Travis County Commissioners Court
May 9, 2006
Item 15
15. Consider and take appropriate action on streets within seven oaks subdivision, including marly way and olympus drive. Good morning again. On April 4th the Commissioners court addressed this issue. Adopted a motion with several components. You had an intent to make the roads public roadways in seven oaks. You directed the staff to put together a punch list and work with the developer to have that completed as soon as possible. You also asked that we come back in 30 days to give a status report on what has been done. It has been 30 days, the purpose of this agenda item is to do that, provide you with a status report. You also directed us to work with the neighborhoods to install traffic control devices and other traffic controls that address volume and speed. Reremoved the barrier that was put up and replaced it with one that met the fire code. We postponed any traffic calming devices for at least six months. We posted reasonable speed limit as soon as we can do that. And that we close the roads during the parade of homes or indicate that we would be receptive to closing the roads during the parade of homes when that happened. Fine that he will that continue to work with txdot on continuous left turn lanes at cuernavaka.
>> the barricade was replaced almost immediately after that court item, there is no a removable barrier. The fire district is -- has looked at that, is okay with what is there, seems to be doing the job now. Back and forth initially, I think we now have a barricade that's being respected by all parties. T.n.r. Put together -- hold on, let me first preface typically we would wait for the developer to be completed with his work and be requested to do a -- to do a walk through before final acceptance. So -- so it's somewhat not normal for the department to put together punch lists until requested to do so by the developer. But because of circumstances, we put together basically a work list of things that we knew would have to be done before the county would accept the roadway. For lack of a better word we call this a punch list, that was put together on April 13th. Our inspector met with the contractor on April 26th. Mapping out what needed to be done. Also met with the developer on may 1st. I was also at the meeting on may 1st. There really hadn't at that point in time been much work done to address the items on the punch list. Whereas there had been several storms in the interim that could have affected the -- the base of the work. It's not currently ready to be accepted by the county. , just bottom line is that -- there are items on the punch list that I would recommend to the court that we not accept the roadway until those items have been completed. Understanding that -- that it the caught's desire to have at least marly way and olympus drive open as soon as possible, we can recommend to the court that they accept the roadways after the most important items on that punch list are completed. There are some ditch improvements that have to be made. There are perpendicular walls, driveway entrances that will have to be retrofitted. There are about four or five items that we believe are currently underway, that the developer recently has -- has moved toward remedying. I think mr. Gully can probably speak to the time table that he believes those items can be done in. But again it is a question of risk management. We would be accepting roadways with -- with items still outstanding. And I知 -- I知 told by our attorney staff that it is possible to allow the developer to continue to work within the public right-of-way. To complete those items, even after we have accepted them for maintenance. We would also strike the roadway immediately after acceptance to -- typically we would not do any work on a thoroughfare until it's been accepted for maintenance. So our -- our road and bridge crews stand ready to strike the roads just as soon as it's accepted for maintenance. Stripe the road. That would also include posting a speed limit after the appropriate speed limit studies have been done. We would initially post an advisory speed, then conduct a -- a study that -- that we would always do before we -- before we post regulatory speed limits. That has to be posted in the newspaper. So we are -- it will probably be at least two weeks after acceptance where we will have a regulatory speed posted out there. But during the interim we can post an advisory speed. Which -- which at least tells people what we believe is a reasonable speed to be travelling the road on. We also believe that the striping on the road itself will -- will lower speed limits. I have to tell you that -- that during -- while I was in the field I observed fairly high speed on this roadway. This was by at this point just construction traffic. So I think the lack of speed limit, lack of enforcements, I think people would be inclined to drive that road higher than most people would went to be driven, something we need to be very on top of after we accept the roadway.
>> joe [indiscernible] the -- the county has to accept these road for maintenance and -- of course these particulars that you have mentioned, the developers continue to be working on them to make sure that they are done. Is there a rule of thumb as far as how long that time frame, the timing of it when the developer must be completely -- to have done all of these things that we require him to do. In the -- in the ballpark or -- of the acceptance of that road for maintenance. Is there any time line.
>> no.
>> what I知 trying to look, I don't want to -- you know --
>> no. Commissioner, there are no time lines. Basically up to this point in time it's always been the sense that -- that the developer in -- and the community want these roads to be accepted as soon as possible. There's some sense of urgency on their part to get everything cleared up to complete the punch list to accept for ongoing maintenance. But we don't have any regulation to say that you must be completed with these roadways so that we can accept them. The burden has always been on the developer to get things ready for acceptance. Whenever that is, the. But until that point, we have roads where punch lists have never been completed. And so that's -- and we have not accepted them because they have not. But we don't have a normal time period for when a developer would be completed this his items before we accept them.
>> Commissioner, let me address that perhaps. This way. The developer is highly insented to get this project done on the shorter versus the longer because they do have the parade of homes going on out there the third week in June. I知 not fearful that we are going to have the twoer that's going to linger with this thing, the developer that's going to linger. The real I were here is, joe and I spoke about this yesterday after as you can see the backup that joe and his camp met with the developer on Friday. And the issues that I have some problems with specifically pertain to the 30 day period that joe had mentioned. I think that if we were to go back and look at what we did on -- on April the 4th, we would find that that 30 day was, in my mind, a period that most of the things that needed to be done to open that street were going to be able to be accomplish. As a matter of fact when phillip was in the audience, I -- I looked and I said is 30 days enough time for us to get to a spot where we feel like that we can move forward and that we can open it to -- to the bluffs folks and that -- I mean, head shake like that to me means yeah I think that we can get that done. Now when I heard after the Friday meeting that we were going to take this project and go from now and the developer would like to have until the 30th of this month to get that project to the point where we might be able to open the streets because the county would accept that road, that's -- that's as I told joe, that -- that was not something that I -- that I wanted done and then I think it was clear when we voted on April the 4th that we do not want this project to be taken until June or July which is the conversation that we have when we initially started talking about it. Now, quite frankly, that -- did I think that there might be some room or some need to have it beyond 30 days? Yes. As a matter of fact, I think the comment to paraphrase what I said, it was something like if we can't do it within 30 days, it may be due to something where legally we are told that you can't do that and so I knew that we needed to have a little bit of time, you know, beyond the 30 days. But I will tell you that I honestly thought that we could get this project open by the 15th of this month. Which would have taken it from four weeks to six weeks. Now, when I heard that it was going to be the 30th, I talked to joe and I said, joe, I知 not happy with -- what the 30th. Given that I probably can't get this deal done on the 15th, I talked to the developer and I said, let's see if we can get the things that are the most concerning to us, I mean the driveways, the -- you know, the letters that we have to get from the fwee I don't tech people with the vertical cuts on the some of the cuts out there, geotech people. Let's take this things and see if we can get this deal done -- unless it's going to rain for the next two weeks, I would hope that we could get the things that we really would be the most concerned about taken care of, get a signoff on this I thing. I think we are going to have to accept personally, before it's all done. If we don't it's going to get into June, that's not something that I think is fair to the people that we voted on April the 4th to open the roads. I知 assured unless there is some catastrophic happening that we probably could get comfortable with the couple or three things on this pinch list that really need to be done that takes us out of real exposure from the county. Hey it's not that you can't work.
>> five things.
>> five things. All right. But I think that those things can be done I知 going to be pretty insistent on that we get this road opened on the 24th given the developer to the 23rd to get these things done unless of course weather is going to stop us now, I mean, I know we are going to have some rain, but I don't think two weeks of rain. That is really where I want to move with this. Now I don't know whether we are going to have to ask a legal question and -- in executive session or what with regards to -- to what do we really take on whenever we accept these roads because once we open the traffic, or the barricade to the traffic, I don't know if that means that we are technically accepting the road then, that may be a legal question that we have to ask or just a matter we have to open the road and let the traffic come through. By hook or crook I知 not going to be happy if this road is not open on may the 24th.
>> I think it's important for mr. Gully to speak for himself with regard to his ability to accomplish those five things before the 23rd.
>> he's here. Okay.
>> list those five things for me. I have ditch, perpendicular walls.
>> let me go ahead and art sclait that for the record. To repair the ditch lines, stabilize the [indiscernible], number two to fill in the irrigation line ditches off of camel back. Three to acquire a geotech letter for the retaining wall, number 4 to backfill the driveway vertical walls with a 3-1 earth slope, number 5 to extend the guardrail past the trees north of the main culvert crossing. These are what we believe expose the most risk to acceptance by the county. There are probably a good half dozen other items that need to be done as well. Part of the issue is to -- some of these items are items where we expect there will be construction crews in the right-of-way and that will expose some risks. We would like those things where there's heavy equipment, where there's a -- dirt work, where there's things that have to be done, especially on marly and olympus drive and the issue of camel back is really almost a separate issue. The court could accept just olympus drive and marly way without accepting the rest of the streets in the subdivision, thus main obtaining those as the developers work zone not publicly accessible. What we are most concerned about is the travel way between the add joining neighborhood to 2244.
>> what's four again, number four.
>> back phil the driveway vertical walls with three to one earth slope. These are the perpendicular walls that have -- if hit by a vehicle someone could get seriously hurt. They are within the right-of-way. We recommended that they basically slope backfill and slope so that if a car hit it, it would roll and not hit a vertical wall.
>> joe, do you want to come -- to you want to address --
>> any more questions for joe?
>> one real quick one.
>> [one moment please for change in captioners]
>> we need to make sure that we understand the developer is very willing and I think the county would rather the developer finish this project because there are standards by which this development has taken place and there are certainly -- beyond expectations, there are probably legal ramifications with regards to how this neighborhood needs to be finished. And quite frankly, I think the developer -- as opposed to us taking the physical and trying the finish the job ourselves, our people are pretty talented, but I知 not sure they want to take on the look that this developer really wants this project to be. So we are really -- I think we are in a position that we want the developer to finish this project and I think they're willing to do that.
>> I just wanted to make sure we're fair in the -- if it was accepted. It wasn't fair to keep fiscal if they've done certain things. They're entitled to their money back.
>> and Karen, I think that the money talked about on the second page about the partial giving back, if you will, of the fiscal if that need be. And to me the way to really work this thing is there's a part in the camel back where the neighborhood on the other side, they don't care about that. That's not a part they're going to use. What they really want is to to come to olympus and to marly way and I知 sure the neighborhood -- the other neighborhood maybe we can get away from the opposing neighborhood, but the other neighborhood is certainly willing to work with us on that, I would think.
>> to what letter do you make reference?
>> may 8th.
>> I know beth robertson sent -- okay. Your name, please and who you're associated with?
>> my name is phillip gully and I知 with the developer, bee cave oaks development.
>> okay.
>> first off I would want to say that to answer Commissioner Sonleitner's question about the amount of fiscal that's been posted on this job, the vast majority of the dollars out laid have already been kpheurbd. And during the entire project we've had expectations by both the county and the city. So all of the items that are done are done in a satisfactory manner.
>> how much is the fiscal?
>> it's over a million and a half.
>> at this point right now, the items that joe was mentioning first I would address, he had five items that -- did you say six, joe?
>> five.
>> five items that were dangerous. Five items that they were concerned about. Let me strike the last part. The driveway aspect, we've already extended most of those pipe at this point from our meeting on Monday. We've extended the pipe out of the driveways in order to receive the fill on the sides that we have put in the three to one slopes. I知 supposed to have some of the material today to start the filling process on those. The item on -- extending the guardrail, we've contacted the people that actually do the guardrail work as a subcontractor to cash construction and they are saying to us today that they will have that done by Thursday. There is some -- a pretty significant rain supposed to occur this evening which of course has delayed my grass guy who had started the grassing operation yesterday. I think these guys feel that any kind of work they do today is probably going to be washed away or rendered useless by tomorrow if the rains are in line with the forecast. Going back to the list of items he was talking about, the irrigation ditches, every time we have a significant rain, you know, it washes out the ditches, so what I was -- we can cover those back up as best we can, but what will really take care of them is when we put the grass down. That should seal that issue down. Those on camel back, they have been stalled out there a little bit by the rain. There's a certain amount of electrical, the wiring that turns on the different zones, the sprinklers, is in there and it's all exposed right now because it keeps getting washed out. And my irrigator is telling me that he can't -- he doesn't get any headway unless it gets a little bit drier. The vertical walls, the letter from the 83io tech is a -- geo tech, I don't know why this has become an issue because the cuts have been there for aid sigh a year, -- I壇 say a year, but we are endeavoring to do that right now. The guy that had written the original report and done the work is still with the company. Mla is the group that did that work. But looking at it, wondering what we could do now in rec ta tpaoeug something like that is -- rectifying spheubgt, I don't know what we could do because we have actually excavated past the right-of-way already. We've put a shelf on top and excavated past the right-of-way. We don't even own that property anymore. And I知 talking about the deep cuts, the ones that I would think would be the focus of the most concern. How many items I致e addressed there?
>> what are we expecting on number two, joe? Your position is that it's been done already?
>> you're talking about the geotechnical letter? We want some -- a letter, formal letter from an engineer of record that will tell us if that wall is not going to fail and it will be a problem for us later. But if we don't get that letter, it means we have a problem. It means that however it got there, it needs to be an engineered wall. The wall is there, the natural wall will hold up and the geotechnical will give us a letter based on his knowledge of engineering science that the wall will hold. So that would be the easiest.
>> I知 sorry. I知 sorry.
>> that's all right.
>> tell me the response that I think that phillip has or the question that he has about why is this just kind of come about as an issue? I mean, given that these walls and these cuts have been out there for well over a year, I suppose? I mean, what happened that this all of a sudden has become an issue? I mean --
>> a lot of the stuff in the right-of-way was not engineered. Plans were not submitted to tnr for a review. So we've got things going on out there. We don't have certification from an engineer that's going to work. So yes, that is a problem.
>> I知 not saying it's not a problem --
>> I知 not sure. Are you talking about the actual masonry walls or are you talking about the cut?
>> I知 talking about the masonry walls in particular. I am saying that we would like to see things on the plans built as per plans. And when we find things in the right-of-way that aren't there, not even plans submitted, we're saying how did that get there and where's the engineer. So when we have a wall, even though it was on the plans, we want assurance that the thing is going to be -- remain as it is.
>> so it's a built wall, it's not a cut.
>> no, this is a cut. The one we're talking about indirectly here is the geotechnical letter. Basically we're saying, yeah, we see the cut, now tell us it's not going to erode as it is. And the engineer says it's not going to erode, hey, that's good enough for us. But we want someone of authority to be able to tell us that.
>> is that a standard requirement?
>> pardon?
>> is that a standard requirement for this kind of cut?
>> yes.
>> and we would impose a requirement before accepting the roads?
>> okay. My I understand if the areas we're talking about then are the areas where there are walls by the cut, but not the areas where there's cut with no wall.
>> I would say that it's the areas where there's cut with no wall that were cut and that was not on the plans, and when we go out there and we see there's a cut -- anna bowen from Travis County tnr. When we go out there and our inspectors see cuts and they weren't per plans and we don't have either the original construction plans or the site plan, and we go out there, now we're trying to bringing everything up to speed so we can accept it, this would be something that we would need to be comfortable, I guess kind of -- to get on the same page and to know that it's going to work. And I believe we talked about this on Friday and I visited with your engineer a little bit about it yesterday on this. So if he has any additional questions, have him give me a call.
>> is it the cut? If you're going down marly way and you take a left on olympus going into the neighborhood, are you talking about just the sheer part of how you had to cut to create that road? Because those are the biggest ones that come to mind whenever I think of this.
>> I would say that dennis was speaking to any cuts that were not in the plans. Any cuts that were made that were not in the plans, that did not have an engineer's seal behind them. That's what we need the geo tech to say is okay, and then the engineer of record will take the geo tech's report and then certify that and get us a letter and then that comment is fine. And I believe we discussed this on Friday and I had a conversation yesterday with their engineer about it, and just reminded him that, hey, this is something that we need.
>> did we not have this before Friday? Because that cut has been out there as long as I致e been going out.
>> right. What I知 not understanding is when you say it's a cut not on the plans, I don't think you could build the road without the cut.
>> well, I知 saying any cuts that weren't per plans, whatever was discussed in the meeting on the first, that's what I知 discussed. That's what we're talking about here. I was not out there on the first when all of these points were brought. That's what we're discussing.
>> do we have any fear that there's going to be -- that the geo tech company -- that an engineer is not going to okay that? I mean, have you run that by any of your folks?
>> our skwrerpb, who is the one that actually contracts with the geo tech company, he didn't feel it was going to be a problem, but we don't have the letter yet.
>> okay. But we're working on that?
>> we're working on it.
>> do you want to go on down the list with the driveway back fills.
>> we're going to hopefully start the backfill today on some of the drives. We're already supposed to have some material out there by this afternoon. All -- I知 not 100% certain, but most all of the pipe have been extended. I don't know that they all 100% have been extended. As far as getting it to an area where the slopes would be safe, I don't see that that's too many days to complete that.
>> we just need a little bit of cooperation with the weather. There's nothing on here that you think -- unless the geo tech guy is going to have a problem, but the physical things between the ditch, the irrigation, the backfill and the driveway and the guardrail completion, we ought to be able to get that done with any reasonable weather at all in two weeks?
>> well, now, when we're talking about the ditch now, I知 not sure which ditches we're talking about. There's roadside ditches over the entire project. I know we've cleaned them up two or three times because the grass is not down. Part of our delay of course was getting the irrigation in before we can get the grass down. What we're going to do now is the areas that are going to be not sodded, we're going to go ahead and hydro mulch those areas now. But the ditch work -- I know that there's a ditch off of camel back that needs to be reworked, and I met with the contractor yesterday on that item. He doesn't think that it's dry enough right now to do it. He thought it would probably be the first of next week before he could get his equipment in there and do that. There's a lot of ditch work to clean up. And I guess that's what anna was speaking about in particular.
>> I知 david greer from tnr. I think the ditch he's talking about is is the ditch that was eroded very badly during the last storms that drains down to that last culvert crossing. It's been washed out pretty bad and needs to be fortfide fide somewhat so it can withstand another gully washer.
>> I met with the contractor on that yesterday, and we're going to get right into it I think as long as we don't have a bunch of rain. If we can get the bottom reshaped and put some stabilization in there, it shouldn't take -- it ought to be able to do that within a couple of weeks if we get some dry weather, of course.
>> I would think where we need to go from this is by the end of next week we're going to know how these things are progressing. Obviously the following week is the time I would like for us to be able to open this road. Why don't we get a report by the end of next week. We can write it up and I値l get it to the court members so we'll know where we are and put this thing back on the 23rd. Do we even have to put it back on the agenda to literally vote to open it? Is that what we have to do?
>> I think there will also be a -- you will need to amend your construction agreement with the outstanding items that will still need to be done. So there's some certain on our -- certainty on our part that in spite of accepting the road all those remaining items will be done. I think an amendment to the construction agreement needs to be approved by the court and an end by the owner.
>> obviously I think the realisticking point, if there ever is going to be one here, with beth here and having written the letter, you all are certainly in a position to understand where we're trying to get the thing opened. Then it gets down to a liability, you know, standpoint. It's not that the bluffs aren't part of the county and understand that there are some things that we are very -- especially since we have an attorney here with the bluffs today that it makes us a little hedgy to accept something if there is something that likely happened to us where we have a lot of exposure. But you all see where we're moving. I think the developer is moving that direction. I mean, they certainly get the cooperation from our department to move forward, but at this stage, judge, I壇 say we just get out there and get after this project and see if we can't get these things taken care of so we can agendaize this thing on the 23rd and it can be open on the 24th.
>> I can say we have an extreme amount of pressure on us just due to the parade coming up in June. We also have an obligation to buyers and builders alike that we're going to produce the same kind of a subdivision that's in the front part of the development. So it's not like -- you know, as far as assuring the county we're going to complete, we have no problem with that. We're going to complete what we've agreed to do here.
>> well, I知 comfortable with that, phillip. I know that you all want to do it, but I also know that we can still use a road.
>> that's not a problem for us.
>> ... The roads not being worked on and you don't have through traffic. And I know the bluffs people will understand if we get out there and if --
>> there's traffic direction going on during that time.
>> we know that we're probably going to have to continue to be doing work while the road is open, and I know that the bluffs people will be understanding that, hey, we have construction people out there, we have cones, we have just -- we have to have a very slow speed to get through there. I don't think that they really care what the speed is, just the fact that we know that we get the road open and they can access it.
>> any other questions for mr. Gully? You and ms. Robertson work together, I take it?
>> yes.
>> and judge, ms. Robertson is in the audience there. Put a name with a face. Thanks for coming.
>> anybody else here on this item who would like to address the court? If so, please come forward.
>> I値l keep y'all fully apprised of everything.
>> judge, one other little thing. You had mentioned that there would probably be some kind of presumed speed before we get in there and actually do some studies. What do we think the presumed speed is going to be. Maybe that's a question for david.
>> we're going to put in an advisory speed of -- we'll probably put 30. It depends on how much stuff is going on there at the time. But if we have two lanes of traffic and they're unimpeded, I think 30 miles per hour would be appropriate.
>> which means should people ought not be travelling at 40 miles per hour right now.
>> it's got a pretty good slope. Going down it you've got to be pretty aware of your speed and you've -- your foot's got to be on the brake.
>> we have discussed today what staff deems to be important items on the punch list. Specifically five of them.
>> that's right.
>> what about the unimportant items?
>> well, we expect that the developer would continue to work on those until they're completed. And that would be the subject of the amendment to the construction agreement, so we're certain that those items would also get finished in spite of the fact that the county has accepted the roadway.
>> so does the developer have a comprehensive list of punch list items.
>> he does. And unless something else comes up, while he's constructing these items, this list was produced on April 13th --
>> what is the county's leverage after completion of the five items? Let's say that the five items are completed and the county does what's tapbtment to a conditional accept o. -- tantamount to a conditional acceptance?
>> we still retain a portion of the letter of credit, the fiscal, so if they're not pleated, we'll draw down that money and complete it ourselves.
>> and that typically is our tefr rapblg -- leverage.
>> that's correct.
>> Commissioner Daugherty's recommendation is that we have this item back on on may 23rd. And the developer is in agreement.
>> we agree.
>> now, for those looking and wondering, the weather has delayed progress, but the developer is of the opinion that he and his folk have attempted to move seriously and diligently towards completion of the punch list items.
>> that's correct. And we'd mention we've had probably close to eight inches of rain since last Thursday evening.
>> okay.
>> [ inaudible ].
>> okay.
>> thank y'all for coming.
>> anything else on this item? Without objection, we'll have it back on on may 23rd. Thank y'all very much.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, May 10, 2006 1:15 PM