Travis County Commissioners Court
Tuesday, August 10, 2010,
Item 17
>> 17 is to discuss and take appropriate action related to planning assumptions to be used by broaddus and associates for the development of the travis county central campus master plan, including a, parking permits and zoned parking will be used to maximize county assets by up to a 20% increase in utilization in the future.
>> good morning, judge, commissioners. Rodney rhodes, executive manager of planning and budget. Leslie strickland is here with us today. Belinda powell is out ill and is not able to join us. For these items covered in item 17, first and foremost i want to stress that these are planning assumptions only. We are not --
>> should i read all of them. I guess i read a. But b is travis county will overtime reach a five percent reduction in demand for parking through the use of alternative modes of transportation. C, existing resources throughout the area will be maximized to offset the need to build additional structure parking for visitor and juror parking in the central campus. And d, parking structures developed for visitor and juror parking will be pay to park operations, constructed through partnerships that serve the area of the potential garage, not a single use garage.
>> thank you, judge. Again, one of the things that we want to try to stress this morning, as we move forward with our scenario development to take forth to the public and bring ultimately to the commissioners court, what we are asking the court to do is bless these assumptions for the scenario building purpose, for the long range master plan to 2035. This is not a request to change any parking policy at this point. We are simply asking that these planning assumptions be used for the scenario development as we go forward, and as always subject to change, based on policy, both long-term and short-term, but it will provide our consultant with the ability to move forward in the development of those scenarios as we begin to prepare for speaking with the public in general and then ultimately bringing a recommendation to the commissioners court based on public input.
>> i guess the problem i have with d is -- and it basically is an assumption to require pay to park operations, if we do construct a garage. That's what that is?
>> yes, sir.
>> and if -- when i think of jurors, we have a hard enough time getting people to serve. And if we tell them we want you to come down, leave your job, serve as a juror for a day or multiple days and we expect you to pay for your parking, if we have a county garage, i guess i have a problem with us assuming we will do that. Now, it may be that ultimately we need to, but i would strike jurors from the -- from that assumption myself.
>> we can certainly do that, judge.
>> when i read about that, the more i thought about it, the less sense it made really. I think we ought to try to provide free parking for jurors to the extent that we can, and the assumption should be that we will provide free parking for jurors that voluntarily provide their service to us.
>> understood.
>> i mean, am i missing the mark on that?
>> no.
>> otherwise if the others are assumptions that we can deviate from by policy as we deem appropriate, the assumptions make sense to me.
>> yeah. These are again, they're planning assumptions. As we build the 2035 plan and take into consideration the geographical consideration of the downtown campus, the hope is that we will minimize the need to build additional parking structures through using these assumptions. We'll have to test the assumptions going forward to ensure that that does happen. But we feel very confident that these assumptions will allow us to move forward with some scenario development to minimize additional parking structures in this master planning effort.
>> okay. And i guess i don't have any problem with leaving juror in c because what we're saying is that we will maximize the use of existing resources to the extent possible to eliminate the need to build some sort of parking structure.
>> yes, sir.
>> right?
>> yes, sir.
>> any other comments? So on these, my only recommendation would be to strike "and juror" parking from d. With that i move approval of 17 a through d. Any more discussion on the motion? Anybody else? All in favor? Show commissioners eckhardt, gomez, huber and yours truly voting in favor. Commissioner davis temporarily off the dais. That motion carries unanimously.
>> thank you.
>> okay.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, August 10, 2010, 2010 1:30 PM
