Agenda - 09-16-2008 - 6a - Laserfiche WebLink

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5 Mayor Foy said that is the issue Chapel Hill confronted when it went to fare-free. This was the incentive for mon: people to ride and it doubled ridership in three or four years. He said that society tends to widen roads in n~ponse to growth instead of looking at alternatives. Carolyn Efland said that from a UNC perspective, it only has parking for half the employees and about 10% of the students, most of which are graduate students. She said that UNC is losing population in the Chapel Hill Transit service area. One of the original plans when the c~unerrt development plan was put fonivard to the Town, there were targets for transit use from home and targets for transit from park-and-ride. She said that people are moving out of Orange County and into other counties (Chatham and Alamance). She said that TTA's service area does not include Pittsboro proper or Alamance and that it would be good to cooperate with Chatham County. She said that she is not sun: that TTA is the solution to the problem. George Luger said that he would envision spark-and-ride at Brier Chapel, 64, 501, and downtown Pittsboro. He said that .his question is what they can do as these developments are being planned out as part of the application process. Chair Carey said that this is one mason to put joint planning on this agenda. There must be joint planning in this region. Mayor Foy said that when Chapel Hill looks at a development proposal, they ask Chapel Hill Transit how that looks for bus service. He said that other jurisdictions do not have this luxury. He said that the issue that this raises is how to get access to this kind of information. Dan Coleman asked about Chatham County's public transit and George Luger said that , it is more of a public service. Chariie Home said that there are 16-18 passenger vans that take the public for a fee, but primarily it is for Medicaid patierrts, etc., and it is a scheduled service. Commissioner Jacobs said that UNC can help drive this discussion. He said that Hillsborough will more likely be the most immediately impacted by Carolina North. Hillsborough has changed its land use plan to antidpate a lot of residential development in the southernmost corridor. There will be a park and-ride lot at the community college in southern Hillsborough. He would like to try and get ahead of the curve instead of playing 'catch up'. Chair Carey asked if UNC could be the focal point to have the next meeting to talk about transportation within the context of the process on the planning issue with the Planning Direilors and Managers. Roger Standl said that the Chapel Hill Town Coundl authorized him to work with Chatham County with transit issues. The first thing he did was to talk with TTA and there is a partnership now because TTA cannot currently serve Chatham County with the present contrail. The plan is to meet with the Chatham County staff to talk about doing some market studies to understand the need. Mayor Voller asked if everyone agn:ed that there is a need to do this and all agn~ed. He said that he has talked with TTA also to find out how to get Pittsboro involved. At the RPO level, Pittsboro sent a resolution bads with Pat Strong to Chair IGnley and the board to look at to say that P~ttsboro wants public transportation to be part of the planning. He is now waiting for an answer. He would like to get this done, especially with UNC, because most of the people moving into P'dtsboro are working at UNC or are going then: for medical services. Roger Standl said that Chapel Hill could work with Chatham County and Commissioner Jacobs asked that OPT be included also. 4. Joint Planning Mayor Foy said that he would like to continue discussions on joint planning and flesh this out. Chair Carey suggested asking the Planning Direilors and Managers to talk and to bring some possibilities bads to the boards to benefit from expertise on joint planning. ~o