Traffic and Transportation Committee

TRAFFIC AND TRANSPORTATION April 14, 2020 A meeting of the Committee on Traffic and Transportation was held this date beginning at 2:00 p.m. over Zoom Conference Call. Notice of this meeting was sent to all local news media. PRESENT Councilmember Seekings, Chair; Councilmember Brady, Councilwoman Jackson, Councilwoman Delcioppo, and Mayor Tecklenburg Present: Robbie Somerville, Keith Benjamin, Tracy McKee, Janie Borden, Jennifer Cook, and Bethany Whitaker, Council Secretary The meeting was opened with a moment of silence provided by Chairman Seekings. APPROVAL OF MINUTES On the motion of Councilwoman Jackson, seconded by Councilwoman Delcioppo, the Committee voted unanimously to approve the minutes of the March 10, 2020 meeting. An ordinance to amend 31-77(a) and 31-77(b) to expand documentation options required for a taxi cab operator license and chauffer’s license (this is the Yellow Cab request) Ms. Borden stated that these were amendments they had been asked to make by the owner of Yellow Cab which would help to equal the playing field between the online taxis and the City’s taxis. The prominent change was that it allowed them to get a background check through SLED and allow them to get them from the National Criminal Records check. North Charleston permitted a company that did those types of background checks, so it would broaden the resources a driver could use to pull a background check. On the motion of Councilwoman Jackson, seconded by Councilwoman Delcioppo, the Committee voted unanimously to approve the above item. Avondale LOI coordination with Charleston County US17 Roadway Project for approval Mr. Benjamin stated they were excited any time they could partner with the County on improving transportation in a significant way and when they could do that and meet some land use goals. This was a part of that work. The letter was very clear, but he wanted to be able to answer questions. The County was embarking on their US17 Corridor Improvement which would be improving various intersections from the Avondale area to the 526 interchange. As they were doing that, they had been adamant about partnering. They wanted to know what the priorities were at the intersections. One of the thoughts was coordinating with the land owners there to reorganize how the streets functioned in the Avondale area. There was a letter of intent that Charleston County staff could take to their Council to show what the City wanted to do, so that they could move forward with concept designs that merged the land use opportunities and roadways. They wanted Charleston County to know they were serious about this and would work together to improve land use. Mayor Tecklenburg stated that this had been a terrific amount of work that went into bringing this forward, particularly by their West Ashley Coordinator and the Planning Department, Keith and his team. This would align the street across from the Fire Station and make it safer and quicker for them to get out. It would improve the intersections and would create the opportunity for future increase in parking. Councilwoman 1 Jackson asked what would happen next to make sure they were in line with the County. Mr. Benjamin said that the goal from County staff was just to know that the City was on board with them moving forward with their road concept designs. The City and County staff had already been working together on what would work and what wouldn’t. Eric Pohlman stated that the letter was a request from the Transportation Department with Charleston County. That way, the County wouldn’t invest into something and have the parties involved pull out at the last second. This was so that everyone was aware up front. Councilwoman Jackson asked if this would authorize the Mayor to sign it or if it would go to Council at some point. She would like it to go as quickly as possible. Councilmember Seekings said for this, they would bring a report from T&T and then the Mayor would have that authority. There were certain things in the code where T&T was the final resting place, but in this instance, it needed to go through Council. On the motion of Councilmember Brady, seconded by Councilwoman Jackson, the Committee voted unanimously to approve the above item. Lockwood/Beaufain Maintenance Agreement for approval Mr. Benjamin said this was another partnership. The Lockwood/Beaufain intersection was one of the priority intersections identified in the Citywide Transportation Plan in 2008 that Council approved. During that time, they went ahead and submitted it for approval within the Transportation Sales Tax Program. That was subsequently funded and designed and it came before the Design Review Committee for more input. They checked in with the neighborhood and there was coordination with the Parks Department, as the County would not maintain the landscaping and irrigation within the median. The goal of this project was to, essentially, create safe crossing between the neighborhood on the southern end of Lockwood and Beaufain. The other goal was to better dictate the lanes of traffic coming around that bend. The ask was to approve the maintenance agreement for the project, and the maintenance was specific to the landscaping and irrigation that the City would maintain. Chairman Seekings said this project had been long in the making and in the priority list for a long time. He wanted to point out that if they wanted to get off the multi-use path by the water, there was no way to come out of between the Marina and Ashley Avenue legally and safely to use that path. It was over a half a mile from the entrance of the marina to Ashley Avenue. This would give access for recreation, provide traffic calming, and also beautification. It was a great project and he suspected that it wouldn’t be a huge strain on the budget. He asked what the timeframe on the project was. Mr. Benjamin said that they had been aiming to get both this and Folly/Albemarle done this year. Councilwoman Jackson said that this made her think about the County and Lockwood. She asked if there was any news about Courtenay. He could answer it in his update. On the motion of Councilwoman Jackson, seconded by Councilmember Brady, the Committee voted unanimously to approve the above item. Director’s Update Mr. Benjamin stated that the Traffic and Transportation department, especially the crews, had been on the frontline throughout the virus. Many departments were working hard to keep essential services going. They were keeping a level of normalcy with how they were serving citizens. He had been in conversations every week with other DOT heads from around the Country. They were exchanging ideas and ways in which people were keeping those services going. One was the curbside pickup and dropoff. 2 He would continue to be in communication with his colleagues and would bring ideas to the table as they were navigating it. Some of the procedures may be things they should be doing anyway. Everyone was still doing their parts to get projects moving and done. The 526 signal project was still moving along. The BCDCOG was still working with the City on various transit issues. The new shelter at Meeting/Line went up last week. They were still coordinating with the County on Glenn McConnell, Folly/Albemarle. They were in the midst of making decisions for 2021 Transportation Sales Tax Projects, so he was excited to find out what they would get from that funding. They also got notification about CTC requests, and asked the Councilmembers to let them know about things they might want. With CTC requests, they ask municipalities to send their top three priority projects and most would get awarded their number one priority. It was different than TST where they could send in an innumerable amount of requests. They had their monthly coordinating meeting with the County and State on May 1st, and he would get a report on all the projects they had going on and what changes might have been made with the virus situation. Councilwoman Jackson thanked Mr. Somerville for looking at the things in her district for this year. They agreed that there were a lot of what she called the ‘spiderweb’ neighborhood roads that were on the list and talked about going directly and renegotiating to agree that other roads were in worse shape could get looked at. Mr. Benjamin said they were aware that they did do a letting for a number of streets. They were trying to keep progress moving. He asked to get together with Mr. Somerville to talk about that. In the last two years, Charleston County had shifted from taking requests for resurfacings and depending on their road grading process to determine what needed resurfaced. That didn’t mean there wasn’t negotiation space. Mr. Somerville stated that to date, they had installed nine speed humps. They had rebuilt some as well. The Committee had approved Aiken Street and Magnolia Avenue in Wagener Terrace at the last meeting, so he would be marking those locations and working to get those installed. They did have 49 locations, and $36,750 that they planned on taking care of this year in the 2020 Maintenance Plan. That would leave a balance of about $20,000 for the remainder of the year. That could be four or five new speed humps, or they could do maintenance on 20-25 more existing. Right now, they were treating speed humps from 2003 and before, so they were trying to get caught up on the older ones that hadn’t been touched in years. Chairman Seekings asked if they were able to pull out Ashley Avenue. Mr. Somerville said he got a call from the gentleman. They submitted a petition with signatures, but no addresses. Chairman Seekings said there was a contact person they could get with so they could get that done properly. Mr. Benjamin stated that all the permits, except DHEC, had been obtained for Lockwood/Beaufain. They were looking at late summer for bids and construction, and the same timeline for Folly/Albemarle. Chairman Seekings said that was great, as they were both small-scale but needed projects. Councilwoman Jackson asked if there were any further conversations considering the Hampton Garden and needing to stop car traffic. They had a lively discussion at Council when it first came up, but she thought there was a lot of interest, especially amongst the Charleston Moves community. She would be supportive of a recommendation that they consider it logistically. If nothing else, it was a great model of how they wanted to make a bike and pedestrian friendly City. Mayor Tecklenburg said that it was a 3 unique situation and until they made a decision to start opening the parks back up, it would send the wrong message. He would be the first person, once the parks were opened back up, that this could be a first step. Councilwoman Jackson said she would hold onto the hope then that they could do some sort of model project that would give Hampton Park a whole new opportunity to set the stage for pedestrian only conveyances. Chairman Seekings said that when they debated to close the inside lane of traffic, it took many hours of debate at City Council. Having no further business, the Committee adjourned at 2:30 p.m. Bethany Whitaker Council Secretary 4