Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Good morning. Thursday, February 26, back in house transportation. We heard two pieces of, testimony this morning related to, kind of state of the current situation on speed limits and how speed limits can or cannot be adjusted in the state of Vermont and on at least six different levels of speed limit issues and kind of where that road is. And then we also talked about transportation alternatives program in regarding to the transportation alternative programs and the water quality programs that break down the money and the limits. And what I'm looking at least for a little bit here, any open amount of discussion, where the committee wants to go or not on what you've heard. And I don't think we really finished the full conversation on sort of people's position on what we'd heard from earlier testimony in the regional planning commissions and your own town experiences. And I wanted to I think we have an idea of where we might go, but I want to kind of hear if there's more that we can kind of pick that up. I thought I had heard from the agency that they would say that, and I was thought we heard the alleged counsel is still in the room, the law is kind of a little unclear. It's not a simple area. I think that Representative Keyser teed it up actually the best there and talking about there's an awful lot of layers, or it's been layered over time in terms of there was a rule and there was add on to, and then there were some changes as different designations came along, and it of piled onto it. But now with the land use directions think you want to direct what Damien said. If it's not mentioned, then that's meant to assume that this is the way to go about it. I mean, that sounds confusing enough to me. I don't know. So that's where I wanted to start from, I guess. And then representative Keith here and talk a little bit about the layers. And I'm looking to say more thoughts on it, more concerns from your town, and then sort of what's the direction that we may or may not want to go in. And I think the agency at least said that from their perspective, it could be some clarity, and perhaps some more work. Thoughts? I don't know if I call on you there, Representative Keyser, but you sort of put us at a spot where I said we're gonna leave off on what you had last said, and then we'll try to pick up from there. You can kind of bounce back to where we Thank

[Chris Keyser (Member)]: you, Chair. When Dan Noyes came and spoke, I started doing research and I ran into all this. I was like, this is impossible. You can't, nobody can, anyway. Well, many people can't. So I would suggest, and based on the conversations we had with Jeremy, that we might ask the agency to come back with us next year. I guess they ask for more time to be able to understand how to go forward, or at least maybe Damian would want more time. But I would suggest that we try to clean up the language and come to some type of understanding of what allows us to change our speed limits. Because I'm not clear at all. I mean, I know some of the process, but as Jeremy talks about, we could, under some conditions, to be in conflict with federal rights. So we want to make sure we clear that out. So that's my comments.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: I can definitely concur with that, being to do more of a study aspect of it, but within that study, I think we should get on

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: the agency direction of what they should look at. And I really

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: think we, you know, just having three members, it's a lot of power, you know? So should we expand that? Should we put somebody from, you know, I think that's

[Speaker 0]: a great Robert, I

[Chris Keyser (Member)]: have his ideas, but

[Patricia McCoy (Member)]: Put Tom Hartman back on my ideas.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: You know, expand it, put on regional planning questions to put on. And maybe wait what they should really be looking at, the safety aspect of it, of direct that framework for them to come back with us and give us a package next year, but that would be fine.

[Speaker 0]: We're just got the hands going.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: We're gonna

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: go get her in here

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: and here. Piggyback on that. I mean, it worries me and we have examples of, there's three people on that board from V Trans. They decide what it is. There's no alternative. And I don't know if Heinzberg has struggled things through there. And it might be good just to have a couple other voices there speaking for the planning commission or Vermont League of cities and towns to get sort of a mix on there. Think that that, we're just gonna talk about that for now. That I think seems like a reasonable thing. And at the same time, study all the regulatory things to make sure we don't get ourselves into trouble. Although I think the example we gave, we agreed wasn't a real example, but it's potential, I guess. So that, if we can just simply simplify things, keeping it the same, but it's easier to figure out who does what, that might also be appropriate. The reason we're talking about this, we've all been sort of saying, hey, this is an issue for towns and villages. And then we got backed up by all the planning, planners who came in and said, Hey, this is what our towns want. They just want to be able to have a livable town, a walkable town, and that requires maybe lower speed limits and probably

[Speaker 0]: better enforcement. Yeah,

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: I think I'm interested in this idea of like a holistic approach and how, what are the opportunities to coordinate more purposefully with Act 181 and the designation program? And how can we help to ensure that the multimodal guidance addresses that sort of tension that I think is the challenge from the agency standpoint and the municipality standpoint, which is programmatic support for things, but challenges with on the street level design that are needed by the communities to be implemented, and how can that become something that is simpler for everybody to pursue, ideally less expensive, too? The guidance, my understanding is, will provide a menu of options so that we can move beyond the like Jeremy described Danville as the Cadillac version. That sort of gold plating is nice if you can get it, but we can't afford to the cost of that was crazy. So we need cheaper, quicker, more effective ways. And at the same time, we don't want to jeopardize the federal funds. So it's a complex thing. I'm thinking that a study that we are very focused about what we want to get out of it would be very helpful.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: I like

[Patricia McCoy (Member)]: the idea of expanding it, I like the idea of adding the regional planners, because they have the local perspective and the expertise as well. And I'm wondering, you know, when we've been hearing how it's not just the speed limit that's going to change it, how do we also incorporate the other street improvements that need to be done? Is there some way to set aside a pot of money for that within that program, or within that review? How can you put in a crosswalk or near all the lanes or whatever it is. So, a great idea to take.

[Speaker 0]: I'll just shut everybody down, so Representative Chloe, and then Representative White?

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: So I think AOT has the expertise, like the calming, the verbiage that I'm saying about the federal government, it's the calming implements that you put into place, it's not the signage. So I think we absolutely need them there. But I think the regional planning mission or VLC team will add to the conversation because their boots on the ground and they see what happens in communities. I really hesitate to have yet another committee set up, is there some way we could do this like informally? It's just one more committee.

[Speaker 0]: Hear you. I have an idea about that, which we'll get to, but we're going go over to Okay, the

[Candice White (Member)]: so I just did a quick Google search and see that there's a setting speed limits, a guide for Vermont Towns document from 2016 on the Vermont government website, which is a 31 page document.

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: I guess

[Candice White (Member)]: I would love to see this information in a two page summary so that it's clear to towns what the procedures are. Jeremy and Damien just took us through that, but it's a bit confusing. There's a lot of criteria for the different designations. I don't know whether towns are gonna read a ten year old report that's 31 pages, but a two page summary could be helpful. I also really like representative Lalley's suggestion that, how do we make this easy for towns? So the idea of here's how to do this for towns that they can opt out of it, just like, And I don't know the answer, but how do we make it easy for towns? Because I think we are seeing a lot of evidence from towns. They are asking for guidance on how to make this easier.

[Speaker 0]: I am not sure if you want to keep your hands up or more, David. This not sound this may sound a little bit in the other direction where you're going in terms of I don't know how easy and easy is a good word, but it means different things to everybody. On the part of the concern about the traffic committee, on the opposite end of that, I also have a concern that our chief engineer's example is true that the three person select board in Roxbury could put 12 a down to five miles an hour with no other interaction from the agency and for the people that use that highway. That sounds like an awful lot, almost too much power in the other direction with no influence and balance on that decision making. If we're saying that it's too imbalanced for the DMV and the transportation secretary and the public safety, the three of them with no representation from the other side, the idea that Roxbury could put Route 12 A down to five miles an hour without any input from the agency is got to be equally unbalanced.

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: It wasn't a real example.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: I can

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: come up with something.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: It's just as crazy on the other side. So, yeah. Well, there's a point there. I agree.

[Speaker 0]: Okay, so if it's some other town that wants to put it down to 20 or 25, if the agency and the DMV and the public safety don't have an input on that particular speed zone, that doesn't sound balanced. I appreciate that maybe that's I don't think anybody wants to go to five miles. I hope they don't wanna go five miles an hour, but might Use a different example, whatever it is. If we're saying it's unbalanced on one side with no representation, we've got to be able to say it's unbalanced on the other side. But that doesn't mean we want sort of the authoritative somebody's got to be the end all, that usually ends up in court. But anyway, to me that stood out as that's not balanced on either end.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: No, correct. And I think that's why you want a more cohesive track.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: And maybe you could potentially say the traffic committee can, if municipality makes a change, they could take it up. Not necessarily approve them all, but take it up if there's concerns. Act 180 If it was a balanced committee.

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: It's providing that common vision of what we want these places to look like. So there's that predictable sense of where we want to head with this, which I think kind of reigns in a lot of this so that I hope mitigates the agency's risk aversion, which I appreciate their concern about the Surface Reauthorization Act. There's a lot that they're very rightly concerned about, not jeopardizing. But I think there is some balance there. And again, would suggest that it might be helpful for the committee to just have a look at, to take some testimony on what other states are doing, to kind of have this more finer grained approach in the places where they've decided they wanna focus housing and economic development so they can have these nice things and a functioning highway network system too.

[Speaker 0]: I'd also want to emphasize that perhaps I didn't say it clearly enough. People in charge with our motorist safety related to enforcement and the vehicles moving on those roads should have some say over the travel and public that's coming through that road. Maybe that would make it more clear that in addition to the agency, the Department of Motor Vehicles and Colorado Public Safety are in charge for the safety of our motorists. They deserve a say on what speed limits are appropriate and not appropriate, but not an overall necessarily that overall veto idea of it, that does that's a concern that I should probably push them in the safety direction as well. They should have an influence over what rate of speed vehicles are allowed to travel, at least some say in

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: that particular part. Yeah, no, obviously I don't think anybody said taking a pump, but it

[Speaker 0]: doesn't But have they are not on the

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: return to that. They are on the left There is a public safety, emergency safety, DMV.

[Speaker 0]: I'm saying under the, isn't it if you become a designated downtown? Oh, you're talking about the upgrades. Don't have to be involved in them. That's a concern to me. In a designated downtown designated neighborhood, the people responsible for the safety of the people that's going through there should have some level of sense is what I would push on, what I was trying to get at in a more balanced portion of those two areas at the end. If there were six columns of things that happened, there were the two at the end that are going to be the idea that they can just go ahead and do it. That doesn't sound right to me.

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: Perhaps, Mr. Chair, we could look at that. I'm a little concerned about communities that have gone through all of that very intentional work, then having somebody arbitrarily decide that maybe this is not safe for them. Meanwhile, they've gone through a lot of work to implement and pay for some of this themselves, design conditions that do lower the speeds and things like that. So there's gotta be some kind of

[Speaker 0]: I was up there in that process somewhere,

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: I guess. This

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: is what I mean about setting really clear expectations. And then it could become almost like a checklist. You do these things, you're good to go. But there's got to be agreement about what those expectations are. And that's how you make a predictable system that people can feel confident signing off on. Right now, we have a predictable system that people feel confident signing off on that is focused on getting cars as quickly as possible from A to B. What we're trying to do is add that finer grained approach so that in the places where we want to have people living and just fiscally productive streets, we have those opportunities too. To me, that seems like what we're, in a nutshell, what we're trying to do.

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: I think Representative White's plan of having just like the one page or two page or so municipalities, when this, if there's going to be a provider, if it's an existing committee adding a couple of members to it, that municipalities can look at it and go, okay, check, we did that, check. And if there needs to be a drive by funeral AOT, then let them look at it because ultimately if they are in charge of safety and well-being, travelers on roads, then yes, they should have a look at it. But I really like the idea, and that's kind of like the one stop shopping thing. Can we just have it? We don't make it so hard for municipalities or members of

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: the public to do anything stable. Why can't we just have a check? That may require, well, putting the list together, we may want

[Speaker 0]: to change the language as to how it's all handled to make it simpler. On top of that, have a checklist of what it is today, but we are saying that we probably want it to be different than perhaps it should be different than it is, right? That's what we're So sort of along that, Representative McCoy's point of that and the earlier one in terms of the terms of committee, we have from last year's T bill, a two year program that's going on between the RBCs, Broadleases, the Town of the Agency on trying to make the grant programs and processes simpler and less of them perhaps are more concise about how the pieces are. We also have them working on the project related to how would you quantify an inventory, the entire need of towns and assets that are out there. I believe we have them also working on a third sort of transportation. All the players that we need are already on a couple of different committees. I don't know, the ether listens to what we're talking about here, If they're already coming together with various transportation related programs, what we're asking for also needs to be paid for or granted in through these transportation alternatives, bike pad, sidewalk projects. If we're talking about they sort of go together, right? We want traffic calming and bumps. They're paid through some of these, and of course, from their local loan money, but they're paid for through some of these programs. We're looking at how to simplify those programs, and we're looking at how to address this. Some way that we should be able to, without creating a new study community, find a way to add language or instruction that says something about pick this up and come back with recommendations.

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: And an additional charge to what we already gave them.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: I could do that, and in a policy plan, they have money set aside for these, I don't know what it's down to, but we can get that number, they do have money in the budget for doing this.

[Candice White (Member)]: And I would just add to that, maybe we insert some intent language, just kind of with this vague idea that we want to make this easier for towns to achieve safe traffic calming areas. It's something to that effect.

[Speaker 0]: Go ahead, Arfan. I was

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: just going to say, I just want to recognize that we are a little bit tricked in between because the multimodal guidance is still being worked upon. But it seems like this intent idea is really important because there's low hanging fruit that we can do right now. It's not perfect. It's not everything we want it to be. But we can kind of if this is an ocean liner, we're shifting it just to a degree that you end up in maybe a different continent at the end of the day. I think that's the way to sort of look at it. Like what are the things that we can do right now? It sounds like there's agreement on it's too overly complex. It's also challenging, and I know this from a little bit of personal experience through my work with one of the RPCs, the eleven eleven process, it's not a picnic for AOT either. It's complicated what they're trying to do. So they're trying to make a process that is not really suited for being able to make these determinations work. But the water in the sun, the simple things that we could do now to make this better for everybody as we work towards this fuller vision, which I think is where we're headed. And I think that's where the other committees of jurisdiction are trying to, a lot of people are trying to move Act 181 to. So kind of think of it as a trajectory. But I think one of the most important things we can do as a committee is integrate this with the broader land use goals of this body. And so we are in more coordination with the other committees of jurisdiction, which my feeling has been that there's been this, that hasn't necessarily been happening.

[Speaker 0]: I guess I would ask, David, these thoughts are collecting and we're going to be looking to sort of bring the agency back into the conversation and I guess the direction of a lot of VCs and a lot of these cities and towns about what we might be able to draft and consider sort of to address this issue that remember sitting in the seats next section would have some information about and understanding our intent that addressing speed limits, traffic calming, safety in towns, in designated development areas, designated neighborhoods, needs to be more clear and perhaps more balanced, and might require some statutory changes that we would want the committee that passes after us to really take a look at. Does that sort of sum it up, Matt? Yeah,

[Candice White (Member)]: just thinking through the process, could we request a two page summary of current, the way it currently is now, and perhaps an effective date, not June, but April, like something soon, just asking for it, like not a lot, but just like, let's have the summary of what's currently in statute. We can review that and with the idea that perhaps, was it next session, we would make adjustments to that. You know, but the two page summary is state our intent, ask for the two page summary with the idea that we would then probably ask for some changes next year or with kick it to the study committee that's working on some other things already. I'm just trying to think of like, so that we don't have to wait a year or six months to get this pretty simple document that we want to share for ourselves and also with towns to kind of demystify the process where we are right now.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: You're just talking about a request audit, something that

[Speaker 0]: the bill, you just want

[Candice White (Member)]: Well, and whether we put that on.

[Speaker 0]: No, think that could

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: be accomplished just asking the emails.

[Candice White (Member)]: Without putting it in the bill?

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: I am correct, yeah. Take it Putting with

[Speaker 0]: one or two of our members together with the agency and our alleged counsel, could probably draft something of that nature without making it to the level of bill.

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: Well, not that draft, just ask them.

[Speaker 0]: They're probably listening now. Right, I'm saying we're not using it. I think what I'm saying is that

[Patricia McCoy (Member)]: Are you getting this?

[Speaker 0]: Someone has a picture of what she wants. If they would invite her to that particular discussion, it would help her get what she wanted. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I'm trying to get at.

[Candice White (Member)]: And I don't think I'm the only person who wants that.

[Speaker 0]: No, no, no. You just have to be the one that has

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: a clear vision of what they want. It would help

[Speaker 0]: them draft that. We don't need a law to do that. We have people that are supposed to support us.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: And sort of to build on that, another two pager that a municipality could get that would show them here are all the ways to do traffic comment. And for this, these grants are available and these are the three or four or five methods that you can use besides reducing the speed limit because we know just reducing the speed limit isn't necessarily gonna do it. Here are the other ways to do it. Because for Einsburg, we don't own the road. To get an eleven eleven permit to do a bump out, that's not gonna happen. It just isn't gonna happen. But maybe traffic calming speed signs might be something the town would be willing to do. So here's the price range, here's what we recommend, here's if you want to put some bump outs or on street parking, here's five or six things you could consider. And here's avenues to get it done. Right now I don't know that that's I mean other than the planning commission, the regional

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: Planning change can help. Yeah. I

[Kate Lalley (Member)]: just wanted to say that VTrans is very, very accomplished at controlling the speeds when they need to do work in their right of way. And so I would suggest that this offers an array of opportunities that could be covered under an eleven eleven permit for demonstrating to a community the benefits of having slower speeds. So some of this is, I'm concerned about some of the smaller places that aspire to this, but are feeling completely overwhelmed. And that is the kind of thing that RPCs would be perfect for handling. Like a two week demonstration, what would it be like to have a crosswalk here? Or narrower lanes that maybe you could actually walk in some of those on your state highway. What would that feel like? So they have the opportunity to kind of get in the queue and become that kind of a place in the future, which obviously we have to figure out how to pay for all this, that kind of thing. But to give them a taste of that, I think is really important.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: I know they're still in

[Chloe Tomlinson (Clerk)]: the draft stage, think, but that completes the streets design, the errands, the engineering and AOT presented several weeks back. I'm not quite sure when that's finding ways to get the old academy, that seems like it may be a great asset to municipalities to use for this particular block that we're having here, because it was all about, she spoke about howling, traffic howling, using trees and like Chester, I remember she brought up Chester and what they did. So, there are things there, I think that's what perhaps a white two pager can say, you know, check this out, and have a hyperlink to The Complete Streets whenever it finally does become out of draft.

[Speaker 0]: Okay, we are adjourned for lunch break. We're back at 01:15, and we're going have a conversation this afternoon about this transportation alternative piece that we heard just going on earlier also as far

[Timothy R. Corcoran II (Vice Chair)]: as Burlington first and then we'll have the

[Speaker 0]: company