You might speak anything to them, Mike here.

I'd like to call the meeting to order for the BID on Wednesday, July 15th, 2026.

And open the uh for any uh any disclosures.

Okay.

Any changes to our agenda this afternoon?

And uh first call of action for approval of minutes.

Great.

Um we have our April 2026 meeting minutes for approval, so I'll look for a motion and a second.

I move to approve.

Second?

Second.

Great.

And I will do um a roll call though.

Elaine and July?

Yes, I.

Eric Nelson.

I Mark Kiki.

Aye.

Susan Nightby.

Aye.

Great.

Motion passes four zero.

Okay.

We have uh some members of the public here today.

Uh any of you wishing to make comments or anybody online.

Um there's an opportunity to do so.

I'd like to just um before anyone comes up, we have um we received a letter of public comment from David Lose.

He said it right before this meeting started.

So I will um distribute it to the BID board uh after this meeting, but it was um discussing building heights and transitions, which will be on the city commission meeting on August 25th.

Um at our August board meeting on the 19th of August.

We'll actually have a discussion around those transitions and building heights.

Chris Daunders from community development will be attending our meeting um to kind of leave that discussion, answer any questions um and look for our insight from the board heading into that um August 25th meeting.

But I'll distribute that public comment from David Lose up after this meeting.

Okay.

Anyone else?

Is there anyone in the room that liked to make public comment?

I did, but I wanted to hear John Anderson's report first.

Sure, absolutely.

Is that okay?

Absolutely, we'll take public comment.

We need to check that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um if you are online and would like to make public comment, please use the raise your hand feature.

No requests online for public comment.

All right.

Well, we have a couple of great special presentations here today.

Let's kick it off with uh John Anderson.

Our Bozeman Creek plan.

Uh good to see you, Eric.

And thank you for having me.

Umagers and thrilled to be here.

Appreciate the the opportunity to uh provide a kind of a high level summary of where we're at with this project uh that we call the Bozeman Creek Vision Plan.

Uh so if you haven't heard about this yet, um this has been in the works for a couple of years.

It was actually established as the commission priority uh way back in 2024, and then we've carried through um as a part of the work plan for the next couple of years.

Uh so uh I'm gonna try to keep this pretty high level.

There's a lot of information.

Uh more than happy to linger and answer any questions that you might have, but uh really just wanted to make sure that you had an opportunity to provide some input.

Um at a point that's uh I I think uh able to provide some influence on where some of these recommendations are gonna head.

Um and I'll get into the overall schedule here as we as we move through the slides.

So uh uh full disclosure, I'm actually uh using some slides that we presented last night to the city commission, so you might see uh city commission labeled at the bottom.

And um and that was only out of convenience and just trying to uh recycle and and reuse some of the sli the content that we provided to the elected officials last night.

Uh so in general, just gonna be working through an introduction, talking about some of the work that we've accomplished here to date, uh, and then really want to get into some of the recommendations that were starting to uh come forward and then talk a little bit about what the next steps and and that future implementation might look like.

So we're about midway through the process right now.

We we really got started at the end of last calendar year uh with um a really wonderful consultant that we have on board called port urbanism.

They do this work all over the country and they were selected through a competitive process, and uh very, very fortunate to have their uh perspective and experience uh contributing to this effort.

We started with a uh really significant uh effort to engage with a variety of different constituents, um and I'll I'll list some of those on a subsequent slide.

Uh we did a bunch of literature review, wanted to make sure that we were in compliance and alignment with the codes that we've got.

So we we really tried hard to front load as much as we can to make sure that when we get into the into the real work here that it's something that is set up for success.

So I apologize for some of the font and the text here not intended to be uh explicitly legible, but uh happy again to kind of give some details as we move forward, but generally about halfway through the process right now, uh targeting end of this calendar year for consideration of commission approval.

Uh so this box shows kind of where we're at in that process.

Again, we're uh in July and August, we're uh going to the public and and giving them another opportunity to uh kind of put their finger on some of these recommendations so that we've got um a good uh support uh leading into the fall where we're gonna have a draft available.

Uh I want to make sure right away to mention this incredible partnership that we have with this group called C.

Bozeman Creek.

It's a local organization that's real grassroots.

Um, and uh they've been instrumental in helping uh advance some of these conversations to in a meaningful way.

Uh they've been around for a couple of years now and are actually uh co-leading this effort with the city.

So a bit of a unique model uh, and I'd like to consider it as really demonstrative of what we can accomplish when we join forces with uh all the skills and experience that this uh city staff have, in addition to that community interest and and that community support, uh really fundamental to that relationship that we're gonna uh provide uh as form of continuity throughout the project and beyond.

So a lot of credit to see Bowels and Creek here.

Uh the goals uh that were established, this would have been uh late last year as a part of that commission priority, um, really speak to the uh need to mitigate flood hazards, especially through the downtown.

Uh we've got um a desire to improve water quality and ecological health overall.

Uh certainly want to consider opportunities to improve access for uh parkland and trail easements, um, as well as economic vitality, uh, especially downtown.

And then uh goes without saying that you know we really want to try to pay uh respect to our heritage here and uh do everything we can to give the creek a good the best life that it can since uh it's been fundamental to creating a nice quality of life for us.

So some of the work that's been completed that that this effort builds on include a long list of plans here that have been completed in the last uh 12, 15 years or so.

Um, and I and I want to highlight the downtown uh plan in particular.

I think there's an entire chapter dedicated to uh ideas and and things that we can do to uh really leverage the benefits of the creek uh here downtown.

Uh there's also been a lot of work that's been done on the back end when we look at engineering um and floodplain modeling.

Uh we we did a study last year that uh that I'll talk about a little bit more detail here in a minute.

But I really want to highlight this uh 2020, uh sorry, 2012, what we call the Bozeman Creek Enhancement Plan.

Uh and in a lot of ways, this really set the stage for having you know something to work with here when we start to talk about how the creek changes throughout its course through down through town.

Uh so um, you know, safe to say we, you know, the way that we're gonna treat Bozeman Creek specifically downtown might be a little different than what we do upstream or downstream.

So this is uh, you know, this plan was really helpful in establishing um some definitions for what we call a reach, uh, which really just try to describe you know the intent of what we can reasonably accomplish within an urban framework uh for making improvements to the creek there.

So I mentioned that engineering study that we did last year.

Uh that was really important to make sure that we're understanding the the current flood hazards.

And um I think I've got a couple slides here that'll speak to this here visually.

Uh what we what we learned in early 2022 and 23 with the floods that occurred uh used to here is that we really need to be thinking um in a more modern way about uh this changing climate and some of the impacts that rain on snow events might have and just some of these more dramatic weather patterns that we're experiencing.

So we took the existing FEMA data and we built into that a little bit of extra uh flow.

And that is intended to represent uh that additional uh flood that would occur uh if we were to continue to experience these kind of weather patterns.

So here, right, this slide will uh visualize the existing, what we call the hundred-year uh floodplain, and that's the document that we regulate on today.

Um this is the extent of flooding that is that is demonstrated in that um regulatory document.

And then this is the extent of flooding that we're looking at when we look at um basically what we're calling about 125-year flood uh is just a little bump up uh from that 100-year flood, again, uh trying to represent uh to our best ability the current modeling techniques that are used to uh include the impacts of climate change.

So you can see just by the variation of color here, there's a pretty dramatic uh uh difference between the two.

A lot of structures uh involved in this.

Uh, but I want I do want to highlight that uh this work in front of you today is not regulatory.

That is not officially recognized by FEMA.

Um, and so we're gonna work towards um, you know, just keeping that in consideration as we uh consider some of the recommendations moving forward.

So I mentioned those recommendations uh that the these next few slides will start to get into are born from the community input that we received early in this calendar year.

So we had a series of workshops in February and then again in April with a long list of constituents, including a bunch of neighborhood groups, uh we met with some downtown business owners, um, uh Gallant Valley Land Trust, Trust for Public Lands, Watershed Council, um, and then of course the Seabos and Creek.

They have actually have an advisory committee that uh that's established within their group.

Um and we we we got some incredible feedback.

We we actually sat down at the table and started to put our finger on the map and see where we could uh make a difference in some of these improvements.

So I just really want to highlight that that these ideas are generated purely from the public.

Uh none of this has been top down, none of this came from the city commission.

This was all bottom-up uh from the public and and are grateful for uh just the level of expertise and commitment that we have from community members here.

Some of those key takeaways that we learned are early in this process that we really need to be thinking big about the ecological context about this, you know, and it's not just the flooding, uh, but we have an opportunity to improve uh water quality and just that overall ecological uh benefit across the across the board.

Uh we we definitely uh also recognize that as Bozeman is becoming highly amenitized.

You know, there are healthy tensions between some of the goals that we're trying to achieve here between balancing ecological health versus public access.

Those two things deserve uh a healthy balance and uh working hard to make sure that we're we're hitting the mark there.

Um as you all know, I'm sure uh the state of Montana provides some uh very significant limitations that we have to work with.

Um I'm happy to say that we're far enough into it now that I think we've got a pretty good handle on uh what we can and what we can't do and whether or not there might be even some state uh some laws that that need uh just to be considered for change in the future.

Those are definitely uh on the table right now.

And then last but certainly not least is this idea that uh we heard over and over.

It's not a matter of if uh we flood, it's just it's a matter of when.

Uh, we've had significant historical floods uh in the century and last and uh want to do everything we can so that we're prepared for uh the inevitable here.

So I'm gonna rip through these uh what we call big ideas uh again generated from the public.

We have uh 10 or 11 ideas uh that um are starting to kind of take shape and advance.

I I do want to uh caveat that some of these uh graphics are a little outdated now.

They've actually evolved a little bit in a good way because of that input that we've received.

So I just want to make sure that you have an opportunity to kind of see early on.

This is kind of how we were starting to think about it, and then I'll finish the presentation today talking a little bit more about where we're going uh with some of these things that might look a little bit different than some of the slides here today.

So uh when we started putting all these ideas together, we knew that we needed to get out in front of the public and make sure that they had an opportunity to put their voice into the conversation here.

So we had a really successful public event on June 2nd down at Syroptimus Park, right downtown here, uh, where we were estimating uh somewhere between three and 400 attendees.

It was a really great turnout.

We got lucky with the weather, and it was a beautiful setting uh right next to the creek there.

And we were very intentional about having ways for different ways for people to interact with the information that we were providing.

We've had these really neat tabletop maps.

We had uh boards that we wanted people to provide feedback on.

Um boy, did we we get it, right?

We uh we got what we asked for.

We got some tremendous input that's helped shape some of these recommendations.

So again, really grateful for the community and coming out.

Um, and you can see just some of the pictures here.

It was uh it was a really wonderful uh engaging event there.

So the ideas uh in no particular order here.

I'm just gonna advance these again fairly high level and quickly here.

Um, but starting with maybe the most ambitious one here, and this has to do this has a lot to do uh with um our opportunity to mitigate flood hazard, uh especially through downtown.

And so Mill Ditch, if you're familiar with the base of Pete's Hill there, uh that is Mill Ditch, actually goes um to the to the east here a little bit and then comes back under town pump and over to the wetland uh by the railroad there.

That's always been considered um as a possibility for diverting some of that flow.

Um, but it's it's intended for irrigation, it's not up to you know those engineering standards that would be required to properly uh mitigate flood control.

And so what this idea is is actually coming from that engineering study that we did last year where they looked at four alternatives essentially.

This is alternative number two, and this is the one that's starting to uh to lift up in a way that that actually might be possible.

Um, and the idea being divert some of that flow uh down Mill Ditch instead of having the entire flow uh run through Bozeman Creek, which has significant constraints uh underneath Main Street, and uh I think there are 20 uh one or 22 different uh what we call conveyances or basically culverts or bridges or tunnels uh that are all undersized essentially.

And so that is what contributes to the surface flooding that we experience in these events.

Uh, we want to find a way to not only help make sure that we're properly maintaining those conveyances, but also consider ways that we can just frankly divert some of that flow around downtown in the event of a flood, and mill ditch would provide that conveyance.

Um you know, should go without saying here that there is a tremendous amount of work that would need to be done in order to realize this vision in the form of additional engineering studies and surveys and potential uh you know reconstruction.

It's a very significant lift.

Uh, but that is the idea here.

We want to think big and and uh find a way that we can achieve you know what has largely been described as a generational project here and helping manage something that's been um uh neglected for for a long time.

We we have not done a very good job uh celebrating the creek here uh going through downtown.

So uh the second idea here um has to do with uh utilizing some of our public lands uh to improve um access and flood control and water quality and all these things.

And so uh this graphic uh shows Bogart Park, where we're considering um ways that we might be able to move the existing pavilion.

It's actually not shown on this graphic, but we'd we've been talking about ways to save that and actually move it so that it would maybe occur at the corner of Bogart and uh church there.

And then um what you can see in the in the green there in the graphic is essentially an expansion of the channel that already exists to allow the creek to move a little bit more and allow the public to have a little more access and and uh really celebrate that uh portion of the creek, which is just a beautiful location.

Um this next slide uh is the one that is uh perhaps generating the most excitement right now, and it has to do with this idea of um exploring the opportunity of potentially changing rouse uh from Main Street all the way to Olive here.

And I apologize if the if you can't read the labels there, but uh essentially if I can follow my mouse.

So here's the Olive Crossing that we have today, uh, and then we move north.

Here's Babcock, and then here's Maine right here.

And if you can imagine you kind of have to use your imagination here a little bit.

There are ways that other communities have done this where you basically convert that right-of-way to um a different design that still provides some access for those businesses and homeowners, but largely um converts that space into a greenway, and we can actually move the channel out into the open.

And so this is what people refer to as daylighting the creek.

And the graphic, uh, if you can look closely here, has some depictions of where we might be able to actually expose that channel and and really help solve a couple of problems all at the same time here.

It helps divert some of that flow out of the main channel uh in the event of a flood, also obviously provides uh tremendous access to the public to be able to experience the creek and and really enjoy it.

So this where the cursor is right now is where Suropton's Park is today.

If you can envision the creek actually flowing through Suro Optimist, this would be a public walkway here.

It would be really an incredible asset to downtown and the community at large and providing just a wonderful celebration of the creek and space for access there for sure.

A lot of interest in this idea for sure.

Another idea that's moving forward is this notion of taking other existing public lands.

This is actually Beale Park, where we could consider ways to provide additional flood storage facilities, essentially.

And the way it's been subscribed to me is that this is pretty common in major cities where you don't have a lot of room to work with.

You can actually bury cisterns and storage facilities underneath the public land.

So you're not changing the use of the park at all, but you're essentially relying on that area to act as what's been described as a sponge, essentially a sponge park, they call it.

So this would contribute to improved water quality and flooding control.

Just an idea.

And this is just one example of a number of parks that in public locations that we could consider when it comes to thinking a little differently about how to leverage some of our existing public land.

Speaking of which, uh City Hall, uh right out in front here, as you know, is uh is a really beautiful stretch of Bozum Creek.

And we want to see what we can do to maybe uh build build on that.

And uh this graphic, I think demonstrates um what could be possible uh if we were to relocate some of the parking that's out front here.

Um this would allow another opportunity to braid that channel, actually move it around a little bit, create a beautiful public space that people could participate in, and it'd be right adjacent to City Hall.

You know, a lot of opportunity here partly because it is publicly owned, um, and we wouldn't be you know uh having to acquire any additional property to achieve something like this.

The the section right across uh Lammy here, uh what we call, I think Creekside Park, has this really nasty 90 degree bend that we know is an issue for flooding.

This would again provide an opportunity to smooth that out and really solve some of those flooding issues while providing the public with a uh pretty amazing opportunity to be immersed in the creek there.

Uh moving up downstream, uh this uh idea of reusing some of the um, or I guess using some of the underutilized right-of-way that we have.

Uh, this is actually right across from the safety center.

So this is Rouse.

I think this is uh maybe Tamarak, and so the safety center would be this building right here.

If you look right to the east, that there are a couple of sections here right where my hand is that are abandoned right-of-way, essentially, that the city still owns.

They're still dedicated right away, but that would allow us to use it for a different purpose.

And so it's been proposed that we use these right-of-ways to uh provide uh access to the creek, and we could build a trail here and then connect uh some of these trails that already exist, actually north and south, um, through another type of greenway there.

Just another example of uh leveraging uh our public assets in a in a more intentional way.

Uh continuing uh downstream, we're looking at uh ways that we might be able to keep uh some connectivity with regard to the creek all the way to Story Mill Park.

So it's been uh suggested that we could think about building um a viaduct or some kind of bridge over uh the railroad tracks there that right now, otherwise the users have to come way out here as you as you know, and uh take a gravel finds trail back under the viaduct here.

So it's it's quite a ways out of the way.

Uh we want to think about this in terms of like being able to follow the creek itself and and really provide a nice clean um kind of more direct route over to Story Mill Park.

Um so this is another graphic of Story Mill Park.

There's a lot of opportunity there to leverage the improvements that have already been made and then uh continue even further to the north.

Uh there are some policy recommendations also that are coming forward.

Um I will disclose this slide is really no longer current.

Um we're starting to move away from this specific idea of what we called indexing setbacks relative to your parcel size, you know, for a variety of reasons, and I'm happy to respond and answer any questions you might have, but we're gonna move away from that.

It's just it's too complicated.

There are too many barriers uh for us to be successful in implementing something like this.

But I do want to stress that setbacks are gonna be a part of the policy recommendations, just maybe not in this exact form.

So we are taking a hard look at what we can do to advance and increase those existing setbacks because that's really one of the only mechanisms that we have to protect that boundary of the creek there on private property.

We're also looking at other city land that we might be able to leverage for a variety of purposes, not just in support of the creek, but maybe affordable housing as some of the other community needs.

We're looking at creating incentives for private property owners to build and develop more of an ecosystem approach to some of the lands that they have.

This is the Osterman's storage area there on North Rouse.

If you've ever been back here, that it's a stunning location.

There's just beautiful land, and that's just an example of what could be realized if we were successful in providing uh meaningful incentives to private property owners in a way that they might be compelled to uh to develop accordingly.

And then this graphic uh finally starts to show how all this would stitch together.

And I think that's an important uh way to think about this.

You know, while yes, these projects can all be done independently.

The real magic happens when you can put them together and really start experiencing um kind of that force multiplier effect of having all of these things work together in concert.

So this I think graphic uh visualizes pretty well all the way from uh bogert um uh through Rouse here, which we talked about, and then City Hall and then beyond.

So where we're going next are are taking all those ideas and additional input that we've received.

Um, and we got some great feedback from the commission last night uh on a variety of topics, and we're we're starting to uh focus them into four different categories, essentially.

Uh we're we're hyper focused on flood mitigation, that is the primary driver of this project.

There is no question of that.

Um, but we also want to make sure that parkland trail access, those things that I mentioned are front and center as well.

So we've got flood mitigation, parkland development, and then uh zoning and planning policy.

That's kind of what I alluded to here in a minute.

I've got some other examples.

And then when we talk about connectivity and access, we're talking about being able to excuse me, uh, connect all of those and provide a nice uh uh active transportation corridor there.

So, real quick here, um, and I've only got a few slides left, I promise.

Uh, you know, this is now where we're starting to focus while those original graphics were kind of early in the process.

These bullets, I think, represent uh where the conversation is today.

Um in fact, we just came from a meeting this morning with the Seabos and Creek Advisory Committee where we're starting to get into the details about these specific items.

And this first bullet is that um idea of using Mill Ditch uh to convey some of that flood water.

Um, there's a lot of interest in that, and that's definitely uh gonna be one of the uh higher priority projects here.

And then we want to make sure that we're thinking about ways that we can sequence this.

There are uh any number of ways that you can you can uh take bites at this, but but we need to be intentional about making sure that we're doing it in the right order at the right time in the right spot.

Uh so that sequencing is is really critical.

And then I do want to lift up that you know, part of this conversation absolutely includes you know, acknowledgement of at-risk communities here and populations within our community.

So we have a lot of uh folks that are uh renters or low-income earners that live in this area that we want to be particularly sensitive to, that may not have flood insurance, that you know, becomes a community problem really.

And so part of the uh kind of undercurrent, I guess pun intended here, uh, would be to uh you know make sure that we're not uh missing opportunities to serve you know those that may uh otherwise not be always included in in these conversations.

Uh the the second category of parkland development.

Again, we're gonna be focused on uh that bogert section, that Rouse suroptimist um couple blocks there and City Hall.

Those are the three that are starting to uh bubble up right now.

And then we've got um, you know, certainly a need to engage heavily with all the private property owners that would be impacted by this and have um you know proper relationships with with all the agencies and and groups that are gonna need to be involved.

Um there's gonna be a huge kind of neck, like it's described kind of this nexus of you know flood mitigation and parkland.

They they they do really work well together.

Um, so we're kind of getting two for one there, if you will.

Uh talking just specifically here about the planning and zoning policy recommendations.

Um I think I've mentioned most of these on my previous slides.

Uh I'll highlight maybe this first one here, um, this idea that we could consider um what's called first rate of refusal for uh properties that may be damaged by a flood.

Um, this idea that we could consider um what's called first rate of refusal for uh properties that may be damaged by a flood.

Um that we this is this is a pretty uh new idea that that that we don't have we haven't tested.

We I'm not even certain that there are other communities in the state of Montana that are doing this.

This just deserves a lot more due diligence to know that you know if there even is a mechanism, and this is essentially intended to you know uh look out for you know those property owners that um could be impacted by flooding and then gives the city an opportunity to either uh purchase that at market rate or you know convert that into um you know in into uh a different use if um if it were flooded.

And then I mentioned the setbacks um and the incentives and um and that sponge park.

I think we've hit all those.

Uh just real quick again on that connectivity.

Um there are a number of locations throughout the corridor here that we've got this right-of-way that we could leverage.

Uh pretty interesting concept, you know.

When you think about it, it's um it's pretty ripe for uh just tying all this together and making it work as a as a system.

So uh I do want to signal, you know, there once we get through this planning effort, there's uh quite a bit of work in front of us here.

Um we want to make sure that we're maintaining some momentum here.

So I mentioned we're we're considering we're targeting December for commission adoption.

And then the commission just uh last month uh approved some additional funding early in 2027 calendar year uh to continue implementation ideas.

And I again apologize for the format here, but not intended to be visible here, I guess.

But all of this information is available online.

This isn't a memo that was shared with us that describes some of the opportunities for implementation, and it's a wide range of things from um additional design and study that I mentioned earlier.

Uh we've got um a lot of work to do to develop these policies in a legally defensive way.

Um there's grants that are gonna need to be uh pursued.

There are um a lot of relationships that need to be uh cultured and and maintained here, not the least of which be that um with Seabows and Creek.

Uh and they're talking about uh really advancing their uh funding mechanisms in a way that they can uh contribute to philanthropy and and a variety of other means.

So a lot of work in front of us, and we just wanted a way to signal um, you know, this is really where the where the rural rural work begins once we get this plan adopted.

And then finally, uh this is this is where we're heading.

Uh so the next couple of months, we're gonna actually be back at um have uh our next public open house on August 8th.

That'll be at SLAM.

Uh so we've got a really perfect spot right in between the food trucks and the beer tent.

It's like the perfect spot uh right along the creek.

And uh we're really excited about that.

Our consultants will be here, um, C Bows and Creek will be there, I'll be there, and uh and I encourage you all to attend if you're if you're able.

Um it's gonna be a really good opportunity for you to see where this project is at a point where we still have enough chance to in the next month or two to kind of fold you know, additional feedback into those final recommendations that are start coming around.

We think in about late September, early October, we're gonna be meeting with our citizen advisory boards uh towards uh draft of the plan uh in early November that'll be publicly available, and then really all focus right now on that December uh mid-December date for City Commission adoption.

So I just want to put the website up here uh for those of you who may be out there listening.

Um this is uh an engaged ballsman site that we have available with all of the information that I just shared.

We've got um good access to all of the documents that are being used as the basis of understanding.

We've got just an enormous amount of uh good information out there that people can can get educated on.

And um and you can sign up for updates.

This is where you would go to um get little notices of when we're gonna have events and and so on.

So I think uh I will rest there and happy to take any questions you have.

Thank you.

Thanks, John.

You've done a nice job stewarding this.

Uh pretty exciting.

Really cool stuff.

Um I realized just on kind of looking at the time, and I know that we also have we have one more pretty meaty conversation with parking that we all love too.

Um I want to make sure we leave enough time.

Well, Clara, do you know like how much time you would need to present?

I think I'll need 20.

Okay.

All right.

So leaving time for questions.

That's right.

Yeah, right.

Let's just I only say that as an FYI so when we move into questions, we can kind of keep rolling.

So it's pleasure.

You want to speak or have somebody's first members of the public?

What do you want to do?

Thank you for the beautiful work.

Enjoy seeing in detail.

We've met with some of the people early on when they were coming up with the idea.

I have two areas being of concern.

Where would parking be when people need to come to City Hall for City Commission meetings?

Looks like there's no parking for City Hall, which makes City Hall inaccessible for important meetings.

That's my first question.

Second part is the area of South Rouse for access for vehicular access to so many people who want to use Ogart Park, the swimming pool, the tennis courts, and also for public safety with the safety center just on North Rouse to be able to get South and clearly easily access in the case of an emergency.

And the circulation of traffic seems like that could be problematic, in my opinion.

Yeah, thank you for both of those questions.

So with regard to parking at City Hall, part of the project idea at this point in time would be to consider a parking structure, actually, where the community gardens are, um, just to the west here between the Marin and City Hall.

Um there could be ways that we could provide structured parking right there.

Um but we did hear from the commission last night that um we we certainly don't want to compromise people's ability to get to City Hall.

Um but we also want to um you know find a balance here.

And and the way it's been described to me is that um, and I really like this actually, you know, because there's some parking that would be considered to be removed on RAS as well.

Um but to think about that more holistically, like we would and could have an opportunity to increase supply through more structured parking, uh, maybe adjacent or in the vicinity of downtown, um, albeit sacrificing some of the surface lots that we have today.

Uh it kind of reinforces that idea to think more comprehensively and beyond just a couple of block stretch and to be thinking of parking as a system, um, which I suspect you'll be you'll be hearing about here more today.

But uh yes, we we definitely recognize that.

We also heard from the commission last night that uh there's a strong desire to um yeah, strike that balance between ecological health and community needs.

Uh there, the mayor and the deputy mayor both individually um expressed interest in uh leaning more towards um you know the perhaps the ecological health of the environment that we're so fortunate to have versus the trade-off that we all know that we're gonna have to live with, and that is uh where does the parking go?

Well, it might it might be there might be a net loss in in a particular area of town, but we need to be thinking about this a little bit bigger um so that we're considerate of of the demand and needs for parking as a whole.

Uh with regard to South Rouse uh noted uh for sure.

Uh we we definitely don't want to compromise safety at at any point in the game here.

Uh I will mention you know the block between Babcock and Maine would would be a one-way street, actually, uh the way that it's envisioned right now, which would be accessible by emergency service vehicles.

The block between Olive and Babcock right now, um, at least as it's designed today, and and to be clear, we are a long way from real design.

These are concepts, these are drawings really at this stage.

And uh that section uh needs more exploration.

Uh we we definitely want to make sure that we're not making a making an error here.

I will say, you know, we've got this uh transportation plan effort that comes around every 10 years or so that just happens to coincide is getting started right now.

That's gonna be a consideration in that plan as well.

So we want to make sure we're thinking again, sort of broadly about about those impacts.

John, thanks.

This is a great presentation, and it's fabulous to see all the progress that's been made.

I've been following this one from the beginning, so it's it's great to see where you're going.

A couple of comments and questions.

Obviously, any of this is going to be hugely, hugely expensive and way beyond the scope that our community can afford without significant outside support.

I've said before, encouraged you and curious your thinking now on designing all of this in such a way as to maximally leverage the opportunity for particularly federal grants.

I mean, this thing, there's a lot of really pretty pictures and really wonderful ideas, but at its foundation, it feels to me like it's still a flood control project, and that the big money that's gonna come to pay for this is gonna come from big government programs to address flood control.

So I just your current thinking on sort of how the design of this is being done in such a way to maximally qualify for those big government grants.

Yeah, thanks, Mark.

And great question.

So yesterday we had a really interesting kind of deep dive with staff about just that.

Like how do we set this up to make sure that we're not missing opportunities for more federal grant opportunities.

So in every way we are going to be lined up.

We've got this written into the what's called the Galton County Hazard Mitigation Plan.

We have it called out specifically.

That's going to be required when we go to a FEMA grant application.

They're going to need that.

There are other terms for this, but we are being very intentional that at the end of the day, these recommendations need to align perfectly with allowing us to have access to those federal funds, certainly.

Beyond that, I can tell you there's a pretty limited appetite right now at the elected official level, and I think community-wide for additional uh property tax uh to be contributed to this to these efforts.

I I can't commit to that today, obviously, but I can tell you with in good faith that you know we will be doing everything we can to exhaust opportunities from federal state government.

Um we're looking to see Bozin Creek actually quite a bit and their ability to raise money uh from the uh from philanthropy.

There's opportunities to partner with the private sector here.

Um but at the end of the day, I I as a city official, I can't see a future where we've got anything that goes to bond or a public vote or general tax purpose.

I I I can't I can't envision that.

No, I I completely agree.

I think it's it's gonna be big money to deal with flood control that pays for the ball, the the vast majority of this.

And so to that, any encouragement that I can provide we can provide in enhancing the city's ability to make grant applications to write grant applications to really build up that capacity in the city, I think would be money well spent.

And we talk about something that pays for itself, you know, hire a grant writer, get a grant vastly exceeds the cost of the grant writer.

So that's one point.

And just a follow-on, I love the shift to looking at Mill Didge as a way to kind of mitigate some of the pressure on Bozeman Creek.

Um I'd love that it appears now the thinking has evolved to not viewing that as just a sort of secondary dump excess water, but actually creating its own park control system there and enhancing MILDIC and keeping water in it all the time, so it's not just a flood control thing.

Like one CFS might be a little light, but I've said that to you in the past.

Yeah.

But I love the direction you're going.

So thank you for considering that.

I appreciate that, Mark.

Well, and not to spoil the uh the moment, but uh we did learn yesterday, uh so this is fresh, um, it's unlikely we're gonna be able to provide perennial flow in Mill Ditch uh because of water right issues.

So worth more exploration, but I I do want to be up front that um at this as of yesterday, uh we're needing to think a little harder now about what that might look like.

Um and in a way, the way it was described to me, you know, this goes back to the Montana you know laws that we have to work with that transfer water rights and repurposing and channeling those that water, incredibly difficult.

Um so it might actually not be possible, uh which is why we're we're thinking about it in terms of more flood mitigation than than uh perennial flow now.

So we'll keep keep it alive.

You bet, yes, sir.

John, nice work.

Thank you.

Um I'm kind of on the same vein.

There's a couple things.

One, um, I I was headed the same direction you were with Milleditch.

Like I didn't see that didn't get all the cool growies and beautiful, you know, renderings along that, but it sounds like that may be a limiter.

Um I think the main one is uh these are huge projects.

It's it's a clearly a game changer of a lot of different things.

There's a lot of moving parts, things that would be whether it's traffic intersections on Wallace and Maine or church in Maine because of diverting traffic, et cetera, et cetera.

Have you, you know, it feels to me like there's there's the big ideas and there's not a scale of how to bring it into we all like you know, you think about designing a house or something like, yeah, I I'm gonna I want a pony and I want some other stuff to put there.

But do we is there another way we could do it that's like it's 50% of that?

It's not all of that.

We we we accomplish the same things, we we we daylight the creek, we get more of this to happen, but it's it puts us closer to the to reality, maybe without having to um measure it against you know what clearly is an extremely expensive set of projects.

And and also importantly that the beautification or the the kind of enhancement isn't left to have just like you know, back to the architecture analogy, just one room in my house has carpet, the rest doesn't even, it's not even painted yet.

We're just sort of looking at this one spot.

So this so we don't end up with one area that looks really great, and we didn't do anything else for the rest of the stretch as you kind of move along.

And then lastly, I think the other one which sort of ties into this is um the you started the presentation with these with the kind of big metrics of the the big ideas, the kind of the vision.

Do we have anything that measures how we make a decision on which one to do and which way to go?

And in these conversations as we start that, whether it be about priorities, because right now these dreams are great, and it's easy to attach ourselves to it and say it's gonna be the best thing ever.

But if there's a way for us to say these are the things we really should be thinking about.

Here's the and when we have two projects identical in in their kind of wow factor, what other metric are we going to use?

You know, whether it be that you know this enhancement in particular is does more for flood mitigation than the other, or it has better access to federal grants than others and things like that.

So as port or if I don't know if that's in their purview or kind of in your leadership of it, that would be a I think a helpful tool in your next steps.

Okay.

Thank you.

That's super helpful.

Great.

Just quickly, I guess my only other thought that kind of attaches to that is when putting numbers to all of this eventually, thinking about maintenance going forward, right?

Like you have all these things, and then you know you can't just build them and walk away.

They're gonna require years, you know, forever potentially of maintenance, and like where does that come in and how do we fund that?

And that kind of goes back to when doing the grant.

You know, if you're putting together a grant writing department, maybe like how you know that's part of it, that would be part of it.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Thank you for that.

Thank you.

Okay.

There aren't any more questions or thoughts for you?

All right, thank you.

Thank you, John.

Thank you.

And if you'd like to provide public comment on Boseman Creek Vision plane, feel free to step up to the podium.

Hi, thank you.

My name is Ken Vanderwall, an architect here in Bozeman.

Thank you all for everything that you do for our community.

Thank you, John.

Terrific presentation.

I just wanted to make a few points is that for the most part I agree that this is a wonderful plan, a wonderful vision moving forward.

And I really you know read through the whole engineering report in allied engineering specifies how the best option might be a little bit of this and a little bit of that and a hybrid solution.

So I think if Mill Ditch is not the go-to, what if it was an opportunity to look at the reservoir idea above Bozeman, the um pocket island uh wetlands within the city of Bozeman, like our parking lot that John has mentioned, as well as Mill Ditch.

What concerns me about Mill Didge is that in the engineering report it talks about leveling pretty much all of the trees.

Now I think there's can be so selective cutting and so that you don't decimate people's backyards and the viewshed and the wonderful nature of it.

If it can't take the full flow, maybe it's a little bit here and it's a little bit there, and the pocket pieces that the city of Bozeman owns, emphasizing on publicly owned property before furthering our taxes and uh investments to private property.

So that's that's one.

Um the uh other part is about accessibility and universal accessibility.

When John showed one of his second to last slides on the bridge idea that goes up and over the train tracks, I visited with uh port representative at the Syroptimus Park.

He was from Wisconsin, so I know he's uh being from Wisconsin that uh I also knew he was where he grew up.

And he said one day he was back there visiting family and saw that in a place in Wisconsin, thought it was a great idea.

And I think it is a great idea, but then I think about being at the creek level at the train tracks there, if you've ever been down on the ditch, there's some good fishing holes down in there.

But getting the the getting people up over the track safely and then back down, it seems like an opportunity, John.

And now the Underland Preserve is something that is, I don't know if any of you are aware, but it's going to be hugely impactful in the downtown development because bigger picture with all the energy that's going into there and what it's going to be.

It's all about the wetlands.

It's about water, and it's about creating access for the citizen scientists.

Any of you that have been down on any of the bird walks in the morning when you see so many birds, it is just so phenomenal.

And that's all in our backyard.

By the time that the nature center is built there, what will happen and what contributions it will make to our own city, downtown Bozeman, is huge.

And so what if this bridge idea, the historic berm from the train trucks that came right down across the trestle, and then a bridge is put a place over the train tracks, opens up the opportunity for the citizen scientists, bird watchers to view the wetlands from above.

Then we are not encroaching down into the habitat.

If any of you are hunters, you know that you don't go stomping around deer hunting in the march land because that's their home, and that scares them away and that pushes them out.

Likewise, John, it was a wonderful idea going over the train tracks between uh Wallace and Rouse, but there is a pocket environment there on the west side of the creek.

There are black bears down there, there are deer that migrate through there, there's wildlife, blue herrings come swooping in there.

Probably nobody knows that because it's not really accessible to the public.

It's pushed away.

But that is a pocket wetland, and if we disturb that, then where do those deer go?

And they're being pushed out.

So the environment impact of bringing a trail along there is huge.

But more so is if we can bring people into the preserve, but also channeling the water, because the aspect about wetlands is that we need water.

Now the C Bozeman Creek, Jim Madden has done a terrific job, and they have their art festivals, and they talk about the water and the quality, but there's another aspect to that of not being in the water or being next to the water, but being above it and seeing how the water life or the the waterfowl and the wildlife flourish from that.

And so if we have that extra water, Mill Ditch can't take it all.

Is there a way to channel it back into the wetlands because the wetlands need water as well as as it works downstream?

There's the Cherry Creek fishing access, which is a huge wetland as well.

So it seems like you're I like the directions you're going, love a lot of them actually.

It's just that last part in the environment there, and being universally accessible, getting from grade up over the tracks.

Are we going to have elevators down there?

But the ramp distance would be huge to get up there versus the Inderland Preserve is right there at grade.

The train tracks are the bridge over the train tracks was pulled out because it was a little bit too low.

But a bridge could be built back over that, opening up that side for our citizen scientists to measure the water quality, the water temperature, bird watching, wildlife, but yet not disturbing that small little pocket.

Thank you for hearing my concerns.

Thank you.

All right.

Well, should we move on to our next feast of great ideas?

There wasn't any more public comment online or anything.

No, okay.

Ellie, would you like to give it away?

John, thank you very much.

Really appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks, John.

And of course, we'll keep you all updated on the progress here.

Um Emily and I are directly involved in um this in the whole Bozeman Creek project.

So we'll keep you updated.

And we're moving on to McLaren with our downtown parking vision plan presentation.

Um, as you all know, because I keep you updated every month.

Um, we've been working on this for several months now.

Uh we meet weekly with myself and Nick, Ben and McLaren.

And um we're really excited to get this information to you all.

Um, just to keep you updated on kind of next steps, we'll um do this presentation.

This will be in front of all the boards, so URD B I D transportation and DBA.

Uh, then we will go back to work on our vision plan with um taking all of your comments and considerations in mind, and we will come back to you with our finalized vision plan, hopefully um, early fall.

So with that, McLaren, thank you so much.

So, as Ellie mentioned, and you are probably aware because you are being updated about what's happening with downtown parking.

We were hired by the downtown urban renewal district in partnership with the city of Bozeman.

And we got in there and we started looking at everything, and one of our charges was to develop a public education campaign.

And even though we had lots of information, we didn't feel like we had a best understanding of people's opinions, perceptions, and sentiments about downtown parking.

And let me tell you they have them.

So data audience insights and opportunities, where we've been, what we've learned, what's happening now, what's to come.

I'm going to walk you through each of those.

I might have been a little bit optimistic, Eric, when I said 20 minutes, but I'm gonna I'm gonna do my best.

So where we've been, we never want to reinvent the wheel.

We wanted to really understand what all had been happening.

So just a quick look back, a look forward, 2021, 2023 paid parking and curb management exploration that ended with paid parking being denied by the commission in 2023, then in 2024, 2025 parking working group established by Mayor Cunningham set out some great short-term and long-term priorities.

I'll go through those in a minute just to refamiliarize you all with those.

And then where we are now is we've been working on those data and audience insights so that we can develop that effective public education campaign.

So as you probably all are familiar, the parking working group recommended recommended actions had both long-term and short-term recommendations, plus key initiatives and evaluation metrics for the interest of time.

I'm not gonna go through any of these, but I think you're all familiar with them, so I'm just gonna keep moving.

But know that we were aware of these, we kept these in mind.

We understood that this, you know, this was part of it, as well as the long-term and short-term priorities that the parking working group had outlined.

So keeping all of this in mind, we knew what existed.

We also wanted to understand what data was in place, what was already known from a data perspective from facts and figures.

Uh we took a look at the on-street parking supply and the off-street parking supply.

This is the on-street parking supply, and this was collected by Walker consultants with the city of Bozeman in August 2023, uh, quantifying what kind of parking supply we had on street, as well as what was available for off-street capacities too.

So, this is the most recent comprehensive data about on-street and off-street capacity.

So we kept it that in mind.

We also looked at the parking garages and the occupancy, excuse me, the parking garage, singular, and the parking lots, plural, and what kind of off-street public parking was available, what the occupancy rates were, as well as the occupancy rates for the on-street parking.

So, taking a look at all of that, we're able to look at 2026 data.

This is from January through June of this year.

This is for data collected daily at 1 p.m.

between Monday and Friday for the last six months.

And I want to make one correction to this headline where it says 70% average occupancy rate.

That is for on-street parking.

Okay, so that's 70% average occupancy rate in June for on-street parking.

And then you can see how every all the the parking garage and the parking lots, how they have increased and are continuing to increase as you look at June, no surprise with you know all of the outside travelers we have visiting here.

So it gives you a little snapshot about average occupancy rates.

So speaking of visitors, we were able to obtain placer AI data, and I'm not sure if you're familiar with this, but this is an in location intelligence and foot traffic data aggregated and extrapolated from automatized mobile device signals.

This is provided to us via visit Bozeman.

Um this is specific to US visitors.

So these are US data.

We do not have international.

We might be able to collect some international data from possibly credit card charges, but for right now, we're working with the US.

So 1.3, and this is 2025 data.

1.3 million people experienced downtown Bozeman in 2025.

Out of state made up 74% of total visitors.

Montana made up 26%.

We can then dig down even deeper, looking at um data by zip code, and from the greater Bozeman area, we can see that 11% of all US visitors were from the Bozeman area.

Okay.

So one thing I want to clarify, and this came up yesterday when we were um presenting to the DURD board is that isn't this doesn't mean that only 11% of the total Bozeman area came to downtown Bozeman.

This is 11% of all the US visitors were from Bozeman to the downtown area.

Does that make sense?

Okay.

I've seen headwag.

Great.

Okay, and so you see how that's broken down between those who live in 59715 and 59718, and then the surrounding communities, Belgrade, Livingston, Big Sky, Galton Gateway, Three Forks, and as Manhattan and Logan.

So overall visitation is trending down since the peak in 2021.

We all remember those days, the height of COVID.

Um, but it is up 8% in 2025 versus 2019.

So interesting to see these trend lines.

We also thought that this was really interesting too, is that since 2019, if you compare 2019 versus 2025, total number of out of state visitors is up 22%, but total number of Montana visitors is down 20%.

Okay.

So we're seeing since 2019, we have an 8% increase, and we have a greater increase of Montana, excuse me, of out of state visitors versus Montana visitors.

We then dug a little bit deeper into that and looked at visitation numbers from the Bozeman area.

Those are steady, right?

You can't, there's nothing statistically significant in any of those changes.

However, that pace is not keeping up with the pace with the area of population growth.

So if you look at the population growth for Bozeman in the surrounding communities, those are up 14, 17 percent.

But the downtown visitation from those areas is pretty much holding steady.

Okay.

So interesting to note that another data point for us to take into consideration.

The other data we looked at was overtime citations.

These are overtime violations enforced via license plate recognition technology.

So this is not a person going around and and seeing who you know, measuring it, it is based on that license plate recognition technology.

So interestingly, 58% of overtime citations are from Bozeman area residents.

And we can't claim that someone's targeting numbers that's you know the six license plates because it's not done by a person, right?

It's done it's done by recognition technology.

So even though out-of-state visitors made up 74% of all visitors to downtown Bozeman, only 29% received were got the overtime citation.

You know, only 29% of all overtime citations.

Sorry, I made that misspoke.

Only 29% of all overtime citations were from those visitors.

And then you can see where all of us, myself, maybe included, I'm not gonna call myself out, but all of us were uh a little bit more likely to get those overtime citations.

Any questions on that before I okay, because I kind of I do have a couple quick questions.

Yeah, this is pretty dense information, by the way.

Yes.

Um I was wrong when I said 25 minutes.

That's a lot.

Sorry.

But the question I have on the million and a half people.

Yes.

If that, and then it's broken out by from the Bozeman area.

Yes.

If Ellie goes home or and comes back downtown, does that count as another visit?

Just one time.

So it's it tracked on each individual cell phone that ever pained in the downtown area.

Correct.

So from a parking percentage perspective, even if you had an out-of-town visitor that may have visited downtown a hundred times, you would they would show up once.

Correct.

Is that correct?

Yes.

I actually have this is a full page of detail about place or AI data.

So I think this might be helpful to include in the appendix.

Yeah, we'll do that.

So yes is the short answer on that.

The other thing too, I'm glad you asked that question because if you look at the citation data, what we did is this isn't we did this by violator, not by the number of violations, right?

So if you got 20 tickets, you're only counted once.

Right.

Do we um I've gotten a few of these?

So I'm trying to remember.

I know, for instance, when I drive to Missoula, don't tell anybody those.

But if I rent a car, I never pay for parking because the first parking ticket is free.

Right.

Do we do that?

I don't know.

Is our first parking ticket free, Nick?

No.

No.

Okay.

We used to.

I think that's what we did for quite a few years.

Okay.

Before warrant.

No, don't park your rental car downtown.

You will get a ticket.

Okay.

We also looked at safety citations and safety citations are enforced via officer observation and community complaints.

So this is not automated, right?

So this is done by individual.

Again, 55% of safety citations are coming from Bozeman area residents.

What's a safety violation?

Nick, do you want to expand on that?

Hello, everyone.

Nick Fokan, parking manager.

We deem a safety violation that of course is kind of uh affects the aspect of uh our walkers kind of downtown.

So anything that's in a crosswalk, too close to a crosswalk uh in front of a fire hydrant or anything like that.

Um my officers will give citations for those.

Handicap spaces would be included.

Correct, yes.

Thank you.

All right.

So with all the data in hand that we thought was most helpful and effective and viable, we then wanted to dig into the opinions.

All right.

One of the questions that we asked ourselves was is downtown Bozeman the only one who has challenges with parking.

And coincidentally, Gensler Research Institute did a global study asking core business district uh folks, people who visit core district business districts, how they feel about parking.

76% of global responses have unfavorable sentiments about the cost of parking, and 70% have unfavorable sentiments about the availability.

So just in case you're wondering, you're not alone.

Okay.

So we this is you could say that this is a global challenge.

We also did 17 key stakeholder one-on-one interviews.

Mark, Elena, thank you both for speaking with me.

Um you were two of 17.

Um, great conversations.

One of the things there was lots of different things that came out of that, and and two, and it was one of the reasons why we wanted to do the larger online survey, is that opinions often vary by individual.

They they vary by user type, they vary by even block to block, right?

Some people who are north of Maine, east of excuse me, south of Maine, east to black, west of black, right?

It can really change block by block that whole downtown experience.

So a couple of key takeaways from here, you know, employee parking definitely top of mind.

This idea of like, okay, what's per people's perceptions versus what's their reality?

How are parking opinions impacting downtown?

Um, the need for education, data-driven strategy strategy, and infrastructure and capacity.

So not any big surprises there, but really those those conversations gave us a chance to dig in a little bit deeper and set us up for success for the online survey.

Okay, this long's long-winded slide basically in summary, says what we did was not a random sampling or a scientifically based representative sample.

This we did not go out and make sure that we had a sample that would reflect the US census data.

Okay, we did this, it was called a convenience sample.

It was convenient to us, we are able to get it out quickly, and we are also able to get qualitative opinions.

All right.

So a pure scientist statistician would not necessarily like love this because it's qualitative and not a representative sample.

However, all that being said, we did have more than 1,300 people respond, and it was fantastic to see all those responses.

The other thing that we were able to dig into is that we were able to determine based on the questions that we had put into the survey, is that these folks really represent the core of who is using downtown Bozeman from a down, a greater Bozeman area every day, every week, right?

So these aren't the people who complain about downtown and never come.

These aren't out of state visitors who are only here once and they're used to whatever parking is like in their communities.

So these are these are folks who are frequent Bozeman area visitors from Bozeman area residents.

As you can see here, 90% live within 15 miles, 64% live within five miles, 26% are downtown employees, which and that's a really nice sample size of 340 people, right?

So even though it says, oh, only 26%, well, you have 340 people.

Same thing with the business andor property owners.

Again, 148.

So a nice, you know, good size.

It wasn't like two, you know, two business owners or two property owners took a time to take the survey, we were able to really get some good, good insights there.

So again, this is really digging into people's opinions and perceptions and sentiments.

This slide is basically a way for us to try to capture how complicated, as you all know, the downtown Bozeman parking experience is.

As I mentioned, we have different user types, we have some people who are like, everything's available, it's no problem.

Some people are like, it is so stressful, there's so much confusion.

What often came up, well, I shouldn't say often, but one of the things that came up was people's dislike for parallel parking in downtown Bozeman.

And one of the things that we were joking, I was like, I'm gonna I love parallel parking.

I've parallel parked in front of the crystal with a crowd before.

Like I'm like, woo-hoo, you know.

Um, but the uh I'm like, we'll just have parallel parking classes and everyone will get over it.

It'll be fun.

Um, but as you can see, there's lots of different things that go into that um Bozeman parking experience, and these were all things that came up through this through the survey.

Also, too, I want to note here just even traffic and pedestrians, and that isn't that isn't necessarily a parking experience, but that is part of the experience that they feel when they come downtown to park.

Okay, two things we want to call out.

One, employee parking.

This is um, this has obviously been a priority of the parking working group.

Um we asked all the survey respondents if they have significant issues finding legal parking spots.

And 51% of those who identify themselves as downtown employees noted that they do.

We also captured a quote here as an example of the sentiments shared in the survey.

Um, and these are their opinions based on their personal experiences.

Okay, so they're they're not necessarily right or wrong, that's just how they feel.

And this person said, it is incredibly frustrating as a college student who deals with parking on campus to come to my full-time job downtown and stress about parking and pay inside insane fines.

I do not feel supported as a downtown employee and would love to see more support for those who work downtown and help this area thrive.

And then we have some demographic and sort of information about that individual.

So it just gives you a little sample of you know some of the sentiments that people shared.

The other topic we asked people is to share how important it was to them to add more parking spots.

So 77% of all survey respondents said it's important to add more parking spots in downtown Bozeman.

We've also included a quote here of some of the sentiments, and again, this is their opinions based on their personal experiences.

We need more spots and they need to be bigger.

As much as a perfect world would have no vehicles or no need for parking, it is a fantasy and not reality.

The more you build, the more parking spots you need.

We drive big vehicles and need more spots that accommodate big four-wheel drive vehicles that tow stuff, right?

So this is you know, real life person who, you know, they can see they visit downtown daily.

Um they live within one to five miles of the urban core, they've been a resident from 21 to 40 years.

So this is, you know, this is their perspective.

So we want to capture that and really just understand that it was an honor to read through all of the responses and hear everything that people had to say.

And again, just sharing a couple tidbits with you.

We also had different statements for people to how they could agree or disagree on a scale about different aspects of downtown parking.

And at the end of the day, there's just really mixed feelings.

You can see here availability and proximity.

28% never have significant issues finding legal spots.

Now remember for the downtown employees, it was 51%, right?

So this is all, these are all respondents.

28% never have.

So, you know, there's there is definitely those aspects.

Larger vehicles, we talked about parallel parking, we talked about as well.

Parking experience and avoidance, 25% said that their overall parking experience is positive.

33% said neutral.

One of the reasons is they feel like parking takes too long.

Rules and awareness, 45% worry about receiving parking citations, 15% aren't sure where they can legally park.

Traffic and safety challenges, 74% find downtown traffic patterns challenging, 51% worry about vehicle pedestrian collisions.

And then facility preferences.

This was a really a good insight for us to understand 15% choose Bridger Garage as their first choice.

Okay, so in summary, parking is an emotional topic.

I'm sure you all can relate, and how to best solve it is not black and white, no surprise there.

People have a lot to say.

It's not easy for all downtown parking users to find a spot that works for them.

We also are seeing visual cues, existing communications, and current challenges, challenges reinforcing how they feel.

And after reading all of those responses, there is a lot of misinformation about parking, and it's a great opportunity.

Because we at the end of the day, we believe that clear communication can really successfully impact those sentiments and behaviors.

And one of the first things that we're going to do is take a look at getting some better frequently asked questions answered and up on the website.

So a couple other key top things.

These all offer insights and highlight opportunities.

Number one, long-term priority as identified by the parking working group, looking at those public-private partnership, utilizing downtown URD funds, employee parking priorities, and informed public education campaign improvements for the existing garage surface lots, and then other considerations, which I'm going to go through those with you right now.

So employee parking priorities.

So after all these insights came out, we sat down collaboratively with downtown urban renewal district as well as City of Bozeman and talk through okay, hey, we've got this information.

What are some of the opportunities?

You know, what are some of the opportunities?

What can we consider?

And some of the things that were discussed is explore top-level parking for employees, top-level parking at the existing parking garage, free affordable options in the future, prioritize employee parking needs and management decisions, subsidize programs, and then shared use programs.

Okay, so again, just really keeping that employee parking top of mind.

An informed public education campaign.

It's been great to see the opportunity for the city and the downtown urban regional district to have all this information and empower them to work together on finding solutions.

The frequently asked questions, updating the website is going to be another opportunity as well as enhancing current science signage, wayfinding, also always remembering that surrounding neighbors are important.

And the sense of welcoming the Bozeman community back to their downtown.

We talked about positioning the garage as the heart of the parking management.

So it really is like the core, and really celebrating what's up, what's available in the existing garage and optimizing that user experience, better communicating rules and signage.

There have been some app and kiosk challenges that were noted in the survey that are being addressed, as well as also to a lot of confusion around the hotel and city usage of the parking garage.

So we've got some great opportunities to outline and better communicate what's happening there, uh, as well as that larger vehicle, vehicle safety, as you all know, you know, vehicles are expensive to purchase, and people that was a thing that came out in the survey is like I want my car.

I we first thought it was like maybe personal safety, but the more you looked into it, it wasn't just personal safety, it was also vehicle safety.

Um and then just to point out that already they're actively addressing issues, repave two of the four lots, and then plans for 2027 to create wayfinding.

So lots of great things, lots of great opportunities.

As I mentioned, too, parking isn't always just about parking, it's also about thinking about the whole user experience.

Um, pedestrian safety at lights, turn signals.

If you think about it, you know, and in some communities, there is a time where every all the pedestrians can walk, right?

No traffic, no vehicles are moving.

I'm not saying that's a solution, I'm just saying that doesn't happen in our downtown.

Um there's uh a lot of people called out in the survey, you know, the one ways go the wrong way, you know, in their minds because you're turning left instead of turning right.

Um alleyways, uh the fact that oftentimes uh ride shares will just stop in the lane, and that's that, and whether you want them to or not.

Um so there are opportunities here working with the city and the Montana Department of Transportation to address address that and then implementation of additional parking zones, whether those are 15, 30 or two hours.

So lots happening.

Um for us, we're going to be digging into the downtown parking FAQs, and also that that parking garage experience plus the vision for downtown parking and the campaign.

So a couple FAQ examples.

I'm not gonna go through all these in interest of time.

I see we're running out.

Um, but here's some of the questions.

What was great is in the survey, we actually asked people an open-ended question what questions do you have about parking in downtown Bozeman?

So we go, so we have we have all these insights from from questions that people actually asked that we can address.

Um, as I mentioned, the parking garage experience really changing that perception, making it easier, wayfinding and enhanced experiences.

So, with that, any additional questions.

Just a quick one.

Yes.

Would you uh you probably covered it, but in just a simple couple sentences or one sentence.

What all of this is is in this enhanced communication, which is terrific.

You guys have a lot of analytics here.

What's the goal?

Yeah.

Downtown parking vision plan and a very effective public education campaign for us.

Like, so that's what Indigo West is focused on based on this.

So we even isn't to is the is to develop something to I mean, I'm trying to understand from the from the metrics.

Is it to right the wrongs?

Or is it to me?

Like I'm trying to figure out like we're yeah, I think starting with that as a perspective.

I see it as better educating people on what the what the parking experience is all about and empowering them to proactively engage with downtown.

Okay.

I can I think I can help answer that question.

Yeah, as I don't know if I I don't even know if I addressed your question, Eric, but please, Ellie.

Well, and I think Nick will agree.

There was certainly sediments after the paid parking um was you know turned down that um well, if you know because the city had put so much time and effort into that potential program for it to be turned down that it was like we'll make changes when downtown comes back to us, right?

It's that kind of sediment of the city owns the parking.

Um, you know, they manage the parking district downtown.

So there's limitations on what we can do as a downtown organization.

But yet it is our downtown.

We're the ones who talk to you know our customers who work with our businesses, you know, run the boards and and and have these sediments.

So the thought was if we can get together the city and the downtown, right?

The boards, the staff, um, our business owners or property owners, and come up with a plan that we all agree upon, then we can go and do and make the changes and really get on top of these.

So the way that Nick and I, I think have been looking at this through all of this is once this vision plan is here and we have it on our hands, it's like this is our action plan.

This is the moment that myself and and Nick have the support of you all um as our downtown representatives as well as the city commission to go and do the things we need to do from the share use program to you know the long-term um infrastructure project that that we've been working towards.

So I think does that kind of explain it?

Yeah.

In in broad terms.

Yeah, so that's basically how we see it is our action plan.

Um, from here, um, of course, the vision plan, the FAQs, the um, you know, public awareness campaign um will follow this.

We will get feedback again from all of our boards, and then the next plan is to get that parking vision plan in place, bring it back to you all for more of a formalized adoption or not at you know, um support for this plan and taking it to city commission for um their support as well.

So support from downtown, support from city, and then you know, we're gonna go do our our work here.

Thank you for this excellent report.

I find that we've been lacking in data, which has been very difficult to have a vision plan formed because we've been working from very spotty data, and this is great information.

I think it was essential.

So I I really appreciate it personally.

And I think that it's uh to your points of why are you doing this to your question?

I think it is even broader than that, and that is as we allow more height to buildings downtown.

Yes, we increase the tax basis and we increase that, but we choke the parking.

And so I think that having this kind of data is essential to a broader discussion as to what do we want to do with the core with the height and how much density we really want to allow without adding parking.

So I think that's been one of the biggest challenges for people, and you can see there's a high dissatisfaction level, and there's a low number of our locals coming downtown, and I can speak to that because many times we have to beg our friends out in Spring Hill to come downtown because they hate the parking.

So, and that's just a few friends, not to mention many.

So I think that this data will help make the vision plan be more clear and bring to light some tough discussions.

Thank you.

And just to expand on that, thank you, Alina.

That brings back the point too.

That I didn't want to interrupt John, but you know, it does also um allow us to have a more active support for things like the Bozeman Creek project.

Um, if we're looking at our vision parking vision plan, and obviously part of that is adding to our infrastructure.

Well, you know, can we actively go into you know Bozeman Creek plan knowing that some of these things include a net loss?

Can we, you know, look at that with a little bit bigger eyes because you know, we're working towards this project at the same time.

So yeah, thank you.

I'd be obviously they're all interrelated, uh fabulous data.

I mean, something that we've been dying to have to really understand quantitatively and qualitatively where we are with parking.

Um I guess I'd like to know more about the vision plan.

There's it to me, and this came out of the working group conversations we had.

There's a communications piece because there is so much misconception.

And that's something that we can do, relatively inexpensive, can be super effective and impactful.

There's another set of procedural kinds of things we can do.

The 15-minute parking, you know, there's a whole bunch of those things that came up.

And then the most challenging one obviously is building more parking infrastructure, building parking garages and and those sorts of things.

Are will all three of those levels be included in this vision plan, or is it focused on communication?

Ivan.

Yeah, I mean, it's truly all three.

I I don't think that we will get into you know the nooks and crannies of the building of the infrastructure.

I think that is you know one larger focused project.

And we probably won't, you know, explore that or funnel that down.

Thank you, Alina.

Um in this vision plan, I think that will be looked at as a standalone project.

Certainly mentioned a large focused focus from a long-term perspective, but um likely that project will be a separate project, similar to like a wayfinding plan or you know, establishing the employee parking on the on the top level garage that you know it'll be written in there, and then we'll go and we'll you know tackle it on a on a whole different basis.

I don't know if that had to be a lot of different things.

I recall the big downtown plan that everybody worked so hard on, produce a downtown plan.

This is what we're gonna do, and very little of that's ever been implemented.

You know, cloud parallel parking view was the the back end angle parking, you know, changing the way Main Street functioned.

Yeah.

I mean that that kind of thing could potentially have a huge impact.

I just don't want us to lose sight of the work that's been done and the ideas that were generated in the past that could be directly impactful on the issues that people have articulated.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, these are great points.

You're you're writing these down.

Yeah.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Yeah, the only thing I would add, thank you.

First of all, yeah, I agree.

Really needed data, and um it's nice to have it.

Um I think the main thing I from sort of what we're all saying is that now I would love to see this be truly in action plan.

You know, visions are great, but we've been envisioning for a long time.

So I'd love to see this sort of become a real thing.

And you know, the employee parking to me is like number one because the viability of downtown is hinges entirely on employee parking, and I know that's a major issue for my employees and other people's as well.

So thanks again.

Absolutely.

Last question.

Do you I don't remember in the survey, did you ask whether or not the respondents of the 1500 or so?

How many got a citation?

Well, uh that's what wonder how many.

Interesting, interestingly enough, we one of the ways that we look to collect survey responses was from the citation receivers.

Like so and we refuse we received very few from that link.

So we had a custom link for them.

I think it was less than 20.

That must have been my link.

Yeah, it was anyway.

You were all responding anyway.

I could there were people who mentioned that they had received tickets and the open-ended responses.

I could tell you I could go through and see who claimed to have received tickets.

But no, I don't think we asked them specifically that.

No.

It's a great great question.

Yeah.

Thank you, McLaren.

Yeah, absolutely.

The data is cool.

It's super cool.

I'd be really curious to know, just like if you peel back instead of what is it, you said 1.3 or 4?

1.3, yeah.

If you took that out and you said all visitors to downtown Bozin, what's the total visitation?

Do you know?

Right.

So do we have to address not individual users, but if you looked at like how many trips downtown annualized basis, is that like five million people come down?

I mean, is it it's got to be greater than that?

Oh, yeah, it's gotta be right.

I mean, because if you think about it, yeah.

Do we have that?

Do we have like traffic data?

No, that would be because that would be also the that would be it's an interesting fact that has a relationship to the kind of real estate marketing and how many what's what's the foot traffic downtown if you can the PLASA AI data is a stone.

Yeah, we can put it up there, but if there's like seven million people that visit downtown annually, and what months that they're high, they're low.

I mean, that would be amazing data points to to have for the our constituents.

Access to the Plaster data, we could put together a dashboard and publish that regularly.

Yeah, that would be a really valuable thing.

The Plaza is phenomenally powerful.

Yeah, Mark Mark is right.

This the Placer AI is is really remarkable.

Um the Chamber of Commerce recently um jumped on to gathering this data.

We've also put um a geofense around downtown so we can gather the data from downtown.

Um, you know, the chamber is just really starting to get to um uh why how they're pulling this data, where they're gonna use it, you know, what data they really want to focus on so they can get you know consistent data and we can look at trends.

Um they're not quite there yet, but I did immediately have Greg put that geofence around downtown um so that we could get that data and then start to develop how we can pull from it.

But yes, it's there um and and certain and certainly intentions to use it more and more.

It's only been available available to us about six months.

Yeah, you just a little bit that I've worked with it, not through um visit Bozeman, but through Explore Livingston, we might be able to look at it from like map like map like what you were saying, like total number of total number of visits, not just total number of visitors, and you might even be able to look at it like during like we could look at it like during music on Maine, you know, like what kind of you know, you can look at it during depending on the subscription level that you know that we all might have.

Well, it would be interesting too, I think even uh as you look at the parking plan, if you know, as we all know our let's say starting April through October, it's crazy, right?

And maybe that's a there's a there's a a seasonal planning that's associated with how that would function.

Yeah, just like you would do that with you know snow and other things.

You might be able to change how you it would be more dynamic.

Absolutely.

Anyway, yeah, it's fun.

It's fun data.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Any other agenda?

And you know, before we um go on to put out for public comment, do we have anyone online, Emily?

Or okay, I just wanted to make sure we did open it up for public comment.

All right.

Thanks everybody.

Okay, thank you.

We're adjourned.

All right, there we go.

Wrapping upye.

Oh, thanks you guys.

Sorry to go over.

Yeah, we went over.

I tried.

I tried to go fast.

No, it