Coraggio Consulting
Fairfax County Board of Supervisors Transportation Committee, Tuesday, February 25, 2025

Date: Tuesday, February 25, 2025
Place: Fairfax County Board of Supervisors, Virginia
Length: 1h 27m (video)
Official meeting video (Fairfax County): https://video.fairfaxcounty.gov/player/clip/3692
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 2026-10-30. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

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[00:00:07] Good morning, everyone. I'm Jimmy Bierman, Drainsville District Supervisor, calling the Transportation Committee meeting to order. A big welcome is in order for Jennifer Miller, our new deputy county executive, who I believe started yesterday. So thank you for coming to your first committee meeting. You got the best one, just throwing that out there.

[00:00:33] But really, really appreciate it. Happy to have you on board. So we've got a lot to cover today. And yes, I am aware that the last Transportation Committee meeting went 15 minutes over. We're not going to do that today. We will be ending on time, if not early.

[00:00:49] So with that, we don't typically vote on the summary of the last meeting. But does anybody have any changes to the summary of the last meeting? Okay, I thought it did an insufficient job of giving me a hard time for going over, but other than that, it was fine.

[00:01:07] With that, I'm going to turn it over to Director of the Department of Transportation, Greg Steverson, to introduce his team and talk about our first topic, which is transportation demand management. Thank you. All right. Good morning, everybody. Greg Steverson, Director of FCDOT.

[00:01:23] So first out of the gate is Sam Chansman, one of our transportation planners in the site analysis section. He's going to talk a little bit about transportation demand management. We do a lot of really good work in reducing single occupancy vehicles on the roadway. And so Sam's going to talk a little bit about how we may even be able to do a little bit more.

[00:01:43] So with that, I'll turn it over to Sam. Great. Thank you so much. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for having me. My name is Sam Chanisman. I am the Proffered Transportation Demand Management Coordinator for FCDOT. And just as a quick recap for those that might not be as familiar, uh tdm is all about reducing congestion on our roads so removing single occupancy vehicles through a set of strategies whether that's getting people on transit carpool telework other active transportation methods and we have a whole team that works a lot on promoting the resources that the county has um which i believe you guys heard from marcus more team lead a few

[00:02:21] weeks ago with the best workplaces for commuters and the resources that we give to them my work is a little bit more specific to developments in the county that have a legal proffered obligation to do TDM as they proffered to our TDM guidelines through their entitlement processes. And so let me get to the next slide here. So these guidelines were adopted in 2013 and essentially established a reduction goal expectation for different office and residential uses that come through the entitlement process. And the way that that works is when they come in for an application using the

[00:02:55] International Transportation Engineer's Handbook, we can estimate the amount of trips a site is projected to bring onto our network. And then based on a certain amount of rates, which I'll go into a little bit more later, those developments are expected to prove to us that they're reducing that projected amount by a certain percentage. So generally, what do these guidelines outline for a TDM program? They're first and foremost designed to be flexible. So prior to 2013 guidelines, We had a lot of very specific TDM proffers that had, you know, very specific standards,

[00:03:33] like you have to have a shuttle between X and Y hour, and it's just very constraining. And the best TDM programs are designed to be flexible, ones that are able to adapt with the times. Like a few years ago, we had a lot of shift to telework, and programs under these guidelines were able to adjust accordingly and able to have very site-specific strategies that work best for them.

[00:03:55] And so what these guidelines also outline is a TDM plan that they submit to us that we kind of review to make sure, you know, these are the strategies that they want to do for the site, and we approve those, and then if they need to change it, they're able to submit amendments to those without having to go through the full entitlement process again.

[00:04:14] Additionally, these guidelines set out to set up a TDM account to make sure that these developments are having money set aside for these strategies in the plan and work plan, a remedy fund, which is an account that the development sets up in the case that these goals somehow aren't being met.

[00:04:33] And so we have a fallback then that they can draw upon in the case that somehow the TM accounts depleted and the strategies that we had approved previously hadn't worked. And it also serves as an incentive for developments in Tyson specifically as they, for those developments that exceed their goals, they can earn back that money in the remedy fund that they've set aside.

[00:04:57] Additionally, another Tyson-specific one is we have a penalty fund, and this is if everything goes awry and all these fallbacks have gone astray. The county can draw upon a cash escrow or a letter of credit to go in and implement strategies ourselves should the remedy fund strategies not work as well.

[00:05:18] And we've never had to implement that one before, which I think is a great marker of success for our program. Additionally, the guidelines set out methodologies for traffic counts and surveys. These are how we monitor and make sure that these programs are meeting their goals.

[00:05:35] They do a study to show that they're under the threshold of allowable trips. And then the surveys also allow us to see how employees or residents are using the program and how the TDM plan or work plan can shift overall.

[00:05:50] So a little bit more about the reduction rates that we have today. As I said, they were established in 2013. The county commissioned a study which determined a base rate of reduction for the county with the kinds of transit we have available to begin with, you know, metro, bus.

[00:06:08] And then using that base rate determined a trip reduction goal based on your distance to metro. So in this example map here, I've got the West Falls Church metro. And so if you're falling in that orange circle closest to metro, you're within a quarter mile from the station. And if you were in office, we'd expect your trip reduction goal to be between 35 and 45 percent.

[00:06:28] um the range kind of is um determined based on a conversation with an applicant um you know if you're further out from metro and maybe don't have as much bus connectivity we might have you closer to the lower end of threshold versus the higher and vice versa and then the guidelines also set out specific guidelines for tyson's um as it's a more designated urban dense area with a lot of development. And so this chart I know is a little more confusing, but essentially the way it works is the more development that there is in Tyson's, the higher expectation there is for TDM for these

[00:07:07] developments. So right now we're still under this first category of up to 65 million gross square feet of development. But as you can see, the rates are a little bit higher because if you're on Metro's doorstep, you've got a little bit of built-in TDM with that as well. So with all that said, as kind of a recap of our guidelines as they stand today.

[00:07:35] What's changing and why? So the guidelines have been in place for a little bit over a decade now with not much change at all. And so based on feedback from industry and the data that we've been seeing these developments report as they've been required to annually, we're proposing a few updates to our guidelines and how they work.

[00:07:53] So I had kind of mentioned the Remedy Fund release previously. That's that incentive mechanism in Tyson's that allows developments that exceed their goal to earn back money that they've set aside in their remedy fund by proving to us that, you know, they've got a robust TDM program that exceeds the goal that they've proffered to, and we want to reward that for not just in Tyson's, but all areas of the county.

[00:08:18] So the first thing that we want to do is open up that release mechanism for more than just Tyson's developments. The second thing is updated language regarding TDM funding and operating accounts. A lot of the feedback that we receive from developments is we have all these different accounts that they have to set up separately with interest-bearing funds.

[00:08:38] And so this would allow them to streamline it into one account with line items but continue to report to us the various expenditures that they have for TDM annually and make it a little bit more streamlined for them in how they operate these TDM programs.

[00:08:54] Additionally, a streamlined process for TDM plan submission. I'd kind of mentioned a TDM plan and work plan separately. This was established in the guidelines and is a bit redundant, so we're merging the two into just one plan submission, which would make it easier for both staff and for developments as well.

[00:09:14] Additionally, we're updating language surrounding transportation management associations, specifically with the sunsetting of the Tyson's partnership and just the lack of TMAs in other areas. We are having to be more of an optional part of our guidelines, or at least one that's a little bit more flexible in how it's written without specifically naming a TMA by name, but rather joining a TMA generally.

[00:09:45] As a result of all this, the sample proffers that we have for developers will be cleaner than the ones from above. And additionally, we want to add in a building-by-building option for TDM. Another big thing that we've heard from the programs that we have in place today is that when these developments come in site-wide, there's one building that will come online a lot earlier than the others and has to bear the brunt of the TDM program for the rest of the buildings, and that includes cost and setting up marketing.

[00:10:16] And so this way is just a little bit more equitable for different owners that come in first and that the other ones later also pull their weight in this TDM program we can monitor accordingly. And then this next slide, we've got updated resources for developers.

[00:10:34] Again, the guidelines were created a decade ago, so we've got a few broken links in that document that needs some updating for sure. And then finally, most notably, which I'll delve into next, is an update to our reduction rates. So I spent some time explaining those, and what we're seeing currently is that developments are really exceeding these goals and blowing them out of the water across the county.

[00:11:00] And we just want to make sure that the guidelines that we have in place today are right-sized to what we're seeing out and observing in the real world. And that way we can have more accurate traffic studies when they come into rezoning or other entitlement processes and making sure that we're right-sizing those applications as well and not overbuilding or providing the correct amount of other resources as well.

[00:11:30] So a little bit about what we're seeing. So I've got a map here of the active proffered TEM programs that we have today. There are definitely other TEM programs in the county. these are just the ones that are actively submitting. There are other proffers that haven't been activated yet as those sites haven't been built. But since the guidelines were established in 2013, the average trip reduction for sites with the TDM programs at 61%, which is really great. Programs that are reporting are on average are exceeding their goals by 29%.

[00:12:05] And then all these numbers are from 2023 before, because we're still receiving the 2024 data with the annual reporting this year. So we don't have a full 2024 data set until May. But as of 2023, 55 programs are reporting annually. And there's only been one instance of a residential or office development not meeting their reduction goal. And after we met with them and kind of determine what the problem was, they've now exceeded their goal for the three years following. So this is just It's kind of a timeline of the averages that we're seeing across the county.

[00:12:44] I will note that the 2020 dashed line is not included in any of the averages. I just wanted to include it in this slide for information purposes, but it's not part of our analysis for the rest of this presentation.

[00:12:59] But as you can kind of see, after 2020, we're kind of tapering back out a little, but maintaining around that 50s percentage, 60s percentage. And then moving forward, I don't know if the clickers seems disconnected maybe. Is there any way to manually go to the next slide? Thank you. Perfect.

[00:13:39] Thank you. On this slide, you can see the general county goals in blue, so excluding Tyson's. And these are the highest ends of the range for this analysis purpose. And in the orange, you can see are observed reductions on average.

[00:13:57] So if you're within a quarter mile of a metro, the highest expectation you might have is a 45% reduction rate. And on average, we're seeing 61%, which is 16% higher. Half a mile is at 19%, and then over half a mile is also at 19%.

[00:14:13] And then if you can go to the next slide, please. There we go. So this is, I know, a very condensed graph. But I did want to point out two specifics for the Tyson-specific ones. I pulled out here on the left side is that current escalation rate where we're still under 65 million square footage of development in Tyson's.

[00:14:42] And so you'll note the blue line, again, is the trip goals, and the orange line is the observed reduction. So, as you can see, we're a lot higher than where our goals are set that we set in 2013. We've got 25% higher on average within an eighth of a mile, 22% with fourth, 35 under half a mile, and then greater than half a mile at 42% higher than the goals that are set.

[00:15:09] And then I also wanted to compare this current situation to what our ultimate reduction goal level will be. So if you'll remember on that chart, the goals escalate as Tyson's grows. And so even at the highest buildout of 113 million square feet, our current observed reductions are still higher than even at that highest level of expectation.

[00:15:37] So we've got 5% higher on average with an eighth, 2% for a fourth, 15% for half, and then 22% for over a half. So even under today's conditions, the expectation is that these developments would have a higher goal at this time, and even today we're meeting it.

[00:16:00] So with all that said, we're proposing just a nominal change to these reduction rates to kind of right-size this for the time being. So for the general county reduction rates, we're proposing a 5% increase to the ranges, and then within Tyson's, a 10% range.

[00:16:24] We feel that these are attainable even as today's standards are. So obviously the proffers that exist today would stay at the percentages that they're at. But for future development, we feel that this is not an unattainable goal.

[00:16:41] So this way, we're right-sizing the goals that we had set in 2013 and then hopefully opening up the conversation with your offices about potential other changes to this program, looking at potential other TOD reduction rate areas, whether a higher increase in certain metro ranges might be appropriate, things like that.

[00:17:09] something that we want to open up the floor to discuss and see if that's something that we would want to pursue and that brings me to the end of my presentation just some feedback requested does the board have any questions about the proposed rates and then outside of the development industry representatives are there other groups that you all think that we should engage on team and policy changes in the future other than that thank you so much thank you that was these are really good numbers. But one quick question before I open up to the rest of the

[00:17:42] board. Can you share some examples of what the TDM policies are to reduce trips? Is it providing a metro subsidy? Is it bike to work days? Is it carpooling? What are the businesses that are reducing the trips actually doing to reduce trips? Yep. I think the biggest one I've seen personally is um the subsidies is definitely a big um draw for people especially when these developments submit their surveys a lot of the responses that i see are people being like well yes if you gave me a subsidy i'd be more likely to take transit or do things like that but the

[00:18:20] other strategies that you listed as well are definitely up there um i think telework has also been a huge um uh boost in tdm and has you know since the pandemic been a little bit more widely accepted for sure. Thank you. I'll open it up to questions. Oh, sorry. Yeah, I just, first, I want to thank you for the presentation, because I think this is excellent data. And many of us have been wanting to know the answers to these questions for a long time. And I think most importantly, the streamlining of the process and the standardization is critical. I mean, we're going

[00:18:59] to focus on the numbers, because that's a change moving forward. But I think the parts about what we're doing for people coming into the process and standardizing those are critical because one of the concerns at least I've had I think others have had is given that these have been all over the place in the past makes enforcement a lot harder makes monitoring and collecting the data harder and now that we're 10 years in obviously we have a lot of experience with what's happening out there the standardization piece to me not only is it easier for the applicants it's it's going to be much easier for county staff on the back end to try to track all this stuff and do

[00:19:36] the necessary enforcement. The questions that I have, one is there's one area and Tyson's is the only area right now where you get a penalty. You mentioned there was one location, one instance of a development not meeting the reduction goal. Was that in Tyson's? Yes. That one instance was. And so I guess, you know, as we look to the new numbers, and I don't have any problems with these because I think they're probably within the range of doable and that's a good thing.

[00:20:06] I think we need to look at outreach, not just with the development community, but I think some other groups too, particularly given the penalty component for Tyson's. And I'm not suggesting that penalties should be in place for anywhere else in the county. It probably is premature to do that.

[00:20:22] But if we move these numbers the way you've predicted, what we don't want to do is have people who are doing a lot of the really good things and have a pretty high number but come in just under that number now be triggering penalties and Tysons. And so I think we just need to be cognizant of that. The other thing is because of COVID, and you mentioned it, I'm just wondering if, in your opinion, if that has falsely skewed any of these numbers. And obviously now we have return to work happening. We're getting ready to see a big change in the next couple years of people returning to work. And I'm just trying to, in my own mind,

[00:21:00] Try to add all that up and make sure that we're not getting any false reads here. Yeah, for sure Um to go back to your first point about the the penalty fund and all that so that specific case If I remember correctly was that they had just kind of gotten off to a late start that year for their tm program And so it just wasn't fully up and running that year And so we talked with them and figure out strategies to implement for the next year and they they met their goals for the three years after Additionally, what's great about this program is that we have a fallback before we get to the penalties.

[00:21:37] So the Remedy Fund, they have money set aside before this program starts up to dip into if there is issues with meeting their goals. And so that's there as a fallback, and the penalty is just really there to be like, if everything were to go awry, we can step in and work through that that way.

[00:21:57] To answer your question about telework, I do think about the pandemic and return to work. I do think there's definitely a little bit higher numbers because of telework. I think it's been a lot more widely accepted. However, looking at this chart, I feel like even prior to pandemic, we were seeing numbers that were pretty consistent with what we're seeing now.

[00:22:23] Obviously, it's a little bit higher toward now, but I would say I would feel comfortable still going forward with the rates, even if we hadn't had those high telework numbers. Because I hope it's not the case, but the number could be going down just because of what's happening, and I think we need to be cognizant of that.

[00:22:44] Would it be too hard for you to do an overlay of the new numbers with what our experience has been over the past couple of years and see if there are any close calls to us? I mean, if those were in place today, would you have any close calls in there of people not meeting their team requirement?

[00:23:00] Yeah, I can absolutely run that. I think it would be helpful for us to know that because I'm okay with everything in here, but if you superimpose those numbers over the data we already have, I'd at least be interested in knowing if not only were there close calls, but where were they?

[00:23:18] Were they in Tyson's or were they in the other areas and how close were they? Because again, I want to raise the bar here because I think the data supports it, but I don't want to get us in a situation where now we've got a bunch of people who are doing a lot in the TDM space, but they're not meeting our number and now somehow we're into an enforcement action.

[00:23:36] And I appreciate what you said, the way that works. It's not go right to that remedy, but it is a concern that I have. And so I do think, lastly, I do think you need to go back with these new numbers, have outreach to a broader community besides the developments, and maybe in some cases hitting the residential piece of this as well, making sure that we're reaching out to the management companies and the people in these TDM areas that run some of the apartment and condominium uh, communities in particular. I also lastly think it wouldn't hurt to go to the transportation

[00:24:10] advisory, uh, committee and maybe also, you know, our, our, what, what used to be our trails committee just to, to get some input, uh, from some, some of the citizen components too. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Good, good questions. I saw supervisor Alcorn, supervisor Palachuk, supervisor Herity, then Stork, uh, bouncing around. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. So a couple things. First of all, Sam, you have a very important job. Thank you. This is really important stuff that we're working on here. Your question about other groups to consult, I would suggest

[00:24:45] maybe some of the land use committees out there that have focused on this that are in areas I know like in rest in the planning and zoning committee. I think it would be helpful to run this by them and get feedback and maybe Tyson's Community Alliance. I don't know. They're making some other groups too i think that would be helpful um i think the new numbers are fine i would like to see as the chairman requested you know the breakdown of anybody that would have not just the average but sure yeah absolutely that would be helpful um but specifically for

[00:25:19] the tyson's goals those were really informed in large part by the experience in arlington of the Wilson Boulevard corridor. And I would just point out that was 20 years ago. And the performance of that corridor has only increased since then. So I think this is consistent. Raising the goals a little bit, I think, does make sense because we have continued to see. And that's embedded also in the numbers for Tyson's. The more development, the better performance we would expect. And that's certainly Arlington is continuing to bear out that example. So, and thank you for flagging

[00:25:58] that slide seven, you know, in terms of the effect of COVID. Definitely a spike there, but it's interesting that it hasn't changed the overall trajectory, at least that I could see significantly. The one request or suggestion I'd love to see you, and I actually pulled up the guidelines themselves. And I was looking at them. You know, there's some information in there about guidance in there about things like bicycle racks and encouraging bicycles. There's also some encouragement about encouraging live, work, play, you know, to get people to try to live closer to

[00:26:35] the office. The one thing that's not there that we might want to include is encouraging more pedestrian-scale improvements. Because I know in a lot of our areas, a lot of this happens during the entitlement process anyway, but I know the addition of a crosswalk, maybe it's off-site, but it's close. Some very small changes actually go a long way to increasing the pedestrian movement. And I know this is TDM, it's transit, but on the other hand, we're already looking at

[00:27:14] bicycles. We're looking at live, work, and play. So being more explicit on some of those pedestrian focused improvements and programs potentially would be, I think it'd be a good addition, particularly as in Tyson's and Reston and some of our other growth areas, we're seeing more people, I mean, literally living, working, and playing close by that rely on pedestrian movement primarily to get around.

[00:27:40] So thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yeah, absolutely. And, yeah, those pedestrian improvements and other active transportation are a big part of TDM as well. So we want to make sure we highlight those two. Great. Supervisor Palcic? Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Sam. You are a pro. Excellent work.

[00:27:56] And happy to follow on because I do. I actually have a very specific question because as we analyze the data And just this week, I was looking at American Community Survey of pre- and post-pandemic travel in another region. And the quarter mile is funny because I was sitting here writing, have we looked at the last mile?

[00:28:16] But really, the last quarter mile seems to be in the Tyson's area, the one that dips, that probably is going to fall into the area of concern. So if we can dive a little bit more deeply and 100% agree, Tyson's Community Alliance, even in Tyson's Transportation Service District, and some of our newer senior community buildings that are being built, because we want to make sure that those improvements that we look at are multi-generational and look at ADA and our seniors and our little ones and making sure that they can more easily access.

[00:28:55] So, yeah, I mean, I think it's like that whole atmosphere is active Fairfax comes in. And I know we're having conversations with VDOT about our road standards and making sure that we are looking at where they are now and not where they were. But, yeah, I mean, I think before we finalize this, I don't know if you have more information, but specifically making that quarter maybe to a half mile more accessible for people to use public transit.

[00:29:24] Sure. Yeah, we can definitely have in the guidelines maybe some more, like Supervisor Alcorn said, some more support for those active transportation improvements. And then finally, I had some conversations, and I don't know if you have heard this when you met with the industry groups or with the residents, about do we get to a point where it makes more sense to start to look at encouraging joining, right, some of these properties to do joint shuttles or joint programs, right? At some point, do we have enough space? I mean,

[00:30:01] that's a larger conversation that there are better ways to tap into the existing circulators and to some of the private ones to be a little bit more accessible for more people. I think definitely a larger conversation. I think sometimes with, we have some developments, I think that have had some cross conversations regarding, you know, sharing shuttles and things like that. But I definitely think TDM programs are generally stronger when you have that kind of collaboration. Okay. So yeah, if there's a way that we can help encourage that, maybe work together on that with TCA, that would be wonderful. But yeah, thank you so much. Thanks for being the

[00:30:39] numbers guy and breaking it down because I think it's a little bit, it was a little bit confusing at first. Right. Orange is all the same. Yeah. Right. And so as we look at the comparisons, I appreciate you honing in on that. Absolutely. Great. Supervisor Herity. Yes. Thank you.

[00:30:55] outstanding presentation. Just for the, I know the folks around the table understand this, but could you walk through the 61, the calculation of the 61%? So I'm afraid people are thinking this is 61% of total trips. Oh, sure. What's the numerator? What's the denominator? Just so again, yes. Right. Okay. So essentially the way that it was calculated. So when these developments come we using the engineering handbook project the amount of trips they're supposed to bring onto

[00:31:32] the network and so um based on that projection they and where they fall in those kind of circles around the metro stations they have a certain reduction goal and so what the 61 i think the number you're referring to is i just use the overall number you can use any number you want sure um sure right and so essentially what what we took here was the number of um actual reduction it might be better if you just pick an example and walk through how it's calculated for

[00:32:10] a development sure yeah yeah we can do one i was just going to quickly say really what it shakes out to is on average if somebody is expected to generate 100 trips for their site we're basically saying it's going to be 61% less so basically they're only doing 39 my math is right 39 trips 100 total trips or 100 trips on it's peak hour it's it's peak hour trips yeah it's peak hour trips yeah okay but just from the math perspective yeah that's how it shakes out okay um so you

[00:32:46] mentioned subsidies um are kind of the the thing that drives most of this transportation demand one of the one of the more effective tools who pays for those subsidies the development so out of that tdm account that we have them set up um the tdm plan they set the strategies so the strategies can include a subsidy um and those surveys generally inform what will get you know your employer resident to take transit and so out of the tdm account which they budget every year and they tell us the amount that they plan to put in that account and the expenditures um that's where that money comes from so they have a programming budget that they they set every year

[00:33:26] it'd be helpful in the future if we could see some information on cost per unit for the residential certainly and for the what do you call just to understand what this is costing us because we do have a housing affordability problem um just to clarify yeah so those aren't coming out of the county funds those are no i know okay they're coming out of the hoa's funds correct well for like a multifamily development they would be providing the money for their residents so it's generally HOA's or privately owned like townhomes generally aren't part of this program okay but condo associations would be

[00:34:03] right yep so it's the condo association that would pay the subsidies right and they get that money from the tenants sure okay for rent okay I would include you know I would include I thought the chairman's suggestion of including those condo associations is a good one because I think we should get their input on this because they're ultimately the ones, their tenants that are going to pay for them. So I think AOBA would be another good organization to reach out to if that's not on your list yet and the chamber certainly. And I

[00:34:40] would reinforce the need for flexibility because I had a disaster story in my district where it was a 50 plus community and they signed a TDM that had, this was a long time ago. So we've gotten better since then. They had a bus that showed up that was supposed to show up and take them to the mall every day and then bring them back every day. And nobody ever rode the bus. And to get that change, they had to do the special exception, which we don't ever want to do to people's side.

[00:35:11] I think we need to build flexibility. I understand the need for some standards, but flexibility is key because we don't know when we're going to have another pandemic or another who knows what. And I shared the chairman's concern on the change given the federal back to work. Yes, they're kind of back where they were, but they're still a little bit higher. I don't know how much of that is federal workers that are going to end up having to go back to work that aren't going to work now because they haven't been. So I got a little bit of concern with changing the numbers and making them more aggressive, given the fact that the last three

[00:35:47] or four years, most of the federal government has not been going to work. Understood, yeah. And I definitely share your concern about flexibility. I think that the way that the guidelines are set up has been really good about just setting the framework for a TDM program and really giving each individual development the ability to pick the strategies that work best for them. So if subsidies aren't what's best for a condo community, they can choose a different strategy and we work with them to make sure that it's what works best for them. Thank you very much, Sam. Thank you.

[00:36:18] Supervisor Stork, we're short on time. Do you have anything? I would like to, maybe you can come back, but what is, how does this comport with best practices around the country? The formulas that we use to assess and determine what that denominator is, I would like to understand how that fits in.

[00:36:38] You know, savings is a relative term. We know you can go in the store and there's huge savings in over what? I mean, is it off of the inflated parts to begin with or not? So that particularly would be of interest to me. And the other is we're talking mostly metro stations, and how does that look, and how are you looking at doing that for other areas, in particular the one, you know, what that will be for them.

[00:37:04] And if we have the wrecks on Richmond Highway, does that count as something more? So just those two things in particular we'd like to know a little bit more about. Yeah, absolutely. We can get you some more information on the calculation and best practices. I will say that it's folded into how we do traffic assessments for incoming entitlement applications, and so that's why it's set up with the International Transportation Engineers Handbook.

[00:37:30] And then I definitely think there's opportunity to look at things like the one and how we might want to adjust these guidelines, and I think that that's something that we're looking forward to maybe having a discussion with all of you on how to, you know, have the next iteration of this update. This is kind of more of a right-sizing.

[00:37:49] Supervisor Smith, you said you had a quick question. Yeah, and I don't need the answer now. I want to understand the remedy fund and how the contributions to that are determined. Thank you. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you. And this, sorry, Supervisor Lusk, go ahead. I thought I was recognized earlier.

[00:38:07] My fault. Just making sure. Real fast, for different associations, I would include tags as a part of that, so connected to what the chairman was referring to earlier. And then I also think it might be helpful for my own land use committee, the Franconia District Land Use Committee, to be apprised of what's happening with this TDM program.

[00:38:27] I just want to acknowledge this is really great news. This is very exciting, the success of the program. But let me ask, it looks like you've measured data based on when the TDM program was established in 2013. We do have proper commitments for developments that were done prior to 2013.

[00:38:48] Have we collected any data on those TDM efforts? So there are some that have similar language that has this monitoring baked into the proffers, but a lot of the proffers that we have prior to the guidelines being established don't have a monitoring mechanism.

[00:39:09] So I think we have some data prior to 2013, but it's not a lot. So maybe if we have a particular development or question in an area, we could come back to you and maybe ferret out what you have. But it seems to me it might be helpful because I'm thinking about the Springfield Town Center and I'm thinking about Metro Park, which are very large developments.

[00:39:33] And we know that they have made commitments with TDMs. So the question to me is how do we find out what's been kind of the success of their efforts and how are we measuring that? Jeff Herman, Fairfax DOT, we can get you a couple examples to run through so you understand how those proffers work versus this one to see how that flushes out.

[00:39:53] Okay. I think that will be helpful. And then last question, I apologize, is on slide five, I really appreciate the points that you've made here. Is there a place we can get additional information on these items that you've identified? Sure, yeah, we can provide these for you.

[00:40:09] Okay, thank you. Mr. Chairman, very, very quickly. So this is a great story. Could I suggest, can we, like, tell this story somewhere, you know, maybe with OPA? Because there are a lot of residents in my district that are very skeptical about the success.

[00:40:25] And this clearly shows that this is a successful program. Thank you. Yes, Mr. Okay. Thank you. With that, we'll start changing over to our next conversation, which is the active Fairfax transportation plan. And as we're changing over, I'll just add that it's always good to have more data and it's always good to try and account for various things in the data.

[00:40:50] So I'm all for trying to price out some of these programs with respect to their impacts, for instance, in the residential market. Of course, when we do that, I hope we're also pricing in the benefits that people who live in those residents get out of having a subsidy for transit or things that they might want.

[00:41:10] to help them get to the metro more often or the like. Those can actually be beneficial in those communities, which can make them more desirable places to live. Yeah, which might be why people move there. So with that, we'll go into the next agenda item, which is an update on the active transportation plan.

[00:41:31] I'll turn it over to Nicole Winans in the active transportation section. Thank you. Before we do that, I do want to introduce, Laura Goach is here, And that is our new section chief for active transportation. So I warned her that now that her face has been shown, be prepared for plenty of people to come talk to you.

[00:41:53] But I do want to introduce her. She did great at a community meeting we had in Great Falls about a crosswalk. There you go. Leave it at that. That's what I like to hear. Let's get going. All right. Thanks. All right. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, members of the board. My name is Nicole Winans.

[00:42:08] I'm an active transportation planner with the Fairfax County Department of Transportation. And I'm here today to provide you with an update on the draft development of the network for active transportation and trail facilities as part of the active Fairfax Transportation Plan project.

[00:42:27] So the Fairfax County Department of Transportation was tasked to create an overall update of the existing comprehensive plan guidance on walking, biking, and trail infrastructure to streamline the conflicting recommendations that we have, provide a thorough review of the planned network to identify gaps in the system and potential impacts to natural and cultural resources, and recommend walking, biking facilities that would meet the needs of people of all ages and abilities.

[00:43:00] FCDOT followed a multi-step process to complete this review, which included significant geospatial data analysis, multiple rounds of interdepartmental coordination, as well as coordination with our public landowners and the surrounding jurisdictions, as well as extensive public engagement.

[00:43:22] The public engagement process launched in August 2024 and concluded in December 2024. And the strategy included 12 in-person community open houses, four virtual community meetings, an online survey and an interactive map, an engagement of stakeholder groups such as the Fairfax Families for Safer Streets, the Fairfax Alliance for Better Bicycling, and Nature Forward, as well as the Trails, Sidewalks, and Bikeways Committee, the Transportation Advisory Commission, and the Planning Commission. Key themes among community members that attended an in-person

[00:43:59] or virtual meeting included general concerns about pedestrian and bicycle safety in many areas of the county and the need to fill gaps in the existing trail, sidewalk, and bikeway networks. We also heard many requests for dedicated bicycle facilities that are physically separated from vehicles to increase comfort and safety for all users. Meeting attendees also addressed the varying needs of specific areas of the county, including, for example, better wayfinding signage in Tyson's and increased connection between suburban communities, as well as better protection for

[00:44:36] equine trails in rural areas. At a meeting with community organizations, a request was made to ensure that the new comprehensive planning guidance provides a baseline facility recommendation with additional flexibility for enhanced facilities. A similar request was also echoed by the Planning Commission. 599 community members provided comments on the interactive map of the proposed planned active transportation trial network. The comments primarily focused on the

[00:45:11] lack of safety and the inconvenience of current conditions, as well as barriers limiting active mobility such as wide roads and busy intersections. Comments related to proposed plan network were largely supportive and constructive, so including requests for additional connections to school, parks, and transit. Other supportive feedback focused on using road diets and speed limit reduction to implement active transportation projects. There were also a lot of comments that we categorized as other, and those include comments that were outside of Fairfax County's

[00:45:48] jurisdiction, as well as comments related to cartography, so map labels, comments related to other topics like land use and transit service needs, as well as blank comments. 425 members of the public participated in the online survey, and the results indicated a general preference for physically separated facilities from traffic, which reflects concerns for general road safety issues such as speeding and distracted driving.

[00:46:22] Of particular note was that respondents rated enhanced sidewalks to have the highest comfort. So 89% of survey respondents indicated that, and that off-street two-way cycle tracks had the highest comfort for bicycle users at 86%.

[00:46:40] On the other hand, shared streets with optional safety and or wayfinding signage had the lowest comfort rate at 28 percent. Responses also indicated a preference for additional traffic enforcement and better maintenance of existing facilities. The survey also asked about potential community impacts of the proposed active transportation and trial network with positive expectations across all categories, as shown in the graphic on the slide. In particular, responses anticipated that the proposed network, if implemented... Sorry.

[00:47:21] Never a dull moment around. Go ahead. So in particular, respondents anticipated, if the network is implemented, that it would provide additional recreational opportunities, improve public health, provide community safety benefits, and enhance mobility options, and increase convenience for active transportation users.

[00:47:43] Based on the public and stakeholder feedback we received, the project team made a few amendments to our draft plans. So we made adjustments to the planned active transportation trails network itself where it was possible. We updated the map symbology to provide a specific facility recommendation. If you remember, we used to just call it a route. Now it's a specific baseline recommendation, but additional flexibility is provided in the map notes and as well as in the facility selection table that's included on the plan map.

[00:48:22] We also adjusted recommendations for shared streets. Since we heard loud and clear that shared streets were of great concern to include recommendations for lower speed limits and additional speed management design interventions. Public comments on existing conditions, we will share with the responsible agencies for further action.

[00:48:42] And any higher level comments we received, We will use those to inform our policy, programmatic, and implementation recommendations, which are still in development. In addition to the presentation today, we have shared the updated draft network plan for your review.

[00:49:00] And based on your feedback, we will adjust the next steps for this effort and see how we move forward. Once any outstanding issues regarding the proposed planned active transportation network have been addressed, The next step would be the comprehensive plan amendment authorization to move this effort forward to an official adoption.

[00:49:24] This process would entail additional public engagement and changes to the plan network to reflect any ongoing transportation recommendations that are currently underway as part of a special area planning effort. So there are multiple plan amendments already underway, including the Centerville study, the Lorton Corps study, and the Fairfax Center area study, among others.

[00:49:47] So if those get adopted, they will be reflected in the active transportation network as well. So we would appreciate feedback on the proposed active transportation and trial network by March 14, and are looking forward to discussing any remaining issues and concerns.

[00:50:05] And with that, I would like to open it up for questions and discussion. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Yeah, let me just ask one question. The 425 respondents that you mentioned, do you have them geographically mapped? Do we know where the responses came from?

[00:50:20] Thank you. We have it geographically mapped for the interactive map, because those are specifically on the network, but they're anonymous, so there's no zip code or information about who the commenters are.

[00:50:39] And similar, the survey, we have some demographic questions, but not a location-specific question. I'm just wondering, I mean, I know how hard it is to get people to respond to these, so this is not meant to be derogatory at all, but 425 is a kind of low number.

[00:50:57] And I don't know, you know, how much outreach was done in specific areas. I get leery when I see a number like that because I think people most likely to respond are people who live in an area where there's a particular immediate concern that's going on and it could skew the results.

[00:51:14] And so I just I think it's something to think about when we do further community outreach is we still want people to be anonymous. I'm fine with, but maybe at least putting a zip code or something so that we know where the comments are coming from and so that the district supervisors can know at least their constituents had an opportunity to weigh in with that.

[00:51:33] And the draft comprehensive plan language on the slide on page nine, or the last slide, do you have an idea of when the draft comprehensive plan language, the goal would be to have that language because obviously you're doing the outreach we're authorizing the amendment but somewhere between late 2025 and early 2026 I would presume is when we're looking to see the actual language is that right yes so the the plan the draft plan map that was shared via email that includes the draft

[00:52:09] language that would go into the comprehensive plan that immediately relates to the map okay then additional changes in the comprehensive plan text will be necessary and those will be made during that amendment process okay the text is what i was was focused on so i appreciate that and last just to compliment the folks didn't see the the uh first active transportation newsletter that came out on february 21st i don't know if any of the current folks here were uh pride of authorship on that but it was excellent and i would just suggest that all of us try to you know urge our constituents and folks to subscribe to that because I thought it was very well done, very helpful it was inaugural.

[00:52:49] But that's another thing that, you know, Mobi OPM can help push out an opportunity for people to sign up for that because it's excellent. So thank you. Thank you. Supervisor Palchuk. Yeah, thank you.

[00:53:05] I wanted to second that newsletter. Oh, my goodness. It is incredible, very helpful, very excited about that. Thank you for doing that because I know when we go out in our communities, there are so many questions, right, about what are we doing, what can we do? And I think the newsletter helps us have that information and share it with the community. So very much appreciate that. Also appreciate the survey. I think that photo may have been from one of our community meetings. I recognize it. And I know, I agree with the chairman, right? It's difficult to get feedback, but I am hopeful to see that we still have time to continue to engage with the community. So perhaps now that we have, you have a great

[00:53:44] newsletter. You have a full chief. I think if we can be helpful, this is something that many of our HOAs and community associations, I think, would really appreciate and appreciate being able to, for us to bring to meetings, to bring you to meetings or community events, and to increase the feedback. Because again, I love the map. I just started looking at it. I think we just got it.

[00:54:07] But I would love to be able to share that with people who know every street and every corner Even better than we do but excellent work really moving in the right direction And it's pretty clear what we hear from our community That we want it to be safer To share our streets in our in our transportation. So just want to thank you for all your work Supervisor stork. Did you have a question? I think you and and I think Obviously the act of Fairfax work that we've done and really the efforts to really truly make that a comprehensive

[00:54:47] Trail and pedestrian bike plan is I think essential and and I'm a huge supporter of it But I don't think it goes quite far enough in particular I'm gonna. I'm gonna quote Jim Klein is is my appointee to the the trail Commission and He's identified he's done this excellently for me and for others for a long time But for example, we have particularly in the Aquaman regional park area

[00:55:18] We have a trail that we're looking to try to put through and make it's going to involve the obviously the Regional Park Authority, Fairfax Water, VDOT right-of-ways, county-owned land. Potentially it could involve a national park system because we have a there's a park that we're also wanting a trail that we're wanting to put through there.

[00:55:39] And I think what I'm saying is that in my mind a comprehensive active transportation plan should truly be comprehensive. And maybe the biggest challenge we have is the park authority and their need to include with this their trails.

[00:55:56] Some of them are going to be, I know, commuter ways. Some of them are not. But I think having those all together so that Dance Work and anybody else can pull up on their phone and see all the different options they have to go from point A to point B, whether it's through County Park Authority land or regional park or, in my case, Bureau of Land Management.

[00:56:19] I mean, there's so many different – I have a lot of federal entities. I just – I'd urge us to go the extra mile. It's an 80 percent we've got. Let's go and get to at least the 99 percent level. And I think it's essential that we do that to truly end up with what I know the commitment and what our objective was in the beginning, which is to truly have it be an active Fairfax.

[00:56:40] Opportunity for everyone. Thank you supervisor Alcorn. Uh, thank you. Mr. Chairman. So, uh, thank you, Nicole Thank you to the team. This is it's been a long time coming, but we're here. So thank you. And we're Uh, we're we're now really diving into the the details Um, so I do have one question and then just one comment My question is what about some of the very small fixes that are very important that might not show up on a plan And what I'm thinking about specifically is all the different crosswalk improvements that need to be made all over the county.

[00:57:18] A lot of times they're not that expensive, but they might not rise to the level of showing up in this plan. Is there any way we can deal with that? I mean, and here's kind of what I'm thinking is we already identify intersections that are identified in the comprehensive plan as needing improvements.

[00:57:35] is there some way that we could identify like places where there either need to be crosswalks or crosswalk improvements it's a tough question i realize it is a tough question um so we have a number of different ways that we try and tackle it we um we were here a while ago talking about spot improvement program um um as we talk about aspects of the tpp i think the struggle is going to be sort of trying to create a little robust list of every single location.

[00:58:08] We're going to have to, number one, we're going to have to work with VDOT. But number two, I think what we're going to have to do is, as we start talking with you all further and more about TPP, start getting some of those locations in our midst, because it's going to be very difficult for us to try and catch every location.

[00:58:26] But if you all know things, and we all know things, we can start to at least compile and have some sort of list that we can start tackling when we get those funding aspects so that we can do it that way. That would be my suggestion. Also, I think we can work better with VDOT.

[00:58:41] If there's four pieces that need to be fixed, they make us fix eight. We need to figure out a better way to deal with just fixing what needs to be fixed so we can move forward because they tend to go back on us and make us do more. I'm not saying it doesn't need to be fixed at that juncture but it could be four or five years from now when we need to refix things so thank you excellent points um i i know i know you have a list of all the improvements that have been like requested or identified and i believe that list has what uh 2,000 suggestions something like

[00:59:19] i know that maybe more 2,000 yeah i mean i they're like 300 and 100 mil alone and and and that's not the full list. There are 2,000 in tradesville too. So be thinking about that. And I don't know, maybe it's a prioritization issue, but it just seems to me being able to track that and show that on a map would be super helpful over time. And I realize that it's going to take a long time to address some of these locations. Right. And I agree with you. Again, going back to not to put our spot improvement program out there in the mix. But the concept of the spot improvement program

[00:59:58] was literally looking at each location. Didn't necessarily have a specific solution, but had an idea of the area, the intersection, crash data, vulnerability in terms of, you know, equity to give you an idea of at least the location. Maybe not necessarily the improvement, but I think the next step from that list is to sort of look at that list. It's prioritized in terms of, you know, crash data and equity, and then go, all right, do we want to point at one of these, two of these, three of these, however many of these for a specific solution?

[01:00:30] So that may be the direction of the prioritization, if you so choose to do it that way, and then you can start looking at those locations. That's one way of doing it, at least. Okay. And one last request. I think this is going to be a long list, I know, of improvements that are going to need to be made, and it's, again, a long-term issue.

[01:00:50] But will we be able to calculate how much money it's going to cost to put all these improvements in that we're talking about putting in the comp plan? That's my question. At this juncture, I would say no, but we will continuously build on that list as we move forward.

[01:01:08] You'll get an update every year. So we won't try to estimate the total cost for putting in all the improvements? We'll try to estimate, but you know how estimating has been going on for the last two years. It's been really difficult.

[01:01:21] Right. And I'm not saying it's critical to have a number, but my point is I think this – and this was something we talked about as a board in the last session anyway, when I was sitting in that seat, that this could be a basis for basically some funding investment, some infrastructure investment down the road, whether it's a bond or some other – and we've talked about the $100 million as really a down payment.

[01:01:51] For some of these improvements so anyway, just wanted to I know there are a lot of competing priorities and it's not necessarily the best time to bring that up. But anyway, I just wanted to put that down. I hope we're thinking that way. Thank you. Well, since Supervisor Alcorn is bringing up topics that, you know, might not be the best time if we do that, I want to make sure that we are also looking into how we do these projects more efficiently and more cheaply.

[01:02:17] they are extremely extremely expensive there are factors that are within our control and there are factors that are not within our control the aspect of trying what what we need to be doing is figuring out how we best bring down the costs on the factors that are within our control and i say i i mentioned the factors that are not within our control because guess what vdot very often makes things just a little bit more difficult. Sorry, VDOT. It's true. There are other aspects that raise costs that add time, whether it's land acquisition, whether it's moving utilities. We

[01:02:55] get all that. And so sometimes it's not necessarily easy to predict exactly how much something will cost. But there are definitely more opportunities for efficiencies and more opportunities to bring down some of these costs. And I think if you haven't heard me be a broken record on this yet, you probably haven't been to one of my public meetings because i talk about it all the time it's something we definitely are going to need to to work on uh supervisor harity yeah let me start with the the survey was that at least limited to one response per machine or do we know so we use

[01:03:30] the county's public input survey and i do believe it can be taken as many times as somebody would prefer but um we can check on the back end if it tracks unique users most websites do that yep I sometimes go in and have fun testing it and take the survey multiple times just to see whether it does, and a lot of times they do.

[01:03:55] So I only represent three or four of those 420. I'm just kidding. And one of the things we should consider, because our people are really busy. I mean, a lot of our residents are two-way generator families, so they don't have time to get engaged, but they will answer sometimes a survey that's statistically validly done.

[01:04:17] We all know something about that. But we ought to consider that. It's not all that expensive to do a statistically valid survey to truly get the depth and breadth of how our residents feel about something rather than just have advocacy groups weigh in, which is typically what happens in a survey like this.

[01:04:37] And you listed off the people that I would have thought would respond to this, but you probably didn't get the soccer coaches and that kind of stuff. So that was my first comment. You know, the second one, I'm kind of a broken record on this, and we've somehow got to continue to work into this, our backlog on maintenance, and I would love to get an update of the number of miles that we've got and how far we are behind in maintaining what we've already got built.

[01:05:07] The third real question, it kind of ties into Supervisor Alcorn's question, It would be helpful to go look at the use for the projects that we built. Are we really getting use there?

[01:05:23] I mean, when we build a 10-foot path, would a 6-foot path really have worked? Those are questions because when you do 10 feet, that's four additional feet of right-of-way, four additional feet of materials. I know on Rolling Road, it came in with 10 on either side.

[01:05:39] And again, that's a VDOT prescription. But this was taken people's front yards. And there is no way we're ever going to need 10 feet on either side. So I would just encourage us not to go back and take a look realistically in a given area and provide flexibility to reduce it where it makes sense to reduce it.

[01:05:59] Because if I've got a fully established residential neighborhood, it's just not going to create the usage for a 10-foot path on both sides. What I'm going to see, what we can try and do is work with VDOT to reduce and relax some of their restrictions to ensure that we can get things done a little quicker.

[01:06:19] We'll get a report back to you with a yes or a no from them. And that goes to Supervisor Behrman's thing and being able to do it quicker and quicker and cheaper. Thanks. Supervisor Walkinshaw, and after that, we'll then move on to the next topic.

[01:06:38] Go ahead, Supervisor. Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to weigh in on the outreach and just share my experience. I attended one of the outreach events at Laurel Ridge, I think, and it was more or less what the chairman described. As you would expect, people show up because they want a specific sidewalk or a specific path, and it was some soccer parents.

[01:07:02] There was one of your constituents, Supervisor Herdy, who wants a shared use path on Pope's head. I told him that's probably unlikely to happen. But it is a small group of people who are interested in discussing the abstract notions here.

[01:07:18] people are understandably focused on, you know, what is not taking place or not taking place in their neighborhood. And, you know, I think that's hard to get past. But I think we can deduce from that if there are a lot of people who specifically want a sidewalk connection or improved trail in their specific neighborhood, that is a statistically valid expression of how people feel around the county about about the importance of this and to Supervisor Alcorn's

[01:07:50] point you know whether whether we take this on as an investment or some component of this as an investment to be made with county dollars is a discussion I really think probably moving forward and this has is part of the DMV moves conversation also because you know part of transit succeeding in the region as people being able to get to transit, I think we probably need to do more in articulating with Richmond the need for dedicated state funding to make these

[01:08:27] kind of improvements when they're not connected to a widening project like Rolling Road or Braddock Road, but standalone pedestrian safety and access improvements, very difficult to get state funding for, and we need to advocate for that to happen.

[01:08:44] Thank you. Thank you for that presentation. And with that, we'll move into the last presentation of the day – of the meeting, which is the Free Student Bus Pass Program and Transit Ridership Incentive Program. Tripp. So while everyone's shifting out, transitioning out, and coming in – ah, there we are.

[01:09:10] So really quickly, as I said, Greg Steerson, Director of CDOT. Sal Cies is here with me. Between the two of us, we're going to tackle some information on two programs we have here at FCDOT that are focused on increasing and enhancing transit ridership, as well as reducing barriers to transit related to cost.

[01:09:32] I guess if you all see the theme of sort of the things that we're talking about today, you know, we talked through TDM, we've talked through active transportation, now we're talking about transit ridership. So Saul, kick us off to talk about the student bus pass program, and then I'm going to talk you a little bit more about the trip program so good morning okay supervisor year man and members of the board thank you thank you very much for having me here today it's a pleasure my name is all CS and I am the coordinator of the free student bus pass program as you know this program provides free

[01:10:11] transportation to thousands of our students and we participate regularly in cultural events at schools, libraries, actively participation in fairs, and we receive a variety of feedback about the program and the Fairfax Connector Transportation System. We constantly and regularly create different do-de-animation, videos, brochures in Korean, Spanish, and English, So we try to cover most of our population.

[01:10:45] And I am glad to report that the free student bus pass program since 2015, we already have 3.5 million trips, not considering the plus metro bus program that I'm going to talk about later. This one?

[01:11:04] Yes. I'm still. Yes. Yes. Okay, right here. Okay. Thank you. For instance, in a recent event at Chantilly High School, a parent expressed their appreciation about the program because his son could understand and use the Fairfax Connector system and get around for free.

[01:11:26] So there are a wide variety of benefits for our students. Similarly, at Robinson Secondary School, a student said that this program enables her to get to her part-time job. and another parent told us in Spanish Este programa es fabuloso y espléndido Realmente lo apreciamos which in English is fabulous, right?

[01:11:49] And it's a splendid program that is really appreciated by the community We are transforming positively the lives of many families here so we are very, very glad for that Next one, right here?

[01:12:04] Yeah, there you go And in September 2022 we expanded the initiative to better serve communities that are close proximity to Metrobus. So we started the Plus Metrobus program.

[01:12:22] It started with Justice High School and then we had the extension for Falls Church High School, Annandale High School, and Marshall High School and Davis Center. So over the last two years and four months, now we have almost half a million trips for students.

[01:12:40] I remember when we started this in Marshall High School, it was the event. So now we have almost half a million trips. Also, we have received some preliminary and several additional schools that I see potential benefit in the PLUS Metro Bus program.

[01:13:03] So this certainly speaks of the success of this program and what has been achieved to date. So in total, combine these two programs, the regular free student bus pass plus the metro bus program, we are going to reach more than 4 million trips this month, February, because right now we have $3,950,000.

[01:13:35] So definitely we're going to surpass that number. And now Greg Stevenson, director of FCDOT, will continue with the presentation. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. So I'm pinch hitting today for Kayla Berry, who leads our marketing team.

[01:13:55] She's out on sick leave today. I doubt I'll bring half the knowledge. Maybe I'll bring a third of the energy to the presentation. We'll see what I can do here on our TRIP Ridership Incentive Program or TRIP. For those of you here back in 2022 in the summer, we talked about how we were planning on implementing the TRIP program, which is a program that's supported by the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation. And at the time, we received what was about a $5.5-ish million-dollar grant, which basically is aimed at reducing barriers to transit ridership due to

[01:14:33] cost or potential riders' financial issues or concerns. And the grant basically allows us to provide a 50% reduction in fares for the connector based on the user's income-based criteria. And the income-based criteria we use is based on the neighborhood and community services in their TOPS program, which is the Transportation Options Programs and Services Program. So after 2022 in the summer, we did a lot of work in getting the program started, including purchasing specialized

[01:15:07] smart trip cards for the program. We did outreach. We did marketing of materials in multiple languages. We had some really good, great videos promoting the program. We worked with NCS and we worked with the office to prevent and end homelessness to help with promoting and supporting the program. And in terms of where we are trip-wise, trip-trips as I like to say, we started in the spring of 2023. You can see here some of the data. We started slow in the 100 or so range, but after that first year, we jumped up to about 1,000 trips per month is what those numbers

[01:15:46] represent. And we've held in that range for most of 2024, but we're looking at and we're projecting and shooting towards getting that number up to the 2,000 and 3,000 range per month. In terms of how we're planning on doing that and expanding the program. As I talked about, NCS and the Office to Prevent and End Homelessness have been instrumental in getting this program off the ground and growing it to this point. In the future, we're looking to expand our outreach and marketing through collaborations with schools, with local universities, churches, non-profit groups, as well as DSB and

[01:16:26] CSB. The last slide here shows some of our promotional efforts, really for both programs. You can see up at the top some of our social media engagement. We also do printed materials. We do school visits. We are active participants in fairs and festivals. One thing I wanted to highlight here, though, is where you see down it says 2D animated material. And Saul didn't know I was going to do this, but that's Saul's work. Saul does our animation. So if you look through the slides and saw the animations and some of the cartoons that we had through the slides that's

[01:17:01] Saul he does videos for us as well and so I wanted to give him a little bit of a shout out because that's his work and that's really something that's been beneficial for especially students and for people who are looking at this that maybe don't want to just see the standard stuff that you always see instead see something that's a lot cooler and better than than you know what we would normally do So I wanted to give them that quick shout-out.

[01:17:26] And with that, from a feedback perspective, just curious on your thoughts and ideas and any questions you may have regarding some of the potential future expansion we've been talking about here. Yes. First, Sal, amazing job.

[01:17:42] I mean, I've watched these videos so many times, and the simplicity of them is what is so important for people to understand and very well done. It's hard to believe, I was mentioning to Jimmy, when Supervisor Hudgens and I brought forward the board matter to set up the student bus program, initially it was thought that there wouldn't be any demand and, you know, it wouldn't be a big deal, and we tested it a few places, and these numbers are just amazing, and frankly, I think bode really well.

[01:18:13] Not only is this a program that reduces trips, it puts kids in the safest mode of transportation possible, builds future transit riders, helps the environment, but also is highly consistent with our One Fairfax notion of providing equal access because there's a lot of kids.

[01:18:32] I see them at these schools when I'm there getting on these buses. They're going to work. They're taking buses to jobs after school. They're taking buses back to school. They're staying late after school, and they have the confidence that they'll be able to get home because they're able to ride these buses.

[01:18:48] Just an enormous success. I guess my only question is we are looking at expanding potentially the metro bus component of this, but is there a high school or middle school left in the county that doesn't already have the baseline connector access?

[01:19:05] There are some schools, for example, we have received not official requests, but when I go to different schools, fairs, or cultural events, there are some teachers or staff who mention, I'm sorry. He's on, yeah. Okay, who mentions, they mention that they want to know if someday they are going to have something like that.

[01:19:27] Okay, so I think it would be good for us to know where we're not serving and what we can be doing with that. I mean, I appreciate the Metro bus piece because we added it to these strategic schools where we thought Metro was riding, was routing, had routes in place that would benefit the student body.

[01:19:46] But I'd sure love to know if there are middle and high schools in the county that don't already have service. And then I think in addition to that, and we talked about this at the onset of the program, is making sure that the stops are proximate to the schools and so which is driving which um you know is this is the stop convenient for the students and and that's why we get a lot of ridership at those schools and at other schools do we not have a lot of ridership because frankly we don't have a stop convenient and safe enough and close enough to the school uh to make it convenient for the students to be able to use it and so a lot of great work uh on this i just want

[01:20:22] make sure we keep up that momentum and make sure that we're serving all of the schools and i think it's time to go back and look at the stops uh frankly i mean one of the the challenges i have is you know we had the bus shelter advertising program we had a lot of initiatives to uh better dignify uh bus ridership in the county and yet i see some of the most heavily used transit routes for our students at some of the schools that i drive past that have no improvements other than there's a connector sign there there's no shelter there's no trash can there's no amenities at those

[01:20:58] places and and we're starting to get you know huge ridership at some of these stops now and you wouldn't know it if you drove by at a time when the students weren't standing there but there are times where you can drive by and see 25 30 kids waiting for a bus and there's not a shelter or anything at those locations so i would like to have us go back and look at where we're having the most success and looking at the infrastructure that's in place and seeing if we can do any enhancements in those locations, or at least prioritize those.

[01:21:25] Thank you. Thank you. Supervisor of Minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Great presentation. Great work, Saul. Really, we want to commend you on that. If you look at, I guess, page three, you'll see that three of the schools are in Mason District.

[01:21:42] So, you know, this program is succeeding. It's working. It's helping the community. It's helping the children, the students, and I think that we need to continue to broaden this access. You know, Mr. Chairman talked about One Fairfax, and that's exactly kind of putting words into action, which I think is fantastic.

[01:22:02] And my only one question is, in these efforts, is there any plans at any point? So we have 14 bike shares coming to Mason District, which is really exciting. Is there any plans on maybe opening it up for potential partnerships with, like, BikeShare?

[01:22:20] That's a good question. I'll have to get back to you on that. But that's a good suggestion, quite frankly, and that's something that I'll have to look into and talk with the folks that just left to see how we can maybe match up some of the Capital BikeShare with some of the student bus pass and trip work, quite frankly.

[01:22:37] Yeah, I just think it would open it up, I think, to a lot of, you know, Students who maybe don't want to use a button. No don't need to use the bus Maybe they just need to jump on a bike and head on home or whatever activities after school that they're using So just a thought thank you or even first mile last mile stuff. You never know Yeah, you know if the if we're talking about where the bus stops are located if there's something else around there that they might be able to Get to you know first mile last mile if they got off the bus that might also be helpful. Yeah, I agree. Thank you Great. We'll do supervisor Lusk supervisor Palachuk supervisor Alcorn, and then we'll break

[01:23:10] Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Two quick questions. The first is looking at the trip program in the slide number six. You noted that it's supported by a grant from the Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation. Just curious, what percent of it is actually sourced from that grant? And then second, as a follow on, if we wanted to expand the program, could we also expand the grant that we receive from DPRT?

[01:23:40] I'll take the last one first. I'm not sure if we'll be able to expand the grant. Specifically, it was a three-year grant, step-down grant that basically sort of diminishes over time. But in terms of what it supports, it's basically the half fair, right? So if the fair is $4, it pays for $2 of that, and then obviously the user pays the other two. It's basically the setup.

[01:24:03] Okay. And are there other grants that we could look at instead? Potentially, but that's definitely a question I'd have to do more research on if there's something like that. And whether or not, you know, DRPT, depending on how this works out, if they would consider, you know, us applying for it again and again, don't know.

[01:24:24] But that's something that I think as we get into the middle end of this year and as we start to get to the end of this grant, which is May of 26, I think it's something we probably should revisit and sort of say, all right, here's where we sit. We want to continue this. What's the best way of doing it?

[01:24:40] Okay, that's perfect. And then last is the total numbers that we have here are reflecting the actual number of trips that are being taken by riders. I'm curious to know how many trip users are there, and then what is the average number of trips that they are taking?

[01:25:09] There we go. Yeah, that's something, and that was actually something that I was interested in, too, when I was going to be doing the presentation. That was something I asked, too, and so that's something that I'll get back to you because that's something I'm interested in as well, quite frankly. Thank you very much. Supervisor Palachuk?

[01:25:25] Thank you. I'll try to be brief. Amazing work. Really appreciate it. I appreciate the work. After the kickoff by the chairman and our predecessors, I was a big proponent. We helped expand it. So I love that you're looking at additional schools. Two, I guess, recommendations, questions.

[01:25:42] One would be we just had a conversation at NVTC's Program Advisory Committee about the research they've been doing with our buses and where they're seeing the most access, especially where there are connections with things like bike share programs.

[01:26:01] So I love that question. I think, you know, that might be a good, helpful group to work with to do that. Also, I think students are commuters, I believe, so this may be eligible under commuter choice.

[01:26:17] That's one grant to look at. I know when the I-66 round comes around, that may be a possibility. And two, that I don't see Oakton High School on here. The Building Better Bus Network, F-64 bus, will now be, I think, an excellent connection for potential riders.

[01:26:38] So that's one that I don't see listed that I hope you'll consider as you move forward. Thank you. Supervisor Alcorn? One request for information to be provided later. We talked in this committee and other committees about the back-end qualification under the TRIP program and other programs that are based on income and similar qualifications.

[01:27:02] If you could provide us an update on what the progress is to doing cross-program qualifications, It's an IT issue, I think, primarily, but it also runs in the regulations. I know it's something, frankly, we want to keep people from having to fill out multiple forms to get similar qualification services.

[01:27:24] So that's great. And you're talking about in terms of, like, interaction with the TOPS program? Yes. Well, not just that, but also across all programs, basically, where there's an income qualification, you know, even, like, free and reduced meals, you know, for schools. and the back-end coordination, where is the status of that?

[01:27:42] Thank you. Great. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. And with that, only a minute over, we are adjourned. Thanks. There we go.

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