Coraggio Consulting
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Transportation Committee, Tuesday, October 17, 2023

Date: Tuesday, October 17, 2023
Place: Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 1h 21m (video)
Official meeting video (Fairfax County): https://video.fairfaxcounty.gov/player/clip/3074
Official Board of Supervisors page (Fairfax County): https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/boardofsupervisors/

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-11-03. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:04] Okay, let's call the Transportation Committee to order, please. That was fun.

[00:00:22] We are going to start with what's listed as number four. Well, first, are there any additions or corrections to the summary of the meeting? Okay, seeing none, those will stand as approved. Supervisor Alcorn is out of town on business, so since I'm vice chair of this committee, I get to chair it today.

[00:00:44] And we are going to skip right to item number four to begin with, which is the traffic calming program evaluation. Sure. Greg. Good afternoon, members of the board. My name is Greg Steverson. I'm the acting director of the Fairfax County Department of Transportation.

[00:01:01] And so this particular item actually stems from a letter from the Trail, Sidewalks, and Bike Waste Committee to Chairman McKay back in March of this year related to pedestrian and bike safety, which led to a board matter at the March 21st board meeting requesting for FCDOT staff to research turn calming. For example, what types of turn calming programs are there out there, what's going on with those, with other jurisdictions, what measures have they implemented and how they've operated and so the board matter also asked us to kind of have some

[00:01:40] discussions with VDOT which we can talk about it in a little bit and we can talk about a little further at at the end and then come back to the BTC to discuss how we might be able to do something like that here in the county and so Lauren Delmar is here to give the presentation on turn calming and then we'll have a question or so for you all for feedback and then we can talk about a little bit more about it at the end. So, Lauren. Thank you, Greg. My name is Lauren Delmar. I'm the chief of the active transportation section. I'm joined by Hannah Kachner, who's our active transportation planner, and Eric Teitelman, the chief of the capital projects and traffic engineering division

[00:02:16] today. So, as Greg mentioned, you can go to the next one. Oh, I got that. Sorry. I'm not used to being in charge of the presentation. So, as Greg mentioned, this stemmed from a board matter that originated from the letter from the Trail Sidewalks Bikeways Committee asking us to review a potential turn calming program as well as other places where this has been implemented successfully.

[00:02:41] To summarize what turn calming is, it's intended to reduce turning speeds, particularly to eliminate the highest speed turns, and to increase driver visibility of pedestrians in the crosswalk by reorienting the vehicle to be looking straight ahead at the crosswalk rather than at an angle.

[00:02:58] And it's typically implemented through a quick build program. So the cities who have successfully implemented it, including New York, Portland, San Francisco, Toronto. They have all used a quick build program, and I'll show you some different images of what quick build could look like versus a more long-term program. We are already looking, with all of our new construction projects, to slow turning speeds with reduced radii and other measures like medians or other timing or design measures. So that's already happening, but this is how can we retrofit our roadways. So typically,

[00:03:37] most of these cities have implemented left turn calming, which we'll talk about, as well as some of them have implemented right turn calming. So left turn calming is primarily using a hardened center line or a small median bump along the center line of the roadway at the intersection. This can be with or without flexible posts and with or without a nose extension. I'll go into more detail about that in a moment. Right turn calming can include a slow turn wedge. That would be a quick build solution that I'll talk about, as well as a truck apron or pillow, which is more of a long-term solution. And then pavement striping with or without flexible posts, again, quick build

[00:04:15] or timing considerations that signalize intersections, which would include a leading pedestrian interval with a no turn on red. We looked at a study primarily coming out of Portland that looked at how their hardened center lines were in effectiveness at their primary goals, which were to decrease turning speeds and decrease the drivers crossing the center line.

[00:04:37] So the first image on this slide shows a hardened center line without flexible posts with a nose extension. That means that the hardened center line goes past the crosswalk into the intersection. And those saw the highest decrease in turning speeds at 16% and the highest decrease in drivers crossing the center line at 90 to 100%.

[00:04:59] Without the nose extension, we saw a slight decrease in each of those statistics as shown. And the second image shows an example from Washington, D.C., where they have a hardened center line without it going into the intersection past the crosswalk. They also, in Portland, looked at hardened center line with flexible posts.

[00:05:21] This was a smaller study group, but they did find that, again, with the nose extension, They had similar results, and without the nose extension, slightly higher proportion of drivers who were not crossing the center line. However, it was only slightly more effective in slowing the vehicles, and these are more expensive to install and to maintain.

[00:05:43] They're more likely to be struck and knocked down and need replacing with the flexible posts. So as an example, the New York City DOT is moving away from using these because of that cost and lack of increase in effectiveness. Right turn calming measures as a quick build include a corner wedge, which is the same type of temporary curbing material that's put into the corner to encourage drivers to go around it.

[00:06:10] And then this design must consider the path of the bicyclist if there's a bike lane especially because they can be pretty hazardous to bicyclists who have to traverse over them. There's also a design called a truck pillow or an apron. This can be more of a longer term solution, it typically requires a little more investment because you're actually putting kind of like a speed bump at the corner. And all of these designs, we're really trying to target the primary users of the roadway, which would be a passenger vehicle, to go around them. They're

[00:06:43] allowing trucks and larger vehicles to pass over them. So we're still designing for the trucks, but we're not only designing for the trucks. We're also allowing the drivers of the passenger vehicles to travel slower through the location. And then two more right turn calming strategies would be just painting the corner the way that you want the driver, the passenger vehicle to travel around it. That tends to be less effective because it's just paint, but you could add flex posts. So we have an example here from Glencarlyn Drive and Glencarlyn Drive in Colmore behind the

[00:07:19] shopping center there where VDOT actually put these in because it was such a wide turn and they were having such high speed turns around that corner. Then the last strategy, which isn't sort of a physical feature, is a leading pedestrian interval. This gives pedestrians a head start crossing the intersection.

[00:07:38] When paired with no turn on red, it can prevent those turning movement conflicts and prevent drivers from running into the pedestrian in that crossing. We also considered the effects that snow may have on these features and whether or not they would be a hazard for snow plows.

[00:07:57] We don't think that this is a likely issue. This has been implemented in cities with high annual snowfalls like Calgary and Toronto. And it also has a similar effect. This picture shows something called planners call a snickdown, which is where snow creates a neckdown at an intersection. It's the same place that we would be putting the turn calming measures, and therefore it wouldn't be implemented in this or wouldn't prevent the snowplows from turning that corner.

[00:08:23] We also talked to VDOT about these considerations and strategies. They were primarily concerned with maintenance costs. and the durability of the speed bumps and the long-term effectiveness if they were to be hit. They asked us if we would develop a selection criteria for roadways, and they also asked how this would work in a suburban context, particularly on roadways with medians.

[00:08:45] And for that, we looked at Toronto, which I'll talk about in just a moment. These images are from a very suburban context in Toronto. So just some further considerations that we have is that flexible posts might be unnecessary. They will produce additional maintenance, which we know is a concern for VDOT.

[00:09:02] and it didn't show a significant difference in turning speeds in the Portland study. They do require a lot more replacements in the long term. We also found that in Toronto, we looked at their suburban program. They actually implement this at signalized intersections, which none of our local comparables do, but that helps to slow the vehicles, especially where there's a left turn conflicting with a pedestrian crossing at the signal, and they use those on roads ranging from 20 mile an hour to 37 mile an hour speed limits.

[00:09:34] It's in kilometers, so it's a little off. And they also just use a wider bump on a road with median, so they're sort of shadowing the width of the bump on the opposite side of the crosswalk when they have a median, so you can see that in that image here. So this concludes our research into this.

[00:09:52] We would love to hear what strategies you would like us to explore further and what questions you have about dirt and calming. I'm going to call on the chairman. Yeah. So good presentation. I appreciate this. As was mentioned, this was from a board matter that came in with some suggestions made. And, you know, I think it's hard to argue with the percentage numbers that are on here. I mean, you know, the ones I'm talking about, the hardened center lines without flexible posts where there was a, you know, 16% decrease in median turning speed, 90 to 100% decrease in drivers crossing the center line. I can't think of many things that

[00:10:31] are relatively low cost that could return that type of benefit when we're dealing with the pedestrian issues that we're dealing with. And so, I mean, I would think we need to continue to work with VDOT on this and look for areas in the county where we know we have high pedestrian volume, where we've had pedestrian crashes. I know that, you know, police do a good job of working with DOT when there's a pedestrian accident, looking at that particular intersection and what can be improved at that intersection. I don't know if this is one of the things that has come up before in any of those conversations, but we know where the data is, where we have pedestrian

[00:11:10] fatalities, accidents, where we have high pedestrian and bicycle activity. I think we should continue to work with VDOT in those corridors at looking for opportunities to install what appears to me to be a very low-cost, high-percentage benefit type of public improvement that doesn't require a lot of work, and so, you know, this to me is a little bit like when looking at repaving roads and re-striping them, can we add a bike lane, what can we do when we're re-striping them, we have to stripe them anyway, and we went down that path because it was low cost, you could do it incrementally, I look at this the same way, this seems to be a

[00:11:48] tool that we should be working with VDOT to try to get in more places in the county, even if we started off as a pilot to see if our numbers, you do this in one corridor of the county and see if our numbers match what we see in these Portland findings here. Because I think we're all struggling to look for ways to make pedestrian safety a higher priority. We know we have limited funding. I would support us working with VEDA to fund a corridor or two and do a pilot with these markings and see if it makes a difference. Supervisor Griff.

[00:12:25] Thank you. They have a really nice turning corner movements in Palo Alto. They're not flex posts. They're more permanent. They look really, really nice. But of course, Palo Alto is quite a...

[00:12:44] Jeff, you may be familiar with them. It's a very wealthy community. But sometimes you need something that doesn't look so temporary. You need something that looks a little more permanent, maybe the, just the, the design. I, I'm looking at the feedback from VDOT, the concerns over maintenance. I, sometimes, you know, little humps or bumps really do, you know, have the desired effect. But I'm looking at these, and this looks like they're the plastic kind of sort of temporary.

[00:13:22] We have a roundabout in Mason District on Ravensworth at Jayhawk. Yeah, Jayhawk. That was put in as a pilot program some time ago. And it seems to be, it works well. Some people still don't like it, but it works well.

[00:13:41] But the one thing I have noticed is that because it is made of some sort of composite, plasticky kind of thing, after a while, it begins to fade a little bit and it looks a little shabby. I don't know if that's a maintenance issue, just a sunlight issue or what, but we might want to look at if there are primary concerns over maintenance, what is the maintenance requirement for that particular roundabout?

[00:14:07] Because it looks like it's using the same kinds of composites, and maybe there's already some information out there about it. I haven't heard much about of any problem. I just have noticed when I've driven through it, sometimes it's a little difficult to see, especially sometimes at night.

[00:14:31] If things have faded a bit, you can't see it quite as well. So that's probably a maintenance issue, but maybe not the kind of maintenance that VDOT was thinking about. And thank you for a new word, snickdowns. That sounds like a Jeopardy question.

[00:14:48] Thank you. I have Supervisor Peltier. Could I respond just about the material? I just want to let you know that it is a rubberized material as opposed to plastic. So I don't know for sure what the roundabout is composed of, but I know that we looked at a couple of different brands comparing sort of their effectiveness and the reflectivity over time, and we would attempt to select the one that's been most effective in other locations to address that.

[00:15:15] It's some sort of composite that gets installed by drilling down and installing it that way rather than putting asphalt over asphalt. Yes. Thank you. I have Supervisor Palchuk, then Walkinshaw. Thank you so much. I very much appreciate your work on this and your research and bringing in VDOT to that conversation.

[00:15:35] I think that's critical and important to do. I'm looking at, so my answer is yes, but I'm looking at your specific question is which strategies are you interested in us exploring further? And I think earlier there was also a question about how do we choose the roads and how do we choose those pilots? So, I mean, I number one would say the work you've been doing with active Fairfax of using data to help understand both high use, high vulnerability, high crash or high issue areas, definitely starting there.

[00:16:10] I also would say looking at VDOT's feedback, because I think in addition to the jurisdictions you mentioned outside of Virginia, there are a few, including Arlington, that are not under VDOT rules always, where I've seen some of these be pretty effective, would be the suburban context.

[00:16:29] So I would say let's start with our more urban areas, right, especially for piloting. I know we've been hearing from a lot of our communities, especially our businesses who pitch the walkability in Fairfax, and then a little surprise that it's not always safe for pedestrians to get around.

[00:16:48] And so we want it everywhere, and maybe a couple of pilots, I think, would be more helpful than just one. we're such a large county uh so maybe a more urban area in the middle of the county a different kind of area in a different urban area of the county um and I would say looking at the types of things you're you've looked at um I appreciate your recommendations um that things that are high effectiveness and low maintenance are probably uh near the top of the list so if I'm understanding is correctly, those truck pillows or aprons or those sturdient things.

[00:17:28] I mean, I know you've built the first Zikla in our district in the county, and looking at some of these, maybe they don't stand out as much, but if they're more effective, hopefully require a little bit less maintenance, and our things, we can start tracking and monitoring both their effectiveness and their maintenance.

[00:17:47] So I think it's exciting. We need to use everything we can, and hopefully, if I understand correctly, if we do piloting, highlights, especially, you know, in areas where VDOT might be more open to it, we can see the impact and that they're effective moving forward. Thank you. Supervisor Walkinshaw, then Stor.

[00:18:08] Thank you, Madam Chairman. I think this is great. I absolutely think we should move forward. You know, I had last year, late last year, Lee Tran, who was 70 years old, was walking in the crosswalk, cross Braddock Road at the Kings Park Drive intersection and was hit by a car that was turning right. The textbook, I think, example of the need for this. And I think I'd say in terms of the pilot, I think it probably makes sense to look at a couple of different contexts, right,

[00:18:46] to determine where it's effective and different areas of the county, right? Obviously, in more urban parts of the county. It's going to be a particular set of solutions, and VDOT seems to be skeptical as to whether these solutions can work in a suburban context on an arterial that's running through the middle of the county somewhere, Braddock Road or elsewhere. I think it would be worth trying some of those out, and maybe the answer is it works in some contexts and not others, and that's okay. That's the purpose of doing the pilot to learn. So my recommendation would be to try a couple of different kinds of areas and roadways in the county and then measure

[00:19:24] the effectiveness. Just one question in terms of the plastic, maybe plastic's the wrong word, humps or bumps. Did we hear from other communities that have implemented them? How long are they lasting? Are they lasting for three months or three years in a typical use case?

[00:19:45] so we don't have a timeline on that but um in the portland study they did test two different types of the speed bumps like two different brands so there are a number of different brands that make these and they test a tested like a rubberized version um i think that sounded maybe like what supervisor gross was referring to um and then they tested another product that was more of like a plastic version and they found that overall the plastic one um held up a lot better um just had of higher durability, and I think they're planning to update the results of this study because I think they published this back in 2021, and then they were going to do like

[00:20:24] a two- to three-year update, but that's certainly something we could ask about with their DOT. Yeah, I think since that was one of the pieces of concern that VDOT raised, if we're able to go back to them and say, hey, Portland said, you know, these things are lasting for five years, so, you know, we've got to be on a cycle to replace them, but it's not every couple months, you're going to have to be out and replace them. I can tell you, with the plastic bollards, the ones that they installed at Braddock and Birk Lake, they do a great job of replacing them, but it's like every other day, they're replacing them. So that's a different life cycle,

[00:20:59] I think, than what we're talking about here with the bumps. But if we could get some numbers on that, I think it can help us make the case. And one of the things I do want to chime in on, just to make everyone aware of how this may shake out, we very well may have a conversation with vdot where they say will you be willing to maintain them if we put them out there and so that's something that maybe we want to think about up front right um whether we're willing to do that or not because i do very well expect that conversation to happen as we get further and further into we want to do this and we want to do this here we want to do this there i very well

[00:21:37] expect that to be a question that's placed uh at our feet so that's something we may want to think about and consider if we don't want to do it, okay? If we do want to do it, yeah. And I think that we're going to need some heart, some numbers in terms of what does it mean. Okay. Maybe we can get an extra mowing cycle out of them in exchange since we're paying for that, too. Well, I like that. Supervisor Stewart? Yeah, I concur that VDOT question is the one that we always, do they pay for the RTAP program now? No. We pay for some of it. I think they pay for maybe a little bit of it.

[00:22:14] what's the answer on that one? Because to me, this is how I see this going, is having this part of a larger speed reduction effort. And we've got an RTAP program, at least in our communities, is beloved. I mean, not necessarily by everybody in the community, but the folks who want to slow the speed down, they have a mechanism that they own. I mean, it's not even about the supervisor, It's about this community, neighborhood, block, et cetera.

[00:22:42] Do we see this being connected to that and part of an overall package of offerings that we have to increase safety, reduce speed? I would probably say this might be slightly different. RTAP has its very specific rules with respect to neighborhoods and, you know, the voting process and all those things.

[00:23:03] I see this more akin to some of the, where we're going potentially with some of the spot improvement things, except my hope is that obviously it'll be cheaper. And so I think this might kind of be in a separate sort of program that we're working towards with respect to just kind of intersection improvements and intersection safety and might be outside of R-TAP a little bit because of the R-TAP specific rules that come with it.

[00:23:30] And I'll just add R-TAP is more likely to impact residents because we're working on neighborhood streets whereas with these we're talking about intersections that could be in neighborhoods but are more likely to be further from the homes than the speed bumps on in in our tap program do you see a similar kind of community engagement when you go to do this or how have you even gotten that far maybe you haven't so yeah i don't know that we've gotten that far but i think that's obviously something for us to to consider um how we would tackle a lot of it will just depend on what road we may be talking about and you know what the situation is But I think that's something for sure for further discussion that we should talk about.

[00:24:08] I'm very supportive, looking for ways to reduce speeds around turns and reducing speeds in general. I think compliance is always going to be our challenge, and enforcement will always be very difficult. So having things that will do that naturally I think will help tremendously.

[00:24:26] How do you see this addressing or affecting the protective bicycle lanes and so forth? so similar strategies could similar features could be used to create protected bicycle lanes and in a similar quick build type of manner so you can use the same type of temporary curbing or flex posts to add those into the existing buffer of buffered bike lanes to convert it into a protected bike lane so that is a another thing to explore that's sort of akin to this the turn calming where that would be appropriate where we have a long enough stretch of protected bike lanes without

[00:25:03] turning lanes intermingling that it would be effective. I guess specifically the impact that this might have on bicycle lanes. Oh yes oh so sorry at for the hardened center line there's not an impact to bicyclists for the right turn wedge there can be we just have to look at the exact placement if the bike lane is right on the edge of the pavement against the curb it could be a conflict we can also potentially where we have buffered bike lanes swing the bike lane out and put the buffer on the curbside just for the through the intersection to prevent that conflict so there are measures we can take we don't we think we can work with it essentially okay well

[00:25:41] thank you i think we need to move forward with something like this and i realize that's part of the process is you try some things that maybe works it doesn't work in our particular communities but i think we need to move forward with that thank you okay so i think the board is very interested in this so i i appreciate the presentation and um how you move forward and hopefully VDOT wouldn't use some of their money. Okay, so before we're going to get ready for the next presentation, which is a presentation from EMWA. And as they come up, I want to point out you had an extra presentation at your seats. We do have one more addition to the agenda, and

[00:26:21] that will be a presentation about the proposed smart scale modifications. And I am going to turn to Mr. Steverson. All right. So we have with us today President and CEO of the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, Mr. Jack Potter. And I know there was some interest in hearing from EMWA at the Economic Initiatives Committee to talk about, for them to talk about their economic outlook and some of their future plans and priorities. And I know the timing didn't work out for the Economic Initiatives Committee, but fortunately, we had some time today to work with

[00:27:01] MOI and have them come forward and talk to us a little bit about some of their plans. So with that, I will turn to Mr. Potter. First of all, let me thank you. First of all, thank you for that introduction, and thank you for giving me the time today.

[00:27:21] Happy to join you and bring you up to speed on where we're heading in terms of the Airports Authority. So first of all, let me just say our mission is very simple. Our goal is to help the DMV grow, economic growth in the, whether it's the district, Virginia, Maryland, our goal is to contribute to economic growth in this metropolitan area.

[00:27:45] And we do that, obviously, by providing air service to and from as many destinations, both domestically and internationally as possible. We do that by making it attractive for the airports to serve this metropolitan area by keeping their cause down to us.

[00:28:04] And hopefully they keep cause down for those who are seeking to fly. And by having a high level of service into and out of this metropolitan area, we know that it helps attract businesses. And we know that it was one of the key things that Amazon considered when they came to Crystal City.

[00:28:28] It's no secret why they called it national landing, you know, national airport, nation's capital. So we've had a very good year. We've had an exciting year for growth. in fact that Dulles, we're the number one airport in America on a percentage basis for growth in international travel. And we've done that by doing a lot of work with United Airlines and their Star Alliance partners. We are the number one airport in America when it comes to the number of Star

[00:29:03] Alliance partners that we serve. By having Star Alliance partners fly into Dulles, it enables United for those transfer passengers to serve more destinations domestically. So this year we have 10 new airlines, 19 new routes, and almost 800,000 seats coming into and out of our airports. I'm very happy to say that we are back to 2019 levels. If you look at where we were in 2020 versus where we were in 2019, we're at about 32 percent. In 21, we grew

[00:29:41] to 59%. Last year, about 92%. And this year, at 102%. The interesting thing is that the growth that we saw in the past couple of years was driven by DCA, because it's a slot and perimeter controlled airport. But I'm happy to say that Dulles Airport has now overtaken them. And the key driver there was international. We are down domestically, but internationally, we're up above where we were in 2019. And you can see from this chart that when it comes to Latin America, Africa, Middle East, and Europe, we saw significant growth. Domestically, I mean,

[00:30:21] within our continent, Canada's trailing a little bit, but Latin America is very, very strong at 152%. The one destination that's kind of trailing is Asia, and it really has everything to do with China. And that's not just us, but that's all airports in America because of the geopolitical situation that exists there. We are very happy that, you know, with all of the economic growth along the Dulles Corridor, so thank you very much. It builds up our catchment

[00:30:56] area. It really helps feed both of our airports. And so we're excited by, you know, the many businesses that have relocated there. And I thank you because you're the folks who recruited them. We're happy to serve them, but we're delighted that you were able to get these folks coming in, and we're also excited by the fact that the Silver Line was a contributing factor to help recruit those.

[00:31:22] And I think, you know, we are certainly one of the beneficiaries of the Silver Line, and we were very happy that, just to celebrate a couple of weeks ago, hit our millionth rider at Dulles Metro, at the Dulles Airport Station.

[00:31:43] uh that's a combination of uh obviously our employees and by the way we incent our employees to take the metro we encourage other employers out on our campus to incent folks to take metro but we are selling very very strongly to international destinations and international travelers that they can come into dulles airport and take transit to downtown and any other destination that's served by the metro. And it is a very, very good selling point.

[00:32:16] It's very interesting how we've been able to, you know, what we go out and sell. We sell the fact that particularly to college campuses, now Thanksgiving's coming, so our pitch is, hey, you're going home? You're flying through Dulles? Hey, wait till Saturday, it's two bucks. Weekdays at six bucks. And when you look at the alternatives, whether it's TNCs, taxis, it's a real bargain. And it really is a, it's been a good selling point for us. So I know it's been helpful to you. So again, I think that's been a win-win.

[00:32:52] When we look at our contributions to sustainability, we're working very, very hard on that. We were happy that we were able to break ground on our new solar project out at Dulles. It's the largest solar project at any airport in America. And with the energy that's generated, it can serve 37,000 houses. That's according to Dominion. I'm not an expert there, but I'll use their pitch. We're also excited about the future. If you know, for years, everyone's been talking about replacing the CD concourse out at Dulles Airport.

[00:33:32] And we've taken the first step in that direction. We're hoping to break ground in a, hopefully in the next month, on our new IAD Tier 2 Concourse East, which is basically if you fly out of the sea gates, you know that you go to the sea station on the train, and then you have that long walk back.

[00:33:51] Well, these are going to be built up right above these gates, right above the station. So you'll just take an escalator upstairs, and you'll be at one of these seven international gates or 14 domestic gates. So there'll be 14 gates if we're using them on wide bodies for international, we'll be able to use seven aircraft there.

[00:34:13] Going forward, and this is an important thing just to share, we're in the process of developing our master plan for Dulles Airport. And you can see here on this slide there are three different configurations that we've been sharing with the public, asking for their input on, working very closely with United Airlines and other airlines out at the campus.

[00:34:35] And you can see from the right-hand diagram, you have the A-B concourse. You'll see it connected to the main terminal. And the idea there is that people are going to be able to use that new concourse that's created.

[00:34:51] What we intend to do is put on that A-B concourse all of our international flights. So you'll be able to get off a plane. The connector will have an FIS for those people who are getting off a plane and transferring.

[00:35:07] So they'll go through a customs facility that will enable their transfer. For those who are destinating here in Washington, D.C., we're going to move the international arrivals into that facility. So people will be connected. No longer will you have to take a mobile lounge there.

[00:35:25] And we're working very closely with the United Airlines to come up and the other airlines there to build out the, what you see there in dark blue, the new CD concourse and an E concourse.

[00:35:43] That concourse at E, the solid blue line at the bottom, that's an existing station that hasn't been built out. But literally, the train runs through a station, and the only thing there that hasn't been done is the installation of elevators, escalators, and some finishes.

[00:36:00] But we're going to be able to, without major investment, build gates at that area as well. And so we're very, very excited about that. We're in the throes of developing this master plan, negotiating with the airlines out there on a new use and lease agreement that will be effective in 2025.

[00:36:19] We've made great progress on that. And so we're looking for continued strength thanks to you and your economy because you do a lot to drive the economy, our economics, and we're looking for some significant growth in the not-too-distant future.

[00:36:39] So with that, I'd like to just, again, thank you for the time, and I welcome any questions that you might have. Thank you for the presentation. Mr. Chairman? Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much, Jack. Appreciate the presentation and a lot of good news in here. So we're certainly glad to see that. I guess I had two questions. And one, they're both along the same lines. And you talked about this a moment ago about DCA and IAD and how they contribute to this exceeding 2019 number. I'm just wondering if you can help or you can send

[00:37:17] this later to us. I'm just interested in the total number of passengers at both of those airports relative to what you've identified as the capacity of those two airports. And maybe with the IAD number, you can tell us what capacity we might be able to handle with Tier 2 implemented, just to give us a better idea. Because I know, you know, DCA punched above its weight level for a long time.

[00:37:42] We got a reprieve in Congress with, you know, some of the intensity to even increase the flight regularity and size going into DCA. And so I think this is something we just want to continue to monitor and make sure that, you know, we're maximizing Dulles' capacity.

[00:38:02] And it's hard for me to get a feel for how close we are to that. Now, obviously, with Tier 2 coming in, it's coming in with the anticipation that we'll continue to see increases at Dulles. but if you could give us some type of sense of how they're relative to DCA and where you see the future on that going, I think it would be helpful because we're in this together trying to steer as much traffic as we can to Dulles for obvious reasons, but I have no idea where we're coming up against the capacity levels of those two airports.

[00:38:31] So I will address it because I think I can answer kind of most of your questions, but I will ask Michael Cooper to follow up and provide, you know, more detailed information. So when you look at Reagan National right now, Reagan National is literally a one-runway airport, and we, there have been efforts now to add additional flights to Reagan National, as you know, that we've been on record saying that we oppose additional growth at Reagan National with additional flights.

[00:39:06] We have the busiest runway in America at Reagan National, and when you have the busiest runway, and you literally, for most aircraft, are one runway airport, any bump in the road over the course of the day really causes an inconvenience for the customers that are there.

[00:39:25] You know, there'll be conga lines waiting to get for takeoff. And we find ourselves with a very high percentage of cancellations there and delays. So we're all about maintaining what's there.

[00:39:41] There are opportunities to grow. The opportunities to grow are upgaging aircraft. And so right now, you know, not all airlines are maximizing the gauge of the aircraft that they can fly. Right now, we're flying about 25 billion passengers.

[00:40:00] I think it's reasonable to expect over the next decade that we might begin to approach 30 million passengers. And again, that's all upgaging of aircraft. At Dulles International, we're at about 25 billion inbound and outbound passengers, about 12.5 million in plane passengers is the term we use.

[00:40:19] That airport today could sustain 40-plus million passengers. But the reason that it's limited is because of the fact that we have one major bank of flights in the afternoon. And so if you go over there at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, we literally are using 100% of the gates, 100% of the airport is entertained.

[00:40:45] Over the course of the day, though, you could have, for example, this is an example. At Reagan National, we have about 10 turns per gate per day. At Dulles International, we have three turns per gate per day.

[00:41:01] So our capacity is there, but it's the time of day. And when you serve an international bank, when you're serving international, particularly when we're focused on going east to Europe, the sweet spot is to fly between 5 and 7 p.m.

[00:41:19] And so that's why you see this heavy, heavy concentration of flights, you know, during the afternoon window, late afternoon window. So the capacity is there to fill out, you know, and create other major banks of flights.

[00:41:35] So I think we could hit 40 million easy with the current infrastructure. Now, that said, the pressure is on that one peak bank of flights. And so we're building additional capacity to handle that. And we're also seeking to fill in those gaps by, for example, right now there's a concentration on looking at flights from Mexico because Air Mexico is going to be allowed to fly into the United States again.

[00:42:01] And they're able to come into our airport at much different hours of the day because of their proximity. So that in a nutshell is the game plan. United does have plans to grow for the next five years 25% at our airport.

[00:42:18] And we know that's going to be very healthy for all of us. They'll be able to serve more destinations. And again, now, I caveat everything I just said with all the geopolitical stuff that's going on globally, right? So I would say, you know, we're all going to find out where that takes us.

[00:42:37] But right now, if the economy stays sound, we don't have any major disruptions, you know, with the economy, inflation kind of comes under control. that's kind of the game plan where it lies right now. And Jack, just one quick follow-up. The Tier 2 concourse project benefits the airport how? Is it a sheer capacity issue? Is it a different type of aircraft or different destinations? What is the driver of that project? Initially, there's a couple of things that drive it. One is it's going to increase, it's going to initially increase capacity, but it's really going to improve the customer experience. Right now, we look at customer

[00:43:14] experience and you know the fact that the the cd concourse is not served by the train the fact that you have to go out to the sea station and do that walk back people find that very inconvenient we don't have enough concessions to serve the people in the cd concourse the whole rooms are undersized but so what you're going to see is you're going to see that initially i think united's going to use that during that peak bank that i just described for international flights but over the course of of the day, they'll have 14 gates that they can use for some of their domestic flights.

[00:43:47] And again, I think it's going to significantly improve the customer experience. And so that's the two things we're trying to drive on is we want capacity, but we also want to really make sure that we improve the customer experience. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you.

[00:44:04] Supervisor Lusk. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Good to see you, Mr. Potter. I'll say congratulations on that one million passenger here on the Silver Line. that's pretty impressive. I'll also say thank you for what you've done to support our economic growth. It's been pretty powerful. And looking at the companies that you had in your slide presentation, it's a mix of both international and national-based companies. But I'll say when you think about the international-based companies, they are very particularly interested in being as close as they can to Dallas International Airport. It just makes their traveling abroad so much

[00:44:43] easier. So, you know, thank you for being perfectly situated to make that possible. But let me ask on the tier two con course project, just out of curiosity, just trying to understand, I know there's going to be capital investment there that you're going to make. Can you share with us what that might look like? And then what about the, secondarily, what about the jobs that will be created as a result of that effort? There's going to be jobs to the airport in kind of Building out that infrastructure than also in operating it once it's online. So that that capital project is

[00:45:23] 580 million dollars. Whoa, okay, so it's going to create a lot of Construction jobs. Yes, but more importantly in addition to that United has announced that they're going to add a thousand jobs at Dulles Airport in the coming years So and the other thing that you know, I described that master plan. Yes we're We're very close to signing an agreement with the airlines for another, on top of that $580 million, another $6 billion investment in Dulles Airport over the course of that time.

[00:45:55] So all of that, you know, that $6 billion will encompass, you know, the buildout of the C gates. The current A gates that are the regional gates will become contact gates and be international flights. And then we'll have E gates.

[00:46:12] And we're going to phase all of that construction because we want to obviously keep people, you know, we don't want to inconvenience the travelers as little as possible. there's also a major investment in improving the roadway structure because that has been problematic and so we'll make an investment to really build up the efficiency of our curbside and I apologize but at times that can spill out on to Route 28 and so we're very cognizant of fact that we have to make an investment there as well so let's just say that over the course of time

[00:46:48] there will be thousands of jobs on our campus that will be created and as the The growth in traffic, you know, grows. It's not just those construction jobs, but it'll be, you know, all the current jobs that we have, you know, will grow, the airline personnel as well as ours.

[00:47:06] Well, I'll say this. That's a better story than I anticipated. So thank you for sharing those numbers, particularly the capital investment numbers. Those are very, very significant. And then if I could just thank a couple of folks on your staff. So Matt Bell, we've had conversations with him.

[00:47:23] He's been involved in helping with an effort we have in the Hiba Valley community. I want to acknowledge that he's been able to help us through some strategic partnerships and then also providing some equipment for some of the residents there and then some training.

[00:47:40] So I just wanted to at least acknowledge the effort of your team. So thank you very much. Thank you. I have Supervisor Faust, then Stork. Thank you. Thank you for your successes and contributions to our local economy.

[00:47:57] We certainly appreciate that. I was wondering, with respect to your own, the people who work at the airport, I guess many for you, but for vendors and so forth, the airlines, do you find they're using the metro?

[00:48:13] Yes, I do find that they're using the metro, and I find that it's really expanded the base of people who can come work at the airport. Because, for example, you know, folks from the district, you know, we're trying to attract people from everywhere.

[00:48:32] But what I'm noticing is that we seem to be attracting people who live east of the airport on a higher percentage than we had in the past because of the fact that, you know, there's an affordable way of getting there, and it's more convenient than the previous where you had to take a bus.

[00:48:53] So I think it's been a benefit in terms of enhancing the reach for anyone recruiting folks to work at our airport. Do any of the major employers out there have a transit benefit for their employees?

[00:49:11] We encourage them to, but we don't keep track of that, so I'm not aware of that. I know we do. You do? Yes. Comparable to probably what you do and the federal government does, you know, we provide compensation for any employee that takes mass transit to work.

[00:49:30] Excellent. And then the other kind of, I'm not sure how important this is to our local economy because I just don't know, but the cargo, you know, the cargo flights. We've talked a lot about passenger flights and so forth, but what is Dulles's, what are you doing with respect to cargo flights, and what do you see for the future?

[00:49:59] So let me just tell you, cargo is an interesting topic. When I was recruited here, everyone told me cargo, cargo, cargo, and I came from a business that was in the process of moving there. They came from the post office, so I had relationships with, you know, the major, a lot of major cargo companies.

[00:50:19] And so today we have UPS, we have FedEx, we have DHL, and then we have some other cargo, but it's largely belly cargo. We don't have a dedicated cargo carrier coming into and out of Dulles. And the reason is that we don't have anything to put on the plane.

[00:50:35] So people don't deadhead into a place with very expensive transportation and then leave empty. And so we do have, you know, belly cargo that, you know, the airlines, you know, will move cargo. I'll just give you an example.

[00:50:53] We're able to recruit a flower distributor out of Ethiopia. So they fly their flowers, their roses into Dulles, and then they put them on a refrigerator truck and take them to Miami, where it's distributed, because that's the major distribution point.

[00:51:13] So when you think of cargo, where are we in this metropolitan area when it comes to any major cargo? We don't produce things that can be then put on a plane to go back. And so I'm just hoping that, you know, Ethiopian never gets direct service to Miami.

[00:51:32] Otherwise, we'll probably lose our flower business. But that's the dilemma, you know, is what can you put on the plane? And by the way, we did a lot of work to look at what cargo might be bypassing this metropolitan area, like going up and down Route 81 to go to New York or go south to Atlanta.

[00:51:56] And spent a lot of effort on it, and it just simply wasn't the volume that could attract a dedicated cargo plane into this area. And our goal there was we're a great buyer of things, but we don't produce, you know, the type of things that would fly.

[00:52:14] So, you know, we do have UPS, we do have FedEx, and, you know, they are the primary cargo customers out at Dulles. Thank you. Supervisor Stork. Thank you, Madam Chairman.

[00:52:32] Thank you very much for being here. And there's no doubt that what's happened at Dulles and even what's happened at National in terms of the infrastructure investments and the improvements, I think, in, if you will, passenger experience, I think you referenced that.

[00:52:49] I think those are all very positive and, I think, important parts of the work that you all do. I'm also trying to, I guess, understand how you see the balance of that work and the airlines in particular, because that's the common refrain I hear when things are brought up, is that the airlines are your customer.

[00:53:09] Who all do you see as your customers, and how are you looking to make sure you're aware of what their needs and concerns are? So, first of all, let me describe who we are. I view us as we're owned by Virginia, by the district, by Maryland, and by the federal government.

[00:53:32] We're on federally leased property. When I look at our customers, our primary customer base are the passengers that come into and out of our airport. We spend a lot of time looking at what their needs are, first from a comfort standpoint, whether that's concessions, whether that's restrooms, whether that's parking.

[00:53:52] So we spend a lot of time looking at their satisfaction. We do continuous surveys of people to determine what that is, and then we take actions according to the responses that we get. So we're very much focused on that. We work with all of our partners in this metropolitan area, and I consider Halfax County to be a major partner on economic development.

[00:54:17] So we will solicit where are the destinations that, you know, are important to be served out of our airport. And we work together with your folks as well as the folks in the Commonwealth. We've done a lot of missions to different countries where we participate, where air service is important to be discussed.

[00:54:41] So we work with those folks on a regular basis. And then obviously we have to work with the airlines to figure out what their needs are. And so when we talk about an investment in infrastructure, that's not to meet our needs.

[00:54:57] That's basically saying to them, where are you going, what are you going to need for the future, and how are we going to be able to service this metropolitan area, whether it's what destinations, how many people, and how do we make sure that we're able to provide a good experience, and also, you know, provide incentives in the sense that there's an opportunity for profit here for the airlines, as well as opportunity for profit for folks that are going to locate in this area. And again, we work mutually with you to try and attract companies to

[00:55:35] this area and build up our catchment area to serve, you know, to serve people's air needs. I appreciate that, and I would concur with you that no doubt Virginia, Maryland, and this region of D.C. are the owners, and I know that's part of the concern that I have is that part of the ownership, in my mind, is ensuring that certain standards are met, and I realize that's always difficult, much like we have issues with traffic enforcement that the police are involved, but there's also sometimes it's the National Park Service,

[00:56:12] sometimes it's other entities, but we also know, I know as elected official, that when And people bring issues like that to me that I need to look for ways to try to address that. And so a lot of the issues that I hear have to do with airplane noise, in particular, how do we work with EMWA to, frankly, make a difference?

[00:56:33] And one of those key issues, I think, as you probably well know, is how do we get airlines to comply with what clearly are rules and regulations that they have about how they fly, where they fly. Even if I maybe disagree with the particular FAA procedures now, I recognize that there are responsibilities that airlines are not following that I need.

[00:57:00] And I think the community would look to MWA to support and assist us in ensuring that those organizations are clearly consistently abiding by those rules as well as supporting, if you will, the ownership needs, if you will, the people of Virginia.

[00:57:19] And I guess I'm trying to figure out a way to do that better because I know that that's not, at least in many of our areas, that's not the perception of EMMA being a good partner in that process. Well, I'm sorry that that's the perception.

[00:57:35] Certainly, we want to be good neighbors. That's, you know, one of our number one goals is to be good neighbors, and I think you see that in many different ways. When it comes to, you know, noise, obviously it's a major issue at all airports across the country.

[00:57:53] And so we try to work with, you know, the surrounding jurisdictions when it comes to planning, as you well know, in terms of zoning issues, et cetera. When it comes to the FAA, unfortunately, we're not in charge of the FAA. We work with the FAA. We work with the airlines.

[00:58:09] We have a noise group. And I know that there are times that frustrations. We're equally frustrated because we don't control it, and so we'll continue to do that. We'll continue to try and work that issue with everybody to try and, you know, do the best we can to, you know, address the concerns that are out there.

[00:58:31] At the end of the day, we can only try and try to do our best because we're not in control, and I do appreciate the fact that you mentioned that, you know, we are reliant on our partners. You know folks who have a problem with TSA with customs with You know some of the the noise issues rounding we actually act as a cheerleader and we try to bring as much pressure in a sense of transparency around concerns that people have and for the most part, I think we're able to successfully address it and

[00:59:11] But we're not perfect. And so, you know, I think we're more on your side than you think we are. I definitely want to believe that, and I'm definitely looking for that. And so I'm not here to not be in support of it.

[00:59:27] Yeah, and I'm not taking it that way. Yeah, good. Excellent. That's my intent. Not at all. Not at all. My intent. And the county, along with Alexandria and Prince George's County, as you know, we've hired a consultant to try to look at some of those issues that we recognize that aren't specific in the control of EMWA, but we also know it's, as you point out, it's the partners together and looking for EMWA to support that process and even help that financially because the counties have stepped up to do some of that, but we know there may be other things that can be done. I guess ultimately my question is, you know, are you supportive of working with

[01:00:05] us and to engage financially, at least at some level, if that's helpful in getting changes that might be generally supportive by the region and yeah i i don't want to speak in generalities but you know financially is kind of where we have said you know uh we spent a lot of money on noise and the question is you know i'm not going to make a commitment financial but commit and continue to work with you i i'll start with that and i'm not talking big bucks i am but the other piece of it

[01:00:41] for me is the key part of it you and i don't have to do much more than just remind carriers and others that they need to comply with with the law because we have people in our community that are constantly spotting planes that are flying too low or too you know basically too low when they're where they shouldn't be and things like that so and we have as you know working groups that we all are very involved with that are trying to address those and make a difference with those issues and i'm just looking for your support your personal commitment that you'll keep working on those and

[01:01:14] And hopefully we can at least the things that are universally agreed upon, what the standards are for inbound and outbound flights and that those are being complied with. And when they're not, you'll be raising those issues appropriately with your partners. We will.

[01:01:30] I commit to do that. And we probably need to engage the chief pilot of United. We were very successful at Reagan National by engaging American Airlines chief pilot where we had some issues. So we will look to engage United if there are issues with compliance out at Dulles.

[01:01:51] Well, this one in particular is national because where I live, which is Fort Hunt, if you want to come to my house about 1230 at night, I can guarantee you will hear multiple planes that are flying too low for what they're supposed to. I'm not highlighting that for personal reasons, but just to make the point that and that maybe is the right method for improving that.

[01:02:15] And I'm all in to work collaboratively and partner with anybody to try to make those kind of difference in our community. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you as well. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you very much.

[01:02:31] Appreciate all your time. And, again, thank you for your partnership. You're the number one attraction for people flying in here, so keep it up. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So the next item is actually – oops.

[01:02:48] I want to skip to the proposed smart scale modifications next. I think we just need to be aware of that because the next one is that memo so hopefully that will go quicker I think this is important for the board to know about okay so Noelle Dominguez is here to talk about some of the changes that are being proposed at the Commonwealth Transportation Board regarding smart scale And I know you all are interested in that as it pertains to potential response that we would maybe we may want to have towards that I'm going to call on the chairman for a minute so people know why we're hearing this and then Noel.

[01:03:23] Just very briefly, I appreciate Noel and others putting this presentation together quickly. We had a briefing at NVTA about the proposed smart scale modifications last week. I know a lot of jurisdictions are going to be weighing in with some concerns that they have with some elements of the presentation.

[01:03:45] And I think it's fair to say there may be some jurisdictions that are in a different place than others. We're not looking for, you know, regional uniformity here. But I do think NVTA was tasked with putting together where the uniform concerns are and trying to express those as the NVTA.

[01:04:02] And then we as a jurisdiction and every jurisdiction will have an opportunity to submit our own comments about these changes. And so I asked staff to put together a quick presentation for today, Because on Tuesday at the board, I'm going to bring forward a letter for board support to submit for the record, raising some of our concerns.

[01:04:22] And so the point of this presentation, we don't have to get into a ton of detail with it, but was to share it with my colleagues. Have you have an opportunity to review it? And if there's any concerns you have, to get those either to myself or to Noel by the end of the week so that we can finalize a board matter for Tuesday.

[01:04:39] I will just highlight the other reason why this is important is in part of the presentation at NVTA, Mary Hines, who serves on the CTB, gave her perspective on this. And one thing that stuck out of me, which is so true, is these changes, when made, if made, will likely be in place for the better part of at least the next 10 years.

[01:05:03] And so this is important because whatever changes are made, we're going to be stuck with for the next 10 years. And so we don't want to miss this opportunity to provide comments, and that's why we had this added to the agenda late. And so I just wanted to kind of set the table for folks so they understood where we were and why we were getting this now and that we will have a letter Tuesday.

[01:05:24] I will be bringing forward a letter Tuesday for the board to vote on, to sign, to submit as our formal comments. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Madam Chairman, Noel Dominguez with the Department of Transportation, and hello again. I saw all of you this morning.

[01:05:42] I'm going to first start off with some background. I think most of you have seen these summaries when we submit applications to SmartScale. SmartScale was created by the General Assembly in 2014. The CTB was directed to develop and implement a prioritization process for transportation projects.

[01:06:00] And the project scores are based on congestion mitigation, economic development, accessibility, safety, land use, and environmental quality. Those different factors can be weighed differently across the entire Commonwealth, and they have essentially done that.

[01:06:16] This map shows the different weights in different parts of the Commonwealth. We are in Category A. The Code of Virginia does require Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads to have congestion mitigation weighted the highest. So you will see our congestion mitigation is at 45%, and the others range between 5% and 20% for us, whereas your Category B's, your Fredericksburgs, your Bridgman's, congestion's significantly lower, and then C's are rural, and then D's are more rural.

[01:06:45] So, obviously, their focus is more on something like an economic development, whereas ours, the General Assembly felt, would be focused on congestion. How is this used? Two programs are funded through SmartScale, the High Priority Projects Program, also known as HPP, and District Grant Program.

[01:07:04] We can apply for both programs. Regional agencies can only apply for the high-priority projects program, and I'm mentioning that specifically for a reason for one of the recommendations. This past round, round five, they've had five rounds of funding so far.

[01:07:19] This last one, which the CTB voted on in June, it was part of the June six-year program, allocated about $1.085 billion through the district grant program and about $550 million through the HPP program.

[01:07:36] So after every round, they do a review. They're usually smaller reviews, but I think both the administration and the CTB said it's been 10 years, time for you to do a wholesale look. So now I'm going to go through some proposed changes.

[01:07:51] The first change is, and how I put these together, is the issue has been identified by the Office of Intermodal Planning and Investment, which is the office within the Secretary of Transportation that runs SmartScale.

[01:08:07] And then their actual recommendation is italicized, and then proposed comments by staff is down at the bottom bolded and underlined. So to address application support needed and application quality, they are recommending reducing the number of applications.

[01:08:25] For large jurisdictions and agencies, we're currently at 10. They want to reduce us to five. And for smaller jurisdictions and agencies, they're currently at four. They want to reduce them to two. They also talk about streamlining their application portal, screening out applications that don't meet certain requirements, and tying funding to prior performance.

[01:08:48] Our comments are that we have concerns with the CAP. We have a large, diverse county. We usually submit six to eight projects, so that is our concern there. We also believe that while the process is objective, it has gotten extremely complicated. So I think streamlining, simplifying would be a good way to go about that.

[01:09:08] Next up. If I could just interject with one other comment, because I drilled down on this a little bit during the meeting, and the explanation I got was concerning, which is the reason for the cap and tie to quality is that there are a lot of jurisdictions in Virginia that don't have the high caliber, high quality staff and sophistication that we have.

[01:09:27] So they submit a birdshot of applications, and then VDOT has to spend enormous amount of time working with them on each and every application. And so just putting a cap on does absolutely nothing to change the quality of the application and is punitive to a jurisdiction of our size.

[01:09:44] And frankly, this falls into the category of no good deed goes unpunished. We prepare. We put money into these. They're sophisticated. They're good applications. They don't take a lot of time for VDOT to review, and that's not what's happening in other parts of Virginia. And so, you know, I share the concern they have about this, but to punish us for being the good actors doesn't seem like the right solution.

[01:10:05] The next item is that they've noted that smaller projects are more likely to get funded because it is a cost-benefit analysis. And I do want to go back to the high-priority projects program.

[01:10:22] That is supposed to be for projects and strategies that address a need identified for a corridor of statewide significance or a regional network. But they have found that there are projects with benefit scores of less than zero out of 100. I mean, less than one out of 100 actually being selected for funding.

[01:10:42] So they are having two recommendations here. One is to define what is eligible for HPP funding. So you see a lot of very small projects that were selected. They want to focus on your bigger projects here, your improved interchanges, your managed lanes, your new capacity highways, new capacity fixed guideways.

[01:11:03] So they do reference both transit and roadway. I think we're okay with this. We generally submit bigger projects. It might be good to also add in bus rapid transit because we are still looking at that network up here. continuing on. One of the reasons that smaller projects are getting funded over bigger projects is because regional agencies and other parts of the state are submitting small, small projects.

[01:11:29] So they're looking at getting rid of a step within their funding requirement that essentially gives these projects a leg up over projects that have a higher score. So that's our, I think we're good with that. Most of our projects tend to have higher scores, but other ones get funded above us.

[01:11:48] I'd also note, we do want to reference the fact that our projects are expensive, largely because of issues we have no control over. Our utility relocations, our land values, they're just higher. Continuing on, congestion mitigation.

[01:12:04] Right now, they look at current congestion. They're looking at changing it to going 10 years in the future. I think we have congestion now. We have congestion then. It might make sense to consider current and future benefits. That is our proposed recommendation. Economic development.

[01:12:21] Right now, they believe there's a disconnect between square footage and how things are currently scheduled, so they want to use a statewide database of economic development properties versus how it's currently put in. I don't believe all economic development goes into the statewide database, so we would suggest they consider ways to incorporate development sites that might not be in this state database, because we do have a lot of economic development that may or may not be in the VDEP database.

[01:12:52] land use, and this is where it gets complicated, and I apologize. What they found was there were a lot of projects that were getting funded solely for the high land use score. They might have low to zero to less, you know, less than one scores on the other five criteria, but because they got a high land use score because they were in an area with good land use issues, they were being selected.

[01:13:22] So what they have recommended is rather than having land use be one of the six, take it out, add in those percentage points to congestion mitigation and to safety, and then use it as a multiplier at the end.

[01:13:41] So I'm going to go to the next slide. That kind of explains it. This is their slide. I'm not, I'm using theirs because it's the only way I can try to describe it. If you see here, this was a previous project. Land use was at the end. This project got a 1.45 in land use. So they want to take that out, give those points to congestion mitigation and safety, the percentage points, and then at the end, when you have your score of your other five criteria, you would multiply that whole score by 1.45.

[01:14:15] So if you got a land use score of 10 last time, the multiplier would be 1.1. So it's 1 plus, you know, that's how their recommendation is. I apologize for the confusion. It's not the easiest one that they have come up with on how to address this.

[01:14:34] So you're saying work from 5 instead of 6, but they're still going to calculate land use anyway, but use their calculation differently. Yes. So they're keeping land use in, but using the score differently.

[01:14:50] Thank you. And honestly, the recommendation here is we have our projects tend to score well in land use, but they also score well on the other criteria. And because they're scored on based on how everything goes towards each other, scored against each other, the impact on this for us is not really currently known.

[01:15:13] We did some evaluation, and our projects scored within one or two points of where they were before, but other projects were significantly impacted. So if I go to the last slide, again, this is a slide provided by the OIP to the Commonwealth Transportation Board in September.

[01:15:34] I'm not going to ask you to see the eye chart, but at the end, if they ran all these criteria, there are three projects against the projects that were considered this last round. Three projects would have been added to that list, and six would have been dropped.

[01:15:50] The three added were Hours and Prince Williams. The three dropped, or the six dropped were from, and this is only for Northern Virginia. Every district had its own list. The three, the district, the localities that had projects dropped were Arlington, Fairfax City, and Loudoun County.

[01:16:06] So it really is project specific. And because of all that uncertainty, especially in that land use one, I don't believe we have a recommendation at the moment because it really is dependent on our project might have gone down one point, but if somebody else has went down 10, we still might be a winner and it's hard to clarify or understand. So those are the proposed changes and staff recommendations. We'll put together whatever comments may come from the board into a letter. And if there are any questions, I am here to answer them or to try to answer them. Yeah, Madam Chair, I thank you, Noel, for that

[01:16:40] quick presentation. This, as everyone can see, is highly technical, and I think it was acknowledged at the meeting that, you know, several jurisdictions are trying to figure out if this even affects them or not. Like, it's that complicated for them. I do think there are some things in here that are obvious that we want to be strongly weighing in on. I think the kind of ties, so to speak, where we're largely, you know, for example, on the land use scores one. I know that's a particularly important subject for some jurisdictions, but as you acknowledge, we're kind of in between on that one. And so what I think we want to do is put

[01:17:18] together a letter where it's very clear that there's a disadvantage here to the county. And we don't have to opine on every single one of these changes, but we should on the ones where it's very clear that there's a negative effect to the county. And then other jurisdictions that maybe are more aggrieved in some of those areas will submit different comments than we will. NVTA, I'm not sure if NVTC is doing this or not, but NVTA, I know, is putting in what might be two or three comments where everyone in the region is in agreement. And so what I will be bringing forward

[01:17:52] Tuesday is the elements of this where staff has clearly indicated a negative impact on the county. That's what our letter will focus on. And the areas where we might not have a strong opinion, We may choose to ignore or just use the language that is in this presentation.

[01:18:08] So the letter will largely follow along with the positions that are taken in this presentation. Wanted to get it to you now because of how technical it is to give you an opportunity to ask staff any questions, not just today, but through the course of the week so that when we bring this forward on Tuesday, no one is surprised and everyone has had an opportunity to ask any questions that they have.

[01:18:34] Supervisor Fels. Yeah, this is very technical, and I mean, I'm going to refrain from digging into it, but that one thing that jumped out at me was currently the formula is 45% congestion mitigation and only 5% for safety in Fairfax, Gary, and Northern Virginia, which, I mean, everywhere else, you know, safety is 25, 30, 40%, whatever. So if they are going to take 20% and move it around, I would say don't add it to congestion mitigation, which is already 45%.

[01:19:08] I mean, we want cars to be going really fast when they hit our constituents, you know. I mean, I would add the additional 5%, which would take it to 25%. Safety, which would mean that no place, we're no less a priority.

[01:19:26] Safety in Northern Virginia is no less a priority than it is anywhere else. The next lowest is 25%. Yeah, and I will say that was pretty well agreed to during the course of our meeting, too, from multiple jurisdictions about that because that, you know, wasn't framed the way you just did, John.

[01:19:47] Actually, I think you framed it really well that, you know, we shouldn't be shortchanging ourselves on safety here if safety is something that we're concerned about. And increasingly, with some of the multimodal projects, it most certainly is. And so I think that's a point well taken and something I would support, including in our letter.

[01:20:07] Any other comments? Okay, thank you. I appreciate this presentation for us. The last thing on the agenda is just the memo that we got about the charge-up program. I thought the memo was very well done and had good details. I think staff have learned a lot with their initial work.

[01:20:25] I don't know if anybody has any questions, or if Greg, do you want to say anything? No, I know the folks from OEEC who were the ones who wrote it are here if there are any questions, but hopefully the item speaks for itself. Okay. Thank you very much. Have a good evening. This meeting is adjourned.

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