Sprawl and Transportation Committee

Minutes

Committee Meeting - January 12th 2006

Action items are formatted like this.

Meeting was devoted to Boulder Transit Village. Louise Grauer (Boulder Planning Dept) and Micki Kaplan (Transportation Dept) were our guests and provided a summary of the current status of the BTV Area Planning process. Still very much in the "idea" stage - City Council and Planning Board have requested a re-examination of goals and what the city wants to accomplish with BTV. The process has been slowed down. Concepts developed so far bracket potential scenarios: more housing/less industrial and less housing/more industrial. Concepts would allow up to 11,000 additional residents. Louise pointed out that under current zoning, up to 1500 residents and 8000 jobs could be added to this area.

We offered some ideas for a "vision" for the BTV:

Green-built, affordable housing including energy efficiency goals that lower monthly utility bills. Affordability should consider monthly operating costs of housing, not just purchase price. Perhaps consider different "levels" of green building standards
Encourage solar, try to realize full potential of solar
Be pro-active with banks/financing industry when evaluating the "affordability" of a home, including utility and transportation costs. Can the city help the finance industry with information, make them partners in affordable housing?
Need to consider phasing of development, including parking. IGA with RTD to ensure they don't build a permanent parking lot where more useful development is appropriate Design for people first, then bikes, then transit, then autos. Consider ped-only zones. We discussed the pros/cons/differences between no growth and slow growth and smart growth.

Status of US36 EIS: Draft EIS in June 2006, final EIS in June 2007.

We reviewed projected travel times for different regional transit options. BRT is faster because of more direct route between Boulder and Denver and more efficient stops compared to commuter rail. BRT operates more like light rail (but without tracks). What is current B ridership compared to BRT projections? How many passengers will transfer between commuter rail and BRT at the BTV?

We discussed the benefits of the Boulder Breeze to connect BTV to downtown Boulder.

Thanks to Louise and Micki for taking the time to talk with us. They were excited about some of the ideas we discussed. Send additional ideas to Micki at kaplanm@ci.boulder.co.us.

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