Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, June 1, 2010,
Item 16
Number 16 is to authorize purchasing agent to commence negotiations with the most highly qualified firm, hiewt huitt-zollars inc., rfq number q 10091-lp professional engineering services for hamilton pool road improvements.
>> good morning, judge and commissioners. I'm steve with tnr. Where we left the project or this issue last week was i believe commissioner huber asked that it be delayed a week so that she would have more time to speak with her constituents. What is requested of the court today, though, is approving tnr and the purchasing office to negotiate a professional services agreement with hiewt sollers for the design of safety improvements to hamilton pool road. So that's where we are.
>> thank you.
>> okay. Mr. Reeferseed, if you don't mind, let's have people who have property on hamilton pool road have the opportunity. And you are kind of like a county employee, these days, mr. Reeferseed.
>> i'll take a job with you.
>> but we will get to you before this item is over. We have three seats available for residents. If you would give us your name we would be happy to get your comments. Now we have four chairs available. Morning.
>> good morning. Hi. My name is annie borden and i have a three-minute d.v.d. That i wondered if we could show to you just to show you the area that we're considering, you're considering.
>> media, do you have that?
>> they have it.
>> can you show that to you now?
>> we're ready to go, judge.
>> okay. Government.
>> please, if you will, look at this. It's the area that we're talking about that we treasure.
>> is there music? There should be some sound.
>> it was done yesterday or the day before, sunday, memorial day weekend. And there were 11 cars. __ this is the river. We started late. It was on sunday. It was memorial day weekend. My husband and a neighbor went out and videotaped it. There were 11 cars. This is memorial day weekend, a lot of people come out to this area. I hope you can see how beautiful and scenic it is and how untouched and pristine and how much we treasure it. There were two bicycles. It went really fast, but you can have it if you would like, look at it again if you need to to make your decision. Anyway, i'm a resident out on hamilton pool road. I live on the river just across the bridge, hammonds crossing, and i'm the president currently of our subdivision, la tierra. And everyone i have spoken to has said that they -- everyone is very clear that they do not want this area developed. We don't want it. We don't need it. And we can't afford it. As it is, we don't -- the development that we have is small and i have maps to show you how small it is. You can see there's very little traffic. Very few people using this area. There's not a lot of water out there, so we really don't want to encourage a lot of development. I think that any money that we spend on making this road wider, that road that you just saw will encourage development that we the taxpayers will pay for and it will destroy this beautiful area that the people who don't live there that come to it, use it for recreation, it wouldn't be nearly as enjoyable if there were bigger areas on the side and more people and all this other stuff. And straighter. People want to make it straighter. Why? So people can go faster? And so i'm just here as a resident and speaking for quite a few other residents saying that we really hope that you will not -- not have -- pass this bond or they have the bond passed, but approve this development of this scenic area from ranch road 12 to the river.
>> i would like to see nothing happen with this road. I'm frightened of the language in the ballot that was included in here that said that we needed to prepare for a four-lane road. I don't know if even just putting on a bike lane will increase the safety of this road. It will increase it for the bicyclers and most places, yes, but it will also make the cars drive faster because of the optical illusion of the road being wider. It's just people drive faster when you have a seemingly wider road. And as it is, when people come and slow down for a stop, right now it can be -- it's a country road. We all have to stop for our neighbors. The language of the ballot i've always been upset about. It made us believe when this ballot was approved by the county that we were approving a road with only a bicycle lane, but later it became apparent that no, we were approving a road for four lanes and a bicycle lane. And a lot of us in the neighborhood feel that this was -- it's kind of like -- i think i've stated it in a letter to karen hughes, this is government incrementalism -- huber, i'm sorry. Oh, god. I'm awful with names. That this is governmental incrementalism. It might be a tool for you, but it's a curse for the common citizen because we really do not know what we are looking at, what we're dealing with, what we can protest against, how to put a stop to it, when it seems that -- when we understand what it really is, the train is already coming through the door and there are no brakes available. This is what we have a problem with. During the ballot, you know, we weren't even allowed to vote on the road alone. We had to vote on the road with a park that the entire county wanted. It was a guarantee that this road was going to be passed from the get go. And then to have it morph from one type of road into another type of road and now we still really don't know what type of road it is. This is -- it makes me want to pull out my hair. It's just going to go gray. You know, to me from an outsider, i am looking in and it's just governmental charades, i don't know what i'm looking at. And i would really like to see the language. I said it last week, i'll say it again, struck from -- the language about the four lanes struck from this -- from the goals, from the directions to the design crew, and i'd like to see the whole project shelved. What we could really use are two turnarounds for trucks on either side, you know? I mean, that's what we could use. I mean, i ran into a stuck truck driver down there one day and i asked him, you know, didn't you see all the signs? He goes yeah, i saw the signs, but there was no place to turn around, so i thought i would take my chance. I said well, you're going to get out halfway on this bridge and you're just going to be sitting there. And then even if you magically get beyond that, there are one, two more, even more severe curves up on the other side of the road. As for your concern where you were worried about the sale and money, i could make jokes about money laundering, but will not do that.
>> thank you so much for that.
>> [ laughter ]
>> you know, there must be procedures here that -- because i seem to remember having voted on stale money in -- where do we go to elections and you have all sorts of little things, odds and ends where government is cleaning up. I'm an artist type. I don't know what the details are for those type of things.
>> that was just a procedural question because this is bond money so bond money is dedicated. So if they don't use it for one purpose, my question was what do we do with it and is it transferable or do we have to diffuse it. It's banker talk.
>> the other thing of comparing brodie lane to hpr. I've been here since '74. I remember brodie as a cul-de-sac. And i remember when they opened it up and all of a sudden i was going, gee, i can drive from buda to west austin. I can -- i don't have to go down i-35 during rush hour. That's really cool. Because i was a reverse commuter. And so i used that a lot, you know. And i understood that the neighbors didn't like me using it because they in their minds saw this as a cul-de-sac. I don't see as it is right now, you know, brodie is an urban road. Hamilton pool road is not. There are no other right present populations and i don't see even from campo's projections that there are going to be large populations out there beyond that would be using this road as a cut-through even if you did put reimers road in there. I mean, i think that that's the only way that you could ever make hamilton pool road into a brodie is to connect it with reimers, you know, to 71. I think then -- i doubt, you know, even then it's going to be a brodie. You were talking last week that you wanted to look ahead and to to foresee problems with a lot of future planning, but what i see when i -- i see creating problems with future planning, creating the need to -- the pressure to (indiscernible) development instead of creating a pressure that would actually cause denser development closer into town. I mean, sometimes the actual problem of driving creates density where it's needed instead of -- i mean, that's how i see it.
>> that's absolutely true. And my remarks weren't going to planning, it was going to our lack of ability to plan. We don't have the ability to plan in counties. We don't have any zoning authority. The only tool we have is where we put roads.
>> well, and i do -- you know, my last point is that i've never seen a road designed that has had the esthetic ability to deal with the hill country beauty, you know? I mean, i think miriam wright wrote a letter that was really beautiful that really pointed towards what we really treasure about living out there. And i just really am sick to my heart that a road design crew has the ability to come in there and just totally destroy what we already have. Thank you.
>> thank you. We have three or four others who would like to address the court on this item. So after you finish, we will need your chair. Okay. Who is next?
>>
>> [inaudible - no mic]
>> we need you to speak into that microphone there, please.
>> i have been a resident of hamilton pool road for 20 years. After 20 years the number of resident households in the hammonds crossing area is still approximately 20. My husband and i have been blessed to live simply in a cabin on a wild texas river, the pedernales, about a mile up river from the historic bridge at ham mitt's crossing. Built by fm 962, the western extension of hamilton pool road ranchers, which has been declared structurally safe by both the travis county bridge examiner and the texas department of transportation. Up river pedernales state falls park is a series of sliding falls dropping over 150 vertical feet of 300 million-year-old limestone. Lyndon b. Johnson state park and the historic park are further down the pedernales river. Buffalo ford where great herds of buffalo once cross sheriff's department about three hours up river by kayak. The river's natural features include dramatic bluffs and curving sandy beaches before ma'am mitt's crossing with west cave on opposite banks followed by cypress creek and reimers canyon. The pedernales has been protected by development by the good land stewardship and esthetic sensibilities of ranchers since the texas republic inspired by them and by west cave and hamilton pool reserve and reimers ranch park, we have spent the last 20 years of trying to restore our property with the intent of willing it to the reserves. We have an idea of an expanded reserve on both sides of hamilton pool road inclusive of the bridge at ham mitt's crossing. In 2007 this vision was shattered by a campo plan to build a four lane divided highway from highway 12 which would dead end inexplicably at the blanco county line less than two miles from a new bridge spanning the canyon. Neighbors protested this scheme and former commissioner gerald daugherty requested a campo representative to change hamilton pool road from a four-lane highway to a two lane hill country arterial. It is so des i guess i guessnated in the 2035 campo plan. In 2009 our bridge qualified for the federal off season bridge program, fallout from the collapse of the minnesota. Txdot present add plan to the community which involved excavating, blasting 20 feet of preserve up to a height of 100 feet along 120-foot line to keep a lane open during construction of an expanded bridge. The excavated lane would then be retired so damage to preserve bluffs was not only unthinkable, but unnecessary. This developer driven plane was also defeated. Regarding hamilton pool road, txdot is operating under at least two wrong assumptions. Travis county dead ends less than two miles from westgate preserve at the blanco county line. After ham mitt's crossing it is difficult to determine what is travis, hays or blanco counties. Hamilton pool road is not a travis county throughway. Convention national thinking tells us that expanding a road or bridge will make them safer. This may be true in some cases, but not in the case of ham mitt's crossing where a scenic road carved from bluffs cannot be expanded even if the bridge is expanded. There will be more traffic at higher speeds. In 20 years the only accidents i've seen driving or hiking across the bridge almost everyday are 18-wheeler drivers who even though they've been warned still try to make curves that will never be safe for large trailers and trucks. Those who don't expect a one lane 16 footbridge wouldn't necessarily respect a two lane to 10 feet lane bridge and would be better off on parallel highway 71 and 290. For txdot to tie bicycle lanes voted for in the 2005 bond election to their twice-defeated agenda to widen the bridge at ham mitt's crossing, construct reimers peacock road not even included in the 2005 citizens bond committee and expand hamilton pool road to four lanes is reprehensible. Bicycle lanes will make the roads safer, but if txdot insists on use them to push through the developer line, it would be better that travis county not proceed with the project at this time. We support reassignment of the funds to bee cave road between sh 71 and highland boulevard, a project that has real safety needs. Hamilton pool road preserve called the jiewl of the travis county park system, was polluted by construction of the ranches at hamilton pool subdivision. Travis and hays counties, the state of texas and affected tax county property owners want a 3.5-million-dollar lawsuit against the developers. Travis county will use its 2.1-million-dollar settlement to take on the responsibility of cleanup in hamilton pool and along hamilton creek. How much more environmental damage will be done to the river and the bluffs by attempting to straighten out ham mitt's crossing switch backs. It's irresponsible to say fog if hip cret kel for the county to approve a plan that will cause even more destruction to the bluffs and the river. The water pipeline on hamilton pool road from highway 71 to highway 12 fueled a developer free for all. Build now and bully later for services. It was as easy to get a subdivision approved as it is to drill in the gulf. Travis county cannot regulate land use outside of municipal areas, nor can it regulate housing density in subdivisions. Are txdot and the county working together on an environmentally sensitive road which ends in a network of preserves and is unprotected by city codes. On what data is txdot basing their 20 year projections? Why should long-term residents of hamilton pool road suffer because developers refuse to regulate themselves? Thankfully the lcra has no plans to extend the water pipeline further. Alternatively hamilton pool road residents would like to apply for the federally funded transportation enhancement program. Projects should go above and beyond standard transportation activities and be integrated into the surrounding environment in a sensitive and creative manner that contributes to the livelihood of the communities, promotes the quality of our environment and enhances the esthetics of our rote ways. To be eligible at least one of the following 12 categories must be incorporated. Pedestrian and bicycle facilities, safety education for bicycles. Acquisition of scenic easements and scenic and historic properties. Seenic and historic roadway programs. Landscaping beautification. Historic preservation. Operation of historic transportation buildings, structures and abilities. Control and removal of outdoor ra advertising. Environmental mitigation for water pollution due to runoff. Maintaining habitat. Thank you for the opportunity to be heard.
>> i live on hamilton pool road and i want to say that i do concur with my neighbor's feelings here. But i did want to just mention a few things that i didn't mention last week or that i did not include in the e-mail recently. I need my glasses. This is terrible. Sorry. I did want to remind the court that it is not just the neighbors here who want to see these i am proomplets, safety -- improvements safety or otherwise not happen on hamilton pool road. But also in -- there are other people throughout the state who find hamilton pool road to be a treasure and a beautiful scenic road and don't want more improvements to it. And one was the 2005 texas legislature, who protected hamilton pool road by prohibiting any off-premise signs and billboards. Additionally in 2009 the texas preservation -- preservation texas designated hamilton pool road as the most endangered place. And this was in large part because of that explosive runoff back in 2007. This is a beautiful road that doesn't need the kind of improvements that we're seeing in this design. Nor does it need safety improvements. I would hope that we really take a hard look at encouraging unsustainable development. We have no water and we don't have a population to serve here. So i would ask that this approval not happen. Thank you.
>> thank you.
>> my name is charles harrison. Our family has a ranch on hamilton pool road. We've -- we haven't been out there since 1949, so we're relative newcomers. I'm here mainly just to kind of balance this thing since everybody seems to be totally against it. I'm not sure how many of these people actually drive the road. You know, on this stretch of road is hamilton pool itself and the milton reimers ranch, which is being promoted for dirt bike riding and so forth. These are two parks that we're all proud of in travis county, and i think we should have good access to these parks. These people are acting like this is all for development, all they're worried about is the bridge across the pedernales. And that's fine and good, but the real truth is that this road goes directly to two of travis county's prime parks, and it's a shame to have a dangerous stretch in that two-mile -- you know, in the six-mile stretch where people, visitors, travis county residents can get hurt. And i can tell you from personal experience that there's dropoffs of up to six feet where if you -- if a bicycle went off, they would go down six feet and could get seriously injured. If a car went off, it would obviously turn over. All we're talking about here are shoulders to make a dangerous stretch a little bit safer. If i were guessing i would think the people that recommended this were the park personnel because they're the ones that drive this stretch everyday. If you talk to your own people, you would probably find out they know how dangerous this is. And you can do a movie like they did three minute deal like they talked about. For instance, saturday i was out at the ranch and i was driving back in and i passed seven bicycles riding in the stretch between our ranch road and ranch road 12. So there are a lot of bicycles. The motorcyclists like to use this area. There's no place for anybody to pull off. It's a dangerous stretch. And i think it's a popular area that we encourage terrorists to come into and it's a shame that we have one of our worst stretches of road which could endanger these people. And she mentioned something about an alternative proposal for rather than doing an engineering study on this road, to do an engineering study on -- on Bee Caves road between state highway 71 and highland drive. This is a stretch of road that i've driven for many years. I've had a lake place at inverness point since 1987. My dad had a place on bee creek since 1954. So i've driven this road -- i drive both of these roads all the time. And there's no question that the relative safety factor is far more dangerous to drive hamilton pool road than it is to drive that stretch between state highway 71 and the new highland road. The only thing that's gotten dangerous there is the new entrance into the -- into big rough, which has changed the road flow for Bee Caves road. And i think for a safety standpoint, which is what i understood the purpose of this engineering study was all about, there's no doubt that this road needs to be made safer. I've had family members turn over on this road. It can be dangerous. It's very narrow. It's hard to see because the trees grow out almost to the sides of the road. And i think it's something that needs to be done.
>> mr. Harrison, your family ranch is part of the peacock ranch, isn't it?
>> that's right.
>> is it not true that you have at least in the past entertained ideas of developing that ranch?
>> that's right.
>> and is it not true that you would need the reimers peacock road to help facilitate the development of that?
>> no, that's correct. -- no, that's not correct. As you know, we have rescinded on providing the roadway for the reimers peacock road because you were against it.
>> i had not heard that you had rescinded.
>> well --
>> mr. Reeferseed?
>> thank you, sir. My name is ronnie reeferseed. And i'm against war. And i agree with this gentleman about we need to think this through and i'm definitely in favor of safety improvements like bicycle lanes wherever their possible. But then i also understand and agree with the fact that they might call it a bicycle lane this week and next week they will squeeze in some special deal and phrase and by golly, there's suddenly a four-lane highway there. We have to stay on top of these things and prevent overdevelopment. And as a property owner, proud property owner out in that neighborhood, generally speaking, i cherish the little bit of wildlife that we still have. And widening hamilton pool road would be a mistake. In my mind. And if we can do the bicycle safety lane improvements without further expanding the road, that would be my prif rens and recommendation as a travis county tax paying property owner out there. I think it's really important that we maintain this incredible little bit of wildlife that we still have. Thank you so much.
>> thank you. Mr. Priest?
>> thank you, judge. Morris priest speaking on my own behalf. I was going to ask steve manila a question. I wanted to talk about this item. Do you know if this part of the road is where cecil perkins had requested a light i guess 10 years ago? Are you familiar with that situation?
>> no, i'm sorry, i'm not. I'm sorry, i do not know about that.
>> okay. I do know that cecil perkins, i've known him for years and don smith and all these firefighters and everything, and we grew up in this community. I'm a native austinite. I'm 55 years of age. And i've been on all these roads and i just see the same exact lying that went on the last time about this 45 southwest. Everybody is against it and half the people in this room that i've known for years told me yeah, we really weren't getting -- we really weren't against 45. Those people are getting the shaft. We think it will add added traffic to mopac and the txdot numbers showed that's absolutely not true, the only difference is those people have to leave about 45 minutes early to actually get on the same part of mopac that they would already be on. But this was voted in and i have never voted for a bond in my life and i wouldn't vote for bonds especially after what i've seen this last time with what this court did. And it is related to this because that's actually what we're talking about, this was another voter approved bond and if you're uninformed, don't come in here crying later on after the fact. This isn't an environmental issue, this is an issue of safety. And we've had -- that's the most dangerous damn road that i can think of in this county actually. And they need these improvements. And we have had people killed out there. I was out there one time we had a motorcycle accident and people were coming around these corners, i went down -- just stopped some traffic in one direction, came back down and stopped traffic in another direction, had to go quite a ways to make sure i'm past the two curves because of just the way people were driving. I mean, it's just a situation where you just come up on this situation. And so you almost have to like do go down two curves in a row to get ahead of time. There's been lives lost on this road. And it's been voter approved. And there is absolutely -- all of this -- totally off topic, judge, we have got to --
>> please stay on topic --
>> we have got to stop this environmental bs up here. If it's not on the agenda, these three minute videos, save our springs and this is not an environmental issue. Thank you.
>> thank you. Mr. Oleg.
>> good morning, judge. I'm michael olek with hiewt huitt-zollars. We were the firm that was recommended and clearly support tho this project has waind in the last six months. I've invested a lot of time and energy in this project. I live about 10 miles from this area in hays county. No offense, judge, but i've moved out of travis county. But i do understand the residents' concerns. From the start we were forming a time that could deal with the issues, mostly the safety issues, but i do understand the residents' concerns and i will yield to those concerns. Thank you very much.
>> yes, sir.
>> hi. My name is tom wald with the league of bicycling voters. I'm also the chair of the austin bicycle advisory council. I have to admit i was just made aware of this meeting about half an hour ago, but i've been somewhat familiar with the issue about hamilton pool road and the opportunity for installing shoulders on that road for bicycle safety. And i have to say that i just want to express what -- my perspective on it. But at the same time i -- i've heard concerns about sprawl and i certainly am not -- you know, that's the problem in itself. But i just want to make it clear that hamilton pool road and that part of the austin area is a place that i don't go very frequently, at least i haven't in the last two years. I sold my car a few years ago, so i -- but i do take camping trips and i try to go camping as much as i can without using a car. I bike out. It takes me a couple of hours to get to a campground, whatever, not very long. I live in central austin. And hamilton pool road, i know that road from driving it, and from -- yeah, i've been to hamilton pool a bunch of times. It's not a road that i would really want to bike on. I think there are a lot of people that probably have to in the sense that there's not really any other roads in the area. And that is the only way to get to hamilton pool. That's my primary concern is that we're -- on a local, on an austin level and then also on a national level, there is a lot of sentiment. People are realizing that we need to make roads available to all users and that includes motorists, trucks, bicyclists and pedestrians. By putting a shoulder on that road, that will definitely increase the mobility access for bicyclists and for pedestrians. And that's what i would like to see. At the same time, if you do make it so wide that like this man said, that it could be curnd into a four-lane road for cars, you will increase the development potential out there and you will end up having environmental degradation. You're also going to be having a sprawl -- a sprawl habit that's not really sustainable even economically because it's much more expensive to put in utilities or a wider area like that. And so that's a concern i have too. And from my perspective, i would -- i would like to hear more about this. But i just wanted to on owe wanted to address those things. I'm not sure if this is in the process and whether it can be put off or not?
>> are you aware of the fact that this portion that we're talking about we're doing engineering on is just from highway 12 to the river and that there would not be bike lanes planned to my knowledge any time in the near future on hamilton pool road from highway 71 to highway 12?
>> no, i'm not aware of that detail. I would say that that's often how bicycle facilities get put in, in parts, but then i would question why the whole thing wasn't being done.
>> thank you very much. So my question for staff is if we take out references to the potential of a four-lane road in the future, what safety improvements do we have left?
>> in addition to the bike lanes, we were going to --
>> so are we talking about bike lanes now in the section that is posted today?
>> yes. Between -- this was intended to be permission to allow us to negotiate a design contract with huitt-zollars between ranch road 12 and the pedernales river, and one of the elements of that design was going to be bike lanes. In essence paved shoulders on each side, five foot on each side.
>> okay.
>> and then in the process of looking at that stretch of road, we would also look to improve any curves, to improve sight distance or hills or valleys to improve sight distance. Then on the roadside as well if there are any obstacles too close to the road by our standards or if there was a non-traversable culvert, driveway culvert, we would put a safety treatment on it, that sort of thing. That would have been pretty much the extent of our design. And one more thing. While we were going through this rfq process, we did -- some of our consultants did identify some issues with the bridge at hamilton creek that we would like to have a design for as well.
>> so how important are these improvements to promoting safety on this stretch of the road?
>> well, i believe they're very important. It's not a real wide road. It does wind, it does go up and down. And if you're sharing the road with bicyclists that can be problematic, particularly if you have two lanes of motorists at the same time you're trying to get around bicyclists. The project was -- i believe it was promoted as a safety project when the bond referendum was put forward in 2005 as well.
>> so if i understand the residents' position, you definitely don't want the four-lane possibility mentioned. But are you against the other improvements? That steve has just described?
>>
>> [inaudible - no mic].
>> you may if you use the mic? Mic.
>> okay. Five years ago plus this road was put on the bond list of choices for the county to determine we need the safety improvement for this road. Now, i would ask tnr and mr. Manila from what statistics did you determine that this road was unsafe? Because in the past three years there have been -- and i asked mr. Harrison as well. It's such an unsafe road. These are all anecdotal things. We could all find roads that yeah, in front mif house i had an accident last year and it was terrible. Well, how did you determine that this was an unsafe road? Because i spoke with chiefly dardo last thursday who said off the top of his head he looked at this map, which i would have forwarded to you, but you can't see the road identifications and it would be difficult to see. He said we have no problem here. It's what it is. We haven't had any increases. There are an average of -- of 9.2 call incidents a year. So -- and they're just calls. They may be accidents as well; however, they are calls that they went out to. So how did we determine that this was such an unsafe road? I just -- and i ask mr. Manila this.
>> i wasn't here at the time that the on -- that this was put before the voters. I was working in another state. Some of what i've heard the folks talk about that would apply, the idea that we do now have a new county park out there, the idea that hamilton pool is off of that road, west cave preserve is on the other side of the river. Those are all traffic generators. Right now the traffic out there in portions of it is pretty low. But it will, i think, continue to grow for folks who like to go to hamilton pool or the new park or to west cave. Actually, the statistics -- i looked through some of the information the students presented to us and some of them went to the extent of identifying numbers of accidents up and down the road and where they occurred, and there's clusters of them. And it's more than a dozen that i could see; however, i don't know how -- what period of time that they actually pulled those statistics for. And we could probably get that information for y'all. If you need it.
>> so i hear residents saying that these improvements are not needed at this time. And that there is no data showing that the improvements are needed. Is that true?
>> i can't say whether that's true nor not, judge, as far as the data goes. It may exist. Whether it qualifies for what we consider a high accident location, i do not know. I'd be speculating on why this particular road was put in to the bond referendum.
>> judge biscoe, the speed limit was increased about three or -- in the last three, four years. They increased the speed limit from 40 to 45. Which i argued at the time was not a good idea because it is an unsafe road. And it is a preserve area. This is an visual impairment en. If i was going to use the money, i would say use the money and design entrances at the pool and at the park there at reimers because there's a blind spot. Those are safety improvements. It helps get people into the park and into the pool, and it would go a long way on safety issues. The other thing you could do is like at bell's spring road where people have to stop because you're turning is put a curve lane where you could go around those cars. You've got that all the way from 71 to 12. Very dangerous. There are several spots. Of course we know txdot is not going to do anything to that road for years. So if you're talking truly safety improvements, improve the entrance to the park and to the pool and some of those areas where people are going fast like at bell springs road and go around to folks. There's a -- and lower the speed limit back to 40. People need to slow down in the preserve area. We have the bccp. Why can't we have a hamilton pool preserve? We've got hamilton pool, reimers ranch. We've spent millions of dollars buying that property. We have west cave preserve there. You're talking about 150-million-dollar bridge across that ex-pans for how many people? It doesn't make sense. And if you really want to talk about safety improvements, those are my suggestions, use must not to design the entrances to get people out of those blind spots when they're going to the pool on busy days. It was the holiday weekend. I was home all weekend. There was not that much traffic. When they start going down that hill they're topping 40, 50 miles per hour and they have to be careful because there are bad curves. But this is an environmental issue. It is a water quality issue and it is a development issue.
>> can you identify yourself?
>> yes. I am a resident of -- i'm speaking as a resident today. Of hamilton pool. And i am right before bell springs road on a very curved area. The road is basically a very angled one. You have to cut into the wall. I find all kind of artifacts out there. It's a preserve area. The indians were obviously there. There's flint, there's natural springs. You know, the piece of property across from me is the highest point in the county and there's natural springs at the top of that hill. So it's just a very precious air and we've spent a lot of money, taxpayers, to buy hamilton pool over 20 years ago and then to buy reimers park. And ride your bicycles there.
>> sir, we would be happy to get your comments.
>> through this whole process had we did our soq and talking with the county safe, this has always been a safety project. It's not been an opportunity to increase the capacity of the road by having the four lanes. That was mentioned in there as something to look at for the future. What i'm hearing from the neighborhood and from these neighbors is very important. We all figured out with the team we set up that they wanted this to be a context sensitive design. It would be very interactive with the neighbors and really work with them about safety improvements by adding bike lanes, by increasing the left turn lanes in at some of the intersections, things like just were talked about. The whole purpose of this idea and this process is for us to spend time with the neighbors, identify the safety issues and then concentrate the improvements that the county spends money on in this project with addressing those needs. There's not a predetermined project here. This is not one of those kind of projects like a highway project where you know we're going to design a certain type of road and put in certain bridge improvements and so on. It's my understanding that the construction for this project stops before we get to the river. That the switch backs are not being addressed and that the bridge at hammitt's crossing would not be addressed. We know it will happen some day maybe in the future, but it's not part of the scope of this. The scope is to do safety improvements from the river back to 12. You keep hearing the description this is from ranch road 12 down to the river, but it's not including the river. It's not including going down through there. There's not money in your budget to do that bridge. That bridge would be very expensive. But these are all safety improvements, things to do that will help not only the residents to have it safer for them, it will be safer for bicyclists and pedestrians. I mean, my goodness, you have two major parks. We've talked $150 million that was invested by the county to have these parks. And part of the biggest part of those parks is having a place for bicyclists. But they can't get to it unless they use their car. You had one gentleman up here who said i got rid of my car. I do everything by bike now. He can't get to the place set up for him to have recreation. So i wanted to mention that listen to go what's been going on. And just -- like i said, my understanding is it's a potential project manager of this project is that we need to work with these folks very definitely. And with the county staff. And this is a safety improvement project. Okay?
>> commissioner eckhardt?
>> just a couple of questions for staff just in the triage. We do have so much need for safety improvements in the county generally. Where does hamilton pool road sit in the triage of the safety improvements?
>> for that precinct it would not be my top priority. I was thinking if you all were to say here's so much money, manila, if you pick the best project that you feel is the best bang for our buck, it would not be at the top. Someone had suggested improvements to -- it's actually bee creek road from 71 to highland boulevard. I would put that one ahead of hamilton pool road. The reason being is that area where highland boulevard is is developing. They have the water. They are platting. And we helped to build highland boulevard, which is a four-lane road that now connects to just a two-lane road, this section of bee creek road. I think we need to finish the project as four lanes out to 71. There's also the issue down at 1626 and manchaca road, the pass-through financing. It's another one that we ought to put money toward before we put hamilton pool road. But those are the top two, i would say.
>> i do have concern being a biker myself, but i'm a skirt biker.
>> [ laughter ] i don't do the long haul, black microshort trips. But so many of my friends do and they're very interested in access to hamilton pool and to reimers ranch. With regard to putting bike lanes, i would be very interested in a higher degree of bicycle access to our properties, but i am concerned that txdot controls the portion of the road between ranch road 12 and 71, so do we have any idea what txdot plans are for the future with regard to improving bicycle access on that stretch?
>> and commissioner huber asked that question last week in trying to get out of txdot what are their long-term plans. It's not in the 2035 plan. We asked if they have -- the three year plan, 10 and 20 year. It's not in any of those plans. We talked a little bit about the illustrative list last week. I don't think txdot would use that because they don't have a mechanism in which to grab right waive as platting occurs, a platting organization like we are. But it doesn't look like they have anything in the near term or even 20 years, but things change. And if they do, then they could change their approach to that section of road.
>> that did come up last week and i know commissioner asked where txdot was in this particular issue. So i'm not going to ask the question again.
>> and my own opinion as a cyclist is there are some wonderful amenities for bicyclists, but if the intervening stretch makes it difficult, then i won't go access those amenities as a bicyclist. If it's really safe for three miles, but the five miles getting to the three miles is hair raising, terrifying, then i will find another way to get there.
>> i have hays county relative to the campo plan and on a lot of their roads they wanted to add bike lanes and we listed those as individual projects, but the campo staff said it wasn't necessary. Those are in the back of the plan under grouped projects. There's one for pedestrian and cyclists and there's another one for safety improvements. Those kind of projects don't have to be listed individually in the plan. You have to have the money to do them. I don't know what txdot's plans are for that section of the hamilton pool road, but if they had the money and they're short of money now, they could make the shoulders bike lanes without listed in the plan. They still have to go in the tif, but it would be in the generic route projects is my understanding.
>> which the generic grouped projects is quite problematic from a planning standpoint for those of us who advocate for increased bicycle and pedestrian facilities. Our history has been piece meelg those and often when you piecemeal it, you spend money for an amenity which is to say it is underutilized because you can't get to the darn amenity. And i'm mindful of that as a cyclist myself.
>> commissioner huber.
>> i would like to point out that when the 2005 bond election was passed that i was involved at that time as a citizen. The whole southwestern part of travis county was just exploding with growth. There were lots of subdivisions taking place, there was tremendous amount of population growth. There were lots of dreams on cocktail napkins out there about dividing properties. And part of that bond package was -- which i believe has already been done, was engineering-- money for the money for reimer peacock road. There were great plans to develop huge parcels of land out there. In the last five years, at the time that the 2005 bond package was passed, no one knew the economy was gaining going to take the turn it did -- was going to take the turn it did in the last several years and no one knew that lcra was going to get out of the wholesale water business. They were running lanes everywhere at the time this bond package was passed. The so a lot of those pieces of this bond poj were designed to -- bond package was designed to help with the perceived growth out there. But with the economy changing and the needs changing and the loss in dollars for available dollars for construction projects, it's become so important that we really exercise fiscal responsibility and throw our dollars towards where they really need to go first. And i just reiterate what we've already talked about briefly, and that is i really believe the horse needs to come before the cart. And i see the section from highway 12 to the river on hamilton pool as the cart. And if we don't get the larger section from 71 to highway 12 fixed -- and that's outside of our purview. That's txdot. Then it's going to be a stranded asset out there. Of our money. And safety, there may be some safety issues here. I think it would be great to have the bike trails, but i do believe that this kind of money could be better directed where there are more safety issues and where there is a higher need. Therefore, judge, i would like to make a motion. I would like to move that the court direct the purchasing agent not to proceed with negotiations for a contract for the design of improvements to hamilton pool road.
>> second.
>> and that we hold the bond funds in reserve for the time being pending further review by bond counsel as to the possible reallocation of those funds to another project.
>> second again.
>> that reallocation brings into play a whole lot of legal standards. I'm not sure what was on the bond package. There were multiple projects, i take it, of which this was one.
>> yes, sir.
>> yeah. So that will require legal advice to transfer that to another project.
>> i've had conversations with rodney about that and he's had brief conversations with bond counsel. If you want two separate motions i can separate it owvment.
>> one molestation is fine. I think that second part would be controlled by legal opinions anyway. Seconded by commissioner davis. Discussion? All in favor of the motion? Show commissioners davis, eckhardt, huber and yours truly voting in favor. That motion carries unanimously. That means basically we halt this project.
>> thank y'all.
>> thank you.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, June 1, 2010 2:35 PM
