All right.

You join through the preamble here.

For the record.

Are we ready?

Good evening and welcome.

Before I officially call the meeting to order, I want to remind the public listening at home how they can participate.

If you would like to follow along from home, you can go to the city's webpage at Bozeman.net and click the meeting link.

From that page, you can look under upcoming meetings to find our agenda.

So you'll find instructions to stream the meeting live, listen on the phone, or cable channel 190.

Several opportunities, kind of tonight to provide public comment.

During the public comment periods, we'll first hear from those in the room in person, then we'll take comments from those online.

If you're following on along online, please use the raise your hand feature, and we will call on you by name at the appropriate time.

As a reminder, you can also always provide written comment in advance of the meeting by going to the commission page on Bozeman.net or emailing emailing comments at Bozeman.net.

Emails noted as being for the transportation board are forwarded to us.

Any comment received before noon today was distributed and read by the board.

With that, I would like to formally call this February 25th, 2026 meeting of the transportation board to order.

So we're gonna go to our agenda.

Um, and we do not have a quorum tonight, so this will be an abbreviated meeting.

Um so any disclosures from any members of the board tonight?

Hearing none.

Um then changes to the agenda.

Um we have two uh board members that we need to excuse, and I would like uh to uh solicit a uh a motion to excuse them.

I'll make a motion to expand and I'll second that.

All approved, say aye.

I all right.

We have excused them.

Um and we do not have the quorum.

As mentioned, we will go through staff updates.

Um minutes from last.

Oh, uh, we can't approve these from last year.

Yeah, um, so I guess we will go on to staff update, Director Ross.

Thank you, Rio.

Uh I will be quick since it is a nice evening, uh, but we do have a lot going on.

Um, part of the work plan that we're all gonna get to adopt shortly here, um, unfortunately next month, but um city did close um the RFP requisition period for our uh comprehensive safety action plan last week.

Uh we received five submissions from teams or firms uh that are looking to uh be our lead consultant for that uh for that safety plan.

As a reminder, the safety plan is going to be uh developed in parallel with our upcoming transportation master plan so that uh both plans are aligned with one another, and the safety plan ends up being a document within the ultimate transportation master plan update.

So we're really excited to get one uh get this one going.

Um couple updates on projects.

Uh we are um we actually have right now our North 27th from Baxter to Cat Till Project, uh Out for Bid and are due to open bids on uh March 4th.

So that's gonna be a really cool project uh that we get to fill a missing length in North 27th, uh sort of in the the central part of town, I guess, at this point.

Um, but we hope to get some good bids.

We've seen a lot of contractor attention uh in the last few months.

And so we're seeing uh some good news on that front for hopefully some good prices, and that is a project that we're hoping to complete all this summer.

Um similarly, we will be bidding our annual street maintenance project uh next week.

Uh that's the contract that we use for contracted services to do um our arterium collector milling and overlaying projects uh as well as our friction seal uh projects for local streets as well.

And so uh we've got uh uh pretty full uh projects uh project list uh for this this upcoming year.

The uh really fun one that I'm looking forward to is going to be uh repaving milling and overlaying of Babcock Street uh from Wilson over to Rouse.

That's gonna include uh about a hundred thousand dollars worth of pedestrian safety improvements uh with curb extensions and ADA upgrades at Black and Bozeman.

Uh the other one of the other major mill and overlay streets there is gonna be North 15th from Durston uh North, and that's gonna also get all brand new uh ADA treatments along with it.

So we've got uh somewhere around 200,000 worth of pedestrian and ADA improvements coming this year uh simply through our street maintenance project.

Um in addition, I'll throw out our uh uh Bozeman Streets division.

We have um roughly around 3,000 tons of asphalt mill overlay work planned to do in-house uh this year.

So that's almost the same uh equivalent uh amount of work that our contracted services are gonna do for us.

So it's gonna be a big paving year uh for our streets division as well as for our street maintenance contract.

And the last plug I'll do on street maintenance project um one of the the ways we went about contracting this year.

We're uh soliciting uh unit cost prices for two um of our primary permanent traffic calming installation devices, which will be neighborhood traffic circles and uh asphalt speed tables.

Uh so the goal there is that we have um a contract mechanism available if uh um if and when our um recently launched neighborhood traffic calming program uh receives some viable projects that we can start to go through uh in either past uh streets that uh knee calming or new ones in the hopper this year.

We at least have a contract mechanism available to us.

Um another smaller project, our Black Avenue Bicycle Boulevard, um, the final traffic circles, the permanent installations for for that bicycle boulevard.

That contract has been approved, uh, and we should get going in construction early this spring.

And then finally, an update on design of our college avenue project from 8th to 11th.

Uh we uh should get um uh uh the uh Montana State Board of Regents to approve uh the um uh small um uh additional right-of-easement that we'll need to uh execute that project uh this upcoming month in March, uh right around the same time we should be done with our uh final design plans for that project with the goal of bidding in April.

And so that's again our our main goal there is to get out in front of uh our Keggy Boulevard Boulevard reconstruction project next summer by um doing that much needed project on College Street before moving weekend, I think the third third week of August this year.

So uh it's going to be a very busy uh construction season.

Oh, sorry, last one.

Um we are also moving into final design on our Macquattan Road project.

So uh if you remember, the um uh city and GVLT are partnering on the bike fill park project uh this summer and potentially maybe into the next.

It's about a 70-acre um uh project that will be uh land donated from uh Bozeman Solid Waste at our old landfill that will now become this really, really cool bike park uh that we're our parks division or parks department is developing with GBLT.

And in order to make that project go the stretch of McAlhattan Road that is currently gravel and sort of sloughing off into the hill uh valley below, really really need it needed to be rebuilt to a city standard.

And so uh our Terial and Collector District is going to fund the reconstruction of that street that will allow the bike field project to be accessed in a much more safe manner than we currently have out there.

So uh big year construction coming up, and uh we're looking forward to it.

Thank you, Director Oz.

Um it's a lot um too.

There is and I have one more non-staff-related item.

Um I want to uh graciously welcome Commissioner Jen Magic, who will be our Commission liaison for the next two years.

Um Commissioner Magic.

Um Commissioner Magic is our longest tenure member of Commission currently.

Yeah.

Yep.

So she brings uh an incredible amount of experience uh to our group here.

Um previously was on the community development board, so she's been through the ringer with late nights uh and bi-monthly meetings.

Um personally and professionally, uh Commissioner Magic has been instrumental in my time here as pushing staff to advance community safety goals, particularly around uh our most vulnerable road users.

And so those are bicyclists and pedestrianists, pedestrians.

She was an integral integral part of pushing staff to develop uh our streets are for everyone safe plan in response to the tragic fatality of Kelly Fulton uh a few years back and continues to be uh a huge advocate to our legislature to bring about uh more people-centered solutions to our Montana Department of Transportation.

Uh and I'm looking forward to her challenging staff in this role to keep those goals moving forward.

So Commissioner Magic, would you like to say anything?

Thanks, Nick, for the very nice intro.

Um everyone could call me Jen.

Um I'm super excited.

So I'm a planner degree and have worked in the field of community planning for quite some time.

Not so much transportation planning, but uh I'm passionate about it.

Um I've been uh lifetime bike commuter since first or second grade.

I keep trying to pin down my parents, which it was, and they're like, oh, we just sent you off.

So um really excited, and thank you all for your service.

Um I was really excited to um hear Nick at your last meeting, which I'm sorry I couldn't attend.

Just talk about um wanting to empower you guys and to use you, and that is my thought too.

As city commissioner, we need um more heads on topics and really value your expertise and contributions.

Thank you, Commissioner Jen.

Yeah.

I think, yeah, we all look forward to working with you over the course of uh the board.

Um Director Ross, I had a question.

Well, I'll I'll open it up to any other questions from anyone on the board uh about staff updates.

Um seeing none.

Um I have a question about um what sort of interest level has there been with the traffic calming request form and what's what's the breadth of projects being suggested, etc.

Yeah.

Um unfortunately we have not received uh a ton of attention quite yet.

Um it's a new program, and so uh I certainly don't think this speaks to the lack of need or interest in the community.

Uh but any time uh the government has a new program, I think sometimes there's uh a little bit of a uh a lag and uptick for when some of those applications can start coming in.

So the good news there is that uh we have a load of previous requests that have been kind of sitting without really a mechanism uh to start uh attending to.

And so uh next steps at the staff level are going to be starting starting to work back through uh those previous requests, um, sort of ad hoc requests that we've received, and uh making sure that we're not gonna miss uh a season here to get some good projects out on the street.

Is there any um way to um alert the public about the the new program through like engage Bozeman?

Is that something that's possible?

The uh so we've run a uh a pretty good social media campaign so far to try to get the word out.

Um the engage page is a is an interesting idea there too.

Um when I ran the traffic calling program for the city of Pittsburgh, it was the whole program was engage page-based.

And so we don't necessarily use our engage uh system just for like uh uh how would I want to say it, like projects and programs.

Um that's sort of what we try to keep on our city website, and that's where you can find all the information about the traffic calling program.

The engage page is sort of for uh intentional community engagement on specific projects.

Um so we're gonna keep uh sort of running the social media campaign and hope to get the word out.

Um, you as board members are welcome to uh do the same with um you know either individuals, HOAs, neighborhoods.

Uh we did um Danae Giniety, you met her, our uh transportation engineer uh have has done a couple media pieces, and so we always try to uh uh get the word off that way as well, and also attended the inner neighborhood council meeting.

And so uh if you'll remember, you know, we we were trying to balance that um that idea of barriers to entry versus getting good community support for projects.

And so as we uh have our program out and people are talking about it, we're hopeful that they're just sort of in that ideation and support stage right now.

Um but if we get through you know uh the beginning part of the summer and aren't seeing uh much attention, that's what will give us a little bit of a cue to see if we need to revisit uh uh sort of how we uh formulate the program to see if we can get some better attention.

I see on the website it's got a March 6th deadline.

Um is that just going to you know that was when we were uh heady and thought we were gonna be inundated with applications and we're gonna have this whole long period of then doing the evaluation and data collection in the hopes of getting projects built the first year, right?

Um if we are not seeing a ton of applications in uh off the bat, I I'm certain that we'll uh extend that deadline.

If not, uh maybe uh try to manage it in a running fashion and then uh encourage folks that you know the goal is not to keep anybody out, right?

Is to uh the goal here is to make sure we've got good community support for projects when they come in.

And so if that deadline is a barrier, I'm not gonna have any problem extending or or really even watching it.

Okay.

So all of you listening intently at home right now or on cable TV 190, get those traffic comment requests in ASAP.

Please.

Thank you, Director Ross.

Um I guess we should take public comment.

Yeah.

Um there is no one in the room.

Is there Malia anyone online?

I'm showing no request for public comment.

Okay.

And Rio, it might be good to get uh official motion to continue uh our two action items today uh on the next month.

And then uh without a quorum, there's really nothing we could do with them.

And so um from there we'll wrap up.

Okay, sounds good.

So um I would like to entertain a motion to move the action items on tonight's agenda to our March meeting.

I'll second.

And uh we will vote.

All in favor.

Aye.

Aye.

And we will carry those action items over into March.

And with that, I would I'll add one more Rio if you don't mind.

Um just to prep you guys for next month.

Um we were hoping to adopt the work plan uh this month um for the next two year period.

And I was talking with Rio beforehand, and we were I was hoping to encourage a little bit of uh conversation amongst board members about um taking a little bit uh bigger role in helping staff form agendas in the future for future months, with again with the idea that um you know you guys have been around for a couple years now.

You kind of see that uh a lot of our work um that comes before the board has sort of a uh a time based on projects and plans uh that are uh sort of the city business, but with so much breadth in our work plan this year.

Uh I really want to encourage the board to be willing to speak up and encourage staff to take on certain items and help us set the agenda for meetings.

Um with March coming up uh and the adoption of the work plan then uh I am going to be bringing um a discussion item for the board uh that is uh starting to the sort of kick off to our transportation mastery plan.

So uh we don't uh receive funding.

Uh we hopefully we will not well, if our FY uh 27 operating budget is approved, uh we'll receive funding to begin that project on July 1.

Um the struggle that I have as as director oftentimes with our operating budget is that um we we try to get projects done um as quickly as possible, but when we aren't able to start made till until mid-year, we oftentimes lose a big gap in the whole procurement and scoping and contract negotiation.

Um with and with my goal, sincere goal to get this transportation master plan finished by the end of 2027, by the end of this current work plan.

Um I'm going to be tasking staff with beginning to develop uh the scope of the project and the request for proposals ahead of July 1 so that we have a contract in place the day that we have money authorized to start actually spending on the project.

Uh so with that said, I'm hoping to use this board in March's meeting to help staff review uh potential scope of work for the project.

Um I expect that to be uh more or less an overview of our 2017 master plan, what you guys like about that plan, what you think might be missing, and give you guys some teeth and guiding staff on what elements in the scope of this next master plan update uh we need to see in order to advise uh our commission and their goals for uh their policy goals for the city.

And so by way of kind of prepping you guys uh for next month, um it's I hope to have uh robust conversation about uh the potential scope of the transportation master plan.

Great.

Um as it as you talk, it you know, looking at the work plan um, you know, meeting with the GVM PO and UTD as soon as possible after that meeting about the master plan to see where there might be some possible overlap confluence, that would be the first thing that comes to my mind.

That would be the first thing that comes to my mind.

I don't know if anyone else had any has any I know that's kind of putting a cart before the horse.

I think if you were not quite yet ready to solicit the scheduling aspect, but um we're here.

Let's talk about it.

We're, you know, if anyone would like to.

Yeah.

Uh just to follow up on that Rio, I think it might be um fortuitous timing uh for an MPO update.

Uh the MPO in their long-range transportation master plan for the whole uh Galton Valley planning area are soon going to be getting to the point where we'll be putting out a call for projects.

So we've kind of got through the existing and projected uh conditions part of that plan.

Now we get to the fun part where uh we get to start soliciting project ideas that uh may be included in the long-range transportation plan.

So uh I bet you I won't have any problem uh getting Jeff Butts, our MPO manager uh to attend our March meeting and uh have that be uh another item of discussion.

Great.

That's awesome.

Okay.

Do I need to make a motion to adjourn the meeting and get first and seconds, or do I just do it?

All right.

Well, with that brief uh lovely meeting, um, I would like to call um the this meeting of the February 25th Transportation Advisory Board uh to an end.