you. >> Primarily to date there's four overlays when you choose where DC fast goes so it's mostly around electric infrastructure, traffic patterns, and other type of indicators. But I've asked the team to now take in consideration the smart corridor. But I think even more importantly for autonomous and for the corridors, it's really about planning for the future. So one thing we are doing is we are making the -- through conduit and as future proof ready as possible these locations. So instead of doing the bear minimum 100wk service we're looking at 300kw swerves to once again plan for the future. We're also early discovery making the lighting systems ev ready. There's no technologies coming to market where you can make it more ubiquitous of having ev charging among poles. Lastly on autonomous that's going to be a whole advanced charging infrastructure. The good news is the standards bodies are starting to address that so j1772 if you want to get specific about it it, it's about wireless and inductive charging. I have talked to some of the earliest promoters and companies of that technology who do have a patent - - do have patent rights on it, and right now they expect by 2019 to have the first what's called ul listed devices. That means it's safe in public places available by 2019. So that means a car drives over it and then probably by 2021, '22 you'll start seeing roads driving available, cars could actually charge wirelessly as they drive around the day. That's it in a snapshot. >> Wow. >> Kitchen: The -- let me [4:46:16 PM] ask the question about the west gate. That's the park and ride. So is that a tentative in the sense that it's still being planned or is it just unclear about whether taxicab be located there? >> It's still kind of finalizing the contract. We have worked with capital metro where we can colocate with park and rides. Also transportation department has been a great partner on whether it's public space or access. So I can report that your departments are working very nicely together. And so we have a lot of stakeholders that have been providing input. We've also got input from rocky mountain institute, the methodology through the electrification coalition so quite a bit of feedback into the siting, as the airport. >> Kitchen: So that number 77 is on the way. It's not -- west gate, it's not hitting barriers or anything that you're aware of? >> Yeah. We -- I'm pretty confident -- so we had to do it in three batches but I think that one will go through, frankly, and we really start shoveling dirt, if you will, on these in March -April time frame, other than the pilot location. I am glad we had a pilot because there are a few things we leather, how parking works, the length of the cord, they changed part of their product based on our feedback, it's called an arm cord thing, I think they should call that the city of Austin cord, frankly. We are providing early feedback to the oem manufacturers and community on that. >> Kitchen: Okay. Go ahead. >> Alter: This is fascinating and I'm excited to see where we're going. Just yesterday it a tech town hall and I had someone telling me all the stuff they were doing with electric vehicles and I hope that we can also connect up with some of the local businesses and local entrepreneurs who are working in this area here in Austin. I know that we were all involved with an ifc that we had in the spring to push forward this program. I'm just wondering at this [4:48:18 PM] stage what additional policy guidance or policy assistance do you need to be taking the next steps or is that what we did then sufficient for this stage? >> Thank you for asking that, councilmember. We are actually literally on the verge of publishing the av/ev shared roadmap as that direction -- >> Kitchen: Let me interrupt and invite my colleagues, we have a presentation this Friday. >> Yeah. >> Kitchen: With the mac, which is the group that works with rmi on that project. >> Right. >> Kitchen: So you all will be unveiling the plan at that meeting, right? >> Yes. >> Kitchen: So if my colleagues -- if y'all have time, it's at 11:11? >> I believe so. >> Kitchen: 11:00 to noon. >> Just to clarify, that is a public draft. So this is the start of the process. >> Kitchen: Right. >> Not the end of the process. >> Kitchen: Right. >> We've hesitated to call it a plan because we're doing a lot of plans specifically the strategic mobility plan, this is really a roadmap, how do we get from where we are to where we want to be which council clearly identified as a world leader, a nation-leading city in electric and automated and shared vehicles. So that's where we're going. It's pretty exciting. I think you'll see the report also covers data and how we collect and make decisions, continue to move down this road of making decisions based on data, and so we're pretty excited about that. You would think I'd learn a lesson every time I tell a councilmember's office, oh, yeah, we can do this in a month and a half or two months but it's really been a process to learn what we need to do to get to where you all have decided we want to go. And I would just like to leave one other comment here, is that one of the things we've really realized through that process of developing the ev/av shared roadmap and by way, my -- my [4:50:19 PM] chief of staff, Carla Taylor, was the chief author on that. I think you'll be very proud when you see it. This is not a new mode. We need to quit fooling ourselves this is a new mode. It is just one more tool to meet the same travel demands. It is a small vehicle with four passenger seats at best in it. So, you know, what that should be harkening to us is a lot of the old principles of basic transportation physics will still apply. They might happen at a faster speed or more reliable speed in terms of incidences and so forth but this is not as new a technology as perhaps the automobile compared to the horse and buggy was. This is a natural progression and I think that will be -- it will be revolutionary, it will be disruptive, but I think it will be something the community will absorb quickly and move forward with. >> Alter: So the roadmap will have those next policy -- >> Yes. >> Alter: Steps in it? That's where we would see what you see are the next steps? >> Yes. >> Alter: Will it also be clear what's needed of council with respect to that? >> I believe it will. Some of that clear feedback to council will be reneed to start a process to, you know, refine some of that policy. We won't pretend to say we've got all the policy latched up. But it will certainly talk about processes to get from here to there. >> Alter: Okay. Thank you. >> But thank you for that. >> Kitchen: Okay. Thank you, all. We're excited to hear this is moving -- we know you've been working very hard on it, and we're excited as this proceed. Yes? Do we have someone to speak? Did you want to? >> Hello. I'm John Woodley. [4:52:21 PM] I just thought I would mention I'd like to bring up rapid age developing technologies, including remote controlled vehicles. Many of these could be used for deliveries and other services. I think this would need to be included in the transportation option people are inventing other aerial vehicles that can carry passengers, what heights, minimum, maximum, do they need to be -- many of the aerial vehicles would need routes to and which which can affect people in traffic on the ground, what are considered safe routes, the transportation department partnering with the federal aviation commission to address these type of vehicles. So those are some of my questions. >> Kitchen: All right. Thank you very much. >> All right. >> Kitchen: Go ahead. >> Flannigan: Just let it be known this is the day flying cars became a policy issue. >> Kitchen: Exactly. >> Flannigan: Today is the day. [ Laughter ] >> Kitchen: So okay. So the last item on our agenda is discussion of future items. Do either of y'all have future items that you want to bring up at the moment? No? >> Alter: I just want to say, I had a meeting the other day about the impact fee part and a piece of that is going to be coming to us, I think. >> Kitchen: Okay. >> Alter: Next week. I think that -- >> Kitchen: The transportation impact fee? >> Alter: Yes. I think that -- I understood it in a new way and I think the policy choices that it's going to enable us to have are really important and I think that would be really useful as we get further along in that process but before it comes to council for us and this committee to be able to work through specifically some examples and specific cases so that we can understand the policy calibration that might happen and to just kind of [4:54:21 PM] road test it a little bit before it gets put forward to council with specific recommendations. And I don't think I have to go into detail of what I understood right now. I can explain to you how I understood it differently separately if you want, but I think it's going to set us up to be able to make some important decisions, but I think that kind of feel for it and that understanding of the limits and opportunities will be very useful thing to be done in this committee in particular. >> Kitchen: Yeah. I think that would be great. We had conversations in this committee very early on before our staff started down that road I think that's very important. I don't know what the right time line is, Mr. Spillar, but I think bringing that back to us would be very important to do. Is that part of the asap? You know what I'm asking? >> Absolutely. I just wanted to clarify that the first action that council will be doing is holding a public hearing on October 18 related to the defined service areas in which then we would define. There's certainly policies beyond that but this is the first step and hopefully one we can move forward with on the area. >> Alter: Yeah. Just to clarify, so in order to get to the policy stage there are different steps along the way and one of them is the step I think we're hearing on the 19th. >> Right. >> Alter: And that one is separate from the additional -- it is a policy question, but it's -- that's a policy question about how we collect our data and how we set up the pieces of it at the end of this process, [4:56:22 PM] though, we will be able to change those fees and geographically concentrate them or not concentrate them, and that's the portion -- >> Yes. >> Alter: I have at least three other steps, I think, before we get to that point. >> Absolutely. >> Alter: And those have to be resolved before we could actually have any examples that would be worth using. So I think this is several months at least away. >> Yes, ma'am. >> Alter: I just wanted to flag it. >> Kitchen: Do you think it's in the spring sometime perhaps? >> At the earliest, it would be prick before we'd be able to talk about those pieces. This is important because based on this we develop our capital needs for each of those small areas if you will that are defined as catchment areas and then based on those capital needs then you define how much is growth and how much does each unit of growth need to contribute. >> Kitchen: When we get to the point like you're saying that we have to actually -- >> You're absolutely right. >> Kitchen: Okay, good. >> Thank you. >> Kitchen: We've got that flagged. >> Alter: Also I just -- I don't know if it's more appropriate in here or full council meeting, some opportunity to have some discussion about codenext and mobility issues, whether parking or whether -- you know, we were talking all about these evs and shared cars but are there things we need in the code so they're ready for that or that we have flexibility to move forward with that in the future. I think there's several questions that would come out of codenext that although our colleagues will want to talk about it in other forums it might be useful for us to also have some of those conversation opportunities. >> Kitchen: I think it would. I think it would. That's one of the things we've kind of been thinking about. I think that -- I'm getting yeses from everyone. I think it would be important for us to talk about at least some of those transportation issues in this setting because we'll be able to dig into them deeper so I think we should [4:58:23 PM] do that. We'll have more time. We've got that flagged too. Okay. Anything else? All right. Thank you, everybody. I guess I should adjourn. Anybody have a motion to adjourn? All right, we're adjourned. [ Adjourned ]