safety efforts. So these are efforts being made or that have been identified as a priority for local and county governments. We do have a deadline coming up July 10th for those for the submission of those applications but any implementation projects have to be identified as part of a local road safety action plan. And so what we're looking at from last year is that successful applications were probably in the $30 million range or less. So we do have a safety action plan that is now nearly complete, and we want to thank the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet Highway Safety Improvement Program for helping us with that. That action plan is supposed to identify any regional challenges and problem areas for fatal and serious injury crashes, perform an analysis of those and look at historical trends for the region and identify specific safety needs and implementation strategies that would be particularly effective at reducing these types of crashes. And then I've already mentioned that we've done a lot of coordination here. In that plan, let's see, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, we still have a quorum. So in that action plan, a section of New Circle Road between New Town Pike and its Bryan Station Road, I apologize, we put Russell Cave Road in the blue sheet, so that's incorrect. Yes. But this section of New Circle Road came in as the second most problematic corridor for fatal and serious injury crashes within our region. So we also had a parallel process for our transportation and land use study that was being conducted for this section of New Circle Road as well, which included a lot of public outreach to identify not only what the data is suggesting is an issue. Two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. and we will have to take a pause because we have lost a quorum. We need nine. We need nine. Or wait. Nine or eight. But, okay. And we are good again. Thank you. Okay. Anyway, so it was noted through that process that there's a significant challenge with this corridor, but more importantly, that study also identified conceptually what the residents in that area desired to see, what the users of that facility desired to see, as well as those who worked along the corridor, what they felt this corridor ought to look like. And I apologize, this is very difficult to see on the screen here, but the New Circle Road study identified a number of strategies designed to make this a safer and more attractive corridor, while also trying to address some of the traffic flow concerns along the corridor as well. So what's come out of these two efforts is a recommendation to submit an application for this program which has a three pronged effort. First is the reconstruction of a section of New Circle Road between Boardwalk and Bryan Station Road. The reason we didn't go further is because we don't have enough funds in this program to really go much further. The second prong of this is a five-year public outreach campaign focused on driver behavior and the study identified several different behaviors that we could target that would be effective at helping us on this issue with fatal and serious injury crashes and then to fund a vision zero coordinator for five years. For the new circle reconstruction, the main concept is looking at installing several restricted crossing U-turns where feasible. Since this is still conceptual, the actual design phase would identify where it makes sense for that type of design and where it doesn't would probably identify maybe another concept. The advantage here is that through the RCUT design, we could potentially double or more than double the number of safe pedestrian crossings along the corridor. This also greatly simplifies the signal timing along the corridor. Instead of having a multi-phase signal, each of these new signals would be two-phased. We are making traffic flow a lot more efficient along the corridor as a result. Then we would have a shared use path along both sides for most of the corridor. We would have a connection to the legacy trail for this and on the outer loop of New Circle, the trail would continue all the way down to Bryan Station, whereas it would stop a little bit short of that on the inner loop. This kind of gives you a perspective of where some of these improvements are at least conceptually proposed. Now, let me mention that when we get into the design phase, there may be some changes to some of this. Total budget is a little over $27 million. The lion's chair of that is the reconstruction of New Circle Road. The safety education outreach campaign, about $1.75 million and then half a million for the Vision Zero coordinator. The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet is a very significant partner here and they are going to provide the lion's chair of the non-federal match for this application effort. It's just short to $4 million. The Lexington Valley and Urban County Government is proposing $1.45 million, a million of which would be for the New Circle project. Now, it's anticipated that the Transportation Cabinet will probably perform most, if not all, of the work elements for the reconstruction of New Circle Road. So what we're asking for you is to consider providing a resolution of support for this application that we can include and forward on to USDOT. Any questions? Councilmember Gray. It's merely just a comment. A lot of this is the first and sixth districts, which I'm representing both on this committee here. These areas have been highly major issues for our pedestrians on the walkway since we do not have sidewalks whatsoever, and we have a large population without transportation that crosses. New Circle Road, this right here will save lives in the end. And I'm looking forward to this project being, I guess, agreed upon by this committee and getting this work done so we can save some lives. Vice Mayor Wu? Thank you, Chair. Chris, can you tell me a little bit more about the Vision Zero coordinator and what their role would be? The primary goal is to look at the safety action plan, which has a lot of recommendations included in it, more than just New Circle Road and some systemic issues that we've got across the region. And we want to identify opportunities to implement these other projects and these other concepts that have been identified as part of that plan. The other part of this, their role would be to evaluate our performance annually. How are we doing in terms of reducing fatal and serious injury crashes since the policy committee has adopted a Vision Zero goal for 2050? So we want to be able to show that we're making progress towards that. That would be part of their job is to assess, are we making that progress? If not, what are the challenge areas? Do we need to be working on something different to help us get to that eventual goal of zero? Thank you. Apologies if this was in the slides deck and you went over it, but what's the time frame from beginning to end once we get this grant? So the grant requirements are that the funds have to be obligated within five years of award. Now it takes probably about a year maybe to get all the paperwork done. So we're probably looking at, for the final construction phase of this, having to begin within six years. To begin within six years? Right. And then once it begins, how long is the construction phase, would you say? Oh, I don't know if that's been conclusively determined yet, but a project of this size I would anticipate is probably a two to three year project. We're looking at best case scenarios eight years out-ish? I think that's actually a worst case scenario. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Other questions? Mr. Bolson? Can you tell us the contributing factors for this stretch as far as, Is it speed, alcohol, distracted drivers? Any data to support that? So speed is always a factor when you're talking about fatal and serious injury crashes. But also, we have a lot of mid-block crossings occurring because there aren't really a lot of places for pedestrians and bicyclists to get across this facility safely. And then, of course, we also have crashes occurring at our signalized intersections. And so one of the things about RCUD is to minimize those potential conflict points at those intersections, which has proven very successful across Kentucky at reducing those types of crashes. Thank you. Do we have a motion to approve Resolution 2314? We have a motion and a second. Any further questions? Council Member Brown. Thank you, Chair. Chris, so you picked the starting point and the end points based off of funding. If you had additional funding, where would the likely starting and stopping place be for this project? Starting at Boardwalk, would you go all the way to? So Boardwalk actually was determined because that is the effective transition point between the freeway section and the boulevard section or signalized section of New Circle Road. And then we just carried it as far as our resources we felt we could take, which ended up being Russell Cave. Not Russell Cave, Bryan Station. Why do I always, I've done, yeah, just something up here. Apologize for that. We'd like to take it, we'd just keep going past Bryan Station. And ideally, we'd like to get all the way to Winchester Road if possible. Okay, okay. Okay. The city's match, where would those funds come from? So I don't think that's been determined yet. I think that will probably be determined at the point an award is made. Okay. Okay. That's all the questions I have. Thank you. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, say aye. All those opposed? That passes. Thank you. Council Member Brown. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. So the states match, so it hasn't been funded yet either. So that's a request we're going to make in the upcoming? Well, I think the state is working through their section to be able to make that commitment. Okay, so you think they have the funds? If the project is being submitted, yes. Okay. All right, thank you. Council Member Gray has a question, too. Thank you, Chair. Stand in. So when you all attended the council meeting and we made a vote, what were we voting on? I can't recall. You were actually voting on the urban county government to authorize the submission of this application. So today you're just submitting a resolution of support for that application. Thank you for the reminder. Thank you. Number four, information discussion. Item number one, discussion regarding federal certification review. All right. So I'm just going to introduce this. And every four years, MPOs the size of Lexington have to go through a formal process of review by the U.S. Department of Transportation to ensure that we are complying with the various federal regulations associated with this program. And so we do have the, that review has been taking place this week. And yes, even though we're, actually I think we've determined that our quorum is eight. So we're still in a quorum, but we don't have any more action items, I don't believe. That's correct. So it's all for information and discussion. This is a discussion item, yes. Yes, but so we have been going through that review process this week and we do have representatives of the Federal Highway Administration and the Federal Transit Administration here to provide their initial findings of their review. And so I invite Nick Vale from the Federal Highway Administration to come up and present their report. Welcome. Yeah, if you want. Welcome, and could you give your names please? You bet. Good afternoon, I'm Matt Smoker with the Federal Highway Administration from the Office of Planning at headquarters in Washington, DC. It's my pleasure, and I'm Nick Vale with Federal Highways Kentucky Division. Thank you. It's my pleasure to be here today and be able to participate in the certification review. As Chris alluded to, we're required under federal law to do a planning certification review every four years for metropolitan planning organizations that have a urbanized population greater than 200,000 as deemed by the census. This is a robust review which conducted in various phases. The first phase is conducting a desk review, so we requested a whole bunch of planning studies and required documentation from the MPO that they made readily available to us. We documented the findings of those reviews in a desk review letter and prepared our agenda for the day and a half meetings that we just concluded earlier this afternoon where we focused in on some. Some topics we want to have more robust discussions on either to ensure that those federal requirements are being met or to get more information on some of those programs and studies that the MPO is doing an exceptional job on. someone to learn a little bit more about it, get some more background information to maybe take and replicate across the state or even through my office, maybe recognize in additional case studies to kind of spread best practices across the nation. Part of the planning process review, we look at documenting whether there's any corrective actions. Are there any requirements that are required by federal law and statute that aren't being made? If we find any of them, we call them a corrective action, and we identify them and then work with the MPO to develop a timeline on when to correct that deficiency. We also try to identify any recommendations. So it's planning processes and studies that the MPO is meeting all federal requirements from the spirit and intent of the law, but maybe some additional things that the MPO can consider. So they're considered to improve and further evolve the program and maybe more encompass something a little bit more robust, but they would be meeting the requirements. And then we certainly have cases where they're doing an outstanding job in coordination and studies, meeting the planning requirements, and we call them accommodations, and we'll recognize them when we do the final report. We just concluded a day and a half review. which included a tour of some of the larger projects and corridor studies that have been conducted by the MPO. And I'm going to turn it over to Nick to kind of give the preliminary findings of what we discussed over the last day and a half and what we found in the desk review phase. Thank you, Matt. So, yes, we want to thank Chris and all of his staff for all the time and effort they put into this, as well as all the planning partners, Lex Tran, the other transit providers in the region, KYTC staff as well. My FTA counterpart, Avianz Webb, she had to run to the airport to catch a flight back to Atlanta, but she leads the effort with federal highways. So as it relates to corrective actions, we did not find any corrective actions that need to be addressed. So that's always first and foremost. We do have a few recommendations. The timing of this review and the timing of when Lexington MPO is required to update their long-range plan coincides a little bit here. So in 2019, the MTP had just been passed. We had some recommendations for the next MTP, but that MTP isn't due until next year. So some of those recommendations are going to carry over as it relates to the congestion management process, freight planning, and environmental mitigation. We discussed all of those, and I think we're on the same page in terms of those carryover recommendations. Another recommendation will be just kind of amplifying the information that can be found on the website for the public's best interest. and then potentially having a kind of a one source interactive map of some sort for addressing all public comments that have been kind of entered at different planning studies phases and whatnot. In terms of the recommendations, we thought they were doing outstanding work as it relates to the complete streets policy and the work that's being done with the bike and pedestrian advisory committee. The limited English proficiency outreach is another one. The CMAC committee that meets in the analysis that is done to ensure that the region doesn't backslide as it relates to air quality. You guys are in a great place right now, and Chris and his staff are doing a great job to make sure that all measures are being taken into account to prevent going into a non-attainment status for air quality, whether that's ozone or PM 2.5. obviously days like this don't help. The project management committee is definitely something we also wanted to highlight and commend. I think it meets bi-monthly and tries to make sure as best as possible that projects are moving forward in a timely manner. We know there's all sorts of reasons why things don't move as smoothly as possible, but it's good to have that committee there to kind of monitor and guide that process. And then finally having that new member orientation that takes place every couple years after the election cycle is really important, but more so that that training is offered to those interested citizens and other stakeholders who may not be on the policy committee. So that's just our initial analysis. There'll be a couple months of work for the Federal Review Team staff, and I do want to acknowledge our team. Matt Smoker with Federal Highways Headquarters helped us out. Myself, this is my first one. I've been here with Federal Highways for about four months now, coming from the Louisville MPO. Tanya Higdon, who works with me at the Kentucky Division, and Kara Greathouse from the West Virginia Division, who kind of helped out as well. So I want to acknowledge all of them, and thanks for all the hard work from staff. And that's all we have. Thank you so much. Any questions from the committee? Yes, Director. Hello, not a question but a comment that I wanted to make. Thank you to your team for the work that you guys have done. Jill Barnett with Lex Tran here, but I mostly wanted to offer my congratulations to the NPO and the staff. They are a wonderful resource friend, partner to Lex Tran, and the team does a great job. I think they're probably often overlooked and underappreciated. And having gone through our own similar process every three years with the FTA triennial review, I understand the anxiety that comes with not knowing what you're going to ask for when you show up and the importance of having everything in order and pleased to hear a good review for the NPO. So thank you. Absolutely. Appreciate it. Any further questions? Don't hold them against that the chair is wearing a hat today. I was riding my bike and I had a helmet on, so it was either a hat or the helmet, so I went with the hat. I think my boss, John Ballantyne, would greatly appreciate you wearing a hat. Okay, thank you. Any others? I see none. We'll move on to the next item. Thank you. Number two, the NPO area transportation studies. Some brief updates. Number A, East Lexington Trail connectivity. All right, so we have two studies here that are wrapping up work. The first is the East Lexington Trail study. Just as a reminder, this is trying to make a connection from the IMAG center over to where the Bryden Rail Trail currently terminates to provide a connection from the southeastern portion of Fayette County up to the trails that interconnect at that location, which includes the Legacy Trail and the Town Branch Trail. They did come up, the consultants came up with two alignment alternatives for consideration, and the feedback we received was that the neighborhood alignment was considered a preferable alignment, but that at some point we may need to consider something that continues up Liberty Road and along Winchester Road just because there are important access destinations along there as well. And so this study identifies some concepts for consideration as part of a future design phase. And so that would be the next step of work. Any questions on A? Seeing none, we'll move to B. And we mentioned the New Circle Road study as part of our SS4A application. That work has wrapped up. The Planning Commission did conduct a public hearing on that and then voted unanimously to amend Imagine Lexington, the city's comprehensive plan, to incorporate that study and its recommendations into the comprehensive plan. And so you've already seen one of the implementation efforts that we're moving forward with, but it does provide a number of other recommendations along the corridor all the way down to Richmond Road as far as providing for better bicycle pedestrian access, better transit access, and to also address the traffic conditions along the corridor. and there's also a very robust land use component and land use recommendations associated with that as well. Both of these consultants, we have asked to come before you in August to give an overview of the study, since these are your dollars that funded those studies. Any questions? Seeing none, we'll move to item five, other business items. Questions, comments, or new business? Any from the committee? Seeing none, our next meeting date is Wednesday, August 23rd at 1.30 in the chambers here. I will entertain a motion to adjourn. We have a motion. Second. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? We are adjourned. Thank you. Thank you.