Mr. Chakravarthy called the meeting to order at approximately 12:12pm. Self introductions were made. The following members were present:

Transcription

1 CITY TRAFFIC ENGINEERS (CTE) ASSOCIATION BI-MONTHLY MEETING, WEDNESDAY, October 12, 2011 MEETING MINUTES CALL TO ORDER/SELF INTRODUCTIONS Mr. Chakravarthy called the meeting to order at approximately 12:12pm. Self introductions were made. The following members were present: Sri Chakravarthy City of Agoura Hills Frank Benavidez Mohammed Mostahkami City of South Gate Scott Ma City of South Gate Stephen Yanez City of Downey Conrad Lapinski City of Dana Point Sam Morrissey City of Santa Monica Steve Libring City of Riverside Loretta Mustafa City of Claremont Maria Tipping City of Claremont James Keena City of Whittier Eric Lewis City of Moreno Valley Dennis Barnes City of Buena Park Chad Veinot City of Fullerton Eric Zandvliet City of La Cañada Flintridge Melissa Murphy City of Rancho Palos Verdes APPROVAL OF MINUTES Motion to approve the minutes of the August 10, 2011 meeting was moved by J. Keena and seconded by S. Yanez. Meeting minutes were unanimously approved. LEGISLATIVE UPDATE 2011 Draft CA MUTCD S. Chakravarthy provided the legislative updates.

2 EDUCATIONAL FEATURE No educational feature. OLD BUSINESS CTE Traffic Commissioners Workshop Update South Gate Location and Survey Results The group revisited the discussion from the previous meeting about the Traffic Commissioners workshop. S. Chakravarthy went over the two options for venues that have been narrowed down so far: South Gate and Pomona. E. Zandvliet inquired about the pricing of the Kellogg-West Center at Pomona. S. Chakravarthy provided the anticipated pricing and a description of the setup of catering, printing services, parking, etc. tied to the use of the facility. D. Barnes stated that there would be no fee for use of the facility in the City of Buena Park. He added that food would have to be catered into this facility since there is no on-site food service available. He asked S. Chakravarthy to view the facility after the next ITE meeting that will be held close by. E. Zandvliet asked about the capacity of the Buena Park facility. D. Barnes replied that he believes it can hold about people, but that he would check to make sure. E. Zandvliet asked S. Chakravarthy about the Long Beach facility. S. Chakravarthy responded that he had not had a chance to investigate that facility and will contact Long Beach. S. Chakravarthy concluded that there are thus three, or potentially four, locations currently being considered to host the Traffic Commissioners workshop. E. Zandvliet stated that he likes the Buena Park location since it is right on the Los Angeles County/Orange County border, so that it could draw people from both counties. M. Mostahkami stated that the proximity of the facility to the freeway is an important aspect to consider. S. Libring commented that Buena Park is a common destination that many people are familiar with. S. Chakravarthy added that there is plenty of free parking available at the South Gate facility. Regarding the online survey results being used to determine the preferred day of the week to hold the workshop on, S. Chakravarthy informed the group that only seven responses had been received thus far. 2

3 M. Mostahkami commented that he prefers to have the workshop on Friday, since it does not ruin the weekend for people wishing to spend time with their families and also allows those to attend that could not do so on a business day. E. Zandvliet pointed out that many Commissioners are working people and cannot attend the workshop during the week. A survey was then taken of the members in attendance at the lunch meeting and the following preferences were obtained: Prefer the Traffic Commissioner Workshop to be held on a Friday: 5 Prefer the Traffic Commissioner Workshop to be held on a Saturday: 9 S. Chakravarthy asked the members present at the meeting to forward the link to the online survey to their respective Commissioners, if they have not done so already, in order to get more responses to the survey. S. Chakravarthy explained that a couple of the dates being considered for the workshop are March 10, 2012 and March 17, E. Zandvliet responded that March is a good month to have the workshop since it avoids most Commission elections. S. Libring commented that the location should be set in the next two weeks. E. Zandvliet added that the letters need to go out to the potential presenters and that the police officer is usually the hardest presenter to get. E. Zandvliet and S. Libring commented that the Attorney usually winged the presentation and C. Veinot added that the Attorney was also often difficult to get for the workshop. S. Chakravarthy summarized that there are three items that need to be decided by the next meeting: 1) The date of the workshop 2) The location of the workshop 3) A list of possible presenters for the workshop C. Veinot said that the printing of the binder containing the instructional material was a big part of the cost for the workshops in the past. E. Zandvliet suggested doing a combination of printed material and electronic material stored on a compact disc and C. Veinot agreed that he was thinking about the same thing in order to reduce printing costs for this year s workshop. 3

4 M. Mostahkami stated that some of the agencies may have trouble paying the $75 per person so to consider giving a price break to agencies that send multiple people to the workshop. E. Zandvliet stated that in the past, the Association has always made some money on the workshop. He added that the people attending were usually split between those who were sponsored by their agency and those who used their own personal funds to attend. NEW BUSINESS/SPECIAL DISCUSSION TOPICS E. Zandvliet passed out handouts on retroreflectivity requirements that will go into effect on January 1 st, He explained that Los Angeles County is not providing a service for compliance with this requirement to the jurisdictions it provides contract maintenance for. E. Zandvliet added that there has been some discussion at the federal level on extending the deadline for compliance, but that agencies will have to wait for the final determination. D. Barnes stated that he has been spec-ing out Diamond Grade retroreflective signs for the last 15 years, including street name signs. He added that his City has the advantage of having its own sign shop. L. Mustafa asked about the repercussions of not having the program in place by January E. Zandvliet replied that he did not know of any penalties in place, adding that the City could be held liable if there was an accident and there was proof that the sign was the cause of such accident. S. Morrissey stated that the City of Santa Monica has a sign maintenance program in place. C. Lapinski mentioned that the senior citizen viewing of the signs is an option for a program. S. Libring stated that he drove 120 hours throughout the streets of Riverside with his engineering technician recording the signs that lacked sufficient retroreflectivity and thus in need of replacement. He said that in total about 700 signs were found to be in need of replacement. E. Zandvliet commented that the minimum retroreflectivity level is quite low and that even the engineering grade signs can often meet the minimum requirement. E. Lewis said that they are replacing signs in the City of Moreno Valley. S. Libring said that they also took some signs down that were no longer needed before conducting the survey. When asked how long it took for him to complete the survey, S. 4

5 Libring estimated that he saw about signs in eight hours. He added that they only logged the signs that were in need of replacement they did not note the location of signs that had acceptable retroreflectivity. F. Benavidez stated that he has seen Requests for Proposals for sign inventorying that required GPS locations. E. Lewis commented that 3-M Company will do the entire inventory for a fee. ANNOUNCEMENTS/UPCOMING EVENTS E. Zandvliet reported that the federal Safe Routes to School application results may be out by the end of next week or the following week. S. Yanez reminded the group that the Metro Call for Projects workshop will be held tomorrow, October 13 th, S. Chakravarthy stated that the ITS-CA conference will be held in Long Beach on November 14 th and 15 th, E. Zandvliet asked if anyone in the group attended the Long Beach bicycle event last week. S. Morrissey responded that he did not go, but some of his staff went. S. Morrissey informed the group that he will send out his budgetary/organizational information survey soon. He also mentioned that the UCLA parking workshop will be held at the Ziman Center and added that the Western ITE District abstract deadline is approaching, potentially this Friday. S. Chakravarthy requested that the members RSVP to the lunch meetings in advance, since it makes it easier for the restaurant and for planning purposes. M. Murphy informed the group that the Monterey Hill restaurant may not be able to honor the pricing for the next meeting due to the holidays and thus the group may need to consider another venue. The Northwoods restaurant was discussed and pictures and menus were circulated. Concern was expressed among the group if the room at Northwoods was too dark, while others expressed the fact that they liked the location better than Monterey Park. D. Barnes suggested setting up a website in which the members could pay online in advance of the lunch meeting. E. Zandvliet responded that there is a cost involved in setting up an online payment option. 5

6 ADJOURNMENT The meeting was adjourned at approximately 1:05pm. Respectfully submitted, Melissa Murphy Secretary/Treasurer 6