Travis County Commissioners Court
April 17, 2007
Item 20
That is number 20, which is to consider and take appropriate action on the following items: a, acceptance of dedication of street and drainage facilities for briar creek section 1, section 2 and section 3, three subdivisions in precinct 1. And 20-b is license agreement with the briar creek owners association, inc.
>> this one is a little unusual, I guess, joe, right?
>> well, only in that there were some issues wrashd to the street -- with regard to the street that needed to be corrected prior to the tnr making a recommendation to the court for their acceptance. This is -- the subdivision is located in northeast Travis County. To the east of manor. The area has high shrink swell soil. Clay, when it gets wet expands and contracts when it dries. So the roads had some particular issues that needed to be directed, particularly where the utilities were cut in the road. When we first went out to inspect the roads, we said certain thing had to be corrected. And we had the applicant's engineer take a look at them. We came to agreement on what those remedies should be, and they have now been taken care of. And so we are recommending to the court that the roads be accepted. I think there's probably a larger issue raised here with regard to the county standards in eastern Travis County for pavement sections. It's not just particular to this subdivision. As we experience more growth in eastern Travis County, we -- the engineers within tnr have basically come to the conclusion that we probably need to beef up our standards for future subdivision streets, in part because of the nature of the soils in that end of the county and the number of new developments that are going on there. That is a different issue. We are currently in discussions with the design community as well as technical advisors on what those new standards should be. And we'll be be recommending some changes to the Commissioners court when we come forward with our final subdivision rules. So with that said, I think this is probably a precursor in terms of road issues. We believe we've probably taken care of these particular issues as best as we can at this point.
>> move approval of this item. And let me say this, moving approval of this, there is a significant problem with the way that things shift out in precinct 1, and also precinct 4. We both have some of the same similar type of deals as in your precinct.
>> right much.
>> and we need to look at something I guess in the future on this particular issue, and I don't know what policy or what standards we can deal with because it's going to continue to be a problem with us, but I understand that they have -- the way I'm understanding this, joe, as far as our acceptance of the road and drainage as it's being in that area, that the developers have gone back and have complied with the necessary thing that y'all have laid in place and then happened to correct these things. So I guess due to that, after the inspection and everything else was done, it's ready to be accepted into our maintenance as far as rod rodes are concerned.
>> I'll second your motion, Commissioner.
>> thank you. So it's just a matter of sometime in the future how can we best serve precinct 1 and also 4 because of the conditions of the soil in that area? And I know another date of discussion we'll have to have for that, but as of right now I would like to move approval since you have gone through the process and having contradicted what those problems were at this subdivision.
>> talk to me about the license agreement. In b. All right. Since you don't like that one, let me try this one.
>> [ laughter ] we're asking for a million dollars worth of insurance and a 500,000-dollar security deposit.
>> I'm sorry, judge, I'm not prepared for your question.
>> my question was about the b, whether we routinely request the two of them. I can understand -- that's with the neighborhood association, right?
>> that's correct.
>> it's for landscaping, judge.
>> it was a combination of security deposit plus insurance that I guess caught my attention. I see what they're for, but have I just been overlooking that in the past and this is routine?
>> I'm sorry, judge, I'm not --
>> it's standard county form, and I would say that -- I can't say authoritatively whether it's our regular practice to provide cash security deposit and insurance, but I think -- they serve two different purposes. The insurance covers us on liability, which could easily exceed $500, so I'm not sure what the $500 cash is for, but the insurance is definitely to cover potential tort liability. That is standard. I'm not sure what the intent of the cash deposit is.
>> I really thought it was a softball.
>> that's all right. I'm so focused on the road issue, I wasn't prepared for that. If you would like, I could get an answer to those questions before you take action.
>> no. I mean, if the association agreed to it, I guess they think it's fair and reasonable. It did kind of jump out at me. I don't have any issues with it.
>> are the standards that we're applying to the roads in this instance with the hooefg and the clay, are these going to be precedent setting for our standards in our final subdivision plat regulations?
>> absolutely, the new standards will be precedent setting, yes.
>> is this repair in line with what that precedent -- does this set a precedent?
>> I think we'll go beyond. There are some fundamental issue that we will change in the standards the. The engineer and the developer of this subdivision used the standards that we currently have in place, and there are some calculations that are done that have some level of discretion, and it is in that discretion that you can get to the thin side of thing, and we need to kind of beef it up so that we have a better standard to start with so that future developers would know how to calculate what goes into those pavement designs.
>> does this have relation to setting regional standards for roadways outside of the subdivisions as well, for those that the county is maintaining?
>> no. This is pretty fb what would be for subdivisions. It wouldn't be -- we typically have a geotechnical firm advise us on cip projects that is specific to that project, so they'll go out and do bore samples. And the design engineer will design that road specifically on that set of information. So we have standards, but we also pretty much are specific to the cip project when we do it. We are talking about kind of global standard that all developers would be using for subdivisions. We believe that standard should be different on the eastern side of the county than it has been on the western just because of the nature of the geology. And that's what while try to do, we'll try to tail tailor or standards.
>> any other questions? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you very much. Good to see you again.
>> didn't even need to say anything.
>> that's the way I like it.
>> just not used to it.
>> [ laughter ]
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, April 18, 2007, 8:34 AM