Travis County Commissioners Court
August 14, 2007
Item 14
14 is consider and take appropriate action on the master plan for milton reimers ranch park in precinct 3.
>> good morning, Commissioners.
>> [inaudible] t.n.r. And brent from land design partners is here too. And they are the firm that's completing the planning and design work for us. And larry howford is in the audience with mwm, formerly martinez
>> [inaudible] and he's here on call in case we have any questions on architectural issues. As joe said we're here asking for adoption of the master plan. We came to the court in may sction for approval to go out to the public with the proposed plan. We opened up the public review process at the end of may and closed it June 29. We had meetings throughout the county. We advertised it, issued press releases. Received e-mails and comments through the meetings. So what we want to do today is give you an overview of the plan and then hit the highlights of the public review process. And I'd like to hand out copies of the power point presentation so you can follow along. Brent, are you ready? Okay. Thad is getting --.
>> thank you for the opportunity to present today.
>> [inaudible] we are the project lead for the development of the reimers ranch park master plan. The presentation today is going to follow the packet that ms. Caparata gave to you. As you recall in may we came to the court with a proposed master plan and asking the court for permission to go to -- to the public for review and input. Essentially just stepping through our schedule, that's the last item from the bottom, the may 23 through June 29 was the time period that we did go to the public for the review process today. And as the last item shows there, we've incorporated many of the public input comments from that time period and ask for your adoption of the master plan today. Part of the public review process that we went through is that we notified the stakeholders of the different forums that they had the opportunity to review the plan. Basically to discuss the issues with the knowledge that we were going to again incorporate those items and comments for adoption of the master plan in front of you today. The stakeholders that have been involved throughout the process of the master plan design included the different user groups, both historical and potential, the future user groups out there, neighborhood associations, youth organizations, conservation groups as well as other special needs groups. The county went through a very thorough process of notifying these stakeholder groups through press release. There was e-mail and distribution flyers. Ads were placed in the newspaper as well as copies of the plan were also shown on channel 17. The different review opportunities that the stakeholders and the public had were the different libraries, the history center, the website, again, channel 17, the copy center as well as our public meetings. There were five separate public meetings that were held, one each in each of the precincts and then here at Commissioners court as well on the dates that are indicated in the plan. The plan was presented and also we received public input at those meetings that were captured in the master plan document that you have in front of you. I wanted to review a little bit again in regards to the context of the scope of this particular master plan. The acreages that were purchased, the county's part of the bond, the two items you see highlighted were the actual study area that this master plan looked at. The next slide that we just wanted to go, there are some historical existing uses you see with the hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing, fishing being the predominant activities, but also including bird watching and the river. Part of the master plan we have in front of you incorporate rates and enhances existing opportunities but also provides a lot newer opportunities for the site and that's the column that you see on the right-hand column of the side. Two additions from when we presented to you back in may was we have added star gazing and as tro ca viewing activity as well as horseback riding. Overall about -- overall the concept plan itself, I wanted to hit the highlights again. There's much more detail on the website and the master plan in front of you. But essentially infrastructure improvements to the site include a backbone infrastructure of roadway systems as well as the wet-dry utilities to the site. One of the things that are charged for most county and the public was to make sure that infrastructures were a light touch on the land as well as a light touch on the county's pocketbook. And so what you'll see in the plan is that most of the infrastructures go to the main entry and to some of the major activity nodes, but throughout the rest of the park there is not those wet and dry utilities run throughout. There is a very significant trial hierarchy. Six distinctions of trail. If you will follow my curse or, that multi use trail accommodates biking. It does accommodate hiking and equestrian use on that perimeter trail. We also have nod to that 14-foot wide trail we have a hike and bike trail that is purely just that for hiking and biking uses. We also have an extensive network of mountain biking trails as well as an area that we're going to expand to the east of the site for potential mountain biking. We have probably one of the most components we have-accessible trails if you go to the site right now, even though some trails are located on a flat terrain, we wouldn't actually call them accessible. So that's another component that we're proud to have as an addition to this trail. And then we also have a very primitive trail that utilizes both the river corridor as well as some of the existing trails that are out there for primitive hiking. I wanted to highlight several of the activity areas, and I'm going to do so on the screen in front of you. The areas that you see that I'm circling in red were the primary activity nodes. Throughout the park. Basically those activity nodes, as I'm going to go through on the next couple of slides, are very typical in nature of what you see here where we have parking and restroom infrastructure as well as pavilion and gathering infrastructure there. All the improvements with a light touch on thend la. We happened to make sure we're use liesing the trees in existing terrain where we can as well as just to make sure for instance with our parking we're not putting in a large see of asphalt. A little about the character of those improvements. You've seen this before with our previous presentation, but basically using indigenous materials, using materials that make sense to the site as well as to the historical architecture, not just on the site but throughout all of southwest Travis County. This also shows some of the character. We're not talking about just a typical concrete slab with a pavilion on it, utilizing some of the existing trees, materials for benches, et cetera. One of the areas that I circled, of course, was down by the pedernales river. There's about a quarter mile stretch of the -- of area, parkland along the river that we're officially calling the river terrace. Basically it opens up that stretch to hike and bike trail trail and provides vehicle access down to a turn-around that will allow access to that area. Several other items that aren't part of the physical plan but are part of our -- what we went through as far as importance and making the plan successful and sustainable as we move forward is basically our environmental plans that will accompany the park. Certainly with the cedar and mesquite, oak wilt control, that needs to happen on the site. That needs to continue as the county continues maintenance of the property. One of the most unique opportunities is potential for cypress restoration. The picture you see shows some of the natural beauty of the cypress that are out there. When the dam was actually built several decades ago there was a lot of cypress harvesting and that was another things in our planned target is reintroduce the cypress to that part of the river. On site restoration with some of the activities needs to occur and also just the inclusion of the wildlife habitat management. Certainly whether it's bird species or wildlife that's an important component of the plan. One of the things that we are charged with from county throughout day one is making sure that we're at budget as we move into the phase 1 development. You can see the breakdown of the cost estimate that we have here. I'm going to go ahead and move to the next slide because that's really the one people tend to move towards anyway is the bottom costs. You can see with the 5.1, that does dove-tail right in line with what was approved with the 2005 bond. And thals includes that -- that number includes a 15% contingency as 8%es sca laition cost. Our budgets were based on today's cost and escalation puts us to our anticipated summer bid when we go out for the improvements next year. With that, I'll turn it over to wendy.
>> I'm going to start explaining or hitting the highlights of our public review and I'm going to start on a positive note which is what revisions we could make to the plan based on the comments that we got. Quickly, that's a lot of horseback riding, give astronomers space, modify the trail system according to comments we got from the mountain bikers and climbers. And in that process, we are reconfirming our commitment to work with those groups in the field in the next phase of design to work out the details of that trail system.
>> pose a question right now. But my concern is, especially with the horses and the multi-use of the trails, would there be competing interests as far as using the trails and maybe some folks out there at the same time, how will it be -- how will you police to make sure that, an example, horses stay within the confines of the trail and not be running all over the place off the trail? How is it going to be handled?
>> I'm going to let parks answer that, but that is a question that came up from parks.
>> oh, it did? Okay. Well, I just kind of -- parks.
>> currently we have to deal with that on a day-to-day basis with the mountain bikers because we have trails out there right now and the mountain bikers stay on the trails because it's really kind of an educational process that we have to go through with that type of user group. Equestrians are going to be no different. We're going to have to cathy them and those that ride off the trail, they will be asked to leave the facility. I mean that's basically how we'll deal with it. From an operational standpoint, we -- it's not a frequent occurrence for multi-use trails to incorporate equestrians, but it does go on. The international mountain bike association recognizes a trail design that incorporates equestrians and bikers and they attended some of the meetings and from an operational standpoint we think we can accommodate the equestrians on a set trail. We will have them go opposite direction from where the bikers and the hikers will go. They will go one way and the equestrians will ride the opposite way so when they come on each other they can see each other. That's how we're going to manage it.
>> so will it be for that four-mile radius?
>> right.
>> and it will be counterclockwise?
>> that's how we'll manage it. We were skeptical from the -- I've always been kind of skeptical about it, but as I talked to the membership for the mountain bikers and the equestrians and we did some some research on our own, we realize that we can work with these groups. And if they are willing to work with each other, we think we can accommodate their needs. We just -- we can't -- I don't think we can operationally have them ride all over the place, and putting them on a four-mile trail which they agreed was workable for them, I think operationally we can manage them there without a lot of conflict.
>> okay. I just wanted to pose it. Thank you for your response.
>> the four-mile trail issue was key to our dialogue with the equestrians. We initially said no horse back riding because we couldn't fit in a 10-mile trail, which is the recommended Texas parks and wildlife standard. When we went out to the -- had our public meetings of -- you know, some people wanted access to the mountain bike trailer which neither the mountain bikers nor we supported. Some people wanted access to reserve land which we're not making a decision about that land, how it's going to be used yet, but they did say four miles was okay so we did get that loose trail going -- loop trail going. Let's see. What we weren't able to accommodate, we didn't decrease the parking that the mountain bikers had asked for in the vicinity of the -- they have trails over here, and, you know, we have -- are putting in new trails. And they felt there were too many intersections. We modified it in terms of eliminating some sections of the hike and bike, now multi-use trail, but we felt this was an area they had to actually compromise on. I'll jump down to -- let's see, oh, the decreased parking. We're eliminating parking in the river canyon, and that was per request or recommendation by the lcra. So we needed to find parking elsewhere, and we also wanted to spread it along the length of the river. So as I was saying, we felt the mountain bikers had some give here. They couldn't be the only ones having access to this part of the park, which is, you know, some valuable real estate. One of the other things we couldn't accommodate was a.d.a. Facilities on the river. We're not building any structures in the river canyon. We do have vehicular access to the river and we also have access to -- there's a mid-terrace -- brent pointed out this activity area here. Excuse my scribbles. So they can drive down to the river and they can also drive and park at the mid-terrace level where it's going to be picnicking. Opening the reserve land, I already addressed that, we're not going there now. Preserving the land. We got questions about how we're going to use that land in the long term. There's been some discussion of it possibly being sold and funds -- those funds being used to buy parkland elsewhere. Our position with the master plan is we're not designating that -- that -- we're not making that decision at this point in time. Clothing optional use, we're not providing that. Our county attorneys have interpreted state law that no one under the age of 18 could be allowed in the park so we're not going there. Camping. We're not providing general camping or camping for the general public. We have camping at pace bend park, and we can't provide enough camping in this site that would justify the expense of managing it. I mean it has a big impact on o&m costs. However, one thing I want to address here is since placing the master plan on the agenda, we've gotten a few comments, and one was a question about our position that there would be camping permitted for special events out there for the organizers of those events. And they had -- they questioned whether or not participants in those events could be allowed. So we want to refine -- modify our position to say participants can camp out there with a special permit; however, it's for special events that are tied to a facility at reimers or a resource. So mountain climbers, climbers, mountain bikers and boy scouts, for example, could be issued permits because the
>> [inaudible] are there, the trails are there, the boy scouts come out and clear cedar. Those are things that relate specifically to that park.
>> what's our definition of camping?
>> they -- it would be basically an open area. They would have water and electrical service nearby. For instance, the mountain bikers could camp in an area adjacent to where their trail head is.
>> overnight stay?
>> yes. And we wouldn't be, you know, putting in special infrastructure.
>> so if they were to come one morning and leave late evening, it's all right, but overnight is what we're saying?
>> we're saying those groups could stay overnight with a special permit.
>> but there's a general prohibition against staying overnight except in special circumstances.
>> that's right.
>> okay.
>> sports field. We did have one individual come forward and asking for sports fields. He did leave the meeting, the public meeting that we had agreeing with us after learning more about the park that it wasn't appropriate. We don't have the water for the fields and constructing fields would require too much clearing of trees and extensive site grading. So that's not accommodated but also ultimately wasn't a real request.
>> so did we promise sports-fields when we acquired the land?
>> not in the bond process. It was clear in the bond process that sports fields would not be part of the master plan or the parks now. We do have a commons, an area that's it's an existing hay field that lend itself perfectly for an informal play area. So that's a feature that we're going to have at the park. Let's see. Okay. There are -- and brent already touched on these. The o&m issues that came out of the public review. Cedar and mesquite control is something that numerous people identified as being important. They want to preserve that open landscape. They don't want the other plant communities, native plant communities taken over by cedar or mesquite. After hours use, with the astronomers using the park, we need to have a policy for who and when, and what we're proposing is that the astronomers, and I think they were all affiliated with the Austin astronomical society, that they would host star parties for the general public and then those individuals that did that would be allowed to come out to the park on other nights on their own to star gaze.
>> what is the curfew for the park?
>> dusk. Dark.
>> so if I'm an astronomer and I belong to an association, I got access to the park, but if I go out and buy my own equipment to do it my way, I don't.
>> if you hosted -- and you wouldn't necessarily have to be part of an organization, although it might be harder to contact individuals that aren't, and yes, you would need to be participating as a host for a star party.
>> this is a public park, not that I do it right now, but after retirement, I might want to buy some equipment and spend a little more time in reimers park star gazing. I don't know that I'm going to seek an association membership.
>> we wouldn't want to prohibit you either.
>> the state parks allow star gazing parties. How did they handle it?
>> I'm not real sure, but we can check and see how pedernales falls does it and see what criteria they use.
>> and, of course, they have an overnight camping and primitive camping. It might not be a perfect comparison for us.
>> and what issues and objections they have.
>> right.
>> how they have dealt with them.
>> transportation for disabled. This is something they identified as an important amenity for them. We are not offering to provide that service but we want to to work with the community to see if there is another means much getting that service to bus people from basically the Austin area out to the park one or two days a week.
>>
>> [inaudible].
>> I'm just wondering, I best --
>> because it is so rustic, I'll have to research that and get back to you.
>> another question is what's the right thing to do whether required or not.
>> pardon?
>>
>> [inaudible].
>> yes. Yes.
>> while you are doing research, john, best practices for a.d.a. Achievement.
>> o&m issue also is managing the wildlife recreational user inter phase and that's something that parks does for all their parks, but one of the specific comments related to there's a wild turkey habitat area out there. And they are concerned that introducing that multi-use trail through that may be a problem. So we'll keep an eye on that and also when we talked with mountain bikers who would be the group that comes to that area also or climbers, they were very receptive to that being managed, perhaps having to be closed on a -- you know, at certain points during the season. And I already talked about the special event camping, but there would have to be a process of just per permitting. And I just want to close with -- bring you up to speed on the few comments we received since we put this item on the agenda. We had one equestrian come to us asking either with the multi-use trail either to have the trail extended to the area for expanding the -- putting in an advanced mountain biking trail, and we responded that there wouldn't be enough trail to make a significant difference for horseback riding. I don't even know if we would get half a mile so we're still way below the recommended standard. That area is most suitable for advanced mountain biking. It's on the opposite side of the hill of where their existing trails are and they weren't developed there because there is a property line going between reimers and hogue. It's the only steep site so it makes sense to put that use there. They also asked access to reserve land which we're not providing. That was one person. We had two equestrians contact us and thank us for accommodating the use, and we had someone bring up the issue of camping, the special event camping. So thank you for your time. I don't think there's anyone in the audience, perhaps there are, that want to comment on the plan.
>> do we have an executive summary of comments?
>> no, we don't have an executive summary.
>> they are all in, like, a comments folder or something?
>> it's in the -- it's in the master plan. There is a section that provides all the comments we receive and they are organized by topics. And then there's another section where we respond to specific topics. So what is it? Section 5?
>> both of those are append diss to the master plan.
>> you are looking for action next week?
>> we were looking for action today, but --
>> [laughter]
>> just one additional -- should we have comments from adapt? I know these other groups network with them.
>> I met with adapt and they are the group that wants to work with us on access to the park.
>> I will need a week. You have campo and our budget to thank for that.
>> oh, okay.
>> but I'll be ready next week.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you very much. Appreciate you all's good work on this. You all have put me in a park mood.
>> it's beautiful work too. If anyone would like to take a look at these, the master plan is beautiful.
>> and it's on the county website.
>> good work.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, August 15, 2007, 18:30 AM