Calendar Details:
Monday, April 10
3:00 pm - Transportation Committee Meeting, Room 280. AGENDA: Transportation Action Plan; Center City Transportation Study
5:00 pm - Council Manager Dinner Briefing, Room 267
7:00 pm - Council Business Meeting, Meeting Chamber
Wednesday, April 12
3:00 pm - Budget Retreat, Room 267. AGENDA: Zoning Administration User Fees: Draft Capital Investment Plan (CIP); Charlotte-Mecklenburg Utilities Budget; Storm Water Budget; Questions and Answers from 3/22/06 Retreat
6:00 pm - District 4 Quality Neighborhood Meeting, Martin Luther King Middle School, 500 Bilmark Avenue
Friday, April 14
Good Friday Holiday - City Offices Closed
Agenda Notes:
Agenda Item #8: Brevard-Caldwell Connector Interlocal Agreement
Staff Resource: Phil Reiger, 704-336-4896 - preiger@ci.charlotte.nc.us
City Council Agenda Item #8 requests authorization to execute an interlocal agreement between the City and Charlotte Housing Authority (CHA) to fund the construction of the Brevard-Caldwell connector. Included in your agenda is a copy of the map showing the area. An electronic copy of the map is attached.
In the summer of 2005, the CHA approached the City requesting adjustments to the Brevard-Caldwell Connector in conjunction with the HOPE VI replacement housing. The connector is located between 12th and 13th Streets just north of I-277
City staff realized the HOPE VI redevelopment was a catalyst for rapid, positive change in the area and that the opportunity to make street improvements would soon pass. As a result, the City agreed to work with CHA on the project.
The Brevard-Caldwell project benefits are:
- Additional transportation network for CHA's HOPE VI replacement housing.
- Improved development with more on-street parking, slower traffic flow, and a safer environment for pedestrians.
- Better access to existing developments, which offer new housing and supports the 16th Street Transit Station area of the Northeast Light Rail Corridor within the Optimist Park neighborhood.
- Supports the proposed Center City Transportation Study recommendation to change the operation of Brevard and Caldwell Streets from one-way operation to two-way. To implement this recommendation, the Brevard-Caldwell Connector would require realignment.
Since the proposed project benefits both parties, the CHA agreed to fund 75% of the total project and the City agreed to provide the additional 25%. Both parties concurred that logistically and financially the most efficient method for constructing the project is for CHA to build the project as a part of their development and the City to inspect the developer's work.
Agenda Item #17: Parking Pay Stations
Staff Resource: Doreen Szymanski, 704-336-7527 - dszymanski@ci.charlotte.nc.us
City Council is being asked to approve the purchase of parking pay stations at the April 10 City Council meeting. Parking pay stations allow a motorist to park on the street in a numbered space, and pay for that numbered space at the closest parking pay station. This is known as pay by space parking.
Two types of pay stations were tested in the Gateway area for customer acceptance, and to help determine whether a pay by space unit was preferable over a pay and display model, which requires the motorist to return to the vehicle once they have paid to park, and display the receipt in the vehicle window. The pay by space units proved highly customer friendly and acceptable to motorists. Motorists were educated through posted signs, messaging on the unit, and Park It! staff, who were posted on-site for several days.
The advantages to pay station use are:
- Payment flexibility for motorist (accepts credit cards)
- Convenient to pay additional time when meter is about to expire
- Monitor window can be programmed for Spanish language option
- Improved streetscape
- Simplified revenue collection
- Reduced down time due to meter malfunctions
- Lower maintenance costs
- Enhanced maintenance response
- Tighter security and audit function of software
- Data availability for system management
Approximately 45 pay station units will be installed in high demand parking areas of the center city between August, 2006 and July 31, 2007. Gateway area will receive units in phase one. Single space meters will remain in low parking demand areas.
A sample of other cities using pay stations with success are: San Francisco, Portland, Berkeley, Houston, Ft. Lauderdale, New York City, and Baltimore.
Agenda Item #19: Pipeline Inspection Vans - PULLED
Staff Resource: Donnell Wilson, 704-391-5097 - dwilson@ci.charlotte.nc.us
Agenda Item #19 is being pulled by staff from the April 10 Council Business Agenda.
Agenda Item #33F and G: Condemnation Pulled from Marched 27 Agenda
Staff Resource: Mike Knox, 704-336-3479 - mknox@ci.charlotte.nc.us
The following two parcels were deferred at the March 27 Council Business Meeting. They are on the April 10 Council Business Meeting Agenda.
Steele Creek North Area Sanitary Sewer, Parcel 9 - Morningstar United Methodist Church: CMU Project Manager had the project redesigned to reduce the impact of the project to the land. Cost of the redesign and re-alignment is approximately $4,500. The independent appraisal values the easement at $12,875. However, when presented to the church governing body they agreed to the new design but asked for free CMU tap valued at $18,000, in addition to the redesign and $12,875. This makes the total compensation package worth $35,375, including the redesign costs. Since this is $22,500 over the appraised amount, we are unable to reach a negotiated settlement at this time; however, negotiations are continuing and we hope to reach a settlement before Council meets.
NC 73 from Summers Walk to County Line, Parcel 35 - Mr. Willie Ray: Real Estate has been in negotiations with Mr. Ray on amount of compensation but is unable to reach a negotiated settlement. Appraised value of easement is $4,125, which takes into account benefit to the property of access to a public water system. Mr. Ray wants $11,125.
Information Items:
South Corridor Light Rail Project Update
Staff Resource: Ron Tober, 704-336-7245 - rtober@ci.charlotte.nc.us
There have been some recent developments on the South Corridor Light Rail Project which we wanted to bring to Council's attention. In general, the Project is proceeding ahead nicely at this time with construction underway all along the light rail alignment from I-485 to the Uptown. The finishing touches are being made on the first light rail vehicle at the Siemens plant in California and the vehicle is scheduled to arrive in Charlotte on or around June 20. We expect to have the test track ready by July for testing of the first vehicle to start thereafter.
On March 29, we held our regular quarterly review of the Project's status with the FTA. In this review, we addressed the questions and issues the FTA and their oversight consultant had on the Project's schedule and budget status and other matters as part of their standard monitoring of major New Start projects.
Schedule Status: Staff has previously advised the Council that the biggest threat to the Project schedule and budget has been the unwillingness of Norfolk Southern Railroad to assign additional "flagmen" to the areas where CATS' contractor was working adjacent to the railroad's mainline track. After several months of working with Norfolk Southern management we were finally successful in getting the railroad to assign two additional flagmen to the Project effective March 20. We now have six flagmen assigned to the Project. This action abated the impact that the lack of a sufficient number of flagmen was having on our schedule for completing construction of the roadbed and track structures. The CATS contractor involved (Archer-Western) has now been able to resume construction at locations where it had been forced to stop work because of an insufficient number of Norfolk Southern flagmen.
The delay in gaining additional flagmen from the railroad has caused us a delay in completing the Project beyond the August 2007 date previously set. Exactly how much the delay will be is now being worked out between our construction management firm and Archer-Western. We expect that the delay will be at least two months. The uncertainty about exactly what this delay might be is why staff has recently been saying that the Project will be completed in fall 2007.
The Full Funding Grant Agreement (FFGA) with the FTA requires that we complete the Project by December 31, 2007. Now that we have been successful in dealing with the Norfolk Southern flagmen problem, the only threats to completing the Project by the FFGA-required date would be weather events or labor-related work stoppages.
Budget Status: At this time, our estimate of the cost to complete the Project remains within the FFGA budget of $426.8 million. All of the construction contracts have been awarded and we have taken a series of actions in the award of these contracts to reduce scope and save cost. We are approximately 50% thru construction and have started nearly all in-ground excavation work and most of it is complete. We have had a very favorable claims experience to date under the Project's Owner Controlled Insurance Program.
We will incur additional construction management costs due to the delay in completing the Project. Other threats to the budget include possible contractor delay claims caused by the Norfolk Southern flagmen problem; unfavorable results from outstanding condemnation actions; weather events; or unforeseen problems encountered during construction.
At present, we have approximately $6.5 million in contingency remaining within the Project. We are exploring actions which could further offset Project costs and provide additional cushion in the budget. These include real property transactions such as the Scaleybark transit oriented development project in process and legal actions to recover costs incurred to date.
